Effectively Wild Episode 1261: How Luck is Bailing Out Baseball

August 25, 2018

EWFI
Ben Lindbergh and Jeff Sullivan banter about the returns of Mike Trout and Willians Astudillo, Astudillo’s new hobby, Jose Ramirez‘s power/speed combo, the NL Rookie of the Year race between Ronald Acuna, Juan Soto, Harrison Bader, and Brian Anderson, the decreasing incidence of stolen bases and sacrifice bunts, the Angels’ active offseason in retrospect, the Angels’ lack of playoff appearances with Trout vs. the Mariners’ lack of playoff appearances with Felix Hernandez, David Wright’s painful latest comeback attempt, and a Rich Hill (AKA Dick Mountain) anniversary, in addition to a deeper discussion about the role of randomness in baseball, what the standings “should” look like, and how luck, timing, and clutch hits are saving the season from the boring stretch run that some fans feared before the season.