Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast

Ben Lindbergh, Meg Rowley, and FanGraphs writer RJ McDaniel banter about a controversial walk-off hit by pitch call involving the Mets’ Michael Conforto , the early success of exciting Tigers Rule 5 pick Akil Baddoo , and unexpected fauna on the field, then conduct the second annual Effectively Wild Team Fun Draft, in which they draft all 30 teams in order of how fun they are to follow in 20...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley convene an emergency podcast to discuss Shohei Ohtani’ s exhilarating, terrifying, and historic Sunday Night Baseball performance against the White Sox (which veered from triumph to near-tragedy), touching on Ohtani’s titanic home run and resounding bat crack, the aesthetics of his stuff, his Statcast superstardom, his narrow escape from injury after a cont...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about immersing themselves in Opening Day action, Opening Day highlights and oddities, early-season optimism, the divisive automatic-runner rule, the Francisco Lindor extension and why it matters so much for the Mets, the perception of players’ positive COVID tests today compared to last season, what they’re most looking forward to this season, and m...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the completion of the season preview series and the Marlins renaming Marlins Park “loanDepot park,” do a draft of current corporate-sponsored MLB ballpark names from least to most objectionable, and then preview the 2021 Dodgers (24:20) with Pedro Moura of the The Athletic and the 2021 Orioles (1:09:03) with Joe Trezza of MLB.com. 2021 EW Seaso...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Meg getting vaccinated, the social dynamics of looser restrictions for vaccinated MLB players, an update on the infamous Tom & Jerry baseball scene, another baseball term named after a player, Willians Astudillo making the Twins, a few other players not making their respective teams, politicians’ performative fandom, Randy Dobnak and the future o...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about how the absence of the injured Eloy Jiménez will affect the White Sox, follow up on their discussions from the preceding episode about distracting on-field animals and baseball terms named after teams or players, then preview the 2021 Padres (19:37) with Dennis Lin of the The Athletic and the 2021 Rockies (1:03:17) with Nick Groke of The Athletic . 2021 EW...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Isiah Kiner-Falefa being mad at Meg (sort of), a billboard in Boston about Mookie Betts , MLB’s renewed attempts to crack down on foreign-substance use, and what an NHL referee oopsie says about umpire makeup calls and automated strike zones, then answer listener emails about whether the season preview podcast series influences their appraisals of te...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the latest spring exploits of Shohei Ohtani , the Royals extending Salvador Perez , rooting against injuries in spring training, and a mysterious former major leaguer known only as “Lewis,” then preview the 2021 Mets (37:09) with Deesha Thosar of the New York Daily News and the 2021 Marlins (1:14:26) with Jordan McPherson of the Miami Herald ....

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley preview the 2021 Astros with Chandler Rome of the Houston Chronicle and the 2021 Rangers (54:07) with Levi Weaver of The Athletic . 2021 EW Season Preview Series AL BAL CHW ATH BOS CLE HOU NYY DET LAA TBR KCR SEA TOR MIN TEX NL ATL CHC ARI MIA CIN COL NYM MIL LAD PHI PIT SDP WSN STL SFG .intro-team, .intro-team td { font-family: lato, Arial, Arial, Helvetica, sans-seri...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley attempt to make sense of unsightly spring training uniforms, then preview the 2021 Braves (08:42) with Grant McAuley of From The Diamond and the 2021 Mariners (45:27) with Ryan Divish of the Seattle Times . 2021 EW Season Preview Series AL BAL CHW ATH BOS CLE HOU NYY DET LAA TBR KCR SEA TOR MIN TEX NL ATL CHC ARI MIA CIN COL NYM MIL LAD PHI PIT SDP WSN STL SFG .intro-t...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about weirdness and whimsy in spring training, the Giants and Cleveland playing an unnecessary bottom of the ninth (without umpires), the 22-pitch plate appearance between Jordan Hicks and Luis Guillorme , Jacob deGrom ’s ever-escalating velocity, and two recent research pieces, then preview the 2021 Twins (23:33) with Aaron Gleeman of The Athletic and the...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley pass the halfway point of their 30-team season preview series by previewing the 2021 White Sox with James Fegan of The Athletic and the 2021 Diamondbacks (46:45) with Nick Piecoro of The Arizona Republic , plus a brief postscript on the career and retirement of Nick Markakis . 2021 EW Season Preview Series AL BAL CHW ATH BOS CLE HOU NYY DET LAA TBR KCR SEA TOR MIN TEX...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the new baseball format embraced by the Savannah Bananas, the experimental rules MLB is imposing at various levels of the minor leagues in 2021, and whether they would want to live in a ballpark (like a man who claims to have lived for three years in Veterans Stadium), then answer listener emails about whether this season’s spring training stats are...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about MLB.TV repetition, Yadier Molina throwing out Jose Siri , teams opting to end innings early, the effect of Jarred Kelenic ’s injury on the Mariners service-time controversy, the Astros signing Jake Odorizzi , and teams being more brazen about lowering their competitive balance tax assessments, then preview the 2021 Blue Jays (21:50) with Kaitlyn McGr...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Shohei Ohtani ’s first home run and pitching appearance of spring training, follow up on their previous discussion about the abominable baseball scene in Tom & Jerry , and recap the results of a Baseball America study about the number of big leaguers (and good big leaguers) in the average farm system, then preview the 2021 Red Sox (31:32) with Al...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Justin Dunn ’s offseason overhaul and the value of spring training clichés, the Brewers signing Jackie Bradley Jr. , why Jake Odorizzi is still a free agent, where he’ll end up, and why he’ll decide the EW free agent contracts competition, and an abominable baseball scene from the new movie Tom & Jerry . Then (41:25) they bring on Sam...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about spring training games starting, Jeff Mathis batting cleanup in a spring training game (and once improbably batting fifth in a regular-season game), the latest reports about suspended Angels pitching coach Mickey Callaway, the postponement of the start of the Triple-A season, the outlook for attendance in Texas, and Zack Greinke ’s quest to join the e...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Jarred Kelenic ’s beef with the Mariners about alleged service-time manipulation, then preview the 2021 Nationals (25:37) with Jesse Dougherty of The Washington Post and the 2021 Cubs (59:43) with Sahadev Sharma of The Athletic . 2021 EW Season Preview Series AL BAL CHW ATH BOS CLE HOU NYY DET LAA TBR KCR SEA TOR MIN TEX NL ATL CHC ARI MIA CIN COL NY...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley preview the 2021 Athletics with Alex Coffey of The Athletic and the 2021 Phillies (30:13) with Matt Gelb of The Athletic . 2021 EW Season Preview Series AL BAL CHW ATH BOS CLE HOU NYY DET LAA TBR KCR SEA TOR MIN TEX NL ATL CHC ARI MIA CIN COL NYM MIL LAD PHI PIT SDP WSN STL SFG .intro-team, .intro-team td { font-family: lato, Arial, Arial, Helvetica, sans-serif; font-s...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about Fernando Tatis Jr. coining a term for his contract, a Bill James tweet about analytics, and Shin-Soo Choo leaving MLB to make his belated KBO debut, share Stat Blasts about all-over-30 lineups and players who’ve dominated one position in their franchise’s history, and then (32:39) bring on FanGraphs author RJ McDaniel to talk about the recently...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about discordant college baseball uniform fonts, a piece by Blake Snell in The Players’ Tribune , and whether there’s a competitive advantage in making the bullpen less visible to the pitcher on the mound, then preview the 2021 Cardinals (15:13) with Will Leitch of MLB.com (and elsewhere) and the 2021 Cleveland baseball team (58:59) with Zack Meisel...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the Baltimore Orioles trending on Twitter because of their 0.0 percent FanGraphs playoff odds, what that figure really signifies, and how teams tend to respond to pessimistic projections, then break down why the record-breaking 14-year extension signed by superstar shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr. is a windfall for him, great news for fans of the Padres, and a...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the beginning of the ninth annual Effectively Wild team-by-team season preview series, discuss a trio of players ( Justin Turner , James Paxton , and Jake Arrieta ) who re-signed with their most recent or former teams, and preview the 2021 Rays (16:01) with Adam Berry of MLB.com and the 2021 Brewers (57:25) with Will Sammon of The Athletic . 2021 EW Season...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about the de-naming and possible renaming of the minor leagues, the Andrew Benintendi trade and the state of the Royals, and what they would add to SABR’s list of the 50 most noteworthy moments in the evolution of baseball analytics over the past 50 years, then (30:00) bring back NASA Jet Propulsion Laboratory Systems Engineer (and baseball fan) Shannon To...

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about having baseball on the brain and the NL Central’s measly World Series odds, then answer listener emails about umpire underwear and repeated pants-splitting, an eccentric baseball billionaire who wants his son to break Cy Young’s career wins record, whether they would pitch a big-league game in exchange for Trevor Bauer ’s single-start sal...