Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about whether Shohei Ohtani is throwing too many sweepers to opposite-handed hitters, the MLB debut of flamethrowing Ben Joyce, the extreme walk/strikeout stylings of George Kirby and Spencer Strider, the states of the Central divisions, the offense and defense of Ke’Bryan Hayes, the return of Jon Singleton, whether the pitch clock is responsible for this season’s uptick in attendance, and the taken-for-granted greatness of Mookie Betts, answer listener emails about baseball’s version of a hockey goon, players singing during the seventh-inning stretch, and whether it would make umpires more accurate to give them a PitchCom device, plus a Past Blast (1:18:33) from 2015.

Audio outro: Andy Ellison, “Effectively Wild Theme”

Link to Ohtani sweeper RV vs. RHB

Link to Ohtani sweeper RV vs. LHB

Link to sweeper leaderboard

Link to Ohtani pitch usage

Link to SP sweeper usage

Link to Ben C. on sweepers

Link to Ohtani sweeper HR vs. LHB

Link to Joyce’s debut

Link to Joyce pitch speeds

Link to story on Joyce’s record pitch

Link to Strider/Kirby spreadsheet

Link to Kirby command plot

Link to Kirby fun fact

Link to Strider fun fact

Link to Herbstreit Reds Twitter war

Link to Hayes’s defensive ratings

Link to MLBTR on Singleton

Link to annual attendance

Link to 2023 team attendance

Link to spring ratings story

Link to early-season ratings story

Link to Ben on the pitch clock

Link to Mookie gamer

Link to FG WAR leaderboard

Link to hockey enforcer wiki

Link to Brault EW episode

Link to Jeff on Brault

Link to Brault’s album

Link to Brault’s OF conversion

Link to Alberto singing

Link to EW emails database

Link to 2015 Past Blast source

Link to other 2015 source

Link to TORIIHTW book website

Link to David Lewis’s Twitter

Link to David Lewis’s Substack

Link to Dan S. on pitcher zStats

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