PMS 2.0 - 1506 Live From Arizona at The World Baseball Classic, Adam Schefter, Aaron Judge, Bryce Harper, Clayton Kershaw, David Ross, Paul Skenes, Cal Raleigh, Scott Boras

15:24Pat McAfee:Ladies and gentlemen, senior NFL insider for ESPN, Adam Schefter. Adam Schefter! Schefter, you look cool out and about. Gentleman looks nice there. What are you, in Arizona right now? Yeah, we're in Scottsdale right now out here, you know, taking in Team USA Baseball's first day of training as we take on Brazil on Friday. San Francisco Giants baseball training facility out here in Scottsdale. Shefty, it is beautiful out here, brother. Beautiful.

15:51Bryce Harper:It is. Your last two shows have been very USA-oriented with Jack Hughes and the women's hockey team on Friday. And that was a great job by you, bringing Jack Hughes to Indy. And I will say, standing next to your set and watching all the people in the Dome come at him, wave after wave after wave. If he could not have been more gracious and accommodating with his time and the way he handled all that attention, it was very impressive to watch. Kudos to Jack Hughes for that.

16:20Pat McAfee:Yeah, Jack was outstanding for America and for hockey and for our show. So I thanked him about a thousand times. Sent him a video yesterday while we were boozed up thanking him again for it all. A true mensch, Shafter, I believe. A true mensch is how they would mention that. And Megan Keller, also spectacular. Today, we'll have a couple of Americans that are going to be representing USA. Hopefully, they go on to win the gold as well, like we were all expecting. Let's talk a little football here. A couple of huge trades. Casario's working this morning, huh? Did you expect this? Do we expect more?

16:51Pat McAfee:How are your thoughts on what's going down in Houston right now?

16:54Bryce Harper:Well, you knew that they were reshuffering their line, and you know Cleveland's resetting its line. So, Titus Howard goes there. But, obviously, the headline there would be David Montgomery winding up in Houston. The Texans struggle to run the football in the red zone. They struggle to run the football in general. They have Woody Marks, the rookie running back from last year, who was impressive. But now you match Woody Marks and David Montgomery there together. David Montgomery was incredibly popular in Detroit. They get back some draft picks, Juice Scruggs in return for David Montgomery, and he obviously will bring a big boost.

17:25Bryce Harper:The one thing the Texans had to do, they had to get more weapons, and they had to get a running game going for C.J. Stroud. There's been some questions and criticism for C.J. Stroud. Whether it's fair or not, I don't know. But it's hard for C.J. Stratton to be the best quarterback he can be without a run game. So David Montgomery gives them the chance to have that now. The Lions going in a different direction. Obviously, they'll add another running back at some point here for agency in the draft while they go out and sign Jameer Gibbs to what we would think would be a massive new extension. Obviously, one of the most explosive players in the league.

18:00Bryce Harper:They're not going to let him go from Detroit. And I would think at some point here this offseason, that deal gets done for him.

18:04Pat McAfee:All right, right tackle for Texans moves up to Cleveland for a fifth-round pick as well. Texans working right now. Franchise tag tomorrow. There's going to be massive conversations. Let's start with the Indianapolis Colts. Alec Pierce allegedly going to get franchise tagged. And then I've been asking his question. Okay, you're saying I don't know, okay, because it might follow up to this one. I've been asking his question, but everybody's just been acting like Daniel Jones is the Colts quarterback next year. I'm like, well, isn't there a contract that has to happen? And did he not just play his best football that he has ever played?

18:37Pat McAfee:Now he had one broken leg and an Achilles on the other side. So what, you know, how can he do what he can do? But everybody was just assuming that the Colts were going to have Daniel Jones back like it was going to be no big deal. And then reports come out that they're not close in contract discussion. So where are the Colts kind of sitting at that case? And with Alec Pierce and with Danny Dimes being a huge topic of conversation on the offensive side, do you see them using the franchise tag to maybe make some plays before tomorrow at 4?

19:03Bryce Harper:I'm told it's 50-50 that they'll be able to get a deal done with Daniel Jones by the deadline tomorrow. 50-50. Either way.

19:11Pat McAfee:50-50. That's not bad. Good odds. They were talking like it was 100%, wasn't it? Yeah. Social media team posting photos. Look at our core back out here. Indiana QBs. We don't even have him. We don't even have this guy. And then I'm talking to insiders like you, baby. I don't know how much you kind of perpetuated this narrative as well to me and being like, well, Daniel Jones will be back there with the club. Everybody was just acting like that was going to happen, Shefty, didn't he? Hold on, Pat.

19:35Bryce Harper:I think what's going to happen here is either they get a deal done for Daniel Jones, or he winds up, I think, in my mind, with the transition tag. I think that's in play here. That's certainly an option. And if he gets the transition tag, then I think I know he'd be allowed to go out and get offers from other teams. And you just wonder about a team like Minnesota, although they've got cap issues, it's hard to structure a contract if you're the Vikings. Holy shit. Transition tag to make it work. I'm not telling you it can't happen. There's always ways to make things happen. What are you looking around there for, Pat?

20:14Bryce Harper:What's going on there?

20:14Pat McAfee:Aaron Judge just said, this guy is gigantic. You've got to be kidding me. Sorry, Mr. Judge. Hold on. Sorry, Mr. Judge. We're getting some last-minute baseball news here, Mr. Judge. Holy hell. What a thing. Captain America. Thank you, Captain America. Thank you. Thank you, Captain Thank you, Cap. Thank you, Cap. Do anything for you, Cap. Say about a minute and a half, Cap. We will not leave you waiting, Captain America. Okay, so you talk about Daniel Jones and transition tag, maybe something compete. Then he mentioned Minnesota Vikings. Felt like from all the conversations I had around the combine, and obviously you're having some similar, not just with Vikings people, but like people around the NFL, the Minnesota Vikings are looking for any quarterback that can layer a football, right?

20:53Pat McAfee:That is basically anybody that can go ahead and get the ball up and down on the other side of a linebacker in play. Kyler in play. Kirk in play. Basically, anybody that they think. Tua can be in play. Geno Smith in play. Aaron Rodgers. Anybody that can layer up. Josh McCown, who's our quarterback coach, might be in play. Is that what you're hearing as well? They just would like to find somebody, probably a veteran that they already know if they can't do it or not, that could pull one over the linebacker in front of the safety. That is basically all they're looking for right now. Is that what you're hearing as well?

21:23Bryce Harper:I think they're looking at a veteran. The guys that I'm looking for, Kyler, would be one option. Geno Smith, if the Raiders decide to release him, would be another option. Daniel Jones, very pricey. I don't know if they can get it done, but in a perfect world, that would be a great option for the Vikings. You could bring up all the coolers, but I don't know the list is all that long, but clearly they're going to be adding to that quarterback room here in the next week or two.

21:50Pat McAfee:All right, last thing before we get Captain America up here as we're sitting on his grass making him wait right now. Anything that we missed in there that you think is a notable conversation that's taking place out of Combine Week right before franchise tag here that we need to know about?

22:03Bryce Harper:I think A.J. Brown and Max Crosby are in a similar situation. Both teams not wanting to deal their guys. Both teams open to listening, and both teams have to have an offer that they can't say no to to move guys that they want to hold on to. Those are the two notable names. Feel free to dump me any time, and how about that? Jack Hughes Friday, Aaron Judge today. Who's tomorrow? I mean, this is unbelievable. This is quite a rumble. Yeah, thank you.

22:31Pat McAfee:Yeah, I read an article that was like, these guys got the big guest game. It must be nice or whatever. It's like, you don't know what it feels like about 30 minutes before the show, we got nothing. There's a lot of anxiety that comes with all of this. Go ahead. Pat, you flew Jack Hughes to Indianapolis, right? Yeah, yeah.

22:47Bryce Harper:How come you're not flying me straight here in our last? We got to go like commercial and we just got to get out there. All right, see, that's Schefter. It looks like a nice chef there.

22:54Pat McAfee:Yeah, it's Schefter. Sucks we had him on the show. Jack Hughes and -

22:57Bryce Harper:Also offered Megan Keller to fly in.

22:59Pat McAfee:Yes, we did. Please, we've got to remember that. Ladies and gentlemen, joining us now is a guy that might have to fly his own plane. I assume he'd be able to fly it perfectly. Without a doubt. This man is currently the back-to-back MVP of the damn league. Some call him the greatest hitter maybe of all time. He appears to be 6 '12. Mm-hm. Ladies and gentlemen, Captain America, the captain of Team USA Baseball, Aaron Judge.

23:33Pat McAfee:Good to see you, dude. Thank you so much for joining us.

23:37Aaron Judge:God, man. It's Sky. Always an honor. It's Sky. Cap, cap, cap, cap. Great shoes per usual. Yeah. Yeah, that was a miss. Jordan.

23:49David Ross:No shoes last time or no?

23:50Pat McAfee:Yeah.

23:50Paul Skenes:Hell yeah. Thank you. Thank you again.

23:52Pat McAfee:Here you go, sir. Ready? Cap, you see my Jace, thank you for sending them to me. That's incredible. That's incredible. You're ready to go. That was you and your people.

24:01David Ross:You're ready to go.

24:01Pat McAfee:I will say my pinky toes right now kind of, you know.

24:05David Ross:Give it a sec.

24:07Pat McAfee:I got to break them in.

24:07David Ross:Break them in a little bit.

24:08Pat McAfee:Yeah, do a little bit of that. Just like the gloves. Yeah, can you tell us about break? Yeah, on that note, I was playing some long toss out here. How, okay, this is not you being in brag, like braggadocious. How far are you throwing from this line here? Like, whenever you're doing long tosses, my first time doing it was earlier today. I just need to know where you're at versus where I'm at. Who are you throwing the ball to? Like that fence over there? Are you making it all the way to the fence?

24:29David Ross:We're getting close to the fence. We're getting close. It depends on the day. Not every day, but a little long toss a couple times a week. Get some arm feeling good.

24:35Pat McAfee:Okay, so you guys play so many games. I just played catch, and I got these tingles in my hand, and I got this thing. Give it a week. Okay, and I think I'm pitching against Kershaw potentially later today. So, I mean, I got a really good, I don't know what juice they were using back in the day, but I need to find it quickly out here. Can you tell me about this Team USA journey that we're about to go on here? Because me as non-baseball person, I got so invested in the World Baseball Classic two years ago whenever Japan wins. I have been told that a lot of you watched that just like I did and decided that this one was going to go different.

25:07Pat McAfee:Is that an accurate depiction of how this Team USA team came together and how you ultimately became Captain America for us in this WBC?

25:14David Ross:Yeah, definitely, definitely. I was sitting at home watching it. I was a free agent at the time, wondering where I was going to play and signed it back with the Yankees. Best decision ever. And, yeah, Team USA in the championship. They lose to Japan. And, you know, we kind of all were texting like, man, we got three more years we're going to rewrite the ship here. And the boys were fired up. I got a call from D-Ro. Hey, I want you to be the captain. I want you to bring the boys in. Awesome. And it's just been an incredible journey kind of talking with D-Ro, talking with the boys, just seeing how many people just right away were just, hey, I'm in.

25:48David Ross:We're doing this? Like, I'm in. I'm in. So looking forward to it, man. It's getting real. You know, putting the uniform on, seeing you guys all day out, it's getting real. I can't wait.

25:56Pat McAfee:Yeah, us, of course. Yeah, we make it feel like it's real. Yeah, I understand. Hey, don't feel the pressure too much of us being here. Whenever you talk about putting it on and, like, representing for our country, basketball was starting to deal with a European invasion, okay? Basketball was starting to get all the MVPs in a row were all European invasion. Now we all have eyes. We see it. Shohei, Japan really becoming, I think, good for the sport of baseball because how much they love it and how much their country has kind of got involved. But this is America's pasta. Is there something about that in this locker room or I don't know what you guys call it, in this clubhouse, in this doghouse?

26:31Pat McAfee:Clubhouse. Clubhouse, you had it. In the clubhouse? You had it. Is there something about that? Because the NBA guys, I think, were starting to talk about it like, hey, this is not how this is supposed to go. Is there a natural conversation about what's happening whenever it comes to, like, these types of international events for your sport, our sport, America's pastime?

26:46David Ross:You know, first off, I think it's beautiful how much the game has grown. I think it's wonderful seeing kids all across the world getting a chance to see the best of the best play and, like, grow the game. You're seeing kids who've never played baseball, never heard of baseball, getting a chance of, hey, let's check this thing out. So I love that aspect, but it's America's pastime, man. Come on, we've got to see what this thing is. Yes, we do.

27:07Paul Skenes:Steve has a question for you. Yeah, I got a question for you. I'm going to compare it to golf because I got a lot of internal dialogue when I'm standing over that ball. Maybe too much. Maybe too many swing thoughts. What's it like when you enter that batter's box? Is there before you're entering that matchup in between pitches maybe? What's that internal dialogue like for you?

27:27David Ross:Well, for me, it starts on deck. When I'm on deck, there's a certain breathing technique. I'm kind of visualizing the pitcher. I'm kind of thinking about how that bat's going to go, what the situation's going to be. But I think one of the coolest things, I was talking to Harper before the postseason this last year, and he texted me probably the coolest thing. He was like, hey, one thing I tell myself, every postseason, every big game, it's like, own the moment. Don't let the moment own you. You know, there's so much unknown. You don't know what's going to happen. Like, own the moment. Big spot.

27:54David Ross:Nobody's on. Who cares? Go out there and own it. And, like, it gave me chills. I was sitting there, and, like, before I walked into the steps in Yankee Stadium, we're about to play the Red Sox. And before I went out there, I was like, hey, own the moment. I'M GOING TO GET A LOT OF I'M GOING TO GET A LOT OF

28:06Pat McAfee:WELCOME TO MY SHOW. THAT IS REAL. SO AS A PUNTER, YOU KNOW, WHICH IS OBVIOUSLY YOU GUYS GET SO MANY MORE AT-BATS AND EVERYTHING MEANS MUCH MORE. BUT AS A PUNTER, I'M WALKING OUT ON THE FIELD ALL BY MYSELF BACK THERE. ALL EYES ARE ON ME. YOU'RE GOING TO FIND OUT WHETHER OR NOT, BECAUSE YOU GUYS FAIL SO MUCH. LIKE STRIKEOUTS ARE JUST LIKE, YUP, TAKE IT. EVERYBODY'S LAUGHING IN YOUR FACE, WALK OF SHAME BACK THERE, AND THE NEXT ONE YOU GOT TO GO BACK OUT THERE. ONCE I CLICKED IN MY MOTION, AND THIS IS NOT ME TRYING TO COMPARE TO YOU, YOUR FUCKING CAPTAIN AMERICA OR BRYCE HARPER, BUT I DID HAVE TO CHANGE THE THING LIKE I'M GOING TO PUT ON A SHOW RIGHT NOW.

28:39Pat McAfee:WELCOME TO MY SHOW AS OPPOSED TO TRYING TO DO MY JOB. IT'S LIKE I'M WALKING OUT HERE TRYING TO STEAL THE SHOW ALMOST AND TRYING TO BOMB SOME BALLS. IT'S A DIFFERENT MENTALITY WHENEVER YOU'RE TRYING TO GO ahead and dominate as opposed to get by you you have brother back to back MVPs I ride along your seasons with this man hi and tie had a long one yesterday I want to let you know for his country he tied one on yesterday alongside us out here in Scottsdale which wow beautiful what a place out here especially with the access team USA is getting tied as a question for you Aaron obviously there

29:09Scott Boras:are a bunch of all-stars on the Yankees but being the captain of the Yankees like how how does your duty differ here when you have you know there's 30 guys on the team 65 all-star selections a bunch of mvps like is the approach a little bit different when obviously there are a bunch of dudes on the yankees but like everyone here is it like this is the best of the best like how how different is that day to day and obviously this is a lot more truncated than a full season with the yankees but how does that approach change for me it's gonna stay the same you know i got a chance to

29:38David Ross:play for the best franchise in all sports with the yankees you know the guys are coming in out of those doors are some of the best of the best mvps cy young winners everything and you know same with this room cy young winners world series champs mvps my job's the same i gotta get the best out of everybody in that room you know how i can help you elevate your game anything i can do if it's a talk if it's us hitting the cage us talking on the field whatever i gotta do to elevate your game to help us win that's that's what i'm gonna do so it doesn't matter if you're from you know cincinnati the dodgers miami whatever i gotta do to help you be your best for the next two or three weeks, like, I'm going to do it.

30:11Pat McAfee:What do you guys do? Play cards? Do you have cards group? Because you guys are around. Baseball is a long season. Is it normally a cards type situation? What would the camaraderie building be for Team USA in this quick amount of time?

30:22David Ross:Yeah, that's a tough thing. We played cards on the flight. You know, 3-5-7, Boo-Ray, kind of messed around a little bit. Boo-Ray with baseball contours. Yeah. Yeah, it goes quick. It goes quick. Yeah, I could imagine. But team dinners. We have a couple team dinners. Get the guys together. I think Logan Webb's going to have some people over. We're going to have some fun. I think that's the biggest thing is, hey, just dive into it. Dive into each other. Ask questions. Get to know each other. You got the best of the best all in one clubhouse. Let's soak it up. I think that's the coolest thing is I get to know each other.

30:53David Ross:Because when it hits the fan out there on the field, we're going to be ready. I'm going to have your back. I know you dived into me. I dived into you. We're going to have each other's back.

31:00Pat McAfee:I love that you guys are taking an emotional standpoint for representing the United States of America. and with what just happened with the hockey teams, how does that kind of change? You and the boys are obviously on a group text, I assume. You're watching both the women and the men just pawn Canada. Pawn Canada. It's our sport now. Now, granted, Japan was saying the same thing to us a couple years ago about this particular sport, so we didn't love that. We had to get pretty quiet quickly. But whenever that happens, what is the group text amongst you and the rest of the boys for Team USA here?

31:33David Ross:Boys were fired up. But Hughes, man, we said so many pictures of Hughes in the group text. It was great.

31:39Pat McAfee:How about the beer gif from Quinn? Yeah, I assume you got it.

31:43David Ross:Yeah. It was great. It's kind of cool. Like, it's just going to snowball into this. Like, just the excitement we had when I was with the Yankees and then in the group text, just the boys were pumped up. And all of a sudden now it's like WBC get a chance to throw on the red, white, and blue and, like, copy what they did, man. That was a special run. That was fun to watch on both sides, men and women. It was a blast.

32:04Pat McAfee:And we're going to watch you guys do the same damn thing. Go ahead, Con, man.

32:06Bryce Harper:Yeah, speaking of emotions, Aaron, when you first put on that uniform, what were your emotions? Were you thinking of your family? I mean, granted, you play for the Yankees. You mentioned it. Every time you put on that uniform, the pinstripes, that comes with something. But when you put on the USA uniform, was it a different feeling? Was there something specific you thought of? Or was it just kind of an overwhelming, hey, let's go do this thing?

32:28David Ross:Kind of all of the above. When I put on the uniform, honestly, looking at the flag, And just really reminded me of all the men and women out there that have fought for this country or are fighting for this country. You know, I get a chance. My family's safe at home. I get a chance to go play a kid's game every single day. You know, I get to see my daughter at home. I get to see my wife, see my family. So it's just that was my first thought. I was like, man, there's people overseas everywhere around the country, people in the past that have lost their lives, didn't get those moments that I get to spend when I go home and see my daughter.

32:59David Ross:So that was kind of the first thing kind of going through my head was thinking about them. And then it was like, oh, it's go time. Yeah, absolutely.

33:06Pat McAfee:Because there's a lot of people that aren't baseball people. Just because they see USA playing against somebody. Like Brazil, okay, there's going to be people that are going to see Team USA playing Brazil. And we're expecting 30, 40, nothing.

33:17Bryce Harper:At least.

33:19Pat McAfee:Five home runs. What is real? What should we be thinking about some of these teams? Like, I think Brazil, I don't know their entire roster. I don't think I know anybody on their roster. But some of these countries, I don't think anybody in America, non-baseball people or baseball people are going to have respect for them. What is your guys' mindset? Like every game, obviously you can't slip. Like I think that is that baseball in a nutshell as you view this tournament? Because like, and do you know all these guys you're playing against in this tournament? Great Brazil, Great Britain, Netherlands.

33:50Pat McAfee:Yeah, Italy, I think, has a team. Do you know these teams? Are you studying these teams? And what should our expectations be of your squad?

33:57David Ross:We've got to have a killer mindset. That's the thing. It doesn't matter who you're playing. Because teams are going to come after us. They're going to give us our best. They're going to do anything they can to beat us. So we've got to do the same thing. We've got to treat every opponent. It doesn't matter if you know them, don't know them. It's like, hey, we've got a job to do. You know, we've got to get in, get out, take care of business, and move on to the next.

34:15Pat McAfee:So if somebody's throwing the floater out there, you've got like a 60-mile-an-hour coming out. A little floater, Ephus. Yeah, how would that go? For instance, like I might be pitching against Clayton Kershaw later today. He's pitching against me for sure. We'll see if I can get out there. he might have when was the last time he saw 67 miles an hour coming over he's

34:34David Ross:gonna he's gonna happy Gilmore you I think it's do you think I make contact

34:41Pat McAfee:one full inning I get three outs I can barely make you might have better odds than me we'll see of course no but there is like levels to this shit what are you expecting pitching wise like we have the best pitchers right in the world some these other places might have one guy two guys like what should we expect competition level from

35:02David Ross:some of these countries we're gonna see I've never been in it man if I played a couple years ago I'd

35:06Pat McAfee:have a better better oh so you really are just kind of international play is not a normal thing for like a baseball thing like when your kids are not doing like international games the the good

35:15David Ross:ones are I wasn't invited to those once crazy what yeah it's all good but it's um yeah I'm just excited it doesn't matter man it doesn't it doesn't matter what we're about to see see ball bomb ball

35:26Darius Butler:Uh-huh.

35:27Pat McAfee:Tone has a question for you, Aaron.

35:28Darius Butler:Yeah, you were talking about what you learned before the postseason, last postseason with Bryce Harper, and now you have Skeens and Scoble and Kershaw and Bednar on your roster. Like, during these next couple weeks, are you going to try to pick their brains as well to kind of get into the – do you think they'll even divulge information to you to help you the next few weeks since you guys are teammates?

35:49David Ross:I think a little bit. They won't give all the secrets. But I think, man, there's greatness all in that room. We're surrounded by greatness. this you got to just I think what I'm going to try to do is just appreciate it and see like how these guys tick how's their what's their preparation what's their weight room routine what are they doing the bullpen what are they doing the box like what do you like especially the hitters what do you think in certain situations to prepare for this situation so I don't know I think yeah everyone's going to kind of keep all certain secrets kind of tied to home but uh no you're gonna yeah we got to dive in that's one thing I'm going to tell the boys uh here in a little bit just dive into each other learn what you can like be there for each other man that's what's going to help us ultimately win the gold.

36:25Pat McAfee:How old are you?

36:26David Ross:33. God.

36:29Pat McAfee:We're a perfect human, Todd. I agree. Hey, my captain. Ty is the last question. Our captain. Yeah, our captain. Our captain, sir. Yeah, our captain, sir.

36:38Scott Boras:How, A, how's the elbow feeling? I know that was like a big thing last year. And then in terms of like this, I saw spring training, you're down in Tampa, you hit a couple homers right away. It's like, all right, Judge, he's ready to go. You know, he doesn't really need spring training. But, like, in terms of preparation, do you have to kind of accelerate everything because this is full go and it's not like a spring training game where you might get in a bat or play three innings and then you're done for the day? Like, how in terms of, like, the big picture, how much did you have to accelerate everything to get ready for this?

37:07David Ross:Yeah, for the elbow, throwing the elbow, I didn't take any time off. I probably took two weeks off after our last game, no throw, no baseball stuff, and then I was right back to throwing just to kind of get the juices flowing a little bit. I'm getting older, so I can't. Yeah, got it.

37:20Pat McAfee:But then there's always the question about how many reps can your old body handle, you know? Because you can't take much time off because old body will obviously – not you're old, you're 33, but you get it. But then if you do too many reps, is the old body able to keep up? Have you always been a lot of reps guy and just get back on a horse?

37:35David Ross:No, usually I take a lot of time off and try to recover, but it's just like when you got that old 72 sitting in the garage, man, you got to keep that thing running, you know? So, nah, so I started right after the season, started throwing, doing my stuff, and you just you got the same schedule just move it up a little bit you know if I know I got to be ready March 6th to kick some you know just move it up a couple weeks so I'm ready just move it up so the preparation was all the same and yeah we're fired up man you mentioned Logan Webb I was

38:04Pat McAfee:actually there there was a photo that I posted in November Ernest had a show at the Ryman auditorium down there in Nashville. And whenever I got down there, I went to his bus beforehand. And Grandpa Ross, he was sitting in there. And I'm like, holy hell, I'm such a big fan. And we're hanging, and Ernest is in there with his guitar, just singing, singing, singing. And then all of a sudden, they start a music conversation. And me and Grandpa Ross are kind of stuck on his side. I'm potentially at a much different elevation altitude than he is. We start talking about Team USA. And then all of a sudden, Logan Webb walks onto the bus.

38:39Pat McAfee:and Logan Webb walks by us. I introduced myself. How you doing? Has a couple of friends who are awesome walks by and Grandpa Ross, he's like, we had a 45 minute call earlier today about how to get that guy to join Team USA. And I'm like, what do you mean? He goes, well, Team USA, we're trying to get everybody. Like we're actually trying to get everybody. The coaches are trying to sell. D-Rowe and Ross, I guess they're trying to sell. And I was like, well, let's go. I'd like to be a part of this. What are we doing? So I walked over to him immediately and I was like, man, I love what you do with the Giants.

39:05Pat McAfee:That world baseball classic is really the thing that the whole world gets it. And then Ross, he comes in, he goes, hey, all the boys are just getting a little bit earlier ready so that they're not injured. Like, we did a full work. And on that bus at the Ryman at the Ernest Concert, he said, all right, I'll do it. And we took a selfie. I put a little Easter egg up there. And then I think he announced that he was going to do it like a month or two later or whatever. But getting a chance to hear how Ross was talking about it, then how Logan talked about it, how I guess some people were scared of this because maybe they weren't fully ready.

39:32Pat McAfee:And then there's an injury that takes place. And then all of a sudden, not only does that suck for the player, the fans, the team, everything. Has that been true? Because I only heard it with Logan, like, hey, just need the boys to be ready for earlier. What does this mean back end wise? Like, I know you haven't done it, but the way you've projected how this is going to go for the rest of the season, you just got ready earlier. Is that kind of what these guys have all done?

39:53David Ross:Yeah, you're just getting ready earlier. But I see, you know, I've seen a couple of guys get hurt throughout, you know, the World Baseball Classic. But, you know, the guys we have on this team, man, they're professionals. There are a lot of veteran players. They've been there. They've done it. They know what they need to do to get ready. So I think for me, man, if I can hit the ground running through this and beginning of opening day, like, I think we're going to be in a great spot, man.

40:12Pat McAfee:You got 400 games, and then maybe you win the Orioles series. We can't thank you enough for representing America. We can't thank you enough for taking time. We can't wait to watch you guys work out here. And if you have any tips for me against Kershaw.

40:27David Ross:You got a guy right back over there. I think Harper might have a couple good ones for you.

40:30Pat McAfee:I'm a righty, though, I think. Or a lefty. I don't know. I'm throwing my hands at that thing?

40:34David Ross:Yeah throw the hands and you see those mountains out there. Yeah. That's where you're aiming. Yeah.

40:39Pat McAfee:That's Aaron Judge baseball. Ladies and gentlemen Captain America. Aaron Judge. Thank you Aaron. Thank you Aaron. You're the man. Dude that was awesome. You're the best. What a specimen. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He's a house. Got a lot of professionals on his team all right. Listen if these guys are out of shape that's on them. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you for the Jays too. I look so cool. Glad you got them. Yeah, I look so cool with these, dude. You do? Hell yeah. Those are sick. Can't tie them though because the pinky toe is really getting squashed out.

41:11Darius Butler:That's a good thing.

41:12Pat McAfee:You know the game. Got Jorts in a jersey. Who knows how that'll bode for Clayton Kershaw later. What's the people who are hollering? There's boys in the, hey, come on now, turn down that number. That's a good number. I don't know. What up now, what up, yep. Yeah, we love it. Two now, two now. Ladies and gentlemen, joining us now is an eight-time All-Star, a two-time NL MVP, the NLCS MVP, a man who was once the man known for the greatest hair in all of sports, the incredibly handsome lefty bomber. Ladies and gentlemen, for Team USA, Bryce Harper. Yeah! You look so cool!

41:55Clayton Kershaw:He's got cool shoes on. How's his hair that perfect? If I look at on peptides like you, I'd look even better. Whoa! All right. It's not a bad thing. I'm all about it. So it's not.

42:04Pat McAfee:They need to bring those back. Unbelievable, this guy. How are you? Hey, if I was on a bunch of drugs, I'd look good like you. I'll tell you, the baseball uniform is an interesting thing. It's awesome. It's sweet.

42:14Clayton Kershaw:You look great.

42:15Pat McAfee:I don't know if this is my thing. It's longer than I thought. Yeah, it's longer. And we need the. We got to talk it in. Tucked in, you know? I'm supposed to talk this.

42:23Clayton Kershaw:No, no, no. I mean, I can't believe your shirt's not off yet.

42:26Pat McAfee:It is. I've seen it.

42:27Clayton Kershaw:You're going to wait for like skis to get out here. I already know it.

42:29Pat McAfee:You put the headset on?

42:32Clayton Kershaw:First time. Good to see you, man. How you doing, brother?

42:35Pat McAfee:Thank you so much for representing Team USA.

42:36Clayton Kershaw:No, this is great, man. There's nothing better than this.

42:39Pat McAfee:Honestly, tell us about it a little bit, because Aaron was just talking about, hey, we need everybody to kind of dive into each other. I think Logan Webb's hosting a little event. Go ahead, you're good. Are you good?

42:50Clayton Kershaw:Jeez. All right, go ahead. I'm just excited. I see that, yeah.

42:55Pat McAfee:So are we? Yeah, I see that. I can see that. And also... When he took the hat off, too, we got to see the flow, which is still very, very strong in there. I appreciate that. Thank you. But Aaron talks about, hey, we got a couple weeks here to dive into each other, get the best players in the world around each other. How does it feel playing in this thing, the World Baseball Classic for Team USA, with the best players and also coming off of Japan winning it? Like, is there a conversation about that happening amongst it? And what does it feel like to be a member of Team USA here?

43:23Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, no, I think growing up, being able to represent my country as a junior. You know, there was nothing like it. I mean, going into different countries and wearing USA and wearing the colors and there's nothing like, you know, representing your country. I'm so proud to be an American. I'm so proud to be here and, you know, represent our country in a great light. And we don't care where you're from, what you do, walks of life, all that kind of stuff. You know, you put USA on your chest and we're all family in here and, you know, we're excited to get going. Yeah, sports are the greatest. It's the best.

43:53Clayton Kershaw:It's the best. There's nothing like it.

43:54Pat McAfee:But, Jeremy, anybody in there that you didn't know or do you know everybody in this clubhouse pretty good?

43:58Clayton Kershaw:I know everybody pretty good. Obviously, we play against each other throughout the year and stuff, and it's a lot different when you get together. But there's nothing like coming into a clubhouse knowing that everybody is here to represent their country. Everybody is so excited to be here. And hopefully we can take this one home.

44:15Pat McAfee:You're not going up to anybody and saying, get out of my clubhouse.

44:19Clayton Kershaw:Come on, man. I've heard. I've heard. No real beefs. Try to be happy, man.

44:24Aaron Judge:Historic story. Historic story. Right there. Just want to let you know. That'll be forever. We need more you around. That's what I know.

44:29Pat McAfee:I'm happy you're on Team USA.

44:31Paul Skenes:Go ahead, D-Boy. Yeah, just ask Aaron about kind of owning, well, not owning the moment, his eternal dialogue when he's up in that batter's box, what he's going through. And he said he got something from you about owning the moment. When did that start for you? Because even like a casual baseball fan like me, I knew who you were when you were still in high school. So when did that start for you? And how tough was it with kind of that microscope always been on you from a young age?

44:52Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, I think my dad did a great job of giving me so much confidence every single day. Obviously, he hammered me down, hammered me down, but he loved me as well. There's something about getting out there. My dad was able to build so much confidence in me. No matter the moment, no matter what's happening, how you're feeling, what's going on, it doesn't matter. From pitch to pitch or at-bat to at-bat, anything can change in a moment. Just try to enjoy each moment you're out there, find gratitude in those moments. obviously you're not going to come through in every single moment. But if you can find gratitude and really understand what you need to do in the batter's box each day or at first base or wherever you're at.

45:30Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, I texted Judgey when he was in the offseason. And you own the moment. Don't let the moment own you. You know, go out there, do your job, have fun. Same game we've been playing since we were kids, just at a higher level. But, you know, it's okay. Just go out there and enjoy it.

45:44Pat McAfee:That's American swagger right there. You know, that's kind of the hockey role there. It's good. I actually think you say you're not going to be able to do it every single time. Mott, I just closed my eyes and I had a – I don't know who it was. Maybe the baseball guy just came in here and told me.

45:58Clayton Kershaw:Makes sense.

45:59Pat McAfee:You're going to have a perfect world baseball class now.

46:01Clayton Kershaw:Wow. Perfect. That in 1 ,000. Every single – That in 1 ,000. I need that helmet then. No doubt. Maybe not. I'll wear that helmet tomorrow during the game.

46:10Aaron Judge:Yes. Okay. Sign it, Connor. Sign it.

46:15Pat McAfee:Now, hold on, though, Connor. What the baseball guys just delivered to my brain there, if he has a perfect day tomorrow with that hair.

46:22Clayton Kershaw:Oh, that thing's going to. Superstitious sport. The crazy part is the left-handed helmet. Yeah, exactly. I'm a lefty. Perfect.

46:28Bryce Harper:Me and you are kind of simpatico. Very similar. Very similar. Both good hair.

46:36Pat McAfee:Handsome, strong. Strapping young lads. Representing USA. Very American. That's right, Jack. That's who you are. And that's what we need for the next few weeks. Absolutely. We talked to him a little bit about watching a men's hockey team and a women's hockey team win and the Olympics as a whole. I think it's great for baseball that that happened, and this comes right afterwards. Because I think you followed our show a little bit. You know that I'm not, like, the biggest baseball person. That's okay. Yeah, shout-out Pittsburgh making that for me. Although I heard we're up over$100 million for the first time.

47:06Pat McAfee:They might be back. Shout-out. I think that's just your salary, but we got a whole team doing that. That's the first time we've done that in a long time. Okay. So, like, getting to learn about the sport has been, like, spectacular. I would say it is spectacular. What are the lads like? We got group techs. Who's a driver in there? Are you a driver in the group techs? There's always some chirpy ones in the group techs, some others that are just, like, double tapping thumbs up and hearting. Like, how active has the group techs been with the American lads? And what did the Olympics, you think, did to kind of either motivate you guys, as I think baseball is about to get a huge bump from this world baseball class?

47:42Clayton Kershaw:I mean, the Olympics, what an incredible thing. I'm missing the Olympics so much. There's nothing like turning it on in the morning and watching all the events. But, you know, seeing the women's hockey, men's hockey, take gold in a football country, right? Like we're making, you know, hockey ours right now. You know, for the next four years at least, it's ours. Yes, it is. But, no, I mean, what an incredible experience to be able to watch them play and do their thing and represent our country. And the Hughes brothers, just unbelievable. I mean, so much fun to watch them. I'm such a hockey fan.

48:13Clayton Kershaw:I love the game of hockey. Just the culture, the way they go about it. I mean, popping a tooth, like still in the game. Like, who cares? You know, we're doing this and just amazing. So kind of take that and then come into what we're doing now. Just the swagger we need to have. And the cool thing about baseball and the World Baseball Classic or the Olympics or anything, you see the culture of everything of baseball. I mean, from the Dominican Republic to Japan to us to everybody. So it's such a fun time for fans to be able to see it. even people that don't watch it as much you're going to see something that you know the culture and everything that baseball brings and the players and the swagger and everything else because baseball is kind of you know are they can they have the swagger can they do this can they do these things yeah but you're going to see that from the U.S.

48:57Clayton Kershaw:from the Dominican Venezuela

48:59Pat McAfee:Japan everybody so it's uh it's going to be a lot of fun hello do you script your uh bat flips do you practice a bat flip?

49:10Clayton Kershaw:I don't. I don't really flip my bat. No, that's what I'm saying. Yeah. I like to set it down. It's kind of just like a little set down. Respect. Respect. I've been here before. You know, kind of like.

49:20Pat McAfee:I'm saying if we run into Canada in this thing, which I don't know is possible or not, down the road, and you hit a big.

49:26Aaron Judge:You want me to do that? You hit a bingo. What do you want me to do? I'll do it.

49:30Pat McAfee:What do you want me to do? Who's it against? Canada? Whatever you want. Canada or Japan.

49:34Clayton Kershaw:Okay.

49:34Pat McAfee:Because I think in sports, especially your sport, and in hockey, we're just fresh up.

49:39Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, that was in 19. That was my first series back with the Nationals.

49:44Pat McAfee:That's what I want. It was like the chopper. Yeah, but I'm thinking two hands on the back of that thing, and you're walking under it.

49:53Clayton Kershaw:Wow. So I'm trying to throw it as high as I can.

49:56Pat McAfee:Yeah, and then you're jogging underneath of that thing. It's a dinger tunnel.

50:01Clayton Kershaw:The internet would enjoy it. I'm just going to put it out there right now. Now, this is for Pat. Thank you. That's it.

50:06Pat McAfee:Don't do it against Brazil because we don't know. We don't need to go to Brazil. Don't be doing American asshole, okay? We need American swagger. You'll find it. You'll feel at the right time. I got it.

50:17Aaron Judge:But I am very pumped to watch you do it. This is for the boys, so I'll do it for the boys. Yes. Thank you. No, no, no.

50:23Pat McAfee:But please don't force it, though.

50:24Aaron Judge:No, no. It's not for us. I'm not going to force anything. I'll tweet it.

50:27Pat McAfee:I'll say, that was not for us. Ty has a question for you, Brian.

50:31Scott Boras:I know this is the first day that you guys are kind of all here, and maybe this will come later, but will there be internal discussions like when the order comes out, like the lineup, and maybe a certain guy is like, hey, listen, I'm not batting eighth. Is that you? No, not at all. I should bat him too. Or will it all just be, hey, whatever D-Row puts out there, you guys will kind of just run with him.

50:50Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, whatever D-Row wants. I mean, it's about us. And I think at a young age, I learned when we put U.S. on our hats, it's about us. That's why it's only U.S. and not USA because it's about us. And so for our team, it's about everybody that's in that clubhouse. Like I said, no matter where you came from, who you played for, what you got, we don't care. Because every single day we come out here, it's for the greater good of America, what we're doing, for the people who we're representing. And like I said, I'm proud to be American. I'm so happy to be in this clubhouse with all these guys. And there's no greater feeling than going out there, listening to your national anthem, blare over the speakers, knowing what you represent.

51:27Paul Skenes:Who else were on those junior teams with you? because Georgie told us he wasn't good enough to give the impact.

51:33Clayton Kershaw:Who else was on that squad? So it's funny. So the captain of Dominican was my third baseman, Manny Machado. And so, you know, I love Manny, man. Grew up playing with him. Great dude. Nick Castellanos was with me as well. You know, I think our pitching staff was insane at that point. We had Robbie Ray, Jamison Tyone. And Jamison, out of high school, he was like 100. He was like the first one to like do it.

51:58Darius Butler:Pirates gave him away, yeah.

52:00Clayton Kershaw:He punched out 16 against Cuba in the gold medal game for us. And so, I mean, I'll remember I caught him. So just being able to sit back there and catch that, like there was nothing like it. Tony Walters, who was a really good amateur player at second base. Nicky Delmonico.

52:15Pat McAfee:None of these guys, though, on this.

52:16Clayton Kershaw:No, none of these guys. Matt Boyd, I played with him in the trial. But he ended up not making the team. But, yeah, none of these guys. Our 2009 team, there's a story out there already, but it's a billion-dollar team.

52:29Darius Butler:Oh, that's awesome.

52:30Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, so it's pretty cool. Like, that's the team that kind of everybody looks at, that 0-9 team. Probably the greatest amateur team ever assembled playing in the JOs.

52:42Pat McAfee:Would this be considered an amateur team, this Team USA?

52:44Clayton Kershaw:We're all pretty young, yeah. Why not?

52:47Pat McAfee:Do you get paid for this team? Do you get paid to play for us?

52:50Clayton Kershaw:I don't care. I don't think so. I have no idea. I don't know how that works. I love that. I love everything about that. I really have no idea. We probably do.

52:57Pat McAfee:There is an insurance policy. We got those, yeah. We got those. Go ahead, tell him.

53:03Darius Butler:Yeah, Bryce, obviously we just had Aaron on, and you look at him, you're like, all right, Aaron's captain. He looks like it or whatever. But you – not that you're not perfect. Your hair and beard are perfect. But, like, who do you think is going to be the glue guy in the clubhouse? I looked at the roster. I was thinking maybe you or Schwarbo, one of those guys. But who do you think is going to be the glue in the clubhouse?

53:22Clayton Kershaw:Schwarbs. Yeah, for sure. I mean, he's just – he has that demeanor. I think Judgy too, man. And, like, just the way he kind of approaches it, obviously he plays in such a big market in New York. And he's got to be that guy. Like, that's what it is. So there's nobody outside who'd rather be, you know, wearing the captaincy on his chest than judgy. So I'm excited to play with him. I've been excited to play with him the whole time. We've got such a great group of guys. I mean, you look at that list right there, man. It's pretty incredible. You know, it's going to be a lot of fun. We've got a lot of really good young guys, pretty good flavor in there as well.

53:52Darius Butler:Hey, well, Bednar's got a lot of good grit, too. I know that for sure. Pittsburgh boy, man. Watch out. It's awesome. There's nothing better.

54:01Clayton Kershaw:I'm serious. Even from the opposing side, you hear that song. He coming out of the bullpen, you're like, gosh, man. Are we at a Steelers game? Yeah. What are we doing? I mean, it's so much fun. And then obviously Paul Skeen's Air Force boy.

54:14Pat McAfee:And a Pittsburgh Pirate, yeah.

54:15Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, hell yeah. For now. America.

54:19Pat McAfee:Actually, not going to get into it because I would like the Pirates to be good. But I would like Paul to also see some big moments. I think for the good of baseball. That's why I think this world baseball class, I thought the Olympics for hockey, for the good of hockey. That's why when the NFL was telling players, or the NHL was telling their players that they couldn't play an international play because if they get hurt, blah, blah, blah, that whole thing, I thought it was really short-sighted because I think the majority of people are only going to watch your sport because Team USA is playing.

54:47Pat McAfee:And I think they're going to see that bump in hockey. I think they're going to see it in baseball, too, with you guys in this entire thing. I cannot wait for the big moment and for us.

54:54Clayton Kershaw:I think the big thing about hockey, what's going to happen is it's the amateur world in hockey. Kids are going to want to grow up playing hockey. You know, like, I mean, it's such a great game. I mean, being able to have the players that we do on America right now, it's so much fun to watch. I mean, obviously, Canada is Canada, right? Like, I get that 100%. Yes. Like, they're unbelievable at their sport. They, you know, live and die by Canadian hockey. I understand that. But for this to happen for America, just for the youth of America, knowing that they're going to want to play, you know, hockey growing up a little bit because of the, you know, Austin Matthews and the Hughes and all the boys out there, like Eichels and everybody else.

55:27Clayton Kershaw:Like, it's going to be so much fun to be able to see that. And my kid loves hockey. So, you know, I hope I'm a hockey dad one day, dude. Just going out there, hanging out at the rink and seeing him, you know.

55:36Pat McAfee:You and Big Walt Kachuk up here stop each other around.

55:39Clayton Kershaw:Come on. Hey, I'll let him train my kid any day of the week. Yeah, absolutely. The Hughes is doing it. The Kachuk brothers crack me up, man, just the way they go about it. It's so funny. Like, the bridesmaid thing.

55:51Aaron Judge:Just burying them. Always the brother, Leon. And I love Dreisaitl.

55:57Pat McAfee:He's a son, dude, no doubt. We're not changing jerseys afterwards. No chance. Yeah, they don't really have that.

56:03Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, no chance.

56:04Pat McAfee:Last question. We have about a minute before our hardout. Go ahead, Kyle. Yeah.

56:08Clayton Kershaw:It's on you.

56:09Pat McAfee:No, I'm good. Let's go. Too good of answers.

56:11Aaron Judge:No, man. If you would give shorter shit of your answers.

56:14Clayton Kershaw:Give me like five more minutes, man. I'm just chilling. We ain't got nothing until 2 o 'clock. Can we push?

56:21Pat McAfee:We can, though. Okay. We can do that. It's your show, right? Yeah, but. Isn't it your name?

56:27Aaron Judge:Mm-hmm. Yep. We're pushing break back. Oh, man. We just did it. Yeah, so that's what I just did there. Yeah, yeah.

56:33Pat McAfee:We just pushed the Bryce break. Oh, okay. Let's go. Yeah, we'll call this the Bryce break. Okay, we'll push it back. Connor has a question as we push the Bryce break back.

56:40Bryce Harper:Yeah, speaking of kids growing up, you know, playing a specific sport, it feels like that's what's been going on in Japan. You know, they are all baseball all the time. What was the feeling, you know, watching from home when they end up winning the last time? And how much of a motivator was that for you? Does it feel as though, you know, you've got to get baseball back here? Yeah, and we'll see you tomorrow. They did not push the break.

57:02Aaron Judge:We are still alive, though, on YouTube and everything like that.

57:06Clayton Kershaw:No, I think as we were all watching that, in that moment, I think everybody wanted the Mike Trout at bat, right? Like, all of us wanted that at bat. And we all wanted Trout to come through and all those things, obviously, especially facing Shohei and them being teammates and all that. We have so much respect for all those guys and what they do. And, I mean, that's their national game. I mean, baseball is their game. And so being able to kind of hopefully take it back a little bit, you know, going in there, understanding what we need to do as a team, that's a great fundamentally sound team in Japan.

57:35Clayton Kershaw:So hopefully we get the chance to play them again and, you know, we'll see what happens.

57:39Pat McAfee:I'm hitting Kershaw today. Sorry, I'm standing in a box while Kershaw pitches. Okay. No, you're hitting Kershaw. Own the moment. Own the moment. Come on. Let's go. You said earlier Youth of America, and I immediately thought of we are, we are. I'm sorry. I'm getting jacked up over here. Trying to own the moment against Kershaw. What is the thought against these pitchers? Forget Kershaw, because he's the greatest pitcher. I mean, I'm going to fall in that box from what I'm saying. But what do you do? Are you guessing pitches? Do you have a hint on what a pitch is going to be? Are you seeing the pitches?

58:12Pat McAfee:Are you actually reading the laces? THIS IS BECAUSE FOR INSTANCE WHEN I PLAYED IN THE FRONTIER LEAGUE, THAT WAS MY FIRST TIME EVER AT A BATTERS BUCKS. NEVER DID BP NOTHING. MY FIRST TIME WAS AGAINST THIS GUY THAT GOT DRAFTED TO THE BREWERS. I THINK HE WAS PLAYING FOR THE WASHINGTON WILD THINGS. 92 MILES AN HOUR FASTBALL. AND THEY SAID HIS FIRST PITCH IS GOING TO BE A FASTBALL RIGHT DOWN THE MIDDLE. IF THIS GUY DOESN'T THINK HIS FASTBALL CAN BEAT YOU, HE'S already been beat. So he's going to do that. So they said first pitch is going to be the best pitch. When I'm standing in there, that thing gets on me quick.

58:38Pat McAfee:I make contact, but I don't have any power. Just roll it right back to him. Then I get thrown out while blowing a hamstring going to first. So that was my entire.

58:45Clayton Kershaw:Hey, you making contact on the first one. That's pretty impressive. Thank you. I'm not going to lie.

58:49Pat McAfee:But I think it was right down the middle. It didn't move. I think it was 92. But then I thought, though, by my third at bat, I had three at bats, got on base once. You tell me if that's good. I don't know. It was an overthrow.

58:59Clayton Kershaw:One out of three in the Hall of Fame. That's true. Just saying. Something to think about.

59:03Pat McAfee:But I did think that I started seeing a little bit. Now, can I tell you why? I'm a holder for field goals. Yep. Okay, so that's coming back 1.25 seconds. So, like, I'm naturally looking for laces whenever I'm doing that. Do we think that will carry over to this? And how much should I be looking for anything while I'm staring down Clayton Kershaw?

59:20Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, if he throws you a curveball, you're in trouble. Which we think is going. I told him. Yeah, I mean, it's an impressive pitch. No, but I mean, I think you've got to simplify in the game today, especially. I mean, there's so many good pitchers out there, from Paul Skeens to, you know, Zach Wheeler to, you know, Tyreek School. I mean, there's nobody better in the game right now or ever in the game right now than the guys that we have in the game now, like from back then or now or whatever. Like the pitchers that are throwing, they're so athletic. They're so good. Two-seam, four-seam, curveball, splits, change-ups.

59:53Clayton Kershaw:Everyone's throwing 100. Yeah, backdoor sinkers, 102, 93.

59:57Pat McAfee:What about 68? That's what I'm throwing to Kershaw. 68.

1:00:01Clayton Kershaw:He can swing it a little bit. He takes BP and stuff. He loves it. He's all about it.

1:00:05Pat McAfee:Oh, okay.

1:00:07Clayton Kershaw:Don't let him fool you. He's not just a pitcher. He's out there taking BP all the time. He loves it. I mean, he probably hasn't since he retired.

1:00:12Pat McAfee:No, I think he has because I've been FaceTiming him through this entire process because I pitched the idea to, can I have an at-bat against somebody? And I guess, you know, because he's retired, he doesn't have a contract next year. So it's like he is actually the perfect. He can blow it out. Yeah. He can do whatever he wants. They're like, if you have any of these other pitchers, I'm like, us and Paul Skeen's pretty close. We'd like to ride the lightning a little bit with Paul Skeen. And they're like, I would just like to see because I see the pitching ninja.

1:00:39Clayton Kershaw:Isn't that crazy? Like, same slot, same rotation. So what do you do there?

1:00:43Pat McAfee:So you're guessing?

1:00:44Clayton Kershaw:No, I mean, there's times where I guess against guys, depending on count or situation. But it's so hard to guess on guys nowadays, man. You just try to look for one pitch, one zone, and try to do the best you can. Guys like Skeens, man. It's so impressive just because he does throw from the same slot. Everything's the same. And then it gets up there and it moves this way. It moves this way. You realize it's a slider or changeup or whatever. But, like, repertoire-wise, like, I mean, Zach Wheeler is one of the best in baseball. I mean, his fastball is the best I've ever seen. Like, just a high-heater fastball, 98, just here you go.

1:01:14Clayton Kershaw:And then, like, Christopher Sanchez, he's one of my teammates too. Yeah. And he's a Dominican. He loves this guy. And so he just – I mean, the two-seamer and the changeup is – it's elite. Like, not even close.

1:01:24Darius Butler:Will you have an advantage if you face him?

1:01:26Clayton Kershaw:No. In the Dominican?

1:01:27Darius Butler:No.

1:01:27Clayton Kershaw:Absolutely not. My only thing that I can, advantage-wise, is I don't think he's going to want to hit me. You know what I'm saying? So I think that's the biggest advantage. Maybe Krause will play it a little bit more. Because, like, if he hits me and he, like, breaks my hand, then Philadelphia is going to be like, what the heck? You know, like, what are we doing?

1:01:44Pat McAfee:That is the big problem, I guess, in all this international plays if somebody gets injured.

1:01:48Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, I mean, you can't think about it. I mean, there's no reason. I mean, we could be in spring training facing some guy from the backfield and he absolutely just, like, lets one go and he gets drilled. You know, it just happens. So, I don't think anybody's going to think about that.

1:02:01Pat McAfee:All right. Well, don't. Because all I'm thinking about is us. And I'm not sure how to do it. Regaining the title of America's pastime.

1:02:09Clayton Kershaw:Own in the moment. Own in the moment. There you go. Got to do it. You got to live after if I get it done or? Yeah, 11.

1:02:14Pat McAfee:Head down to 11. That's what I meant. And by the way, you guys are paying for it. All right. I know your guys' deal. So it's contract. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The hockey boys are signing like 10 years,$14 million deals. Okay? You baseball guys, we know where you're at. We would like to be invited, though, whenever you guys celebrate and win this whole thing. Let's go. And good luck on the journey representing the United States of America. We appreciate you.

1:02:35Clayton Kershaw:I appreciate you all. America. America. America. That's what it's all about.

1:02:39Pat McAfee:You're the best. Appreciate you. Thank you. Ladies and gentlemen, legend Bryce Hart. Yay, Bryce. Hey, Bryce. Hey, Bryce. Hey. Hey, what are some good chirps that those guys are saying over there, you think? They're saying like...

1:02:51Clayton Kershaw:They probably were thinking, man, he could have been here with the Giants, but he's not.

1:02:55Pat McAfee:Was that a thought? Yeah, it was. Okay, so Phillies or Giants? Yeah.

1:02:59Clayton Kershaw:Anybody else in play? It was like San Diego and a couple other teams. but it came down to Phillies Giants.

1:03:04Pat McAfee:Giants are like a very respected organization. Oh, 100%. Judge, too, right? Yeah, no doubt. Arson Judge. Yeah. He had a heart attack.

1:03:11Clayton Kershaw:Arson Judge. Yeah, it was close. The thing that killed me was Bochy was retiring. Yeah, of course. So, I mean, he's the greatest full-time. Bochy's the good.

1:03:19Scott Boras:Massive head. Yeah, Bochy.

1:03:20Clayton Kershaw:The biggest. Yeah. Unbelievable. Eight and five-eighths or something like that. Like Elko.

1:03:25Pat McAfee:I think there was something about Barry's head that was the biggest. Well, yeah. Who's got a bigger head, Elko or him? Elko. Elko's got the biggest head. Big head. Big head. The bowling ball. Wow. You don't have that large of a head, just very good hair. I don't, yeah. I don't. You got good hair. I'm on so many peps. You mentioned it.

1:03:42Clayton Kershaw:I'm telling you, man, I wish baseball would be on peptides. Yeah, we all do. Me too. They're so good for you. Yes. It's not even like, don't give me the growth hormone ones. Like, I don't care about that. Those are the best ones. But like, peptides-wise, like, there's so many good ones out there that, like, you don't need the growth hormone unless, obviously, I mean, they look great.

1:03:58Pat McAfee:Thank you. Yeah, vascularity, actually.

1:04:01Clayton Kershaw:BPC? Yeah.

1:04:04Pat McAfee:I got kind of everything going on right now, but I'm hoping Kershaw gets a little glimpse at it. Yeah, that's right.

1:04:09Clayton Kershaw:Which field you're on? I think we're around here. Where are you guys? I have no idea. You're here? I think 2 o 'clock somewhere.

1:04:16Pat McAfee:I like that you guys are just living a life where somebody will put me somewhere. It's the show. Are you doing a real workout? Will you be working out out here?

1:04:21Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, it's the movies, man. Let us know.

1:04:24Pat McAfee:Are you going to hit?

1:04:25Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, I'll hit.

1:04:25Pat McAfee:So we'll be able to hear the crack of the bat from Bryce Harper today?

1:04:28Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, definitely.

1:04:29Pat McAfee:How do we feel? We feel good.

1:04:32Clayton Kershaw:Yeah, worked with Judgy yesterday and Bregman, so we all feel good. That's the best part about this whole thing. I mean, I know we're going on break, but that's the best part about this whole thing. We can always lean on each other and like. No, we're not going on a break. We're back. Oh, we're back.

1:04:42Pat McAfee:Yeah, we've been back.

1:04:44Clayton Kershaw:You've been on. No, I think that's the coolest thing, though, is like we can all kind of. Oh, no, you know you've been on. What? Okay. That's cool. No, I think that's the biggest thing, though, like being able to like, what, have we done? No, we're still alive, though.

1:04:55Pat McAfee:I just want you to know that we missed a break completely. Would you want to hang up for the next 55 minutes?

1:05:00Clayton Kershaw:I can leave. No.

1:05:02Pat McAfee:No. What I'm saying is we want you to know that this is all still happening for as long as you want it to. But do you feel like you're in midseason form? Because, what, it feels like baseball, everything is always like the goal is to, like, ramp up, ramp up. But this tournament is going to be seen by a lot, and it's on the line. So do you feel like you're –

1:05:18Clayton Kershaw:I mean, you better figure it out. You know, obviously I don't think – I mean, you better figure it out. I mean, obviously we're not where we want to be. If this was, like, middle of the summer, then definitely a little bit different. But, yeah, I mean, it's a little bit different. I mean, I think I've had seven at-bats, eight at-bats, which is, like, crazy. But got to figure it out. Do you want us to get any info out of Skeens when he comes up here?

1:05:36Pat McAfee:Like what type of pitches and stuff?

1:05:37Clayton Kershaw:Had a no. I mean, he's just – he could tell me what's coming. All right, have a good day, dude. Wish you were in the Air Force, man.

1:05:48Pat McAfee:You're the man. Ladies and gentlemen, Bryce Harper. Appreciate you, Bryce. Appreciate you, Bryce.

1:05:57Aaron Judge:Save money and get a better view of the road when you replace your worn-out wiper blades at O 'Reilly Auto Parts. Right now, save$10 on a pair of Rain-X Latitude wiper blades. They feature beam blade technology to improve windshield contact for maximum visibility. The professional parts people will even install your new wiper blades for free. Choose Rain-X Latitude wiper blades at your local O 'Reilly Auto Parts store or online at OReillyAuto.com.

1:06:23Paul Skenes:As you know, managing maintenance, repair, and operations is never easy. But for the ones who always rise to the challenge, Grainger has your back. From professional-grade products you can count on to fast, dependable delivery, they're there to help you keep things running smoothly. Plus, their technical product specialists are here to help answer your toughest questions. And because Grainger knows safety is always a priority, they're committed to being your partner in protecting both your people and your facilities. Call 1-800-GRANGER, click grainger.com, or just stop by.

1:07:20Pat McAfee:WE HAVE A LOT OF FUN. LIKE JACK HUEES TAUGHT US A SQUID AND NAIL GUN AND WEDDING CRASHERS TAUGHT US TUMMY STICKS BUT IT FEELS LIKE HOCKEY IS KIND OF USING A RUN AWAY. YOU HAVE A BUNCH OF YOUR OWN WORDS AND STUFF AS WELL?

1:07:31Clayton Kershaw:643. HUMBABE. HUMBABE.

1:07:36Scott Boras:HUMBABE. HUMBABE. HUMBABE.

1:07:49Pat McAfee:HUMBABE. CHICAGO. JUST REAL QUICK. DERO IS GOING TO BE PISSING YOU'RE DOING THIS. EXACTLY. SPEAK FOR DERO. USE THIS, MICHAEL. NO, NO. USE THIS.

1:08:02Aaron Judge:YOU'RE LOCKED IN. YOU GOT THE JORTS AND THE SPIKES ON. YOU'RE ALREADY LOCKED IN.

1:08:06Pat McAfee:YEAH, I GOT THE JORTS. I THOUGHT YOU GUYS WERE MAYBE GIVING ME SOME PANTS. THESE ARE THE MOST UNCOMFORTABLE THINGS I EVER SAID.

1:08:10Aaron Judge:WE COULD PROBABLY GET YOU SOME PANTS.

1:08:12Pat McAfee:These look sweet, though.

1:08:13Aaron Judge:You guys look good. Yeah, he's cool. I appreciate it. Very nice to meet you guys. That's good-looking, man.

1:08:17Pat McAfee:Before you leave, okay, because I know you don't want to piss anybody off. He's like, I don't need to be on the microphone.

1:08:21Aaron Judge:I'm going to say hey. I'm going to say hey. Yeah, well, you're a good guy.

1:08:24Pat McAfee:We showed the photo from Ernest Buss down there at the Ryman of Logan Webb, and I mentioned about how much you and D-Row and the crew were talking about how to sell what we need. It wasn't that hard of a sell, but letting guys know, needs to get ready earlier, and we're trying to win this damn thing. Can you talk about that a little bit and the moment with Logan Webb that I was a part of on that bus?

1:08:43Aaron Judge:Yeah, well, he walked on. I said, listen, we had already been hanging out for a little bit. And I whisper in McAfee's ear, I said, hey, bro, we got to get this guy on the team. He's like, I'm on it. I'm on it. And immediately be like, the scary part was he's like, hey, I've got a bet with skeins that I'm going to get in the box and hit with him. And, you know, we'd had a couple of pops and feeling good. and he starts taking hitting advice from me. And I was feeling good. I was showing him all this stuff. I got home, sobered up a little bit, and I was like texting him. I was like, hey, man, just so you know, it's career 220 hitters.

1:09:18Aaron Judge:Don't take advice from me. Don't take advice from me. He's like, you're a legend. I was like, yeah, I've got plenty of guys you can call, but it's not me.

1:09:25Pat McAfee:So, you know, it's going to be – I'm happy you're here. It's going to be Kershaw. It's not going to be Skeens, actually. So, you know, we've kind of adapted a little bit.

1:09:30Aaron Judge:Well, that breaking ball, good luck. It's pretty nasty. It's pretty nice. But I saw some highlights where you took guys deep. Was that softball you hit? See? Hit tanks. Now we're talking about. I just want to tell you, it's a good swing. Thank you. It's a good swing. And you're jacked. Yeah. Yes, I am. So jacked. We're talking about peptides right now.

1:09:46Pat McAfee:All the boys can't do it.

1:09:48Aaron Judge:We're very excited. I'm pissed their sleeves on here, but I know that you've got an American flag. Can't cut that off. True. Good point. Right? Right? Can't cut that off.

1:09:56Pat McAfee:I was actually thinking about taking scissors to this thing, and now that you just mentioned that I cannot do that. Tell me about D-Road. Tell me about the coaching staff. Yeah, it feels like it's a lot of ex-players, but certainly all for the lads here.

1:10:06Aaron Judge:The coach staff is like some of your favorite. We were at dinner last night, and I woke up as more of my face hurt from laughing and telling stories all night. It's one of those guys, we're going to have a really good time. We're focused. Putting this across your chest is such an honor, and I got to do it when I was a young player in junior Olympic teams. And so I know Paul, who's been running USA baseball for a really long time. It's a special, special, special group. It's a good minute. Yeah. And it's a little old. I had to knock the dust off of it. It's been a while. It's been a while. I'm sure these guys will break it in.

1:10:37Aaron Judge:It's only like 90. Back when I was coming in, it was like 91 sink slider. Now everybody does 100.

1:10:40Darius Butler:You catching skeins in the bullpen or what?

1:10:42Aaron Judge:No, I'm not a dummy. You know what I mean? I like, you know, things have slowed down a little bit. Put some knee savers on? Maybe. Yeah, exactly. Old school knee savers. I think I can get down there and catch. I just don't know if I can get back up. That's a little different. I'm pumped, though. I told Webby, I was like, I'll catch a flat ground. I'd love to catch some sinkers. I don't want to break my thumb or anything. Got to enjoy the ride. But I'm pumped to be here. We've got a great coach to have. D-Rowe is absolutely a dude, the dude. He's done this before, been there. Brian McCann, Mikey Young, Matt Ha.

1:11:13Aaron Judge:I mean, like the list goes on and on. Me and the third base coach, Dino Ebel, who's been with the Dodgers for a really long time. Oh, yeah. Won an A-ball championship together in San Bernardino, California. So we go way back. He was with the Dodgers minor league system until he got to the big league. So it's a fun group. We've got great people. And that's what it's all about. and obviously the talent is insane.

1:11:30Pat McAfee:Thanks for everything you did for Chicago and for Team USA that we're about to watch. You're the man, brother.

1:11:35Aaron Judge:I'm glad you guys are here. Very nice meeting you, gentlemen. Big fans.

1:11:38Pat McAfee:You should take that. You're the man.

1:11:40Aaron Judge:Oh, this. Yeah, I don't need that.

1:11:41Pat McAfee:You can take that, too, if you want, brother. Anytime you want to be a Mike. Come say hey. Okay, great to see you. Thank you for everything.

1:11:46Aaron Judge:I can't wait to be in there. Maybe I'll catch while you're back there. Yeah. There you are talking. That's all you've got, Pat? All right. All right.

1:11:55Pat McAfee:Maybe you don't. Maybe you don't. YOU KNOW WHAT THE BEST PART IS? ALL THE BASEBALL DUDES ARE DUDES. YES.

1:12:01Darius Butler:THEY'RE AROUND EACH OTHER. THE COACHES WEARING THE UNIFORM IS ONE OF THE BEST PART.

1:12:05Pat McAfee:YEAH, BECAUSE EVERYBODY MOCKS JIM HARBAUGH FOR HAVING THE CLEATS AND EVERYTHING. THAT'S RIGHT. BUT OUT HERE THEY'RE LIKE, YOU NEVER KNOW WHERE YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO GO. EXACTLY. NEVER KNOW WHERE YOU 'LL HAVE TO GET OUT THERE. WELCOME BACK TO THE PAT MAGFIE SHOW HERE LIVE AT THE SAN FRANCISCO GIANTS BASEBALL TRAINING FACILITY. We did not take a break. I know we're now on E2 because there's spring training baseball on ESPN. I believe the Tigers are taking on the Braves. Now, we will continue to have massive names in baseball. Who? Oh, Paul Skeens will be joining us here in a little bit. Clayton Kershaw will be joining us.

1:12:34Pat McAfee:What? And then Scott Boris will join us for the third hour. His name is going to be brought up a lot during these new negotiations on what's going to happen with these contracts, mostly because he just negotiates a billion dollars every single offseason, basically.

1:12:46Scott Boras:Yeah, yeah, five of the last seven years he's had at least a billion dollars negotiated. I think the biggest being$1.8 billion.

1:12:54Pat McAfee:Ladies and gentlemen, I see a huge ass and a huge arm. Ladies and gentlemen, joining us live, the ace for Team America, Paul Skeens, and the big dumper, Team USA's Cal Rowling. Yeah, boys. Cal, don't you all, guys, stop by. Paul, good to see you. Let me get the hell out of your way here. Nice cleats. Thank you. I just sent to me. It was very nice. I know you're in a rookie contract. That's it. Dump, how you doing, big dumps? It's good to see you again. Good to see you, buddy. Yeah. There's another headset.

1:13:26Darius Butler:I'll come to you. Don't hurt yourself. Good to see you, buddy. I was just security.

1:13:28Pat McAfee:Hey, keep grabbing that headset up there for dumps. Here you go, Paul. Paul, saddle up over here. Here? Yeah.

1:13:35Cal Raleigh:Man, you look great. What's up, fellas? Cal, good to see you, Cal.

1:13:38Pat McAfee:Dumps, you want to saddle up over there, Dumps? I was just supposed to walk him here. I wasn't supposed to go. Well, no, but we're going to join you. We got the fattest ass. Sorry, you have no choice. Yeah, definitely going to do that. The headset, can you grab that headset for him down there? Bo. Bo. Bo. Bo. Ladies and gentlemen, joining us right now is, I think. You have a mic on your headset, Paul.

1:14:01Cal Raleigh:This looks cool.

1:14:02Pat McAfee:Yeah. No, that was strictly for Grandpa Ross because we knew he was going to show up, and he did. He grabbed the mic. It was great to chat with him. Paul, thank you for joining us. Cal, thank you for joining us. obviously Air Force and love America not that anybody doesn't but it feels like this is going to be a pretty special feeling for you I don't want to put words into your mouth but honestly representing the United States of America fresh off of what the Olympics just were can you put into words how you feel right now and how has the training had to go to get ready for this

1:14:30Cal Raleigh:World Baseball Classic yeah the training I don't think was too different there was there was some stuff you ramped up a little bit earlier but it's not too much different I don't think yeah putting on the jersey I mean walking into the clubhouse today and seeing everybody in there is pretty special and then getting to put on the jersey it's it's it's a feeling that you can't really put into words they're saying the same thing when you walk in brother you didn't know

1:14:58Pat McAfee:that now you know your young little dumb ass is now the guy America's ace congratulations Cal Raleigh, Dumper, how you doing, pal? How was the season? For you getting ready, lefty and righty, you just had to stay in shape all offseason. Have you got back into it a little bit early? How do you feel as we enter the World Baseball Classic here? Dump?

1:15:17Paul Skenes:Yeah, I think the ramp-up is just a little – usually, typically, you start at three innings and you work your way up every other day. But this year, it was kind of starting at five innings from the get-go. So, just trying to work my way up to a full game. And, yeah, but kind of like he said, you know, it's not too much of a different buildup or workload or anything.

1:15:36Pat McAfee:Just starting a little earlier and just the dates. Paul, riddle me this. I saw a pitching ninja thing on you. It was four pitches. And it appeared as if – how far is it from mound to plate?

1:15:48Cal Raleigh:60 feet.

1:15:49Pat McAfee:Okay, so it appeared as if it was about 40 feet of the same pitch. And then they want a completely different direction. When you see that you're like, that's the goal? Like, that is literally what you're working for? That is what the perfection of what your pitches are trying to be?

1:16:04Cal Raleigh:Yeah, that's what we're trying to do. I mean, that's called, you know, tunneling. And I think, you know, 40 feet, 30 feet, whatever it is. I don't know exactly where it breaks. So it was 30 feet, I guess, is where the break starts? Something like that. But, yeah, it looks cool. Cool. I like that.

1:16:21Pat McAfee:That's what you're aiming for, though, right? Cal disagrees. Yeah, Cal just shook his head. No. No, it's like, honestly, because wide receivers are trying to make every route look the same. So they're running the exact same way. This is literally what you are trying to do with every pitch, is look the exact same?

1:16:35Cal Raleigh:Yeah. Yeah, that's pretty much it.

1:16:37Pat McAfee:And Cal, whenever this happens, you think to yourself, this is the rudest human of all time. How many pitchers have this type of thing? Is this what the difference is between elite and guys that are in the MLB, if that makes sense, Cal?

1:16:48Paul Skenes:Yeah, I mean, that's kind of what, you know, tunneling, you're trying to make everything look the same, kind of like you said, and ends up in four different ways. and it's kind of a nightmare for a hitter. You know, you typically know what a guy has, and usually some, you know, normal guys, their stuff will break a little earlier than that, and his stuff is so late. It just makes it hard. It makes it hard to commit to something, to look for a pitch in a certain area because, you know, like you said, you don't know which way it's going to go. And when you can locate and throw 100 and do all that at the same time, it makes it really hard on the hitter.

1:17:16Aaron Judge:You just fucking murder people.

1:17:19Paul Skenes:D-Bott has a question. Yeah, I know it's a lot of probably shit talking that goes on in the clubhouse, and obviously you have teammates playing on other teams. How much shit-talking or has there been any? I know we're the favorites going into it, but has there been any shit-talking with any of the guys?

1:17:32Cal Raleigh:Not a ton. I mean, some of, you know, if I see you, you know, I'll give you a heater. I won't give you a heater or something like that. But that doesn't mean anything anyway. I'm going to throw whatever they, you know, put down a little bit. We have a few guys on the Pirates that are playing for other countries. So I'm hoping that, you know, we'll get to see them. but it'll be fine.

1:17:54Pat McAfee:Are you giving anything away to anybody? Because I know we're trying to learn about each other. We're trying to become as much of a team as possible, as quickly as possible. But obviously you're going to run into some of these guys. How much are you giving up, honestly? Because I think the hockey boys, when they get together, they share game. I think football guys, when they get together in the offseason, they share game. But old school mentality of football was like, don't give too much away. I assume pitchers, because you guys are psychos, there's a lot of like not, don't want to give anything away.

1:18:21Pat McAfee:or is this like an open book for you to learn and for others to learn from you?

1:18:25Cal Raleigh:Yeah, probably a little bit of both, you know, because we're here for, you know, two and a half weeks with the best players in the world. And so I'm going to, you know, do everything I can to learn as much as I can. I mean, I've been up there for two hours, I think, and I've learned a ton already. So it's going to be a fun couple weeks.

1:18:41Pat McAfee:Well, you ask Aaron Judge, like, hey, if my pitch was to go like, and then, like, you know, everybody kind of knows, Because I think Harper told us that you or Clayton or one of these guys could tell him what's coming, and it's like we're still going to – Good luck. Yeah, it's still like hell. Is there, like, a piece of information that you would not want to give up? Like, is there a delivery or a mentality or a strategy maybe? Like, what would it be? What would be the something that you would not want to give up? As somebody that doesn't know baseball, what would be the thing that you would not want Cal or any hitter that you're going to potentially see in MLB to not know?

1:19:13Pat McAfee:Is there anything?

1:19:14Cal Raleigh:Yeah, there probably is. He's not going to tell you. Yeah. Yeah, I think we're on national TV right now. Can you give me, like, a heads up?

1:19:22Pat McAfee:Like, so, yeah, what would you want to know? That's a good question, actually, D. But what is something that you would want to know from a pitcher that you can't tell? Is it, like, traits, trends, what they fall back on? But doesn't film kind of tell you that? What would be something that you would learn from a pitcher? Yeah, well, I think it's kind of like a combo.

1:19:37Paul Skenes:Like, we're here to win the whole thing. You know, I want to. So, like, whatever I got to do to get on the same page with these guys, like, we're going to do. But, yeah, I mean, there's so much data now anyway. way you kind of understand you know who these guys are kind of before you're getting back there and catching them and then it's really just kind of finding out the why why do they do this why do they do that is it something specific to them or is it specific to the type of arm you're seeing so it's more I'd say it's more like that so so

1:20:03Pat McAfee:the thing that you would not want them to know is like in the first inning like we have a first 15 plays for football where we're trying to see what the defense is reacting to our different packages okay so we're putting plays out there in the first 15 we're not necessarily thinking and they're going to be a home run. We're just trying to see what the other team's doing. There's something maybe for you that you're seeing in the first couple innings that's like, okay, and this is what I'm going to roll with going forward. Is that inaccurate?

1:20:25Cal Raleigh:Yeah, probably. And that's probably the stuff that I wouldn't want to give away.

1:20:29Pat McAfee:Okay. Ty has a question. Okay, good. Thank you. I'm a dumb baseball player. Go ahead, Ty.

1:20:34Scott Boras:In terms of getting on the same page, I know a lot of pitchers will, hey, I'm only throwing to this guy. I want him to catch me every single time. Will you guys spend more time together? Like, for you, you know, you're not catching really any of these guys ever except for an event like this. Do you have to spend more time with them to, like, kind of get on the same page? Because, obviously, you know, you don't want to be getting crossed up when we have games that matter here, you know, in, like, a week or so. Like, will you guys spend a lot more time together going over that kind of stuff? Or is it just kind of like, hey, you know, I'll be able to catch it.

1:21:03Scott Boras:It'll be fine.

1:21:04Paul Skenes:Yeah, I don't think that catching it will be the hard part. It's going to be more about learning kind of, you know, how they want to attack guys. What's their – what are their cues? Like, where do they like me to set up? things like that. So we're going to have time to get on the same page. You know, we have a few days here, and we're probably going to have some meetings and some stuff like that to go over hitters, scouting reports, things like that. And, you know, I'm only speaking from, you know, where I come from with the Mariners. Like, I'm sure that they do pregame meetings as well. Like, typically most organizations do that with their pitchers and catchers and try to get on the same page.

1:21:34Paul Skenes:And kind of like what you said, you're starting off with a, you know, a first time through the order type thing. And then from there, like, you're kind of reading swings.

1:21:43Pat McAfee:and it's a combination. That's a combination. How much are you pitching? So, not in the tournament. I know you're doing two games or something, and then, yeah, right, you're Paul Skeens if we need to. Yeah, we might need you. Yeah, I mean, that is. We'll let you all figure that out. Didn't love that whoever leaked the news about Scoobal leaked the news about Scoobal, kind of made Scoobal look like the bad guy, which he's in the middle of something I think everybody in baseball is like, we're on your side in this entire thing. I think they should have said D-Row will decide when Scoobal's going in as opposed to publicly saying that.

1:22:10Pat McAfee:I think it's got out like Paul Skeen's projected to throw, too. But are you getting throwing sessions in with him? Like, how often will you pitch for this? And is this just like off-season pitching routine? How often do you pitch during the week? Yeah. How many sessions or balls are you throwing?

1:22:24Cal Raleigh:It's a normal rotation for me here. I'll be on a five or six day. You know, what I'll do during the season, that's what I'm doing here. And so I'll have one bullpen time, you know, session between my starts. And if they want to catch it, they can catch it. If not, we have bullpen catchers. But we'll sit down and, you know, talk as long as we need to to get on the same page so we can win the tournament.

1:22:47Pat McAfee:When you put that back back, that's your thing. Does anybody else do that or I only see it with you?

1:22:54Cal Raleigh:I'm sure there are other people that do it, yeah. Yeah, there are. Do you bring in football? Yeah.

1:22:58Pat McAfee:We need to – so you need to start selling these things, you know what I mean? Because I'm seeing what's going on with Scooble, his arbitration. I don't know if that's just going to work out. I assumed he was going to get a billion dollars. That is not – you're the same way. We need you to stay in Pittsburgh, by the way. Yeah. Excited for you to stay in Pittsburgh. On that note, go ahead, Tone.

1:23:13Darius Butler:Speaking of, Paul, obviously last year the pitching staff was great. Runs were kind of hard to come by. Signed a few bats in the offseason. How do we feel? It feels like we're going to be able to score some more runs this year.

1:23:23Cal Raleigh:And I say we because we are we. Yeah, we are Pittsburgh. Yeah, I love it. Yeah, we signed some good guys. We made some good trades. I love that the only hat that you have of a team other than the USA is Pittsburgh. So, thank you for that. But, yeah, I mean, it's a different vibe in camp right now. Awesome. And I'm as excited as I am to be here right now. I'm a little upset that I'm not in camp, you know, kind of missing out there. So it's going to be fun. There's plenty of time. Yeah.

1:23:50Pat McAfee:You guys play cards. I heard Boo Ray happens in MLB. I didn't know that baseball contracts were allowed to play Boo Ray. Are you a card player, Kyle? Three, two, one, drop. I'm in. I couldn't even imagine with how much travel baseball has, Let alone the amount of money that you guys potentially have going in there. A Booray game. That's a part of baseball. Cards more a part of baseball culture than anything else? Yeah. I'd say, I mean, cards.

1:24:16Paul Skenes:Dice? Dominoes. Especially, like, a lot of Latin guys like to play dominoes. So there's usually a couple card tables on the flights, and that's usually where guys are getting most of their, I guess, most of their bonding in, most of their downtime.

1:24:29Pat McAfee:Three, two, one. Are you selling or are you doing a little?

1:24:34Scott Boras:Ty's got another question. In terms of this tournament as a whole, like we've talked a lot about how, and you guys are both young, and I don't know if you would have even been in position to play on the last team, but has there been much talk about how from the outside it's like, hey, Japan is like baseball is their thing now where it's our pastime. When we want to put the best team out there, we will put the best team out there, and we've done that. But is there anything internally about you guys saying like, man, we would love to kick Japan's ass in the championship in this?

1:25:07Cal Raleigh:I've talked to some guys individually. There hasn't been a ton for me. I don't know about you, but I'm sure we'll get that in the next few days before we get into a pool play.

1:25:18Pat McAfee:What's D-Ro saying to you guys as you spoke yet?

1:25:21Paul Skenes:We haven't had a meeting yet.

1:25:26Paul Skenes:I can't imagine it's going to take a lot to fire or something. Yeah, we got this on.

1:25:31Pat McAfee:It already feels like I'm floating on cloud nine, so it's going to be fun. All right, I can't wait to watch you, boys. I'm going to be taking on Kershaw today. Did you hear about this? Actually? Yeah, for a full inning. Wow.

1:25:41Aaron Judge:He's trying to get me out three outs. Are you going to stand in? What's that?

1:25:45Paul Skenes:You're going to stand in, try to hit?

1:25:47Aaron Judge:Yeah. Oh, sick.

1:25:48Paul Skenes:Yeah. Think he's going to make contact? Let's go. No.

1:25:53Pat McAfee:What am I looking for, though? Maybe I need to go from both sides of a play. Maybe I get an inning on the right side.

1:25:59Darius Butler:I don't know if you want to go left against Kershaw. Yeah, that's true. Are you a switch hitter? He doesn't know.

1:26:05Pat McAfee:I do not know. I didn't play baseball at all. I think I have more power on this side just naturally because of golf and stuff and maybe a little hockey dangles. Hit for average from the left side, though. But, boy, I always – Ken Griffey Jr., you know, growing up, just like that's like a much prettier swing, it seems like, but I don't think I can get any power on that.

1:26:22Darius Butler:Kyle, are you always opposite of the pitcher? Yeah, always. Yeah.

1:26:25Pat McAfee:Okay, so I'll bet right at it, I guess.

1:26:27Cal Raleigh:Yeah, that's a good idea. Yeah, good.

1:26:28Pat McAfee:Shut up. Okay, I don't know. You sound like a little negative there. What is it, though, Kyle? He'll have a big breaking ball and you're just waiting on it. Is that what you're doing? What should I be doing here?

1:26:37Paul Skenes:I mean, he's got, I mean, the bread and butter is the fastball slider. And he's got a big. What's that mean?

1:26:41Pat McAfee:So what's that going to do? What's the fastball slider going to do to me if I'm on the right side like you would do against him? What is that thing going to do to me? It's going to go away.

1:26:47Paul Skenes:It's going to go straight down. It's kind of a gyro type, which means it's not like a big one. It's not move a lot. It's going to be tight. And at the very end, it's going to drop down.

1:26:54Pat McAfee:And I'm going to go, me! I'm going to see that. And then, boom, it's going to drop underneath my bat. If I were you, I would just start swinging as you're releasing. So just guessing where it'll be, strike somewhere.

1:27:07Paul Skenes:Yeah, swing hard in case you hit it.

1:27:09Aaron Judge:I like that.

1:27:10Pat McAfee:Yeah, it will. It's kind of my life in general. I'm going to swing hard just in case we hit this thing, and then if we do, guess what we're doing? Those are the Papa Go Butch right there. Okay, Clayton Kershaw, I know he's retired. There's a chance I hit one off that fucking rock right back in the far. Okay, just know that.

1:27:26Darius Butler:It's only like 800, 900 feet, probably. Yeah, exactly.

1:27:29Pat McAfee:And with what he's going to be bringing, if I just close these things, shut these eyeballs, boom! And that's what you're saying I need to do. I don't know. All right, that's sweet. If you were pitching against me, a person that's never played baseball before, you're throwing fastball, right?

1:27:42Cal Raleigh:Yeah, there's no point to throw anything else. Just fastball, fastball, fastball at a time? Yeah.

1:27:47Pat McAfee:And is that going so fastball, you can direct where that's going to go, right, in the strike zone? Clayton would want to go close, you would want to go close to me to scare the shit out of me, or would you want to go far knowing that I wouldn't reach it?

1:27:57Cal Raleigh:I think Kersh should throw a ball behind you. I don't think we should do that.

1:28:03Darius Butler:John Krux style.

1:28:04Pat McAfee:I don't think we should do any of that. Kershaw, professional, we don't need any of that. I don't need poop in my pants here while I'm doing this entire thing. Will he try to get that thing close to me to scare me?

1:28:12Cal Raleigh:Probably, I would guess.

1:28:13Pat McAfee:Okay, good. All right, now see, these are things you're giving away.

1:28:16Cal Raleigh:Yeah, you're thinking the game. I love it.

1:28:17Pat McAfee:See, then I'm starting to do it. And I cannot wait to watch you guys represent our country. I cannot wait for our country to rally around you guys, you know, beating the rest of the world. Thank you so much for taking time. Good luck the rest of the way and let's go win this whole damn thing.

1:28:30Cal Raleigh:Why not?

1:28:31Pat McAfee:Ladies and gentlemen, it's Paul Skeens and Cal Rowley.

1:28:34Paul Skenes:Here you go, boys.

1:28:36Pat McAfee:Thank you.

1:28:37Paul Skenes:Here we go, boys. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

1:28:38Pat McAfee:You're a good man. You're a good man. You're a good man. Con man, welcome back, brother. Great to see you, Duke.

1:28:45Paul Skenes:Good luck, Kyle. Yes, sir, thank you guys. What's that? Is that a new haircut? Yeah. It looks good. It does look good.

1:28:53Pat McAfee:It's good, it's back. Oh, you're back. Yep. Good seeing you again. Good luck, boys. What a year you have, Ruster. Thanks for letting us do your part of it.

1:29:02Cal Raleigh:Love it.

1:29:04Aaron Judge:Wow.

1:29:06Darius Butler:He doesn't wear a U.

1:29:08Aaron Judge:Wow. He looks nervous. He does. I don't think he looks nervous at all. He looks like a guy who kind of does what he wants. I like it. Shaking his boots.

1:29:17Pat McAfee:That was my picture on the show. He's a monster. Did we know he was this? Ladies and gentlemen. Big son of a bitch. Yes, we're ready for you anytime you need it. Ladies and gentlemen, 11 time All-Star, three-time World Series champ, three-time Cy Young winner. Ladies and gentlemen, a man who's going to be maybe up to his toughest task later today. Stud, stallion, high school friends with Matthew Stafford, icon first ballot Hall of Famer Clayton Kershaw. Clayton, we got some Hembo stats sent over to us. You can put that on if you can. And I don't know if you'll be able to see the screen or not with how bright it is.

1:29:52Pat McAfee:Look at these stats here that Hembo sent over to us from ESPN. Live ball era since 1920. Okay, that's a long time, 1920. Lowest ERA, Clayton Kershaw. Lowest whip, which I know what that means, Clayton Kershaw. Lowest op OPS, Clayton Kershaw. Minimum 250 starts. So whenever you talk about greatness personified, it is actually this man. And not only that, I think everybody that's ever met you loves you. Thank you for what you've done for sport.

1:30:17Paul Skenes:Thank you, man. Thanks for having me. This will be fun.

1:30:19Pat McAfee:Genuinely, thank you for doing what you've done for sport. Now, let's talk about this Team USA. saying you are retired MLB yes but Dero and everybody wanted you on the roster because how much you mean to everybody you mean to baseball where do you currently sit with like what's potentially the WBC schedule for you and how do you feel about life right now I feel great man

1:30:39Paul Skenes:I'm so excited to be here and be uh be with this group like you saw the guys coming out here and um yeah I got I amazon all my gear yeah you know I'm ready dude I've been ready for a long time so So I'm just so fired up to be on this team. And I told Dero, I told Andy Pettit, our pitching guy, I was like, look, whatever you guys want. I'll throw zero. I'll throw every game. It doesn't matter. I'm done after this. So I'll do whatever you want. I'm going to face you in a little bit, and I'm ready. Look out.

1:31:06Pat McAfee:I know you've been pitching against high schoolers. I don't want to give too much away. But how has those sessions gone?

1:31:13Paul Skenes:The results have been mixed. I'm not going to lie. Really? They've been mixed. Yeah. You know, I think the velo might be not what it should be, but the arm feels great, and I think I have enough for you. I think I can get you out. Okay.

1:31:25Pat McAfee:Now, me, certainly no problem, but is there a chance that today against me as you just make me look like I'm trying to hit a fucking homer again. See those boots? See those boots right there. That's what those are called, okay? That's what I'm aiming for. Love that. But everybody that knows baseball has seemingly been telling me, like, hey, you need to not get your hopes up here on contact or anything like that. Is there a chance you come out here and just straight nine pitch me, okay, through an inning, and then all of a sudden D-Rowe and Kershaw are like, okay, Kershaw, let's go ahead and have a WBC.

1:31:58Pat McAfee:Are you looking for anything in these moments for WBC, or do you already know what you could potentially do if you had to do it?

1:32:04Paul Skenes:No, I mean, you're getting me ready. I need this. Yeah, I need this. This is a competition. You're helping America. Yeah, let's go. Yeah, he's helping America. Exactly. We need you right here. I need good at bats. I need to know what I'm facing. And, yeah, I'm getting ready.

1:32:17Pat McAfee:Okay. Skeen said that if he was pitching against me, throw him behind me.

1:32:21Paul Skenes:Okay. I've had a lot of votes to get you in the ribs. A lot of votes.

1:32:28Pat McAfee:From who? I would like to let you know. That'd be on base. Look at the money donation now. Kershaw, normally whenever we do these types of things, the people we're doing it with very rarely say, I would actually like to donate. Kershaw was like, I would actually like to donate alongside you in this thing. Right? I don't want to speak out of pocket. Yeah, I got you. He said, I'll donate. I'll be a part of this. So here's the money we came up for. If I had a bingo, dinger, dong shot, you name it, 25 grand. Extra base hit,$15 ,000. And my ghost runner's quick, by the way. Don't you ever forget that.

1:33:00Pat McAfee:If you walk me, which that would be a rib shot, right? Would that not be? Yeah, how much is that worth? $10 ,500 donation. Strikeout,$10 ,000. A hit is just$10 ,000. Ball contact,$5 ,000 donation. Hit by pitch, that's an extra$5 ,000. Boom. So it's actually$15 ,000. Still worth it, but all right. Strike is$1 ,000, obviously, and then every ball will be a donation by the pitcher as well, you know, for$1 ,000. If I throw a ball.

1:33:26Paul Skenes:$1 ,000. Okay, these are new. Okay, good. I'm coming after you, man. All strikes. Let's go. Okay, good. We know who's umping this thing?

1:33:33Pat McAfee:What's that? Who's umping this thing? I think D-Row's going to beat a ump. Small box. Yeah. All right. I think he needs to make you like a – yeah, it does need to be a small ball. Yeah, that's a tiny strikeout zone.

1:33:42Darius Butler:What's it called now? What's the robot called now? Is there a name? ABS? Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:33:47Pat McAfee:ABS, all right. And am I pitching against you? If you want. Everybody's telling me that you rake. That's what they say. They say you practice.

1:33:54Paul Skenes:No, no, no, I don't rake, but I can swing a bat. I'll make some contact.

1:33:58Pat McAfee:Okay, so we'll do all those donation things for you pitching me an inning and then for me pitching you an inning.

1:34:03Paul Skenes:I get to try to go deep against you?

1:34:05Pat McAfee:Every time, yeah. We'll cap it, though, because I might never get you out. I do not know if I can even throw a strike. Can I have bats? Cap? Yeah. Full order. Full order is an add. It is a cap because if I can't get an out. And I do fear, although this is going to be at the end of training today, that some of the other boys might see me up on the bump after you do your thing and they go, hey, throw a couple more in here. I'm just getting shelled out here. So I am excited for it. I'm thankful for it all. Thank you for agreeing to do that. It's going to be awesome. It'll be a blast. It's going to be spectacular.

1:34:33Pat McAfee:Now let's talk about Team USA a little bit. and you said you're just happy to be here, I'll do whatever you need from me. What do you think the proper vibes are for the best baseball team? Because it feels like you guys are always upbeat. It feels like there's like a lot of ya-ya-ya-ya-ya, but then in the biggest moments locked in as well. How do you balance what the proper tone of a team should be in your eyes, especially as a multiple-time winner?

1:34:52Paul Skenes:I think that's the way baseball is. I think you play every day, so you can't just be locked in for the whole day. So I think guys do a really good job being pretty relaxed. And then from everything I've heard about this tournament, The adrenaline, the atmosphere itself, you know, will get you locked in. And it's just so much different than a spring training game. So a lot of guys like Will Smith and some of these guys that were on the Dodgers that told me about it said it's like a playoff game, playoff atmosphere. And so that atmosphere alone will do enough to lock in the guys. But, you know, as far as just hanging out, you just want to get to know the guys.

1:35:23Paul Skenes:And it's kind of like an all-star game with those guys in there. You know, you just want to hang out, get to know them. All my boys are sending me baseball cards, all my kids saying, hey, I need Aaron Judge. I need to think about it. You know, I need it. I was like, all right, guys, I'll get it done.

1:35:34Pat McAfee:This is a retired life. Now you're going to do a lot more of that. Go ahead, Pete Butt.

1:35:37Paul Skenes:Yeah, as a kid, you know, you dream about certain moments. And we were in the same draft as your buddy Stafford. I definitely dreamt about, you know, playing against or picking off Peyton Man and having that moment. Are there, like, two or three moments for you, whether it's a strikeout against a legend, first CY win, first World Series? Like, what are the top two or three moments that stand out for you in your amazing career? I mean, I would say one of the World Series. You know, I got to do it three times, and that was – No big deal. Yeah, I mean, that was it. You know, I think when you play a team sport, you want to win the last game of the season, you know.

1:36:09Paul Skenes:And so I think for me, being able to do that, especially this last year, my last game ever, get to win the World Series, like couldn't script it any better than that. And I just – it was just such an amazing moment for me. And then winning the first one, you know, we had a lot of times we got to the postseason and we didn't win. And so for me to win that first one and finally get that monkey off my back and get to do it was amazing.

1:36:28Pat McAfee:Going out on top is where everybody dreams of, brother.

1:36:30Paul Skenes:Yeah, I agree. It felt pretty good.

1:36:33Pat McAfee:And then today it can all change.

1:36:35Scott Boras:Go ahead, Ty. Go ahead, Ty. In terms of going out on top, was there – what led you to officially being like, you know what, I'm done. I want to retire. Obviously, I know you've got kids at home, but you see the team you guys have in L.A. right now. And I assume that, you know, like you're still confident in what you can do. It's probably hard not to be like, you know what, yeah, maybe I run this back like a year or two because I might be able to add two more World Series races.

1:36:58Paul Skenes:I'm not that confident. You know, I think you look up at the gun and you're throwing 87, 88. I think we might be it might be time to hang it up, you know, and just physically, too. I think I have enough in the tank for these three weeks. But, you know, you asked me in September if my body's OK. I don't think it would be. So between winning last year and like you said, if you're on the Dodgers, you probably have a chance to win the World Series every year. So at some point you got to walk away because every year is going to be a chance to win another one. So we won and it just is just the right time.

1:37:26Paul Skenes:Felt good.

1:37:28Pat McAfee:So your body told you is what you're saying? Yeah, a number of things. When did it start going? And was it quick? Because for kickers, can I tell you about kickers? Yeah, yeah. So kickers will kick, kick, kick, kick, kick, and then they lose their height. It's almost like they say overnight. Damn. It'll become a thing where it just becomes obvious. Like Vinatieri, he would have kicked until he was 70 years old if he could, but then he just couldn't get the ball up quick enough. That's the determiners. Can I get it up quick enough? And then it happens. It just kind of comes out of there. Was it the same for you, or was it a gradual process?

1:37:57Pat McAfee:Because I guess you can kind of game whenever you're losing speed a little bit more.

1:38:01Paul Skenes:Yeah, my VLO kind of stopped going up, you know, about six or seven years ago. And then slowly the deterioration happened. So I don't think it was like a one-year thing. I think it was just over time. And then, you know, I started having surgeries, and that's no fun to have to rehab and all that stuff. But, you know, every offseason when you go and throw bullpens in the offseason, you're throwing, you know, 82, 83, and you're like, man, I don't know if I'm going to be able to make it, get to 90 this year. and then just keep going with that route every offseason. And then finally, this past offseason, I was like, you know what?

1:38:30Paul Skenes:This feels like it's the right time. This is just getting harder and harder to gear up and go. Like you said, I love playing. I love playing baseball. I love baseball so much. I love those guys, and I love the Dodgers so much. I would have played as long as my arm would have let me, but I think my arm told me it was time.

1:38:46Pat McAfee:Thank you for your contribution to sport. Connor has a question for you.

1:38:50Bryce Harper:Speaking of the Dodgers, two of Japan's biggest stars, Otani and Yamamoto, they are obviously kind of the headliners of that Japanese team. Are you going to basically tell everyone their secrets, tell everyone how to hit Yamamoto, tell them how to get Otani out, how to hit Otani? And also, what do you just think about Japan baseball culture as a whole? Because it feels like Otani, I mean, he's tipping his cap every time he's stepping in the batter's box to the other manager. Like, Japanese baseball also feels like such a huge part of their culture. How difficult is it to, you know, kind of beat a team like that?

1:39:25Paul Skenes:Yeah, I mean, Shohei and Yama are so good. And they both go about it very differently. So, you know, I think when you think about Japanese culture, like, you think of, like, you know, all the, you know, Mr. Miyagi, all these things. And Yama is a lot like that. Yama, like, is in the weight room every day doing these same things. But with Shohei, he's got a pitch and he's got a hit. And he's a monster in the weight room. And he's so fast. All these things. So it's amazing what Shohei does. And as far as secrets, I don't know how he does it. I have no idea. I've watched him for a few years, still have no idea how he does it.

1:39:53Paul Skenes:So it'll be fun if we get to face them for sure. And it'll be a tough matchup. But that's a pretty good group of guys in there. And I'm excited to watch that. OK, you said you watch Shohei. You don't know how he does it. Don't know how he does it. Really don't.

1:40:05Pat McAfee:Special, right? This is like alien type stuff.

1:40:08Paul Skenes:Yeah, it's just God-given talent. I mean, he works really hard. You got to give him a lot of credit for how he takes care of himself to be able to pitch and hit and stay healthy, but I don't know how he does it. How's he amongst the boys? He's great. He's great. He's funny. He speaks a lot of English, which I don't know if he lets on to the media too much, but Shohei's great, and he's been a great addition to the clubhouse, and yeah, everybody loves him. He's great.

1:40:32Pat McAfee:Whenever, I mean, because what has happened with MLB and Japan's relationship with Shohei and then what your team does with him being there, You guys feel what's happening for baseball, right, with Shohei? Why are you riding kind of that light? Not that it's just Shohei on your team. You guys have got studs everywhere, which people are pissed by. Yeah. Everybody's pissed about that. People are not happy about it. But as you're riding that wave of obvious global popularity alongside Shohei, is there something that you try to, like, I don't want to be, like, a mentor for him? Or, like, hey, like, it's all good?

1:41:04Pat McAfee:Like, he has to feel the weight of the world on his shoulders. And I don't know, like, how the teammate stuff works, especially with such different cultures between Japan and America.

1:41:11Paul Skenes:He does a great job. You know, I think that with the media circus that follows him everywhere and all of the Japanese reporters that are in L.A., like as a team, we don't see that. He does such a good job of like handling all that and still being a good teammate and still playing really well. So, like I said, it all bakes into the formula of like I don't know how he does everything that he does because he literally does have like a country watching him every second of the day. And, you know, we went to Tokyo last year. We opened up an opening day in Tokyo last year, and that was wild. I think it was probably like what the Beatles were.

1:41:42Paul Skenes:It's kind of like that's what I would experience, just being around Shohei and being on the Dodgers. That was once in a lifetime to see him in Tokyo last year.

1:41:49Pat McAfee:And then there's drama. Obviously, he's a megastar. You're talking about a whole country following him, so anything that happens is going to be amplified. And in between years is seemingly everything. He'll have so much happening out here, and he still somehow hits a baseball that's just been like – he had like a three-home-run night, like the night after some devastating thing happened to him. Like, hey, yeah, you were robbed or something like this, and then now everybody on earth is expecting you to show up, and then he hits three dingers. It's like this guy, I don't. He's special. In between the years, I don't know, let alone his whole body.

1:42:19Pat McAfee:This feels like a special special. But I don't give a shit.

1:42:22Aaron Judge:Yeah, exactly. At all.

1:42:23Pat McAfee:I don't give a shit in this baseball classic, okay? Not at all. Go ahead, Tony.

1:42:28Darius Butler:Yeah, Clayton, we were talking to Skeens, and obviously everyone on Team USA, this is a team, everyone wants to succeed. But he said, like, hey, I'm not going to give away to guys in here why I'm throwing a certain pitch in their first at bat, what I'm setting them up for in the second and third at bat. Now that you're retired, are you going to give away all the secrets to all the hitters in here? Has anyone started picking your brain yet? I had no secrets. I think I threw the same three pitches my whole career.

1:42:50Paul Skenes:What are they? What are they? Fastball, slider, curveball. I tried to throw a changeup for 18 years, never really figured it out. But as the fastball went, the slider usage went up, and I started throwing the slider basically every pitch. And, yeah, there's no secrets. I just tried to throw it in a good spot and hope for the best. That's awesome. Okay, so I've been told.

1:43:10Pat McAfee:Okay. What do you got? You should have faith in your fastball against me. Right down the middle. Every single time, fastball. Balls cost money. You've got to throw them a hook.

1:43:19Paul Skenes:Have to. I'm going to try to throw some strikes based on that formula. I'm going to go from there. You can work it a little bit. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

1:43:27Pat McAfee:But honestly, facing me.

1:43:29Paul Skenes:Yeah.

1:43:30Pat McAfee:You know that I have no clue.

1:43:32Paul Skenes:Yeah.

1:43:32Pat McAfee:what I'm doing yeah yeah so you can really work with that right like I need to know that you are definitely fucking with me whenever whatever's happening in there is I mean when you think about

1:43:42Paul Skenes:it it's a pretty lose-lose situation for me yes if I'm facing a kicker and he gets a hit off me but if I strike him out it's exactly what I'm supposed to do yes this sucks for you that's why I called you multiple times saying hey sure you won't do it I'm rethinking it now but uh no it's

1:43:59Bryce Harper:I appreciate you. Go ahead, Codd, man. Yeah, the other thing about, you know, the entire United States team is the importance of putting on the jersey. You know, you put on an L.A. Dodgers jersey every day, and that means a lot. You know, you mentioned that you were in it for the World Series every year. But, I mean, first of all, the outfit you have on is fantastic. But when you put on, you know, the USA jersey itself, you know, you see the flag on the hat. How important is that to you just representing your country and kind of being able to do that on such a worldwide platform?

1:44:30Paul Skenes:It's so cool. It's so cool. I think it's a bucket list thing for me. I've tried to be on this team a few different times and it hadn't worked out for numerous reasons. But now that I finally get to do it and represent USA and get to play baseball, it's an amazing thing. We were all watching the Winter Olympics to see the hockey teams win and just to kind of see the nation support them and be behind them. It was amazing, you know, and we love that. And so I think to get to do that in a baseball uniform for Team USA is – it's a bucket list thing for me. I'm so grateful to get to be on the team, and it's going to be a blast.

1:45:05Pat McAfee:You've watched World Baseball Classics in the past. Yeah. You say it's not being able to work out, whether it was injury or a free agency. It feels like baseball does try to look out for its players. Like, Scoobl, it's currently happening right now, where we want to load our team definitely, but he also has generational wealth potentially on the other side. So everybody tries to balance it. It feels like because MLB is involved in this as well. And all the baseball players, I think they kind of get it. What do you think the fans at home should look forward to with WBC? Like you might, I mean, literally you might throw two innings, fourth and fifth inning against some team that we're playing against.

1:45:38Pat McAfee:That could be anybody. Now they're saying Paul's on and throw two games, but it's like we get into a playoff game. Trying to win. There's a chance that a guy who's an ace comes out and does it.

1:45:48Paul Skenes:Don't tell the Pirates that. They don't want to hear that. They don't care.

1:45:50Pat McAfee:Don't worry. They don't care about baseball. The Pirates spent$100 million on their entire roster for the first time ever this year.

1:45:56Darius Butler:Nothing doesn't even know that WBC is happening.

1:45:58Pat McAfee:Yeah, we're not 100 % sure if he does yet. He probably found out today. Show was on. Why is McAfee in Arizona? I hate that guy. Why is Paul? Why isn't Paul at our place? That's potentially real over there with the Pirates. But what do you think people should look forward to for this WBC?

1:46:16Paul Skenes:I mean, just the matchups. I mean, the way it ended last year, having Shohei face Mike Trout teammates at the time, and that swing and miss to end the game like that, and to see how meaningful it was for Team Japan to win that. And that's all I've heard is just, like, how much people want to win this thing for their country. And so I'm excited to get into it. I'm excited to see it. And then you're going to see matchups that you don't ever see. Like, the Dominican Republic is loaded, right? Team Japan is loaded. Venezuela is always good. There's good players on every team. So just the different types of matchups, the different pressure situations for guys.

1:46:47Paul Skenes:It's going to be awesome.

1:46:48Pat McAfee:I'm excited to see if you can handle the pressure. I'm excited, too. A little nervous. What'd you do yesterday? What'd you do yesterday?

1:46:55Paul Skenes:I didn't do anything. I played golf. Family came in town. I did no baseball activity. Didn't do any baseball activity yesterday or the day before that, either. Okay.

1:47:04Aaron Judge:All right. So Matthew, a little cold coming out. I need a warm-up. I need an hour. Give me a warm-up, and I'll be good. Yesterday was a lot of water for you, though? I'm hydrated. I'm very hydrated.

1:47:11Pat McAfee:So for me, it was the complete opposite. Yeah. Yesterday, we had one here in Scottsdale.

1:47:15Paul Skenes:You had a good time?

1:47:16Pat McAfee:Had to. We were introduced to the Illuminati of Scottsdale called the Thunderbirds. Our friend AQ Shipley's in this group. They got belts. And they're a whole. Custom shoes. They're a little fraternity thing. They own everything out here. We had one. And there was multiple times we mentioned you where I was cheers to, we're doing a cheers or whatever, taking them. What do a Kershaw's doing right now? So I want to say lose, lose, lose situation.

1:47:41Paul Skenes:sounds like excuses after excuses just telling you the reality of the biz

1:47:46Pat McAfee:okay a lot of dry mouth yesterday excited to see and step in there and thank you for allowing me the honor of being able to honestly you this is normal for you for me as somebody that didn't play baseball ever the fact that I'm allowed to step in that batter's box and face you is very fucking cool I understand that and I'm very very grateful very very grateful well thanks for being here

1:48:06Paul Skenes:bringing your show out here it means a lot to the guys And it's good for baseball to have you guys here. So appreciate it. You're good for baseball.

1:48:12Pat McAfee:So is this. Ladies and gentlemen, the man who's going to try to strike me out. Not hit me in the ribs.

1:48:17Paul Skenes:No. Definitely not. Maybe. No. Maybe. Thank you, guys.

1:48:22Pat McAfee:Thank you so much. Appreciate you, man. All right. See you in a bit. All right. See you, dude.

1:48:32Bryce Harper:You don't have a chance, pal.

1:48:34Pat McAfee:Yeah, bud. See you later. That's what I thought.

1:48:36Bryce Harper:I won so many championships with that, dude.

1:48:38Pat McAfee:just on the show.

1:48:40Bryce Harper:Oh, yeah. He's so big.

1:48:43Pat McAfee:He's huge. He's a moose. He's a moose. Now, I will say on that handshake on the way out, I did try to. Try and get him? Just wanted.

1:48:50Scott Boras:Yeah. Because I think that's a big.

1:48:51Bryce Harper:You're going to need that. It's a big. Mind games are going to be a big part of it. This is awful. And now you know it strikes. Yeah, I just shook his left hand and just tried to crack that. Yeah.

1:48:58Scott Boras:He's not letting that happen.

1:48:59Pat McAfee:So what? Fastball, slider, curveball, he said. Yep, that's it. Slider is going off the table. It's going right there.

1:49:04Bryce Harper:He saw the balls, though, being a donation from his side. I'm just going to have to kind of throw some strikes only. We have some tape, right?

1:49:11Pat McAfee:Let's do some Hembo stats here as we continue. The best pitches during the tracking era. This is since 2008. Oh, number one, Kershaw's slider, plus 229. Number two, Clayton Kershaw's four-seamer, plus 225. And number three, Justin Verlander, who's back with the Tigers, four-seamer, plus 207. So basically every stat that I've seen, I know there's a lot of stats for baseball because there's a lot of games, a lot of things to remember. Clayton Kershaw, generational tie.

1:49:35Scott Boras:Yeah, probably the best pitcher of his generation. He will be a first ballot Hall of Famer. That's what's crazy is because, I mean, this curveball. That's a big hook. This just, I mean, you want to talk about it.

1:49:46Pat McAfee:So what am I doing? I'm sitting and waiting for the slider. You're golfing that thing.

1:49:50Scott Boras:You're not hitting his curveball, so don't worry about that one. That's not the one we want. Okay. I don't know if you're hitting the slider. We want the fastball. We want the fastball dead red. That's the one we want to be sitting on and trying to drive.

1:50:02Pat McAfee:And I'm just going to say meat as I'm swinging.

1:50:05Scott Boras:You can say that for every pitch he throws. Me? Yeah.

1:50:08Pat McAfee:All right, yeah, because Ty was trying to teach me good baseball chirping yesterday. Like, when I'm in the batter's box, things that I could say here, like, oh, like, meat's like, yeah, it's a meatball, beach ball, here we go. You should definitely ask for time in here a couple times. Definitely tap head. We want a review of the pitch in there, all these things that could potentially take place. I'm worried once I get in there, it's all going to go black. There's a chance. And I'm just going to see Kershaw out there, and I'm going to go, what, I sign up for this and then he's going to put a uniform on or is he pitching in?

1:50:40Pat McAfee:If he's going in that with that, that's a problem. Yeah, that won't be good.

1:50:44Darius Butler:This weather is also really, really good for him. For me? Yes, it is. No, for him.

1:50:48Pat McAfee:For me because the ball will fly.

1:50:50Darius Butler:Oh, yeah, yeah. For everybody.

1:50:51Pat McAfee:Yeah. Yeah, I forgot about that.

1:50:54Scott Boras:He might get a couple more miles an hour on his V-Low. Yeah, he's nice and lathered.

1:50:58Pat McAfee:All right, let's talk about some stuff happening in the football world as we continue. Kirk Cousins will be released by the Atlanta Falcons. That old thing ends after he gets paid$180 million to be their quarterback. Then they draft Michael Penix Jr. at the number eight overall pick a month and a half later. Now we see a time where Kirk Cousins could potentially go back to the Minnesota Vikings or maybe to the New York Jets or to any of these other teams that could potentially need a veteran. We've seen veterans who get their second, third opportunity in places, Kirk Cousins included, have massive success.

1:51:30Pat McAfee:Look for him to get out there. Derek Carr allegedly was coming out of retirement, told the Saints that, told the world that. There was no movement. Maybe Derek Carr gets another gig. Tua Tonga-Valoa is going to be moved on from the Miami world. Geno Smith is being looked at potentially for the Minnesota Vikings. Kyler Murray's days in Arizona are over. Remember, they draft the kid from UCLA. Josh Rosen. Josh Rosen. It does not go well. He's the Rosen one, they say. He does not do really well at all at baseball or at football. No. One year later, new staff knew everything. They draft Kyler Murray.

1:52:02Pat McAfee:Kyler Murray becomes first player ever, athlete ever, to be drafted top 10 in football and in baseball. He then goes on to have an interesting career with Arizona where during his contract negotiations, something comes out where it's basically like this guy's playing video games. He's not actually watching film. They say, no, that's not true. You're still talking about one of the greatest athletes to ever exist in Kyler Murray. He'll have a fresh start somewhere. Will that be in Minnesota? It feels like all these veteran quarterbacks, all eyes are on Minnesota. They win 14 games with Sam Darnold, playing for the number one overall seed in the NFC.

1:52:36Pat McAfee:Then they go into what they are. Injuries take place. They're holding back J.J. McCarthy from an injuries perspective, not getting as many reps. But they're clearly in the veteran quarterback market, it feels like, from everything we've heard. And I also heard some people around the Combine say that they've talked to people at the Minnesota. This is not Minnesota Vikings people saying this, but talked to people at Minnesota Vikings after the season goes. And they're almost like, it was almost disrespectful to ball to just move on from a quarterback that wins 14 games. Just almost disrespectful to the NFL.

1:53:05Pat McAfee:So this guy wins 14 games in the NFL. And you say, ah, we can kind of move on. There was like a narrative that like that decision in and of itself for Minnesota was one that maybe karma was going to work against them just because of it's hard to win 14 games. And I think their fan base saw them win 14 games. So now they're in a sense of urgency to get right back there as soon as possible, D. Buck.

1:53:26Paul Skenes:Yeah, and a lot of people felt like that when they made the decision to move on. But as a coach, as a front office, as an ownership group, you've got to make that decision. Whether it's firing a coach who's a Schottenheimer or a Chargers with more like 14 games, and then they let him go because it just felt like it was time for a change. You drafted a guy in the first round. You obviously believed in him, so you turned that page. But a lot of us felt that way. And then there were other people on the other side who were like, hey, if they get J.J. McCarthy, he does this, they'll be right back in that situation.

1:53:54Paul Skenes:But we know how. Yeah, exactly. But we know how fleeting success in this league can be. You know, whether it's going to a deep playoff run or getting to a Super Bowl or winning to a Super Bowl, winning a Super Bowl, that staff, that team, everything is different year in and year out. So it was a tough decision. And it's why they get paid the big bucks.

1:54:11Pat McAfee:Aaron Jones will be released from the Vikings. Same with a defensive tackle, Javon Hargrave. So they'll be freeing up some money. Aaron Jones on the market is good news for a lot of people. Speaking of running backs on the market, David Montgomery is now a member of the Houston Texans. He was once a part of the Sonic and Knuckles or Ass and Cheeks, depending upon how they played backfield up there in Detroit. He will now head down to Houston to be alongside Woody Marks in that backfield with C.J. Stroud in a revamped offensive line because a part of everything happening this morning for Houston is they're getting rid of offensive linemen.

1:54:44Pat McAfee:So I'll be excited to see what they end up putting together. Let's go back to the truck Detroit Lions superfan. Evan Foxy. Yep. Demo out of town. This is what you guys wanted, right? We only want Gibbs getting around?

1:54:54Aaron Judge:No. No, no, no, no, no. This is a bummer. Montgomery has been a pillar for this team once the MCDC era started, once that brand new Lions era started. Monty has been the guy. He actually would always start the games and then Gibbs would come in after that. I actually remember a game against the Rams two seasons ago. We go to overtime. They gave Monty the ball nine or ten times in a row. He ran down the field. Touchdown. Game was over. He's an absolute dog. We're definitely going to miss him in Detroit.

1:55:20Pat McAfee:Yeah, why'd you say that people were calling him Cheeks though?

1:55:22Aaron Judge:Well, you know, at the beginning of this season, they didn't have a great game against the Packers, first game of the year, and people said, yeah, I thought their nickname was Sonic and Knuckles, not Ass and Cheeks, so that's how they got that nickname for this season. They didn't deserve that. I would never say that about them, and now Gibbs is going to be the highest paid running back in the league, it sounds like.

1:55:43Pat McAfee:I did see that, you know, some people were saying at the end of the season they stop giving the ball to Demo we no longer have a dual backfield and we stop winning games so I thought Jameer Gibbs was spectacular and anytime you give a ball to somebody that isn't him you're certainly taking away from runs but maybe they needed Demo to do what Demo does he'll go to Houston with a bunch of dogs down there what's that offensive line look like it is multiple times now where Casario will move on it feels like from big names trying to find it I hope they're able to do it I trust Casario good luck down there congrats to the Texans getting and active.

1:56:14Pat McAfee:Congrats to also Brandon Aubrey, kicker for the Dallas Cowboys. It was reported that, you know, he's looking for 10 million a year, which would be the highest. That was all I guess. I guess that wasn't real. His wife confirmed it. Also, his agent, everybody confirmed it. I think that report was coming from a place of somebody saying, I mean, pay him 10 million. And then it just kind of comes into play. He will be the highest paid kicker coming into next year but i guess him he wanted to let people know i'm not commanding 10 million dollars this is just agents saying hey this guy needs 15 20 million if you wanted to well

1:56:49Scott Boras:and it's smart because you know jerry gets wind of this and he thinks he actually is you know demanding 10 million we've seen what's happened with cowboys players in the past who kind of

1:56:59Pat McAfee:wronged jerry in that way yeah he's on the first thing smoking at indianapolis uh d but speaking Speaking of Indianapolis, Daniel Jones and the Colts allegedly not close on a deal. Sheffield said 50-50 on that thing getting done before the franchise tag. Your thoughts on where the Colts are at right now?

1:57:14Paul Skenes:That's very concerning. Obviously, we saw what Daniel Jones can do with an offensive line and Shane Steichen's offense, and it was MVP level. So, hopefully, we can get him back. But, number one, you know, he's got to get healthy and recover from this major injury as well. But I hope we get him back. 50-50 is literally a toss-up. So, we sell C according to Sheffield. Unbelievable shot right here. That might be the coolest you have ever.

1:57:36Pat McAfee:Yeah. Yeah. And from us to all of you on E2, we'll continue digitally on YouTube, TikTok, ESPN Plus, and Disney Plus live from Scottsdale, Arizona, the home of Team USA Training Camp as they get ready for the World Baseball Classic. First game on Friday against Brazil, then Great Britain, then Mexico and Italy, then we move on to take on the world's greats. Be a friend. Tell a friend something nice. It might change your life. We'll see you tomorrow. Goodbye. I feel like we really hit it. Oh, yeah. That's a good old. I said the game's great. So if we lose to anybody, that would be a real, you know, that'd be tough.

1:58:10Pat McAfee:That'd be like he's expecting to get by all these guys. We can't be losing to Brazil. No, no, no. We're not going to Brazil. Or Italy.

1:58:16Bryce Harper:Or anybody. They swing spaghetti. Sorry, what?

1:58:19Pat McAfee:Yeah, but those spaghettis. Uncooked. Yeah. Yeah, you're right. You know, it's got to go. I suppose.

1:58:24Scott Boras:We're going to beat the shit out of every team in pool play. Like, beat the shit out of every team.

1:58:29Bryce Harper:So Brazil is last in the odds when they have the odds to win the world baseball. They're like plus 400 ,000. Yeah, boom. Plus 40 ,000.

1:58:38Pat McAfee:Great Britain right there next to them. We got them as well. Plus 35 ,000.

1:58:43Scott Boras:It feels like now, which. Hey, you never know. That's why we got to play the games. That is why we got to play the games. That's baseball.

1:58:49Pat McAfee:Why don't we take a break that two will be leaving from this pool. So we assume it'll be us and Mexico. Maybe Italy will get in there with the Gabo. Who knows? Maybe Brazil starts seeing it, even though the books say they got no shot. We're going to take a break. When we come back, we got a man who runs baseball. I don't know. Yeah, I think you could say that. Most powerful agent in sports?

1:59:14Darius Butler:Without a doubt.

1:59:15Pat McAfee:Certainly the most wealthy.

1:59:17Scott Boras:Yeah.

1:59:17Pat McAfee:The NFL has a 3 % cap at what agents can make. I don't think baseball has one, but I think it's like a 3 % to 5 % is normally the era. If you were to do that particular math on the amount of money that this guy has negotiated, Scott Boris, he's negotiated$15 billion.

1:59:38Scott Boras:That's pretty good.

1:59:41Pat McAfee:He'll be joining us. I'm sure he's going to have some shit to say about everything going on in MLB.

1:59:45Scott Boras:Yeah, I think he will.

1:59:46Pat McAfee:I'll be excited to see who's happy he's on the show and who's not happy. That's kind of this thing about this baseball world. I don't know it, and I have a lot of people telling me that on the internet that I don't know baseball, and I've said I don't know baseball. But we're here. No shit. Yeah, we're trying our best. Yeah. Trying to learn the game. I'm stepping in batter's box here to take on a generational is great. Yeah, one of the goats. Yeah, I'm trying to learn as much as possible. But also, I don't know when we step in it and when we don't. That does kind of happen to us. We don't. We get into a place where we don't necessarily know all the ins and outs, and all of a sudden we throw ourselves into a war with somebody that I never expected.

2:00:20Pat McAfee:Scott Boris coming on, the only people that are going to be mad about that are all the people that have had to pay him over the years, I assume.

2:00:25Scott Boras:Yeah, I guess. but the fact that they kind of just let him in here, you know, if there was actual heat, I'm guessing it's harder for him to get. I think everyone knows what Scott Boris represents.

2:00:33Pat McAfee:Because we are big fans of the way MLB has been nice to us. Yes. We are very, very thankful to MLB. And it is very hard not to say the MLB.

2:00:42Darius Butler:It is. You've been good with it, though. Yeah. Yeah, you've been crushed. That was last year's you. You've grown. Yeah.

2:00:47Pat McAfee:I think I did it three times today. I heard me do it. That was All-Star you. This is World Baseball Classic us. That's right. We're lucky to be here. All right, I'm going to go to the bathroom. You should do the same. When we get back, we got some great baseball talk and we'll wrap up all the news around the sports world. College basketball doing it. Yeah. Crushing it. College basketball is bringing it. You're about to get shocked by all the crooks. Just put up 41.

2:01:10Paul Skenes:What month is?

2:01:12Pat McAfee:March.

2:01:13Paul Skenes:That's right. Yeah.

2:01:14Pat McAfee:You don't want to be a monster in January. You want to be a monster in March. And it feels like college basketball has been a monster as a whole. But the men's and the women's have been must watch. People are saying college hoops better than NBA hoops this year.

2:01:26Bryce Harper:Yeah, I'd sign off on that. Yeah, hard not to argue it.

2:01:29Pat McAfee:I saw Wemby go from the elbow the other night.

2:01:32Bryce Harper:He might be. He's an alien. Yeah, and Tatum's back this week. What? Yeah, yesterday was the first day he was listed as an actual doubtful versus just being out, and they're saying Friday would be a date to look forward to with Dallas and Cooper Flagg. That's unbelievable.

2:01:49Pat McAfee:All right, sports are the greatest. Baseball's on fire. Be a friend. Tell a friend something nice. It might change your life. Take five. Five.

2:02:02Aaron Judge:Want to earn extra income for your business? Amazon Hub Delivery is looking for ambitious business owners to assist with local deliveries. When you become a partner, you and your staff will deliver packages to customers in your area on a schedule that works for you. With each package delivered, you'll gain extra income and exposure for your business. Plus, Amazon Hub Delivery makes it easy to get started. There's no upfront costs, delivery experience, or long-term contracts required. Sign up to learn more at Amazon.com slash hub delivery. That's Amazon.com slash H-U-B delivery. When you want your spring break to feel like,

2:02:36Scott Boras:and your kid's pool day to feel like, and your hotel bed to feel like,

2:02:45Aaron Judge:ooh, and room service to feel like, because at Hilton, hospitality feels like Your cabana's ready. Would you like fresh towels? It matters where you stay. Book now at Hilton.com.

2:02:59Scott Boras:Hilton, for this day.

2:03:05Pat McAfee:And welcome back to beautiful Scottsdale Arizona. The home of Team USA baseball training camp. Our three begins now. Sports are the greatest and we're so incredibly lucky that we are a sports program because moments only happen every once in a while where an entire country comes together and say yeah. Let's beat the hell out of them. We fell into the Olympics. It started with Quad God. A lot of us started watching the Quad God late at night on ice do things that the world had never seen. They lost. And we all said, wait a minute. Is American greatness suffering? Are we not going to be able to climb to the top of the mountain whenever it comes to competition in sports, whenever the United States of America is competing with the rest of the world?

2:03:53Pat McAfee:And then all of a sudden, Michaela Schifrin says, we got it. Then Ferrara on the halfpipe says, I got your back. Then the bobsled story says, yeah, this land that was made for you and me does create the greatest athletes on earth. And obviously the women's and the men's hockey team take down our biggest rival in Canada in overtime, in the gold medal matches. And all of a sudden, the United States of America isn't this little suffering, little boo-hoo country. No. All of a sudden, we are the American swagger, sports country that we are. Hell yeah. And that leads right into what's about to happen with this Team USA baseball.

2:04:30Pat McAfee:They're in the World Baseball Classic. And it might not be something that people hold in such regard as the Olympics or as the World Cup, but at one point they will because this is the Olympics for baseball. Baseball, America's pastime, obviously, but currently Japan reigning champs of the World Baseball Classic. That's right. Shohei Otani and the boys have come in and really taken over this baseball like a wildfire, like a firestorm. And the boys from the United States of America who grew up throwing a rock and hitting a rock on this great land said, nope, we are signing up. Captain America, Aaron Judge, watched World Baseball Classic a few years ago when Shohei struck out trout and said, nah, it ain't going to be like that.

2:05:09Pat McAfee:Bryce Harper watched and said, hmm, I don't think we're going to let this happen anymore. Paul Skeens, young legend and icon, youngest, most talented guy since insert beginning of baseball, said America's competing. I would like to play for them. Yeah. Kyle Raleigh, you name it. It's a who's who of baseball players that signed up to say, we ain't letting Team USA lose in this thing. And I'll tell you, the Dominican Republic is stacked. Oh, yeah. Japan is stacked. And I think what you're about to witness from now until March 17th is a bunch of people coming together around a sport that maybe not all of us watch, but we do love strictly because our country is about to do its thing.

2:05:47Pat McAfee:Odds on favorite is us. There's certainly a lot of pressure. The hockey teams just won. A lot of pressure. But these boys are built for it. These boys are ready for it. And all of it starts today out here at the San Francisco Giants baseball training facility. Papago is the name. And I'll tell you what. We love that we go here. The Talks table is here at Boston Corner and Ty Schmidt. Conman, how's your patriotism boner feeling?

2:06:11Bryce Harper:Pretty amazing. You know, you mentioned Japan. That's a good baseball team. But we got the best baseball team. Okay. There's a big, big difference.

2:06:18Pat McAfee:That is a good baseball team. It's a good baseball team. That's a good baseball team.

2:06:22Bryce Harper:And that is unarguable. But you see what Kershaw showed up in? I mean, are you freaking kidding me? There aren't vibes like that pouring out of Japan. I know that for a fact. From the bandana to the, you know, basketball, lacrosse penny, whatever the hell it was, he looked phenomenal. I couldn't imagine what the vibes are inside that locker room looking around like, oh, Aaron Judge is here. Oh, Kyle Schwarbo is here. Oh, Bryce Harper is here. Paul Sikins. Oh, my God. Look at that ass.

2:06:49Pat McAfee:I know that ass.

2:06:50Bryce Harper:That's Kyle Rawley's dumper. That's a big dumper. Oh, wait, no, that's the biggest dumper, okay? So we know Japan doesn't have those tools, and I just can't wait to actually watch them play. I think it's going to be really fun to watch them just beat the piss out of Brazil. I didn't know Brazil played baseball. Beat the piss out of Italy. What? Beat the piss out of Mexico. What? And then let's go to the quarterfinals. No, we've got to play Great Britain, too. You already skipped them. See, I don't even think – when I think of USA, I don't even think Great Britain. They're not even on the radar when it comes to sports, when it comes to anything.

2:07:19Bryce Harper:Something happened. Their tee's still in the bottom of the Boston Harbor, baby. Yeah, they are completely out of my mind, out of sight, out of mind. But, yeah, it's going to be very cool to watch all these studs play on the same team.

2:07:29Pat McAfee:Ty Schmidt, baseball guy, obviously our baseball guy. Pass and not here.

2:07:33Scott Boras:Yeah, what's that about?

2:07:34Pat McAfee:Congrats to him. He just signed a new deal. That's a good decision. That's a good decision to sign Pass into a new deal. We're very appreciative of him. He has a fantasy baseball draft that happens with the boys 15, 20 years on this particular day. We wish he would be out here. We assume in the future he'll be here. But congrats to him on the new deal. But for baseball, not only are we getting back, I know pitchers and catchers report and there's like a slow rollout. World Baseball Classic is baseball is back right at the beginning of the season. It's like Daytona 500 starting out first for NASCAR.

2:08:04Scott Boras:Yeah, and I think, you know, I could understand why people in years past maybe aren't a thousand percent on board with watching these games because it is just a weird time for baseball to be on. Usually there's not meaningful baseball on at this time. So if you're not like a baseball purist and you love it, you know, you kind of be like, whatever. Like, if we make the championship, I'll consider it. But look at the guys we've had on the set today. Like, and the way they've talked about it, like, it does mean more this year. Not that it didn't mean, you know, a lot in the past, but they're ready.

2:08:33Scott Boras:Like, hey, this is not Japan's game. This is our game. So, yeah, like, household names who, if you don't watch baseball, you know a lot of the guys on this team, and you're, you know, instantly you're just more willing to be like, you know what, yeah, yeah, I'll watch a lineup that has Judge and Schwarber and Cal Raleigh and all these guys back-to-back-to-back. Like, outside of the All-Star game and even that, that's kind of something where people don't really care about. Like, you know, this means something. So I'm so excited. And that's the best part, too, is we don't have to wait. Like, it starts this week.

2:09:05Scott Boras:So, I mean, we're ready to go. And, yeah, there is no situation in my mind where we are not beating the shit out of every team in pool play and then ultimately winning this whole thing.

2:09:14Pat McAfee:Tone, how can I profit off this if I wanted to gamble on it? Obviously, USA's odds-on favorites, so it feels like that's always an easy bet. Minus 110, you can still get some good money. Not as much as Brazil gets some hot bats. They'll obviously hit. Is there other things that we need to be looking at as we gamble on this world baseball class?

2:09:30Darius Butler:Yeah, so as I went through it, it's really you can bet on it. You'll be able to bet on it game by game. So those odds aren't out yet, but as they go on, you will be able to. And then obviously each pool, there's four different pools. You can bet on who's going to win that pool. The favorites in those pools are USA, Japan, Dominican. And I can't remember who the fourth favorite is. But you can bet on the pools. You bet on single games. I haven't seen anything like home run leaders for the tournament or anything like that. Puerto Rico. Yes, Puerto Rico. Puerto Rico. Thank you very much. Yeah, no problem.

2:10:00Darius Butler:But, yeah, you could go pool play right now, single games, and then overall minus 110 for the America is probably, you know, the best bet.

2:10:06Pat McAfee:Nine-year NFL vet Darius J. Butler is here. D-Budging. What was the number that DraftKings said today is live betting? Like 50-some percent of their money is live betting. This does feel like a sport we can watch first couple innings and see how the boys are buzzing. I think there's going to be pressure. I know we're playing Brazil. Baseball is such a little – there could be pressure early or the boys could come out and just demolish D-Bud.

2:10:26Paul Skenes:Yeah, based on what Todd's telling me, I don't think we'll see any pressure. I think there will be some tune-up games early. And that will bode well for later in the games, getting these match-ups, the big match-ups, the household names that we know from the other countries as well. So I can't wait for those games. and I am a huge live better in all sports.

2:10:44Pat McAfee:Yeah, you got to get a look at what's going on. Yeah, it's kind of hard to see who's going to show up, especially if you can see who's going to show up and then gamble on that. 54 % of 2025's sports betting handle came from live bets per their investor presentation, in which I think they gave out a lot of stats and a lot of numbers about how their business operates. Shout out to DK. Shout out to us wanting to see it first. Yeah. We want to see it. It's probably a good thing, too. We can't name a single player on Brazil, and we look at the names on Brazil, and we go, are they from Brazil? Yeah, what the hell is that?

2:11:15Pat McAfee:I didn't know that was Brazil's team, but they might have a squad. Yeah, they might. And it might be a little bit of a dogfight. We'll find out. There's a person that can tell us the value of every single player in every single game that's going to be taking place in a World Baseball Classic. There's a man that has been running baseball behind the scenes for a long time, and I believe he actually was a former football punter and also a little bit of a baseball player. So anytime ex-athletes go ahead and take over a business, I love that. Ladies and gentlemen, the man who owns the Boris Corporation, Super Agent Scott Boris.

2:11:48Aaron Judge:How are you, Scotty?

2:11:51Pat McAfee:Sir, how you doing? That's a good handshake. A billion dollar handshake. Yeah, not as good as you, dude. Not as good as you, I'll tell you that. This man's a plan, Shane. I'll tell you that. Scott, you look phenomenal, dude. You look really cool. You want to put that on? I'll put it on you. You want to put it on? You're Scott Boris. I'll do that. Well, you tell me. How's that?

2:12:15Adam Schefter:I'm privileged. A lot of stars wore this today, didn't they? Yes.

2:12:18Pat McAfee:Well, you probably got them all paid. Can you tell me exactly how much money you've had that headset on? No. With yours on there and with you here, we are very, very appreciative. Obviously, you represent baseball business. Anytime there's a big contract coming, your name is looming around it. Can we talk a little bit about Scoobal? Okay. Because he's the big one next. Scoobal, obviously, pitcher for the Detroit Tigers, one of the greatest of all time. It came out that he'll be pitching in one of these games during World Baseball Classic. I thought that was a bad idea. Might have been you that leaked that.

2:12:46Pat McAfee:I think that makes Scuba look bad. I think we should just have DeRose say, hey, he's in the middle of something, whatever the case. But with how much money is on the line with every single pitch, how do you view World Baseball Classic for your clients? Because I think for baseball, this is good. I think this is all inevitably good for baseball. Business-wise, how do you view World Baseball Classic?

2:13:05Adam Schefter:Well, the first thing is players receive the call because they're invited. And so the idea of what they do after they're invited is then the issue. And you've got loyalty to your fan base in the city. You play for your management, your coaches, your owners who pay you. And so one of the real problems we have is that unlike hockey, which turned out to be a – Unbelievable. It was that tremendous. It was like, and, you know, you get to wear a gold medal, and it's a true representation of what Olympics and diversity and collectiveness and understanding of nations is all about. And I think we need to consider and look at that because that's something that, you know, baseball is really international because we have Asia.

2:13:54Adam Schefter:We have Korea, Japan, Taiwan. We have a lot of South American countries, Dominican, Puerto Rico, that are playing the sport, and they've done it for generations. So the game is part of them. And so we have hockey, which you really look at is really a European and Canadian and American sport. But look what it generated. So we have the opportunity, I think, in the Olympic theater to really address the idea. The players are at their ready to perform where they know that it's not going to be injurious to the team, to the owners, and there's less risk with it rather than potentially doing it at points where they're not built up yet.

2:14:35Adam Schefter:And that's the issue.

2:14:36Pat McAfee:Okay, so I was part of a pitch to Logan Webb with Ross. And the one thing he told me to tell him, because we're on a bus, and he wanted me to go pitch Logan Webb, because I think there is some business happening with Logan Webb as well. I'm not 100 % sure, but I think there is. And the entire thing he wanted to tell me is we're telling all these guys that they just got to move up their training. Like we're telling these guys to move. Much easier to say than actually do because of routine. But he said the big fear is that you get hurt in World Baseball Classic. But what they learned from injuries of the past is that guys that didn't really shift their training would go into World Baseball Classic, and then their juices would get them into a moment that their arm or their body wasn't ready for.

2:15:13Pat McAfee:From your understanding, from your clients that are playing in this, everybody feels like they're ready for World Baseball Classic for best baseball, right? trying to put themselves in a most safe situation at least so we can compete at the highest level?

2:15:23Adam Schefter:I think the thing you must do is you – athletes, professional athletes, and anybody who's played pro sports, you know we're about routine. And it's about that routine that works for you. It's an individual routine. So you have managers, team trainers. You have all the people off the field that are close to the player. All those things unified to say, we received notice now months in advance. How do we prepare for this? and what can we do and what are the through studies when do you reach your optimum when do you really become who you are that makes you great and for a lot of the pitchers their their command what they do their build-up is much different in june july and august and september than it is in the early even in the initial parts of the major league season so our sport kind of uh and we have all the studies from prior WBCs where we've seen performance gradients, deficits.

2:16:20Adam Schefter:We've seen injuries with pitching. We've seen all these things from early ramp-ups that interrupt the routine. So we have to consider all of that in the calculation of the best interest for our country, the best interest for the teams they play for, the owners they play for, their teammates, their managers, and, of course, the player and his family.

2:16:36Pat McAfee:Yeah, let's find that insurance. Go ahead, Ty.

2:16:39Scott Boras:I'm just curious. Going away from the World Baseball Classic, I don't think there's anyone better to ask about everything we're hearing with a potential lockout and everything that's happening with the MLB, with the Dodgers. In your opinion, how real do you think that whole situation is? And what would you say to people like fans who are very, very worried that, hey, we're going to have a baseball season this year, but then there is a very good chance that we might not have one or we might have a shortened one a year from now?

2:17:08Adam Schefter:You know, I've been through about 11, you know, CBA negotiations, and you worried about the 75 Reds, 76 Reds. We worried about the 96, 90, you know, 2000 Yankees. And there are purposes and reasons that talent runs professional sports. It's talent driven. And when you have Posada and you have Bernie Williams and you have Jeter and you have Rivera, you have players of five players of great distinction show up in 96 all of a sudden you realize i can go sign veteran free agent pitching i don't have to pay the young players and all of a sudden i've got a unit that's going to allow me to supersede the talent level of the league for maybe seven to eight years now let's fast forward that do we change the system or do we understand that it's talent intellect and acquisition or good fortune because a lot of those players were lower run draft picks.

2:18:02Adam Schefter:And so we go to the Dodgers and we look at the fact that, look, they went in and said, I got Otani. Otani is an elite talent, maybe one of the greatest talents we've ever seen. Plus he brings 250 to$300 million in revenue to my franchise. Every team in baseball had an opportunity to sign this player, every team. And they had an opportunity to go out and say, this is what we get to do. Now the Dodgers signed him. And, you know, Now, remember that 13 years before that, the Dodgers are in bankruptcy in a major market in L.A. They got a TV subsidy. Things were so bad for them. And so now, is it the system?

2:18:38Adam Schefter:Or no, because that same system was in operation when the Dodgers were in bankruptcy than it is today.

2:18:43Pat McAfee:Okay, so you, obviously,$15 billion, I think, is the number in contracts. Thank you for what you've done. You are potentially one of the biggest drivers of like, we got something good here that every other league wishes they had. It is kind of how every other player looks at it. Like the baseball deals are kind of what we need to be looking at as a whole. And you say anybody could have signed Shohei Otani. In theory, that's accurate. But the Pittsburgh Pirates are never going to sign Shohei Otani. So Pittsburgh Pirates fans, amongst others, are like, isn't there some sort of something we need to do to maybe bridge the gap to force our team to try, if that makes sense?

2:19:20Pat McAfee:How do you kind of what are your kind of thoughts on that? And who's fighting against your thoughts on what you're saying here? Who is openly battling against you?

2:19:29Adam Schefter:The common bridge that is used in every CBA is there's a lack of parity. But the truth of the matter is when you take the elite eight of performers over the last five years, who makes the elite eight? Well, baseball offers that to almost over 70 percent of the teams in the NFL. it's 56 percent in the nba it's 63 so parity is something that is more foremost in a non-cap system than in a cap system and we can demonstrate that over time so the next step of it is is that when we come through and do this is that what salary caps do in my mind is it makes bad owners a reason to stay in the league and the reality because their their franchises are artificially appreciating because the entrance is something that is coveted for reasons that i only have to pay lebron james one-third.

2:20:19Adam Schefter:I just did Juan Soto's contract. Tom Brady and LeBron James combined in their career earnings are less than Ron Soto's contract. Now, what does that do for a major market? A major market can go out and sign star-level players in these cap leagues and keep them because the fact is their cost is fixed. It's not real. It's not market. So consequently, when it's not market, it allows them to do more and to do more in major markets than it does in

2:20:46Pat McAfee:small mark now on that note didn't make the playoffs right that team yeah it didn't make the playoffs which would be a good counter argument to everybody saying that the dodgers because of how much money they spend is why they're good it's like well i think the mets are spending a lot of money and they're not in there as well feels like this is all going to get very loud and you you have seemingly bunch in the chamber to go ahead and discuss on why we don't think it should change what do you think inevitably becomes the reality of baseball i think people

2:21:12Adam Schefter:forget the Dodgers didn't win their division last year. And by the way, in game seven, did we really know who the champion was going to be? No. So my answer to you is that all this idea that we have dominance, if it was dominance that led to this, the fact is the game plays so many games and we have double the content of the NBA. The game plays so many games. What a bar. And so we have a varietal association with the game where players are taxed due to the fact that there's frequency of play. And that's harder on an athlete. From a media standpoint, we are at a precipice of value in our game. We have the highest media ratings we've ever had.

2:21:50Adam Schefter:We've had record attendance five years in a row. We've had record revenues five years in a row. And we're talking about altering a system that provides that. Who's fighting you? Who is fighting you? I work for players and then so who is it other players is it it's not players i i i can't address i can only address the customary arguments that are often portrayed about parody but who are they who are

2:22:15Pat McAfee:the people that want this to change owners the league cheap oh i i would i would imagine that

2:22:19Adam Schefter:anyone would covet an ability to where they can go out and take the true stars the true you know minds i i want a system that attracts greatness and i want owner geniuses to come to our game If owner geniuses aren't coming to our game, if they're playing checkers, if they're playing chess and they can figure out a way and have the intellectual L belly to take and grab a sport and provide through all kinds of different avenues of technology or thought or psychology or preparation, physiology, all of those things create an interest level to the geniuses that can come to our game and provide us with a growth and a measurement of the game that goes so far beyond what it is today.

2:23:01Pat McAfee:Yeah, and zoology, too, because there's just animals out there. You know, just so many animals out there. I'm excited to see how it all plays out. Cannot have another lockout. No. Cannot have another lockout, especially with what you're talking about with ratings and game. They get rid of the pitch clock or lower the pitch clock. The games are faster. You've got more ratings. You've got higher ticketing and all that stuff. And then if you go away, I mean, that's like a death blow potential. Go ahead, D-Bud.

2:23:22Paul Skenes:Yeah, talk about genius and dominance. You've been dominating the agent space, and obviously that's great for the players. What led you to this? When did you know you were going to be an agent, and what was kind of the origin story of Scott Boris?

2:23:36Adam Schefter:You know, when you are a young athlete, as we all can remember, the coaches come pick you up. You're always playing with the older players. And then you go and you do well at every level. And in baseball, you show up to spring training, and you see that, wait a minute, what I thought those five tools were, maybe you got one or two. And then it starts to go, and then you do well, and things are going well, and then boom, knee operation, another one and another one, you're sitting in a hospital bed, and you remember what your organic chemistry professor said to you. I promise you that you will do more with what goes on above your shoulders than what goes on below.

2:24:16Adam Schefter:And I never forgot that and went back to law school and was going to go into the, I have a medical background in pharmacology, and I was going to go into legal medicine and decided – and then my teammates called. And I had the great fortune of representing Keith Hernandez and Bill Cottle and all these greats of that era and won a few arbitration cases and realized that I get to live the life that I love, which has always been this game. Yeah, you're a punter, ex-punter as well? I was a punter, kicker in high school, you know, that kind of thing. Defensive back. Oh, we got a bigger back pedal? We got a good back?

2:24:54Adam Schefter:Yeah, yeah, yeah. Three interceptions in one game.

2:25:00Pat McAfee:Not a bad athlete. As soon as I walked out there, he goes, Pat, good to see you because I got a chance to meet you at the All-Star game in the back. It was awesome to see you. Hey, I just want to let you know, as a career 290 hitter and ex-punter, that back, I'm a lefty, so you have to do the opposite. You need to get that knee inside of that foot so you're already kind of cocked with the hips. As soon as I saw him, that was immediately what he went into.

2:25:23Adam Schefter:I think that's actually good advice. Well, remember, I've watched Clayton pitch. I have the privilege of it for sitting in the front row of Dodger Stadium for years. So I figured he's going to put that slider right on your back foot. So you better have those hips. There's a potential rib shot coming to it.

2:25:37Pat McAfee:I mean, I don't know how that's going to help. But anytime we see ex-athletes go on to do great shit, we love it. So good luck in there. You talked about arbitration. Once again, not in the baseball world, haven't been in the baseball world. That's fascinating. I don't think I fully understand what arbitration is. I know it's a massive piece of your world. SCUBL, OBVIOUSLY ARBITRATION WAS A BIG CONVERSATION. AND FROM MY UNDERSTANDING OF SCUBL WHO HE IS AND WHAT BASEBALL IS, I JUST ASSUMED HE WAS GOING TO WALK IN THERE AND A REASONABLE PERSON WAS GOING TO UNDERSTAND THAT WHATEVER HIS NEXT DEAL IS, IT'S ABOUT TO BE ABSURD.

2:26:06Pat McAfee:CAN YOU TELL ME A LITTLE BIT ABOUT WHERE WE SIT WITH SCUBL, WHAT THE ARBITRATION THING IS AND WHAT THE FUTURE LOOKS LIKE FOR HIM?

2:26:12Adam Schefter:Well, in fairness to everyone involved is that it's a collective bargaining agreement issue was at hand about how the language was utilized. And there was a theorem on their part that it would connect them to a$19 million value. And there was a theorem on our part that would connect them to a$32 million value. And that's the largest gap in arbitration history. I think the largest was$3 million. This was$13 million. So it was a pretty big theater. We had about 50 lawyers in the room on each side. Oh, nice. Geez.

2:26:46Pat McAfee:So all of a sudden, that 13 million.

2:26:49Adam Schefter:Yeah, you have three judges that are there and are very versed. And these are labor law lawyers that are quite efficient. They're members of the National Arbitration Association. And they're brilliant men and women that are the service of the judges. Yeah, we love them. And so all of these things are there. and you kind of submit your case for an hour, then the team does, and then you kind of have the rebuttal for each side, which kind of unfolds a lot of the –

2:27:15Pat McAfee:Is Scoobo in there?

2:27:17Adam Schefter:Oh, he's there.

2:27:18Pat McAfee:So he has to hear the team that he is way better than say, nah, I think it's 19, this guy. We won't give him a dollar more than – No chance.

2:27:26Adam Schefter:He has to listen to – isn't that set up for – No, it's great because on our side, they have their – it's like a T, and they have their table and our table, and as they're saying things about Scoob, I see the table rising. So it was – I knew I had the right guy on our side. Absolutely.

2:27:42Pat McAfee:Scoobal, okay, in our profession, new quarterbacks up, that's been pretty good. We got new. For you, I assume every deal is a new, blah, blah, blah. Scoobal is going to set the mark now? Like, that is just how it goes? Every guy is looking to set the mark? And tell me about these deferred payments that the Dodgers are doing that is kind of changing the game. Has this always been available, and why is this the way it is now?

2:28:05Adam Schefter:Well, I think that the Dodgers have a financial plan that fits their element. And what you have to do is the net present value, the MPV, as we call it. And you sit down and look at it, because a lot of people talk about deferrals, but there's also pay a lot of money up front, too. So when you go to look at the MPV and how you do things, it just depends from organization to organization. Some don't like that. Some do. And my point is that you should look at your ownership, look at what fits for you. And the idea of it is you're going to create value in a dynamic that has a calculus. a meeting of the minds point that allows you to do a deal because each side has the appropriate barometer to say what's the value.

2:28:43Adam Schefter:And so however teams do it, but the truth of the player who's an elite player is that when you step into the market, that demand becomes something where I can't get a player like this for what period of years. And it might be as many as four or five. And even if I do, there's only one other player that can fulfill that performance level that allows me to optimize my championship goals. And we know that with number one starters, that we know that they place you in a position where he creates not only his performance, but he also creates the shade for the development of young players. He also creates for recruiting of other players.

2:29:21Adam Schefter:It creates a centric to it that allows for championship behavior. And there's a lot of proof on that. And that's why the demand for elite players of like a Scoob or like a Soto are so great because they know the formulation allows to achievement of their goals.

2:29:38Pat McAfee:Yeah, here's the jersey sales, okay? Here's what primetime games pull in. But also, what about the shade of lifting up all the other boys, too? What about the recruiting process? You see, these are the things that are considered priceless. And on that note, I need$765 million.

2:29:53Darius Butler:I love everything about it.

2:29:54Pat McAfee:Go ahead, Tone.

2:29:55Darius Butler:Yeah, Scott, I had a question about, obviously, the salary cap. I'm not sure that's ever going to happen. But don't you think or do you think it would ever happen to be good for baseball that there would be a salary floor? So we don't have teams who are spending$30 million a year,$50 million a day.

2:30:09Pat McAfee:The Pirates just got to one-seventh of Soto's deal for a yearly thing. We're from Pittsburgh.

2:30:15Darius Butler:So, yeah. You hear us, Scott? We're frustrated, Scott. But do you ever think that they would go for a salary floor or that would work?

2:30:22Adam Schefter:You know, when I hear about salary floors, it relates to golf. which I love and not very good at. But the fact of the matter is when you're on the tee box and you have the guy that hits it down the middle and then you have the guy that hits it off the fairway, the guy that hits it off the fairway is going to get penalized for that. So when you step off the fairway, you know the game rules are that you're not going to get the reward that the person who does it appropriately right down the middle. And the thing is, is that the device of what and how we govern the game, I think we need to reward teams that hit it in the fairway.

2:30:56Adam Schefter:We need to reward them with greater draft picks. We need to reward them with less luxury tax. We need to do all of these things. And we also need to understand that if you're not competitive after a period of years, then the penalties, I should say, the lack of rewards don't come to you. And then all of a sudden, financially, that impacts your franchise value and affects what you do so that there's some internal governance of ownership performance. Players are graded every day. We all are graded every day. Are we not? Yeah. I mean, look at you guys. Look where you've been. I mean, you know. Yeah.

2:31:31Adam Schefter:I mean, you know. It's something. I don't know if it's great. This is the Walter Crockite of hard news coming in 15 years. And so the idea of all that is that you're talking about how we as a game make sure we attract the genius owners. How do we do it? We did it. We've done it in our country throughout, whether it be medicine, science and what impacts it's had in our country, bringing in all the people that that are various talents to this great country. And the same thing has to be true of owners so that the operation of the game is something that we're seeking elite. And we're also really monitoring and have a barometer for those who have proven not to be league worthy.

2:32:13Adam Schefter:And until we get that in place, until everyone has guarantees without evaluation of performance and competitiveness, until then, I think the league suffers.

2:32:24Pat McAfee:You talk about to be good enough for the league standard. Who's the owner of the Pirates? Nutting. Have you ever negotiated with him? Never. I've talked to Bob a couple times, yes. But he's never negotiated with you?

2:32:37Adam Schefter:No, no.

2:32:39Pat McAfee:This guy's got$15 billion in contracts. and he never even talked to one of the owners, which is kind of what we're talking about here. You're saved in his phone as we will not do business with him. Yeah, do not answer. Can't afford business with this guy. Can you think about the city of Pittsburgh, though? I want you to think about me whenever you have this all going on. I think I would have been a very good baseball player. I have a strong arm, fat ass, pretty good hand-eye coordination in there. I think I would have been good for baseball culture. But because I was in Pittsburgh, where their ownership did not care about baseball, it just didn't even crack into my world about being something I cared about.

2:33:14Pat McAfee:I think that's not good for baseball. Like, and obviously we go on to have this and this entire thing, but like I'm not the only one. Like I'm not the only one in a lot of these cities where it's like baseball isn't even really a thing because that's why I think world baseball classic matters like a lot. I think it matters a lot, but whenever you're in there doing your shit, I would like you to think about little young me back there in Pittsburgh or in Cincinnati or in Detroit, or I guess Detroit's kind of doing its thing and you are thinking about one of them now, but like in those cities as well.

2:33:42Pat McAfee:And if it is like get these owners out of the league, we would back it completely. We would be very much behind that.

2:33:48Adam Schefter:I think, you know, I operate under the guidance of players, and they do have geographical likes. It's not always just about the most money. They have family. They have measurements. They have winning desires. They have a lot of things on their plate that can attract them to a franchise. And we also know that in sport, how many times have we seen a franchise that was not very good, and because of talent, it became very good, and then players wanted to go there. That's the recruitment part. And so the point of it is, I think, when you're looking at this, you have to say, this is like restaurants.

2:34:18Adam Schefter:You know, the Yankees in the 90s were the place to be. The Dodgers weren't. The Yankees had the chefs. They had the elite menu. They had everything they wanted. Such good half-price apps. And then, you know, the Dodgers were a pub back then. They were the local pub. With no live music. Yeah, they just didn't have it. And so now they have the elite chefs. They have the menu. They have an international course that everybody attracts to. So all of a sudden you say, how do you create that? And how you create that is with investment ideas and bringing together the genius that can take a market of four or five million people and optimize it.

2:34:54Pat McAfee:Execution, too. Go ahead, Con Man.

2:34:56Bryce Harper:Yeah, Scott, you've been a fan of the game for so long. How do you feel the state of baseball is right now? A lot of new things coming in, you know, challenging balls and strikes, the ABS system, the pitch clock. Are you kind of, hey, that new stuff sucks? Or how do you feel about kind of the transition into that era?

2:35:13Adam Schefter:Well, the most important thing for me is that, you know, I have our own training staff. We have our own training facilities. We have a medical review staff. We have to review doctors in the same way we review players to discern who's optimal so that our clients can get not the best doctor in 50 miles, but the best doctor in the world. So you have to have medical care understood because the white coats are out here. They're always around these ballparks. They sit over here. They're hunting for professional athletes. And anybody who's played, you all know, all of us have had those injuries. That's it.

2:35:42Adam Schefter:And so the next phase of it, I think, has to be clearly that if we love this game, you know, we have to grow it to its potential. And how we do that is that, remember, we have hockey in Nashville. We have hockey in Florida. Go back 15 years. Yeah, it's these back to back to back to back to back to. And so now there are four teams going to be in Japan. There's going to be two in Korea. We're going to attract, you know, one in Taiwan. We're going to have a whole Pacific division someday as soon as we figure out jet travel. So when we link all these things, we're going to have 200 million people that have been playing baseball for generations, and they're going to want to link to the MLB at the highest level.

2:36:22Adam Schefter:So all these markets are available for us. And remember, the greatest thing about baseball for media rights is that we have doubled the content of the NBA and the NHL. And by that is that all these entities that want to market their product and have an association, they have the ability to take live contact where the mystery is unknown. The wonderful thing about baseball is that bad can be good on any day. There is no over—it's not like the NBA where you've got two great players. You're probably not going to win much if you don't have those two great players. But in baseball, that one pitcher on a team that's not very good can go out and beat you.

2:36:59Adam Schefter:So you never know the outcome. I think that's going to be great for gaming. It's going to be great for people that look at this because the diagnostics of our game are so difficult to determine victory. And I only say that. I sat in Dodger Stadium in Game 5, and everybody thought the Dodgers were going to dominate the Blue Jays. And then you're in Toronto in Game 7, and I've got to tell you, that seventh inning, I had no idea. And I've been in this game a long time. I had no idea. You know, you really didn't. I think they're going to make that catch. I think the ball's going to stick on the wall.

2:37:27Adam Schefter:I think all these irregularities are going to happen. But our game offers so much variability that it creates really a moment of, I think, attraction that people who've invested in it as a fan, they've watched it and they've looked at it, that we just have so much content. We should be widely more successful in our media rights. And if our media rights are correctly compensated, then all the ills of this bargaining they're talking about are just completely different.

2:37:56Pat McAfee:It's going to take a lot. It's a lot of contracts, obviously, because your local rights are a big deal, and those are all kind of getting swallowed up right now as they speak. So how much do they roll into the future? All the different streaming platforms. I know you guys had an Apple deal. I assume everybody else is going to want to get involved. You said a good thing about your game. Not only do you have more content, which is 700 games or whatever the case is. We're going to run forever in the games. Shorter than they were. Games are shorter than they were with the pitch. You said anybody can win on any night.

2:38:21Pat McAfee:Brazil can't beat us, right? No. Great Britain can't beat us. No way. Mexico can't beat us. Italy can't beat us. Dominican can't beat us. Cuba can't beat us. Puerto Rico can't beat us. Canada can't beat us. What? Japan can't beat us. What? Is that how we're thinking of looking at the World Baseball Classic? I say the probabilities are damn in our favor.

2:38:42Aaron Judge:Yes. Very good probability. Go ahead, D-Bud.

2:38:45Paul Skenes:I got a question. First of all, this has been a great conversation, I know, for me as far as baseball goes. But do you have any aspirations for ownership? Do you want to own a team in the MLB? Yeah, getting close.

2:38:55Adam Schefter:We tried to do the percentages. No, you sit down with parents. And when you're a parent and you sit down and everything that that young man is telling you from 18 on as a lawyer, it's in your heart. It's in your mind. And being a fiduciary from day one, I would never cross that line because I made a commitment to care for them from the beginnings of their career. And if you transferred ownership for me, that would be a deviation from that commitment. And I, as an attorney, I would never want to breach my fiduciary relationship with the players that have allowed me to be in an environment where you're sitting here and, you know, I mean, this is the best I've ever looked on a baseball field.

2:39:39Adam Schefter:I'm sitting here.

2:39:40Pat McAfee:I mean, have you seen this? Have you seen this? So that's Scott right there. Scott is running that gym. He's a Cajun man. He's from down there. I don't know if you've seen the Zooms he's got. He's got the – It's been very good. You've got the Papago Buttes. Behind you. You've got a jacket on with a long sleeve. You're the coolest customer I've seen because it is scorching hot out. I mean, it's scorching hot out. You just play cool all the time, huh?

2:40:01Adam Schefter:But I think the attitude is that when you get to stay in the game and you get to be around the game, and for reasons I don't represent any other players in any other sport because I want families to know that we're 24-7 studying what your son does, how to make him get better, what to do because it helps the owners. We invest millions of dollars in the idea of their training, monitor them, and that means psychology as well. We've done all these things that are unique to optimizing the talent so the game can get better. And for me, it's just a wonderful world. Really blessed by it because of that commitment to those boys.

2:40:37Pat McAfee:Yeah, and you've blessed a lot of people too. Now, NFL has a cap at 3 % for the agents. What is it for you guys? Just so I start doing math every time I see it.

2:40:46Adam Schefter:Well, like I say, I think when the minute you talk caps, you're talking that genius runs south.

2:40:52David Ross:Well done.

2:40:53Aaron Judge:It's your answer, lawyer. It's your answer, Mr.

2:40:56Adam Schefter:Lawyer. I think you want the best people in the game, and you want people there for reasons, and everybody should make their own judgments about what's right for them and what value they have and what they do, what the quality is. Because a lot of this business in the agency world is about personality. we try to make it about quality and qualifications. And that's what you have to show in what you do and how you do it. And we become great friends because we're trusted, because you have quality and you have qualification, and you have commitment to who they are and what they do. And then the relationships become really, really remarkable and long-lasting, too.

2:41:37Pat McAfee:Yeah, well, you've done a fantastic job, obviously. Good luck on all of it. We can't have a lockout, okay? So we're putting that on your ass. Okay, we're putting that on you. Good luck with everything. I'll relay that to Rob for you. Thank you. I'm sure you will. Yeah, make sure you do. And we appreciate you so much for taking the time. And the Scoobo situation, fascinated to see how that all rolls out. Because there's a guy back in the truck, Foxy's from Detroit. Boy, he loves Scoobo. And when it went to arbitration, I think we heard the numbers 19 and 32. I think everybody in Detroit was like, give them 30.

2:42:08Pat McAfee:Yeah, give them 50. Give them whatever we need there. So that's an interesting dynamic. so Foxy would like to get you to get that to figure out, I think. Right, Foxy?

2:42:15Aaron Judge:Yeah, spot on. Let's just keep him in Detroit, whatever it takes. Get him a percentage of the Tigers if we have to do that. We need Scoogle in Detroit.

2:42:24Pat McAfee:Scott, I want to let you know, the picture we used for your graphic down there on the left is nowhere near how cool you look right now. Oh, awesome. You need to steal a photo from today or whatever you've got going on and run with that forever with the Boris Corp. And thank you so much for taking time out of your life to join us.

2:42:40Adam Schefter:We appreciate you. And thank you all. And I hope this entity stays in sport and is around baseball fields a lot more offer. Because I know hard news and late night's coming. So, please, guys, try to stay in the game.

2:42:51Pat McAfee:That's what he told me right after he told me about to activate the knee a little bit so we can have a little hip call. And then he said, and news is going to be coming, calling for you. And same with late night. He said, we need you in sports, buddy. And I'm like, I ain't fucking looking at any of that. Don't you worry about that. Late night, they're just trying to do YouTube and news. A lot of news. A lot of news. I don't know if I need to do that. But what we do know is that people like you looking out for athletes is a beautiful thing. We appreciate the hell out of you, ladies and gentlemen.

2:43:21Pat McAfee:Super agent, Scott Boller. Thank you. Scott! Thank you. And on that note, Scott, we're going to get out of here. We're going to enjoy the hell out of the training. That's right. Don't leave yet, Scott. You're going to be with us here for this. I'm actually going to ask you to speak here in a second. We're going to get out of here and go watch the boys train. This is their only training, I do believe, before this entire thing starts. Coach Dero, Skipper Dero, whatever the hell the words is in baseball, he's giving them a speech, getting rallied. We're going to get a chance to watch Bryce Harper.

2:43:46Pat McAfee:Same with Aaron Judge. A couple of the boys pitch. It's a dream come true. We can't thank MLB enough for allowing us to be out here. Shout out to the San Francisco Giants for making room for everything taking place. And Arizona, once again, you continue to be the greatest place on earth every time we come out here. Thank you so much. Let's watch these boys win. Let's continue the USA-American swagger in sports. And let's remind everybody that this land creates the greatest athletes that have ever been created. We're so incredibly lucky we get to do this. We'll be back tomorrow live from Indianapolis.

2:44:18Pat McAfee:Be a friend. Tell a friend something nice. It might change your life. We're in this thing together. Team on me. Scott, anything to say to the group? You, Scott, anything to say to the group?

2:44:29Adam Schefter:I do. Is that greatness is a part of you as long as you do what? Seek it. That's all.

2:44:37Pat McAfee:Fuck. yeah team on me team on three we'll see you tomorrow one two three goodbye

2:44:45Scott Boras:it's a season two playoff race with tgl presented by sofi sunday at 9 p.m eastern jupiter links versus boston common golf monday at 7 p.m eastern los angeles golf club versus new york golf club

2:44:56Aaron Judge:tuesday at 9 p.m eastern the bay golf club versus jupiter links keep up it's golf watch on espn ESPN2 and the ESPN app. Thought Sweetgreen was just salads? Think again. There's a new way to do Sweetgreen. Wrapped and ready. These handheld wraps pack bold flavor and 40-plus grams of protein into something hearty, satisfying, and built for life on the go. From craveable sauces to satisfying textures, they're designed to keep you going without slowing you down. So put that fork down. Try the new wraps today in app or at order.sweetgreen.com. Available at participating locations only. Thank you.