No Crying In Baseball

Patti 0:17
Hi, welcome to episode 464 of No Crying in Baseball, the Wave Rainbow Flags episode. My name is Patti. I'm here with my friend Pottymouth. Hey, Pottymouth.

Pottymouth 0:25
I had a rainbow flag with me, I would be waving it for you, and all of our listeners would definitely be able to hear that.

Patti 0:32
So, you don't just have them in every location in case you need it,

Pottymouth 0:36
you know? I'm wondering, there might be.. it's

Patti 0:38
like Advil, right? That's your Advil in your bag, in your car, upstairs, downstairs, you need rainbow flags in the glove compartment, you know, in the purse. Yeah,

Pottymouth 0:45
and actually, I should do that here, because, so, for those of us who are those listening who didn't hear last week, right now we're recording remotely, because I am in the great state of Massachusetts, in my dad's basement, and because I'm starting, especially because I'm starting to visit more, I'm doing things like buying stuff to leave here, you know, like toothbrush, shampoo, but I'm thinking I could add rainbow flag to that collection.

Patti 1:10
You never know. Yeah,

Pottymouth 1:10
12 pack of Sam Adams beer in the basement, you know. I've got the important things. Oh, you got the

Patti 1:14
beer, you got the only beer in Massachusetts right

Pottymouth 1:17
now. Isn't that funny? I gotta be talking about that later, but oh my god, Massachusetts has been partying, partying like crazy, and I'm a little bit late to the show, but here I am. I'm not late to our show, though. However,

Patti 1:29
no, we're right on time. And yes,

Pottymouth 1:31
I do want to give a big shout out to a new Patreon friend, Liam, who is across the pond, so we have some foreign currency coming into our Patreon, which is a very exciting thing.

Patti 1:42
Hi, Liam. Welcome!

Pottymouth 1:44
Woo! And yeah, what.. I don't know what you've been doing today.

Patti 1:48
Well, I was having pretty colored drinks at a local establishment, because you know it's my job to, so to support the local economy. So I was out with the intern, another family member, drinking Pride-themed cocktails at a local place, and it was lovely. Mine was purple.

Pottymouth 2:02
Oh, so good, so good. Yeah,

Patti 2:04
it was very, it was very delicate. So,

Pottymouth 2:05
does that.. does that mean they have one for every color of the rainbow? Do they have..

Patti 2:08
they don't. They have three different ones, but I like that on the actual drink menu they print out the name of the drink and what's in it in the color of the drink.

Pottymouth 2:17
Excellent.

Patti 2:18
So, all the text describing mine, which was called Abracadabra, was all in purple, the one that was sort of like a fancied-up Aperol spritz was all in orange, so you know what you're getting.

Pottymouth 2:27
Yeah, and I'm thinking I have limited days before I should get there before the end of Pride month,

Patti 2:32
yeah. You know, and I'm willing to go a third time if you need. Oh,

Pottymouth 2:35
excellent, because I suddenly have a bunch of free time, sort of. Why is that? So, I'm now.. I.. this feels weird to say it out loud. Everybody, I'm officially fucking retired. Thursday was my last day as a full-time teacher, although I found out that Thursday we didn't actually get paid for, because it was our snow day makeup day. So, we were allowed to leave the building as soon as we were done with our work. It wasn't like we had to stay our full eight hours, because it was a no pay day, because it was a makeup. I don't know, I don't make the rules, I just follow them very,

Patti 3:07
or break them, ready to follow them, or break them, but you don't make them, that's the important no,

Pottymouth 3:11
no, and I, and I'm not going to be, well, I guess you know, I'll follow the rules when I sub, and I am going to, I think, sub occasionally, but I'm retired, so here I am on vacation in Massachusetts for a while, and then there's more fun coming that you all will hear about as our summer progresses.

Patti 3:28
So, did you sing Alice Cooper?

Pottymouth 3:30
I played it, so I, you know, key, but when I came home, I put it on the on the old Apple Music, very loud, and maybe sing along with it, you know. School's out forever, I guess.

Patti 3:47
Got a little headbang.

Pottymouth 3:49
I've been big on the head banging, actually. We did, I mean, Thursday, which is the last day of school, we went to see a local band in the streets in Bethesda, and there was much head banging, like they play a little bit of everything, so there was some salsa, there was some meringue, and there was some crazy train, so you know, I got all my excitement out,

Patti 4:09
and I did see video evidence during Crazy Train. It made me very happy. I

Pottymouth 4:14
didn't stop bouncing, my knees hurt the next day.

Patti 4:18
That's how you know it's a retirement celebration, supposed to say, like a graduation celebration or something. Yeah, it's all it's all in the news. Hey, on today's show, our boyfriends feature slump-busting, teacher appreciation, a couple of cycles, and athletic supporters. We've got Pride, Prejudice, and Taxpayer dollars. We cannot stop cross-training with the World Cup, because there's just so much stuff, and we're union organizing this time in the stands, so cheers is

Pottymouth 4:44
power in the union,

Patti 4:46
you sing more when you're reading,

Pottymouth 4:48
absolutely, and I'm working into this beer, so I have a beer in my hand, it is called Little Fire, and it is a smoked Helles lager made with German pilsner and smoked malt. Is smoked? If you say smoked multiple times on the label, you know it's a good thing. So, this is from a local brewery. Oh, it's from Tree Tree House. I don't think it actually says Treehouse, but there's a picture of the Tree House on it. Yep, Tree House Brewery.

Patti 5:14
So, it must be true. Please bring one home for me, because I like, I liked the smoke-y flavored cocktails. Okay,

Pottymouth 5:19
okay.

Patti 5:20
So, I was at a party at a friend's house on Saturday night, and she was pointing me towards the bar on their porch. She said, "Oh, wait a minute, you like the caramel colored licorice? I'm like, "Nope, nope, not between Memorial Day and Labor Day. It's like wearing white shoes, according to my mom. I'll drink the clear liquor between, you know, memorials. And so, yeah, so we did. We did a little bit of that, but you know, smoke, yeah, all about the smoke,

Pottymouth 5:44
all about the smoke.

Patti 5:46
All right, my friend, you're

Pottymouth 5:47
kicking off the boyfriends.

Patti 5:49
I am okay. So the boyfriends, these are the guys that we pick in the off season. We each pick one guy per team, because something special about them that we like, they're good at baseball, we like the philanthropy they do, they're funny, whatever the bottom line is, somebody we like to have a beer with? We keep one guy, we can keep one guy from year to year. And for me, that's Aldi Richmond. He's been my once and forever boyfriend for several years now. He's on the seven day concussion aisle because he was hit in the ear by a thrown ball. Now you know he's a catcher, so he, you know, gets beaten up a little bit, but he was, and you know, you get, you get hit when you're batting. He was running to first base versus Seattle, hit the ball running to first base. Seattle shortstop, Cole Emerson tags Gunner Henderson, who's running by him to second base, and then turns to my throw to first to make the double play, throws to Josh Naylor, misses Josh Naylor, and hits Adley Richmond in the ear

Pottymouth 6:48
man

Patti 6:49
in the unprotected ear, because you know Adley is a switch hitter, so depending on which way he was hitting, that's where the ear protector is, right? Ear protector was on the outside, he got hit, and I watched the replay, and I think it was just like not a great throw. I've seen quotes, like, "Oh, it was a hideous throw, like, you know, like Colt Emerson was terrible. It was pretty close, like Josh Naylor almost got it right, but it was bad luck for sure, and it wasn't a great throw, but hit him pretty hard, and so he was kind of like off for observation, and so now he's, he's like the seven day concussion IL is sort of like the watch list, just to make sure. I mean, if it was really bad, it would be, you know, it's not great, probably hurt like hell. But anyway, I hope so. All

Pottymouth 7:32
right,

Patti 7:33
yeah. Me too. Me too. I think I think they would have said if it was more than that. Good timing for me, as far as my fantasy league is concerned, is that Drake Baldwin from the Atlanta team just came back. He was out on the aisle for four weeks. He came back on Tuesday, immediately hit a lead-off home run, which was 473 feet long. Stop me if you heard this before, but this is the longest in MLB this season. I said that last week when Nick Kurtz hit a 471 foot home run, so maybe my boyfriends will just keep, like, topping each other by, you know, two feet, you know, every week to keep having the longest home runs.

Pottymouth 8:12
That's 473 is big, though, like, although 475 to round it off, somebody's got to, you know, come up with that.

Patti 8:19
So, like, the manager of Atlanta, Walt Weiss, said some guys are just different, Drake's different. So, interestingly, so he started the game as catcher, you know, had this lead-off hit. Then the weather turned, so they suspended the game in the second inning. They resumed the game the next day, you know, they did like a split double header, and he came back as a DH, as opposed to catching. I went over four, so that's not great. But, boy, that lead-up home run sure was good. So, because, like, there they got a little trouble there with the whole backup catching situation. Atlanta just traded right-handed pitcher Hunter Stratton to Pittsburgh for Joey Bart, former boyfriend of mine. He was my boyfriend in 2020 we knew the Giants. He actually grew up near Atlanta, so the Atlanta baseball team was his team growing up, and he went to Georgia Tech, so he's so.. this is actually pretty exciting for him to be able to play for this team that he was really meant a lot, and he said, like, Brian McCann, you know, long time catcher for Atlanta, was like, you know, one of his idols, and they gave him jersey number 16, which was McCann's jersey number.

Pottymouth 9:25
Oh, that's great, but Chris kind of miss him, though. That's, that's rough.

Patti 9:29
Yeah, yeah. I have a story for you on the occasion of your retirement. If you remember when I first introduced JJ Weather Holt, my, my St. Louis boyfriend, I talked about how, when he was in fifth grade, his teacher said, "You know, what do you want to be when you grow up? And everybody wrote down cards, and she took pictures of them with their cards, and he said, "MLB player. And, of course, Caitlin Ingoldsby, the fifth-grade teacher, kept that photo and posted it when he debuted. Right.

Pottymouth 9:56
So good. That's so good.

Patti 9:58
Well, the Cardinal. Just had teacher appreciation at Busch Stadium, so JJ invited, and I swear to God, on social media they list her as mrs. Ingoldsby, because she's their fifth-grade teacher. He invited her, and she threw out the first picture to him. Isn't that great?

Pottymouth 10:16
I really need to teach more, maybe, so that I could teach a prospective baseball player. Holy shit, that's so awesome.

Patti 10:24
And then you know, in front of his fifth-grade teacher, who he said he was going to be an MOB player, he had a three-hit night, so yay for that.

Pottymouth 10:30
That's, you know, wanting to impress the teacher. I can totally respect that. But now I'm having second thoughts. Maybe I need to know that's not no, no, that's not the message I should get out of this, should appreciate, appreciate my fellow teachers for making a difference there. So, I'll talk about my babe, my current baseball boyfriends now, and I'm kind of excited because I feel like for a good long while I've just been talking about shit news, like guys on the IL, or problems, things like that. I have some great turnaround news this week, and despite the fact that my team is still in the basement, now I'm realizing that I got to pay more attention to them and make sure that I'm putting people into play every day, because I think that's my problem. So I had had Jarbit Vivas as my Nats boyfriend, even though I picked him as a Yankee because of the trade, and my Nats boyfriend, because we can't have two on the same team. I had relegated to, you know, not being on my team. Nasim Nunez, and I've been talking about his base stealing and how amazing he's been doing. And this week, on Tuesday night, mr. Potty mouth and I went to the Nationals game, and mr. Potty mouth turned to me and said he's trying to impress you, and you must do something about this. So, basically, if Nassim Nunez does well tonight, you need to shake things up and finally put him on your roster. Well, he had two triples, two walks, and a steal,

Patti 11:56
and two triples is outrageous. It was

Pottymouth 11:58
crazy. One of them I really thought was going to be a home run, but two triples, two ox, and a steal on Negro Leagues Night, and that's do Negro Leagues Night really well. Last year we went, and they had this panel before the game with Josh Gibson's great great grandson and some other wonderful people. This time they not only had Gibson's great great grandson, but they also had our friend Bob Kendrick from the Negro Leagues Museum out there doing the first pitch, and it was hysterical, because he was out there first, just with players, and he was doing that like endless wave at the Jumbotron. Patty can see the big screen, whatever it is, it might not be a Jumbotron, Patty can see me, but they just stand there looking ridiculous for a while, because they know the camera's on them, and they're just waving and waving and waving, and I'm looking, and I'm like, that looks like Bob, that looks like Bob. And so I looked up our numbers, and because we're on a first name basis, I texted him and said, I think that's you on the field. And then, of course, right after I texted him, they actually introduced him, and I was like, okay, I texted you that before they said your name, but we ended up texting and then running into him on the way out, and so there will be a picture that I'll post. I don't know, somewhere, probably Patreon. So back to Ness Nunez had a great night. He's currently tied with Bobby Witt for stolen bases over the season with 28 which is something similar. I've been saying he's been, you know, jocking first and second with Bobby for a while, but the key with Nunez this past week is he started hitting, he had been the lowest average in MLB for a while, and then he, like, got to the Mendoza line. It was really excited. This last week he went 10 for 18, that's a 556 average and a 1.452 ops. This is unreal for a guy who is in the 100 and somethings, for you know, March, April, May, and here we are in June, and he's kicking it, so yay for Nassim Nunez, and now I just have to remember to put him in my lineup, and I didn't check it, so shit, the other guy that was struggling, struggling, struggling, is continuing to come back, which is Caleb Durbin, and that makes me very happy, because my Red Sox player, I put on my line, not regardless of how they're doing, because this is, you know, how I play baseball. He is up to five home runs this season, four of them in the past seven games. So, in March, he had no hits, in both April and May, he was right at the Mendoza line. He had a 200 average for April, 200 average for May, June 288 with an 886 ops. So, the question is, was it the G swing guy, was it the judges guy? Go back to our last two weeks to get the explanation on that, because he's gotten some private hitting coaches, because the Red Sox are just not doing their job, but he, as of today, I just saw him get two hits in the game today that they lost against Seattle, but they won the previous two, so yay for that. He has a four game hitting streak in the last three, he had multiple hits. He also has solid defense, he's in the 80th percentile, and now it's above average.

Pottymouth 14:59
Are tied for seven for third baseman, and last week this is where, like, Patty likes to do the fun statistics that math does for the past seven days, he's batting a 333 average with a 1090 ops, so for Nunez and Durbin, who are both at the bottom of the barrel for averages for a while, to be doing so well this last week, I'm hoping that that holds, and I'm also hoping that Sal Stewart, my Cincinnati Reds guy, is really busting his slump, because I talked about him early in the season when he started off like gangbusters, a 22 year old rookie in his five March games, he was batting 563 with a 1125 ops, and then he went way down, and you know, April and May not so good, June right at 200 This past Tuesday against the Mets, he had a three run home run in the first inning to sort of set the stage for their one win. They ended up winning five to three, so not only did he have a three one home run in the first inning, but in the third inning, so you know how based on balls is 2b has had three because he got a bee sting on his chin while he was up to that in the third inning he looked a little like, you know, it was hurt, and he ended up taking his base, and then he comes back in the sink in the fifth with an RBI single. So, not only did he get four RBI in that game against the Mets, but they were playing the Yankees yesterday and today, and yesterday he had a six RBI game against the New York Yankees at Yankee Stadium, like he's just like a New York buster, is what it seems like. He leads the Reds with 53 RBI on the season, and the next up is Elliot De La Cruz with 37 and he also leads the Reds with 14 home runs. And after his day at Yankee Stadium, he said six RBIs at Yankee Stadium. I'm 22 playing at Yankee Stadium. I'm just so blessed. So power to South Stewart. And then you know how we get those, those alerts when

Patti 17:12
our do

Pottymouth 17:12
players do well, and they're on our fantasy team. I have not, even though I keep them on the team because I'm a shitty manager, I hadn't seen anything from Jacob Marcy, my Marlins guy, and I get this alert on june 17, Jacob Marcy home run. I was like, "Holy shit, it was his fourth of the season, so I'm not used to it. His first since may 15, and then the other like highlight for that game, and I think we'll link to it, hopefully I put the right link in the show notes, is this amazing flying catch to preserve the win against Pittsburgh, to basically, you know, save, save the winning what would have been a home run, where he's just, or it probably would have been like a RBI double or something, but he's leaping through the air, and this is my second bad Batman reference of the season, because Michael Keaton was in the stadium, and so the article was like, Batman's in the stadium, and he's doing this superhero catch, but Batman doesn't fly, whereas Jacob Marcy did fly, so yes, superhero, not Batman, MLB did get that right, but it's just, you know, it's interesting that this is our second Batman appearance on the pod,

Patti 18:22
second, just slightly wrong Batman appearance. Hey, did you get an alert about 15 minutes ago about your guy, Blaze Alexander, because he just hit a two-run homer in the game that the Orioles are now leading the Dodgers 12 to 112,

Pottymouth 18:37
to 112,

Patti 18:39
to one. So it's a good day, that's a good day.

Pottymouth 18:42
Oh man, I really need to check my lineups more often. All right, now that I've got players right right after in the first thing in the morning, right? I can't do it tonight, first thing in the morning.

Patti 18:51
Okay, all right. Hey, so we do follow boyfriends that we've picked in previous years, right? You know, unless they do something egregious, in which case we boot them when they become ex-boyfriends, but former boyfriends, we keep an eye on, and so I've got, like, you know, good news, and, like, God, this guy's kind of dumb, but I keep him around. So, the good news one is Pete Crow Armstrong on Monday versus Colorado hit the first cycle of the MLB season, and, boy, it's lucky he got it in, because you're gonna talk about the second one. So, yeah, so I love that he kind of did it in reverse order. He had a lead off home run, then a triple in the third, and the double in the fifth, and the single in the seventh. He, he then immediately got picked off of first base. Thankfully, doesn't really undo the single. The single still counts for that, so he kind of made out for that, getting a sac fly in the eighth, but I like that he was very orderly and got that done and got that out of the way. Now the guy who's not so bright, and you know, I just.. it's really because for you, I want to say the word groin two weeks in a row,

Pottymouth 19:52
which is interesting, because last week you had so many different ways of saying groin, as I recall from that article, it was like family jewels, and like.. All these other, like, right euphemisms.

Patti 20:02
Yeah, I'm only going to say it two ways today. So, here we go. So, suggestions famously, famously,

Pottymouth 20:09
oh my god.

Patti 20:10
Okay, so he was my boyfriend in 2022 when he was Miami. You know, he's with Yankees now. Doesn't wear a cup, I, you know, I can't explain it. He, yeah. he fouled a ball off of his groin on Thursday. How to leave the game that I almost stopped with the title of the article about this that appeared in The Athletic, because the title was Jazz Chisholm Junior's Pain Was a Million After Groin Strike. We'll continue not wearing a cup, yeah. yeah, so the million was, you know, of course, he was asked about, you know, the pain scale, right? Where does it go, like zero to 10? He said a million. He said, if you ever got hit in the testicles, you'd know.

Pottymouth 20:53
Well, I haven't, but I can still guess. No,

Patti 20:55
me either, but you know, I'll just, I'll imagine, right. And so he spent Thursday night, like icing the parts that were painful, and he still says, "No, I'm not gonna start wearing one, because, you know, I no. So, Aaron Boone also made me laugh. In the same article, there was a quote saying Yankees manager Aaron Boone said the biggest difference between this generation of MOB players from when he played is their lack of a close relationship with athletic supporters.

Pottymouth 21:19
So, you know, we could be athletic supporters, right? We can support our athletes, but yeah, exactly. He forgets Adrian Beltre, who famous.. no, that

Patti 21:30
gets referenced in the.. and so Jazz Chisholm says, "See, I'm in great company, like that's not the point. He had to go to the hospital, yeah, internal bleeding,

Pottymouth 21:39
testicular torsion, that was our like third right

Patti 21:42
this right

Pottymouth 21:44
old daydream belch

Patti 21:45
secular torsion in the third oh my god so I just keep jazz chism around I think for comic really

Pottymouth 21:52
yeah holy cow he did that himself

Patti 21:58
he did that to himself

Pottymouth 21:59
all right so for my former boyfriends, now that I'm Massachusetts, in Massachusetts, I think there's got to be celebration going in Wall Fam, which is where we'd like to think that Kyle Schwarber is from, even though he's not, but I appreciate the T-shirt, it does. I had thanks to Patty, I had that Kyle from Waffan T-shirt, which is awesome. He had a three home run game yesterday, two of those home runs were in the same inning, in the third inning, and here's the like fun stats part: they were both over 450 feet, two home runs in one inning, both over 450 feet. Shockingly, that's the only player in the Statcast era to do that in one inning. It is his fifth career three home run game, only three other players, that's a lot.

Patti 22:48
Yeah, that's a lot. Is

Pottymouth 22:49
crazy. He also had to hustle from first base to home, so that his buddy and teammate, Bryce Harper, could get his first career cycle in the same game, and so Bryce Harper had little sympathy for him, because he, so literally, when Kyle was at first base, that he knew this was going to happen, because that's what Harper had left was the triple, and so he knew that he was going to have to hustle to give him a triple, and the first base coach was like, yeah, you're just going to have to go for it, because he said, if I get thrown out at home, it was the last out of the inning. Is it going to count? No, it's not going to count. Damn it, right. So, Bryce, in his sympathy, said, I mean, he jogged a lot tonight, so for him to bust it out around third like that for me, I definitely appreciate it. Those home runs, right? But then he had to get that triple in, so of course they thought the two of them celebrating things that you know we must be on the only duo to have ever done this, but no, Da Yankees did it in Philadelphia in 1932 Lou Gehrig had a four home run game and Tony Lazari hit for the cycle. Wow,

Patti 23:58
that is so many, so many runs, very cool. I like that. You know, the assumption was, of course, Harper hit a triple down.

Pottymouth 24:07
You're gonna have to really run.

Patti 24:10
Oh my god. All right, you know, I'm book club girl, so I have to use the phrase Pride and Prejudice. Talk about the upheaval in the world of month of June pride celebrations around baseball, so I'm also going to add and taxpayer dollars, especially for this first one, which is the one about the Giants pitchers. Why is it always the pitchers? I mean, like when we talk about collective bargaining, it always seems like the executive board is made up of mostly of pitchers. We make jokes about, oh, these are the smart players, or whatever, and yet they're also apparently the bigots, because this is the second time that Pride caps have really made the news and refusal of pitchers to wear the caps. Last time it was the race, this time it's the pitcher. So, last week, Friday, so you know, week ago it was Pride night in San Francisco, we. Was the home of the very first Pride night. It was like HIV awareness night in 1996 I think. So they've been doing it the longest in San Francisco, of course, right? So three pitchers appeared in the game Friday night wearing the Pride caps, but they wrote Bible verses on the caps, sometimes kind of like overriding, like the logo part, the rainbow logo part, and this is starting pitcher Landon Roop, and relievers JT Brubaker and Ryan Walker. Right, Sam Henschees wore his regular uniform cap, not the pride cap, so it's unclear whether he is involved in the actual upheaval because he did not deface any MLB uniform, so here's what happened. MLB issued a warning to the players who wrote on their caps to not wear that hat in the future, basically, and it cited the actual uniform regulation that appears in the collective bargaining agreement, which means everybody has agreed to this. The workers, which we, the players in this case, and management has agreed to these uniform regulations, which says a player may not write, attach a fix, and write, or otherwise display nicknames or messages on apparel or play equipment. So, basically, don't write on your uniform.

Pottymouth 26:17
Yeah, no matter what it is,

Patti 26:19
no matter what it is. Yeah, it doesn't say, you know, it can't, you know, you can't use political things, you can't, it says you can't do it. Period, it's content free, right? It wouldn't be in the CBA if it was content based, can't be, right? It'd be illegal. So they said MLB has said they've issued the same standard warning. Hey, cut it out, don't do that anymore, don't wear that thing anymore, for things like Happy Mother's Day, or you know, I love you, or hey so and so, whatever. You just can't do it. They also don't make those warnings public, generally, so it's kind of hard to track how often does it really happen, right? MLB says they're doing it, you know, we don't know, but they probably do, because it's a pretty. it's not. This is not disciplinary action. This is a warning. They're not being fined, they're not being sat. Nothing bad has happened to them. They're just like, "Hey, that's against the rules, don't do it anymore.

Pottymouth 27:11
Remind,

Patti 27:11
that's it. No disciplinary action. Okay. So, on Thursday, almost a week later, starts hitting the fan because, because elected officials and others just can't stay out of things that have nothing to do and aren't even a problem, okay. So Republican Senator Josh Holly expresses his concern to the commissioner of baseball about a pattern of discrimination against Christian players. Oh

Pottymouth 27:37
my god,

Patti 27:38
he said he's talking about, like, the response I just read from MLB about it not being, you know, content-based. He says that that response, that it wasn't about the message, quote, is dubious, given that MLB is openly promoting a political viewpoint and possibly compelling adherence to that viewpoint, and if by viewpoint you mean we welcome everybody to come to a baseball game, that's the viewpoint. It's not saying you have to be this kind of person or that kind of person, and says we welcome everybody to the baseball game, and tonight we're celebrating these folks,

Pottymouth 28:12
right?

Patti 28:12
That's all they're doing, that's what we're doing, right. So then on Friday, the Department of Justice, these now, now we're entering your federal tax dollars. DOJ starts investigating whether those pictures were discriminated against on religious grants. Okay, so then the next day, Saturday, even those pictures are like, what the hell, people cut it up. So Brubaker, Walker, and Hench is all said we don't feel discriminated, like back off, right now. I agree that they did a bad thing. I don't agree with their viewpoint, but they're also like messing up, like they knew what the consequence was. They got the consequence, they have, you know, the fingers shake, they don't do that anymore, and they're okay, and they got their point across, and you know, whatever. So Brubaker told the Chronicle it's just people getting a hold of something and turning it into something, right? Then, if you live in Missouri or Florida, your state tax dollars are now going to a stupid

Pottymouth 29:14
seriously,

Patti 29:16
because

Pottymouth 29:17
in those states,

Patti 29:18
because the attorneys general for Florida and Missouri, both states with two MLB teams, right, are spending tax dollars threatening MLBs, and we're going to have a probe, we're going to have an investigation, and let's quote the league promises to not discipline players for refusing to wear pride, not uniforms, and for writing, writing Bible verses on hats. Well, cool. That's what we did. There was no disciplinary action. Why are we spending time on this? What? How these people should have their salaries docked? Yeah, you know, we find that into the general fund for the state, because that's ridiculous. There was no disciplinary action. I'm yelling. Yeah,

Pottymouth 29:55
well, I don't blame you. I mean, this is Florida that spent tax dollars on removing rainbow. Sidewalks, and then guarding areas overnight, because people were using sidewalk chalk to make rainbow sidewalks, and they spent money to have police prevent people from shocking the street in rainbow colors. What the actual fuck, like, why put any attention into that? It's, it's a, it's a horrent, you know, and it is, and I think that, that calling it political is dehumanizing, because this isn't, this isn't about politics, it's about human beings and respecting human beings for who they are, and that's just super, super shitty.

Patti 30:36
Tell us a good price story.

Pottymouth 30:38
Oh, but first, I want to give credit to Clayton Kershaw for coming up with, I don't know if he came up with it, but he did this last year. Remember when, with the Dodgers, he wrote the Bible verse, and nobody said anything, nobody did anything, whatever. So there is less precedent.

Patti 30:54
We don't know if he got a warning, or that's true, right? So that's one of the examples that was listed, like there are examples of these things happening in the past without taxpayer dollars being spent on a whole freak out, you know, country-wide. He probably got the warning, he's like, 'Yeah, sure, screw it, I won't wear it again, it's fine, you know. I just, you know, I got my point across, I'm done. I'll take the warning, okay?

Pottymouth 31:17
Yep, but he's inspired a whole bunch of pictures, San Francisco, of all places, too. That's just the fans have got to be bullshit. Actually, there's a really good article, I think it's in Outsports by a San Francisco fan, totally condemning this, and that's definitely worth a read.

Patti 31:32
Grant Brisby also wrote a piece in The Athletic about this, saying, "Hey, pitchers, you're missing the point, you know, it's about making people feel welcome. It's not saying you agree with anything about them. It's just, it's just like you said, it's being human.

Pottymouth 31:48
So I am going to say nice things about the Yankees right now in a similar thread. Patty looks over

Patti 31:56
shoulder, hell freezing over. Can you see it from here? It would be cooler in this room if that were the case,

Pottymouth 32:01
it's really crazy. So, for a long time, you know, we are counting who was doing Pride nights, and because we've been doing this podcast for 10 years now, and for a little while it was just the Yankees and the Rangers who weren't, and so I got to criticize the Yankees heavily, heavily for it. However, at the time, we even mentioned that their rationale for not doing pride night was because they didn't do any nights, they were the Yankees, they have their one uniform, you know, they, they do things the traditional way, and so they weren't doing Pride night because they had no special nights like that, so apparently they wanted to figure out a way to celebrate Pride without having a Pride night, and I think we even mentioned this back when it started in 2019 that the senior VP of Corporate and Community Relations, Brian Smith, sat down with the co-owner of the Stonewall and said, like, sort of brainstorm together with what can we do, and they came out with something where he said basically we want to do something that wasn't a night, wasn't a month, but something ongoing, and so there's a scholarship that is a collaboration between the Yankees, the Stone Wall Inn, which is in New York City, and you know very famously that's where Pride started as a riot at the Stonewall with trans women leading the thing, and New York City public schools. So, the three of these organizations together have an annual scholarship program that they've had since 2019 which was the Stonewall's 50th. So, an appropriate time to do this, and it goes $10,000 to five different high school students in New York City, one from each borough, so they now have their Pride Night, and they sort of like backtracked it, and they call Legacy of Pride Night to make it seem like they've always been doing this, and it was this past Wednesday night, so they invited these five kids there to the game, they had a pre-game ceremony with the kids on the field, representatives from the Stonewall Inn and the New York Department of Education and the Yankees, and what, what moved me the most. I hate to say this about this article, GM Brian Cashman, who not only I but the Yankees fans have have criticized over the years, because you know it's been a minute since they've won a World Series, but he said, quote, being involved with this is the most meaningful thing professionally that I've been a part of. So, kudos to the GM of the Yankees to come out and be that, you know, outwardly supportive of Pride. The recipient, one of the recipients, Ocean Miller, Ocean Hiller, sorry, Ocean Hiller, who I believe is the Manhattan recipient, said, quote, this Pride month we're seeing a lot of companies abandon queer and trans communities out of fear of persecution from the government, so it means a lot to me that the Yankees are continuing to materially support our community. I plans to major in English, and says I've always been passionate about storytelling, and especially as a queer and trans person, I think storytelling is a crucial way to humanize us and show the world what we're fighting for, and so these five young people, I am really impressed, and you know, grateful that the Yankees are putting their money in a good place and giving them the exposure and saying positive things about this, especially like, who would think that the Yankees would be more progressive than the Giants? I don't know,

Patti 35:32
I don't know. So I thought I was pretty solid on this story, and then out sports made me go, huh, this is about an independent team, the Atlantic League's York Revolution, right, York, Pennsylvania, not far from here. The landmark when you drive through York on the highway is the big statue of the guy holding up the barbell, that's when you know you're, you know, you're almost to Harrisburg, but apparently their team is made up of a lot of people who are basically bigots, so they had to forfeit their last Thursday night pride game, which was their 11th annual Pride Night versus the Southern Maryland Blue Crabs, because a majority, not a couple, a majority of the players on the team refused to wear their pride jerseys, they could not even field nine players so depressed for the lineup, right, and then the club decided that, quote, hosting the event is more important than forcing players to wear jerseys that they're not comfortable with in playing the game, so the team, the organization, and also the location, the ball field, but the venue said it values inclusivity, and the players' decisions are completely inconsistent with those values. So, by forfeiting the game, the team takes a loss, right, that they take the loss, but the venue was still hosting Pride events, which they call the free and fun celebration and recognition and inclusion on Thursday. I didn't get a good picture of what that meant, but whatever activities they were going to have around the game, they had, we know, like some of the players actually showed up in their jerseys, and they were autographing things, they were showing their support for the community, but the game didn't happen, and so the team had to take a loss. The team, also a team as a whole, ownership is pissed, right? But they think, you know, they said we are donating $10,000 to the Rainbow Rose Center, which is an LGBTQIA plus community center that serves York and Adams counties as a gesture of support. Right, so they are putting money into the community, as well as hosting this event that was everything except for the baseball for Pride Night. Now I think I'm still on this side where I think taking the loss shows there are consequences to your bigotry, right? No one is saying you have to be best friends with people in the gay community, they're just saying we welcome everybody, we are inclusive, right? And if you can't even do that, fucking take the loss, I'm okay with that. On the other hand, out sports is really angry about this. Outsports is mad that they didn't just go ahead and play the game in their regular uniforms, really, because what - here's what they said. They said this is giving the public the opportunity to blame the LGBTQ community for the game cancelation, right? So, like, they're not going to blame those players, there it can be easily spun to blame the LGBTQ community. The quote that I put out here is with the players wearing normal game jerseys, like for Pride Night, right, the LGBTQ community supporters and fans could still come to the game, wave rainbow flags, celebrate, have a good time, and raise some money for the community, so they felt like that game opportunity to show the inclusivity to be fans of baseball was lost. At the same time, one could put a target on the gay community as the reason that game got canceled. It's your fault, you were trying to make people do things they didn't want to do, because it's against their religion or against their tiny little peep brains, whatever it is. And so I thought that is also legitimate,

Pottymouth 39:29
you know. What just thinking about that, it would have also done, or it could have also done, is forced those outed, the people who were refusing to wear the pride jerseys. So, you know, just to give a name, Jacob Teeter, the first baseman was out and at the Pride event, and very vocal about supporting Pride, and so his name is out there, and his image, and his Pride jersey is out there, but the guys who refuse to play, their names aren't anywhere,

Patti 39:58
yeah, and how they. Had they said, okay, you can wear your regular uniform, then people could say, "Oh,

Pottymouth 40:04
there's the bigot,

Patti 40:06
there's the bigot, but then you know what, what good's going to come of that? I don't know, but I liked it, but Teeters, his interview was great, because he said we may have nothing in common but baseball, but if we have baseball in common, that's a starting point, that's the thing that we can, you know, start from and build, you know, build our relationship, our, you know, we can have a conversation about this, we can be part of a larger community because we have this thing in common.

Pottymouth 40:31
Absolutely,

Patti 40:31
and I thought, I thought he really represented very well, so, and I'm, you know, there were more, more players there, also wearing their pride jerseys, talking to fans, you know, autographing things, you know, playing whatever they were doing out there. I'm happy about that. Yeah, so part of me is agreeing with the, yeah, let those guys wear their regular jerseys, and then that's painting targets on them, and do I really feel okay about that? But kind of,

Pottymouth 40:56
but they're doing it to themselves, right? You know, if you know, they should, if this is what they're so believing in, then they should be out there with their beliefs. Also,

Patti 41:06
one of the fans said, you know, grow up, be a man, your boss tells you to wear the uniform, you wear the uniform, right? Like, okay, well, there's that too. But so, there's, there's so many sides to this, but I do think it was a really interesting way to act on this. It's like, fine, you're gonna be a bigot, you know. We don't agree with you, but all right, we'll take the loss, and that's gonna show up on your record.

Pottymouth 41:28
Well, and it's shit like what you just talked about with the Department of Justice getting on fucking MLB for this, that's just enabling these guys and making people more brazen about being bigots, because they're being backed by, you know, the current administration. Yep, like all of a sudden it's okay to be an asshole.

Patti 41:46
I mean, we talked about that during Trump one, which was, you know, it doesn't mean they're like there aren't all of a sudden more people who are thinking of these thoughts. There's just more people who feel comfortable acting on things that are harmful to the larger community. Yeah.

Pottymouth 42:01
Oh boy, all right.

Patti 42:03
Let's cross trade.

Pottymouth 42:03
Talk about making peace and sports, bringing people together. I want to talk about the World Cup. It's happening now. It's super exciting. I spent last night watching the Ecuador Curacao game with my dad and stepmom, and explaining soccer to them. I was like, it's like hockey, but you run, and like, there's a lot of similarities, there's offsides and things like that, but what totally freaked them out was stoppage time. So, at the end of the 45 minutes, I was like, they're gonna add on some time, and we don't know how much, it's just gonna be some magic time that gets added on. That's

Patti 42:35
the weirdest rule that

Pottymouth 42:36
was super fun, but the game was in Kansas City, and Kansas City Royal, so here's the like baseball connection. Kansas City Royals showed up, and actually, you know, at a lot of these games, they're showing all the famous folks in the in the stands, because they're the ones who can fucking afford the prices, right? But Salvador Perez was there with my current baseball boyfriend, so Salvador Perez, past pick of mine, with my current pick, Card Carter Jensen, and Starling Marte were all there rooting for I don't know Ecuador or Curacao during the game, but Curacao is a tiny, tiny country. Curacao's population is around 150,000 people, so they were bringing up that that's like half the population pretty much could fit in the stadium for most of these games, because if you looked at the stadium for this, it was yellow, which was Ecuador. So many Ecuadorian fans, and I was like, well, how many people from Curacao are there? Like, they, you would need a lot of them to come here to actually have a presence in the stadium, but Kansas City, Philadelphia, and Houston are the three stadiums where Curacao has played, or will be playing, each of those stadiums hold about 69,000 people, so that's like, you know, fairly close to half the overall population. Curacao totally exceeded expectations last night, so they, their first game, they lost to Germany, understandably. Last night for me was a real heartbreaker, because I was rooting for Ecuador. That's where I learned Spanish. I have great friends in Ecuador. They had lost their first game in the final moments to the Ivory Coast. They really needed this win, and they did not get it. It was a 00 tie, which folks who don't like soccer really don't understand, that's definitely one of the reasons. So, for Ecuador, this was devastating because it meant that they didn't have a win, they're not going to move on. For Curacao, it was huge because they got a point, you get three points for a win and one point for a tie, and this is Curacao's first time in the World Cup, and they got a point, not only did they get that point, but their, their goalie, Eloy Room, tied, or was one short of, depending on how you count, and I'm going to link to an article that explains this better than I can in two minutes of Tim Howard US goalies record of 15 saves in a game. Not only is Aloy room historical for that, but he's also super buddies with Kenley Jansen, and so there's an MOB article that you got to read with Kenley Jansen's reaction to it, the I don't know if it's President or Prime Minister, whoever the leader of Curacao called Kenley Jansen, like they've all got to be buddies, this is a tiny country with big stars called Kentley Jansen and said, Now you know what we feel like when we're watching you pitch, because Kenley was like on the edge of his seat watching his buddy as a goalie, and he said, You're right, like I didn't know whether to stand or sit or when to go to the bathroom, like yes,

Patti 45:35
and what is the stoppage

Pottymouth 45:37
time? How much more time does he have to like save goals, but fun, you know, connection there, and Saddam Raffaele was wearing his Curacao team, so it's just amazing that this tiny island is having so much success. Like, what's going on? What's its sun? Is it the water? Who knows? Another fun thing about soccer is the yellow cards and the red cards, right? So, when you have an air foul, right, which we in basketball or football, they have a yellow card, which is warning, and shit, I didn't look it up, I forget if it's two or three yellow cards equals red card, but if you get a red card, that's really bad, you're out for the game, and you're suspended for the next game, and when you're out for the game, your team is playing one person short, so it's like a hockey situation. The first player to get a red card for covering his mouth happened on Friday, Paraguay's Miguel Amiron, and this is a new rule by FIFA, and the reason why is to stop racist and homophobic remarks. So, what was happening. Unfortunately, there were a lot of incidents in soccer of people saying really horrible shit, and so now if you cover your mouth so that the cameras can't see what you're saying, you get an automatic red card. Is that I'm wondering, like, can we transfer that to other sports? Like, how does, how would that work? I think, like baseball, the problem is like they cover their mouths with their gloves to chat, but I don't know.

Patti 47:07
Yeah, I mean, how would you know? But also, what if what if you're like, you know, coughing or sneezing or whatever, and

Pottymouth 47:14
they do say that it's it's when it's clearly something confrontational, so like if you're joking around and you cover your mouth, it's okay, but if you're like clearly confrontational with the other team, and you cover your mouth, you're out of the game.

Patti 47:30
I like the intent. I feel like there's a lot of room for deciding how many extra minutes in stoppage play. I mean, there's no formula for this. Yeah, well,

Pottymouth 47:40
he's out of the game. I, there's some other no,

Patti 47:42
but what I'm.. but I mean, it's like I think like the intent is the eye of the beholder.

Pottymouth 47:46
Gotcha,

Patti 47:47
it's what I'm saying. It's like, okay, you're covered. Your mouth, I don't think you're kidding around, I think you're being confrontational. How do you know? Interesting, it

Pottymouth 47:53
didn't hurt Paraguay in that game, they still won one over one zero over Turkey, but you know now he can't play in the next game, and we'll see what happens. The other World Cup notice or news story that's really big is kind of the partying of the fans, and here's where I see a real political and racial dichotomy. So, there's a lot of celebration here in Boston of the Scottish fans, and I give a minute to that, and then there's also a lot of notice on the Norwegian fans who have been all sorts of fun, but the non-Northern European fan bases are not getting the same sort of celebration, so I think that there's, you know, a little not so subtle racism here in Boston, the Scottish fans have had a fucking blast, so they're in the World Cup, in the men's World Cup, for the first time in 28 years, and their song and chant and theme is No Scotland, No Party, and they are Bostonian, like they party like Bostonians, but they drink even more, so they had june 14 was Scottish Heritage Day at Fenway, which, of course, they planned for the Scottish being in town for the Boston game or the Foxboro game, rather, but counted as Boston, and they took over Fenway Park, and they wore their kilts and played their bad pipes outside of Fenway Park. The Sam Kennedy, president of the Boston Red Sox, wrote this amazing letter to them that I think we can link to, about how you know they're the best fans, and they got so much out of having them at Fenway, and because of this kinship between the Tartan Army and Boston, Glasgow and Boston are now going to be sister cities, and this is going to involve quote innovation, education, sustainability, tourism, and economic development. Notably, no, notingly, notedly, no, that's it. Halfway through my beer, both of these cities are led by women, so Boston. Mayor Michelle Wu, and they don't call her Mayor, but it's Lord Provost, which I think is an amusing title for a woman. Oh, I

Patti 50:07
want to be Lord Provost for sure.

Pottymouth 50:08
Jacqueline, maybe Lord

Patti 50:10
Provost of the Fantasy Light.

Pottymouth 50:11
Sure, if you want to switch from commission to Lord Provost, I'll vote for that. The two of them have come to this agreement, and everybody is super excited about it, especially of all the Scottish folks celebrating in Boston. Cheers, you know that the pub that used to be Cheers, or you know, from where the Cheers TV show, for those of us of a certain age, was based. Their beer sales were up 75% Sam Adams Brewery ran out of Boston Lager multiple times, and you don't have to go far in Instagram to see heartfelt posts by the Scottish talking about what wonderful people Bostonians are, and how they get a bad rap in general, but they've been so great for us. So, unfortunately, they left today for Miami, and already they're saying Miami, no, Boston here. So one of the fun things that the Scottish like to do is put traffic cones on top of statues. Did you see this? It's hysterical. So you know all the statues of like whatever revolutionary hero on a horse, they climb them and put a traffic cone on the cop. And in Boston, everybody cheered, including the police. They thought it was hysterical. Miami, they got called on it right away. Take that cone down, and they're literally an Instagram post saying, like, excuse me, Chief of Police from Boston, can you please call the guy down here and tell him that we're just having fun.

Patti 51:36
Can I just tell you that not Boston could not contain the Scotts. I had an on the ground report from our intern, who was on Cape Cod, who was, who spent the week in Provincetown, who said, yeah, I went to this bar, lot Scott's everywhere, and I ordered a lager, and the wait staff kind of shook me off, and then I ordered a colch, and the wait staff shook me off, no beer, and and ended up with I had a wheat beer, because they kicked all the other kegs, and restaurants and bars on Cape Cod in Provincetown are saying, we kicked all the kegs, and we can't get any more.

Pottymouth 52:07
They

Patti 52:07
right, I mean, yeah, they

Pottymouth 52:08
actually, a lot of them stayed in Providence, Rhode Island, because it was a cheaper place to stay, and commuted up, and though then they donated a whole bunch of money to various charities in Providence to give thanks for the hospitality there, so very

Patti 52:22
nice all

Pottymouth 52:23
over the place. The Norwegians were check out those posts because they were rowing up escalators and all over Times Square, and you know, lots of partying there as well. Not quite as pervasive as the Scots, but they're out there. And then there's the folks that are banned, and it's all folks from countries where people have brown or black skin, and it's just, you know, it sort of goes back to US immigration policies when you look at the restrictions, and how they, you know, Asians were the first to be restricted, and Southern and Eastern Europe, way before Northern Europe, and so it's, it's a shitty pattern, it's a super shitty pattern. So we've talked about the bans for Iran and Iraq and Haiti, and last week I talked about the Iraqi striker, whose name is Ayman Hussein, who was detained for seven hours, apparently. While he was detained, his phone was taken. His phone was searched. The team photographer, who is held for 10 hours, was then not allowed to come into the country and sent back to Iraq. So, two weeks later, Hussein scored his first outing, first game, second Iraqi goal in World Cup history. They did lose four to one to Norway in quote Boston Stadium, which is hysterical. It's called Boston Stadium, even though it's in Foxboro, but you know his. So to make this even more like heart-wrenching, his father was in the Iraqi army and was killed by Al-Qaeda. So Al-Qaeda is the terrorist group that was found by Osama bin Laden, who you know, in charge of the bombings in this country, the Twin Towers and the Pentagon, and for his father, who was fighting against that to be killed, and then this guy is being banned from our country, and well, not banned in the end, but held up for seven hours. He said that his, he wanted to quit soccer as a kid, but his mom said no. And not only was his dad killed, but his other brother also joined the Iraqi army, was kidnapped, and disappeared, and nothing else had been ever heard from him. So, the last and only World Cup appearance for Iraq was 40 years ago, and so for these people, this should be a celebration, and they should be welcomed, especially that you know this is a guy whose family was fighting the forces that have been enemies of the United States in many ways, and he's treated like shit, so. And it, of course, it goes on, so Iran, who talked about also not allowed to stay in the United States, they're forced to have their whole team stay in Mexico throughout the World Cup, despite the fact that their games are being played in the United States, they're filing a complaint against FIFA, they had a two two draw with New Zealand and Los Angeles, and they're saying that this was affected by they literally have a 24 hour limit of being in the United States, they can't come 24 hours before the game and they can't stay 24 hours after the game, they have to get on a fucking plane and fly back to Mexico. Good God, yeah, the Football Federation of Iran believes these restrictions are inconsistent with the principles of providing equal conditions for participating teams and may affect their technical preparations. Is their official team statement? It's ridiculous. Ridiculous, one of their main players, Medi Tarami, said, quote, We're in a bad situation, and to be honest, we're tired of it, because we've been facing many problems for the past two months. It's affecting our team. We just want peace, which is also FIFA standard. They just want peace because our country has been bombing them. You know, it's.. it's a horribly complex situation. But what it comes down to is the World Cup is supposed to be non-political. It's supposed to bring people together, and the host country is supposed to be a peaceful country, and that's not what we are. So, this team that's staying in Mexico, they flew back to LA today on june 27 They're playing in Seattle, that is not close to Mexico at all. So, that flight is absolutely going to affect them totally unjust.

Pottymouth 56:42
And then there's the countries who are affected by the $15,000 visa bond quote that we talked about last week, also that limits their fans from coming, unless they're willing to pay $15,000 just to come here, and it's a bond, but you have to have $15,000 on hand, so Cape Verde, one of those countries, their goalie, bless him, I love the old guys, 40 years old, Vozinia saved, and apparently it wasn't 15, he had seven saves, seven saves to keep a 00 tie against Spain, which totally rocked the world. Everybody expected Spain to win this game, and after he won, he fell down crying on the field, which is understandable in general, because you know when you're emotional, you're playing the World Cup. They just outdid any expectations of them, but he was crying because his mom couldn't be there, because she couldn't pay the $15,000 visa bond to come now, apparently that there was, there were a lot of articles about this, and his picture, his image was all over the press, State Department came around, they stepped in, Mom is here, and she's at the game today against Uruguay, but how many other players are out there who are not the game you know, saving goalie whose family can't come because they can't pay $15,000 Is we should not be hosting this. And then to add to the fun with American capitalism, so one of the reasons that they call Boston Stadium Boston Stadium, even though it's not in Boston, is because they also can't use the word Gillette Stadium, so the World Cup has this deal where nothing in the stadiums can represent any company that is not a sponsor of the World Cup, so they literally have to cover up, and you know, stadiums all over this country have sponsors, they have to cover up the name of the sponsor of the stadium,

Patti 58:43
that is a lot of scrubbing, that is so much cleaning, right?

Pottymouth 58:47
Right, but what, Gillette,

Patti 58:49
they can fix it in Photoshop.

Pottymouth 58:51
I know, right? No, apparently the people there cannot see the word Gillette in Gillette Stadium, but you know what the folks from Gillette did, they covered it up in what looks like shaving cream, so what this is, and then stadium, which I think is in Texas, did the same thing. They covered up the Levi's tag, but it's in the Levi's tag shape, and so everybody who knows what it is knows what it is, so you know, letter of the law. All right, last bit about soccer, women like to end on the high note of the six women who are reffing in the World Cup now, which is all sorts of historic. Turns out the assistant referee, referee Brooke Mayo from the US, is the first openly gay referee of any gender in men's World Cup history. She ref this past week in the Czech Republic South Africa game. At that game, Tori Pencil became the first United States-born woman to be the lead ref for a game, and the second woman ever to lead ref for the game, and plus the third ref on the field, Catherine Nesbitt, made it the first all-whim. An on-field reffing for the World Cup. Yay for ending with a happy.

Patti 1:00:05
Oh, nicely done. Nicely done. Okay, super quick. We've been talking about, you know, the MLB PA, you know, the CBA negotiations, bargaining happening for Major League Baseball. It's not just the players on the field, the ushers in Camden Yards are starting to organize in the off season. They contacted the United Food and Commercial Workers, our national union, the UFCW Local 27 and said, "Hey, we want to organize, and here's some of the things we want to do. That was the off season. They actually began meeting formally to move this along once the baseball season started. The ushers at Camden Yards are paid $15 an hour, which is the minimum wage. Washington and Philadelphia, the two closest ballparks to Camden Yards, pay between 18 and $20 Right, they're not just talking about wages, they're also talking about getting regular performance reviews that are equitable, they're talking about equitable discipline and talking about retention from year to year, like not waiting to last minute to find out if you're going to have this job again for the next season. So basically, all of these things are about making it more of a professional job for these workers, early stages, but fingers crossed, good work, you guys deserve it, you work so freaking hard,

Pottymouth 1:01:20
so so true, and one thing in there that I loved was one of the negotiation pieces was access to the giveaways for staff, and when we were at the Negro Leagues night on Tuesday night, the giveaway was awesome. It's a Homestead Grays jersey, but the quality - I've got to show it to you - it's linen and cotton, it's light, it's so lovely for the summer, and so we were wearing our jerseys, and we went to get our beer, and we said to the beer woman, aren't these jerseys great? Don't you have one? And she said, no, we don't get the giveaways,

Patti 1:01:53
no.

Pottymouth 1:01:53
And I was like, that is crazy, like, how much more effort would that be to make a couple 100 more and give it to your concessions folks, like what a statement. So, if this works for the O's, I think the Nats need to get in line too.

Patti 1:02:08
Yeah, the thing about that is that that will be a hard one to negotiate, because those are always done by outside sponsors, right? It's not the team, or like, your team ownership is saying, "Hey, we're gonna do this giveaway. It's an outside sponsor saying, hey, I will make this bobble head, and I'll give, I'll give you 10,000 okay? Right. So, I agree that absolutely, that should be included, but I don't know how you bargain, right?

Pottymouth 1:02:30
Well, as for 11,000 there you

Patti 1:02:32
go. All right, hey, so we have this crazy fantasy league with really crazy rules. This is the league for which I am the Lord Provost. There's only been one change this week, and that is Karen's crew, once again leapfrogging over All-Star Cobalt 112 back into second place. So those two switched, so still Trident's tap rooms number one, but Karen's crew is second. All-Star Cobalt 112 is third. Bono's boyfriend's wicked awesome at five, Sonny Slammers at six, me at seven, McClaining Pitching Machine at eight, I'm at nine, so you know there it is, but not a lot weird, because we've been having a lot of upheaval and not so much upheaval this week. What do you have going on this man? I gotta, I

Pottymouth 1:03:14
gotta start paying attention to my fantasy league, because it's one thing to be in last place, but it's another thing to be so embarrassingly in last place, I've got to pay attention to that, and

Patti 1:03:23
I have some time.

Pottymouth 1:03:24
Yeah, and then I have some fine. I do want to some time. I do want to remind everybody to vote. We are in the all-star voting. Well, also vote. We have primaries, like Maryland has primary on Tuesday. I voted by mail ahead of time. If you have a primary coming up, please, please pay attention. There is stuff happening. We need you to vote, and we also need you to vote for our all stars. What I figured out, because we've been at this so long, is that I could do an all potty mouth ballot. So, my all potty mouth ballot, I tried to do, you know, most of my current guys who are doing well and on the ballot, and then I went for my formers to fill it in, and my only place of struggle is where you actually exceed, and that's the Al outfield. I am short of stellar outfielders in the American League. I was so tempted to combine potty mouth and Red Sox, but those are your guys, that's William Brau and Saddam Rafaella both definitely deserve it, and we're not going to vote for Duran, because, fuck that. So, yeah, so my outfield is little itchy, but you know, I guess that helps the National League vote.

Patti 1:04:33
There you go, there you go. I am looking forward to going to Pride Night in Baltimore on Friday night. They have City Connect Pride jerseys, which is pretty cool. They're hosting the national, so I get to see two of my favorite teams play each other in Baltimore. All right, friends, let us know what's happening around you. Baseball-related pride stuff. I'm hoping you have more good stories and bad stories. We want to hear all the stories, so please find us on social media.

Pottymouth 1:04:58
Send all your stories. To us at Blue Sky NC IB Podcast, we'll also check those Twitter messages, Facebook and Instagram, or No Crying and B Ball. And to make sure that we can keep doing what we're doing, you want to join our Patreon, that's P A T R E O n.com/no Crying and B Ball, and for as little as $1 a month or as much as $5 a month, maybe we have to raise our ceiling, but you can make sure that we keep doing this, because we are completely listener run, and we really, really appreciate every Patreon dollar, and if everybody does little, we get to do this.

Patti 1:05:31
Thank you, friends. We appreciate you all the time. Go see some live baseball. Fight the man is the right thing to do. Send your game balls to Meredith. And until next week, say good night, Body Mount.

Pottymouth 1:05:39
Good night, Piner. Bye. they

Patti 1:05:58
were beating the Dodgers 10 to one. Holy

Pottymouth 1:06:00
shit,

Patti 1:06:01
I know

Pottymouth 1:06:01
that's amazing.

Patti 1:06:03
Yeah, Alonzo hit a three run homer right before I shut everything off to come back. I'm like, okay,

Pottymouth 1:06:08
wow,

Patti 1:06:09
hopefully it'll be okay.