Houston Astros: Caught Stealing | The Game Within the Game | 2
American Scandal
Wondery
4.6 • 18.7K Ratings
🗓️ 22 October 2024
⏱️ 42 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
As Jeff Luhnow and the Houston Astros work towards rebuilding the team, they hire veteran outfielder Carlos Beltran and bench coach Alex Cora to help guide their roster of younger, less experienced players. Both Beltran and Cora arrive in Houston with deep insights into the game, including the intricacies of sign stealing. And after the league expands access to instant replay in 2014, the veterans look for ways to take advantage of the new technology.
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Wundry Plus subscribers can binge new seasons of American scandal early and ad free right now. |
| 0:05.7 | Join Wundry Plus in the Wundery app or on Apple Podcasts. Wandering. It's late 2016 in the front office of the Houston Astros. |
| 0:28.0 | Brandon Taubman walks toward the breakroom coffee machine carrying an Astros mug. Cheerful Christmas decorations are hanging |
| 0:35.2 | around the office, but Taubman is not in a celebratory mood. |
| 0:39.7 | Even though the Astros finished the 2016 season with a winning record. |
| 0:43.8 | They failed to reach the playoffs, and for Taubman's boss, General Manager Jeff |
| 0:48.2 | Lune, that's not good enough. |
| 0:50.6 | Lune has been using every tool imaginable to optimize his team's performance. |
| 0:55.8 | But everyone in the office knows that if the Astros want to have a real shot at a World Series |
| 0:59.9 | title, they're going to have to sign some veteran players who can mentor their talented but |
| 1:04.6 | inexperienced roster. |
| 1:06.8 | And there's one decision that has Taubman tied up in knots, the choice between two |
| 1:10.7 | out-fielders, Carlos Beltron and Matt Holiday. |
| 1:15.0 | Tobman is an analyst with a resume not unlike Lunos, a background in finance paired with a personal obsession with fantasy baseball. He prides himself on being able to... with Fantasy |
| 1:22.5 | Baseball. He prides himself on being able to evaluate players on the basis of cost-benefit analysis |
| 1:28.0 | and according to him, neither of these players is worth the cost. |
| 1:32.0 | Both Beltron and Holiday are way past their |
| 1:35.2 | prime and analytically unpredictable. They could have one more great season |
| 1:39.6 | left in them or their batting statistics could drop off a cliff. |
| 1:43.0 | But the team isn't really looking at a third option. |
| 1:46.0 | And Loono has ordered Toppman and the team's analytics expert Mike Fast |
| 1:50.0 | to figure out the best answer before the end of the day. If he had to choose, |
... |
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