Effectively Wild Episode 2094: Double Secret Shobation

Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley (at the Winter Meetings in Nashville) banter about how the secrecy surrounding Shohei Ohtani’s free agency is breaking baseball media members’ brains, what makes free agency fun for fans, the advisability of a winter transaction deadline and whether it’s OK for baseball to just be boring sometimes, and the latest ridiculous dot-connecting about Ohtani’s destination, plus (41:50) discussion of the Winter Meetings milieu, the Jarred Kelenic swap (43:55) and what it means for the Mariners, the Yankees’ Alex Verdugo deal (1:00:30), the Orioles’ Craig Kimbrel signing (1:06:05), Erick Fedde joining the White Sox (1:15:24), and a smattering of minor news and transactions, followed (1:18:08) by a conclusive solution to a recent Stat Blast mystery and an outro rendition (1:24:43) of the classic Michael Baumann baseball ditty “What Did Jerry Dipoto Do?”

Audio intro: Justin Peters, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio outro: Michael Baumann, “What Did Jerry Dipoto Do?”

Link to Olney column
Link to Rosenthal column
Link to Mintz column
Link to O’Brien tweet
Link to Janes tweet
Link to Janes column
Link to article on Ohtani’s agent
Link to article on Jays meeting
Link to article on Giants meeting
Link to flight-tracking tweet
Link to Washington quotes
Link to quote about Boone’s face
Link to Nightengale on Roberts
Link to article on Roberts/Gomes
Link to tweet about Friedman
Link to EW branzino wiki
Link to Opryland photos
Link to Hollander’s quote
Link to Dipoto quotes
Link to Baumann on Kelenic
Link to Dubuque on Kelenic
Link to Clemens on Brewers SPs
Link to Gilligan on Kelly
Link to Roberts on Betts
Link to Roberts on Kershaw
Link to Blum on Trout
Link to Baumann on Yates
Link to Clemens on Verdugo
Link to Baumann on Kimbrel
Link to Longenhagen on Fedde
Link to tweet about Fedde
Link to Verdugo benching info
Link to Verdugo Dodgers incident
Link to EW episode 2093
Link to 1998 Baseball Weekly article
Link to 1998 Ocker article
Link to 1998 AP article
Link to 1998 game’s play log
Link to 2000 game’s play log
Link to latest-first-whiff data
Link to longest whiff-less stretches
Link to Ryan Nelson on Twitter
Link to Nightengale “two sides” tweet
Link to 1998 clip 1
Link to 1998 clip 2
Link to 1998 clip 3
Link to Secret Santa sign-up sheet