And welcome to the first episode of what we hope will be more than one episode of effectively

while the baseball perspective podcast. I almost said many episodes, but I want to keep expectations

low. In Manhattan, New York, just a short stroll from the beautiful banks of the Hudson River,

I am Ben Lindbergh in Long Beach, California from his garage, I assume, in which he is sitting

in his Honda Sam Miller. Hi Ben, how do you think it's going so far? We haven't made any obvious

mistakes yet. I don't know that we've really hooked anyone yet either, but people are still probably

reserving judgment at this point. Probably. I feel like we do have a long future ahead of us though,

so it's a good start. Well, I hope we'll look back at these last few minutes very fondly.

And will always remember the day because it's your birthday. Happy birthday.

Happy birthday. Yeah, great. Now just tell everybody how to steal my identity. Thank you.

Yeah, I'm sorry if I overstep my bounds there, but I just wanted to just celebrate since we're

celebrating by by starting this podcast, which has been several months in the making or in the

not making more accurately. I guess should we explain why you're in a car right now?

I don't think so. No, okay. Well, Sam's in a car and I'm seated at a desk with a microphone

in a computer, which is how most podcasters probably record their podcasts. So I guess we should

maybe talk a bit about why we're doing this or what it is we're doing, which not that we have

a clear sense of that ourselves. No, it's I think mainly we're doing this because we've now

met each other in person. And so the shame of having this project on the back burner and not doing

anything about it is a little bit harder to deal with now that we know each other personally and

not just as online avatars. Right. I think yes, that was that was a big development because

I raised the idea of doing a podcast before Sam was was even in his current role at BP

sort of to either to lure him or to warn him before he actually accepted that position. And

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