Effectively Wild Episode 2424: The Perfect Fits for Free Agents
Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast
Ben Lindbergh, Meg Rowley
4.8 • 2.6K Ratings
🗓️ 9 January 2026
⏱️ 97 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about how the on-ramp for learning about sports analytics has changed since they were students, follow up on players who unretired after becoming coaches, break down the Edward Cabrera trade (and the Michael Lorenzen signing), and then discuss the remaining top-10 free agents (Kyle Tucker, Alex Bregman, Framber Valdez, Cody Bellinger, Bo Bichette, and Ranger Suárez) from three perspectives: where they’d have the biggest impact, where would be most fun for them to sign, and where they will sign.
Audio intro: Garrett Krohn, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Audio outro: Philip Bergman, “Effectively Wild Theme”
Link to Rice job listing
Link to Andres class article 1
Link to Andres class article 2
Link to Sabermetrics 101 MOOC
Link to Mota article
Link to Quirk bio
Link to Chambliss bio
Link to “Conformity Gate”
Link to Ben on Mass Effect 3
Link to Baumann on Cabrera
Link to Cabrera pitch values
Link to worst fastballs
Link to Andrews on Lorenzen
Link to FG top 50 FA
Link to Petriello on Tucker
Link to Gelb on Bichette
Link to IF fielding value
Link to team payrolls
Link to team SP depth charts
Link to team positional projections
Sponsor Us on Patreon
Give a Gift Subscription
Email Us: podcast@fangraphs.com
Effectively Wild Subreddit
Effectively Wild Wiki
Apple Podcasts Feed
Spotify Feed
YouTube Playlist
Facebook Group
Bluesky Account
Twitter Account
Get Our Merch!
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | We're gonna crunch those stats. |
| 0:04.4 | We're gonna talk about baseball, sticky stuff and torpedo bats. |
| 0:10.0 | We'll talk about it all. |
| 0:13.0 | If you want good takes on baseball in life, |
| 0:18.0 | just tune in a bed and his lovely co-host Ben and Meg it's effectively wild |
| 0:28.9 | Hello and welcome to episode 2424 of Effectively Wild a Fangraphs baseball podcast brought to you by our |
| 0:36.3 | Patreon supporters I'm Meg Rowley of Fangraphs and podcast brought to you by our Patreon supporters. |
| 0:40.7 | I'm Meg Rowley, FanGraphs, and I am joined by Ben Lindberg of the Ringer. |
| 0:42.0 | Ben, how are you? |
| 0:43.3 | Quite well, and you? |
| 0:44.7 | I'm okay. |
| 0:45.7 | Okay. |
| 0:56.0 | I was thinking because of a post published on your very site, FanGraphs, not FamGraphs, but, but fan graphs. This was published this week, |
| 1:01.8 | and it was a job posting. And usually I skim over the job postings. They're usually for a team job or some data provider that works with teams. This one, though, was for a professor in the |
| 1:08.1 | practice of sports analytics at Rice University. Yes. And it says the Department of sports analytics at Rice University. |
| 1:11.8 | Yes. |
| 1:12.4 | And it says the Department of Sports Management at Rice University in Houston, Texas, |
| 1:16.3 | seeks applicants for a full-time, nine-month professor in the practice position |
| 1:20.4 | to further expand at the department's sports analytics major. |
| 1:25.0 | This non-tenure track position has a start date of July 1st, 2026. |
| 1:28.8 | The primary focus of this position will be the field of sports analytics, both the |
| 1:32.6 | performance side and the business side. |
... |
Transcript will be available on the free plan in 18 days. Upgrade to see the full transcript now.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Ben Lindbergh, Meg Rowley, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of Ben Lindbergh, Meg Rowley and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.