I never in a million years thought that they were going to be able to do so in four games and to be able to sweep the Dodgers the way that they did though.

No, I don't think anybody did.

I mean, at the same time, what they proved, I thought coming through the San Diego series and really, I mean, for, All the leaps they have gone through this year in particular, they still had not done the one thing that had eluded them for almost a decade, which was win a postseason game on the road.

And I really thought winning the way they did in Game 4 at Petco against the Padres really flipped a lot of things.

Now, I wouldn't say drastically, but just from the pure confidence standpoint that they had that belief, like, we can go in, we can win a game like that and win a series where we don't necessarily need to be the absolute dominant team.

Like it can be back and forth.

It can be tight.

Yep, I don't think so either, and I do think that when it comes to the Milwaukee Brewers, yeah, it might be a little bit shaky come that game number one, but you know that you're going to have Jacob Mizorowski on the bump, and is there maybe a little bit of concern that Mizorowski did not look so good in his first few postseason starts? He did get out of that big jam when it came to game number one, but still, I do think that there is a little bit of concern that he hasn't quite been himself thus far in the postseason.

Do you want to say? So that's

where I had this original realization is reading about the Wright brothers, because at the time that they're trying to solve flight, There are dozens of other people trying to solve flight.

It's popular at the time.

It's like the AI of the moment, right? A lot of different people are working on it.

Everyone realizes it's the future.

So why do they succeed? Well, because everyone is doing the obvious thing.

And what's the obvious thing? You're trying to get something in the air.

If that was your main takeaway from Joan of Arc, what would your main takeaway from Brigham be? Aren't you related to him? Yeah, he is my great-great-grandfather,

How are you, man? How does that sound? Wow.

Wow.

What a true display of journalistic brilliance from you, Will.

I mean, we're recording this 15 minutes after the final pitch and that you are capturing me just in the pure ethereal aura of the emotion of the moment.

And I'll put it this way.

Big moments in Brewers history for me as a kid were... basically watching the chorizo win any sort of sausage race.

For a long time, Randall Simon had the most significant thing in popular sports culture ever at Miller Park.

what?

How are you, man? How does that sound?

Wow.

Wow.

What a, what a true display of, uh, journalistic brilliance from you, Will, to th- I mean, we're recording this 15 minutes after the final pitch, and that you are capturing me just in the, uh, pure ethereal aura of the emotion of the moment.

And I'll, I'll put it this way, um, big moments in Brewers history for me as a kid were basically watching the chorizo win any sort of sausage race.

Uh, for a long time, Randall Simon had the most significant thing in, in, you know, popular sports culture ever at Miller Park.

The fact that George W. Bush threw out the first pitch in Miller Park history was, for a long time, the most, you know, amazing thing that happened to the Brewers.

I don't even think that's allowed

[laughs]

Well, it, it means you get excited about something, right? You're zealous for something.

But Ar- it had a very specific definition, uh, to the ancient Greeks.

So Aristotle defined zeal as a type of pain.

It is felt by someone when they see another who is like them in nature, who has accomplished good or admirable things, uh, that the other person is capable of but has not yet achieved.

You can see it in a lot of famous historical people.

So one of my favorite stories of zeal is Thomas Edison.

It's like almost unbelievably positive, for lack of a better description.

some tough teams as well.

No doubt.

It's something that we went into last year, believing the depth would be a major challenge for any team to have a super sparkly, impressive regular season record.

And you look at Wisconsin finished the year.

And I think we were both very complimentary of Greg guard as head coach.

for trying to really get in distance himself and turn the table around from the Wisconsin of old and that old Tommy Thompson, Bo Ryan, play like molasses, just defend your butts off and try to grind out a win.

And you think about how Wisconsin's been able to turn that around.

And I think that as the season goes along, more and more stark adjustments need to be made with regards to totals, with regards to teams, and just with regards to what we're seeing in general because it did feel like from the beginning of the year to the end of the year, we were almost seeing a different sort of basketball for a lot of these teams.

and uh you have you have to talk about well i

mean people have told the story before right but essentially it's just strategically so brilliant um he needs to force this coalition army of austrians russians and i think um Maybe it's just Austrians and Russians and some other minor partners.

I actually don't think the Russians are involved at this point.

But they have a much bigger army.

He really needs a decisive battle in this war, and they don't.

They're kind of just happy to hang out.

And so he's like, how can I get them to fight me? He's got a much smaller force, but his reputation is so legendary at this point that they still, they just don't want to fight him, right? And so what he does is he's got this very advantageous position in what is now Czechia, the Czech Republic.

How is this possible?

They use them to browse the web, and that's about it.

Mm.

I don't, I don't think...

I think there's, there's, like, a reasonable expectation for a company this big.

If you're gonna go into making more hardware, you've, you've already figured it out to a certain degree.

They probably do have plans.

Like, my reaction of, "Oh, Android, no apps," they, they lo- they will have a plan for this.

They'll keep using Windows forever.

They use them to browse the web, and that's about it.

Mm.

I don't, I don't think...

I think there's, there's like a reasonable expectation for a company this big.

If you're gonna go into making more hardware, you've, you've already figured it out to a certain degree.

They probably do have plans.

Like my reaction of, "Oh, Android, no apps," they, they lo- they will have a plan for this.

They'll keep using Windows forever.

Now you get three of arguably your top five bats back, and they were 500, above 500 without them.

No doubt.

It's certainly a team that has shown a lot of the same charis- characteristics as they did last year.

And remember, it was a pretty tame start for Milwaukee in 2025, right? They had a couple of closed door meetings.

It didn't look all that comfortable for them, and they started to get hot several times.

They never really got cold [laughs] after about this time of the year, but we're seeing that right now, and they're doing it.

I...

[laughs]

And For the Reds, I think that they're just such an intriguing team, mainly because they entered in the day on Monday, 2014, with a negative run differential, which typically is a sign of regression coming.

It usually is, right? You know, of all the teams I've watched, I mean, I came away so impressed with Pittsburgh, and I get it.

One of those games was...

Paul Skeen's looking like Superman that he seemingly is every fifth day.

So when you have him going 20% of your starts, you feel like you're going to be in pretty good shape as far as that goes.

But I did think that at least from my perspective, some of the bullpen arms that Pittsburgh has, I've really liked and how they've been able to kind of Mix and match some of the late game tunes and matchups, so to speak.

I do think that's a team that is probably going to be a little more than just a, all right, you bet him when Skeens is on the mound and you probably stay away when he's not.

And Ben, Is there maybe a team or two that we haven't mentioned that you currently have your eye on, whether that be a bet for Tuesday, whether that be a team that you're feeling bullish on, just anything in particular that you're looking at and you're seeing a little bit of value, whether it be betting or fading.