Contreras vs. Cardinals, Soto’s trip to the store & Craig Goldstein defends umpires

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This week on the Bandwagon, Hannah and Zach try and figure out how Juan Soto ended up in a Petco for his calendar shoot, explore the already tumultuous relationship between Willson Contreras and the Cardinals, and chat with Craig Goldstein from Baseball Prospectus about appreciating umpires.

This week’s Bandwagon starts with a bang, with Hannah and Zach going deep to try and figure out how Juan Soto ended up getting his picture taken in a Petco near a fish tank for his “Padres Puppies Calendar”.

They then discuss the news of the week, which is the St. Louis Cardinals moving newly-acquired catcher Willson Contreras to the outfield and then deciding they’d rather teach him how to play catcher instead. It’s all very weird and is another bad look for the Cardinals in the midst of a bad season.

It was Hannah’s turn to come up with a game and she showed up with “Actually Angels or Tungsten Arm O’Doyle?” This game is meant to show off Zach’s memory and also the greatness of Shohei Ohtani and Mike Trout (while the Los Angeles Angels struggle to win games).

A little more than a month into the regular season, Hannah and Zach look into the numbers to see if the new rules have had a huge impact on MLB and what that impact might be. Stick around for Hannah’s own ideas for new MLB rules, they’re very outside-the-box.

Finally, Baseball Prospectus Editor-in-Chief Craig Goldstein joins the show and bandwagons for umpires. Yes, baseball’s cops. Craig says they’re better than they get credit for and that we should be empowering them instead of tearing them down. It’s a controversial take, but one with some merit.

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