SPEAKER_00 0:15

Hello and welcome to the Talking Cards podcast with Grant Salami and the Juice. I am your host, the Juice, along here with Grant Salami Bert. And then we are also, of course, welcoming back Big Bob for part two of our Bowman American, nope, not American, nationally breakdown. All right, first, Bert, how are you doing today?

SPEAKER_02 0:36

I'm doing good. How are you doing, Juice? Bob? I am doing good. Fantastic. Thank you guys for having me. We are excited.

SPEAKER_00 0:42

So if anyone missed part one, Bob, why don't you introduce yourself once again?

SPEAKER_02 0:47

Yeah, so I'm Bob. You can find me at Big Bob's Cards on Twitter. You can go over to the website www.prospect-analytics.com. Put out all kinds of content, you know, to help you figure out which uh Bowman autographs to buy throughout the season. Do some weekly hot sheets, some daily recaps of Bowman players, just everything I can to keep everybody up to date on what's going on in the card market, who's who what players that are trending up that we haven't seen the market kind of react yet. Kind of getting in and buying those cards before they go up and is staying on top of it. It's kind of the name of the game. And I bring everyone, you know, as much as I can to help them make money in Bowman. Big Bob's Bible of Bowman. Let's go. I have the Bowman, the Bowman buying Bible. I can't even say that. That's the alliteration right there.

SPEAKER_00 1:27

BBB. Not the better business viewer anymore. No, not in the car world, card world. All right. Well, let's just get right into it. First, we will start with the Cubs who have a very teeny, tiny first Bowman checklist. Why don't you tell us about their loan first Bowman guy?

SPEAKER_02 1:43

Yeah, I actually don't hate him. It's uh uh Cade Snell. He's a he's a he's a bat first college bat, a um uh you know, hit over power guy. But honestly, the Cub the Cubs seem to do well with that profile. I was just talking about this with someone the other day. It's like, remember when we thought Pedro Ramirez had no power? Dude's a little mashing in triple A. Yeah. I remember when when Kane Kepley got drafted in the 2025 draft, and everyone's like, no power, he's boring. Dude's hitting. So um, you know, maybe they maybe they'll strike strike uh magic again with Kate Snow, but yeah, he had uh I remember when I was looking at his college stats when I did the breakdown, he had a strikeout rate under 7% at Alabama his last year. So he's you know, your typical, you know, plus speed, below average power type hitter. The only issue for Bowman is that um I think he's like almost 24. So not only is he gonna have to show some power, but he's gonna have to get promoted pretty quickly in order to get some any any sort of love in Bowman. I think he's in high A right now. Um yeah, he's he's it just seems like normally I would be like, this is not a hobby exciting profile because there's no power, but I don't know, man. I don't know what the Cubs have been doing, but they seem to be thriving with these type of players.

SPEAKER_00 2:54

Okay. So maybe like just like a dart throw on it.

SPEAKER_02 2:56

Yeah, uh they're still like they still should be probably the cheap one of the two cheapest teams just because they have that the loan first autograph, and it's not it's not a super exciting one. I think there's a a Sammy Sosa anime, which is an interesting one. And then they'll have one of those uh talked about on the last episode, the draft pick pairings. Uh, they have a draft pick pairings. Well, technically they have half of it, but there's a draft pick pairings, and it'll be uh Chris Bryant in the Cubs uni with uh Byron Buxton. Wow. So that's kind of a cool one. But I guess if you're a Cubs fan, who's a Chris Bryant fan, that's a fun card to chase. But yeah, they're they probably I would imagine that they're one of the two or three cheapest teams in PYT breaks. Snell's a good player, but he's not not super Bowman exciting. And then and then the yeah, not a lot of depth.

SPEAKER_00 3:38

All right, so let's just move right on from them. They're they're not too exciting there. But let's get to the Cincinnati Reds next. They have twice the first Bowman checklist as the Cubs. Wow. So two whole guys here. Who's the guy to get most excited about?

SPEAKER_02 3:52

For me, you gotta go Pab Pablo Nunez. He's he's a very interesting, he's a five foot eleven outfielder, you know, listed 5'11, maybe 5'10. He signed uh with the Cincinnati out of Venezuela, but he's he's another, you know, teenage outfielder. If you want to just dip into these cheap, I expect him not to be a top name. You know, he probably won't be price very expensive, but these DSL guys, these young, you know, guys who have performed well, they're always worth taking a flyer on because they're cheap. He had one of the most ridiculous when I was looking at DSL stats for the incoming complex league players. He had one of the most ridiculous uh walk to strikeout ratios, which is like one of my favorite things to look at, you know, when it comes to young prospects, because it's very easy, especially in the DSL, because the pitching is so bad there. It's very easy to like swing. I like Laz Montez was a perfect example. Like I remember being like 25% in the DSL against that pitching, but they just swing at everything because they know they're good, you know. So taking pitches in the DSL is tough. You don't see a ton of guys, you know, draw crazy walk rates. But uh yeah, so so Pablo Nunez, when I was sorting this DSL data, because I like to look at, you know, who are guys coming over, good approach, good contact, might grow into power as they mature since they're all 16 and 17 when they play in the DSL. Uh Nunez, this is this was crazy when I was Nunez had a 26% walk rate and a 3.8% strikeout rate last year. So I mean, you talk about I don't know, you don't see many 17-year-olds with a what's that, a nine to one walk to strikeout ratio? It's pretty ridiculous. So he's he doesn't project for much power, but yeah, he's a player, you know, he's a cheap stash. You put a pin in him just because you know the approach and contact might be good. He might be a player worth holding on to.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

And then on the other side, we have Arnaldo Arnaldo Lantigua.

SPEAKER_02 5:40

Yeah, he's uh he's actually my favorite. I I like Lantigua more, but unfortunately, he doesn't have an autograph, which is such a bummer. I I feel like he they've had a ton of opportunities to give him an autograph, and and they haven't done so. But so that's unfortunate.

SPEAKER_01 5:56

Have they really?

SPEAKER_02 5:56

Yeah, Lantigua had Bowman's best autos. Yeah, that's crazy. See, I he's one of those players that you're just I've been waiting on in Bowman, and you know, they just cause they just kind of never gave it to him, which is a shame. But no, he's a good player. And then honestly, other than Nunez, who I really like as a um as more of like a sleeper, the what some of the coolest things you'll be chasing if you go after the Reds in PYT is that Chase Burns and Sal Stewart both have a rookie autograph in this product.

SPEAKER_00 6:24

That's gonna count the price for sure. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:28

Sal Stewart is lighting the world on fire. That rookie autograph is probably going to be, you know, obviously the Murkami and all those guys, those are the ones that are gonna sell like crazy. But that Sal Stewart rookie auto, that could be a nice little hit.

SPEAKER_01 6:40

It looks like Lantigua signed retail autos, which is interesting. Oh, so he's got paper. He's got paper autos, but he doesn't got chrome.

SPEAKER_02 6:47

Interesting, interesting.

SPEAKER_01 6:48

So if you're looking to jump into a blaster PYT or something like that. Yeah, that's not a bad idea. A little something. Sometimes guys that only have first Bowman paper autos end up panning out. The one I always think of is Brian Wu. Yeah, is he paper only? Paper only. I didn't even realize that. Yeah, what was it? 2021 Bowman or something? Yeah. Wow, Brian Wu paper auto.

SPEAKER_00 7:07

And these blaster marks are getting more and more popular as the allocation woes plague uh different breakers. So definitely something that can be found.

SPEAKER_02 7:16

And I mean, when you talk to when I talk to Slab Squatch, I mean he does those breakdowns. He does incredible work. When you go, when you go by pack odds, I couldn't believe he did he did that breakdown in his article, the dollar spent per hit, dollar spent per serial numbered card, the value in blasters, it seems like they just keep making it better.

SPEAKER_00 7:32

Can't complain about that. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 7:36

It's great, it's great for the for the normal people, you know? The biggest who are who can't buy cases.

SPEAKER_01 7:41

Yeah, it's you're just gonna stack up more low-end hits. It's like right and even non-hits, like just base chromes. Like if you're if you're gonna actually join breaks and then sell off those base chromes and you're you know less than five dollar hits, retail could be a good play.

SPEAKER_00 7:54

Yeah, for sure. Retail's pretty fun for Bowman products.

SPEAKER_01 7:57

What percentage of people are actually putting in the work to get those things up on eBay and sold versus just letting them sit and go man, I'm I'm ruthless.

SPEAKER_02 8:05

If I open it, it depends on the product, but if it's a product that I open my box like the day it's released and it's something that doesn't leak early, the leaks, this the leaks for 2026 Bowman have been crazy. I saw Desan Hill auto on eBay three weeks ago. That's right.

SPEAKER_01 8:19

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Random retick.

SPEAKER_02 8:21

But on the products that don't leak early, if I have a chance to be like one of the first people on eBay, you should see how quickly I I list those first those first base chromes for five bucks a piece. I'm just sitting there just ripping listings. That's what that's what you got to do. You gotta hustle. Absolutely, absolutely. If you take the time, yeah. The the blasters, like you said, you'll get a lot, like you said, lower quality hits, but you get more of them. But yeah, if you're the first one, you know, to market with some of those, some of those numbered cards that you get out of blasters, they could sell pretty well. 100%.

unknown 8:50

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 8:51

And then you also, as Slap Squatch mentioned, a lot of these short print inserts, yeah, the the pack odds, they're they're better on the blasters. Well, the the dollar spent. So even if you're looking at like we're talking about the Reds, LE has a final draft. There's a Joey Vado anime, which is insert, which is interesting. Well, that'll sound I don't know who asked for the Joey Vado anime, but it'll be cool. But uh yeah, we talk about blasters. I mean, you chase some of these, the Reds have some good short printed inserts. And you said Lantigua paper auto only. You're getting a blaster break. That could be that could be a nice little team, cheap team. Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 9:24

All right, so now we're getting to back to teams with a fat first Bowman checklist, one of if not the biggest first Bowman checklists that we have. Milwaukee Brewers. Lots of guys here, but which one stands out to you the most, Bob?

SPEAKER_02 9:37

Uh number one gotta be gotta be Andrew Fisher. Andrew Fisher is uh how's he selling in PYT right now, Bert?

SPEAKER_01 9:43

For PYP guys, he's like a top five, top five dude.

SPEAKER_02 9:47

Is he with Arquette?

SPEAKER_01 9:49

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:50

You know what's funny is that when I was doing my uh my rankings article, which I should have out the hitters. I'm I'm working on getting the hitters article out by tomorrow. But when I was doing the hitters, those were the two that I kind of went back and forth on was Fisher and Arquette. I see the argument for both. Fisher is interesting. Fisher is a big, big power bat. He hit between anything three different schools in three years in college. He bounced around, but uh he hit he hit 20 plus homers at at Old Miss and Tennessee. So he's he's the big power bat. What was interesting about him was when he came, when he went from Old Miss to Tennessee, his approach, his walk to strikeout ratio. I think when I was looking earlier, he was like a like uh almost twice as many strikeouts as walks at Old Miss. He flipped that to almost twice as many walks as strikeouts at Tennessee. So he was a 20% walk rate with 25 homers guy at Tennessee. There were a lot of people in the Brewers organization who thought that he was the best college hitter in the entire class, and he fell to them at 20 and they signed him under slot. I don't know how the Brewers how the Brewers just get away with this and we just let this happen. It's unreal. But um, and then obviously he came out and he played for Team Italy in the WBC.

SPEAKER_01 11:00

Classic Italian Andrew Fisher.

SPEAKER_02 11:04

Classic Italian name, Andrew. But is isn't it funny how you see like there's players who I mean he was always a good, he was a good college hitter. He was a good player. His stock is as far as like being popular with people really took off in the WBC. You know, he played really well, it was really cool to watch. So I feel like he has more eyeballs on him than he would have than he if he had not played in the WBC, if that makes sense. Um and he's showing off the power this year. I think he's already got like seven homers. Yeah, I think I think that he'll be a fun one to chase. The Brewers just seem like they don't miss. What level is he at? And how old is he? He is at high A. And he um and he's probably I think he's maybe 22, maybe 21, 22. So he's not he's not too bad. I think I think he's about the same age as Arquette, maybe a couple months younger. Is he an ETA 27 kind of guy? I don't know. Maybe maybe 28, maybe 28. I I guess we'll see. You never know. The the brewers, how how quickly that they they're just loaded, man. Their farm is so good. It's like where do they find room for all these guys? So yeah, I don't know how quickly he'll move. Um, maybe late 2027. I would guess early 2028.

SPEAKER_01 12:10

They just dump them now, like Yoffrey Rodriguez.

SPEAKER_00 12:12

Look what he's doing. He looks great, yeah. All right, so obviously he is the guy for the brewers, of course. Who would you say is on that next level?

SPEAKER_02 12:21

Man, they got a couple, they're another team, a couple sneaky good pitchers on this checklist. But my second favorite chase for the Brewers is probably going to be, and this is 80 grade name, probably the best name on this whole checklist, and handle free and carnacion. Incredible. I I really hope that he has a full name auto. I want the I want it all. I want the I want the full written out version of that autograph. But he's someone his his stats didn't really pop last year, but I have a couple buddies who, you know, you know, they go to like the the the spring training games and hang around the facilities of the teams out in Arizona where I when I hang out, you know, with the Florida ones and watch the Red Sox twins. He's out in Arizona and he told me that the people around the Brewers organization love Encarnacion. He's like, he's like one of the guys that they really rave about. I think that he's gonna be a sleeper. He's gonna be like in like my tier four, he could be close to like a 12 to 15-ish chase for me in this product. I don't know. There's something about the brewers, man. When when when I hear that the organization likes a player and he's kind of like under the radar, and you have a chance to get in before that breakout, I'm always willing to take a chance. Teams like the Brewers and the Rays, who just seem like they just crush it with development. Um he's gonna be a good sleeper of mine, good hit tool, average power, average speed. Nothing that really like wows you on the on the on the report card, but I don't know. I think he's gonna be a big name to watch in this product. All right.

SPEAKER_01 13:44

All right, so we don't end up being one of those guys with just a little tiny auto, too, because that's it, you're not gonna get the full cursive, Bob.

SPEAKER_02 13:51

It's gonna be I wish we I wish we would. I wish we get full names.

SPEAKER_01 13:54

Like H E or something like that.

SPEAKER_02 13:56

He's gonna go initials, probably.

SPEAKER_00 13:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 14:00

I can't blame him. Can you imagine signing 4,000 cards with and that's your name?

SPEAKER_01 14:04

Any relation there to Edwin? Or do we know? I don't think so. There's a lot of incarnaciones. That's a stretch. Not that I know of. That would be cool though. I loved Edwin. Edwin was the man, former mariner.

SPEAKER_00 14:14

What uh picture for the Brewers do you like in this?

SPEAKER_02 14:16

They got a couple of them. They have Josh Knoth, who I I don't, I would imagine is not a first autograph because I think he already had a first chrome card. So he's he has an autograph on the checklist, but I don't believe it will be a first stamp. I may be mistaken on that. But uh they also have Ethan Dorchies. He's he's probably gonna be like right on the fringe of my top 10 pitchers, Chase. He's six foot five high schooler that the brewers drafted in the in the 10th round a couple years ago. He had a ERA under three in his debut, which I mean that's just crazy. You know what's funny is when I talked to Jim Callas at MLB pipeline, and we were talking about how well the brewers develop, he was like, what they do from the 10th round and on in the draft to is just incredible. They just find like Adam Shevsky, Josh Adamschevsky, like they find these guys 15th, 16th round, and even international, like Midday was under a million, like Paney was under a million. It's like I don't know where they find these guys, but yeah, Dorchy's 10th round, six foot five, high school arm, good fastball, really good slider. He's kind of a sneaky pitcher to watch in this product. I like him.

SPEAKER_01 15:19

Okay. So much depth to this checklist. I mean, geez. All right, let's keep it going.

SPEAKER_00 15:23

Who else do you like with the Brewers?

SPEAKER_02 15:24

Or what do you think? Maybe not so much like, but I would say that after that, I mean they really do have a strong list. That's after that, I know that a lot of people's sleepers are probably gonna be uh Braylon Antunez. He's he's he's solid. He's probably the name after uh Encarnacion that I would go after. Great tools. His DSL debut wasn't that great, and I think that that's probably going to keep a lot of people off of him. The DSL stats, it's like you look at DS a good DSL stat line and you're like, I don't trust it. But when you see a bad DSL stat line, you're like, I don't know, you know, if you if you could hit the DSL, I feel like so. It makes people kind of like sleep on you if you struggled. But we saw, and Bert will know, Mariner's prospect, Jorger Bautista, another guy, really good tools, struggled in the DSL. But since he's come to the States, you know, spring breakout game, he lit the world on fire. I mean, so you really just never know what to take with these DSL stats. Antunioz didn't have a great debut, but he's got above average power, he's got plus speed. He's definitely a very solid sleeper. And as I said, the brewers just they seem like they don't miss. So it wouldn't surprise me if every player on the checklist of theirs is good.

SPEAKER_00 16:27

And we do have Pedro Ibargoen. Ibarguen.

SPEAKER_02 16:31

Yeah, he's another one, just another teenage outfield sleeper. He's a he's a low, low power guy, but again, it's what the brewers do. The uh uh above average hit tool, above average power, below average speed, and then all of a sudden these guys one day they show up and you know it's it's like this is like their their bread and butter. Uh Bargwin's probably a little less exciting than the other ones that I talked about, but same type of profile, um also really good results. I feel like he's looked-I mean, we saw him in the the DSL. He looks solid in the DSL. He's in single A this year, he's he's holding his own. Um, you know, for for a prospect who's still a teenager, that's pretty solid for a guy who's gonna be probably one of the 15, 20 cheaper, cheaper names on this checklist. Um, I think he's he's a good good backup hold for sure.

SPEAKER_01 17:15

The only thing that keeps the brewers from being astronomically high, I mean they are really high in terms of PYT pricing, but can you imagine if they made uh second Bowman autos of Jesus or Luis Peña? Oh my god. No. I guess Jesus has insert autos, and Luis Peña signed the the ultimate booklet, but that's about it.

SPEAKER_02 17:32

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Jesus, there's also uh, and I only know this because I saw, I think I forget who teased it. I don't know if Topps posted it, but uh Jesus Medei has a uh has an anime. So that'll be cool. Jesus Medei has a like you said, he has an insert auto, he's got an anime. I think he's got a patchwork as well.

SPEAKER_01 17:51

Mizurovsky has an anime too, so a couple anime chases for the brewers.

SPEAKER_02 17:55

Couple anime chases, and uh Jackson Churio has a patchwork. So a lot of a lot of good short print insert names on the brewers, along with the what'd you say, seven, seven first autographs? That's sneaky. And Fisher's probably a top, where's he been pricing PYP, Bert? Top five-ish, close.

SPEAKER_01 18:13

Top five, yes, safely in the top five, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 18:16

Really? Yeah, some some at like three or four. Dude, he's another one. As I said, with with uh on top of you know hit him playing for for team Italy in the WBC and everyone kind of getting excited about it. Another guy played at Tennessee. I've never it's so it's so funny because when you when you when I rank my prospects for like Bowman draft, I would never even think to consider what college a guy went to for my rankings, but it is like clockwork. The if there's one college that can drive up the market of a Bowman player, it's Tennessee, man. There are prospects. Like I remember uh I ranked like Gavin Keelan in draft, like outside my top 20. And then I was like, why are his base hotter as 50 bucks? Tennessee. And the Fisher's a Tennessee guy. They're they're they're gonna be going hard for him. Brewer's also very sneaky uh hobby franchise, they got a good pretty good following. Yeah, so it doesn't surprise me at all that he's a top he's a top five chase.

SPEAKER_01 19:07

They're they're Arquette, man. Yeah, it's I mean, most most PYPs I've been seeing, it's Florentino and then Holiday, and then Arquette, and then Fisher, and then Justin Gonzalez.

SPEAKER_02 19:18

Wow, people are sleeping on Justin Gonzalez, huh?

SPEAKER_01 19:21

Yeah, I guess so. I guess so. I'm not that's crazy. I went and bought him in five cases for coolie. Did you really? I love that.

SPEAKER_00 19:28

But anyway, there is one player we did not talk about for the Brewers yet before we move on from them. Daniel Dickinson. Danny Dix. How do you feel about him?

SPEAKER_02 19:38

Danny Dix. Yeah, he's you know, six foot middle infielder. They drafted him last year out of LSU. He's just your typical, you know, like more walks and strikeouts type guy in college. Good hit tool, below average power. Nothing that exciting come for for a college hitter in Bowman.

SPEAKER_00 19:53

Okay. All right. Well, with that, so that's all we need to know about the Brewers, I think. Let's move on to the Pirates. And I think there's just some no names here. I don't think there's really anything to be excited about. But anyway, you've been hyping this guy up since the first episode, just talking about how there is one player above all. So I will let you get into it and explain why. I'm sure we probably spend a whole episode on him, but let's just keep it, I guess, as short and sweet as possible because there's just a lot of good things to say about him.

SPEAKER_02 20:21

Yeah, I'm I've been so interested to see PYP pricing and PYT pricing for this product because I think we talked about it earlier. I I wouldn't be surprised at all, and we'll talk about him in the next episode. I wouldn't be surprised at all if Ethan Holiday is the highest selling single when uh for autograph for first autographs when this product comes out. It's the lineage Jackson's little brother, he's Jackson with power. He's on the box, he has every insert. We've been talking about him since they held him out of draft. He's like the hype that that seems to be driving this product for a lot of people. But I think I was telling you before we started recording, I've been working on with my rankings, expected base auto prices, kind of like target prices of where to buy guys. And I can tell you that right now, based on where I have everyone ranked on this checklist, I would pay twice as much for an Edward Florentino autograph than I would of any other product, any other player on this checklist. That's how much I more I like him. I think that if you're doing players by tiers, you can argue about if it's holiday and if it's Arquette and if it's Fisher. Florentino is above everybody else. I don't, it's not even close to me.

SPEAKER_00 21:24

What is it that makes you like him so much? Oh, he's a monster.

SPEAKER_02 21:27

He's literally a monster. Six foot three, left-handed outfielder with with plus power, and the dude just absolutely mashes. And he he's got good power and good speed. He's got a good approach. There's literally just there's like not an offensive flaw like in this guy's package of tools. Last year, he was in the complex league and single A. He hit 290. This is a 18 year old kid between two levels, 290, 16 home runs, 35 stolen bases as an 18 year old. I mean, that's like he had 259 ISO, 150. 59 WRC plus with an 81.5% contact rate. I mean, you don't to see an 18-year-old hitting for that kind of power, stealing that many bases, and you expect, you know, long swing, probably going to have a huge hole in it, high contact rates, low strikeout rates. I mean, his batted ball data is a work of art. He's like if you could build a Bowman prospect in a lab. That's high praise. He's he's literally, I don't know how else to say it. He's they already promoted him to high A. I think he hit his first home run there in the first game he played in. So they're moving him aggressively. I wouldn't be surprised if he moved as aggressively as they moved Connor Griffin last year. We saw him kind of like play for a couple weeks at a level and then like go up to double A. If Florentino starts hitting high A pitching, like he hit single A pitching, he's probably in double A by the end of the year, 19 years old. And you know, plus power plus speed. This is like the hobby profile.

SPEAKER_01 22:48

Let me ask you this then. Come the end of May, after we've had what's that, two plus weeks post-release, things have settled down a little bit. What do you think Florentino's base auto price is going to be? 250. 250? And are you buying at 250? That's kind of tough. Because I mean LDV is what?

SPEAKER_02 23:06

LDV is about 250. Yeah. That that makes it tough.

SPEAKER_01 23:10

Just probably the ETA thing mostly, right? It's like, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:13

You got to think with Yeah, with being a couple of years away. It's like, but then again, it's like I thought I would have said told you the same thing about Connor. That's the problem, you know. It's like I remember what people were paying for Connor when he came out, and I was like, well, you know, eventually he's gonna get called up to a level where he's gonna be so young for the level that he's gonna struggle, and then the cards are gonna come back down, and then you're gonna have like a buying opportunity. I convinced myself that was gonna happen with Connor Griffin. It didn't, which kind of makes me worried with Florentino. Like, I want him, you know, the prices to come down. It might be like a Jesus Mede. When Jesus Made's cards came out, 2025 Bowman, I remember thinking I'll never own one of these because his hype was at the perfect spot when the product came out, that he was just never that great of a value, which I'm kind of afraid for for Florentino.

SPEAKER_01 23:57

He dropped a lot from release Made, didn't he?

SPEAKER_02 24:00

And yeah, and uh there was a time, there was a good time to buy him for sure. Yeah, there was, yeah. I was surprised that that he ever got that low.

SPEAKER_01 24:07

Yeah. But yeah, I think Florentino. Because he's like, he feels like by by far and away the number one chase in this product for PYP.

SPEAKER_02 24:16

I think so.

SPEAKER_01 24:17

I think I think that he should be.

SPEAKER_02 24:19

And like I said, I won't be shocked if Ethan Holiday or you know, that wouldn't surprise me at all if if their autographs are selling, you know, like the same. But I think the kind of as you further move further away from release, you kind of see the market correct on the prospects that Bowman people know more about. You know, I think you see a lot of that like artificial inflation, like pump at the beginning of people who are like, I want an Ethan Holiday car because he's Ethan Holiday. The market will start to normalize and the people who are buying, you know, like the what Bowman the way we buy Bowman, the market will get a little bit sharper, I think, as time goes on. So I I wouldn't be surprised if you saw them around the same price when it came out, but I would imagine that holidays will come down a little bit. Florentino's might just keep going up depending on where he's priced. Interesting. But I love him. He's he's literally ridiculous.

SPEAKER_01 25:06

Yeah. I think when I was doing my comparison, because Florentino's obviously like the top guy, but it feels a little bit like the Charlie Condon and maybe versus a guy like I know different set, but Raini L. Rodriguez. But Florentino's got a lot more hype than Rainy L.

SPEAKER_02 25:19

And you know what's funny is that when 25 Chrome came out, I was like the same way on Raini L. It was like I tried so hard to look at Pena and even Hoswar and be like, these guys are more hobby exciting, right? But I couldn't get there. I'm like Rain. I like Rainiel so much more than them that even when you consider everything, you know, the signing bonus and the team and the tools, I still liked Rainy L more. That's how I am with this product. I don't think there's anything. There's a two-way player from Korea. There's Jackson Holiday's little brother. I just don't understand how it couldn't be Florentino.

SPEAKER_00 25:51

All right. Yeah. Man.

SPEAKER_02 25:53

It's so he is high praised. He is the guy. He's unreal. I when I when I was looking at at the um, because now I always make all those posts on Twitter that'll be, you know, here's a list of prospects with blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I I kind of look for the criteria that I like in in hitters. And I was looking at one and there were this was crazy stat. There were 30 prospects last year who got 300 or more plate appearances at age 18 or younger. Florentino had the second highest ISO at 259 and the second lowest swinging strike percentage at 7.5%. So among 18-year-old prospects, he basically has the best power and he's the best contact hitter. I mean, it's it's just crazy. You don't really see that.

SPEAKER_01 26:35

Insane. All right, so these other guys might not be as good. He's also which is crazy. He's a year younger than Rock Chalowski. Yeah, that's wild. Do you think that, like when prospect rankings come out after the MLB draft this year, that Rock will be higher or lower than Florentino?

SPEAKER_02 26:50

Ooh, for me or for MLP.com.

SPEAKER_01 26:52

No, for you. Because I think Rock will be higher by like most prospect lists, right? Florentino will be way higher for me. For a hobby? For sure.

SPEAKER_02 27:01

Okay. Nice. I love him.

SPEAKER_01 27:02

I I think that he's shaping the one guy here pretty soon, I think. Once we see an LDV graduation.

SPEAKER_02 27:09

Yeah. I mean, what once you see, let's see, who we got? LDV, you're gonna need a um Jesus Made. Jesus Made. Yeah. Who's your three? Uh Rainy L was my three in my update. Okay. But yeah, after that, Florentino is, I mean, that's how much I like him. He's a I did my top an update to my hobby rankings today. Florentino was a top five non-debuted hitter for me.

SPEAKER_01 27:30

Damn.

SPEAKER_02 27:31

Yep. Beast. He is a beast.

SPEAKER_00 27:34

Act accordingly. All right. So we do have a few other Pittsburgh Pirates that are not quite as exciting as Florentino, but they will be making their Bowman debuts. So out of the rest, who do you like?

SPEAKER_02 27:46

Out of the rest of them, I would say there will be another hitter for the Pirates that makes my top, I'll say 20, top 15 to 20. And that's going to be Wyatt Sanford. I like Wyatt Sanford. I liked Wyatt Sanford when they drafted him. I was bummed that he wasn't in 24 draft as a second round. He's a second round, you know, high schooler. So a second round high school, you know, bat in draft would have been like my bread and butter. Then 25 comes around, still doesn't get a card. He's been on my like top 10 guys, I hope gets a card for a while. He didn't have as good of a year last year as I was, you know, kind of hoping for, as I would have expected. But this year he's up in high A, you know, at 20 years old, and he's, I mean, every heat looks much better. The ISO is up. He's showing power. You know, he's 151 WRC plus right now in high A. So I think that he's someone that's very slept on. I'll be interested to see actually, I'll be interested to know what his PYP prices were, Bert, because he's like I said, he he was like a two and a half million dollar signing bonus as a second round high school hitter. So I mean that already is like something that would drive kind of a lot of hobby excitement. But then he wasn't super exciting last year. You didn't really hear his name as much as you thought, but he seems to be turning it around this year. He's he's he's a great name to look out for.

SPEAKER_01 29:02

He's like a $35 a case kind of guy.

SPEAKER_02 29:04

Oh, yeah. I see. I would I would have taken him. That would have been a good grab.

SPEAKER_01 29:08

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 29:09

I would imagine that for PYT, this is the number one team in this product by a long shot, right? Definitely. With Connor Griffin's second or third autos now, I guess. Their non-first checklist is as crazy as their first checklist.

SPEAKER_01 29:22

Yeah. Skeenzie's got autos. Yeah. It's wild.

SPEAKER_00 29:25

Yeah. And then we have a little bit of deja vu with this next name. Uh, because we have Jared Jones here for the Pirates. Another Jared Jones for the Pirates. I had to kind of do a double take. I was like, what is going on here? Is he hobby relevant?

SPEAKER_02 29:39

He I think he will be hobby relevant. He's not my favorite chase, but you know what's so funny with him is that I had Dahl every year for every release, because Dahl's just the wizard that he is, he will, you know, pull from fangrafts and make me when I start my my cheat sheet, he will pull the data from fangrafts so it'll give me like player team age, scout grades, signing bonus. Like he he pulls it all right off the site. And I was combing through it, not that I don't trust his work, but I was combing through it just to separate guys into categories when I was doing my rankings. And the scout grades for Jared Jones was like fastball, 60, slider. And as I'm reading it, I'm like, Jared Jones is a hitter. And then I realized not the only Jared Jones on the Pirates. It kind of the computer couldn't pick that one up. He was giving me Jared Jones the pitcher scout grades. I thought that was so funny. Yeah. But he's a uh he went to LSU. He's just monsters, just your typical monster mashing power bat, six foot five first baseman, hit about 65 home runs in three years in college. Just double plus power, not much of an approach, not much of a contact skill, not gonna offer you speed. He's it's one of those scenarios where you're chasing one tool, at least it's the tool that's good in Bowman. But yeah, you're chasing one tool. He is a one-dimensional just masher, just mashes the ball. What a time to be a pirate. Yeah. Right? You know what's crazy is that when I did my team buy sheets this offseason, this was but obviously I did them in the offseason, so Connor hadn't debuted yet. Did you realize that going into this season, the pi the Pittsburgh Pirates had the highest priced non-debuted hitting prospect and pitching prospect in all of baseball? I'm like, what a time to be a Pirates fan. Can you remember the last time that you could have said that about the Pirates ever? Crazy. It's fantastic. Now they're now they're about to get Florentino. This is, I mean, with Seth Hernandez, they really are so and Bubba Chan, they're such an exciting team.

SPEAKER_00 31:30

And that leaves us with one guy left, Brent Iredale. How are you feeling about him?

SPEAKER_02 31:34

Yeah, he's probably would be in the similar realm as Jared Jones. I I don't think that he's going to be a name that a lot of people are chasing. I think that he's got pretty solid power. He's first base, corner infielder. But again, he's he's a college bat, 23 years old. It's just not not the type of profile that I think is going to sell. I think that Jared Jones, because he's like this double plus power guy, he went to LSU, he was more of like a name in college, even though the the skills might not translate as well, you know, because of the hit tool and stuff like that. But I think that he will be a more exciting chase to people than Brett Iredale. But uh Irondale's solid. He he he can hit. He was he was good at Arkansas last year.

SPEAKER_00 32:14

So Pirates overall, with this checklist, uh, these first, obviously, you have it headlined by Florentino, and then you have all these other guys, they are the team to get for Bowman.

SPEAKER_02 32:25

Yeah, they have, and then after the first, as uh Bert alluded to, the Connor, if you look at the as you said, Topps' done a good job of taking these guys who aren't first Bowmans in the product and just kind of like giving you the names that you want. The Connor checklist in this product, so he has a prospect autograph. So that'll be what his third is that his third autograph? So third autograph for he also has a gold ink auto, he has a couple of insert autos, he has a final draft, he has an anime, he has a patchwork. He is like they put him in every category.

SPEAKER_01 32:56

So no shortage of Connor in this product. Sterling autos, yep. He didn't uh he didn't make the draft pick pairings, which is a little unfortunate, but not everybody.

SPEAKER_02 33:05

Man, they I wonder if they only did the top. I know there's some number three picks. I wonder how deep they went with those picks. Yeah, that would have been a fun one.

SPEAKER_01 33:12

Three or four.

SPEAKER_02 33:13

Connor? He went ten, I think. Nine or ten. Yeah, he slipped. He went, I think him and Rayner, Bryce Rayner went back to back. One went 10, one went eleven, if I'm not mistaken. He went ninth.

SPEAKER_00 33:24

Surprise they didn't pick like.

SPEAKER_02 33:25

Where did Rayner go?

SPEAKER_00 33:27

Surprised they didn't do like a Mike Piazza dual pairing. I'm sure there's a few guys out there.

SPEAKER_02 33:32

Right, that would have been cool. They they do have uh, I will say, so we talked about the pairing of so schiens, obviously this we talked about in the last episode with the nationals is the Strasbourg. So you get the other half of that Skeens, so there's a Skeen Strasbourg. So technically, if you're the pirate spot, you get half that card or however you want to split it up. There's also a draft pick pairings, which is a super this you want to talk about random. This is a random pairing. Andrew McCutcheon in the Pirates uni with Max Scherzer in the Diamondbacks uni.

SPEAKER_00 34:02

That is who that's about as random as you can get it.

SPEAKER_02 34:05

Who thought of that one? When I saw Max Scherzer on the Diamondbacks checklist, I was like, Max Scherzer on the diamond. Why is he on the diamondbacks checklist? I love that. I love the set. Like it's tough. They stay true to the which team drafted you. I like that.

SPEAKER_00 34:18

Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's such a tough car to resell, too.

SPEAKER_02 34:21

You know, like you have to find someone who's a fan of Andrew McCutcheon and uh Max Scherzer as a diamond.

SPEAKER_00 34:28

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:28

So yeah, but you have all those first, you have, like you said, the the cool skeins, all those Connors, Bubba Chandler. Bubba Chandler has, I don't believe he has autographs, but he has a spotlight because I saw a mock-up for it. He's got like the etching glass, the crystallized couple of those short print inserts. So you got Connor, you got Skeens, you got Bubba, you have the number one first hitter in the entire product. I mean, this this is far and away the best team for PYT breaks.

SPEAKER_00 34:55

Okay. And then that will bring us to our last team of the NL Central, the Cardinals, with just a pair of first Bowman guys. All right, I'll let you go. Which one do you want to talk about?

SPEAKER_02 35:04

Yeah, only two of them. They're another team where it's if they're a real cheap team, which I would suspect they are in PYT. I don't think that they're a bad grab. They only have two first autographs, but they're two very different players, but very, you know, could could have their value in Bowman. Um, I think the highest ranked one for me is going to be Daniel Ortiz. He's he's a solid player. He's, you know, community college guy. So he's he's two, I think, or close to 22, which isn't the best for the hobby, but above average power. And I mean, last year you want to talk about just stats. So I don't know if you guys follow Scout the Stat line, but I'll go over to Scout the Stat Line and look at their peak projections, and I'll use that as kind of like a marker for for finding undervalued because they're very good about finding guys that you're like, who is this guy? And and Scout the stat line will have them in their top 150. And then it kind of gives me a reason to like deep dive on them. And Danil Ortiz was kind of one of these. He Denil Ortiz hit 313 homers and 39 stolen bases last year. I mean, that's for at age 21, in between single A and high A, I think he's a player that he's gonna get slept on because it's not like it doesn't seem like it's the most exciting package of tools, and he's been hurt this year. I think he's only played in one game. So he's a player that's probably gonna be slept on right out of the gates. Uh, but he swung it really well last year. Now he's gonna be in double A. He's kind of moving up. Um, he's definitely someone that I that I would be after if if he's cheap and breaks. He's kind of a a nice little sleeper option.

SPEAKER_01 36:30

Okay. I like it. I think the Cardinals could be a good little sleeper team, too, because there's no real headliner, but JJ second autos are also gonna do pretty well.

SPEAKER_02 36:37

Oh, that's right. There's JJ second auto, huh? Yep. Yeah, so that'll do well. There's a Mark McGuire final draft insert. Talk about random.

SPEAKER_01 36:44

Yeah, all these veterans in the final draft. It's it's such an interesting move.

SPEAKER_02 36:47

And then there's a there's a draft pick pairings. Oh, here's a fun one. Came up on my Seattle sheet. Draft pick pairings, Liam Doyle and Hagen Smith. Oh, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:57

Yeah, that's a good one.

unknown 36:59

All right.

SPEAKER_02 36:59

And then the other first that you're after for them is um uh Kenley Hunter, who he's a um you know, outfielder, signed out of Nicaragua, which you don't see a ton of international prospects from from Nicaragua. So that's fun. But he's uh he's probably gonna be on my sleeper list and signed for a little under uh a million dollars. 18-year-old kid. So you can never go wrong when your sleeper and Bowman is a 18-year-old with a good hit tool and good speed, and you can kind of just sit on his cards and hope that he grows into power. And that's exactly what you're going for with uh with with Kenley Hunter here. So I think that he's kind of a kind of a sneaky chase, another player. Like I said, I don't expect a ton of people are gonna be in on him. So Cardinals are kind of like a cool cheap grab. I think that Daniel Ortiz and Kenley Hunter are both solid players, different levels of upside, different types of players, but but a good team to you know try to hit both of those and hold on to them because I think both of them have a pretty decent chance of sneaking up on people.

SPEAKER_00 37:53

Okay, all right, perfect. Well, that I think about wraps it up for the NL Central. Thank you so much, Bob, for doing another episode with us. Um, again, you can Bob, could you just shout out your Twitter handle one more time?

SPEAKER_02 38:04

Yeah, at Big Bob's Cards on Twitter and then the uh website www.prospect-analytics.com. All right.

SPEAKER_00 38:11

The man. Thank you, Bob. Thank you. All right, and we will wrap this up with our next episode. We will look at the NL West and Bob will give us his insight there as well. This is the juice and Grand Slami with talking cards. Thank you.