Reacting To My Top 50 Players for 2024!

[@BraxtonMeyer]

Nice to see the main channel getting some love

[@insurtname8501]

Buddy, this is the secondary channel

[@anzilla_jr]

⁠@@insurtname8501 what do you mean? We all know foolish baseball is inferior to foolish bailey.

[@jessl1014]

What are you talking about? Foolish Bailey and Foolish Baseball are different people

[@marcman1999]

@@insurtname8501no this is the main one

[@goldmember19-fh5ek]

@@jessl1014 then who the fuck is silly softball?

[@pathutchison7688]

Strange to see hitters losing power in their mid 30’s. Back when I was a kid, I’d watch players get into their 30’s, they’d put on 30 pounds of muscle and their heads would double in size. I wonder what happened?

[@robbedcookie]

nationwide needle shortage

[@panner11]

people were eating a lot of balanced breakfasts back then

[@mxmschae]

Lotta people forgetting to say their prayers and take their vitamins.

[@OmegaTyrant]

Players still maintain power into their mid-late 30s, power typically tends to be one of the last things to go. Stanton was 34 this year and he established himself as still the strongest hitter in baseball despite the washed allegations, Votto a couple years back nearly set a career high in HRs at 37 and power remained one of the last two things he was good at in his last couple years (the other being able to still draw walks), Pujols could still hit 40 HRs at 35 and maintained above-average power into his 40s while his other skills severely declined. The guys who mostly suffer power-wise going into their mid-late 30s are those who had just barely enough power to hit HRs like Arenado (who never really hit the ball that hard and got so many HRs from being an extreme pull flyball hitter, so once he lost a bit of power, his plentiful wall scrapers started dropping for doubles and outs).

[@Realdrlipschitz]

Not enough chicken breast, broccoli and brown rice obviously

[@brandon4072]

Thank you for the 1 min acapella of The Strokes for your Strider analysis. The most fitting way to encapsulate the pain, sorrow, and grief

[@griffinhays2053]

Strider has 2025 #50 pick written all over him

[@nomorefielders]

This is honestly what I look most forward to every year

[@NerdzAnimation]

Hey! Love your vids (I know this sounds like a bot but it’s not, lol)

[@thatoneoshawott5826]

You not being verified is criminal

[@mykel6268]

Big boy baseball boy awards?!? That’s the best part of my year

[@aaronchapman3]

Tbh same

[@Orisitdonald]

Keeps me going for another winter

[@devbakaa1373]

can you add back ERA+ to the pitcher cards for next year? helps contextualize the ERA a bit more.

[@Gaythugger41]

Honestly w

[@devbakaa1373]

​@@Gaythugger41and honestly, W

[@one_jame]

Agreed

[@ogvektor]

retweet

[@booradley6832]

It is helpful but I also understand taking it off since ERA+ is such a small-variance stat. In hitting, the difference of WRC+ between the batting champ and a borderline all star is as much as 70 points. In ERA+ the difference between the Cy Young winners and an "average" pitcher is like 12. Stats already don't provide a lot of nuance and ERA+ is the most vague of an already non-descript crowd. I would support showing ERA percentiles instead so you can map it out. Like have an index listing the 25th, 50th, 65th, 80th, 90th, 95th and 99th percentile so you know where a player sits. That way you could tell that they're approximately in the 98th and 85th instead of seeing a player with a 114 and a 112 ERA+ and pretending to know how that translates. I'm not saying your idea is bad I'm just iterating on it to try to make it better. I agree with the spirit of more information comparative to their peers wholeheartedly.

[@ScreamingRamen]

Saying "Francisco lindor if you're watching this" immediately after singing through the whole Spencer strider section was hilarious

[@rayloray8895]

Damn I thought for sure this was a joke imagine my surprise when I got to this section and it was real

[@mayitakeyourhatsir8632]

that lead in to george kirby was masterfully done foolish

[@StinkyPeterson]

Dang, I just came and commented basically the same thing and then saw your comment haha

[@conndor97]

I felt so targeted

[@JamminTrev]

The punch line just really worked

[@jakebennett8962]

@@StinkyPetersonalso came here to say the same thing lol

[@nathanbutler7737]

Targeted at me

[@kylejohansen689]

All I ask for this Christmas is 140 games of Trout and 28 starts of DeGrom next season.

[@generallukeproductions]

Baseball is better with Trout and deGrom healthy

[@IdliAmin_TheLastKingofSambar]

I’ll add that I would like the Rangers to “dump” Jake’s contract back on to the Mets, right before he makes those ~28 starts in 2025. Everyone forgets that he was an innings eater until May 2021, when his injury problems began (and by the way, he STILL averaged 6+ IP/start in his 15 games that year), and the injury issues were all related to his elbow. He has a new one now. And he showed in September that his skills are still elite. Come home, Jake.

[@exwhyz7990]

Gimme one last healthy Kershaw season on top of that 🙏

[@kanikid1679]

Bailey please leave Trout off the 50 next year. The pure negative karma could lead to his comeback. Be a martyr, Bailey

[@Fatallica]

This this this. Grasping at any straws to see trout play at least 120-140 games again.

[@nubernist]

The George Kirby monologue is slander! Walkable cities are the best! I will die on this bike lane.

[@dfp_01]

Walkable and bikeable are not fundamentally at odds with each other, but they're two _very_ different things

[@brendan8870]

A lot of people do unfortunately

[@travisfletcher6342]

I will say, I was a country boy who thought "walkable cities" was stupid. Now that I live in a walkable city while attending college, I LOVE it

[@bradenculver7457]

Sorry pal, this is Kirby’s America now. Walks are illegal, get in the car loser

[@firstlast446]

also 50/50 is way more impressive than 40/70 esp with how dog acuna's steal efficiency was compared to ohtani's

[@phillipeb]

No better day than the day that Bailey posts his bits on the internet.

[@Orisitdonald]

This is the best one of the year too Maybe the best one ever

[@samuelwyatt7846]

"The End of Hunger, World Peace, Harmony among all Races and Religions, the Cure for Cancer. All things that could be achieved if Julio Rodriguez could hit in April..." "The problem with Julio is, he puts himself under so much pressure to perform..." I'd be under pressure too.

[@jz13_]

This and the baseball boy awards are the two videos I look forward to every fall

[@brianaiitken]

4:09 please forgive me Bailey

[@yeetmcskeet1]

Never

[@kells45PS3]

You were right on with adolis!

[@brianaiitken]

@@kells45PS3I’m much more comfortable with the Vladdy prediction since it was the majority view at the time that he was around the 50-60 range rather than in the top 50. I’m 90% sure I said Yandy Díaz should be a top 25 player during the live stream which did not age well lol. Turns out predicting the future is difficult.

[@thehildabeast100]

Yeah right there with you I thought we would all be talking about the Jays non tendering him after another let down year where they would have had to pay him a ton

[@OmegaTyrant]

Sad thing with Trout is while his rate stats weren't up to his standards, the season was looking very promising when he was the first player to reach 10 HRs this season and he was stealing bases again, getting 6 in that first month (as much as he stole in the past four years combined), being on pace for a 50 HR 30 SB season. He was also significantly underhitting his expected stats (.406 xwOBA vs .365 actual wOBA), so his slashline would have probably caught up to typical Mike Trout values too, and then the AL MVP race would have been even more stacked.

[@Weaponator18]

In a vacuum, Trout had a pretty good season before getting hurt. He's just not going to be able to replicate his past success due to his degenerative back issues unfortunately.

[@darkness74185]

Trout was well on his way to another Mike Trout Season before the serious injury. Even if he's not gonna crank out MVP worthy numbers like nothing anymore he's still one of the top 5 hitters in the game. Just too bad that with his body breaking down with injuries every year, it's kinda hard to even expect a full healthy season from him anymore.

[@StinkyPeterson]

George Kirby lead in was ELITE.

[@broncos435]

i was wondering where the hell he was going with that one. then he got to the punch line and all i could do was a slow clap lmao

[@atlas9k965]

Easily my most anticipated baseball video every year. I genuinely feel like I gain a lot of knowledge on the state of the league and it’s most important players from it.

[@antthegamer7813]

56:47 STROKES MENTIONED 🗣️🗣️🗣️‼️‼️🦅💥💥🔥

[@AliceYobby]

if you liked that, him and Strider ranked all the Strokes albums together on this very channel last year

[@tristanmorgan4003]

Probably my favorite video of the year from you Bailey. Really feels like a season recap. Keep up the great work as always

[@capraagricola]

1:39:30 the big thing with Skenes' stuff+ is his splitter/sinker. If it gets classified as a splitter, it's a +++ pitch, but most models classify it as a sinker which grades out below average. If you look at its run value, it really performed more like a triple plus splitter than a below average sinker.

[@capraagricola]

I noticed this on mlbpitchprofiler, at the start he was at around 130 stuff+ average across all pitches and when it got reclassified he dropped to around a 102.

[@edwinlam4679]

If it is a sinker, it's one with 7 more inches of vertical break compared to league average. Really is perplexing why places like Fangraphs grades it so poorly on Stuff+ with such a great Statcast run value

[@capraagricola]

@@edwinlam4679 a lot of the models take a "primary fastball" based off usage then adjust stuff+ for offspeed/breaking relative to the primary fastball. Since he throws the splinker the most of any pitch it becomes a primary fastball when classified as a sinker, and stuff+ just ends up not liking it as a primary fastball for whatever reason. I think it's one of the main failings of the blanket stuff+ model that's usually pretty good for predicting a pitcher's performance.

[@capraagricola]

Also, mlbpitchprofiler must have done some adjustment or autoregression to their model with 2024 results because even though it has the splinker classified as a sinker, it is now at 124 stuff+.

[@capraagricola]

It could just have been that at 96 mph with that much drop, there weren't really many comps to it so the results interpolation was bad until they updated it with the run value from 2024.

[@lion3000hkhk]

It is hard to not have Shohei at the first spot because he made MLB history.

[@TobyElmendorf]

1:13:30 elite reference

[@billym3365]

19:52 didn’t expect that

[@elliskennedy9885]

need the big boy baseball awards to drop ASAP

[@aholymost]

This is the official start of the MLB offseason. Any teams who signed free agents prior to learning if George Kirby at #39 was "on point" or "cringe" will be investigated for tampering.

[@tomburton8478]

56:45 🤌I'd buy a Foolish Bailey Charity Xmas Album, maybe some special guests?

[@TwimsFan]

Hey now, I didn't know Bailey had a vibrato like that. Also, it's amazing how people continue to call Lindor overrated while being a consistent 30/30 guy with elite defense.

[@DaddyRatchet23]

And as a SS no less

[@noahcrouse9789]

Bailey’s obsession with Chad innings eaters is unmatched

[@TenaciousAC]

Honourable mention - Emmanuel Clase. With Kimbrel and Jansen close to retirement, you then have Edwin Diaz and Josh Hader the next two to be paired together at this stage of their careers. And then you have Clase, who could rocket past both. This year - 47 saves, 3 blown saves, 0.61 ERA (and on June 4th, his ERA was 0.3 !!!). He was so great that he will get his second Reliever of the Year award and be in top 3 of Cy Young voting. Career wise, he’s off to a Kimbrelesque start with 158 saves at age 26. If he’s a star closer for the next 10 years, he’s chasing down Kimbrel & Jansen for a Top 5 All Time saves spot…. Could he even sit at #3 All-Time, below Hoffman and Rivera when it’s all said & done ?

[@RuRichelieu]

Holy shit you nailed it at 19:51 lmao. It me.

[@Evan-qo5co]

bailey i think you should talk about the catcher who had 34 HRs and +14 FRV

[@mylunawalker]

CAL RALEIGH LOVE IS ALWAYS WELCOME BIG DUMPER SUPREMACY

[@brandon.richards]

Pour one out for all the viewers who didn't watch long enough for the Spencer Strider intro

[@kilenklimek9218]

omg the strokes wtf thank you Bailey

[@AliceYobby]

him and Spencer Strider ranked the Strokes discography on this channel last year !

[@n0lanv0id]

looking fwd to seeing Big Dumper on next year's list 🚚💪🏻⚾

[@jsu9575m]

I think half of those IG comments don't even realize you're talking about 2024 instead of 2023

[@louiscicale6800]

Baily let me tell you, you're truly a sphere scholar. An orb expert. A projectile connoisseur. Dare I say a ball aficionado.

[@MrBigdude912]

That Ohtani ranking immediately slapping back to reality was truly playing with fire and getting burnt

[@RilesIsTall]

Very happy to see my comment get a shoutout for Skubal 😁

[@generallukeproductions]

Certified ball knower

[@RilesIsTall]

@@generallukeproductions 😁😁😁

[@ryanzeigler]

This coming out while I'm at work is astronomically clutch

[@blakeO34]

I think it would be foolish to not include Jarren Duran on the list next year. Maybe around 40ish. He has consistent top 10 outfielder every year potential and is definitely trending upwards like Witt Jr. and Henderson.

[@mptness4389]

1:09:26 - with at least 59 steals, Shohei was indeed the most efficient, and by a wide margin, at 93.65%. Next closest was 2008 Willy Tavares at 90.67% [68 SB, 7 CS]. If you drop that down to just 50 steals, Max Carey beats him out with a 51 steal, 2 times caught season in ...... 1922. (96.23% efficiency)

[@PauloSSBM]

One day the tigers will be blessed with a foolish 50 caliber player I pray

[@edwinlam4679]

Skubal is gonna be on there next season 100%

[@louisminati]

Skubal top 25 next year for sure and I'm a Cleveland fan

[@AaronThatcher-ko9pl]

57:25 the finest moment of foolish baileys career. He’s officially my favorite baseball content creator

[@jamesonevers3262]

Just a note, Eno Saris just updated the stuff+ model, and it had Skenes much higher. I don't know if they made it public yet.

[@Rpsb2]

I’ve been jonseing for this list. Thank you Mr foolish.

[@MustacheWins]

Also, you should have mentioned Riley Greene in your Honourable Mentions. And I sure hope you include him in the 50 next season, or I might come for you again 😀

[@budrowconye4928]

1:51:35 😭underrated cutaway gag

[@TheTEN24]

Always look forward to foolish 50 content. Excited to go over next years list I expect Lindor to be top 10 the next time around and guys like Merrill or chourio to maybe join the list

[@zach__jew7856]

Yes I’m a bias A’s fan but no mention of Rooker after hitting nearly 40 homers and having one of the highest slg in baseball is criminal

[@MoesWorldd]

50/50 club easily #1 this year

[@max_fischer]

Oh no, Bailey must have filmed this before Brandon Gomes announced Mookie would be back in the infield next year....

[@micmac1719]

He’s a few years off… “2024!” (2024*2023*2022…)

[@vallo105]

I see sadness in Adolis's left eye, but certainly not the right one

[@oliverseed6257]

as a dodger fan, will smith had an absolute ASS second half

[@greatnessdelton1381]

That's happened in back-back years now. I suspect, with Ohtani hogging the DH spot for the rest of his and Smith's contracts, that this will continue. Smith really needs some days off from playing C at such a high level.

[@Zyron22]

Irrelevant

[@greatnessdelton1381]

@@Zyron22 Yes, your team is. 👍

[@JorgeRodriguez-ih8ub]

These videos are always great because they feel like the season finale of the season for this channel

[@juangoato]

got legit chills w that spencer strider reviews, ty foolish casablancas

[@beegmacc]

I was really hoping for a Brent Rooker shout out in the honorable mention category after that twitter interaction earlier in the season

[@JoeDavis2]

Bailey, Teoscar Hernandez won the silver slugger in Left field, had wRC+ of 134, and 3.5 fWAR. Pretty good case for him to be top 50.

[@fiercedeitylink2019]

somewhere in the 40-70 range for sure

[@datad546]

56:47 THE STROKES MENTIONED RAHH

[@AliceYobby]

Him and Strider ranked all the Strokes albums together last year, btw!

[@stephendaniel-cy1gt]

Low-key buried Gerrit Cole at the end there: "He ,uh, just didn't field his position all that well when it really mattered." 🤣

[@RoboticTechnician]

19:55 How does Bailey know everything about me?

[@msteresa653]

I was going to say the same thing 😭

[@moocowthepersom]

thank you bailey for delaying the video by 3 days specifically so i could turn 20 in time for this intro 🥹🥹

[@severianthefool7233]

This is the first two-hour YT video I’ve ever watched in its entirety. Love you Bailey

[@RachelJade70]

As a Twins fan, Pablo Lopez's season was a really strange one. All of our pitchers had weird seasons, tbh. But Pablo had so many games where it felt like he was totally on, until he gave up a 5 run inning in the middle of it. Just strange.

[@jroggs85]

The whole pitching staff was too vulnerable to giving up the long ball. Add that to the hitting inconsistency and injuries, and it's hard to find a place for any Twins in the 2025 Top 50 other than maybe Correa in the 40s.

[@jasonduczeminskyj5551]

That strokes cover was amazing. Keep up the good work Bailey. Oh yeah and the video was solid too

[@TempleofNater]

Hey Bailey! I think it would be really cool if you did a video covering some of the more underrated players of the past decade or so, and maybe some current players that also fit this build. Dudes who may be forgotten in the grand scheme of things, but were truly valuable and contributed to winning. Maybe a couple all star appearances, but nothing more.

[@djk1563]

Bailey stroking it out of nowhere shocked me

[@mascwalt]

1:17:45 I love how you mention Freddie winning WSMVP and show a clip of him taking Tim Hill deep on an inside 91mph fastball. Maybe the same would have happened in an alternate universe after all.

[@thetexanshurtme]

I was starting to get worried that you abandoned your main channel

[@addoln]

54:36 While it suppresses home runs, Kauffman is not a pitcher's park. It has the 4th highest statcast park factor (3rd highest for righties).

[@ryanfoster2936]

beautiful tribute to spencer strider. brought tears to my eyes.

[@elijahgreen2491]

The second of my 2 favorite annual KZbin videos, love these

[@noahrogers672]

Can’t wait to see Jackson Chourio on next years honorable mentions after Bailey leaves him off the list next year

[@adultishsambino]

20:14 magnifying glass

[@kodiakbrogan1691]

I feel so damn clocked

[@tentacleshield1397]

if seiya suzuki can avoid straining an oblique for a full season he's easily a top 50 player. when you look at his stats from the 23 all star break to today he's something like top 15 hitters. also brent rooker.

[@UniNumberOne]

can't wait to hear about the man who absorbed arenado's power place in the middle of the list next year, Matt Chapman

[@stablegenius1]

When the lady at the drive thru asks who’s watching Bailey? Oh that would be me ☝🏼.

[@Mike44715]

lol whats up with the thing on screen during the yandy diaz clips? like right in the middle?

[@joshuawhitley8575]

Between Bailey serenading us during the Strider segment and him taking a victory lap on instagram commenters, this video is everything I could’ve hoped for

[@baseballfan3770]

am i crazy or did i not once hear cal raleighs name in a two hour video about the 50 best players in mlb

[@likeapetter]

He mentioned him in Will Smith's honorable mention. 2nd catcher off the board behind Smith but higher than Realmuto

[@warlordofbritannia]

Aaron Nola deserves extra credit for pitching in the third worst pitcher’s park in the National League, for a terrible defensive team. Walk rate of about 2, strikeout per inning, 190 innings a year on baseline…that constituency is worth more than the sum of its parts.

[@floridaman6281]

consistency*, but yes. Nola survived the dark Philly years and emerged as the perfect 1B to Wheeler. Hopefully that rotation can lead Philly to a World Series win

[@scrub_jay]

What numbers have CBP as a bad pitchers' park? Statcast park factor is at a perfect 100 for 2024, direct center of the pack. Also keep in mind park factors will take into account the Phils' offense which was very good for most of the year. Don't get me wrong, Nola is a stud, easily one of the best pitchers in the world atm

[@marcman1999]

@@floridaman6281won’t happen

[@fiercedeitylink2019]

its, like, the sixth worst pitchers park in the nl lmao, you forgot about coors, chase, gabp, loandepot, and pnc. its "3rd worst" if you have a 3-year rolling period, but that still a 101 park factor, so it would still be pretty much average, tying it with chase, loandepot, pnc, and nationals park.

[@jonbolin344]

Strider's segment was absolute cinema, Bailey... Thank you for that

[@suikinng4232]

I love how he just sang a song and not explained the Strider choice

[@5000yes1]

I didn't think any moment in the vid could top Bailey singing straight through Spencer Strider and jumping straight into "Francisco Lindor, if you're watching this," but then this perfectly timed "I'M HIM" happened at 1:28:12

[@mitchellisrael4862]

I updated my personal Top 50 recently (I do it after each season rather than before) and made sure to add Sale, Skubal, and Skenes to it

[@micaho31]

With manny he was playing the first 2 months injured (still coming off of elbow surgery and didn’t play 3B for the first month of the season) after that he became the manny we know and love

[@AlistairHart-l7v]

I wish you would do a top 100 or at least top 75. It feels like as you get more experience, you don't have as many out of left field picks, which makes sense, but I always thought it was the most fun seeing the justification on some of the 'unproven' talent. The top 10 is typically not very debatable, it's 40s and lower where the extra analysis can really show off some unique and lesser known players.

[@evah1928]

“That would be me” Trea Turner tweet reference made me snort

[@luigi6492]

immediately checked the comments to see who else got it lol

[@mnguyen313]

☝🏼

[@robertcrist6059]

53:56 I still remember during Bobby's rookie year a graphic used comparing his first x games and pa and avg to be very similar to Trout's during his rookie season. Kansas City has been full steam ahead making Bobby THE guy, and you know what he's answered. I've been conditioned to not get attached to any Royals player because they leave or regress, and Bobby is set to not leave (although everyone famously leaves out he's got opt outs every single year...) and continue to be freaking good. I still can't believe a player to this level is playing for the Kansas City Royals. Obviously Greinke was legit, but he was traded (wanted to be traded); Beltran was traded; so we go back to Brett. I am in awe of the kid. He still needs to not press in dire situations (mainly relay throws to home, he continues to rush, overthrow and bounce the ball home). He will chase at the plate, and swing at the first pitch for a foul pop up. But the kid flies at The K logging doubles and triples. Back to back 30/30 seasons after the club had never had a 30/30 player; sad to say his rookie 20/20, soph 30/30, and could have been third year 40/40 (increasing to each tier year after year) didn't happen, but heck I can't say I don't think he can't do it. Would love to see it.

[@bobsaget3588]

I have high hopes for Duran, he really did continue his hitting from last season while finally getting comfortable in the outfield.

[@seanheflin6690]

A little explanation for why Bregman’s OBP was lower than expected. He was spitting on a bunch of pitches that were actually balls, and a lot went against him. He has such a good knowledge of the strike zone, but somehow got rung up on fringe pitches a whole bunch.

[@omalleycaboose5937]

I can confirm as a ranger fan, even from the eye test, Adolis just didn't have it defensively, it may have been injury management, but he just wouldn't dive for balls he could get, he wouldn't run out and catch them the way he used to...

[@ThatOneGuy8305]

Something I would be interested to see is the position-weighted fWAR between you and MLBN. Basically just the sum of each top-50 players fWAR/Ranking. Particularly given your own stated stance that being right at the top is worth more than being right at the bottom I would be curious how missing on Ohtani and Trout effected the sum total compared to hitting on Judge for example.

[@benc728]

Bailey taking a rock out break during strider’s turn brought a tear to my eye, truly beautiful

[@ezridaxsgender3914]

I was curious when you said this was Freddie's worst season as a Dodger and that's obviously true because his last 2 seasons were his highest fWAR seasons...but he also has not had under 4.4 fWAR in a non covid season since 2015! Remarkable consistency

[@Theorpo]

8:03 YOOOOOO IT'S ME!

[@holdanhitchcock6725]

Paul Goldschmidt to the angels feels like a very angels thing to do. Look forward to Jackson Merril being 50th on the list next year

[@jonathanemontgomery]

But where is Tyler Pitzer?

[@T_K7]

In college, give him until the 2030's to ace the A's staff lol

[@3G2J]

41:11 this reference is absolutely hilarious I wish more people got it

[@cartermoss9775]

That would be me ☝🏻

[@RichieMaccas]

Mr. Baseball I know you don't rank relievers because of their volatility, but I would love to hear what you have to say about the Guardians bullpen arms from this year. Specifically the 3-headed setup monster of Gaddis, Smith, and Herrin and the 2024 GOAT reliever Clase