[laughter]
- You're being outsmarted by a lock.
- [chuckles]
- Hey, let's just screw in an alley as usual.
Come on. - No!
Remember last time, the raccoons got so angry.
- Oh, they're just jealous.
- Ta-da! Hey!
Ow!
- Oh, shit. You all right?
- What happened to holding a door open for a lady?
- Oh, I'm so sorry. You know what?
No, I'll make it up to you in other--other ways.
Oh, the hair flip. - [chuckles]
- Mmm.
[both moaning]
[both yell]
Ow. You all right?
Oh, boy.
Ooh, my.
Oh, you are very wet, young lady.
- Well, I--you pissed yourself.
- Oh man, Jim Brockmire.
Well, a lot got on you.
Hey, twinsies!
We're piss twins!
- Stop talking. - [chuckles]
[soft acoustic]
- Now, uh, there's nothing to be scared of.
No one's in trouble.
Now these affirm that you are no longer involved
in a sexual relationship.
And should you change your mind,
here are forms that you must turn in simultaneously,
letting the league know
that you have re-entered a relationship.
- That won't be necessary.
- Yeah, no. Those days are long over.
- Great.
Uh, lastly, all I need are the declarations
that I asked you to prepare
regarding the length of the relationship.
- Oh, boy.
I think I misunderstood the assignment.
- All we require is a short statement
as--as--as Ms. James wrote.
Uh, "Jim and I dated for five months
in the spring and summer of 2017."
- Right.
- I--you gave it a title? - I did.
- "Jim and Jules: The Fuck Year"?
- Yeah.
Well, I was gonna call it "Mein Rump,"
but, uh, decided against that one for obvious reasons.
My hatred of puns.
- You were blacked out when we got kicked out of Waffle House.
- Yeah, no, I pieced that one together
using primary sources.
You know, it turns out that back then,
having public sex in a diner booth
was considered regional news.
Yeah? Simpler times.
- Well, I guess this tome very comprehensively
fulfills the requirement.
I just need to go make a copy.
This may take a while.
- Yeah, sorry.
It's quite heavy, so be careful.
My only copy.
[chuckles]
- [chuckles]
I can't believe you're still obsessed with me.
- What? - This job is all a ruse
for us to start dating again?
- We're not talking about dating.
Haven't thought about dating since I became a single parent.
- Then why am I here?
- Because you're the very best at what you do, Jules.
Every year, the most exciting baseball team
was whichever one you were selling,
except now I need you to sell all of baseball
'cause if we don't, this sport's gonna die
like an old white man in an armchair.
No one will notice and no one will care.
- For the record,
saving baseball is the only reason I'm here.
- No, agreed. That's all I want.
Really.
I mean, I'm nothing if not professional.
- You drew pornographic diagrams of us having sex
and submitted them to HR.
- That was for my own edification
because the physics described in the Waffle House booth
just seemed impossible to me.
♪
[thudding]
Jesus.
Looking good.
What'd you do, sleep in my office?
- Sleep? [scoffs]
I pulled an all-nighter.
I thought about getting some coke,
but I just pounded coffee instead.
So now my stomach's a mess and I'm pissing on stuff.
- I'm glad your instinct was to not do coke at work, Jules.
- Say I wanted to do some coke after work.
Which one of these office jockeys can make that happen?
- How about you just pitch me some baseball ideas, huh?
- Oh, God. My stomach.
[sharp exhale]
[sighs] Okay.
You ready?
Here's how we get fans back to baseball.
First, shorten the game. - Oh yes, please.
I've been trying to get the game down to three hours
for years now.
- Keep going. Make it two-thirty.
Robot umps, shorten the pitch clock.
- I love that.
- Plus we make a rule that only four pitchers
can be active on each team,
thereby eliminating bull-penning.
- That's genius.
I never even heard of that one before.
- And here's the humdinger.
We increase access to players during the game
through body cams, microphones, live-streaming.
We turn the players into stars
by making the game a living, breathing,
visceral viewing experience
where the fans are actually in control.
- Oh, my God. That's fantastic.
- I know, I know! Right?
- Great dreaming out loud session,
but, uh, we should probably get back to work now.
- What's wrong with my ideas?
Sure, they would take a little financial investment
at the top, but-- - Ding, ding, ding.
We have a winner.
These guys aren't gonna spend a dime to try to save this game.
I mean, you remember 'em from when you used to work for 'em.
They're not like us, these owners.
They're-- - Aliens from Planet Money.
- Exactly.
They have absolutely no idea why the average person
likes or dislikes baseball.
The only time they ever speak to one
is when the help talks back.
They're never, ever gonna agree to anything substantial.
Believe me.
- Then we need new owners.
I'm gonna have to pull another all-nighter,
and I can't have anymore coffee, so...
- Liz seems to enjoy the nightlife,
but please, not in front of the interns!
Please! Very impressionable.
[sighs]
[clamoring]
- Ladies and gentlemen.
[clamoring]
Ladies and gentlemen!
[clamoring stops]
And by that, I mean gentlemen.
[chuckles] I have an announcement.
- Who'd you kill this time?
[laughter]
- All right, all right.
Let's--let's listen to what she has to say, huh?
- I know that owning a major league team
has been frustrating lately,
what with the value of your clubs decreasing
for the first time in history.
- My brother pays convicts a dollar a day
to kill themselves on an NFL field.
Now, why can't we just force people to play baseball?
- A dollar a day? He's spending too much.
- Probably, yeah. [laughter]
- Buying a team was the worst business decision
I've ever made, worse than buying NBC.
Does anybody want NBC?
I--I've paid down a lot of the debt...
- Actually, Leslie, you're the reason
we're all gathered here today.
I have an offer for your team,
and it's way above asking price.
$1.5 billion.
- I'll take it. I'll take it right now. Thank you.
- Whoa, let's not get ahead of ourselves, please.
I mean, we still gotta do our due diligence
and vet this buyer, right?
I mean, I got no idea where his income comes from.
- That's gonna be tough. It's a very mysterious offer.
Could be the Saudis, could be the Russians,
maybe a cartel.
Who else can make an all-cash offer?
- Uh...
- I know you're new here,
but these are all men of integrity.
I mean, well, no one's so desperate for cash
that they're just gonna abandon all of their moral obligations.
- I have something difficult to admit to everyone here.
- Did you find out you were a Jew?
- No, something worse.
This year, I fell out of the "Forbes" list
of richest men in America.
- Oh, my God.
- They wouldn't even let me into the party.
The 17-year-old Hungarian model I was with, she laughed at me.
I might have to sell my son's zoo.
They say he's on the spectrum.
I just want to give him room to run.
- How much do you want for the zoo?
I'll make the kid run.
- I'm pounding my desk at home!
Can you hear me? That's my cell pound!
Sell it, Leslie! - I agree.
None of us should have to endure the indignities
you've just described.
A laughing woman? - Good man.
- Yeah. All right.
- Uh, Jules, you seem lost in thought.
- No, I just...
if I can get $1.5 billion for Leslie's mid-market team,
I was just imagining what I could get for other teams.
I know--I know it's not up to me.
- Everybody here knows I'm a righteous man.
When I ran over the neighborhood boy,
I called my son-in-law, I had him call my lawyer,
and said, "I want this handled in the most honorable way,
so that there can be no splash-back on me."
- Of course. Good, good.
- So if selling my team opens the money door
for my fellow owners,
I'm willing to make the sacrifice.
- Sell the team.
all: Sell the team. Sell the team.
Sell the team!
- Okay, ladies and gentlemen, very exciting day for baseball
as we announce the sale of one of our most beloved teams.
And I introduce to you the newest voting member
in our group of owners, Chief Sango Whitehorse.
Chief?
[applause, camera shutters click]
- Thank you, Jim Brockmire.
As you all know, many Native nations
have done very well from Americans spending
their Depression money in our casinos.
But we do not wish to watch the country rot
from our gilded reservation towers.
No!
So a coalition of tribes has decided to reinvest our income
back into the great American institution
of baseball.
- Hear, hear! [applause]
- A place that for too long has been a bastion
of unchecked racism towards the native peoples.
[camera shutters click]
Till today.
I am proud to announce that from now on
the Cleveland Indians
will now be now be known as the Cleveland Colonizers.
[murmuring]
- Easy now, because we haven't even gotten
to the really offensive part yet.
- Now with a new name, well, we needed a new logo.
To show our vision,
we've partnered with a true visionary.
So please welcome mogul designer,
mayor of Tallahassee, and owner of the Lakers,
Sir Lil Diazepam.
- Yeah. [applause]
Reveal it. Go ahead.
[gasping]
- That's right, folks.
That's a cartoon white man
licking the blood off a bayonet.
And now you can feel free to get as offended as you like.
[clamoring, scattered applause]
- Nicely done. Nicely done.
- Hey. - Hey.
- Would you look at this? I can't believe this.
We actually have people talking about baseball again.
God, this is fun.
I mean, not so much fun
that you should be double-fisting at 10:00 a.m.
- No, no, I was just deciding which one to drink.
- Right.
- Both. - Uh-huh.
- [giggles]
I forgot how good a team we make.
- [chuckles]
- We rope-a-doped those owners together.
Surprised they weren't more upset we tricked them.
- They're pretty upset.
You know, I had to talk them down,
but we're all good now.
In fact, they wanted me to tell you to keep up the good work.
- We got away with it!
- It kind of feels like the old Morristown days,
doesn't it? - And this is only part one.
First, we rattle the cages, get the old owners scared,
Next, we bring in new owners,
only on the condition that they agree to back all our changes.
Boom!
We got our voters' bloc.
I've already got five new buyers lined up.
- Really? How did you do that?
- By showing them you could come in
and change a team name,
and--and get a ton of media attention.
And I've got offers on the Padres, Mariners, Rays.
Bill Magorium wants to buy the Yankees.
- What is Magorium like in person?
- Damp. - Right.
Oh, I anticipated this little problem.
So I took the liberty of procuring you a backup.
- One bottle? You know me better than that.
- That's true, I do.
My apologizes, but, uh, well,
I promise to make it up to you in other ways.
- Oh yeah?
- Mm.
Oh.
Oh, Ju-- oh, okay.
Oh, Jesus. Oh, my goodness.
Whoa! HR!
- Oh yeah, you are no fun sober.
- No, it's not sobriety, Jules.
We happen to be at the office,
and sex with you comes with some complications for me.
- All right, save your speech.
I just wanna make a stop in Bonetown;
I don't want to live there.
- Well, I would. That's the problem.
See, you know, there's nothing casual for me
about casual sex with you.
I--Jules, I'd get attached and you wouldn't,
and that's fine, but you know, you're building something here.
I don't want to mess that up. - Boo!
- I've screwed up your life too many times.
- I'm already over this conversation.
You're so sober!
- You know, I like to think that I've changed
in some other ways since we were together.
- You got boring.
- Jules, my boyfriend just dropped off
the eight-ball you ordered.
For your billiard table.
- Oh, very nice, Liz. Very subtle.
Liz, everybody!
No clue she's referring to drugs in the office.
- It's a good thing you're here.
For a long time,
I was embarrassed to work in baseball.
You know, my mom even called to see if she could get herself
a Colonizer jersey?
- A good idea always has legs.
Classic Jim to go in and take all the credit.
Now the owners think he...
I would've liked a pat on the back, at least.
- Oh, you were not gonna get a pat on the back from them.
They hate you. - What?
[clamoring] - Gentlemen?
Gentlemen, hello.
- She tricked us! I want her burned!
- Leslie, I understand you're angry,
but let's remember that we're all gentlemen.
I say we take her up in a zeppelin,
give her a nice dinner, show her the view,
and then durst her ass!
- Yes! - Easy, easy.
Please, I understand you're very consternated.
Allow me to place your concerns in their proper perspective.
You are all getting hammered to the point of desperation,
and in that desperation,
you turned to a man that you fully didn't understand.
Christopher Nolan wrote those words,
because only a mind as depraved and annoying and weird as his
could understand a true agent of chaos,
like myself.
In other words, if you fire Jules,
I will destroy your whole world!
- World!
Or something like that.
- Are you saying Jim went to bat for me?
- You could say that.
- I can't decide who's dumber.
You, you, or you!
Your family is nothing but 100 years of war profiteering,
and 200 years of cousin fucking!
You strangled that stripper, Freddie.
You know you did.
Sure, it was international waters.
Whoo!
Your dad's your Uncle Steve and your mom's your Aunt Susan.
Your third wife is technically your grandson, Leslie!
I'm drawing a mustache on your mustache.
She's your wife, your grandson,
your wife, your grandson.
You made your four-year-old daughter get lipo!
Idiot!
You killed the last dolphin, Leslie.
You paid to murder the last dolphin!
You paid for the privilege!
So gentlemen, in conclusion,
you either keep Jules on or I walk.
Along with all your secrets, nothing but time on my hands,
and the ability to attract attention
like perhaps nobody else in American history.
I mean, the choice is yours, really.
You either let Jules make you all a lot of money,
or I burn your beds down while you're still sleeping in them.
[chuckles] Oh, one more thing.
[zip, urinates] - Oh, Jim!
- Oh, no! - No, no.
- Psssh! Just super-soaked Freddie
with all the liquids inside of his body.
The guy was drenched.
I think in a show of dominance,
and it worked 'cause Freddie just took it.
- What do I look like? A cake magician?
- [clears throat]
- Ooh, there's cake?
- Mm-hmm. There's a ton left too.
[suspenseful music]
♪
[sniffs]
[sighs]
- Hey, you going uptown? I'll, uh, I'll give you a ride.
- Why'd you write, "Letting Jules go
"was the hardest thing I ever had to do,
but seeing her happy made all my pain worth it"?
- Oh, because first drafts are always so on-the-nose,
and I'm sorry if reading that stupid thing
made you relive everything.
- What are you doing right now?
- What--what do you mean?
- You--you--you were never nice to me.
The whole time we were dating,
you--you were fun and interesting and dangerous,
but never kind.
- Yeah, I know.
- And now you're sticking up for me
and--and writing romantic epics?
- Well, it's really more of a pornographic memoir
in the style of Henry Miller, but..
- What happened to the Jim Brockmire
who crawled out of my bed just to stab me in the back?
- Well, I guess that back then,
I just didn't have the strength to own my own feelings,
so I tried to drown them all in alcohol.
The kindest path is always the hardest one to walk.
It really was Beth, you know?
Raising her gave me the strength
to reach out to the world with love.
- I didn't know...
that you'd ever be capable of being this kind of man.
- Well, I know what's coming next.
"I find it so boring that I'm dry as a handblower,
"and Jim and I are never, ever,
ever getting back together again."
Any-hoodles, would you like a ride?
[anticipatory music]
♪
Is that a no?
♪
No idea what just happened.
- Lamon, do I love Jim again? - Yes.
- Shit!
- I know.
- I have to go to him.
- There's no rush. You'll see him tomorrow.
- No, when you realize you love someone,
you have to go tell them right away.
If you don't tell them right away,
then you've wasted all this time
that you could've been spending with the person you love.
- I just feel like you've done a lot of cocaine.
- This is not the cocaine talking.
Why do you always think it's the cocaine?
I have to go see Jim!
By the way, set a reminder for me buy more cocaine.
- Do you really want to wear that hat?
- Can you see me?
- Depends on your definition of "see."
[upbeat music]
♪
- ♪ People say we're crazy
♪ Though we can have it all
♪ But the higher the monkey climbs ♪
♪ The farther it falls
♪ People say we're not one
- ♪ Whoa, whoa
- ♪ And we're making up the rules ♪
- ♪ Whoa
- ♪ But we're tearing up the mountain ♪
- ♪ Whoa, whoa
- ♪ And taking in the views
- ♪ Whoa all: ♪ Go
- ♪ Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
♪ Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa
[door opens]
- Oh, Jules.
Hi!
Jim said you two were working together again.
We just had sex, so he's a little tuckered out,
but I'll see if I can razz him.
Oh, my God.
Are you here to say you're in love with him?
I've always had my fingers crossed for you two!
[squeals]
Jim!
Jules is here!
Jim, wake up!
Jim!
Come on!
[chuckles, squeals]