Fantasy Baseball Today - 05/09: Rankings Movers, Buy or Sell, SPs to Add (Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: May 9, 2019

Chris Sale is officially awesome again, but is Michael Brantley this good (5:00) or is he worth selling? And we had some standout SPs who might be available in your leagues (7:50) such as Kyle Gibson, Brad Peacock and Brandon Woodruff. We'll rank them for you! Then we'll rank a group of high-end SPs (19:05) like Clayton Kershaw, Matt Boyd and Jack Flaherty ... News and notes (26:00), Buy or Sell (33:00) for Christian Yelich, Josh Hader, J.D. Martinez, Tyler Glasnow and more ... Bullpen updates (44:40), and then Scott discusses some rankings movers (47:10). Hunter Dozier and Mike Minor are up. Yu Darvish has moved down. And we finish the show recapping some lousy SP performances from yesterday (55:00), discussing Hunter Renfroe and previewing today's matchups (59:30) ... Email us at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the fantasy baseball today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email fantasy baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Now here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris. All right, everybody. Welcome for the show. It is Thursday.

We are scamming you today. Team scam is here. Scott and Adam. And guess what? Team scam has Chris Sale on its roster. And guess what? Don't ask Scott about Chris Sale anymore. He's tired of answering the questions. What's up, Scott, rocking the CBS polo. Very spirited today, very team-oriented. How are you, sir? Yeah, I am good. I'm good. If you're watching on video, I was trying to do the Jack Nicholson nodding, furiously, Jiff, which I think is from what the departed.

I don't know. I don't know. because that's my reaction to Chris Sale. Because yeah, yeah. If it wasn't obvious before, hopefully it is to everybody now. I know there were some concerns. Oh, he's still giving up hard contact when he was succeeding prior to yesterday's start. But now, if you look at the last four starts, he has 42 strikeouts to six walks, five run runs allowed in his last four starts.

So that seems pretty awesome to me And for all the struggles early, his ERA's down down to 450, his whips down to 1-11. Yeah, I think if you were patient with him, if you kept the faith, you are going to be richly rewarded now. Does it matter to you that he's done it against weak competition lately?

No. Okay. Don't, don't. Don't try to undermine this turnaround for Chris. I don't want to hear it anymore. He is awesome. As soon as he started throwing, you know, when he had that start against the Yankees, he was throwing like 98 miles per hour,

you and I were both like, okay, the hard contact was there, but as long as he's got velocity, he's going to be awesome. Yeah. And then the velocity went down, you know, to even like the 92, 93 range. I don't know what it was yesterday.

And I said, even if he's there, Chris Sale's going to be awesome. As long as he's just not like throwing like, you know, 90 miles per hour with his fastball. I think he's just going to be terrific. So I'm happy that was five starts

ago where the velocity, and it is an outlier for the season when his velocity was that high. But just knowing that velocity was still there when he called on it, I really validated the

reports of him. Oh, he's throwing software on purpose. Because prior to that, you could make the excuse. Well, no, he's not. he's just hurt and they don't want to talk about it. But, you know, once we saw that velocity in that start, even when it dropped back down in the following starts, which it didn't drop all the way down. Right, exactly.

He kind of found a middle ground from where he was early on and where he wasn't that one start against the Yankees, was it? Yes. But yeah, he's pitching. He's looking more like 2016 Chris Sale now. Who wasn't as good as 2018 Chris Sale, but was, of course, a stud because he's always been a stud. Yeah.

And that seems to be what he's aiming to be more like 2016 Chris Sale. All right. Well, I'll take 2016 Chris Sale. No question about it. Today we have buy or sale. Not really by or sale, but it just made sense to say buy or sale right there. We've got some pitchers to add if they haven't already been added, like Brandon Woodruff and Matt Strom and Jared Icoff. We'll talk about those guys and a few more.

Brad Peacock had a nice bounce back yesterday. He made an adjustment. He started pitching from the wind up and it really helped because he had been exclusively from the stretch before that. Scott is going to give us some rankings, risers, and fallers. And we're also going to look at some players who were the story of the first few weeks, you know, the talk of the first few weeks, and whether or not you're still buying it. And those players are Yohan Moncada, Yandi Diaz, Trey Mancini, J. Bruce, Jason Hayward, Mike El Franco, those are the ones I've got in the show today.

We'll ask Scott if he is buying them. And a lot of picture talk, I think the one that I really watched yesterday, I actually went to the Yankees game yesterday, so I can talk about the big cheater, you say Gikuchi, but more importantly, I got home and I watched the Dodgers game, and I want to talk a lot about Clayton Kershaw, and just a little bit of fantasy baseball philosophy and how we go about ranking pitchers. Thursday standouts, yes, Chris Sale was obviously one of them with his eight innings of one-run ball with 14 strikeouts at Baltimore. And Michael Brantley is another one that I feel like could get lost in the shuffle from everything that happened yesterday. was a lot of pitchers to talk about. But Brantley, I think, was the only double-donger yesterday. And he is now the number six outfielder in points leagues, number four in Roto.

And what do you think, buy, sell or hold, Michael Brantley? Yeah, I mean, I think I'd be inclined to hold on to him, though I do get the cell argument, just given his injury history. But in terms of performance, you know, for as well as he's done so far, His BAPIP really isn't that high given his batted ball profile. I mean, he's built to have a higher than average BABIP. And that's what it is. His ex-WOBA and Wobar, you know, he's not outperforming his ex-Woba by that much.

So the kind of contact he's making should be yielding about the results it has so far. And obviously, he makes a lot of contact, which helps. Yeah, I think he's, I think he's pretty much this good. It's just, you know, you've got to fear the injury history with him. So if you are selling on him, you should be getting something really good in return. It would probably mean, like, he's my ticket to getting a high-end pitcher. Yes. Because that's the main thing I'd be trying to trade for right now if I had an asset that I thought could deliver a big return.

You always need. I don't think, I think everybody out there listening is thinking I could really use another pitcher, just because that's the way that's the way this player pool breaks down. Yeah, I don't think Brantley is this good, but he's a top six outfielder. Scott doesn't rank him that way. So he's got a 1068 OPS at home

and a 922 OPS on the road. And he's just, he's not that good of a hitter. You know, it's not just the move to Houston that's really helping him here. He's just off to a really good start. So I buy that he's going to be a very, he's going to be a plus and batting average. he has three steals and four attempts,

so that would put him on what kind of pace, like a 15 steel pace or something like that. Are we about a fifth of the way through the season? So yeah, I could buy that. It's just a power, Scott. I mean, it's like a 23% home run to fly ball rate. I don't think all of that can be explained by moving to Houston. So that's the one part of the game that I see coming down for Brantley.

You know, I don't think he's going to hit. Well, he's got nine home run. runs. So he's not going to hit 30 home runs, I don't think. No, probably not. Probably not. That's probably the area where he's outperforming a little bit, but 25 seems in the range of possibility if he stays healthy. Yeah, he's going to be really good. He's going to be really good. He was great value for sure. Any other standouts you want to get to? I mean, they're in the notes, but if there's anyone that you want to talk about right now, do it.

Who am I dying to talk about? Let's get into it with Brad Peacock because that was the most curious start for me yesterday. All right, so I have a segment called Let's add some pitchers if they aren't owned already. If they are owned, then I guess we'll just rank them. That's the name of the segment. And these guys are all owned in 57% of leagues or more.

There are four pitchers who, based on yesterday, certainly deserve to be picked up. And for three of them, based on recent performance. Peacock was more or less just yesterday. But Brad Peacock, 73% own, seven scoreless 12 strikeouts against Kansas City. The Royals strikeout more. They're not like this low strikeout team anymore.

I think they're probably middle of the pack. I can double check. Brandon Woodruff, first quality start of the season. But I think I talked about him on Monday. I'm excited about... We talked about him on Monday. We did, right? Yeah, like I want to pick up Brandon Woodruff.

I missed my chance. He's owned it all of my... leagues. He's a two-star pitcher next week. So is Peacock. Matt Strom, he's been really good lately. So his first start, he'll have five runs. He's allowed eight runs in his last six starts. That's Matt Strom. Good start against the Mets yesterday. Jared Eichoff. He's got 31 strikeouts and 30 innings, despite only four strikeouts and eight shutout innings yesterday. But Icoff's been really good, and he's a two-star pitcher next week. And Kyle Gibson, personally, my least favorite on this list, I think. Yeah, yeah.

57% and the lowest owned on the list. But he's been very good lately. His last four starts, six earned runs, 28 strikeouts and 24 innings, and wasn't really so bad last year. So again, the names are Peacock, Woodruff, Strom, Icoff, and Gibson. The floor is yours, Scott White.

So you want me to rank them? Is that where we're going with this? Well, let's add some pitchers if they aren't owned already. If they are owned, then I guess we'll just rank them. But yeah, you can rank them because that also helps tell us who you want to pick up. So I think I would go Woodruff 1 here because I agreed with you on Monday. I agree with you now that I'm really excited about some of what we're seeing from him. Because it was his first quality start, but that's just because the brewers were being really careful with him.

His pitch count yesterday, I think was just a second start with 100 pitches. And like the thing is in an era where managers are often scared of letting their pitch. pitch a third time through the lineup. Woodruff isn't just like a guy with two really good pitches and that's all he throws. He has a diverse arsenal. He has the kind of arsenal that should be able to manage a third time through the lineup. I know the results haven't been there, but he hasn't got many chances yet. So I think he could be on the verge of taking off.

So he's number one. Number two for me is actually Kyle Gibson. Wow. Who, yeah, he was 22nd in swinging strike rate last year. year. I think it was last week I talked about how that's a category. You look at the swinging strike rate leaderboard. It's pretty much all aces. There were in that top 22 range last year, I think three exceptions, Gibson among them, where I

would say, well, that guy's not an ace. Dylan Bundy and Tyler Anderson were the other two. But Gibson did have a career best season. He has a really good slider. And after a horrible start to the season, his last three starts have been really good, really good. And I think he's back to being must own because of that. Well, for Gibson, I mean, I think it's the last four starts for him, but three of them were against either Baltimore or Toronto. But, you know, the same argument I made for Jose Burrios yesterday, I said Brrios, I feel like

he's going to be a top five pitcher this year because he's going to, at the end of the year, perhaps face the easiest schedule in baseball, and Gibson's going to have the same schedule. So maybe I should have considered that. All right, so you go Woodruff one, Gibson, two, and then we have Strom and, then we have Strom and Peacock. I'm going to go Peacock over Strom. Just because he's the guy who, who I believed in more coming in.

And he has had good strikeout game so far. He just, he's missing that wipeout slider that made him a success two years ago. That really turned his career around. He's throwing it a lot, but it's not, it hasn't been nearly as effective in missing bats. It's down from like 20% to 13% in swinging strike rate. Yesterday, he did make a change. He was pitching out of the 1%.

wind up for the first time in several years had been an exclusively a stretch guy. I know Heath would prefer everybody pitch from the stretch. No, it really worked for him. Yeah, it worked. Yeah, it seemed like it made a big difference for him. It didn't make a difference with the slider, though, in terms of the effectiveness of that pitch. Uh, and he only had, for having 12 strikeouts, he only had 11 swinging strikes. So I'm still skeptical of Peacock, but he was a guy who I was dropping in pretty much all my leagues prior to this start. And so I'm feeling some regret from that now. And so I'm feeling some regret from that now. My least favorite is strong, but if he keeps this up much longer, I'm obviously going to have to.

The pendulum's going to swing back in terms of how I feel about him, because I was excited about him coming in. And it's just like, he's 55th this year among qualifying pitchers. There's 80, there's 87 qualifying pitchers. He's 55th in terms of swinging strike rate. I knew it. That is your stat. I mean, yeah, you owed swinging strike. great.

It's important to you, but let me, but all right, so you go Woodruff 1, Gibson 2, Peacock 3, Strom 4, and with Peacock, you know, he's had this slider for more than one year where it's been really good and he just doesn't have it right now. And I actually could look at that as a good thing and say, he just needs to get the feel back for that slider and then he's going to be really good because 10 walks, 38 strikeouts, only four home runs allowed in 37 and 2 thirds, a 109 whip. It's just a high ERA. Everything else looks good.

Obviously, it looks a lot better after this great start against Kansas City. If there's one thing that I'd say for Peacock is that he's struggled against the tougher competition. Next week he's at Detroit and at Boston. But like Tanaka, for example, we didn't talk about this yesterday. Tanaka's been a little frustrating for fantasy owners. He gutted his way to a good start, decent start on Tuesday. But he just doesn't have a splitter. And I have to believe, based on his history, that Splitter is going to come back and he's going to be

a solid pitcher. I mean, we know what Tanaka is. He's up and down, but he just hasn't had his splitter. He's going to get the feel for that pitch back. So Peacock doesn't have his slider. You've made a great point. That's been, that's the key to his success. I feel like he'll get it back. And when he does, I'm going to be happy that I, I'm going to brag. I started him in the podcast league yesterday. And I'm only losing 200 to 73 right now. So he's got almost half my points on this terrible team. But you know what I'm saying? And the point you're making is, It's kind of the point we were making about Chris Sale, right? Yeah, right, right.

Where if, you know, there's encouraging signs here lately, and there's not much more he needs to do to get, to get back to being fully Chris Sale. So I get that. I mean, obviously, Brad Peacock isn't Chris Sale. So that makes, that lowers the confidence level a little bit. But yeah, that slider had been for several years, the key to everything for him.

and you got to figure he's working hard to get it back. And last point on Peacock, only 10 walks. And you're probably so sick of hearing it, but I don't know if I've said it since spring trading. But 2017, as a starter, Peacock had a 322ERA. He struck out 135 batters in 111 and 2 thirds. And then in his last 13 appearances, only 20 walks and 70 in a third.

And then last year, only 2.8 walks per 9. was as an RP. So it seems like he's figured out the control angle. And then I actually think that if Peacock's best pitch comes back and he's figured out the walks, I actually think you might have an ace there in Peacock. I'm not giving up on that hope. That was my hope coming in. Bold prediction. Yeah. I mean, but it makes sense, right? Because as the starting pitcher in 2017, he was an ace, basically. He was well, he was like 10-something strikeouts per nine, I think, maybe even more. 1.22 whips a little high,

but the walks were high. You get the walks down. Ace. It must own to me. But all right, so he's third for you, but these are interesting guys to pick up. Pick them up.

Would you drop Mike Fultenevich for Brandon Woodrow for Kyle Gibson? No, I am discouraged about Mike Fultenevich. I've lowered him in my rankings. His velocity is down a couple miles per hour. But the kind of season he just had,

like you got to wait it out longer than this. I mean, obviously it's, it's been what, seven weeks now, six weeks, but he only recently came back. So it's kind of like we're in mid-April. It's three starts. As far as Fultenevich is concerned. Right. Okay.

Chris, or I'm looking at Heath, actually. Heath wrote a story, they might be aces. Chris Paddock, Caleb Smith, Matthew Boyd, who we're going to talk about today. Domingo Armand and Charlie Morton. Yeah, Morton, not a great start. yesterday. Boyd, interesting comments from Brad Osmiss, who faced his team faced Matt Boyd yesterday. I don't know

if you saw this, you probably did. You and I read the same recaps. But Brad Osmiss said, I can get the actual quote, but it was basically like, Matt Boyd's slider is as good as any one slider that we faced. And he's like, I didn't expect Matt Boyd to be

this good of a pitcher because he used to manage the Tigers. So I just thought it was it was interesting perspective. It seems like he's buying into Matt Boyd. Yeah. I think Scott is as well. Yeah, I mean, we've said it before. Matt Boyd is this year's Patrick Corbyn. Like the same thing that allowed Corbyn to take off with Ace Production,

Boyd has done. A really good slider, and it's kind of made it his primary pitch, throwing it a ton. So, yeah, I'm totally on board with Boyd. I have him, if not my top 25, in my top 30, and it's continuing to rise from there. I'm going to have you rank him with some other pitchers. after this quick break on fantasy baseball today.

Okay, Scott, you ready to rank more pitchers? Let's do it. Clayton Kershaw, Shane Bieber, Charlie Morton, Jack Flaherty, Matt Boyd. Current five pitchers there. Kershaw, Bieber, Morton, Flaherty, Boyd. So these are all pitchers who I think have shown Ace Potential. Obviously, some of them have performed better so far this year than others. I go Kirshall 1

Just confirming with my rankings here Kershaw 1, Bieber 2 It's probably time to move Boyd Up to 3rd of this group And then Flaherty and then Morton Morton's been better than Flaherty this year But The biggest question

About Flaherty coming in was would he limit the walks And he has The swinging strike rate Yesterday was an exception but the swinging strike rate yesterday was this season has been as good as we saw as a rookie. It seems like Flaherty's

biggest issue is he's had bad home run luck and playing the Brewers three times probably has something to do with that. So yesterday was a step in the wrong direction. Everything I was encouraged about from Flaherty, he kind of betrayed.

But I'm willing to chalk that one up as a fluke and I still think Flaherty is a strong kid. candidate to have a breakthrough season. Well, we'll view as a breakthrough season when all said and done. Seven walks in his last two starts for Flaherty. That's a little concerning, but still only 13 on the year. So he had done a good job limiting that.

Yeah, and he has had a very tough schedule, not just facing the Brewers three times, but yesterday it was the Phillies. The previous start, it was at the Cubs, and they've been hot. Kirshaw, though, he's won for you, followed by Bieber, then Boyd, then Flaherty, then Morton. All these guys are must starts. I was hoping that you watched the Dodgers game last night because they played the Braves

so we could talk about Clayton Kirshall and just getting a little philosophical because I, you know, I've watched most, I've probably watched 60% of Clayton Kirshaw's pitches this year. Like I've got them on my most important fantasy team and you know, you know me. I like to kind of go with what my eyes see,

but my eyes have not seen a great pitcher with Kershaw. I never really said it, though, because I didn't want to give bad advice, because I've got to also go with my brain, and my brain says, Adam, stop. You're not a pitcher. You're not a scout. You don't really know what you're talking about.

So the results had been really good. Until the last two starts, now two starts ago was six innings, three runs, but I did watch. He just didn't really have it. He managed to gut his way through and get a quality start at San Diego last time out. Yesterday was more interesting. Yesterday, he couldn't put hitters away.

He only got four strikeouts and six and two-thirds. Now, it ends up being six and two-thirds, nine hits, four runs. This is what happened in the seventh. He comes out, six innings, two runs, I think six hits. A perfectly fine start. Gets the first two outs, and now you're looking at seven innings, two runs, if he can just get one final out. He gives up two straight infield singles.

Very frustrating. and then an RBI single to Josh Donaldson. Now it's six and two-thirds, three runs. He gets pulled, one more run comes in, and now he has a pretty ugly line. Nine hits, four runs, and six and two-thirds, only four strikeouts. The point, though, is that I just like, something's just not there with Kershaw. Obviously, the velocity's down.

Oral Herschiser was talking about it last night. His slider is not great right now. He needs his slider to improve, and right now, the difference between his slider and his fastball in terms of velocity is not enough, and it looks like a cutter, and it's just not in a good enough pitch. And Oral Hirschizer, I think, is just about maybe the best broadcaster in baseball. So, look, strikeout printing almost, 0.98 whip, 331 ERA.

Everything looks good. But my gut tells me, my gut tells me to offer Clayton Kershaw for Jose Burrios, I think I might be able to pull that trade off. I want to know what you think, because, you know, before Tuesday, you know, it looked great for Kershaw. Now it doesn't look as great after these last. two starts. Yeah, although I will point out the worst of them, the worst start he's had so far was

four earned runs and six and two-thirds innings, right? Yes. For a worst start, not so bad. I think these are all fine concerns. They would have been fine concerns last year when really there was the big drop in velocity. This year, especially recently, he's kind of been throwing. the same way he was then, which gives us a better idea of what to expect, and it's still really good pitcher. He's still a great control pitcher with a high-end secondary arsenal, and that's enough to carry him to close to ace-level production.

I think the strongest argument for why you might want to trade Kershaw for Burrios is Kershaw, basically for the rest of his career, is going to be pitching injured. He's had the back issue for several years now, and it's not going away. Probably going to require an IL stint, maybe not a lengthy one, but probably will require one at some point when it gets to be bothering him again. And Berrios has a much better chance of being a 200-inning pitcher. I think he came very close to that last year. Would you do it? Would you rather have Berrios than Kirchau? I mean, I rank Churchill higher, so no.

but it's not a big enough difference that I would have a problem with anyone doing it and in the right circumstances like maybe if the situation where my pitching staff is really thin and I know I'm going to have to lean on that top guy be it at Kirshall be it Burrios I know I'm really going to have to depend on him

all season then I might consider it in that scenario but if Kirshall is my number two number three guy probably not And he is really reinventing himself. He is a big time. Okay, he's not like he's, has never been a ground ball pitcher, but he's even more of a groundball pitcher. I shouldn't say reinventing himself,

but he's getting a ton of ground balls. There's a lot of good stuff there for Kershaw. And last night could have been six innings, seven innings, two runs. Two stupid infield singles, you know, really kind of ruin the outing for Kershaw. So that, those are some ace pitchers there. And so maybe you want to buy low on Jack Flaherty. And Matt Boyd is really good. News and notes, Chris Davis was removed with that hip issue, still kind of dealing with it.

So keep an eye on Chris Davis. Mike Zanino left with quad tightness. Pedro Strope is on the IL, Scott White. What do you think? So yesterday they had a save situation against the Marlins. They brought in Kyle Ryan to face a lefty. He gave up a hit. And then Steve Seishak came in and blew the save.

But is Seishk the guy to get? Probably. I mean, Madden's saying it's kind of all. hands on deck, they're going with a committee. And I don't think a hamstring strain is something that should keep strope out too long. So I'm not sure anybody will really have a chance to get a foothold in that spot. But if I'm going to bet on anybody, it's going to be C-Shack. The Rangers sent Delano to Shields to AAA.

If you need an outfielder, that might steal some bases, maybe in an AL-only league. Keep an eye on Charlie Tilson for the White Sox. He has two steals in three games. and I looked at his minor league track record and in the past he actually stole a lot of bases Charlie Tilson Michael Chavis has done some outfield work for the Red Sox, you know, like in practice

So they might be able to squeeze him in there Addison Russell started At second base with Ben Zobras taking a personal leave I'm assuming we don't have any interest in Addison Russell Yeah no No Joey Gallo Joey Gallo became the first major league player

To hit 100 home runs before hitting 100 singles He has 100 home runs to 93 singles. The more amazing stat is that previously the record for fewest singles for 100 home runs, Russell Brannion, when he had 100 home runs, he had 172 singles. That was the fewest amount of singles. Now it's 93 for Joey Gallo. Amazing.

And do you know how many sacrifice flies Joey Gallo has in his career? Yeah, because this was something that was widely. talked about a couple weeks ago. Not on this show. But yeah, it's just one, right? It happened earlier this year. He got his first ever sacrifice fly. How is that possible?

I don't think I talked about it. I should have spent an entire episode on one sacrifice fly. I haven't studied sacrifice fly leaderboards over the years, but I imagine they've gone down because, I mean, first of all, home runs are more fly balls are resulting in home run. Second of all, winter guys on base. You know? Yeah, I don't think the sacrifice flies is quite what it once was. Hunter Pence, not quite what he once was,

but this year he's been amazing, and he had a pinch hit Grand Slam yesterday, and they are going to try to get Hunter Pence more playing time. He already has more home runs in 64 at bats than he had in 235 at bats yesterday. Last year, excuse me. Aaron Hicks could be back this weekend. Stephen Mats may avoid the IL. Jed Lowry could be back on.

Friday for the Mets. You say Kikuchi cheated. I'm sure you can read about that. I don't know if he really cheated, but he was great. Giovanni Orshella bruised his knee. And yesterday I was at the Yankees game, Scott, and we were watching four Yankees fans. And Kikuchi had a no-hitter, I think, into the sixth inning. And the Yankees at the time were down like five-nothing. And so I said to the guys, I said, would you rather the Yankees come back and win? Or you say Kikuchi throws a no-hitter? And I was the only one that said no-hitter. everybody else wanted to see the Yankees. I'm like, dude, we're at the game.

You're never going to see a no-hitter. Let them throw a no-hitter. You know, it's May 8th. Let them throw a no-hitter. They all wanted to win. Neither happened. I would want to win, too. Really?

I would want to win too. When you go to the game, especially, like you want to see a win. We were having fun. We were just chatting, you know, like four guys from work. It was a good time. Thank you for taking me, Adam.

I think back to that time, Randy Johnson, with the Diamondback. through a perfect game against the Braves, however many years ago that was. I wasn't there, so I understand that changes it, but I was watching it on TV, and it still hurts me to see highlights. No, that's different.

It would rather not have the perfect game. Of course, if you're just watching it on TV, you don't want to see it. But if you're at the game, you want to see history, I think. So the other thing I said was, I wish I wanted to throw a no hitter so I have a cool story to tell on the show tomorrow but since I don't have that story I'm going to give you a trivia question

I recently learned I've been hosting podcasts for 10-ish years I recently learned what Pod stands for do you know what Pod stands for Hmm Pod No

It stands for play on demand Can you believe that Like I had no idea I had no idea. That's what a podcast was. Yeah, I hadn't guessed. I wouldn't have guessed it was an acronym, no. Yeah, that's very strange.

That's interesting. Are you sure it's true? Can't believe everything you read on the internet. The sort, no, I got a, I had a good source on this, so I do believe it's true. I have to promote a couple things real quick. Scott and I and Chris, not Heath this week, but eventually Heath, we are going to be on CBS Sports HQ. Check it out this Sunday, 3 to 7 p.m. Eastern. your mother's day. We'll give you some fantasy baseball advice looking ahead to the upcoming week,

talking about trades and stuff like that. We're going to answer some tweets. We're on CBS Sports HQ. How do you watch it? You download the CBS Sports app. I have it on my Roku. So if you have an over-the-top device, download a connected device, you know, download the CBS Sports app. Everything is free. Everything is free. You don't have to sign up or anything and just watch CBS Sports H.Q. We are live from 3 to 7 p.m. So that's going to be awesome. Eastern time. and we have so many other podcasts right now. We've got a golf podcast. We've got a combat podcast, college basketball, college football, NFL, fantasy football,

all this great stuff. Go to CBSports.com slash podcasts to check it out. We're going to be right back with some buy or sell and more from Wednesday's games. Oh, try to talk about prospects a little bit and some rankings, risers, and fallers. That's coming up next on fantasy baseball today. Buy or sell. I got some from our listeners and some from me. We'll see which one Scott likes better.

These are from me. You can tell us watching, I was going through the Brewers box score when I did this one. By or sell, the first three are brewers. Christian Yellich is the second best player in fantasy, By or sell. Sell,

I think you can make a case. I think you can make a case. I don't, especially with the way his numbers have kind of slowly come around. I don't think there's any reason to abandon Mookie bets as a market. Mike Trout-like player. And obviously,

Christian Yelich has a history of kind of disappointing with the power. Great start this year, obviously. And if he keeps it up, then he's going to be in that discussion, too, is one of the top three players in fantasy. Maybe even Leak Frogging pets, maybe even leapfrogging trout. But I think it's too early to abandon those two. I have given some thought to moving Yelich up when I do the trade chart every week.

so I'm kind of reconsidering when I do head it's a top 200, when I do Roto, it's a top 250. So I think about this stuff. Well, wait, so where do you have? I have considered moving Yelich up as high as third. Yeah.

I still haven't convinced myself to do that yet. Where do you have Yelich then right now? Fifth. Okay. By or sell, Josh Hader is the number one closer in fantasy. I think for as long

as we can count on him being the primary safe source of Milwaukee, which may be all season. Yeah, you can't talk around it like that. You got to give me, because this is part of this buyer's sell is do you buy that he is the closer all season. So it's buyer sell, haters number one. Okay. Okay.

All right. I will say sell then, because I think, I don't think this is where the brewers want him. He's actually number eight in points leagues, probably a little better in Roto. but the top eight relievers. I'll take Glass Now out. Yeah, it's Glass Now One. Yates, Kenley Jansen, Shane Green, Brad Hand, Felipe Vasquez, Roberto OZuna, Josh Hater. Yeah, and that's that, like the relief pitcher rankings and points leagues are, it's probably the most random.

It changes a lot during the season, of course. and it's so dependent on how many saves a guy has, which also changes that the pace of guys accumulating saves can change a lot over the course of the season. So I almost don't even pay attention to it when I go into a new year ranking closers or when I'm ranking closers within a season. Is he in a position to get a lot of saves?

For the Brewers, I would say yes. Is his stuff among the best relievers? And it probably is the best. So, yeah, I would say I sell the idea, but not because of Hater's potential while he is filling the role. And Hater actually has a 295 ERA, which is pretty high on this list of elite closers. And there's just, in my opinion, no way he's going to finish with an ERA that high. Buy or sell. Mike Mustakis is a stud second baseman.

It depends on your definition of stud. I will sell it. but it's easier to buy at second base than any other position because there's just not a lot of highly productive bats at that position and I do think the power pace he's on is pretty close to legitimate it's just kind of his profile is all power and you know that kind of prevents him from being like a top 36 top 40 hitter where I tend to think the studs fall

Okay. Buy or sell, Robinson Canoe is done. Cell. Would you put a bi-low tag on him? I would. There's not a lot of indicators that he's had, like, bad luck. I'm not even sure. Nine walks of 31 strikeouts is pretty concerning for Canoe. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, the strikeouts are out. And the BAPIP is normal. Let's see. The home run to fly ball rate is, down. He's been so bad against lefties. You know, I, it's not just a simple case of, oh, he's had bad luck so far and he's got to bounce back, but it's more a case of he's Robinson Canoe and we've counted him out a few times and he's come roaring back. So I just, I feel like you should know better. Yeah, in his last two seasons, last year was pretty damn good for him.

Two years ago was not so good. And he, in 2018, he was good against lefties. 2017, he was terrible against lefties. So far this year, going into yesterday's game, he was batting 152 with no extra base hits in 33 at bats against lefties, crushing righties. So we'll see if that trend continues. Those are my buyer sales. Now from the listeners, by herself from Robbie,

Chris Sayle was better than Max Scher the rest of season. So there's nothing to worry about with Max Scher. I know the ERA is kind of high. I know the win-loss record. He's had terrible luck, which he started out that way last year too, with the wind loss record. But he's fine. He's on pace for over 300 strikeouts.

And I think he leads the majors in FIPP, or he did very recently. So, yeah, there's nothing to worry about with Scherzer. M.G. Mitchell, buy or sell. George Springer is better than J.D. Martinez rest of season. I sell, and J.D. Martinez is actually, and it's been the toughest call,

but he's one of the four players I have ahead of Gellich. J.D. Martinez... Scherzer does lead the majors in fifth, by the way. J.D. Martinez, I think, is days away from just going on a home run tear. He is at 10.2% home run to fly ball rate. The last two years, it's been around 30%. So, you know, and he's hitting the ball as hard as he did last year.

Like, if you can get Jady Martinez right now, he's going to just get piping hot very soon. Like a baked potato. From Scott Peterson. Buy yourself, Joe Musgrove is a must start all year. Yes, I'm buying that. Okay. By the way, the Scott Peterson, the Lacey Peterson documentary was really interesting.

I don't remember what channel it was on, but if you could find it, it was like a six-part documentary sort of thing. It was very interesting, a good watch. Mickey, you know, his thought-provoking, it's an interesting case. Mickey O'Neill says, Jesus Aguilar, buy or sell,

that he's coming around. He sat yesterday. I buy that he's coming around, but until we see more consistent playing time, it's hard to start him. Like, I'd be, if I was close to dropping him

a week ago, I'm further away today. And he has started over things against some right-handers, but he's also sat. Yeah. So if he does fully come around, I don't think playing time will be that much of an issue,

but we're not there yet. Buy or sell, Tyler Glass now will finish as a top eight starting pitcher. Well, I don't rank him that way, so I'm going to sell. But that's kind of a head take. What does my gut say? My gut says no, because he's kind of gotten away with being a two-pitch pitcher so far. The swinging strike rate actually isn't that high.

Those two pitches are so good. that he's getting strikeouts anyway, and I'm not... I'm not saying he's not an ace-caliper pitcher now, but he doesn't quite measure up to some of the long-term studs we've seen in that filling that niche in fantasy. What a dreadful trade that the pirates made. Oh, my gosh. Meadows and Glass Now for Archer.

Was that the trade? I mean, just awful. Yeah. Yeah, I'm trying to think they got anyone else back, but those are the main terms of the trade. It was bad. Unless they got Willie Mays. They made the Garik Bull trade the same calendar year, right?

Where they got back, Musgrove. That's probably the one good thing they got back. My goodness. Yeah. Okay, let's see. Scott, buy or sell real quick. Let's go quick on these. Colin McHugh has only one more bad start before he moves to the bullpen.

I sell it. I sell it. Unlike Peacock, he's actually getting a ton of whiffs with the slider, which he learned from Brad Peackew. up. Clay Garrison. By herself, Scott looks at himself in the mirror shirtless and reminds himself how right he is on An Alberto Mondesie.

I can, as the only person who can answer this for sure, I sell. From Steve, buy yourself. Scott's Michael Cain, tie butchery bit is the best bit in show history. I'll buy, I'll buy it. I will buy it. As long as you have three minutes to spare, it is the best. It is amazing. Scott Wolf says buy or sell, the twins are the best team in the American League.

I sell. Yeah, I sell. Astros, raise, twins. Astros raise... They might be the best team outside of the ALE East, yeah. Astros raise, Yankees, Red Sox twins will be your five playoff participants, and that will be the order by the end of the year. I'm putting the Astros over them. I take back what I said.

They're the best team in the AL Central. How's that? Yes. Corsfield is my homie. Buy or sell, Jose Altuve, is worth a first round pick. I still rank him that way when I do the trade chart, though. He's falling little by little. I don't have really any concerns about the bat.

I think he's going to be Jose Altuve the hitter. Yeah. But one steal so far. I mean, that's a big part of his profile. And if he doesn't pick it up, and you know, unlike hitting stats, you can't just trust that they're going to come around because it takes a conscious effort to steal bases

when it doesn't necessarily to hit home runs or to hit well at all. So yeah, I'm a little concerned. Yeah. Look, he could have a three steel week. You just don't know and things that the outlook could change, but I see exactly what you're saying about Jose Altova. All right, Lisa, we got some time left on the show.

We got about 15 minutes left. So let's save prospects for tomorrow. See how many games we have on the schedule today. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven. We only have ten games, so that'll give us a lighter show tomorrow. I want to make sure we talk about guys like Hunter Renfro and Tyler Skaggs and Sunny Gray. I don't think, let's do the bullpen real quick. I don't know that there's much here.

Chris Martin got a save for Texas, but we've already talked about how they want to get LeClerc back in that role. Matt Barnes was used in a tie game in the ninth inning, but it was on the road. And then Ryan Brazier was used in a tie game in the 11th inning, and then Heath Hembray got a save. And then A.J. Minter was awful. Brazier nearly gave up a walk-off home run, by the way. Trey Mancini. Yeah. Jackie Bradley had to climb, torso completely over the fence to rob him. Yeah, so I would say stock up on Matt Barnes right now.

And I would also say, Scott, I'm going to go to one of my leagues. You should go to the other. The two leagues in which I dropped Luke Jackson in, one of them was our scam league. I think Luke Jackson, I think we should pick him up because Minter was awful again yesterday. I'm picking up Luke Jackson right now. Should I drop A.J. Mithyr for Jackson? Well, that's... He's my worst player. I think I should.

Or I could drop J. Bruce. I mean, depending on the format, I'd be... I'd be reluctant to drop either, frankly, but... But yeah, I get what you're saying. I mean, Minter was working the seventh inning and was horrible yesterday. So it doesn't look any closer to regaining his footing in the closer role. Now, Luke Jackson, you know, the last time the Braves had a traditional save opportunity. they went with Jackson. He's got two of them now.

Or he does look like the guy for the time being. I think in the long run it's still going to be Craig Kimbril. Maybe I say that with too much confidence. But we're less than a month away from the MLB draft now. And once that's done, teams can sign him without Kimbril without losing a draft pick. And I think maybe that's what the Braves are thinking, I think. I could see. Jeremy Jeffress. Would you drop Jeremy

Jeffers for Luke Jackson? Short term yes, long term, no, right? All right, you know what? Jay Bruce is awful. I'm going to drop Jay Bruce. Is this from Team Scam? No, no. I wouldn't do that, too.

Okay, all right. Go pick up Luke Jackson for Team Scam. All right. Scott's rankings, risers, and fallers. He gave me a whole big list. I cherry pick six of them. I want to start with, all right, so we had an email yesterday. You know we have this little kid drop, right?

We have... I'm going to Tyler Skagg. Well, now we have another one. I think the listener was Brian, but I'm going to confirm on that. Our listener, uh, yes. His name is Brian, and he said, I'd like to offer up a cuteness rebuttal to the recently submitted Tyler Skag's cute kid drop. I'm a huge fan of the pot and our family loves the Braves.

Naturally, I've been mindlessly singing Mike Soroka's name because of you. Well, it looks like someone else is a fan of this little ditty. So this is Brian in Tampa, and this is Brian's kid with our new Mike Soroka drop. I freaking love it. Terrific. Well, Mike Soroka is a riser for you, Scott. Uh-huh. Yeah.

I don't see why he wouldn't be. He seems like he's secured a spot in a rotation that still has a lot of trouble spots. He has been, you know, Sean, A diverse arsenal, shown a lot of poise and command, and really everything, just living up to this Gatting Report in every way. And the fact that he's a 21-year-old and he's already doing this, I think, speaks very highly of his future. But after Max Freed, who, you know, is now dealing with a bit of an injury, I'm not sure there's a Braves pitcher I trust more than Mike Soroka.

But you'd rather have Freed? And he's going to make his next start, Max Freed. Yeah, I would. And I know I've sometimes been the naysayer when we talked about Freed, but the way he's introduced a slider to what was just a fastball curveball arsenal, and a slider that looks effective, that's a game changer. I think Freed is somebody you're going to rely on for as long as the Braves are relying on him, given that there could be an innings situation later on.

Okay. You have Soroka 54th. You have him just ahead of Luke Weaver, Sunny Gray. Eduardo Rodriguez Pablo Lopez, and you have him ahead of you, Darvish, who's a rankings faller for you, down to 59th. All right, so what happened here with Darvish? Because I thought you were kind of on the, well, he just has to get the walks under control. Yeah, and he was trending the right direction before taking a big step back in his last start. The walks are just, they've been terrible.

He's unstartable right now. I couldn't in good conscience rank somebody unstartable. as high as I had him, which I think was still in the top 40. So I moved him down quite a bit. He's still in the range that is pretty close to Must Own, I think. And, you know, in shallow leagues, I don't know that you could own him. I think there are certain situations where I might at least consider dropping him. But I do still think there's enough to be encouraged by that I would rather hold on to him, if possible.

So that's Darvish. Yeah, I mean, it's tough on this show when you know you're going to be held accountable for a lot of things you say. Remember, Darvish was the player I loved. So I've already, you know, I'm already accountable for that crap. I think he might just be bad at this point, unfortunately. But I'm still holding on to him and we'll see where it goes. Hunter Dozier is up in your rankings. And, you know, you've talked a lot about Dozier, how there's not that much to doubt at this point.

Actually, let's come back to Dojur and let's just stick with starting pitchers real quick. Mike Minor is also up in your rankings. Is he ahead of Mike Soroka? Is he ahead of... He is ahead of Mike Soroka. And, like, was he and Heath's, they might be Aces column? His latest, they might be Aces column? Because that's the kind of potential Mike Minor is showing.

Not in this one. He's been really efficient. And he, he lost, remember two years ago when he was so effective with the royals out of the bullpen. It kind of earned him this look as a starter for the Rangers. Starters, obviously, how he broke into the league before having a lot of arm issues. Well, he's taken the whiff rate he had in that relief role and is now taking it with him to the starting role after a big step back last year, expectedly, because, you know, you can't, you can't pitch with the same force out of a, out of the starting rotation that you've got. of the bullpen, but his secondary stuff has been that good, that he's just, he's missing tons of bats, he's an efficient pitcher, he's going deep into games. He looks like an ace.

It's reasonable to have some skepticism there to not be fully on board, but it's so hard to find a pitcher with, that even offers a glimmer of that kind of potential. And I think we're a little beyond a glimmer now with Minor. He's a top 40 pitcher for you. It's just interesting. Like, if somebody offered me a trade and they were offering me Mike Miner as part of the trade, I probably would be, like, turned off. I just...

I mean, it depends what they're asking for, of course. I get that the name value is not very good, but... I don't want to make a huge mistake. But the thing is, like, I don't think... It's so much easier to find replacement hitting. a replacement hitting that's going to at least keep you up with the competition. There's just so many bats out there than it is to find a pitcher.

And I feel like I'm, I feel like I'd be willing to overpay a little for anyone who shows that glimmer I was talking about. Fair enough. Just in the hope that it does last because it could, it could be a bigger game changer, I think, than, I don't know, who's a good example of a hitter, Josh Bell or whatever. Maybe you'd have to go a little higher than that. I don't know.

Well, but you like Bell, right? I mean, I imagine he's a riser. No, I do like Bell. I do like Bell. But there's a lot of Josh Bells out there, a lot more than there are Mark Miners. Okay, Hunter Dozier, I mentioned he is a riser for you. And where have you settled on? It looks like 15th in your third base rankings, which is actually really good.

Because 11 through 14 is Ehuhenio Suarez, Yohan Moncada, Justin Turner, Josh Donaldson, and then it's Hunter Dozier. Yeah, and to mention some first baseman he's ahead of, because he's also eligible there, Max Muncie, Matt Olson, Josh Bell, who I just mentioned. Yeah, it's really, if you look at what he's done, the supporting numbers for it, the fact that it's a good walk rate, good strikeout rate, good fly ball rate, ex-woba and Wobah basically match up. I mean, you can't really make an argument just looking at all the peripheral numbers that Dozier's going to regress. It's really just how could he possibly be this good? He wasn't that highly regarded over prospect. He didn't get a shot to be a full-time major leaguer until his mid-20s.

That's really the only thing that is holding you back. And over time, yeah, he may regress. I think that's a reasonable argument to make, but, you know, four times out of five, we've got to trust in the data. The data is showing a really good player here. But the data is showing a hot streak, you know? I mean, it's 34 games, it's fairly extended hot streak. But, I mean, last year, he had a 673 OPS and 388 plate appearances. So it's really buying in on Dozier when you just made the case against them.

I mean... The plate discipline, the plate discipline makes it a lot. easier, I think, to buy in. It's really good. 20 walks at 29 strikeouts. All right, let me finish up with some more from yesterday. Speaking of... I'm going to Tyler Skaggs. Oh, I did

Tyler Skaggs last night, and it cost me. Eight runs, seven earned and four and two thirds. I had mentioned that, you know, he's another guy that I had been watching a lot, because you know, that was one of the pitchers I really like coming into the year. And even though the numbers were good going into this start, he just wasn't pitching that well.

His strand rate was sky high, so you knew he was getting a little bit lucky. And he actually said after this start against Detroit, Skag said that he threw the ball well, but they were hitting all of his mistakes. But I don't know, man, like 75% owned. I thought he was a great streamer for this week at Detroit. This was really bad. So he struggled. Sunny Gray has been dreadful in his last four starts,

and he's got two starts next week. Gray gets the Dodgers and the Cubs next week. Yikes. And then there's Ronaldo Lopez. who was okay, but only had two strikeouts on nine hits at Cleveland in three runs. It's actually a pretty bad start against Cleveland. He will get Cleveland in Toronto next week. I picked him up for a two-star week, but that's a terrible team, and I need all the help I can get.

Skaggs, Gray, Ronaldo Lopez. Do you see a reason to own these guys right now? I think the one I'd most likely own is Gray and the one I'd least likely own is Lopez. We were talking about Mike Soroka. No, I do have him ahead of Gray, so I feel better about that. I was going to say, I think I need to move Gray behind him. But yeah, Gray, he's been really efficient of late, and he's not a good enough Bat Minister to get away with that.

Like, if you can't trust him to go six innings with any consistency, it's going to be hard to justify owning him or certainly starting him. So, yeah, he's stocked down for him. And, you know, Skaggs? What do you think is wrong with Skagg? What do you think I'm going to say about Tyler? gags at him, even prior to this start. Oh, yeah, swinging, swing and strike. You're right.

Swinging strikes haven't been there. Way down. It's way down for Tyler's gag. His stuff just doesn't look, it just doesn't look the same. And I don't know, like he, you know, he had a brief IEL stint. Maybe he turns things around. I still think there's a lot of potentials. What I liked about him was before his injury last year.

He had a 262 ERA. He was like a strikeout printing, a fairly high whip for a guy with that good of an ERA, but a must start pitcher, no question. with a lot of talent. It's just, I don't know. Something's missing there.

Something's not right with Skaggs. I'm not smart enough to diagnose it. But I've noticed it. And that's kind of like why I don't feel like I'm a total moron when it comes to this stuff. Because I watch Skaggs and I was able to see the results were better than what they should have been. And I still had faith to start him against the Tigers, but I'm not shocked that he didn't pitch well because he really had to have been pitching that well. You're not a total. Right.

Right. Exactly. Not a total. Exactly. I don't think I'm going to drop Skaggs yet, but that's because I sort of have a personal investment in him. And I don't know that. Like, I've been looking at my leagues,

and I don't see a lot of pitchers on the waiver wire that are... Exactly. Obviously, I drop him for Woodruff. I drop him for Peacock. I guess I'd drop him for Gibson because Scott would tell me to do it. But those guys are owned in my leagues. So, you know, Skaggs, I still think, has a lot of potential. and there's, you know, starting pitchers don't grow on trees.

Hunter Renfro, Scott, he is 42% owned, and he is homered in three of his last four games. Do you think Hunter Renfro needs to be owned in more than 42% of leagues? No, I don't. Let me see how the playing time has been recently. They've been playing Will Myers a lot in center fields, which is certainly the maximize the offense lineup for them. Not so great for the pitchers. but it's been made perfectly clear here over the first six weeks that Fram Mel Reyes is the preference over Hunter Renfro.

He plays virtually every day when Renfro has to find his spots. So, you know, a flawed hitter already in terms of really providing nothing but power, Renfro. Right. Yeah. Inconsistent playing time. That's not going to add up to much ownership for me. All right. So I did not get to a lot of stuff in the show notes today.

I wanted to. That just means that half of tomorrow's show is already produced. That is good news for me. Well, we've got to talk about Robbie Ray and Kyle Hendrix and you say Kikuchi. We've got to do our Are You Still Buying It segment with Moncada and Yondi Diaz and Trey Mancini and J. Bruce and Jason Hayward and Michael Franco. And we, of course, we'll recap the 10 games

from Thursday. I think the people are probably going to want to hear a little start or sit, so let's do it. Manny Benuelo said Carlos Carrasco. I think it's just Carasco. We've got Felix Pena for the Angels at Ryan Carpenter for the Tigers. Any interest? Not really. Not really. Pena's can be okay at times, but never gives you much length.

Trevor Richards at U. Darvish. I think I passed on both the way they pitched recently. Derek Holland at Kyle Freeland in Corse Field. Nope. Tanner Roark at Chris Bassett. Bassett? Yeah. I want to see more from Bassett.

If people who love prospects are prospect hounds, what are people who love Chris Bassett? I guess they're Bassett hounds. That's right. Mike Leak at Jayhap. Extremely. Mike Leak at Jayhap. That's a pass for me. Joe Musgrove at Michael Waka.

Not looking good so far. I'd start Musgrove. Mike Minor at Wade Miley. Definitely minor. and you can do worse than Miley. How about, oh, the very musical game tonight at Lou Geweaver. That's both.

Bothsies. And bothsies on Patrick Corbyn and Ridge Hill. Enjoy the baseball. We'll talk to you tomorrow on Fantasy Baseball today.