Fantasy Baseball Today - 05/15: More Call-Ups; Jose Ramirez Talk; Everything from Tuesday (Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: May 15, 2019

Busy show today as Austin Riley and Keston Hiura are up and we'll discuss them (3:00) plus which prospects are next to arrive (9:30). We also chat about Jose Ramirez (14:25)! Is he ever going to break the slump? And we've got Monday leftovers (21:00) for you including Brad Peacock, Robbie Ray and Jarrod Dyson ... Tuesday standouts (27:30)! Vlad homered twice and there may be some clarity in the Red Sox bullpen. We also wonder if it's time to sell high on some of the best of 2019 like George Springer and Cody Bellinger (36:00) ... So much from Tuesday as we give you deep league options (41:00) and review the noteworthy pitching performances (43:00). Where are we on Jack Flaherty? Kyle Gibson? Kyle Hendricks? Brandon Woodruff? And finally a look at today's matchups to end the show ... Your emails 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. With fantasy! Now here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris. Yeah, party time on a Wednesday. Fantasy baseball time.

I guess we're partying, Chris. Welcome to the show Chris Towers. I'm Adam Azer. And welcome to the show all the listeners. Great intro. I was not aware we were. party. Yeah. What kind of party are we having for the Knicks?

I'm fine with it. I'm fine with it. You know, it was a big day for me. I'll take the third pick. I'm fine with it. I'm happy. I appreciate these moments where your Knicks fandom just like comes out in spurts. You go like a nine month stretch without talking about them at all.

Who wants to talk? Like, who am I going to talk about them all the time with people who care? But nobody cares. Kevin Knox. You know, we can talk about Kevin Knox, Adam. prediction. Kevin Knox will not be the best Kevin on the Knicks next year. Bold proclamation as it relates to fantasy. Are they signing Kevin Serafin? Bold proclamation. Chris Sale is back. Kevin Looney? For the fifth time in a row, Chris Sail is back. I don't think we need to talk about it, but he did strike out 17. And he's amazing. He's amazing. He's amazing. Yeah, he's back. It's fine.

I just feel we sort of had this understood contractual obligation to talk about Chris Sale after every one of his starts to begin the show with him. So we've done that now. Yeah, we don't need to. He's great. Yeah, go ahead. I was right when I said you shouldn't trade him. I was also wrong when I said you shouldn't trade for him. So hard to say whether I'm dumb or not.

You did call me out a couple of days of. ago for saying one of my tweets on the air, but you just said one of your tweets on the air, because I saw that tweet last night. But I didn't preface it. I didn't say, oh, I sent this great tweet last night. I was just, you know, that was a test run, you know. Oh, okay, okay. It's like a comedian, you know, you put some stuff out there in front of a smaller crowd,

make sure it works, and then you bring it out to HBO. Ah, I see. So, well, last night, like, Sale was dealing. Flaherty was dealing Cinderguard was dealing and I suspected that the show was going to be about these aces just dominating last night

Sale really stood out from the bunch seven innings two runs, 17 strikeouts struck out the first six batters he faced. He has 10 or more strikeouts in four of his last five starts and we'll get into Flaherty who had some control issues. It's three starts in a row with some control issues for him. I have an interesting trade offer on the table

involving Flaherty we can talk about that later Cinderguard was pretty good. Kershaw and Paddock. Obviously, of course, I stayed up and watched that game. It's a very entertaining game. Some takeaways there. They pitched, and we'll talk about that.

But the big news is about the prospects. And really, if you watched us on HQ on Sunday, Scott and I both talked about prospects, sort of differently, but making the same point. The point is that they can have a really big impact on your fantasy team. And it's possible that they'll be bad. It's possible they'll be Willie Adomas or basically anybody that the... Carter Keyboom.

Carter Keyboom, anybody that the race called up. Nate Lau last year, or Brandon Lau last year, really struggled out of the gate and then he was good. But Nate Lowe this year, useless. But it's possible they could kind of win you your league. So it's important to get these guys. Kestin Hira is up. He's 59% own. He batted seventh for the Brewers.

He went two for three with a walk, played second base. and Ender Encearte left with back tightness, and the Braves called up Austin Riley, who has 15 home runs in 37 games, and much better plate discipline this year, 18 walks, of 31 strikeouts. So these are two big-time pickups. In fact, Riley kind of snuck in under the radar, and he's already 32% own. So who would be your priority, Kestanhira or Austin Riley, who could be replacing Ender-N-C-R-Tay, we'll call NCRte day-to-day with back-tightness.

I think Kestan here is the more interesting prospect, both in real life and for fantasy, partially because he's a middle infield or second base has been the weakest position in fantasy besides catcher. But also, I just, I love his skill set. This was a guy who has always had like plus plus bat speed and was considered someone who should hit for average and he's always done that in the minors. And he's like a 318 career hitter in the minors. and the thought from scouts was he'll develop into power as he ages and be like an average

or slightly above average power hitter. And what we've seen so far in AAA is he's turned into a pretty good power hitter. I don't think 11 home runs in 37 games is something that you can expect moving forward. Partially it's the PCL. Partially it's the quote unquote juiced ball that they're using in AAA. The thing is, the AAA ball now that's caused a 50% spike in home runs league wide is the same ball that they're using in the major. And that was a change that happened at the beginning of this year. So we're seeing a more MLB-esque home run rate in the minors.

And that bodes well for Kestenheera being, you know, possibly a 20 homer guy pro-rated out as soon as this year. He could steal 15 bases. He should hit, you know, 270, 280 at the worst. So I think there's a ton to like about Kesten here. Long term, I think Anthony Rendon is a possible comp for him. He could be that good. And yeah, I'm very excited about his call-up. Yeah, so he's second-base eligible, which is great.

Austin Riley is third-base eligible and will gain outfield eligibility. And obviously, you need second baseman, right? Let's face it, it's a bad position. But Riley, let's talk about him. and your expectations for Riley, who's 32% of. Power. I think that's going to be the calling card for him. It hasn't quite always shown up in games the way you would think, given how scouts have

talked about him, but it's starting to now, you know, he's never had more than 20 homers in a season before. You know, he's got 15 and 37 games, so he's going to get to 20 plus in 2019. I think there's a lot to like. I don't know if it's a superstar profile because the plate discipline isn't great and he's struck out a little bit too much but he's played 112 games at AAA now

and he has 27 homers. So that's the kind of potential we're talking about, you know, a potential 25 to 30 home run guy. Maybe you're looking at like a peak Kyle Seeger kind of profile. Okay, Kyle Seeger. That's pretty good. and...

I mean, yeah, he was a top 10 third baseman for a pretty long time. He was basically like the default number eight third baseman like every year. Yeah. When he was good. Kyle Seeger was good. Kyle Seeker, by the way, could be back in 10 days.

Yeah, so like, so here is a bigger priority for you. Do either of these guys strike you as must own players? Like they, you don't necessarily have to have them on your team, but there's a team in each league that needs Keston Hira or Austin Riley. 100% with Hira. He should be owned in every single. league. You should own him in every single league if you still have the opportunity to. I think he's

someone who's potentially worth a 15 to 20 percent fad bid. He's arguably the best prospect left or at least hitting prospect with a chance to get called up or a good chance to get called up. So yeah, I think he's someone who should absolutely be added. Because I also think there's a pretty good chance. He just runs with this job. He went, yeah, Shaw's on the IL, right? We should probably set that up. Travis Shaw's on the IL. Yeah. And we obviously know Travis Shaw's been

terrible. So is it time to drop Travis Shaw? Yeah. Going back to spring training, he struck out 74 times with just 17 walks, a 36% strikeout rate. He's just been dreadful. He's not a good enough option on the infield for them to keep sticking with him if he's not absolutely mashing.

And Mike Mastakis is. So, you know, Hira should be a better defensive option at second base than either Shaw or Mastakis. And I think if Hira hits the ground running, he probably makes them a better team. By the way, I put it a $22 bid on Hira in a Roto League yesterday. $100, $100. I had about $68 left or something. He went for $33. I should have picked him up in the podcast.

Yesterday. Yeah. I said yesterday probably 20 to 25% fab, so. Yeah. I wouldn't have gotten him either. It depends on the team. Depends on how much, what you need. Okay, so I am going to speed Chris along a little bit today because yesterday was the

worst show that I ever produced. I was embarrassed by it. And we just didn't really... It was a great show. It was so bad. And we just didn't really talk about enough. So we need to talk about a lot of stuff today. So who is next?

Who is the next prospect that you need to stash? The guy I would say is Brendan Rogers for the Rockies. They sent Garrett Hampson down. Ryan McMahon's been pretty bad. So it just makes sense to say, Brendan Rogers could be playing second base for them pretty soon. So that's the guy I would pick. Is there anybody else that, you know,

Jordan Alvarez, we talked about a lot. Am I stealing all the names? Yeah, I mean, you could see Kyle Tucker, Jordan Alvarez. It does seem like Alvarez has passed him in the pecking order. After that, you know, maybe Boba Chet. Brennan Rogers is a very good choice. Jesus Lazzardo is going to be out a little while, but might still be worth stashing.

He's 54% owned. And maybe Forrest Whitley. Brendan Rogers is 35% owned. So you can always read up about it on our website on CBSports.com. We've got more big news for you. Elvis Andrews left with hamstring tightness. So they're going to check on that day to day for now, but we'll see. And Mitch Garver homered again.

I don't know how he could be unowned. Except he's dealing with an ankle injury. He got to run into it at the play. slid into at the plate and Mitch Garver has an ankle injury but if he's healthy. High ankle sprain too so probably going to be a little while.

Yeah, if he somehow avoids the IEL though you need to get Mitch Garver. Anthony Rizzo could miss another game he's got this back issue. Chris Bryant's made two appearances at first base. So if you own Chris Bryant, you probably want Anthony Rizzo to miss like another week. Giancarlo Stanton is kind of paused

it seems like I thought he was making some progress but he's still dealing with shoulder soreness. He went on the IL Stanton with a biceps injury, that seems to be done. But he's got this shoulder soreness. And I don't know what to say, Chris. I mean, are you staying away from John Carlos Stanton? Like, if someone offered Stanton to you,

what would you be willing to give up for him? You'd have to get a pretty sizable discount at this point, given the lack of progress that he's made. It's been a really bad season for my, you know, injury prone isn't a predictive thing, but I don't know, like this was something that was kind of impossible to foresee. He's just, like he hurt his bicep and then somehow that led to a shoulder issue or maybe the shoulder issue was there and it made it worse.

It's really disappointing, but, you know, because it's a shoulder issue, that's the kind of injury that, you know, even when he's healthy, it could sap some of his power. Yeah, okay, I'm going to try to read about it here because it might be a little overblown. He might come back in a couple weeks, but Stanton did have, I guess we'll call it a setback with his strained left shoulder. He had a cortisone injection in the shoulder on April 22nd and still is not, that's a while ago and still not back.

Scott Kingery started a rehab assignment. He's 25% owned. He was batting 406 before he got hurt with only 14 games. But Kingery was red hot. Cesar Hernandez has been much better since Kingery went down. So I don't know what the deal is. but I don't know, 25% on. What do you think about Scott Kingery, Chris?

The only spot that he could really play in the infield, I think at this point would be third base because Seguer and Hernandez, they're just not moving. They've been too good. But Michael Franco, basically, since the first week of the season, hasn't been very good at all. And Scott Kingery does have some experience playing in center field as well, and that's another spot where Oduble Herrera has been pretty mediocre.

So if he gets back, comes back, and hits well, I think he can start pushing for playing time at either third base or center field. Who would you rather stash Scott Kingery or Brendan Rogers? Probably Rogers. And there's more notes. For now, Oscar Mercado of the Indians, he could have a short stay in the majors,

according to the article I read yesterday, as they await Tyler Naquin's return. So just be aware, I mean, look, if he hits, he'll probably stay up, but Naquin was, I think, second on the team in batting average when he got hurt. Look, you can't block Tyler. You can't block Tyler. We all know that.

And Trey Turner began a rehab assignment, and just remember what he did in only four games, but he stole three bases on opening day. There was the proclamation that he was going to steal like 60 bases or something like that. He had two home runs and a 357 batting average in four games. It is quite possible that Trey Turner will be the most. valuable player in fantasy when he comes back. I still take Trout. But it is possible.

So get excited for that. Maybe get excited for Jose Ramirez. He homered yesterday. They were basically taking batting practice against the Chicago White Sox. But we promised some Jose Ramirez talk. Let's have some Jose Ramirez talk. Where are you on Ramirez right now? Batting 195 with four home runs.

12 RBIs. 10 steals. Still 19 walks to 25 strikeouts. That's good. Bad at ball data looks pretty similar to last year. One thing I did notice, he's not pulling the ball as much. But this is also a guy now. Let's see, it's been 81 games of a sub-200 ERA with seven home runs in those 81 games.

Thankfully, 17 steals. Yikes, what do you think? Yeah, it's been not very good for a while. But, you know, when you dig into the numbers, he's probably been a little unlucky. He probably still has. some changes that he needs to make. I think he's probably hitting the ball in the air a little bit too much now. And it's, you know, I think there's probably something going on with his swing that he can fix. But there are signs of hope. Maybe not signs of hope. And we've said the chances of him

returning value on that third overall pick at this point are pretty much slim to none. But the chances of him being worth a first or second round pick, I think there's still a pretty good chance for that. he's still not striking out very much. His average exit loss, he's actually slightly higher than it was last season. So there are reasons to believe that he's going to be a pretty good version of himself, if not the arguably best player in fantasy that he was the last season in particular. And I own Ramirez in two leagues. And I think right now my choice is wait it out, wait for the...

hot streak. Well, look, you can still get very good value for Jose Ramirez. If you think, if you, if you look at Jose Ramirez's career, you realize like, there's not that much greatness, right? He's not five years established. He's not Nolan Aronado or anything like that. Now, I'm just saying that, but I do believe he's a very, very good, if not great player. But if you think that Jose Ramirez is just not going to be that good, you could actually actually sell high on him, if you know what I mean. Because, yeah, like, okay, look, in our leagues, if anyone's acquiring Jose Ramirez, they're giving up a lot. If you're playing with less experienced fantasy players, you might be able to

get Jose Ramirez for like Mitch Hanigar or something, something obvious. But if I, if you and I are getting Jose Ramirez in our leagues with experienced players, with people who would listen to this podcast, you're paying up. Nobody's just giving away Jose Ramirez. If you don't, don't think he's that good. If you don't think he's first round value, then you could trade him for, oh man, like, I don't think you can get Cody Bellinger at this point, but... No, no way. Javier Baez. I don't think anybody's giving you Javier Baez for him at this. Chris Bryant. I'd be pretty shocked. I think Chris Bryant, you could have done about eight days ago. But that's the thing. Like, don't you think Jose Ramirez is going to be better than Chris Bryant?

Um, probably, but I don't feel super confident in it. It's a little bit like where we were with Chris Sale, like four starts ago. When it's clear that something's wrong, it's a lot harder to identify what that is than it has been with other players who are struggling. Like there's not an obvious silver bullet that we can point to that's causing his struggles. And so that makes me think either his skill set just eroded really big. badly on like September 6th of last season and just will not come back. Or it's just one of those things. It's a funky cold streak,

but he'll figure it out and be a very good player moving forward. I'd feel a lot more confident going one way or the other on this if there was something obvious I can point to that said, okay, well, he's not running as fast. So his athleticism is deteriorating or he's not hitting the ball as hard. But those things don't really exist. Right. He is hitting the ball a little bit harder than he did last year. So that's what I was going to say is that I am taking the weighted out approach.

And I'm just hoping that this guy gets crazy hot and carries my team. And like Matt Carpenter did last year, which Matt Carpenter, by the way, will probably do again this year. Not to the same extent, but he'll get hot too. It's another by-low candidate for you. All right, so that's your Jose Ramirez talk. I guess I'll wrap it up and say, just give you some. names here. Would you rather have

Francisco Linder or Jose Ramirez? Ramirez. Would you rather have Ronald Lecuna or Jose Ramirez? That's a tough one. Yeah, I think... That's a very, very tough one. If I don't answer, I'm hoping you'll move on. I will say I will take Ramirez in points leagues

because of the tremendous plate discipline. Yeah, that might be the good hedge. And I'll take a Kunia and Roto, even though, you know, Ramirez has all the steals, but if Ocuna leads off, he might run more too. All right, we're going to take a break here on fantasy baseball today. We've got so much to get to, including Monday's leftovers, stuff we didn't get to talk about on yesterday's horrible show.

We'll talk about on today's redemptive show, and then everything you need to know from Tuesday. We'll be right back on fantasy baseball today. Okay, Chris, a lot to talk about from Monday's games that we didn't get to. So I'm going to give you a name. We're going to go Mike Dantonie style, seven seconds or less of analysis. Must start, drop them. I'm encouraged, whatever you want to say. Here we go.

From Monday, Brad Peacock, five innings, one run, four walks, three strikeouts at Detroit. Brad Peacock. Keep him, but you're not starting him in his next start at Boston. And then unfortunately he should get Boston again the following week at home. You say Kikuchi, not a bad start, but he'd give up three home runs against Oakland on Monday. Kikuchi. He's fine. He's not a star.

He's someone you should own. Robbie Ray, five innings, two runs, six strikeouts against Pittsburgh. 314 ERA and 1908 ERA in his last five starts, but only one quality start on the season. Robbie Ray. We know that every Robbie Ray start is predictive of his next start. So he will be good in his next start, obviously. He's good.

He should be owned in all formats. So he's interesting. He's going to blow up at some point. I will allow this to continue here. He's very interesting because he is, He's got a 132 whip. He's not going to help you there. He is going to help you in strikeouts.

If you play in a quality starts league, Robbie Ray is going to really hurt you there, I think. He just throws so many pitches and very rarely gets to six innings. I think the question is, do you buy the ERA? I'm not sure I do. No, I think he's probably more like a 3-7 ERA guy. The peripherals suggest he should be a little better than that, but I don't think he's going to continue running home run per nine under one.

So you'll see some regression, but I think 3-5, 3-7, not a ton of innings, but he makes up for it because he's going to strike out probably 200 batters if he gets to 160 innings. So there's value there. I'm going to throw a little sell high tag on him, and I would just say like, yeah, look at how you are in strikeouts as I get it. But I do think that Robbie Ray could hurt you in every other category. You know, he's got so much downside and we've seen it.

Yeah, he certainly almost certainly won't help you in a couple of other categories. Like, whip, he's not going to help you. Wins, I would guess not on that team, especially with how rarely he goes deep into games. So, yeah, I think he's like a number three, number four starter who, you know, in a Roto League especially, he helps you so much with that high volume of strikeouts that you can live with some of the other things that he doesn't do quite as well. All right, that's Robbie Ray.

Seven seconds or less on Jose Barrios who got lit up by the Angels on Monday. Inscrutable is the only word I can use to describe Jose Barrios, who now has the best ERA of his career, the worst strikeout rate, and the lowest ground ball rate. His FIP is nearly a run higher than his ERA.

I don't know what to make of it. schedule. Schedule has helped. The last three starts, Burrios has 13 strikeouts in 19 and 2 thirds, but he has faced the two, in those three starts, he has faced the two best strikeout teams, like they strike out the fewest, Angels and Astros.

The other team he faced was Toronto. They were 23rd, so he should have struck out more Blue Jays in theory, but I guess I just want to point that out, Chris. Yeah, I guess that kind of gets to the, the whole Jose Brrios thing, though, is we think he should be dominant, and it shouldn't matter what the matchup is. I'm not even sure it does matter what the matchup is, because he's so, well, for strikeouts, it does. He's just so inconsistent from one start to the next.

Well, he hasn't really been this year, but I mean, I do know that he is that type of pitcher. I just, I keep going back to the schedule, I think will give him consistency. But the strikeouts do matter to me in terms of matchup, because you go look at like Trevor Bauer, and he had a great start at Houston, and he struck out like four guys. So I just don't expect people to strike out a lot of Astros, and I don't expect them to strike out a lot of angels. So if I could do the math, 13, let's see, he had 41 strikeouts in 40 innings, 40 and two-thirds going into his last three starts, and the rate has dropped since then. Okay, moving on, Fringy starting pitchers from Monday. Do you have any interest in Freddie Peralta, Rinaldo Lopez, or Tyler Skaggs?

there is a lot to be interested in by with rinaldo lopez uh actually has the strikeout rate up above one per inning which is something that he hasn't really done before he's getting a decent amount of swinging strikes and i think it's because he's he's changed his pitch mix um you know maybe he's i'm going to look it up because i don't want to speculate on what it is but i i know he has made some changes. So he's throwing his slider more often, throwing his curveball less, and throwing his change up more. And that was something that their pitching coach last season at the end of last season really talked about was that change up, getting more confident with it, throwing it in more counts and being able to rely on it. And so far, you know, he's up to 20% when he was at 15% last year

with it. So I think there are definitely things to like about Ronaldo Lopez. Yeah, I mean, he had good matchups this week. Cleveland and Toronto at Minnesota next week. I still don't trust Ronaldo Lopez in tough matchups. But you know, Skaggs is someone that I'm very frustrated with. I just, he's missing, something's not right with him. Something's not there. I still think there's potential for him to be a good pitcher, but at the end of the day, like he's obviously very dropable. I tried to drop him for Griffin Canning last night and I got out bid, so I still have Tyler Skaggs, but I don't, I don't Tyler Skaggs these days.

I sit him. Other hitters to talk about from Monday's games. Draw Dice. is 11% owned. He stole two bases. He leads off against Ritey's. He should be owned in more leagues. Marwin Gonzalez is 34% owned. He's been hot. I don't really care that much. He's got a thousand OPS basically in his last 12 games. I actually think Marwin Gonzalez might be over-owned, Chris, but he does have a lot of eligibility. So I get that. What do you think about Marwin? Seven seconds with us. Yeah, I think he's, most of his value comes from that eligibility. All right. And that's pretty much it from Monday. So let's go to Tuesday. Let's go to last night's games.

I'm going to ask you this. Is Mike Fultenevich dropable at this point? Yes. Yes. Yes, absolutely. He's clearly not right. He wasn't right in his minor league rehab assignment when they kept, you know, I think it was after his second start or before his second rehab start.

They said, you know, we're probably going to call him up, join the rotation after this start. And then after that one, they said, well, we want to get him one more start. And then he was mediocre in that one again. So they were like, well, we want to get him one start. and all of a sudden, they kind of ran out of time and had to bring him back. And he's been absolutely,

there's been nothing positive about him. He's made four starts. He's turned 21 in the third innings. You know, the strikeout rate's not there. The walks are too high. I just, I don't know what it is, but I don't think he's good enough to hold on to when things are this bad.

The Braves broadcasters last night were saying, like, the fastball velocity's down, but there's still enough velocity there to be an effective pitcher. Because he was a really hard thrower last year. Yeah, but he's down to like 93-94 now. Right, but a lot of pitchers can get by on that. What they said was that the slider has been very unpredictable.

He doesn't know where it's going. I guess my thought is many pitchers can thrive 93-94. Jose Barrios is one. I don't think Mike Fultenevich can. Yeah, that's probably a good point. I don't think he has the commander of the secondary pitches to do it. More standouts for me. Matt Barnes is 62% own.

And at this point, I just, don't see how he's not the Red Sox closer. And if he is the Red Sox closer, he probably should be close to 100% owned. Not only that, Matt Barnes is having his best year. He's always been a high walk guy. He has four walks to 33 strikeouts this year in 17 and a third. And Ryan Brazier just keeps on struggling. So there are a lot of relievers out there who we know are good,

who are owned in about 62% of leagues. You know, like it was Pedro Strope, Hector Nerris. I don't know what happened to Neris. Stropes on the IL. Matt Barnes, to me, is ahead of that group. And if he's available, I think you really should get him. I certainly hope he gets the next save opportunity. I just don't see how it doesn't happen unless it's today because he pitched two

winnings last night. And Chris Vladimir Guerrero, he homered twice yesterday. Three for four with two home runs. All he needed to do was go to a better home run park. Get out of that huge Toronto cavernous place and go to San Francisco. The bandbox and Oracle. Yeah, exactly. Nice warm weather.

Perfect. Wind blowing out. Yeah. Yeah, so this was nice. I mean, yeah, he's awesome. There's, I think we talked about it a little bit last week, but pitchers are treating Vladimir Guerrero as if he's one of the best hitters in baseball right now. So that should be a sign that he's going to figure it out. Like, teams are, I think he has one of the lowest rate of pitches inside the strike zone.

among all hitters and the pitches that are in the strikes and I think he has one of the highest rates of pitches on, I think it's referred to as the fuzzy area of the zone so the corners basically. Pitchers are treating him very cautiously and that's a testament to his talent and his potential. Don't give up on him.

Anybody who was worried, there's no reason to be. Would you rather have Francisco Lindor or Vladimir Guerrero Jr. Francisco Lindor. Would you rather have Jose Al Tuvei or Vladimir Guerrero Jr.? Jose Al Tuve? I'm going to read a somewhat non-sequitur email here.

It's from Brandon. Is Whitmeryfield better than Jose Al-Tuvae? Maybe. Yeah. It was last year for sure. Yeah. He's very good, but that's the thing is it wasn't just about Jose Al-Tuva not being good.

Whitmerfield did a pretty good Jose Al-Tubei impression in 2018 and he's continuing it in 2019. At this point I think we just kind of have to buy that he's going to hit for a decent amount of pop. He's going to steal a good amount of bases and he's going to hit close to 300.

He only hit 12 home runs in 158 games last year. He's got half of that already. And I, to me, the answer to that question, Maryfield versus Al-Tubei comes down to steals. I obviously know that Merrifield, even though he only has seven steals right now, he's going to out-steel

Al-Tube. Forget about the IEL Stint. Like if they both played 162 games, Marifield's going to steal more bases. But is Al-Tuve going to be even close? Because I think Jose Al-Tuve has one steal. So if he's a 15 steel guy, then I'm going to take... I'm going to take Whitmeryfield over him, I think.

If he's... Yeah, I am. If Al-Tube is a 25-steal guy, or at least a 25-stil pace whenever he gets back, then I'd take Al-Tube. but Chris, I can't, I don't know. He's on the aisle with a leg injury and he wasn't running before. Like, I kind of got to think, and he had a leg injury last year? I'm not really that optimistic about Altuve stealing bases.

Right, but also I just think, like, we shouldn't undersell how good what Merrifield is at this point. Well, he is really good, but it's the steals. But it was 19 the year before. Al-Tube is going to crush him. Alt-Uve is going to crush him in batting average and home runs. most likely. Yeah, I mean,

Merrifield's probably going to hit 300. Yeah, but Al Tuvee could hit 330. He could, yes. Yeah, and then... I think it's very close. Yeah, I think I probably lean... I think I probably lean Merrifield right now because of the injury primarily,

and the fact that I just don't really trust Al-Tube to run, but ideal Al-Tube is better than... Sure, I just don't, yeah. It's hard to know if we're going to get ideal Al Tuve. Or what ideal Altuve looks like. I run through some news and notes real quick. Julio O'Reas was arrested on suspicion of misdemeanor domestic violence slash battery, and he is on leave right now.

Don't like to see that. Felix Fernandez is out four to six weeks with a lat strain. A decision on Miguel And Duhar is likely coming today. Would not be surprising if he's out for the year. The Yankees acquired Kendris Morales from Oakland. He's barely better than Gras. Greg Bird. Jed Lowry is going to be out a few more weeks with a hamstring injury. Stephen Mats could return this weekend. If he does return this weekend, he'll face the Marlins.

Jose Martinez, just want to bring this up. Jose Martinez has started 25 of the last 26 games for St. Louis, so he is your starting right fielder. Jorge Polanco, we talked about him yesterday and said, well, he hasn't stolen a base. Well, he heard us. Jorge Polanco stole the base. You're welcome. Yeah. Palanco owners, you are welcome. Freddie Freeman is still dealing with an illness. David Price could start against Houston on Saturday. Would you start David Price if he starts against the Astros at home on Saturday? Probably not coming off the IL. Angleton Simmons had the longest streak of plate appearances without a strikeout.

61 in a row. That was snapped yesterday. D. Gordon could start tomorrow and there's a chance Buster Posey comes off the IL on Friday. I'm going to give Chris three big time standouts and I'm going to ask him sell high. Just like that. or no thanks guy. We'll do that right after the break on fantasy baseball today. Chris, be a GM.

Sell high or no thanks guy? George Springer is the number three hitter in baseball. Sell high or no thanks guy? Sell high if someone's going to treat him like he's a first round value. If someone's going to give you, gosh, I don't know. I'm not sure about Jose Ramirez or George Springer at this point because This is the kind of thing that we always thought was possible from George Springer, and he just hadn't done it.

But I don't know if that meant that he didn't have, if he had lost the potential. I don't think it did. It just, it was less likely to happen, but less likely things happen sometimes. And, you know, we might be seeing a career year from George Springer, kind of like, what year was it, 2017? So 2017, first 99 games, he had a 973 OPS.

George Springer batted 3-10 with 27 home runs. He was unbelievable. Then he had a quad injury. He came off the DL. He had a 7-17 OPS in his last 47 games. And I really thought going into 2016, Springer broke out. He had the quad injury.

I'm sorry, going into 2018. He had the quad injury. He's going to be amazing. And he just had a bad year last year. Now, not only, look, obviously he's overperforming, 16 home runs in 43 games. He's got a 35.6% home. home run to fly ball rate.

But he's also got four steals, which is nice. If he gives you 15 steals, that's a plus there. So this is kind of what I was talking about with Jose Ramirez. Like, you can get George Springer, possibly, for Jose Ramirez.

And if you think Springer's just better, and we just don't know it yet, like you could theoretically sell high on Jose Ramirez. Not to turn this to be a Ramirez discussion, but you don't know what I mean? I don't know if I would. but it's a really interesting question,

George Springer versus Jose Ramirez. I don't think Springer has quite the upside, and that's why we weren't drafting him hurt overall like we were with Jose Ramirez, but a big part of Jose Ramirez's value was the perceived safety of his profile. Didn't strike out a lot, hit for good power, stole some bases.

We thought, well, you know, maybe, maybe this is a guy that you can count on you won't have to worry about. And so far, that has been spectacularly untrue. And it's a really tough question, Ramirez, or Springer. So Springer, the other guy in this sell high or no thanks guy, actually there's two more, is Cody Bellinger. He is the number one player in fantasy, number one hitter.

Cody Bellinger, sell high or no thanks guy? No thanks guy. He's really, really good. And he was someone that you and I especially, you know, know, really liked the potential of coming into the season. I think you picked him top three in NO MVP in your bold predictions. Uh, he was someone that I liked a lot more than, than Adam and Heath, Scott and Keith. Scott and Eve. Yeah. I just turned into my grandma for a second. Um, yeah, Scott and Heath, uh, he's really good and he's made legitimate improvements

in his plate discipline, although he hasn't been able to quite sustain what he was. was doing early in the season in terms of being an elite strikeout guy, but he's still been very good. I'm not giving up on him for much less than like a top six or seven player. I think if we redrafted right now, he'd have to be in the first round. Springer and Bellinger are fun comparisons

because they're both hitting the ball, a hard contact rate of 50% or higher, and a home run to fly ball rate of 33.3% or higher. So there's regression coming, at least in the power department, and Bellinger has a 4-11 Babbat and a 409 batting average. But just because the guy is going to be a little bit worse, it doesn't mean you have to sell high.

Last one here is someone I know you love. This is probably your best call of the year is Josh Bell. I mean, you talked about him as a legit breakout yesterday. You talked about him in spring training, and he hit two more home runs. But do you think now is the time to sell high on Josh Bell? If you were going to do that, what would you ask for? I would probably need to get someone in the like,

six to eight range at first base, I think. Because I really do think he's just taken a big step forward. He is just crushing the ball stupid hard. He has been Joey Gallo-esque in terms of how hard he's hitting the ball. So I don't think he'll keep all of that up, but I don't know if I would trade him for Matt Carpenter. right now. Well, the good thing with Bell is that he's probably not your starting first baseman, so you could, in theory, trade him for another position. You know, you could, you could Josh Bell,

would you do Josh Bell for Jack Flaherty? If I needed pitching, there's probably a pretty good chance that I do. You need pitching. Yeah, I think I'd be good. You play fantasy baseball, you need pitching. All right, Chris, I'm going to take about a minute on this segment. Deep leagues. These guys are widely available. Are you interested in any of them? Jordan Luplo. He's hit four home runs, three of them off Manny Banuelos. Aledmiz Diaz, 13% owned, and he's got three home runs in his last four games. I have added him and dropped him twice in the last like four days in a league. Ronnie Rodriguez, 25% owns, second base and shortstop eligible,

and he's batting 312 with six home runs for the Tigers. Melke Cabrera is batting 3.42. Pablo Sandoval has started three straight games, partially because Brandon Belt was hurt, but Pablo Sandoval is actually hitting very well. His OPS is over 900. Jordan Lupo, Aletmus Diaz, Ronnie Rodriguez, Melke Cabrera, Pablo Sandeval. Luplo and Diaz should probably be owned in 15-team or deeper.

At least in Diaz's case, as long as Jose Al-Tuves out, I'm not sure he's going to play every day after that. I would expect not. Looplo already not playing every day. But in a 15-team league where there's five outfielder's in seven bench spots, you can probably find a place for him. Melke-Cabrera kind of just it's weird that we just kind of

and I'm not saying it's wrong or right but we ignore him year after year and he just keeps hitting like 285 every year. He doesn't do much else. Always some batting average but he's 285 hitter. He's not a 3-42 hitter. No. But he's someone that you know like kind of pre

pre-second breakout Nick Marcakechus he can have some value in a Roto League where you need batting average. He can help you start to make up a little ground, especially if you invested heavily in low average power hitters and you're relatively good and run productive. So there's a lot I wanted to talk about from yesterday, but I think it's really important that we get to the starting pitchers. So Wilson Ramos at a grand slam,

Andrew McCutcheon has been ice cold. He's going into yesterday's game, he had a 265 slugging percentage in his previous 18 games. That's Andrew McCutcheon. So I will try to talk about him on tomorrow's show, but I think it's really important to get to the rotation here. So Cinderguard, no complaints. There's seven swinging strikes.

His swinging strike rates a little bit lower this year. 11.9% going into yesterday's game. That's a career low. And he only had seven yesterday against the nationals. Yeah, but a 12% swing strike rate from a guy who has openly said that he's had trouble gripping the ball and getting the most out of his slider, that should tell you what kind of ridiculous level of talent we're dealing with here. Okay, what do you think about Jack Flaherty then?

So Flaherty has, I think, 12 walks in his last three starts. Yeah, 12 walks, only 18 on the year. But now that issue is creeping back up. He was pitching really well, and then it kind of fell apart. he had one bad inning at Atlanta, it gets a quality start, but it could have been better. He's good. He's not an ace,

but he's part of that for me, that Jose Brrios, James and Tyone, pre-injury Tyler Glass Now Rain. All right, so I'm guessing Cinderguard is number one on this list, knowing you, well, I don't know, maybe Carasco or Cinderguard? Hmm.

Look, Carasco is... Probably Carasco, but... I crap on Carasco all the time. Like, he is actually pitching really well. his walk-to-strike-out ratio, I believe, is the best of his career. He's really good. He is really good. He's an ace.

He is a... He's an ace. He is not quite an ace. For me, he, for me coming into the season, he was the last pitcher on the ace tier, because he was the last guy who had proven that he could pitch deep into games and deep into seasons, get 200 strikeouts, wouldn't hurt you in your race. shows. He was the last guy who I felt if he was my number one pitcher,

I'm not falling too far behind. Yeah, same exact thing. I just, I don't think he's the kind of guy that has the 250 ERA upside. Right. I think basically every other ace has. But, but... No, Cindergat has more up. He's having a really good year

and he's throwing the ball pretty hard. So, all right, so we got Cindergarde and Carasco are one and two. How would you rank the rest of these guys? Jack Flaherty. Charlie Morton, who just like Blake Snell, is really, really good for six innings, but barely ever pitches more than that. Clayton, Kershaw, and Chris Paddock.

Again, Flaherty, Morton, Kershaw, Paddock. Kirti, Flaherty, Paddock, Morton. Paddock, Morton. What did Paddock say after? I think Paddock and Morton should be top 30 got. What did Paddock and Morton, what did Paddock say after yesterday's start, which wasn't very good? Oh, uh, it was something. yeah, it was like, you'll want to watch

my next start, that's all I'll say. Or my next start will be fun, that's all I'll say. Yeah, he's definitely got some... He's got a lot of swagger. Yeah, he's got some swag. No question. Yeah, and he got lit up yesterday. He only gave up three run runs, but six total, two homers. This was an interesting start. He just wasn't at his best.

I've made it a point to watch almost every Chris Paddock start. Not his sharpest, and he knew it. But Kershaw, Kershaw, you know when you cover fantasy baseball, Chris, and you sort of create a theory about a skill set, and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. Well, Kershaw, like my theory about Kershaw's skill set is that guys who have like a great curveball,

but not a great fastball, could get a lot of strikeouts or be really good, but give up home runs. I sort of felt like Patrick Corbyn could fall into that, but he hasn't. But that is exactly what's happening to Clayton Kershaw. His mistakes get crushed. Most of his runs this year that he's given up have come via the home run.

He still does have a great curveball, but the fastball is obviously not what it was. Seven home runs allowed in 39 and two-thirds. And I own Kershaw in one league, and it's a league where everybody needs pitching. And I have good pitching, and they come to me for pitching, and nobody wants Kershaw. I'm like, they all want Bauer. And I obviously like Bauer better. I'm like, well, how do you feel about Kershaw? Like, yeah, I don't really want Kershaw.

Nobody seems to want him. And I sort of get it. It is, he has made his slider, his primary pitch so far. So that I think indicates that he's not feeling his fastball anymore. That's not a primary pitch for him. He throws his slider more often now. He needs to make his slider, he needs to increase the difference in velocity between the slider and the fastball.

because they're too similar and the slider is acting like a cutter this is what happened to him last year. I'm not making this up, I promise. He needs to refine the slider a little bit like it's been a good pitch I think but I think he needs to take a little bit off of it because it's too much like the fastball

and I think that's affecting the fastball making the fastball even less effective. Sure, sure, yeah. If they're closer, like you either want two pitches that are similar in velocity but they have slightly less movement or you want a slower pitch that moves a little more. Yeah, I think that's probably...

That's a fair thing to say about Clayton Kirch. Look, he's not like a super-duper ace anymore, but even last year he's still had a 270-something ERA. He's still going to be pretty good as long as he's on the mound, so I'm not looking to move him by any mean. Also, I think the Padres are a pretty home-or-happy team, So that might just not be that good of a matchup for him.

He's sort of struggled against them twice. The good thing about Kershaw is that he has not had any blowups. Like every time he's gone out there, it's at least been a respectable start. More rotation. Rotation part two. These are guys who have sort of played their way into must-start, at least in the two-start weeks.

Brandon Woodruff, I continue to be excited about him. He walked five yesterday, but that's only 17 on the year. I don't know. I think Brandon Woodruff, Chris, might be something here. Might be really breaking out. Jared Ikoff, I'll get your take on the whole group. Ikoff was crap yesterday. Caleb Smith was really good.

Kyle Hendricks has now gone 25 innings and given up one run in his last three starts, eight or more innings in all three. Joe Musgrove bounced back from two terrible starts, which was really nice to see. And Luke Weaver had only five strikeouts, but 19 swinging strikes. And overall, a pretty solid start against the pirates. your thoughts on Woodruff, Icoff, Caleb Smith, Kyle Hendricks, Joe Musgrove, and Luke Weaver,

just that group in general. I think Ikoff's probably my least favorite of this group. He is also the lowest owned of this group, so I guess that's not, I'm not telling any tales out of school there. I do like Brandon Woodruff. I'm with you. I think the talent is really, really high. The home park might make him susceptible to home runs,

but for the most part, I think he's going to be a high strikeout guy who keeps his ERA in the mid to high threes and that's a very useful pitcher Caleb Smith I'm not sure there's much left to say about him he's very good uh Kyle Hendricks he's not gonna keep going eight innings and allowing no runs and striking out seven so this run is so high out of nowhere so high yeah who's gonna buy it though yeah I don't know because somebody wants to give you something for Cal Hendricks he's he's a nice player to have on your team because you can just set him in your rotation and just mostly forget about him. He's going to do what he does. What he's going to do is give you a pretty good whip, pretty good

ERA. Not enough strikeouts, but a decent amount of wins. And then I really like Musgrave and Weaver. I love what we've seen from both of them so far. The moves that Luke Waver made in the off season to develop, I believe it was a cutter, has seemingly played a really big part in his resurgence. Yeah, he's starting a cutter 15% of the time. It was about 4.5% of the time last year. So he's refined that pitch and turned it into something that he feels really comfortable throughout.

So how would you rank them? Is Caleb Smith number one? Yeah. Who's number two? Weaver, Woodruff, Hendricks, Must Grove, Ikoff. Probably Hendricks, but it's close. I think all three of the other guys have more upside. Do you think...

And then... Okay, yeah, go ahead. I think I'd probably go over, Weaver Woodruff Musgrove from then on. Do you think that these fringy starting pitchers, if you saw them on your waiver wire,

you go get them. Kyle Gibson, he's actually 80% own. Danny Duffy, Kyle Freeland and Wade Miley. If they have two starts and if Kyle Freeland doesn't have two starts at home. But that's about the only time I'm going to really be interested.

Freeland is at Pittsburgh and home against Baltimore next week if he gets those two starts. So he might actually be usable in that scenario, but he's been pretty bad this year. And he's 78% owned, so it's not like there's a lot of people who can go out and add him. I'm not sure the leagues where he's not owned are leagues where I'd really want to start him anyway. All right, Kyle Gibson, Duffy, Freeland, Miley, those are your two start, those are your fringy starting pitchers.

Miley ended a streak of 24 straight starts allowing three or fewer earn runs. I think I got to cut Chris loose. Might be able to finish off maybe read some emails here solo to extend the show. show, but in the bullpen, Sergio Romo hadn't pitched in eight days, so the Marlins threw him in a non-sabe situation, and he walked four guys, one intentional. Blake Parker got another save, so he is throwing more than one inning, usually now, but probably going to lead the team in saves, 58% own. Steve Seishak, I think, is going to get most of the saves for the Cubs.

Not all of them, but most of them, while Strope is out, and Rowanus Aaliyas got a two-and-a-third inning save yesterday. It's just hard to imagine that they could go back to Swarzac, but Aaliyos gets used for more than an inning. So I don't know what happens. Like, who gets the one inning save? I have no idea. Elias is the guy to own.

He's having a pretty good year. I don't know that we buy it, but he is having a pretty good year. Yeah. But I'd rather own Seeshech than Aalus, at least in the short term. All right, I'm going to let Chris go. And when I come back, I will preview today's matchups. For the video folk out there, thank you for watching Fantasy Baseball today. For the audio, folks, stick around, but for you video people, I'll talk to you tomorrow on Fantasy Baseball today.

Hello again, loyal listeners. Thank you for being a part of Fantasy Baseball today. So let's take a look at today's matchups, see what we're going to do. I would like to tell you, though, I am trying so hard to make trades right now. I love making trades. That's why I talk about buy, low, sell, high, all the time is the best way to improve your team. The waiver wire is great. but if you can get an established player at a low cost,

that's how you win fantasy. We've got a lot of games on the schedule, and I will give you some start-sit. I mean, I'm going to call it advice. I don't know if it's going to be good. Right now, though, you can let me know on Twitter how you feel about this. I have been offered Max Scherzer and Zander Bogartz for Gregory Polanco and Mike Trout in a Roto League. This just came in.

So the original offer was my Mike Trout for Max Scherzer and Justin Upton. I declined and I said, give me Scherzer and Bogarts for Bregman instead of Trout and Polanco. And he was like, no, which I figured. So then he came back with Bogartz and Scher for Trout and Polanco instead of Breggman and Polanco. It's an interesting trade because here's the thing. Like, Trout is the most valuable player to me in fantasy. But the reason why he's more valuable than Scherzer is that Scherzer's old. And you don't know how he's going to.

You're sitting there in the preseason in spring training doing your draft. And you're like, man, Scherzer's old. I don't know how he's going to. He's probably going to be amazing. But what if he isn't? What if Father Time catches up to him? That's obviously not happening. So can't you make a case that Max Scher is as valuable as Mike Trout right now?

I think Zander Bogartz is more valuable than Gregory Polanco. In fact, I think Bogart's, Bougards has a lot of good production coming. He's a good by-low, in my opinion. It's hard to really make trades with shortstop because everybody's got one good one, it seems. I think it's a justifiable trade. I'd probably get ripped if I'd be traded Trout.

Trout and Polanco for Bogart's insurers. I'm going to consider it. I'll probably make one more counteroffer and make a touch more favorable, because when you give up trout, you should be making sure you're getting something amazing. But I need pitching. My pitching stinks.

All right, speaking of bad pitching, Trevor Cahill will be at the Twins. You're going to sit him, you're going to start, Jake Oteroesey. Let's ride it out. Let's see how long this works. David Hess at Jay Hap in the first of a double-header, Orioles at Yankees. Jay Hap, yeah, we're going to start him.

He's actually, I think he's been pretty good lately. If he can't get it done against the Orioles, then we got some problems, which was the case earlier in the year. He had two starts against the Orioles that weren't good. Hap has been three of his last four, starts have been certainly good enough. I'd say four of his last five starts have been good enough. So you're going to start him. His first two starts of the season, though, eight and a third,

six run runs against the Orioles. Back to the scoreboard. Chris, oh, I didn't even know Chris Archer was back today. We're definitely going to start Granky. Am I going to start Chris Archer? First start off the I L at the Diamondbacks. I think I'm not going to. I think I'm not going to. I think I'm going to. I think I'm going to play it safe with Archer. But you also know I'm not the Archer guy, so, you know, keep that in mind. Not going to start anyone in the Blue Jays Giants game. Definitely going to start Domingo Armand, not going to start Andrew Cashner.

U. Darvish at Sunny Gray, no on both of them. Gio Gonzalez at Jake Areietta. This is a pretty interesting one. This could be the toughest call of the day. So the brewers have just not been good. on the road, offensively. I'll try to get the split up right now. Helps to have another person here to kill some time.

Arieta's been mostly good this year. He struggled last time out. I'm nervous about it. Considering he doesn't really give strikeouts ever, I'm going to say sit him. I understand in a points league if you want to start Jake Arietta. Gio Gonzalez, like a 169 ERA, a 0.94 whip. He's basically doing what he did last year with the Brewers,

which was, you know, hard to buy into, but he was limiting runs. I think they're both sits. You know, I just think this could be a high-scoring game, Gio and Arietta. We've got Wilmer Font. Looks like opening for the Mets, maybe, at Patrick Corbyn. You're going to start Patrick Corbyn. Armand Marquez at Eduardo Rodriguez. I'm starting both of them.

I'm not going to start anyone in the Ray's Marlins game. Justin Verlander, yes, we're going to start him. We are not going to start Gregory Soto for. the Tigers. Michael Waka at Mike Soroka. I'm only going to start Soroka here. Mike Minor at Jorge Lopez. I will start Mike Minor. And Matt Strom at Kenta Maeda, who ordinarily I would say start Matt Strom. I am going to start Maeda. He's coming off a good start. He's been a slow starter in the past. So I think I'm going to be okay with that. Strom has been freaking lights out. But the Dodgers are just so good. Let me look up a couple of splits here.

All right, first of all, let's take a look at the Brewers OPS on the road, just for fun. They are 18th in OPS. They are amazing at home. They are below average on the road. Now let's take a look at lefty-righty splits and see the Dodgers versus lefties. Bellinger's a lefty, but he's been good against them. Jock Peterson's not going to be in the lineup. Seeger's a lefty.

So let's see how the Dodgers are. They're eighth in OPS against lefties. Strom is really risky to me. I'd certainly want to own him. He's possibly breaking out. I'd probably start him as an RP. He's 75% owned. But just like Chris Paddock last night, this could be a tough one.

So he's a borderline start. I will lean no on him. I think it's going to be like six innings, four runs. But it's hard to argue with how good he's been. Even if Strom has a bad start, do not drop him. Thank you for listening, everybody. Solo show. You want more of these?

I'll do the whole thing by myself. self next time. No, nobody wants that. Thanks for listening. We'll talk to you on Thursday. Have a great Wednesday, everybody. See ya.