Fantasy Baseball Today - 05/24: Prospects, Giolito, Most Added, Week 10 Help (Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: May 24, 2019

A busy show today as Cavan Biggio, Josh Naylor and Kevin Cron are getting called up. How does Biggio stack up with the other recently-promoted second basemen? And are the other guys worth adding? Then we give you our favorite two-start pitchers for Week 10 (8:15), some one-start streamers for this weekend (12:30) and Thursday's standouts (14:00) which include Lucas Giolito, the struggling Aaron Nola and Jon Lester, and the surging David Fletcher ... News and notes (26:00) as we get into a Daniel Murphy vs. Biggio debate, Austin Riley (33:20) and the Minnesota Twins (34:45) make history, and we look at the Most Added list (38:00) ... Recapping yesterday's performances (44:00) with thoughts on Masahiro Tanaka, Madison Bumgarner, Hector Neris and many more. And we finish with a more thorough look at the two-start pitchers (55:40) ... 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

Domingo Cokemo Friday Fantasy Baseball It is yet another Call Up Friday The prospects just keep on coming All right Team Name Tuesday

On a Kokomo Friday guys Kevin in the Woods Your thoughts Yeah that's a movie Not bad at all It depends on the person Reading the team name Knowing how that name is pronounced

though Because up to a couple weeks ago Me somebody who's written about Kevin Vizio multiple times, didn't know how to pronounce it. What did you think it was? Kavana. Well, I think the context of the team name gives it away.

Come on, Scott. Because it's... No one would think it's Kavan in the woods. Yeah, because it's cabin in the woods. So the assumption, I think, built in. In case... In case people miss it. Maybe.

I said Kavanaugh, Scott, instead of, come on, Scott. It was a really good joke. So he's coming up. Josh Nailer's coming up. We're going to talk. about some of the other minor leaguers that have come up, the call-ups, and whether or not they're dropable for these guys. We'll try to put it because there are a lot of them,

and some of them haven't been so great. Our favorite two-star pitchers for next week, our favorite weekend streamers, that's not a great list. Lucas Gialito, though, he was awesome on my bench last night, a complete game at Houston, and I would argue his first good start against a good team this year. Might get some pushback on that. Aaron Noah struggled, John Lester struggled.

Who is David Fletcher? And why is he being added? We'll take a look at the most added list. and much more. All right, guys. Welcome, happy Friday to you. Let's get going. Okay, Scott, Kevin Bigio and Lourdes Gouriel, Jr., for that matter,

being called up today by the Blue Jays. And Josh Nailer for the Padres. Who is a bigger priority? Bigio or Nailer? Bizio is by far the biggest priority of anybody getting called up because his seems like a clear case of it's his time and the Blue Jays want to give him at bats. And, you know, the Nailer situation,

just to kind of just to kind of contrast that is the Padres have six games coming up in an AL park. So most likely he's up to DH. And that'll probably yet, unless they're ready to give up on Hunter Renfro or stick.

No, they'd have to give up on Hunter Renfro to find a bet for Naylor. So I suspect that'll be a short-term stay. But Biggio, you know, he can play four different positions. Second base, they can stick them there easily enough. It's not like they don't have openings for him. And he's been, you know, after kind of emerging as a prospect last year with

a big power breakthrough, he's, he's kind of taken another step forward this year's strikeout rate down quite a bit. The line drive rate is up. He's, he's shown he can hit for average to walks a lot, has more walks and strikeouts can run, does a little bit of everything. So that's, I mean, the fact he's second base eligible, and that's one of the few positions there may actually be a need in your league, even if you play in like a standard head-to-head league. And somebody in your league's going to need him. Somebody's going to be excited to pick them up.

Yeah, I thought last week with like Brennan Rogers and Kestin Hira and Nikki Lopez, it was kind of a little bit of a, do you want to bet on the upside of some of those really good prospects or Nikki Lopez is probably going to have a good floor and probably going to play every day. I kind of feel like Bizio gives you

both of those things. I don't think there's much risk to his playing time. I don't think he's going to be called up for a short period and sent back down unless he's just awful. And I think he has a lot of upside. I picked him up in three different leagues last night, including what may have been my weirdest ad drop of the season. In a 10-team Yahoo, 5-5 categories league, I added Bigio and dropped Joey Votto. Whoa! Yes, that is awesome.

Is that an OBP league or a batting average league? Batting average. What size did you say that league was? 10 team. I get it. I have Reese Hoskins as first base outfield eligible. I'm using them at first base. No, I mean, look, in our 2014 Dynasty League,

I haven't started Joy Fotto in like three or four weeks, and I don't really have a spot for him at this point. So I totally get that. I love it. That is really, that is awesome. So would you rather have... Look at Scott. I couldn't recommend it, but I understand why you did.

I just love it because it's fun. Okay, dropping Votto for Bigio. How about dropping Nick Senzel, Brendan Rogers, who will have second base eligibility, or Kestin Hira for Bigio? How would you rank Bizio with those other prospect-e second baseman? He's the lowest prospect of all of them. I think he's the least likely to be an impact player

over the course of his career. But just because the playing time for Brendan Rogers hasn't fully manifested, not totally convinced it will. I drop Rogers for him. The other two, though, definitely not Senzel, who I like what he's doing so far. And then Heura's come around recently. I think there's a good chance he's stick the round too.

Yeah, I would rank them Senzel, Vizio, Rogers, Hira. Okay. No, I would go Senzal, Hira, Bijio Rod. Yeah, that's how I did it. Okay. So two votes for Senzel, Bigeo. Wait, since I'll hear of Bissio Rogers. So I would drop, I would drop Rogers.

I would hope I have someone on my team who's a little less interesting than Brenda Rod. Okay. So those are your two big call-ups, Josh Naylor. We're not really, Keith put a two, got him for $2 in our pretty deep Roto League, dropping Ryan Brazier. So if you want to speculate on Nailer, you know, a guy like Ryan Brazier is a good person to drop. We're not recommending a big fab bid on Nailer. And I got Vigio in that league as well for 20. 22. Yeah.

There's a third prospect that you didn't mention here. Third player getting called up at him. Kevin Crone, brother of CJ Crone. Oh, he is? Oh, wow. Okay. I didn't see that. Yeah. Yeah, who we talked about yesterday when we talked about the prospect. I talked about, ah, there's no room for him. He's not getting called up. So clearly, I have my finger on the pulse. But, you know, the person who initially reported it said he's being called up to be a bench bat and an occasional

starter at first base. I, you know, what complicates it is the fact that Christian Walker's been slumping for a few weeks now. He still has the second highest hard hit rate in all of baseball, according to fangraphs behind just, of course, Joey Gallo. So I would be surprised if the Diamondbacker ready to pull the plug on him. But, you know, I could see a scenario, Kevin Crone, obviously being the minor league leader in home runs, but he's also a 26-year-old and, you know, kind of a quasi-prose. prospect because of that. But I could see a scenario where, you know, if he happens to make good on his

what few opportunities he gets and Walker continues to struggle, maybe there is, maybe they do pull the old switcheroo. So, Scott, you say he's 26? Yeah. So you'd say he's an old Crone? I wouldn't. Not me. That's you. C.J. Cron's little brother. Do you guys know that? Of course. Yeah. And it was managed by his dad. Exactly. Great baseball line.

Yes. Yes. Chris, Chris, listen to yesterday's podcast. You're just using old material. Okay. It's time to look at week nine's two start pictures. Yeah, I can tell. Who are owned in 70% of leagues or less.

Who could we go to? You know, like in our podcast points, League, pretty shallow league, 12-team points league, but everybody's got a lot of pitchers. I mean, the best pitcher available was like Michael Waka, and there's no way in hell I'm touching Michael Waka next week. So I do see some guys in the

high 60 range that could be useful, but Heath, why don't I throw it to you first? A two-star pitcher next week that might actually be worth streaming. It could be available. I think there's a guy in the low 40s who will be usable, and he's actually been better than I thought he was going to be so far this year.

He's a guy, maybe one of those guys we've argued about a lot this year, Jeff Samarja, who actually has an ERA in the threes and has two matchups against the Marlins and the Orioles this week. I'm probably adding him and starting him. I don't think we've argued about him this year, but in the past, definitely. No, it's been like three years, I think, since we mentioned Jess Samarja's name on this podcast. No, it was last, it was last draft prep season. He was joking. We got... Hope he's so literal. Oh, well, that's when we got really into it. But no, Samarja, he just, he

pitches five innings. every time. But this time, two starts, you might actually get some good... You get 10 this week. I think there's probably another guy in the 40s who I like a little more. And sorry, Heath, Lance Lynn. Yep. Nope. Yep. He's at Seattle versus Kansas City. Those are really good matchups. Yes, they are. Compared to Miami and at Baltimore, they're not really good matches. He's a better pitcher than just... Those are two league average offenses. Miami's on fire, though. Seattle might be a league average.

offense at this point overall. They probably have not been a league average offense for a little while now. And they strike out a good amount. So I mean, look, Lance Lynn always has the potential to absolutely blow up. But so does Jeff Samars. Well, he does. So I think I like Lance Lynn a little more. You've got more strikeout potential for sure and the potential to go deeper into game.

She's done a lot of recently. So yeah, that's my standout. for among the two-star options this week. I see like Chris Bassett, Angels in Houston, Gio Gonzalez at Minnesota at Pittsburgh, Sunny Gray, Pittsburgh and Washington. Yeah, Sunny Gray, I guess, would be my favorite in that group just because he doesn't have one really bad matchup.

If you are desperate and you want to go below the 30% range, like for those deeper leagues, I think Trevor Richards' matchups are pretty good against San Francisco and San Diego. He's only 28% own now. Well, he's been really terrible. He was good. He pitched yesterday, right?

I think he was pretty good. Yeah, against Detroit. That was his first. Yeah, by his own standards, he was pretty good. A lot of hits and less than sixth inning. But yeah, I mean, with those matchups, and he still has one of the top swinging strike grade in baseball. Like, it's really good with that change up.

So I'm not totally over him. Yeah, he seems like a reasonable, reasonable choice to take a flyer on, Trevor Richard. Trevor Richards. Okay. And Scott, give me off the top of your head. I'm pretty sure you know this. The top 50 in swinging strike rate.

I don't know. The top 50, come on. Only like the top 40. The guys are like Caleb Smith, Blake Snell. Yeah. They're good pitchers. It's only two. Come on.

You're better than this. Here's a deep sleeper. Jose Orania has a 280 ERA in his last seven starts, and he's at Washington. and at San Diego next week. I mean, the matchups aren't bad, but I think he is pretty bad. Yeah. Like, I know he's on a good run, but, and I almost included him in the Waverware column yesterday, uh, coming off another good start.

And then I just decided it, I couldn't really make a strong enough argument for, like, J.O. No, I got the whole name. I got the whole name in there. And then I started looking and I was like, well, he's got like six straight really good starts. And then I saw he's like still not really striking anyone. The control is still okay but not great considering the strike I ran.

It's just like, he's probably bad. Okay, well, look, if you didn't like the two-star pitchers, I'm not sure you're going to like the weekend streamers for this weekend to try to help you win a league with daily lineups. So there are some pitchers that I like, but they have bad matchups. Raynaldo Lopez at Minnesota, I don't trust guys. I don't trust like fringy guys at Minnesota. Griffin Canning against Texas.

I'd love to add Griffin Canning. I don't know that I'm going to start him. Same thing with Tyler Skaggs and I, whatever. But same thing with Andrew Heaney against Texas. So like Canning Skaggs and Heaney are three of the more interesting ones. And I don't think I want to- Pablo Lopez. Yeah, I mean, he's been so inconsistent, but he's at Washington tonight.

That could be good. Pablo C-2. Joey Lucchasey at Toronto. Kyle Gibson against the White Sox. He's 75% owned. professor. And then like Tyler Malley, who we like a lot, but unfortunately, Malley's at the Cubs. So I don't know what to do about that.

Danny Duffy against the Yankees. Like I don't see one pitcher with a great match. Like one exciting pitcher with a great matchup. That's the problem here. I don't see one of those. Yeah, I think Lopez probably comes closest among this group, GERP, just because Washington's in such a free fall right now. But, you know, the Mets were in a free fall four days ago.

Pablo. Yeah, Pablo, up it. I'd absolutely be fine starting Griffin Canning and Kyle Gibson. Those are my, you know, Pablo Lopez is fine too, but I think any of those three, the others don't really interest me at all. Not Malley? Is it because of the matchup against the Cubs? Yeah.

Yeah, and I feel like the ceiling is limited from start to start. I think he should be added for sure. I just wouldn't want to start him against the Cubs. Guys, let's do some standouts from yesterday. Let's talk about Lucas Gialito. We got a busy show today. A lot of good stuff. Gialito in particular.

He'll be getting Kansas City and Cleveland next week. So you'll be starting Lucas Gialito, who was started in 60% of leagues. I played it safe. Got the Astros. No thanks. He struck out nine in nine scoreless in in in in in in in in in in in walk. And no Springer, no Altuvae.

I'm sure that helped. But we're looking at a guy right now who has a 2770 RA, a 106 whip, 59 strikeouts, only three home runs a long. loud. That's got to be unsustainable in 52 innings. Lucas Gialito looks great. Again, I went through the game log and previously in his tougher matchups, he didn't do so well. He did make

an adjustment. I think his previous start there was rain, so he had to hurry up his delivery. And he said it worked really well, I'm just going to stick with it. He was throwing smoke last night. Anyway, where are we on Gialito? I understand that he's certainly must own. Has he

approached must-start territory? Is Lucas Gialito like a true breakout? out pitcher this year? Well, yes, to the second question. Must start. I mean, there's a regression coming because there's been good home run luck, like you said. The walk rate is high. And those together, I mean, he's not going to be this good.

But he's definitely taking a step forward in terms of production. Swinging strike rate is way up. He's getting, you know, his secondary arsenal seems to improve. He's throwing a little harder. he's better. I think he's like mid-3 ZRA good, but if you're doing that with a good strikeout rate, I mean, that's still, that's obviously an asset.

Yeah, he's got, I think it's, he's got a 3.82 Sierra. He might be a little bit better than that rest of season. He probably is not going to win a ton of games, but I, I'm struggling with how high to move him. He's, he's not quite in my top 50 starting pitcher's rest of season, but he's knocking on the door. One thing to keep in mind, and we've talked about it a lot with Jose Burrios, anyone who pitches in the AL Central, and granted, things will be a lot better when you're a member of the twins and you don't have to face the only good offense in that division, but you're going to get a lot of really easy matchups.

We talk about, well, he hasn't done that great against the good teams that he's face, but, you know, probably half of his remaining starts are going to come against A.L. Central. teams and most of those are pretty bad. Yeah, next week, Kansas City and Cleveland, would you rather have, would you rather have Gialito or Chris Archer? Archer. Yeah, I'm starting to sour on Chris Archer, but I don't think I'm quite to the point of dropping him behind Gialito, which isn't to say Chris Archer has been a bad pitcher in the past, Adam. Don't even go down that.

He is, they're only seven spots apart in my rank. I could see next week at this time Gialito being ahead of Archer. Yeah, I would say I expect Lucas Gialito to be a better run preventer than Chris Archer. I think Archer probably gets the edge just in terms of I would expect him to throw on 200 innings or something close to it this season and get a bunch of strike. Okay, so other standouts, I'll throw it over to you guys in a second, but let me just get through three other guys here. I apologize, I know, monopolizing the standout section.

Nola, John Lester, start with them. They struggle. They faced each other. They both struggled. Nola, you know, has mostly been good lately, but this was obviously a step back, and he walked four. And his walk, like, 25 walks and 57-2-thirds and a 154 whip for Nola. Lester, two crappy starts in a row, and he has allowed more than a hit per inning, and he's at Houston next week, which will almost certainly have George Springer back, and I don't think

Al-Tube back, but there's a possibility. I know that they're obviously in different tiers, but for the sake of simplifying it, who are you more concerned about Aaron Nola or John Lester relative to your expectations? I just still, like, we still don't have any really even reasonable explanation for why Nola's been so mediocre this season. A lot of it's just having trouble throwing strikes, isn't it?

Right, which is out of character for his entire, career going back to, I would assume peewee. So, or Little League? Yeah, he's still Peeley. Every pitcher I've ever seen is that treble throwing strikes in Little League, so I would assume he didn't. Not Aaronola. The track record's really strong, Heath.

The strikes on small. How many, how many Little leaguers have you seen go to the majors, Heath? Come on. Well, so far, not that many. Yeah. Right. Well, we don't know yet. So, okay, Woriometer on Nola.

Zero to ten. Four, five. Three. Two. Yeah. Okay, so it's hard to take him out of the ace tier. When do we start moving Luis Castillo? Looks like Scott already moved Castillo and Barrios ahead of Nola.

Next would be like Junjin Ryu. Guys like that. Yeah, I don't know that I like having Barrios ahead of him. I'll have to think about that some more. But yeah, he's... That is the tier. I think Nola belongs in now. Rios will definitely be better

in about half of his starts. Then let's go to Lester. Scott, talk about John Lester for me here. Two bad starts in a row, but still 2608 ERA. Yeah, I mean, regression was going to hit at some point, and it could have hit harder than this. The wind was blowing out yesterday.

He gave up two home runs, and a big part of his success has been home run prevention. It's, I, I, I think he is a different pitcher this year because he's kind of doing the same trick Madison Bumgarner's doing, was throwing a lot more cutters than before. And even though it hasn't, well, it hasn't proved to swinging strike rate thumb. But more notably, he has about a strikeout for inning again, which I wasn't sure we'd ever see from Lester.

So I think he's capable of sustaining good numbers, obviously, was pitching over his head. I don't think he's must start, but I, you know, I'm not, I'm not, I'm not thinking he's on a downward spiral here. Okay. He, so Matt Snyder of CBSports.com, wrote an article about Lester on May 13th, 11 days ago. And what he pointed out was that John Lester's command up to this point, this was before his two bad starts, had just been amazing. And, you know, it's a little hard, maybe. to trust the guy who has to hit his spots so perfectly, which he had been doing. But I think you can see a scenario where if the command doesn't go great for him, he's going

to be pretty hitable. And maybe that's what's happened over the last few starts. I don't know. But it seems like, you know, that may have been Lester's best skill so far this season, just like an incredible command, which I think he'll be good at. But, you know what I'm saying? Like he doesn't have the stuff to get away with it if he's not completely on point with his command.

Yeah, but I mean, that's probably the argument for why Zach Eflin's been so good this year, why Zach Davies had been so good before his last start. And the difference is Lester has a much better strikeout rate than those two. So that is worth noting his swinging strike rate has actually after last night's start gone down. Oh, so. Yeah. But the strike out there. It's, yeah, it's 8.2% right now, which is that's low. I mean, you can get strike, like, swinging strike rate is important.

it's typically a leading indicator of strikeout rate, but if you sequence your pitches right, you can sustain a higher strike rate than your swing strike rate would otherwise suggest. Lester or Gialito? Lester. Yeah. Okay.

Lester or... I might take you. Oh. Lester or Max Fried. Freed. Lest. Yeah, I think I'm inclined to go Lester there. David Fletcher is my less...

The Gio Lerlito over Freed. Yeah. And Archer over free. Transitive property. And Archer over Lester. We're just figuring out all of Scott's rankings right now. Okay, guys, David Fletcher. He's 38% owned.

He's batting 300 with four home runs. He leads off against lefties. He bats eighth or ninth against Ritees. Is there anything here to David Fletcher? He's on the Angels, FYI. He's eligible in a lot of positions. I think he's good. He never strikes out.

No. He's got some speed. He's got, you know, not a lot of pop, but because he makes contact, this is a profile that we've seen produce a little more power than we might have expected. I don't think he's a star by any means, but something like what Joey Wendell did last season, it's not out of the question, maybe with a little better batting average. Yeah, I don't know. like Wendell had well over double digits did he in home runs at least

No not well over Okay Because he's played 127 majorly games He's got five home runs and six steals Sure That's I don't know where he's going to help you Joey Wendell had seven home runs last year

Oh how many steals he had 16 steals yeah Okay I mean you know We've talked about how bad second base is. I think he can be, at the very least, in Categories leagues, a useful second baseman. It's not, again, it's not a star, but I just lost Andrewton Simmons in a roto league, and I was looking for batting average. I think David Fletcher is going to be a good source of that.

All right. So I'm not going to let you guys talk about any standouts. Hopefully they will be in the notes. I am confident that they will be, but we got to get moving here. We've got to take a quick break on fantasy baseball. today. When we come back, we'll give you some injury updates. We'll talk about a player and a team who are making history. The most added list, maybe some of Heath's regression candidates. Hope you ready for that, Heath. Fringy starting pitchers. What's going on with Madison Bumgarner? Why is he having a very

interesting season? Some deep league targets, two-star pitchers, the dropometer and more. We'll be right back. News and notes begins with Charlie Blackman, who has a calf injury. Uh-oh, we'll keep an eye on that, but he left the game yesterday with the calf injury. Daniel Murphy said, against the lefty. Would you drop Daniel Murphy for Cabin Bigio? Oh, yeah. I don't think I would. I don't think I would either.

Emphatically. Again, I would hope I have someone with less potential than Daniel Murphy. I just don't like, and maybe it's better to wait until the end of May to say that Daniel Murphy is a platoon player who's also been bad against Rites this year too. Well, it just, it's 88 played a period. It's not even like a wait until end of May because he hasn't really even gotten a chance.

Maybe he just won't get a chance and maybe he truly did lose it, but he hit 300 last year and he was on pace for 20-ish homers and 80 or so RBI and runs each. Like he was really good last year and that was coming back from an injury. I still think you got to give him a chance. I think all of those numbers that you gave from last year were just slightly inflated. Because he played 91 games. He's in Cores Field now. He had 12 home runs.

He hasn't played more than 144 since 2013. So he was on pace for like 18 home runs with 70 RBI. And a 300 average. We're talking about second base. Right. That's a really good player. It's fine. No.

But he's in Cores Field now. Like, you're right. Right. So I think that all of us probably have faith in Daniel Murphy as a hitter. The big question is, is he a platoon player? I don't think he does. I'm not sure. You should.

I think he's a platoon player if he keeps hitting like this, but that's not the relevant point. He has a 200 babbitt. There have also been less than concrete, lacking in details, but it's definitely been put out there that the finger that put him on the aisle may still be bothering him, and maybe that has something to do with the lack of playing,

or the inconsistent playing time, even more so than handedness of the opposing fit. They have faced a lot of lefties recently. Yeah. And so, you know, using the lefties as an excuse to sit him has something that's happened a lot. But I don't know. There's just there's just not enough information for me to back away from a guy who, you know, was going in the sixth or seventh round at a weak position and has, you know,

upside of presumably like a second rounder, you know, playing at course field. I just, I just want to wait a little longer. I can understand picking up Vigio and starting him over 50 for now, but I couldn't drop Murphy. I will say it probably makes more sense. There's a 10-game homestand. If we get to the end of that 10-game homestand and Daniel Murphy still looks useless,

I think we have to reevaluate it. Sure. Okay, we will do that then. Andrew Ben-in-Tent. Put it in your phone, in your calendar, Heath, we evaluate. I just remember it. Okay. He batted six Ben-intendi yesterday against a lefty. He did steal a base. Michael Chavez led off and played first base. J.D. Martinez sat again. Doesn't look like an I-L stint, but he's got a back issue.

He had an illness. Did I jinx him? Just real quick, the other side of that Ben and Tendi Chavez thing. Have we explored how good Michael Chavis has been this year? Yeah. I believe we got an apology from Adam or something like that that we hadn't been talking about him. He has been the best second baseman in fantasy baseball this year since he was called up.

Since he was called up. Yeah, we talked about him, I think, yesterday. Scott and I did. So it was recently. I feel like we've talked about Chavis a lot. We haven't talked about it. Every time I'm on this show, we talk about it. It must be what I'm not.

I'm glad you guys have talked about him. He is awesome. He scored more fantasy points per game than Javi Baez or Whitmerfield. But here's the thing. Here's one of the things that I thought was going to not last for him. It was the walks. He came up and he was walking a lot. He was also running a lot.

He's also running a lot. He's stolen a base set. But his past 10 games, he's walked one. Which, yeah, he wasn't a high walk guy in the. line against pitchers who you know minor league pitchers are there's a lot of guys down there who can't really throw a strike so uh if anything you would expect a player's walk rate to get worse upon reaching the majors and shavis was way up at the start but now it seems to be normalizing uh so in the end i think his power his profile is going to depend mostly on how many home runs

he hits and at second base you know maybe that's enough but i i don't think i i still don't see him emerging as like this stud level player. Yeah, I don't, I don't have him in my top five second basement. I think he definitely should be in the top ten. Would you rather have Ozzie... I do you rather have Ozzie Albies or Michael Chavis? I'd rather have Albies. Me too.

I think I'd rather have Chavis. He's getting bold today. Okay, Yohan assessment is... This is all very stunning. This is all very unheavis. It really is. It really is. Like, you're not quite as, you're not quite as, like, let's not react to things as I am.

But you're, like, being better than Ozzy Albies is not some, like, career achievement. Ozzy Albies was undoubtedly in your top six and second base rankings coming into the season. He was like eighth. But he's like a 760, 750 OPS guy that might steal 15 bases. Yeah, he's on my dropometer in shallow leagues. He's just whatever. He's a second baseman, so he's, you wouldn't play him if he played in the other position. He's been the ninth best second baseman this year.

Like I said, he'd probably be like the 34th best shortstop. We really need to get moving here. Chris, don't do that. Chris, why are you always hurrying people? It's so unprofessional. Yohetta says, Minis is likely out for the season. Jeff McNeil and Robinson Canoe are both on the IL. Might not be long stints for them, let's hope.

Max Kepler's day to day. with a bruise knee. Yandy Diaz is on the I.L with a left-hand contusion. Josh Bell's dad is gigantic. Please go to CBSports.com and check out our... Every day they write like a Thursday recap, you know, Wednesday recap, whatever it is, on CBSports.com slash MLB.

And it's awesome. Very helpful for me. And I think it'll be very helpful for you. And there's a picture of Josh Bell's dad. He is absolutely jacked, and it is very funny. The Mets started an all right-handed lineup against a right-handed starting pitcher for the second time in franchise history.

I thought that was kind of a cool stat. according to the Elias Sports Bureau. C.C. Sabathia is on the IL, but he could just miss one start. Kevin Kiermeyer, Homer, it was an inside-the-park home run. The Phillies sent Cole... Astrosk. Yes. Philly sent Cole Irvin back to AAA, and Pedro Strope is nearing a return.

Let's see. I did a Google search for Josh Bell's large adult dad, and I got a cut-for post from MLB.com that said Josh Bell's extremely muscular dad was not happy about a borderline strike call, his son. Yeah, he looked mad. You wouldn't want to, you wouldn't want to anger Josh Bell's mad. Okay. So the Super Shredder look runs in the family, what you're saying. Yes. Okay. So a player making history and a team making history. Austin Riley became the second player in

baseball history with five home runs in his first eight games at age 22 were younger, joining Carlos Delgado. That was from MLB.com's Andrew Simon. And Delgado actually played two games in 1993, didn't homer. And then in 1994, he had seven home runs in his first four or five games. So, no, he had five home runs in his first seven games. Sorry, yeah, he had five home runs at his first seven games. So Austin Riley's great. You know, because I really want to slow this thing down.

Catch her. Oh, really? Cool. Yeah. So how about Austin Riley, guys? Anything new to say about him? We've talked about him like every day this week. he would be a

superstar if he played second base yeah like I said I view him similar to how I view Michael Chavis moving forward I'm a little less excited about Riley just because I'm more concerned that he doesn't have a place to play at some point in the future

and also I don't think the Braves offense is going to be as good as the Red Sox offense but other than that yeah okay and then the twins Scott you can talk about God disagrees a lot.

I don't care. I know, but I don't. Yeah. I derailed us for Carlos Delgado again. All right. Minnesota became the second team in baseball history to hit eight home runs in a game twice in the same season. That is from Dustin Morris on Twitter. So here are some of the guys who have been really good for the twins.

Max Kepler is the number 24 outfielder in points, number 28 in Roto. He's 71% owned. Jorge Polanco is the number three outfielder in points, number seven in Roto. All these guys home were yesterday, by the way. Eddie Rosario is the number 14 outfielder in points leagues, number six in Roto. Weird season for Rosario. He has bad plate discipline, but that's not surprising.

He only has six doubles, but 14 homers. Okay, who else? CJ Crone is on fire. He now has 13 home runs and a 278 batting average. Miguel Sano has homered four times in his last four games. He does have 10 strikeouts in six games. games that's being called up, or it's being taken off the IL, not surprising. And Jonathan's scope is now the number 13 second basement in points number 12 in Roto.

So, Scott, and there's a lot to digest here for the twins. I know you're buying the Jorge Polanco breakout. Anything else you really want to talk about with Kepler or Rosario or Krohn or Sineau or Scope? And Crohn's on my top 10 sleeper hitters for this upcoming week, and not even so much because the matchups are great, just because he's so hot and he's still widely available.

So that's probably the most interesting. Though Jonathan's scope, I kind of get the feeling he's going to sneak up on people because there are going to be stretches where he seems completely useless because he doesn't walk at all. And yet if you look at the pace he's on,

it's much closer to the one he was on two years ago when he was, I think, a top five, second basement in fantasy than what he was on last year. I don't think he's going to be top five, but I think he's probably, I think he's more useful than a lot of people realize.

All right, so if Kevin Bigio were available, would you rather have Scope or Bigio? I'd rather have Bigio, but Second base is so interesting. Scope seems like a good fallback up. Like, it's amazing how many second base eligible prospects have been called up to make the position feel a little bit deeper,

and hopefully they come through for us. Okay. Would you guys rather have Eddie Rosario or Mitch Hanager? I would probably rather have Hanigur. Really? But I don't feel super confident about it. Yeah, with the way he's striking out this year, Hanigar. I'm going, I'm going Rosario. Okay. Would you rather have Rosario or Tommy Fam? I have Rosario, Fam, and Hanager

back to back to back in my rankings. I think these guys are... In that order? In that order. Rosario, Fam, Hanager. I'd rather have Fam. I would, too. All right, cool.

Let's look at the most added list here on CBSports.com. A very useful tool, especially if you want to make your ad drops, might be some players that you're not really noticing. They've been very good or very bad lately. And I'm just killing time. This is how I kill time

until I actually pull up the most satellite list, which looks a little something. Killing time is an excellent way to hurry things up. Like this. Well, I'm not killing time. I'm transitioning, slowly. The most added player. Transitioning with style, Heaf.

Yes. Let's make sure we don't have any long discussions. We need to get these long transitions in there. It wasn't intentional. The most added player is actually on the IL, and it's Willie Calhoun. Are you okay dropping Willie Calhoun? Or do you think we should hang on to him?

He's got a quad strain. You can drop him. I'd want to hang on to him. It depends who else is in your I L spot. I think in most cases I could hold on to. Okay. We have just had no consensus. Lance Lynn is two.

We talked about him. He's got two starts next week. He's terrible. Adam. Yes? What? I'm just going to disagree with everything he says. Oh, add him.

I thought you said Adam. Oh, no. Okay. Adam, Adam. I heard Adam too. Adam. CJ C.J. C.J. Cronis 3. Jordan Liles is 4.

Jordan Liles is 85% 0 now. He did start yesterday. He had five scoreless innings, and then he gave up six runs in the sixth inning. Four of them with him in the game, then two more when a reliever came in. And it was a straight. It was a double, then a strikeout. It was a strikeout, then a double, then a ground out. So he's one out away from getting, I don't know, I had him as five in a third.

Maybe I'm wrong. Then he gave up a single, a single, a single, a walk, and a single. So this has been your Pirates game, play by play, brought to you by animator. So does Jordan Lyles deserve to be 85% owed? I think close to that. It's a little too high. Okay. I think he's more of a 70% guy.

Okay. Austin Riley's next. Geo Gonzalez, 62% own it. He's two starts next week. Anybody interested in Geo? Not really. That seems way too high to me. We're on the same page.

Those matchups are pretty quick, though, I think. Yeah, let's see a high five. There we go. Jason Castro, 36% owned. Nikki Lopez, still only 40% owned. That's ridiculous. He's a royal, people. Add him.

Why do you like him so much? Every time we talk about him, you act like he's this burgeoning superstar. He's not a burgeoning superstar, but he is as a very good. good place in the order. He has guaranteed playing time. He's a second basement. He's going to walk more than he strikes out. He's great. He's good. You know who he's... You know who he sounds like? Yeah, exactly. That's what I was about to say. He sounds like David

Fletcher. This is the thing that you like... I expect he will be better than David Pletcher, yes. Okay. Kevin Bissio is only 31% owned. Scott Oberg is 16% owned. He's the temporary closer for Colorado. Tommy Lestella, we should talk about him. 80% own and just keeps it going. Kreeh, are you guys,

Scott can give the rebuttal, but Kreth, are you guys buying Tommy Lestela? He should be owned. I think this, I very much believe this is going to be a, remember when Tommy Lestella hit all those home runs in May situation, but he's hitting right now.

I don't have really much reason to believe that this is legitimate. It's completely, like, it's, it's such an outlier for, for his career that it would be like Billy Hamilton walking 15% of the time. Like it just, I wouldn't buy it. He has, I think this is a good place to put the number. He has 12 home runs already this year, which is ridiculous.

Over under 12 home runs for the rest of the season for Tommy Listow. Oh, way on? Yeah. Scott? I agree. I don't know that I'd take the under there. I mean, obviously that's his, he's on pace for more than 40 home runs now. So even if you, you know, gave him 13 home runs the rest of way, that's slowing the pace down considerably.

But like the thing that I'm noticing with Tommy Lestell is like his power, his profile doesn't necessarily even depend on him hitting for big power because with a string of multi-hit games, his batting averages up over 300 now. And yet he still has a 256 Babbitt. and there's nothing in his profile that suggests he should be a low-bap-bip guy. So, like, we're talking about a guy who could hit well over 300, I think, and if the power's there, you know. I just think, I think part of the problem is we've got a five-year sample of him being a quad A player, basically. And now we've got a 40-game sample of him being an All-Star. and I am just more likely to It's going to take more than 40 games before I think that Tommy Lestell is definitely good

He could hit it well over 300 but he's never done it before Yeah Okay look this stuff happens You know there are two ways where we can go obviously You hear the argument from Scott and Kreef I'm just thinking of Luke Voight right now as a recent example of Quad A and now he's kind of backing up what he did last year But I'm also thinking of like

Timmylisela doesn't have Luke Void. Luke Void's what? Luke Void muscles. Only Josh Bell's dad has his point. Yeah, he doesn't. That's true. I'm also thinking about Jason Hayward, who is back to being useless. A few more names on the most added list to get to. Hansel Robles, 42% owned.

Cody Allen was bad last night. Cody Allen's walking a batter every single appearance. Robles, I guess, has a chance to really keep that job. It looks like a pretty bad bullpen there. Butchery's probably the best pitcher, but he ain't getting the saves. And then Tyler Malley is still only 40% owned. I don't know what happens this weekend with Tyler Malley against the Cubs, but it's so hard to find good starting pitching.

There's enough reason to think, based on what we've said already this week, based on the Aces story, there's enough reason to think that Tyler Malley should be owned in more leagues than that. We've said it a lot. I think that's a guy that's out there that you should be stashing right now. 100%. As we take a look at yesterday's action, let's go to the rotation. here. Talk about some pitchers that are pretty much started all the time.

Madison Bumgarner. Well, why don't we do some rankings? Bumgarner, Boyd, Tanaka. Lyles, Jordan Liles, Martine Perez. They'll be the last two in some order. But what's the top three? Bumgarner, Matt Boyd, Masahiro, Tanaka, Scott White. My top three is Boyd,

and then a tough call between the other two. I don't want to contradict my rankings, but my feeling today is Tanaka over Bumgarner. Okay. Heath, how about you? How would you rank those top three? I would go Boyd, tier break, Bumgarner, tier break, Tanaka,

17 tier breaks, the other two guys. Liles and Martine Perez. All right, I'll come back to Lyles and Martin Perez. You, Heath, are pretty low on Masahiro Tanaka. He's like in the 40s or something in your rankings, right? I think he's right around 40. Like this start five-strikes. Strikeouts over six innings with one run allowed against the Orioles is definitely not going to change anything.

He's been a frustrating pitcher so far this year. It's a 294 ERA and a 112 whip, 58 strike. I think he has been a little frustrating if you look at the game log. There was a stretch where he had no feel for his splitter. I don't buy the ERA. But I also don't know. He's got a 360 FIP and a 375 X FIP. And a 294 ERA.

I also don't know why the strikeouts are down. You know, he had been over. a strikeout rating two straight years. It just seems a little low. A little low around 40 for tonight. No, I probably, like he has had a good stretch over the last three starts. I probably ignored one too many of them. And as Bumgarner goes here, like, his ERA is probably too high at 410.

13 walks to 70 strikeouts. Great ratio there in 68 innings. 119 whip. But the issue with Bumgarner, guys, he has been really bad third time through the order. and he hasn't pitched more than six in a third all year. He basically, Bumgarner basically pitches six innings every time out, and that's just not the old Bumgarner. But you know what?

I guess it's not the worst thing, Chris, you haven't weighed in. It's not the worst thing. Like if we get quality stars, if we get six good innings, but it is strange that he's just getting crushed. Now, two years in a row, by the way, getting crushed third time through the order. And I don't think that's a coincidence, given the changes that he's had to make to his pitch repertoire

to kind of combat the effects of aging and losing stuff. So when you typically what most starters will do is they'll use, or at least historically, they'll use one, their fastball heavily the first time through, mixing a secondary pitch, third time through, try to get a little more even,

start mixing in a third pitch. By the time you get to the third time through the order, you're really trying to mix it up because they've seen your fastball so many times. I wonder, and I don't know whether there's research, that backs this up, but I do wonder if this trend away from basketball-heavy usages for the league as a whole, but specifically these older pitchers like Madison-Bumbarner,

might limit their effectiveness the third time through the order because they're already using all their pitches the first two times that they face a matter. So that's something to look into. Yeah, that's actually pretty interesting theory. I like that. Scott, why don't you tell me what you think about Lyles and Martine Perez and whether or not you think we can trust them going forward? I like Perez more than Liles. I think I

think given the state of pitching you don't have much choice but to trust him. I know in the leagues where I have him which aren't especially deep. He's kind of just a fixture in my rotation right now. I'm not thrilled with it. But you know that

it just makes sense based on what else is available. So he's He's closer to Mustone, I think, than Liles is, but there's not really any justification to drop either. Okay. Fringy starting pitchers from yesterday, guys, they might be available in some shallower leagues.

Stephen Mats, Kevin Gossman, and Caleb Martin. Two bad starts in a row for Martin. Matt's, Gossman, oh, I also, Trevor Richards is there as well, and Caleb Martin. Richards is only 28% owned. The others are 66 to 71% owned. Would you pick up any of them? Gossmann, Richards Martin.

So Matt's has given up... I'm trying to do the math in my head because my computer died like 20 minutes ago. He's given up, what, 15 runs on the season? Maybe 18, something like that. And 10, I believe, came in that... Eight came in that outing when he couldn't record a single out?

Six. Okay, so yeah, that's... He has given up 22 runs on the season and eight came in the outing where he did not record now. Oh, eight, eight, six, earn runs. So it would be 18 and six. I'm so good.

Well, you know, that's not what you said at all. I did. No. I said 18. Oh, goodness. That's really impressive. And he's striking out a batter per inning and he's got good control. I think he's decent.

And this started at the end of last season. I think it was like the last six or seven starts that he made. He was showing real signs of improvement. So I think Stephen Matt is someone that you not, a must start, but probably should be owned more than 71%. He was so lucky yesterday. He gave up 10 hits. He who dinied his way out of jams in each of the first, at least three innings.

But here's the thing. Was he lucky that he was able to get out of those jams, or was he unlucky that the Nationals had a 556 badbed? No, they were not. Look, what I saw, they were not cheapies at all. I think it was, I have a tough time buying into him. I don't know. I have a really tough time with Matt's. I understand that he should be owned.

Go ahead, Scott. There's no real, like, standout pitch in his arsenal, and it's not like a situation. Like, he had five swinging strikes yesterday, and it's a 9% rate on the season. And that was kind of true last year, too, when he started to pitch well down the stretch. So I'm not totally dismissive of him,

but I just, I'm really skeptical of it. What about Gosman or Caleb Martin? See, I kind of like what Gosman is doing. I think he deserves to have, I mean, certainly in terms of fifth, he deserves to have more of a mid-3 ZRA. This is his third consecutive quality start. He's throwing his splitter like 40% of the time this year versus 25% has been his typical range, and it's led to a big boost in swinging strike.

So I think there are better days ahead for Gosman. His ownership probably needs to be higher than 68%. And I am going to just admit my. ignorance. I get pulled in a lot of directions sometimes. I do not know who Caleb Martin is. Astros starting pitcher had a really good first start. I think the last two. I do not believe the Astros have anyone named Caleb Martin. No, they don't. Corbin Martin is his guy. Corbin Martin. Okay. I did it again. That's a second time. Adam has said Caleb Martin's like 16 times. Each time I'm like searching fan graphs, searching baseball reference, searching baseball savant. Who does this guy play for?

Oh, I was not wrong. What is he doing? No. Oh, good. I thought. Okay. I thought, I thought, I got it wrong. I have definitely not a baseball savants, that is for sure. It is Corbyn Martin, not Caleb Martin. Can we cut Corbyn Martin loose, guys? Yes, for me. I would not yet. I understand you're not starting him, but I wouldn't.

Yeah, I, do we, are we guaranteed another start from him after the last two? Well, McCu's on the I L, so I don't know. I mean, go with Tromber Valdez. It helps the Force Whitley hasn't been great. I think you got off to a delayed start at AAA, and then Josh James has been pretty terrible in the Bull. Well, neither of them are stretched out to start a game, either. They could go on multiple inning. I think Josh James went.

I need to go three yesterday? Oh, whatever. I mean, they have options, and Corbyn's been awful his last few stuff. You ready for Turbo Fantasy Baseball? Turbo FBT? By the way, we have a mailbag coming up. Probably not, but we can try. All right.

Scott, you're the only one who gets to talk during this second. Bullpen. Oh, that's nice. Wow. Who's the closer for the Braves? Who's the closer for the Braves? Luke Jackson, despite Dubloan saves recently,

Sean Newcomb was an alternative presented, but he worked very early in yesterday's game. What percentage of the saves does Hector Neris get? 75. Wow. Okay. I didn't know he got traded.

It's been more than 75%. Heath, you are off base on your Hector Neris evaluation. He's on pace for like 24 saves. He wasn't the closer at the start of the season. Yeah. Okay, Heath, you broke the rules. I'll let you talk about deep league hitters.

Do you think any of these guys have like staying power? Gio or Schella? Willie Adamas, Scott Kingery, or Brian Goodwin? I think Adamas is the most interesting of that group. Kingery would be if you could guarantee me he was going to play every day. Okay. Yeah, I think Kingery is the most interesting. talent for sure. And I think there's a chance he just, they've got big holes at center field

and third base right now. Michael Franco has been basically non-existent since the first like six games of the season. I hope he gets a chance. Scott, you're the only one who follows the direction. So you get to talk about deep league pitchers. Any of these guys have staying power. Ryan Yarbrough who just came up back from the miners and pitched well yesterday for the raise. Clayton Richard for the Blue Jays. Ryan Weber for Boston. Eric Lowell. for San Diego, Jose Urania for Miami or Daniel Norris for Detroit. The most interesting of them to me is Yarbrough, who was solid last year, mostly following at opener.

Technically didn't make many starts, but was, you know, pitching a starter's workload. And after getting sent down to the miners this year and four appearances, three of them starts here, a 214ERA, 12.9K per 9 versus only 1.3BB per 9. He had 16 swinging strikes yesterday. Obviously didn't translate too many strikeouts, but he was doing that in the minors, and that's a lot of bats to miss. Seems like he should have job security

with the guys they've lost to injury. Yarbrough is somebody who's now on my radar. Okay, good to know. And if you are looking for just a reliever for some ratios, keep an eye on Amir Garrett. He's for the Reds. Amir Garrett has retired the last nine batters he's faced via strikeout. we're going to have to skip the dropometer.

Let's go to two start pitchers. All right, I'm just scanning for some at Colorado's to see if there might be any studs. Zach Granky at Colorado and home against the Mets and we're going to start them. Yep. No problem there. Cole Hamel's been struggling a little bit lately at Houston at St. Louis. Start or sit? I would start.

I think you start him. Definitely in a point. How about Jordan Liles at Cincinnati and home against Milwaukee? I think I'd start. Yeah. That sounds fine. to me. Okay.

Rick Porcelo, Cleveland at the Yankees? Yes. Yeah. All right. Rich Hill's definitely a start. Gialito's definitely a start. Marco Gonzalez, Texas and the Angels at home.

Yuck. In a point, sleep. Yeah, I don't love it, but probably would do it. John Gray, Arizona and Toronto at Corse Field. Nope.

He's still John Gray. I would do it in a points league. Matt Strom at the Yankees and home against the Marlins. For sure. Yeah, that's fine. That's fine. He's somebody you could pick up off waivers potentially, too. We didn't mention him at the top of the show.

76% owned, yeah, a little bit above the threshold, but yes, it could be available in some leagues. Matt Strom and RP eligible. Chris Bassett, Gio Gonzalez, Sunny Gray, Stephen Matt's. Who you're rolling with next week? I mean, you can say multiple names. James, Bassett, Gio, Gray, and Matt's. What are Bassist's matchups?

They're not great. They're bad. Angels Astros. Angels and Astros. Both at home. Yeah. I still think he's my favorite of this group, which I don't mean to be a significant statement. Yeah.

But Sunny Gray's not. Yeah, he's the other one I think of the group. No way on Waka. He's just no way. Lance Lynn, we've already debated. How about Brad Keller at the White Sox? and at Texas. No thanks.

Samarja. He's a spark, right? Yes. He is. In a point, like, yeah. He sir walks a lot, too. Samarja, we've said, has some sleeper appeal

at Miami and at Baltimore. You're not going to find better matchups than that amongst these two-star pitchers. All right, so anyone else here, Paneda, Aaron Sanchez, one of his starts is at Colorado. Jeffrey Rodriguez at Boston at the White Sox. Trevor Richards, yeah, we talked about him,

maybe some appeal, San Francisco and at San Diego, and then there's just some desperation options that kind of talked about at the beginning of the show. But Ryan Yarbrough, actually, Toronto at home and Minnesota at home, could, you know, super deep leagues. Anyone else guys? Yeah, I don't really want to start Yarbrough. No, I mean, I don't either.

And I don't want to start, I don't want to start any of these guys. Did they use an opener with Yarbrough yesterday? They did not. No, they did. It kind of gone straight up a little bit. I think they don't have enough regular starters where one of them has to start every once in a while. It feels like they've been doing that less than...

It's like they won other teams over to it, and they decided... Eh. Okay. All right, guys, we are out of time. We talked about the weekend streamers. Pablo Lopez might be your best bet. Kyle Gibson, actually, he's just more owned. 75% owned.

You can go with him. And Scott also would go with Griffin Canning against Texas. I think Tyler Malley is someone to stash, not necessarily start this week at the Cubs. I apologize for not getting... to any emails, but we got a home mailbag show that's going to air on Monday. We're going to record that later on this Friday afternoon. Have a great weekend, a great Memorial Day, and we'll talk to you on Monday, and we'll talk to you on Sunday on CBS Sports HQ.

This is fantasy baseball today. Have a great weekend.