Fantasy Baseball Today - 06/05 Fantasy Baseball Podcast: Weekend Roundup

Episode Date: June 5, 2017

Who's rushing to the waiver wire to pick up Brad Peacock and Jimmy Nelson (7:00)? Which surging hitters do you need to add right now (29:05)? You'll never believe the player Heath just added off waivers (Scott is incredulous) ... Is David Price a Top 10 pitcher (35:35)? Is Luis Severino better than Justin Verlander? Is Kenta Maeda droppable (44:00)? ... A look at the Most Added list (19:15), all the relevant weekend standouts and today's pitching matchups at the end of 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

Aging players, heat heroes with her. Chapman throws 100 plus do it. Welcome to Fantasy Week 10. What's up, everybody? Adam Azers, Scott Whitey, Cummings here on this Monday, June 5th. I will say, RIP, Week 9. Week 9 should... I feel about Week 9 the way Ray Finkel's mother felt about Dan Marino.

Week 9 sucked. I'm glad it's over. Better days ahead, week 10. Yes. You know, I came in today just a little bit down. It's Monday morning. I had a busy weekend. I've got an exceptionally busy week ahead.

But then I saw that I landed Ryan Zimmerman for $4. And I got to tell Scott about it just before the podcast started. He's upset. I'm happy now. It's going to be a great show. No, this is not good. So somebody dropped Ryan Zimmerman last week in a 12-team expert's league. And for some reason, when I went through my whole Sunday waiver claim process

and was sorting by most owned, it didn't stand out to me. And apparently not to anyone else either, because somehow he's got him for only $4. I don't understand. I feel like I'm in some kind of like dream sequence right now. Oh, it's a dream, baby. This doesn't seem like something that could happen in real life.

I still am not convinced that he didn't pick up Jordan Zimmerman. How many ends in that last name? One in, Andy plays first base for the Nationals. He's leading the National League in batting average, according to the player notes on the guy that I picked up. That's terrific. Good job. So I traded for Manny Machado this weekend. Oh, yeah?

Was it a Naser trade? No, I don't think so. It got proposed to me. Did you pick him up off the waiver wire? No. That's the only way this could top. Yeah, let's see it. What's more fair?

Me trading four fab dollars for Ryan Zimmerman, or what did you trade for Machado? Actually, I traded for Dixon Machado, my bad. So I gave up way too much. I gave up Anthony Rizzo, who is not second base eligible in this league. Okay, clearly Heath's was less fair. Yeah. But there's more. Anthony Rizzo, Travis Shaw, and Alex Cobb.

Anthony Rizzo, Travis Shaw, and Alex Cobb for Matt Carpenter and Manny Machado. Do you grade it? I'd say a B plus. All right. You want it, I think. But it's not a huge way. Because I see Rizzo and Machado is almost interchange Right

In value, I mean No I guess Travis Shaw has been a lot better than Matt Carpenter Yeah, he has shortstop though Shortstop, it's all about the shortstop with Manny Machado But that was true coming into the year And weren't we drafting Rizzo ahead? Not me.

It went back to back. Yeah. But also first base is deeper than we realized Like I was able to pick up Matt Holiday And now, oh, I have Carpenter But it's very deep. I found Ryan Zimmer running away from there. Exactly. Okay. Well, anyway, let's get into the show. Let's talk about the weekend.

Another good start for Brad Peacock. Actually, as much as we're teasing Jordan Zimmerman, and then he had a good start, and he had an explanation for it. We'll find out if anyone buys it. Jimmy Nelson almost matched Clayton Curshaw. Actually, pitch better than Clayton Curshaw. I didn't give up a run on Friday. Everybody good? Everybody feeling good? Good weekend? Sure. You know, and I know I'm going to overstate this because I'm a Royals fan, but you guys get to call me a Homer all the time anyway. Those last two innings of the Edinson Volquez no-hitter were so much fun, especially as like we're seeing the things on social media that he had put out that morning about it being Erdogan Batura's birthday. That was maybe my favorite moment of the baseball season so far this year. Yeah, I didn't see any of it.

I was out, and then I came home, and I started laughing. It's like, Edson Volquez pitched a no-hitter. Does anybody care for fantasy purposes? No. No, not for fantasy purposes. I mean, it's really cool. He's got to be the worst pitcher ever to have a no-hitter and a World Series ring. But good for him, rise to the occasion.

Wait a second. Did the guy who pitched on the Giants and no-hit the Mets at Shea? Did he win a World Series that year? I don't know what guy that is. It was two years ago or three years ago or something. I don't remember when they... You don't remember that guy? There have been so many no-hitter's in the last few years that I've kind of lost track of them.

Not really? Oh, oh, oh, you're talking about the guy on the Mariners now. Chris Heston. Yes. And that was in 2015. Oh. So he probably got a ring in 2014. Okay, maybe.

I think what you said about Volquez is probably wrong. I'm just going to guess in the history of baseball. Anyway, thank you guys for asking. I'm doing very well, and I had a nice weekend. So let's go to the weekend standout. So let's start with that incident Volquez. We're going to talk about Justin Smoke. We're going to talk about the longest hitting streak in baseball.

Quit Merrifield at 19 game hitting streak. And actually, really good walk-to-strike ratio as well. Volquez is 15% own. I guess you're not that interested in him. Which pitchers were you interested in picking up? Over the weekend. Well, I guess in our weekly league, I also got Denelson Lamet, and I thought he was one of the top targets for a two-start week this week.

Wow, you're just on fire. Yeah. Yeah. Got it for the same price I got Ryan Zimmerman for. I mean, I just, like, and that's the thing. Like, in the same league, he put in a $4 bid on Ryan Zimmerman and a $4 bid on to Nelson Lamet. You don't even deserve to win Ryan Zimmerman.

You don't even deserve to win Ryan Zimmerman if you're bidding the same amount on him as Denelson Lamet. Why not put all eight of those dollars to Ryan Zimmerman? I deserve it a lot more than you do. Well, I admit I screwed up. Yeah, you sure did. I don't even care about what else I did on the waiver wire because of it. I mean, my moves weren't that interesting. I picked up Trevor Bauer, I think, in every league where he was still available.

And, you know, who knows? I could drop him next week. It depends how, obviously a rain abbreviated to start yesterday. so didn't really get a chance to follow up that 14 strikeout effort, but I don't have a ton of confidence. I just think he needs to be owned. Jimmy Nelson, I think, was still available in one league. He had a great start Friday and eight plus strikeouts and three of his last four starts or something like that. Having a hard time seeing what's made him different this year, but it's kind of just, well, kind of like with Ryan Zimmerman,

at some point you just have to you just have to bid on the results and hope they continue and so far for Zimmerman they have I found two pitchers that through two months have I don't know similar starts one of them similar one of them nearly identical

Jimmy Nelson's one of them actually if you don't recall and I didn't his first two months of last year Jimmy Nelson had a 280-80 RA the difference is this year 16 walk 65 strikeouts and 64 in a third. So great ratios there. And he struck out 21 batters to no walks in his last two starts.

Last year he had a 280-R-A, which is a lot better than 336 this year. That was through May, through the end of May. But he had 28 walks of 59 strikeouts in the 72 innings. So Nelson says his mechanics are good. He's not overthrowing. We know he throws hard. Do you consider Jimmy Nelson to be a must-ad? Oh, my gosh, I cannot miss out on this gem pitcher.

Everything after must add, I would take off, but yes, I do consider him to be must-ad. It's actually four of five that he has eight strikeouts or more. I denied him one. Come on, Scott. And a lot of swinging strikes. I know another thing he said is that, or the Brewers have said, is he's throwing his off-speed stuff earlier in the count, so maybe he's become less predictable.

And, you know, it's not like this stuff is bad. He had great minor league numbers. I picked up Taylor-Martre in a Roto League. he seems to have woken back up just in time to replace Gene Seguerah and he's eligible basically everywhere so you can just pick and choose where you play him

and then I also picked up in a couple of different places Oduble Herrera down to 55% owned and keep on falling Oduble I mean you're pumped up about the last two games he's got four doubles and seven RBIs he's got five extra base hits

four doubles and a home run and he's only struck out twice in his last seven games. So he's back. He's back. How many walks does he have? I don't care. Fine.

He batted like 180 in May. Okay. That's fine. So what does he do to do in June? He's not that good. That's the problem. He's just a 290 hitter over two consecutive years. Those were probably flukes and he's actually a 230 hitter.

But what is the 290 have? He doesn't have any power. He has some steals. If he hits 15 home runs and steals 25 bases, that that sounds pretty great. Great. There are so many outfielders out there. I picked up Domingo Santana today. He's been hot. I dropped Scott Shebler, who is just banged up right now. We don't know if he's going to be able to play much this week.

What? You dropped Shebler? Because he's hurt. He missed Sunday's game, and he was available off the bench, but it's not clear that he's going to start. Like, I could see him missing time. But he's Scott Shebler and has like a million home runs. That's almost as bad as dropping Ryan Zimmerman. Absolutely. First of all, I picked up Scott Shebler three days ago in this league.

And you dropped, look, who did you drop, you dropped Avi Garcia. We had this conversation on Friday. Outfielders are interchangeable. So Domingo Santana's red hot right now. Where did you drop Scott Shebler? I don't want to miss out on him like I did Zimmerman. You are not in the league, sir. I apologize.

You don't miss that one too, Scott. FOMO. I don't understand how, like, that's what really gets me. Because I actually take the time to look at all these lists to make sure I'm not overlooking anybody. And I overlooked the. The most, you know, the biggest gift on the waiver wire I'm going to have in any league this season. Like, to the point that I'm not even sure, right, you know, some sites have like undropable lists, you know, where like they disallow owners from dropping players of a certain level, which I think is kind of silly, but whatever, they do it. I'm pretty sure Zimmerman would be on those lists, right?

Yeah, I would think. I don't know. I'm not sure with weekly transactions leagues. What do you mean? It's the problem. It went completely under the radar. No one even noticed that Zimmerman was dropped because there were 73 transactions that day because the entire league had to process all their waiver claims at once. I feel like normally things would slip under the radar more in a daily league

just because not everybody has the wherewithal to check every day. If I get an email that shows me three or four people that were added and dropped that day, I will see all of them. Right. The Sunday, the Monday morning emails I get from the head-to-head auction league, I don't see a third of them. But there were so many people making waiver claims. How did we all overlook it?

That's what I don't get. I didn't overlook it. All right. So back to baseball, back to baseball here, as we look at the rest of the weekend. I said there were two pitchers that had similar numbers from last year at this point in time. And one was Jimmy Nelson. One was Rick Porcelo, though. Look at this.

So Rick Porcelo in 74 and a third innings has a 424 ERA. And then he had just another, like, ho-hum, six-inning. like just eight, eight hits, three runs, two homers, but whatever. So this is Porcelo side by side, okay? The win-loss record is the big difference. Three, through 12 starts. Three and seven this year, seven and two last year. But the ERA, 424 this year, 404 last year.

The innings within one-and-one-third, seventy-one-third this year, 75, and two-thirds last year. Now here's where it's even more similar. Fourteen walks to 73 strikeouts this year. 15 walks to 68 strikeouts last year, nearly identical, and 12 home runs allowed through his first 12 starts, both this year and last year. I had completely forgotten that Rick Porcelo, at this point last year, was a 4ERA guy who had given up 12 home runs. Then he had a 269 ERA and a 15-2 record over 147 in the third inning's rest of season. Do you think Porcelo can turn it around and be an ace again, or is he just going to be like,

let's get a quality start and hopefully a win kind of guy going forward. I just don't know how you can look at Rick Porcelo's career. And I get what he did from this point forward last year. But you look at his career on a year-by-year basis, and it's pretty clear what the outlier is, right? Yes, but the control is still great. And more honestly, I just thought it was really interesting and really cool. It's interesting.

And he's never had, like, I don't remember a time when Rick Porcelo had bad control. It was just last year it was out of this world elite. I would guess his ERA will come down a little bit. He'll probably be about a 375 ERA guy. But no, I would not expect him to go back to his 2016 self when we've got another eight years of him being somebody else. But to be fair, he has given up some home runs, I guess, but most of his problems are just hits.

Like his Babbat is 367 right now, and his career BAP is 309. So he's had a lot of bad luck. He has definitely had some bad luck, almost as much bad luck as he had good luck last year. This is his career best strikeout rate. So we could say the skills have actually improved this year. Yeah. This is one of those situations, I think, where the K per 9 and K percentage are a little bit deceiving.

Like he's at 22% K percentage. He was at 21% last year. He was at 20% the year before. So it's a little better, but it's not as better as the K percentage. and I make it look. I don't entirely disagree that he doesn't deserve our full benefit of the doubt, given his track record and the fact that, I mean, he's off to a pretty bad start. But better times are ahead.

Yes, I agree with that. If you drop Rick Porcelo, I'm not overlooking that. Well, I don't believe that, Scott. Bad track record. You're in the head-to-head auction league, too, aren't you? Nope. Oh, okay. I am not.

That's good for you. Anything else major that you guys want to get to? Big Time waiver claims. Denelson Lemette is the number one most added player. Liriano, I added. Brad Peacock, I added. Yeah, Peacock. That's a good one.

I just jotted down my own waiver claims. I guess Peacock was already owned in all of my leagues, but he actually went starters length yesterday and still had the great strikeout rate, what, nine strikeouts and six innings. I don't think he's at any risk of losing his spot anytime soon. Would you rather have Lamet or Brad Peacock? Lomet because he hasn't, you know, he has the newness, he hasn't let us down yet quality to him.

And he's making two starts this week. Peacock's not far behind. Would you rather have Peacock or Jimmy Nelson? Nelson. Can I just bring something up about Jordan Zimmerman? So he had his best start of the season, six innings, one run, five strikeouts. Second good start in his last three. The other one was terrible, though.

And Zimmerman is actually 40% owned, which honestly feels way too high considering how bad he's been. But he said he finally got his slider back. And last year, Zimmerman was up to a great start, and they went on the DL. He said he changed his grip. And he'd been using a different grip, and now finally says his slider's back. I don't know. He had his bench coach, Gene Lamont, managing on Saturday because, whenever it was. Yeah, Saturday, because Brad Osmos got ejected.

Lamont said that Zimmerman's a work in progress, but I don't know. Can you buy that at all? I need to see a lot more. I mean, one start where it's one and running six with five Ks. I guess two quality starts in three, but he had three Ks in the other. It's not moving the needle for me. No, no, no, no. All righty.

So we'll find out who the people are adding. There's a lot of news, but nothing like major, major this week. So we'll get to the big news in a second. We have to talk about Merrifield. We have to talk about Justin Smoke. Lucas Duda over the last two weeks is the number one first baseman in fantasy. 353 batting average with six home runs. He's been red hot.

Andrew Benintendi, Homer twice on Sunday. He had been batting 123 in his previous 21 games. So we'll get into all of that. Oh, David Price with a very nice start as well. I do need to tell you, though, about my face. Because I currently have, you can see it, Heath, I currently have a pretty thick beard. I need to shave, agreed? Yeah, I'm growing a beard as well.

Oh, yeah, I'm winning that battle. Well, I just started. Well, you know, my beard right now is like the $4. Ryan Zimmerman, and yours is the $4, whoever Al picked up. Nelson Leavitt. He picked up High Megarcy. Five. Five, guys.

Come on, Al. Oh, well, bottom line is, I want a nice, close, comfortable shave. I certainly don't want to overpay for razors, so I'm going to use Harry's razors. Everyone should use Harry's. It's really a great product. And you know what? Father's Day is coming up. Harry's has a great offer for you.

Go to harries.com slash F-B-T, H-A-R-R-Y-S dot com slash F-B-T for 5 dollars off a limited edition Father's Day shave set or any shave set. I actually just did it this morning. I ordered the shave set from my dad, getting it shipped right to him. I recommend doing it now as you can get the free show. shipping and have it arrived by Father's Day. It's a great shave beyond fair price. The shave sets started as low as $15.

And you can get $5 off with our special offer. Go to harries.com slash FBT right now to redeem it for fans of the show. Harry's going to give you $5 off one of their shave sets. This is a limited time only. Act now. harries.com slash FBT to get $5 off and do help support the show. Did you guys watch the All-Star game last night? Outstanding

Yeah A lot of defense there Good for the NBA Best basketball we've ever seen Sorry you don't like basketball No it was entertaining It was very fun There was a bunch of like

Oh no he did it moments So that was really cool Let's get a closer game You said all-star game on purpose Right? Yes Okay It was a joke

Yeah big joke Very funny stuff Because the teams are so good Yeah right But it felt like it also I mean they were just racing up and down the court and playing no defense. I think that you could make the argument that it may be a problem for the NBA,

that these guys have become so much more skilled than basketball players have ever been, that you just can't guard them. Yeah, though we couldn't yesterday, so that's for sure. Most added list. All right, to Nelson Lemette, Jaime Garcia, I'm guessing Jaime's a two-star pitcher? Yep. Okay, Chase Anderson 3, quit Merrifield 4. Eric Scogland, who I dropped for Liriano, I think.

Yeah, Liriano in a league. Yeah, Scoglund was originally going to be a two-star pitcher and then got bumped up to Sunday and then got rained out after two innings. So it's a bad experience owning him. Two bad innings, by the way, four runs. Yeah. Mike Fires. Yeah. Like, come on.

That's who's eventually going to be at when everybody's healthy, not peacock. He's at Kansas City and home again. against the Angels, so I suppose he could have a good week, but that's not a two-start risk I'd be willing to take. Here's an interesting one. Would you rather have Jimmy Nelson or Junior Guerra? Jimmy. Probably Jimmy.

I'll always go for the strikeouts. And then the next guy, speaking of, well, not speaking of, but speaking of the exact opposite of that, no strikeouts, Ty Blach, who's pitching very well but strikes out nobody. He's 50% own. What do you think? I can't spy Ty Block. He is pitching very well.

His strikeout high during that stretch is five, and I think he's only done that once. Like, that's, that's like Chin Ming Wong stuff, you know, like, completely unsustainable. I'm going to throw you three or four outfielder's here. Tell me who you want to own. Tommy Fam, Stephen Sousa, Aaron Hicks, Chris Taylor. They're all on the most out of list.

Taylor's eligible. at third base, at second base, and outfield. I think we have to view Hicks as an everyday player now. I don't know how you can put a timetable on when Alsbury is going to come back. These situations are scary, and when you go backwards in the protocol, I think it's even scarier. He's the clear number one of this group for me. Who are the others? All right, so we have Aaron Hicks, we have Stephen Sousa, Tommy Pham, and Chris Taylor.

Okay. Okay. I mean, I've given attention to all four on the waiver wire, and Susa, I like, as a starter this week, even more than Higgs. This week. Yeah, this week. But I do think there's some potential sustainability here because he's the kind of line drive hitter that can produce the high Babb if he needs to be successful even with a strikeout rate, which, by the way, is also improved from. last year. So I like Sousa probably second most on that list. But in a much bigger league than our head-to-head categories league, a roto league where 360 players are rostered instead,

I did spin twice as much on Chris Taylor this weekend as he's spent on. Ryan Zimmerman. Goodbye. Yeah. And not because I'm really believing in him, but he is versatile, and that's a league where his team start 15, 14 hitters total. I'm willing to ride it out and see where it goes. So you need a middle infielder.

Would you go with Chris Taylor or Quit Maryfield? I'd go with Taylor. But when Maryfield's interesting, in a deep way also. All right. You can't spell wit without hit. You can't. 19 times in a row, 19 games in a row. Maryfield's gotten a hit, and he is over the last 21 days, the number eight first baseman in points league, number five in Roto.

Second baseman? Oh, second baseman, thanks. He beefed up in the offseason. He went on some kind of program where he was eating like seven meals a day and added, I think, 25 pounds of muscle or something like that. And he's on an 18-homer pace. And, you know, his last half-season at AAA, he was on like a 15-plus Homer pace, too. So I don't think he's completely punchless. Okay, so that's Whitmeryfield, who by the way, in that 21-day stretch, has four walks, four

strikeouts, also four steals. So that's pretty nice. He stole eight steals in about a half a season last year, and he's got six already this year. Keith, who would you take, Merrifield or Chris Taylor? It would depend on what I needed, I would say, but most likely I would take Taylor. One other second-based eligible guy that's higher-owned than those two, but still below seven. 70% double-donged yesterday, Ian Hap. I think 62%.

And I had a thought yesterday, and I let it, you know, kind of sit there for a second. This morning I put the poll on Twitter. Who is current, like who should the Cubs, if they only have one spot in their lineup, play on left field? Ian Hap or Kyle Schwerber. Well, it doesn't really matter because Hap plays center. Well, I bet he can play left. Sure. Anybody that plays center can play left.

This is just a hypothetical. I'm just saying, like, I think he in Haps a better baseball player than Kyle Schwerber right now. Yeah, well, Hap was pretty cold before yesterday. He was, but still had better numbers than Shwerber. I think it's pretty inconclusive for both. I'd rather own Schwerber than Hap still. But if you dropped Hap, you're probably rethinking that today, and you probably should. Yeah, I just want to tell you something about Ian Hap.

Ian Hap gave me a miracle win last night. Now, I shouldn't do this. I shouldn't do this because it's a guaranteed jinx. But in our editorial league, which I dropped Scott Shebler, this morning. Oh, how deep is that league? 16 teams? 14 teams, 3 outfielders. I love that you're doing this.

I love that you're doing it. I have to, right? I have to at some point. Do it. What? 18 at 0. We play two teams a week. We are 18 and O.

We're killing it. You're 18 and O. 18 at O. And Ian Hap is the latest reason for it because we looked like we had this game lost because the Cota Glover. And I share this team with Jamie. He's managed his team with Jamie Eisenberg. Oh, okay.

Who makes a bulk of the decisions. What? False. I am really glad you did that because I'm going to go ahead and come out and say right now, I am guaranteeing a victory this week. Oh, we're playing? 18 and O, no-mo. Can you do me a favor?

Please don't tell Jamie that I said this on the air. He's going to kill me. A victory. And I'm telling Jamie. No, he's going to be so pissed. But yeah, 18 and O, I'm pretty excited about that. Big news. Gene Seguera on the deal with a high ankle sprain.

Look, we hear high ankle sprain. That's never good. He doesn't think it's going to be super long. But as Heath mentioned, Taylor Motter is going to be getting more playing time there. Ian Kinsler is expected to. to return on Tuesday. Eduardo Rodriguez is on the D.L. with a knee injury. I feel like the way they've been talking about it,

it could be a long-term thing for Eduardo Rodriguez. What do you think? I didn't get that impression. I didn't either. Because this is a recurrence of something that's cost him, I mean it cost him like a couple months last year, but he said it doesn't feel as bad as that. So, I don't know.

Maybe. But I haven't gotten that impression. Glad to hear that. And I think you could probably chalk up the bad start on Thursday to... He slipped in the bullpen, hurt his knee. I can't imagine that had nothing to do with it. Chad Bettis is getting closer to rejoining the Rockies. I know he's not really fantasy relevant, but we should definitely be excited about that.

This is another guy who's coming back from testicular cancer. So Chad Bettis making progress, and that's awesome to see. You might want to be a little cautious with Devin Travis. I'm pretty sure the Blue Jays play tonight, so you should know if he's in the lineup. He was hit by a pitch on the wrist. X-rays were negative. Justin Verlander was pitching horribly, and he left Sunday start with a groin injury. They are expecting Verlander to make his next start.

Are you going to feel comfortable starting him this week, Justin Verlander? Nope. No? I have him in one league. I think just one. It's a 15-team Roto League, so kind of deep. But I'm going to start him. Yeah, I don't feel comfortable with it.

I thought about not doing it, but I will. Okay, the matchup is at Boston. So that sucks. Doesn't help. As Heath mentioned, Jacoby Ellsbury's headaches have gotten worse. He's going to see a neurologist. On Saturday, we had seven Grand Slams hit, and that's an MLB record. What was your favorite Grand Slam from Saturday?

Matt Adams. Heath? I don't know who hit all seven, so not Matt Adams. What a stupid answer, Scott. It's clearly Albert Pooleholz. It was a 600th home run. That's my favorite. That's my favorite.

Come on, Scott. Braves' boy. Who else did hit a grand... Did you happen to... I think Taylor Motors was Friday. He hit a Grand Slam this weekend, but I think it was Friday. Who else hit one? There was one in the Brewers game, I think.

Chris Taylor, I think, hit one. Yeah, he did. Travis Shaw had a dong on Saturday. I think Travis Shaw hit a Grand Slam. Yeah, that's right. There were two in that game. My, oh, my. I think we're probably

I'm gonna get Matt Adams is still the best Of all the people we just speculated That hit Grand Slams At least one of them did not No I think we're right I think we're right too Except maybe

Maybe he's right Okay Any big time hitting performances You want to talk about Lucas Duda's been on fire Justin Smoke Scott's got him in the sleeper hitters column He's 72% own

But you're gonna want to start smoke this week Yeah it worked out last week rarely do any of my sleeper-hitter picks for the upcoming week pan out, but he did in a nice big way. I disagree, Scott. I've actually been using your sleeper-hitter column to my benefit a lot. It's a must-read for me, and I... Maybe I just remember all the bad ones. I think so.

Yeah, no, it's a great column. It's a good column. Anything else? I mean, there's so much here. You mentioned Domingo Santana. I don't know why people aren't more excited about him. Yeah, I'm starting to get kind of excited. The same thing I said about Stephen Sousa

could apply to Domingo Santana, just a ridiculous line drive rate. Kind of Freddie Freeman-esque. But he has an even lower strikeout rate than Suz, I believe. Still not very good, but enough... Yeah, I think it's below 25%. Yeah, enough that with the line drive rate, you could see him hitting for a respectable enough average that he won't just be

streaky power guy necessarily. And Santana has homered five times in his last seven games, four times in his last seven games. He's 52% owned. So Scott, would you rather own Domingo Santana or Scott Shebler in a points league? Chebler. Okay. I've graduated Sheppler to Mustown status. I understand the shoulder throws a wrench in it, and if it does end up being more serious

then the Reds are letting on, that'll change my stance. But it sounds like it's just a day-to-day injury, so I'm still happy to keep him around. My issue with Shebler is that I feel like if he doesn't homer, you're getting nothing. But he's going to homer a lot. Yeah.

He's basically left-handed Adam Duvall, except I think maybe he walks a little more than Duval. Maybe. Okay. Mike Zanino, guys, 14% owned since being, being recalled. He's batting 308 with two home runs, but only two walks to 19 strikeouts. He had a really good weekend. Five hits a home run and nine RBIs in his last two games. Anyone care about Mike Zanino?

Man, he's still striking out like more than half the time. No. Yeah. I have a hard time. Nope. Don't get fooled. Let's see, Manny Machado seems like he's snapping out of his funk. Ben Intendi, Homer twice.

You feel okay starting Ben Intendi this week? Yeah. Yep. All righty. George Springer hit two more homers. Yeah, it sucks. I lost the league with Springer and Correa. And those two guys were over 40 fantasy points.

It just feels like a waste. Where are all the Springer complainers now? I know. Like they were lining up a week ago. And now he's tied for the major league lead in home runs all of a sudden. And that's, I mean, I don't know, we forget, we forget just how how baseball numbers come about sometimes. Like, they, you know, a lot of times a hitter, like, you know, a fourth of his season's production will come in the span of two weeks. And that's, that's fairly normal.

And just the timing of that changes our perception of him considerably. Yeah, 100%. And I think it's something to keep in mind, especially when you got a pretty proven player. As I mentioned with George Springer, it's like an 820 OPS every year. You know what he is. He's not a great hitter. But I don't know. He's just red hot right now.

Do you expect him to be the same George Springer that we've gotten three years in a row? Or do you think he's going to have his best year? I mean, certainly now he's on pace for his best year with seven home runs in his last eight. I would bet on him being a top 10 outfielder and not. take it any further than that right now. Okay. But, you know, top 10 outfielders obviously a very valuable thing. That's good.

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Hamilton, who sat on Sunday. Stephen Mats and Seth Lugo are scheduled to make their debuts, their season debuts, this weekend. Robert Gazzelman is going to make another start because the Mets have a doubleheader this weekend. It still seems likely that Gizelman will end up in the bullpen, but you never know. He's pitching a little bit better. Are you going to start Stephen Mats this weekend, by the way? Probably not. Okay.

And we've got Wellington Castillo. He could have a minimum stay on the DL. Canberra Drozhen could return on Tuesday. Russell Martin missed the weekend series. They haven't Deled him, so I feel like Martin shouldn't be too long term of an absence. Hunter Pence is back. Jorge Soler, back to the minors as the Royals called up Billy Burns. Justin Turner could come off the DL this week, and Jason Worth may need to go on the DL with a toe injury.

And with that said, let's talk aces. Some studs who were studs. David Price, seven innings, three hits, one run, one walk, seven strikeouts at Baltimore on Saturday. Clayton Kirschoff, 14 strikeouts to become the third fastest pitcher in terms of innings ever to reach 2,000 Ks. Seven innings, two hits. He was amazing at Milwaukee. And Dallas Kichel picked up where he left off. He's just been so good.

Six innings, three hits, no runs, two walks, seven strikeouts, and he's now 9-0, Kikele with a 1670 R.A. and a pretty almost one to one. Sixty-nine strikeouts and 75 and two-thirds. So, I don't know, 8.5, whatever it is, strikeouts per nine. I think Price probably gives me one we want to highlight here, guys. But Price, Kershaw, Keikle, the studs were out this weekend.

It's really nice to have David Price back on all of my fantasy roster said. Ah, you don't have them in the league where you have Zimmerman. I have them. Okay, there's one. No, in all seriousness, it's just good to see. There was some question with the way that Price's rehab went and with the injury that he's coming back from, and there's a little bit of uncertainty around whether there's actually a problem that they're just not fixing. But no question about him.

He'll move back into my top 10 pitchers for sure. And wow. Let's go. Interesting. Okay. Is Keiko or Price? Price. I'm going to take Keikle.

All right. You know, like, you understand Keikel's. going to win the Sall Young, right? No, he's not. Oh, he is, though. He might. It's like a straight-up guarantee. There's a zero chance he doesn't win the Siong.

Well, I mean, Chris Sail still exists. Don't care. No, not interested. Okay, fair enough. Would rather have Sail and fantasy, but Kikl's going to win the Saly. You're guaranteeing a Kikl Sion, and I'm guaranteeing that I beat you this week. So we'll do it. I'm sure.

Does your guarantee of victory negate my bragging about being 18-0? I don't know. I went to Twitter to ask Jamie. Oh, you jerk. All right. Moore's quote-unquote studs being studs over the weekend. What does this mean guys that are owned in more than 80% of leagues? In this case, more than 87% of leagues.

So basically universally owned, had good starts. John Lackey finally had a good start. Jason Vargas, complete game shut out against Cleveland with only three strikeouts. But Vargas has a 2080RA. If not for Adelaus Keiko, Jason Vargas might win the Sallion. Sunny Gray was good, not great, but we'll take it against the nationals. Jose Barrios, he worked out of some jams, but I don't think you can complain about the results. Two runs in six innings at the Angels.

And Luis Severino looks damn good, and now has 16 walks to 76 strikeouts and 68 and a third. Lackey, Vargas, Gray, Berrios, Severino, anyone you want to talk about? I have things to say, but Scott was just really agonizing while you were talking, so I'm going to let him first. I'm agonizing over the same thing. I've been agonizing about all show. Oh, okay. Never mind. I'm probably tired of it. Jason Vargas, I don't know what to make of, like, I kind of thought he was starting to come back to Earth a little bit, but apparently not. So just keep writing him.

Yeah. I wonder if he's too distracted, because I picked him up in that league for $2. Yeah. So I clearly looked at the most owned list, and I picked... Severino, sheesh. He's got to go in the top 20 now. I was wondering that myself. Where are you guys going to rank Luis Severino?

In head-to-head, for sure, he's got to be a top 20. Well, I mean, the thing to remember about the rankings is their rest-of-season rankings. And at some point, there's going to be not necessarily a season. Ealing reached with the innings, but there is going to have to be kind of winding it back, especially if the Yankees are in line to make the postseason. I have Severino 22nd going into this start. So to say he's top 20, I don't think it's too much of a stretch. I don't know that I have room to move him into that group looking at some of the names ahead of him,

but he's very close. And I do think the breakout's legit. I just wonder about the innings. What do we think that his ceiling is for winnings, though? Because he threw, what, 150 last year? He threw 160 the year before. I would guess between... I would guess 190 is what the Yankees would like to limit him to,

but the postseason, the potential of the postseason is going to complicate that. Well, he threw... He threw how many last year? 150. Yeah, 150 exactly. In the minors? 77 in AAA, 3 and high A and 71 in the majors. I didn't realize he had that many minor beginnings.

Okay. Well, that's good to know. I mean, that's better than what I thought for Severino for the innings. But, okay, yeah, he's obviously a must-start guy, and the change-ups help the fastball command's been a lot better this year, too. All right, well, those are stuff. Like John Lackey, okay, Lackey had a good start, but he has not had a good year. He's 87% owned, I think.

Would you be willing to drop John Lackey for Nelson Lemette, for Jimmy Nelson, for Brad Peacock, somebody like that? I don't think so. Yeah, I mean, peripherally, Lackey still looks pretty good And he's striking out more than a better per inning And still has a great supporting cast I still think the Cubs are probably the best team in baseball Maybe the nationals are

But it's more about the Astros, the actual team best team baseball Yeah, maybe them too If McCuller stays healthy and dominant Like the only way I'm dropping John Lackey Is if somebody like Ryan Zimmerman's out there Well, yeah I could understand in this really shallow league

if you need to maximize the number of starts you could get away maybe with dropping lackey for lament but I wouldn't want to do that and most leagues I don't think you'd have to resort to dropping lackey Also I should probably apologize to all the Ryan Zimmerman owners because you guys saw what I did to Eric Thames

once I finally got one of him on my team this will be my first exposure to Ryan Zimmerman I would expect the slump to be right around the corner We already had a slump. He's out of it. All right, so now Studs being duds. By the way, we have a terrific Matt Harvey email coming up. Studs being duds, we had Porcelo, we had Fulmer, give up five runs. Oh, all right, all right.

Garrett Cole. When we talked about Bilo so high on Friday, I wish I had said Garrett Cole's name. There is something holding me back from fully believing at him. I've watched a lot of Garrett Cole. And like I've said, I really think he's just like a fastball guy. I know he throws breaking pitches. I don't really think they're that good. And now Garrett Cole has given up 13 home runs this year.

He has never given up more than 11 in a season. So he's already 15 home runs, excuse me. It's already allowed a career high in home runs allowed. He got blasted by the Mets. I don't know. This was one of my favorite guys preseason. I am starting to lose faith in Garrett Cole. Also, Lester struggled, but it was mostly bloop,

bloop single in the first inning that scored two runs after a couple of walks. Carrasco was dreadful. he's got 16 run runs in 21 to 3rd over his last four starts and Kyle Hendricks has struggled two starts in a row so I don't know man porcelo fomber Cole Lester Carrasco Hendrix anybody really worrying you well I mean the home run thing with Cole is is definite concern and I just right before this three-star stretch that jumped his ERA from 284 to 427 I was I just convinced myself okay

Okay, last year was an aberration, and he looks like a good pitcher again. Because I never really understood what went wrong last year. I just know the numbers were bad. Garrett Cole. I mean, home runs are something that theoretically is within a pitcher's control, kind of like strikeouts and walks, maybe a little less so, but theoretically, and it's clear something isn't right in terms of command or whatever. So, like, I wouldn't be looking to trade him now.

It's probably too late to sell high. Would you buy low on Garrett Cole? If I could buy low on him, yeah. I still think he's a top 30 starting pitcher. Severino or Cole? That's what my takeaway was going to be. This group of pitchers outside of Lester was pretty much right in order the five or six pitchers

I had ahead of Severino that were keeping him from moving into the top 20. He's going ahead of Hendricks. He's going ahead of Fulmer. He's going ahead of Porcelo. He's going ahead of Cole. He's going to 19th, right behind Carrasco. Go ahead of Cole.

Yeah, I think I'd move Cole behind him, too. And I hesitated on when I said I wouldn't try and sell him now because it's too late. I don't know that it's too late. As needy as teams are for pitching. I mean, I'm not going to drop him outside of my top 25. So I'd be. be reluctant to trade any pitcher with Cole's upside without getting a pitcher in return, and those trades are always hard to pull off. But my faith in Cole is diminished. The tough one for me

is Severino or Verlater right now. Verlander has not been Verlander, and he's currently at least somewhat hurt. I could understand the argument in a head-to-head league that he's just going to throw that many more innings in Severino the rest of the way, and he'll be better. But in a Photo League, I think I might rather have seven-round-old. It just feels sort of like overthinking it. Well, you have to remember that I had Verlander as a number two starting pitcher coming into the year, so I'm not moving them as far down as you guys would be. I think Scott's probably dropped him a little bit.

You don't have him as the number one anymore. He's in my top ten still, but I'll probably move him out now. Okay. Yeah, I probably will. I hope that Verlander's groin injury has affected his performance. I can tell you that his velocity is not an issue. But I can also tell you that nobody in the world throws harder than Luis Severino right now. I'm guessing with Cindergarde on the DL that Severino is the hardest throwing starting pitcher in baseball,

which probably means Tommy John is in his future because he's so slender. But until then, we'll write it out. Yeah, I would take – I personally would give up Severino for Verlander. I would too. But when Verlander gets going two years in a row, he has been, you know, like arguably the best pitcher in the American League, at least. Yeah, it seems like something's just a little off with him. It's been very disappointing to the Orlando owner, I'm sure, coming off, arguably the best season of his career.

But I think there's better times ahead. Let's talk about Matt Harvey as we look at some more studs who were duds. And here's an email from Joe. Just get it out. fantasy baseball at CBS. Can we move Matt Harvey after this week from the studs who were duds to the fringing, fringinging starting pitcher? Only when his ownership drops below 80%, Heath.

It is not subjective. Okay. Joe says, from Rockville, New York, by the way, what's up, rich uncle skeleton, disgruntled goat and flatulent fox? Scott? Disgruntled goat and flagellent fox? These are itching, scratchy, like original...

characters or they're from the creator of itchy and scratchy. I'm overloaded with underperforming but quote-unquote high-end pitchers. Please stress the quotation marks. I got to throw one of these knuckleheads back on the wire. Danny Salazar, Matt Harvey, or Aaron Nola. Who goes? Please talk about these jerks. They are ruining my season.

I drop damn sunny gray instead of Harvey. I'm putting all my faith into Scott's analysis of him. I'm starting to feel like this is like when Lisa found out the truth. about Jebediah Springfield. Do I have to give up on the myth of Matt Harvey decent pitcher? At least Harvey was good once. Nola is all upside, and he goes on. So I love The Simpsons references.

And who would you drop if you had to drop one? Salazar, Harvey, or Nola? I would drop Nola because I don't think there's nearly as much evidence that he could be a stud as there is with Salazar. even Harvey. I don't think Harvey is undropable right now. If I dropped him, I would still, you know, I'd tie a little string to him so I could pull him back quickly if I needed to. But I don't think he's undropable. I don't think any of them are undroppable, but I would rank them in terms of likelihood I'd drop them, Nola first, Harvey second, and Salazar third.

Adam, do you know what Sierra is? And it has nothing to do with Ryan Zimmerman, but yes, I know what Sierra is. Skill interactive ERA? Yes, Ruben Sierra. I just want to list you a list of names. Andrew Cashner, R.A. Dickey, Jeremy Hellickson, Bronson, Arroyo, Hector Santiago, Jordan Zimmerman. Those are the only six pitchers in baseball that have been worse according to Sierra than Matt Harvey. Well, I mean, all those advanced stats take strikeout rate into a major account, right?

Well, okay, if you don't like advanced stats, all of those pitchers, but one, have a better ERA to Harvey. He's been terrible. There's no question. Yeah, nobody's arguing Harvey's pitched well this year. Yeah, I'm close to dropping him, but, I mean, I've been watching. It's going to take more than just statistical regression to get Harvey on track. That's that goes without saying. There were some encouraging signs in this start.

Oh, there's an encouraging sign. He continues to feel the best he's ever felt. Maybe he just feels good pitching like crap now. I guess. You know, look, it's ugly. I get it. If you need to drop him, I don't think anybody's going to tell you. Don't drop Matt Harvey.

Even Scott said he's dropable. Okay, Irvin Santana. How about Kentimae? Irvin Santana had a bad start. He's progressing. It's three of his last six stars. He's allowed five or more on runs. Of course, it's been lights out and the other three, Santana.

Are you ready to drop Kentimaeida or Rich Hill? No. I'd be less likely to drop either than those three weeks. named earlier. I would drop Hill before Salazar, I think. But I'm probably not dropping any of those three.

Hill, Maeda, or Salazar. All right. Maeda really might be one bad, one more bad start away from going to the bullpen. They're giving him another try, but he could be a huge bus this year. Hopefully he turns out of them. He was on a roll. He had just thrown

an eight-inning, one-hitter, or whatever it was, and then they put him on the Dio with that Phantom Hamstring injury. This start wasn't even really bad, right? He was inefficient. He threw a lot of pitches, so he wasn't able to go five, but two hits and a bunch of strikeouts, right? Seven in four innings, but three walks. Yeah, he was inefficient, but it seemed like a step in the right direction.

The Brewers strikeout a ton, as we know. But, yeah, all right, so four innings, two runs, three walks, and seven strikeouts from IEDA. Only two hits. Two hits. Just look at the rest of the rest. of the Fringy starting pitchers guys, and tell me if there's anyone that stands out to you as under-owned. You spell Fringy differently than I do. I do the Control F-F to find it in the notes.

You don't put an E in there? No, I just go F-R-I-N-G-Y. It's a fake word, so we have made it up. I definitely like the E-Y version of Fringy. Yeah, how do you drop Fringe is spelled with an E at the end? How do you drop the E when you make it fringy? There are plenty of words with that kind of construction. Name eight. No. Okay, so we're looking at this list and telling you pictures we want to talk about.

Jordan Montgomery, 61% owned. Underowned. Jimmy Nelson, 51%. No, that's 65 now. Sorry, Heath. It's probably still a little underowned with the way he's going. I think Peacock at 65 is underowned. Ariel Miranda, 53% is he underowned? Yes, yes, he is. We're on a really good five-star run here

and just through a complete game. A lot of strikeouts. I think he's underowned. I think Derek Holland is 79's over-owned. Alex Cobbett's 79's over-owned. Matt Moore at 73 might be over-owned. I don't think so. His home starts have been pretty good.

Yeah. I'd rather have more than the guys we just said, were underowned at 50 or 60%, so. Just don't feel like there's... Like, Moore's always going to be that guy you have to talk yourself in if you own him. Like, I don't really trust him, but I guess I'll start him because the matchup's okay,

or it's a two-star week or whatever. Don't you trust them at home, though, Matt Moore? Well, let's see what the exact numbers are home in a way. Because I noticed, at least in his recent starts, the good ones were all at home, the bad ones were all on the road, but home runs should really be what makes the difference, and that wasn't so different.

But look at what he did at AT&T Park last year. I'm almost positive. He's a 257 ERA there this year. But he's given up one home run per start, both home and on the road. So I'm not really sure. I understand the numbers are drastically different, but I'm not really sure what it would be if it's not the home runs. So I'm still a little...

I'm not completely convinced that's everything to him. Which Rockies pitchers do you want to start in their roadstarts? John Greaves. Tyler Anderson. Anderson's the one on the D.L. Chatwood. Chatwood. Well, you want to start them all at San Diego.

Except Armand Marquez. I was so pissed off about that because I thought that was a great call. One start week at San Diego and Marquez had a bad start. and then the next two Rocky's pitchers just, like, dominated them. Marquez needs to be DTM pretty quickly. Well, I mean, he's had some decent starts, too. I think he and Jeff Hoffman are in a competition right now with everybody else on the DL. Hoffman, a big gap in between, but back-to-back seven-inning three-hit efforts with a high number of strikeouts.

But they were at San Diego and at Philadelphia, so that. I think the jury's very much still out on him. He seems like a two-pitch pitcher, and didn't get a lot of swinging strikes in those starts, if I recall, even though the strikeout rate was good. Okay, I'm just going to throw out a couple more names. Joe Be A Jeannie to-Nine. I told you when Be A Jeannie struggled at Milwaukee

had the most unlucky inning I've ever seen. He and Luriano were probably battling to stay in the rotation, but he's 20% owned, and look, I don't buy it with him. I don't think his stuff is that good, but he had a great curb ball on Saturday and pitched well against the Yankees. But still, 20% owned, just some garbage out there at 20%. I think is Biajini underowned. Yeah, I think he is. I think he's behind most of the pitchers we were talking about just a second ago.

But maybe on the level of like a Hoffman as the guy who's intriguing, but you're not completely convinced and there's a chance he's. may not stick in the rotation anyway. And Cota Glover was terrible yesterday, but had been pitching great. In his previous nine appearances, he did not give up a run at 10 strikeouts. Do you think this is just a little hiccup or glover? I don't know that he was terrible. He came in and the eighth, got it out. Entered the ninth, gave up four singles and a walk.

So they bring in Sean Kelly, who gives up a grand slam. So it was mostly Sean Kelly's fault, I feel like. Singles are a kind of hit that you don't really know how much blame goes on the pitcher ever. I agree with that. I think facing six batterers and giving up contact to all of them but one who you walked is probably bad. Yeah, he hadn't pitched in a while. He wasn't as bad as the line looks. Yeah.

But he had been so good, I think. Right. I don't think this really, like I think his job security is completely the same. Do I trust him any less today than I did yesterday? Maybe a little. All right, it's Coda Glover, and we are going to look at tonight's matchups real quick. We're going to start Carlos Martinez. You're going to start Asher Wojikowski?

No. Nick Povetta and Bartolo Colon? No. Jeff Samarja at Junior Guerra. Jeff Samarja at Miller Park. I'd start both. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. Dan Straley at Eddie Butler. Start Straitly. Yep. Start Strali at the Cubs? Yes. I think so. Okay.

Mike fires at Ian Kennedy. Not going to do either of those. At Kaufman? Yeah. It is at Coffman. Astros. Against the Astros, who are, have the two hottest hitters in baseball. and this is one of the cold of pitchers in baseball.

They're due for a cold streak. Okay. Gio Gonzalez at Hyunjin Ryu. Start geo. Yeah, probably. I'm not excited about it, but I think I could start Gio. Jay Hap at Sean Minaya. I'm going both seas.

I'm starting Minaya. I need a good start from Hap first. Let's read some emails to finish the show, maybe just one or two. Okay, I'm going to stop talking in that weird voice inflection, but I can't find the email. There they are. Josh and Kentucky grade the trade. Yonder Alonzo from Matt Carpenter.

Hey. You sure? I'll go, I'll go B. All right. Ron in Chicago, which of these three will provide the most production rest of season? Justin Boer? Edwin Encarnacion or Justin Smoke?

Edwin Encrossion. Yeah. Yeah. I'm not ready to turn the page on that after five years of first round production. Grade the trade from Tripp. Give Jose Barrios, get Cole Hamels. I will give that a C.

No, sorry, B. I'm going to go C. Interchangeable, he said. Interchangeable. Like, if Cole Hamels was starting tomorrow, then they would not be interchangeable, but we may not see Hamels for another month. I heard Garrett Cole. I'm sorry. Oh, you're confused.

Saw Jordan Zimmerman on the waiver wire, and that's why I overlooked Ryan Zimmerman. I bet that's what happened. Yeah. All right, we're done here, guys. Thank you very much for listening, everybody. We'll be back tomorrow with another wonderful edition of fantasy baseball today for Heath Cummings and Scott White. I'm Adam Azer. I was going to say NBA sucks, but that just be too mean.

And I don't believe it. NBA is great. Baseball's better. Bye.