Fantasy Baseball Today - 06/06 Fantasy Baseball Podcast: Worryometer, Leaderboard Trivia, Cheesy Headlines

Episode Date: June 6, 2018

We welcome back Madison Bumgarner and discuss why it will be difficult for him to be a Top 5 SP rest of season (2:00) before moving on to our first ever round of Leaderboard Trivia (5:03)! We discuss a struggling SP, a hitter who continues to surprise (10:10), an RP who has been nearly perfect (17:04) and more ... Yesterday's standouts include Ross Stripling (20:30), Andrew Heaney (22:10) and Miguel Andujar (24:48). We also wonder when Vladimir Guerrero Jr. will get the call (30:54), Adam pays up for a bet he lost (34:01) and we go through all of yesterday's interesting SPs (35:51) to figure out which ones we want to add ... Worryometer (47:50) for Cody Bellinger, Carlos Santana and Joey Votto ... Your emails at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email fantasy baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Now here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris. Oh, yesterday was a big day in fantasy baseball. We had a lot of really interesting starting pitching performances. You know, Scott and Chris,

I traded Ross Stripling, not straight up, but in a deal for Noah Cindergarde. I'm starting to wonder, did I give up the best player in the deal? Oh, please, Adam, please. Did you also give up like Justin Verlander or something? No, Vladabir Guerrero. You might have given up the best player. I may have. Yeah, well, but next year anyway.

Anyway, yeah, we'll talk. We have an update on Vlad. We have a reaction to Ross Stripling. We're going to talk about Dallas Keikles' terrible story. start. Renaldo Lopez is very good start, Fernando Romero. I am going to do something disgusting on the show, so get ready for that, and here we go. I think we should start by welcoming, by being a welcoming podcast, right? Should we welcome back, Madison Bumgarner? Of course. All right. This is exciting news. I thought you're going to play the Welcome back Cotter music again. You mean this?

Oh, I nailed it. You got it right this time. I nailed it. So what? You just have, like, the song playing on mute in the background, and you just cross your fingers and hope that when you turn up the volume, it's going to be in the right spot? No, I pause it at eight seconds now. I figured out eight seconds is the part where they start saying,

welcome back. So you just guessed when it was? No, yesterday we did this song for a grade to trade since it's a teacher show. Oh, okay. And I sing these inside jokes. You are. I see. Adam, I'm out of the loop.

A few more hits, and you might have a better batting average than Joey Gallo. I buy. And we welcome Scott White back because he was not on the show yesterday. But Madison Bumgarner. Oh, three strikeouts? 10 swinging strikes and 82 pitches, not bad. Just you look at what he did after the shoulder injury last year. He had a 343 ERA when he came back from the DL.

He gave him 15 homers in 84 innings, and he had a 10% swinging strike rate, so not exactly Madison Bumgarner. However, it was basically two terrible starts that boosted his ERA. His first nine starts off the DL, a 270-80RA looked a lot better. Anyway, six innings, two runs on eight hits, no walks, three strikeouts. Where Scott White, do you have Madison Bumgarner ranked rest of season? Even before he took the mound yesterday, I moved him into my top 12 at starting pitcher.

I have few concerns about him, and there's nothing from this start that would raise an alarm for me. Obviously, it could have been more dominant. It wasn't the most dominant we've ever seen Madison Bumgarner, but on its own, there was nothing to be concerned about. Okay. So basically, you just want to see a little bit more before you move him top eight or so. He probably would have been fifth off the board or something like that before the injury after the big. Yeah.

A couple of people have probably passed him, right? Like, it's not, like, I'm not necessarily, like, concerned about Bumgarner as much as it's just, like, I don't know if I would put him over Verlander and Severino and maybe Derek Cole, even with. Yep. And to Grom. I would say DeGrom's in him, too. The highest I might be able to put him if I did rankings would be like ninth. Right. All right.

Well, that's not so bad. That's right. He's good. Ninth is probably the, and who do I have in between him and, uh, Kershaw is 8, then Strasbourg, Cindergartenke. Yeah. Yeah, that sounds about right.

Knight looks like the upside for Bumgarner, unless somebody in the top eight gets hurt. Okay. And that is not so bad. I have to correct something we said on the show yesterday. I said on the show yesterday. Boy am I embarrassed. The band that sings,

Baby Come Back! That's the song, right? That's what we were talking about. Baby Come Back. Yeah. That is a band called Player, not No Mercy. So you can blame it all on me. I was wrong.

Get it? That's a lyric from the song. All right, it's Player. Yeah, yeah. I got a lot of tweets. We got an email. I got a text about it, so I just wanted to set that straight. It is time for a new game called Leaderboard Trivia.

I'm going to ask you a question. You are going to answer it. We're going to talk about that player. Leaderboard trivia. It's kind of like the fantasy feud, except not as fun. It's like the fantasy feud with one answer Okay So the number one answer

It's the bull's eye round Exactly I want you to give the listeners A few seconds to think of it on their own In case you know it immediately But leaderboard trivia begins with this question Who leads baseball in losses Like the player

Pitcher losses Well that's a stat I just Oh yeah That's a good good thing It's probably not him because I feel like we wouldn't be devoting any time to Jose Orania leading the league in losses, so it's someone else. He did just get his first win yesterday. Jacob de Grom.

Yeah, no, it's not Jacob de Grom. I'll tell you what. There are five starting pitchers with seven losses. They all play for the Marlins, the Orioles, and the Reds. There is one pitcher with eight losses, and he plays on a team that was in the World Series last year. Whoa. Oh, okay.

Yeah, I see it. Oh, this is fun. So the Dodgers. You idiots, it's Dallas Keikle. I know, I got it. Okay, you were free to say it at that point. Dallas Keikle, man, 12 home runs. Yeah, idiots.

He is now... Says the guy who got player wrong. 413 ERA for Dallas Keikle. He gave up seven runs in six and two-thirds. He gave up six of those runs in the first two innings. All right, who's concerned about Dallas Keikle? The MLB leader in losses. I'm not concerned about the losses.

Yeah. But I am concerned that he's not good Dallas Keikl this year. The groundball rate is not the otherworldly rate we're used to seeing from. It's still very high, but he's usually, you know, in a tier to himself. The swinging strike rate is way down. Not to the point that it's nothing we've ever seen from Keikel before, but it's definitely on the lower ends. and like you said, the home runs are unusually high for him this year.

So I mean, I think he's a fine innings eater on a good team in the long run that's probably going to lead to, like from today forward, a good number of wins. But he's at risk of dropping outside of my top 20. Why is he throwing his cutter so much? He's starting it 20% of the time, which is double what he was last year. He's never thrown it this off, and I haven't seen any explanation. for it. It hasn't been a particularly

effective pitch for him in his career, so I'm not entirely sure. Don Cooper, the Astros pitching coach now? Maybe. They need to dig up some data on Kikl. They've got Cole figured out, Verlander, all of them. Well, Kiko thinks he's tipping his pitches.

That's one of his theories. Just four starts ago, Kiko had a 310 ERA, and he looked, and he looked like Kikell. In fact, I think we said that. He had four starts in a row of seven or more innings. He looked like he had bounced back from a bit of a slow start,

and now it's been four pretty disappointing starts in a row. One of them was good at Cleveland. But, you know, the whips on your – unusually high, excuse me. Would you rather have Dallas Kikil? Or – well, let me take a look at the rankings. So I ask a smart question. Or Shohay Otani.

That's an interesting one. Otani, for sure. I'd rather have Otani and – Roto, head-to-heads. I think I'd still prefer Kuykel. Okay. Just because, you know, never going to get the two-star week for Motani. I think, like, he has a 376 ERA since 2016.

Since the start of 2016. He has a 385 FIP and Sierra's right in that range. The Sierra's right around 3-8 this season. I just think that's probably who he is. Oh, wow. But that's, see, see, that. I don't think that's terrible. Like, in the position he's in and the innings he pitches in an era when nobody pitches his innings.

And when I say innings he pitches, because I know he's had some injuries, the totals don't look great. But, I mean, start-by-start basis. I mean, this is where Chris and I just don't agree. Because, you know, it's like with the argument you had about Greg Byrd yesterday, looking at his career OPS. And same thing with Dallas Keikl, if you remove when the guys were obviously playing with injuries, which was the entire 2016 season. for Dallas Keikle.

I'm not saying you're wrong. I'm not saying you're wrong. The skill-based indicators don't suggest that there was a giant difference between 2016 and 2017. A lot of fewer ground balls. Sure, but the FIPP in 2016 was 387. It was 379 last year. The Sierra was 37.

FIP does not apply to Dallas Keikl. FIP does not apply to Dallas Keikle. That's not true. Well, it's obviously not true. his FIP and his ERA are like 0.1-2 apart. Like that's pretty normal. We actually like, we have a... Not really any seasons where he's dramatically outperformed his FIP

except for last year. But he's, yeah, he's just better than his peripherals. It's kind of what I'm saying. When he's right, all right, whatever. This conversation has gone on too long. Who leads... Back to leaderboard trivia. Who leads MLB in doubles?

Which hitter leads baseball in doubles? It's got to be Ozzy Albies, right? Somebody struck me as surprising yesterday. Doubles pace he was on. I'm going to say Eduardo Escobar. Scott White on the board. And we are tied at one in leaderboard trivia. Eduardo Escobar is, he had a big day yesterday,

and he has been so streaky this year, by the way. But he's batting 280 with 11 home runs and 22 doubles in 54 games. Escobar is having a really nice year, continuing a strong September last year when he hit 264 with 9. Nine homers, four doubles and three triples. Terrible plate discipline, though. Anyway, he is the 13th best shortstop and points. 10th in Roto.

You take his points per game. 13th in points right now. Take his points per game. And give him a full season last year. He's the number three shortstop. So it just shows you how much better shortstop's been this year. But Escobar is having a nice year. He leads baseball and doubles.

Does anybody buy it from Eduardo Escobar who's 82%? You know, you project out those home runs. doubles. That's a 31 homer 65 double theme. We've been marveling about Jose Ramirez's 100 extra base hit pace. Eduardo Escobar is not far behind. Why don't you

why don't you tell the people about what you wrote? He was in that column, right? Jose Ramirez was. No, no, Eduardo Escobar was in that column. No, he wasn't in that column. I thought he was not. Yeah, but basically what I looked at the last 365 days. for some players whose numbers this year

may appear to be unsustainable at first glance. And over the last calendar year, not the traditional endpoints we use, which is usually April through October, an individual season, but the same length of time, a calendar year, guys like Jose Ramirez, J.D. Martinez, Scooter Jeanette,

they look totally legit based on that criteria. It'd be interesting to do that with Escobar. I'm doing that right now. Yeah, it was just September. He has 28 homers, 80 runs, 93 RBI, 35 doubles over the last 365 days. Right. I was thinking, you did Eddie Rosario in that one,

and I get them confused. How much of it was September for Eduardo Escobar? Because he wasn't doing much before. He had nine home runs, like I said, nine home runs, four doubles, three triples in September. And, yeah, he's been a roller coaster this year. First six games, 1068 OPS. games, 540 OPS, next 12

games, 1283 OPS, next 22 games, 517 OPS. He was terrible. But now Escobar on the last eight games, he's been tearing it up. So, would you rather have Escobar or Dede Grigorous? I'd rather have D.D.

Escobar or Dansby Swanson? Eskabar. Let's see. Who else is he ranked near? Eskabar or Zach Kozor. Start. Escobar at this point.

Yeah, I should probably move Escobar ahead. All right. How about Trevor Story or Eduardo Escobar? Story. Story at home for sure. All right, we've got three more leaderboard trivia questions. This one's a little convoluted, so bear with me. Mike Trout, Bryce Harper, and Aaron Judge lead baseball in walks.

Mike Trout, Bryce Harper, Aaron, Judge. There are five hitters who are tied for fourth with 39 walks this year. Four of them are first baseman. Name as many as you can. Freddie Freeman. Yep. Joey Votto. Nope. Justin Smoke. Correct. Paul Goldschmidt.

You're incorrect. Always get to laugh from him. Brandon Bell. Braddon Bell, incorrect. Okay. Come on. Who's the first baseman? It walks a lot. He's not a player. He just walks a lot. Rizzo walks a lot Carlos Santana Oh, Carlos Santana, yeah

Also, Cesar Hernandez Not a first baseman, and Justin Boar! Ready? Freeman, Justin Boar, Justin Smoke, Carlos Santana, and Cesar Hernandez are tied for fourth in walks with 39.

Now, Boar has walked twice in his last 10 games, but I was pretty surprised to see that. And Justin Smoke. I'm so sick of... Justin's good. Yeah, I'm so sick of Justin Smoke, though. He is ninth. He was in that 365-day column, which, you know, he hit 241 in the second half last year.

But if you look at his last 365 days, he still looks like a second-tier first base. But if you look at Justin Smoke's entire career, it looks like he's had one good half. Well, the last 365 days don't include that half, and the numbers still look good. I think it's more some of it. He's good. He doesn't stand out at first base. Like even over the last 365 days, he probably doesn't... He probably doesn't look like a stud at first base, although...

Yeah. Second team. Yeah, and I think Justin Bores probably in the same. He didn't Homer in his first 10 games, but since then he has a 905 OPS. Who leads MLB in home runs? I'm going to give that round to Scott, by the way. Who leads baseball at home runs? J.D. Martinez.

That is correct. We're no longer giving the listeners time to think about it. That's fine. Jada Martinez is the number six hitter in points number three in Roto. Do you think he can lead baseball on home runs this year? Absolutely. Last 365 days, I think he's at 55 home runs, and he's on like a 51 homer pace right now. I may have those two reverse.

But the point is, when he's healthy, and so far, he's been healthy, playing D.H as often as he does, probably helps with that. if he's healthy, he's a 50 homer hitter, I think. Wow. It's amazing that nobody wanted to sign him this offseason. Yeah, it is. It's just stupid. All right, J.D. Martinez is awesome.

I think we may have talked about this last week, but is he a first round pick right now, guys, if you were drafting again? Yes. I actually, trade chart, latest trade chart, specifically for head-to-head points. He's going to come out today, and he's well in that. So he's right at the first round. Cut off. All right. And final one.

Leaderboard trivia. Chris, you need this one. Who has the... Oh, no, you just got that last one. Oh, is this the tiebreaker? Ooh, big. Who has the most saves in baseball without a blown save? Oh, Jesus.

That's a tricky one. Most saves in baseball. I mean, I'll give you hints. Is it Edwin Diaz? It's not. He has 14 saves. And he pitches in the AOS. Blake Trinen.

Nope. Chris for the win! Three, two, one. Come on, loser. There aren't that many AOS teams. Keone Keone Keone. Keone Keta has no blow to save. I was going to say it, but it sounded dumb.

Has not blow to save. I mean, I was noticing his numbers look better now, but we're still talking a 403 ERA from a closer. Yeah. That's vast improvement from where it was, like, a month ago. But obviously, he just struggles at non-save situations, right? Actually, Keonekello has given up 10 run runs this year, and he's given up seven of them in two appearances. He's actually been pretty steady, just has that inflated ERA of 403. Yeah, I mean, 14.

You know what my concern is with him? It's like, the Rangers really aren't that bad. I know their record probably stinks, but I feel like they've been respectable lately. They're going to be bad at some point. Like, they're going to be sellers, and I think that's going to really hurt his value.

Yeah, I can't imagine... Well, I mean, I could see him getting sold himself, but not to be a closer anywhere. Right. And even if he stays, like you're saying, probably hurts the safe chance. All right. That was leaderboard trivia.

You both lose. But don't worry, I will be the biggest loser coming up later on in the show. We still have to talk about yesterday's standouts, including Ross Stripling and Andrew Heaney, who threw a complete game one hitter on his birthday. We also have to talk about something I did last night. I cooked a beautiful blue apron meal. It was burgers with caramelized onions and a really nice salad with some apples, like a mustard sauce or dressing rather.

It was really, really good. We put dressing on salad, not sauce. Chris, I hooked you up with some free blue apron a few weeks ago. I had that same meal. It was delicious. Right? Really good. The caramelized onions were really good.

Awesome. I'm surprised. And if you had told me a few years ago, because I've been doing Blue Apron for a few years now, every single week for me, by the way, that I would be able to caramelize onions? I've been like, I don't know how to do that. Would I pour caramel on a bunch of onions? No. Blue Apron is awesome.

If you want to learn how to cook, or if you just love, cooking and you want to start making new things. Chris and I were talking off the air. Maybe the best thing about Blue Apron is, you know, you wouldn't normally eat the types of things that you eat like chicken tinged toastados with avocado and refried beans and roasted pork and salsa Verde with sauteed vegetables. But with Blue Apron, you get all that stuff. It's convenient, gets delivered right to your door. It's very affordable. Less than 10 bucks per person per meal. And if you want three free meals, go to Blue Apron.com slash fantasy baseball. Blue Apron.com Fantasy Baseball. You get 12 recipes that you can choose from every single week, so you won't get tired of it.

Different stuff and delicious stuff all the time. Blue Apron.com slash fantasy baseball. Blue Apron, a better way to cook. Fellas, I've made some cheesy headlines for yesterday's standouts. Let's give it a shot. I got it at Ross. Ross Stripling, five shutout innings with seven strikeouts. He has a 152 ERA and 66 strikeouts in 53 and a third. and I got it at Ross as the department store slogan. Yeah, he's good. He is good.

And I give you credit for this because you were excited about him before I was willing to give him the time of day. And he's only gotten better since the longer he's been in the starting role. I was concerned about the lack of swinging strikes, even though the results were good early on. But 15 swinging strikes in this game, And that's three straight where he's been 14 or 15. Wow.

So he's, I think he's good. And he's, I think he's the best spark now. And he's got a 364 ERA and 22 career starts. So it's not like it's just this season. He's been effective in the past. And, you know, I'm not exactly sure what he, like, looking into the numbers a little bit that I have, I'm not exactly sure what changes he's made this year that are fueling him.

But I think he's clearly good. It's just a question of how good. I believe I heard on the broadcast, sorry, Scott. I heard on the broadcasts not yesterday two starts ago that he's just throwing his curveball harder. His pitching coach told him to just let go and throw the curveball as hard as you can. And it's a really, really good pitch for Ross Tripling. I was going to say he's technically not my number one spark.

Walker Bueller is. But he's pretty close. Okay. And how about this next cheesy headline? Andrew is the man drew. Oh, God, I feel so dirty saying that. Complete game, one hit shutout with only four strikeouts, but 17 swinging strikes for Andrew Heaney,

who, like, you don't even have to look at last six stars or whatever. He's got a 312 ERA this year, 19 walks, 58 strikeouts, and 60 and two-thirds. Is Andrew Heaney criminally underowned at 66%? Yeah, I think he should be pretty much owned across the board. I don't think he's a low 3SRA. I think he's had a little bit of good luck so far. Bab-up's a little low. Home run to fly ball rate's a little low.

He's probably more like a mid-to-high-3s ERA guy, but that still deserves to be pretty much universally owned. Yeah, when it's a strikeout per inning on a good team. And six innings per start. You know, they're not necessarily handling him with kids' gloves coming back from Tommy John surgery. So Andrew the manager, Andrew Heaney, would you rather have him or, raw stripling.

I'd rather have stripling. Okay. Yeah, stripling and points for sure because of the SPARP eligibility. And not just that. I thought Andrew Heaney was a two-star pitcher next week, but I forget they have a six-man rotation, so he's not a two-star pitcher next week. It doesn't just affect Shohei Otani. Right.

Would you rather have Andrew Heaney or Ross Stripling or Sean Mania? Who's your favorite there? Mania with another kind of stinky start. Mania stripling. Haney. Hmm. Let's see how far apart I have Manaya and Strifling, having just updated them yesterday. Oh, further apart than I thought. I guess I'm going to have to go with Manaya. There's really not much to like about Manaya right now.

I mean, he's got 58 strikeouts in 80 and a third, and he's got an ERA around seven. I don't have it updated. His last six starts before last night, it was a 718 ERA, and then two runs in five and a third. So whatever. He's been bad since the end of April. Yeah, so basically. five of his last seven starts, he's allowed four earned runs or more, and six of his last seven starts, he's had four strikeouts or fewer. Neither of those are what you want to see.

And even though he's going through, he's gone through kind of a rough patch recently, still just a 218 Babbat, which would suggest there's more correction coming. I think I might be talking myself into moving him down even further. I moved him down pretty far yesterday, but... To where? I have 16 spots ahead of stripling still, which seems too, like, too much. All right. Last cheesy headline for me.

Hit it far, Andrew Har. I've used that one before. Oh, nice. That exact same one. In the spring observations piece, when you enjoyed my cheesy headlines until I shared them on the air. You basically... You sent me up. No, you inspired the segments, Guy.

You understand. You inspired it. Hit it far, Anduhar. He hit a grand slam yesterday. And only one week with 20 fantasy points, although he looks like he's on his way to his second. He bats low in the order. His walk to strikeout ratio is terrible. Seven walks, 37 strikeouts.

But Andrew Har has 20 doubles. And he started on April 1st. That was his first game. I'm going to look up now where he ranks since April 1st at third base. Last six games, he's got five doubles, two home runs. And four of his seven walks have come in his last 10 games. That's another encouraging sign. I don't know what to make of Miguel and Duhar.

What do you guys think? I think he's a good hitter. I'm not sure. And this was the issue with him coming up as a prospect, I thought, was I'm just not sure where he makes his impact in fantasy. And I think that's what we're seeing. It's kind of a really weird skill set that makes it so he doesn't stand out in either format because he hardly ever walks when Church's points league value and his past. and his power mostly manifests as doubles, which hurts his roto value.

So I think he's decidedly out of the top 15 at third base, but he's usable, especially with good matchups. He's a little Yuleigurelli. Ulygerielli. Yeah. Would you rather have Adrian Beltre or Miguel Ann Duhar? Beltray. Yeah, I think so.

Like, supposedly Belchre wasn't going to play every day coming off the deal, but he started four or five. Okay, and Duhar is outside the top 15 in points, and I'll update everybody in just a second. Let's move on now. Any other, on where he is in Roto, any other standouts you want to talk about from yesterday's games? We should probably talk about Rinalda Lopez, who had a superficially good start, but just continues to not be what we want him to be. He's like a fantasy analyst nightmare because you keep warning people.

And yet he continues to put out starts like this. Which, like, he allowed no runs on one hit in seven innings, which is very good. Yeah. Those things are good. But then the four walks, four strikeouts. And seven innings, neither of those is good on their own. And that's what he's been doing all season. And not only that, but he's an extreme flyball pitcher who pitches half his games at a hitter-friendly part.

And every once in a while, he'll have an eight strikeout game. like he did against Texas four start to go or the 10 strikeout game against Oakland 10 start to go. But in his last nine starts, seven of them have been four or fewer strikeouts. I just, he is talent. There is enough talent in his arm to make me feel dumb about it. But I, if anybody wants to give you something for Rinaldo Lopez, do it now. You know what? I'm going to say this.

I'm going to go, I'm going to make some people angry now, I think. Lopez and Lucas G. Alito. Two elite pitching prospects for the Nationals, the prizes of the Adam Eaton deal. They combined for five strikeouts yesterday in a doubleheader, and they haven't been striking anybody out all year. And I just wonder how long, like, what evidence do we really have that Don Cooper is a good pitching coach? Because he's always had this reputation as one of the game's best pitching coach. And I feel like it all dates back to him making Esteban Loiza a near Si Young winner back in 2003. Yeah, it was all like early 2000 stuff.

Yeah. And it's like just ridden the wave of that for over a decade. And I feel like the White Sox should expect more from these two. Yeah. But also like John Danks and Mark Burley, he did pretty well with them. You know, they won the World Series or they lost the World Series? They won it. They won.

They won. They won. They swept. Do you see how confidently I said it, though? Yes. In my defense, that World Series was during Hurricane Wilma, and I did not get to watch it. Yep, I'd listen on the radio. That's pretty hardcore.

All right, so, yeah, actually, you know, I really thought the pitching yesterday was just super important. A lot of fringy starting pitchers. I even broke them down like I do over the weekend to part one, part two, and part three, and deep leagues. So I'm going to go through all of those fringy starting pitchers, and you're going to tell me who you want. And before I do that, you want the draft app on your phone. You want to be playing either on your phone or on draft.com. And you want to be using the promo code FB Today to get a free entry into a real money baseball draft when you make your first deposit. You can also compete against me, Big Cane 2, and you will automatically follow me.

FB today is the promo code. If you use that code, you will automatically follow me on draft. So draft's awesome. Daily Fantasy Baseball or golf or hockey or hockey or. or basketball or football, a lot of stuff you can play on the draft app. I love Daily Fantasy Football, by the way. I can't wait to start talking about that. And you can play for cold hard cash.

You do a draft every day as often as you want, multiple times a day. Drafts start at just $1. There's a draft out there for everyone. You know, I've been noticing that hitting is really the most important thing on the baseball drafts. As long as there's not one or two truly elite pitchers that are so much better than everyone else, I recommend waiting on hitting, unless you're playing against me, then take pitching really early and I'll take all the hitting. But that seems to be the best way to score points. It's just really fun.

You love doing snake drafts. You love playing fantasy baseball. You love playing on draft. Use the promo code FB Today and join me. Big Cain 2. Follow me there with the code FB today on draft. All right, so let's do all this. Oh, wait, quick news item.

Toronto has discussed promoting Vladimir Guerrero Jr. to AAA within the next month. According to John Marrose. Finally. The Blue Jays have discussed promoting Vladimir Guerrero. Okay, here we go. Two AAA at some point in the next month. What the heck is that? It's stupid.

And just speculation from CBS Sports Baseball writer Matt Snyder. He thinks they will take the Chris Bryant route. He says they have no reason to promote Vladimir Guerrero this year. They're not contending. So save his service time and promote them at the beginning early 2019. Just extremely, extremely short rant. This is stupid baseball needs to fix the system. I don't.

But like that hardly ever happens. Teams should not, no, teams are always incentivized to not call up their best players. We got more than, we got two thirds of the season to go, and he's hitting over 400 in the minors. Like the Chris Bryant, he's dominating, but we're going to wait. until next year. That's more of the exception than the rule. This is the skewed incentive system that baseball has set up, and they're just taking it to its logical conclusion. They are incentivized to not call him up, so why would they? It's absolutely logical that they should just not call him up. There's no point.

There's plenty of point. No. They need to further his development. He's clearly too good for the minors. I'm going to make a prediction, too. I'm allowed to do that. I still think he's going to be up in the majors within the next. next month. How do you like that? Okay. Hold on to Vladimir Guerrero. I did not give you permission to make a prediction, Scott, just so you know, but that's fine. They're being silly. We'll allow it. I mean, if we don't really care about defense, but if they

really don't think that he's ready defensively, no, it's not stupid. It is. Why? Bad defensive players play for every single team in the ages, including the Toronto Blue Jays. Your top prospect, like you need time to let him develop and be ready. You can't develop your defense in the majors with the better coaches. It's not fair to the pitchers. That is, oh. No, I think it's legit. Weep for Marco Estrada.

You may have one extra ground ball go through the left side of the infield every five games. I weep for Aaron Sanchez. No, I we for Marcus Stroman. It's dumb. That is not a legitimate reason to keep this guy down. There is no legitimate reason to keep him. down except for economics. That's the only thing that's in play here.

If they could call him up and have the exact same service time, they would if they called him up next April 19th, they would do that. That's the only consideration being made here. Defense wins championships, Chris. You know that. All right. Okay, let's just get this out of the way. Nate Jones pitched in the eighth yesterday and was bad.

And then in the nightcap of the doubleheader, sorry I got to save. I continue to have no interest in that bullpen. But, all right. Fernando Rodney, got to save. He has given up one earn run in his last 14 appearances. I have in my hand the most disgusting snack of all time. I had to order 20 peeps because you can't just get one. You can order a reasonable amount of peeps, which is zero.

Oh, God. And I'm so not looking forward to eating a peep on the air right now. And my wife was like, don't you like marshmallows and sugar? Exactly. And I'm like, yeah, that just shows you. How the lowest quality marshmallow And the lowest quality sugar. Oh, God.

Come on. It's not the lowest quality sugar. Am I doing this now? And like, are there really different? No, you got to eat it all at once. You got to put the whole thing in there. This is my thing. Because I'm not like, tear the bandage off.

Don't. I need to see that whole thing. I can't do that. I'm watching you. Oh, geez. God, pizza suck. You know what? You know what?

This is not as bad as I thought. Exactly. There you go. Adam. That's the thing. Like, peeps, it's not like I'm peep's number one fan. It's not like it makes it makes or breaks my Easter having a peep. But it's a sugar

covered marshmallow. It can't be nearly as bad as people make it out to be. All right. It's not as bad as I remember. Finish it. I am. It's not even halfway down. There you go. There you go. So what you're like that gritty feeling on your tongue?

No. So much texture. Yeah, that's what I look for when I, when I eat food. Something's scraping my tongue. All right, so. Well, it's not painful. It's not sandpaper. Oh, God. It's got an after-taste.

It's just a little texture. Don't you want to feel like you're eating a mushy banana covered in sand? All right. Finji starting pitchers. Tell me who you like. Only two pitchers owned in 65% to 70% of leagues that went yesterday that are worth talking about. Kyle Freeland, Fernando Romero. You want these guys on your team?

I want Fernando Ramirez. on my team. Kyle Freeland. I can't make sense of Kyle Freeland. Yeah. I think he's okay. But obviously,

it's hard to know exactly when to start him, and he's certainly not must start. So, I can probably, in most leagues I can probably do better. You know who hates Fernando Romero?

Brooksbaseball.com. They just don't have him. They refuse to have Fernando Romero. I'm trying to see if he's throwing more pitches. I watched the White Sox Twins game yesterday, this Rinaldo Lopez-Rinero matchup. I watched like three innings.

I'm on his page right now. What? Yeah. Am I spelling it wrong? No. I don't know, but I'm looking at it. Fernando Romero, Minnesota Twins. I've tried, like, all the time.

He's not showing up in the search box for me, Adam. Okay, good. I search for his name, and it says there are no matches. That's exactly what I see. Well, I just sent you the link. Well, give me his arsenal. Give me his arsenal. Because I think he's really a two-pitch pitcher, and that scares me.

He throws his four-seam fastball and his sinker a combined 61.6% of the time. He throws his slider 27.4% of the time. And his change-up 10.9% of the time. So he's a two-and-a-half pitch pitcher. All right. Fernando Romero, we'll keep. Fringy starting pitchers part two. Junior Gera, Nate Avaldi.

Cecee Sabathia and Renaldo Lopez. Junior Guerra and Adivaldi, C.C. Sabathia and Ronaldo Lopez. I can't get excited about any of these. I know Junior Garra's ERA is low, but him and Ulyshas seen are performing a similar trick here where it makes no sense to me. Well, Garra does have 56 strikeouts in 60 and a third. Maybe he's just... It's not bad. They don't let him go.

They don't let him throw 100 pitches, so maybe it's one of those, you know, know, he's good twice through the order. I'm not sure. Like, remember when he first emerged on the scene, I guess it was two years ago? It was like the splitter. Oh, look, this guy has this fantastic splitter. No wonder he's, you know, a 28-year-old rookie or whatever. He's catching the league by surprise.

Like, he doesn't throw a splitter anymore, not very often anyway. So it's not that that's carrying him. I don't know what makes him good. I think I'm more interested in two different guys in the next. than anybody in this one. All right, yeah. So that was Gera, Evaldi, Sabha, and Lopez. We're not that interested.

Fringy starting pitchers part three, 30 to 49% own. Marco Estrada, Jose Orania, and Jordan Liles. You're interested in two of them? I think so. I think I'm about as interested in Josea Rania as I am in Nade Avaldi, who is the most interesting pitcher

in the previous group, I think. And I am probably, I think I'm more interested in Jordan Liles than anybody that we've talked about recently. He basically lost me a week yesterday. I have no chance now. Eight runs on 11 hits in 4.3rd. I'm not so sure about his stuff. And he's been bad on the road, too.

He's got two starts next week. They're both on the road. All right, tell me why you like Jordan Liles. Before this start, he had a 360 R.A. coming as a starting pitcher. He's throwing harder. seen improvements in his, I think it was, Scott, his curveball that has been improved this year.

They were saying on the broadcast he didn't throw much yesterday. I'll see if that's true. They just didn't, like, that would kind of explain why he was so bad if he wasn't throwing his pitch that's helped him turn his time. Yeah, he only threw it 10 times in 66 pitches. He usually throws it about 25% of the time. So he just, it looks like he just didn't have it. but we've seen enough interesting stuff from him. The strike rate as a starter has been really good. He's getting a decent number of swinging strikes. I don't think any of these guys are better than, I don't know, a high threes ERA.

Like I think Jose Arainia's best version probably sees him landing with a 3-9 ERA and a 8 and 14 starting record. But that to me is more interesting than what you're likely to get. get out of Rainaardo Lopez or Cecee Sabathia. Of course, I mean, you see what they pitch for two terrible teams, right?

And that hurts. Yeah. I think that would be enough for me to prefer Sabathia, frankly, even if I think maybe Liles is a more skilled pitcher at this point. Now, Sabathia, yeah, Sabathia is lined up for two

starts next week, but it's a weird week because one of the two games against the Nationals is a resuming resumption. That's the word, right, of the delayed game from last month. So I think he has two starts, but actually I don't think he has two. I honestly don't know. I'm not sure which of those two Nationals games is real and which one is just going to be like four innings. So that might influence your decision just if you're playing week by week. It's the Nationals in Tampa Bay or it's just the Nationals for Sabathia.

That's a big difference. Right. I also need to correct something. My Gera take was outdated. He actually has featured his splitter between 15 to 20% of the time his last three starts. So if that's back, it makes him a little more interesting. All right. And by the way, for Jose Urania to finish 8 and 14, he'd have to go 7 and 7 rest of the season.

Because that dude is 1 and 7 right now, despite really being pretty solid since opening day when he got crushed by the Cups. And in Deep Leagues, you want any of these guys? Jason Vargas, Alex Cobb, Anthony DiScliffeani, Stephen Wright, Brad Keller. And is there one more? Yes, Zach Efflin. Vargas, Cobb, Desclofani, Stephen Wright, Brad Keller, Zach Eflin. So Deesclavani was at Cores, right? No.

Home. No? Okay. So that's a disappointing first start. But it's also, it's been a rough ride for him over the last. last couple of years. So I think you can give him a pass. I think he's interesting. I'm not necessarily sure he'll be good or healthy, but we've seen enough flashes from him that I want to keep an eye on him. I'm not saying I want to start him, but I definitely want to keep an eye on him.

I think Stephen Wright's interesting, except for the fact, like, it probably isn't going to be a long-term D.L. stay for Drew Pomeranz, but seven-two-hit innings yesterday has a 157 ERA and seven total appearances, most of them in long relief. And this guy was an all-star in 2016 with the 13 and 6 record of a 33-ERA. There's just, there are no knuckleballers in baseball anymore. So that pitch has to be like such a shock to the system for any hitter who faces it. Yeah. I think it's a real advantage for a right.

That's exactly what Detroit said yesterday. You know, they just didn't have any, many guys who had seen a knuckleball. And they really struggled. Seven scoreless, as Scott said, on two hits, three walks, six, strikeouts for right. Okay. So some more stuff to get to. Let me go through some of the news and notes.

Jordan Montgomery is out for the season. Domingo Armand will stay in the rotation. But, all right, here we go. Scott, I'm going to give you some prospect thoughts. See what you think. First of all, I think Justice Sheffield could be up in the second half. Or maybe even more likely, the Yankees trade Clint Frazier for a starting pitcher. and Clint Frazier becomes a regular player somewhere.

Well, where's he going to play in Texas's outfield? Yeah, he's going to play center for Delano to Shields. I think both of those sound plausible. I would be surprised if the Yankees didn't trade for another starting pitcher. I don't know if they're willing to use Frazier to do that because, you know, a guy like Brett Gardner is not going to be a starting outfielder for long. They have a talent-rich system, though, and they'll be able to pull something off. Yeah, and Justin Turner expected back from a sore wrist today.

Julio Terran's on the deal with a thumb contusion. Scott just mentioned that Drew Pomeranz is on the deal with biceps tendonitis. Now, the Red Sox are calling up Jalen Beaks to make his MLB debut tomorrow against Detroit, and he's got great minor league numbers. This is probably just a spot start, though, for Jalen Beaks. Yeah, I think they're definitely. Their rotation got kind of out of order with promorants going on the DL, so he's actually, even counting right, Beaks is entering as a sixth starter. So I'd be surprised if it isn't one and done no matter how well he performs.

But yeah, very much, very interesting minor league numbers. Yeah, he's got like 80 strikeouts in 50 innings or something this year. Albert Poolels will be out with a knee-sornness until at least Friday. Jammer Candelaria left with a jam finger. Texas released Tim Linzigum. Addison Russell needs an MRI on his finger, and I think, Ben Zobrist might be the guy who benefits the most from this guys. What do you think?

Because that's what it was yesterday. Hapsat and Baez played short and Zobras played second and let off. I mean, Zobras looks like a good player again. Yep. It's just a question of playing time. Right. And if there are fewer competitors, that definitely helps his case. And Baez is probably the only one of those guys that they would trust to play shortstop for an extended period of time, right?

Yeah, I'd say so. That guy is such an awesome fielder. He has this flare that it's just, he's amazing. I actually love watching him play defense. Yeah. Man. All right, but sorry. Brian McCann expects a return on Friday.

Eric Thames will begin a rehab assignment today. Do you think the Hesus Aguilar ride is just about done? I actually don't. He's been better against Riteys than Lefties this year. Actually, that's not true. but he has an OPS over 900, even against Ritey's. And I'm not convinced he isn't a better hitter than Eric Thames. Dude can hit.

Yeah. So I don't know exactly what they're going to do. I think both are probably better than the current version of Ryan Braun. I know both are better than the current version of Domingo Santana. And Thames obviously can play the outfield. That's why I bring those two up. So it'll be interesting to see. Jeremy Hellickson's on the deal with a hamstring strain.

Marcus Stroman could begin a rehab assignment this week. Elvis Andrews is eligible to return on Monday. I haven't seen anything that indicates he will be back on Monday, but it could be pretty soon for Andrews. Carlos Rodon expected to come off the deal this week. Andrewton Simmons left with a sprained ankle. Any interest in Shelby Miller, guys, he could return soon to the Diamondbacks. Mild interest.

He was, it's been such a long time, but I remember him doing interesting stuff before, like his velocity was way up, I think, before the Tommy John surgery. So if he can sustain that, I will definitely want to see what he looks like. Hugh Darvish has no timetable for his return. Johnny Quato expected to return late this month. And Chris Archer is on the DL. It is not expected to be a long stay on the DL for Chris Archer. Oh, man, that is some aftertaste.

Those freaking peeps. It's Worryometer Wednesday. And let's put three players on the Worryometer. I saw something like Dave Roberts not considering demoting Cody Bellinger now. I'm not sure if I dream that or if that was a legit road or world headline. Yep, that was legit. All right, so let's put Bellinger. He did Homer yesterday.

He batted seventh, though, for the first time. And in the 24 games before he was batting 123, he's been bad this year. Bellinger on the Worryometer 0 to 10. I will give him. I'll give him like a 7. Like, I feel like, I feel like given infinite time, this will work itself out,

and he'll be one of the games elite power hitters. I just don't know that he has infinite time. And if they're already mentioning that they may send him down at some point, like that's, I'd want to have a good backup first basement, that's for sure. I mean, I may just want to stop. Start somebody other than Bellinger at this point. It's bad as he's been.

Yeah. All right. Chris, I'll give you this Worryometer. Joey Votto. Zero. Hey, easy now. Easy now. Zero.

He's got six home runs and nine doubles and one triple in 60 games. And he is struggling. This is not what we see from Votto usually. He's been really bad against lefties. Batting 200 with a 326 on base, good walk rate, and a 307 slugging percentage. So he's just not doing anything against lefties. So what?

That's all, that is all very interesting. Zero. Scott, Joey Vado, worryometer. I'll give him like it to. All right. Okay, so he had three hits in his first five games with a 396 OPS and a six shrekouts. In 54 games since then, he is hitting 313 with an 893 OPS. There has not been a 3.

lot of power, but like, it's Joey Votto, and he hasn't been bad. No. The track record is way too long. Maybe the skills have slipped, and this is something he has talked very candidly about that. He can tell his skills diminish, and he has to make up for it by being even more smart. Even more smart. The track record is too long and too positive, and it's not. not like he's been bad. He's the number six first basement in points leagues.

And number 14 at Roto. Sure. I just, I think he's probably going, if you set the over under at 18 home runs, which is about what he's on pace for right now, I will take the over. I would hope. And I just, he's good. I don't know. He is. What am I going to be worried about with Joy Votto? His power. His power, that's all. And I think that sometimes as players get older, and we talk about this with Matt Carpenter, as players get older, they struggle against lefties or if they're lefties.

That could be what's happening. I just, I need more than two months to be worried about a guy. Like, if my season's going to be racked because Joey Votto is only the 14th best first baseman in my roto league, I guess I have to live with that because there's nothing I'm going to do about it. All right, all right. Hey, I'm not saying I'm worried about him. I'm just pointing out some stuff here.

And how about Carlos Santana? So remember I said, Carlos Santana struggles for the entire first half. don't buy low on Carlos Santana until the All-Star break, basically. And then he had this enormous week. He had like a 40-point week. It really hasn't been very good. He has one home run in his last 17 games, and Santana appears to be struggling again.

That said, I think he's like the number four first baseman of points leagues, because he has more walks and strikeouts. Worryometer on Carlos Santana. Two, one. Yeah, it's very low like that. I'm not really worried. So I'll go, I'll go, too. All right.

Rotation from yesterday. Kyle Hendricks, Patrick Corbyn, Sean Newcomb, Carlos Martinez, and an 80% owned Joe Musgrove. Kyle Hendrix, Patrick Corbyn, Sean Newcomb, Carlos Martinez, and Joe Musgrove. Do you guys have anything interesting to say about those players?

I'm assuming Patrick Corbyn's velocity was still down. I haven't seen anything about it. Yeah, he averaged 90 on both. to this fastballs. Uh-oh. But he's, I mean, he's continued to be effective for the most part.

There are, I don't think he's the ace that we hoped he might be in April. But what, like, do you like him more than Kichel? Yeah. Yeah.

Do you like him more than, like, Tanaka? I think that's probably close. I think those are going to be two very similar pitchers. So you like Tanaka better than Kikil? Yes. Scott, do you?

I rank them Corbyn, Kekyll, Tanaka. But I still have Corbyn ahead of, like, Paxton and Nola. Actually, I may not. I think I moved him behind. I still have him ahead of, like, Blake Snell and Trevor Bout. I think Paxton, Nola, and Snell are all better than him. So, Keiko versus Tanaka. I feel like there's only one category that I would expect to not going to be better than Kikl in,

and that would be strikeouts. Yeah, but I think they'll probably be pretty similar in every other category. I think so, too, actually. I'll give Kikl a lower ERA. Yeah, I do too, but similar. Actually, I don't know. I mean, like, can we really say that about to knock at this point? I think they'll both be in the high threes range, probably.

And they'll probably both get about the same number of wins, because they're on very good teams. I don't think the whips will be dramatically different. No, that's a strength for Tanaka for sure. Yeah, so I think, like, maybe Kikl's a little better in ERA, but the edge in strikeouts probably gives Tanaka the edge for me. The edge. Have you been listening to the YouTube channel on Sirius?

No. I don't have, I don't have Syrias. Oh, it's very good. Very nice. I'm not joking. I understand. Okay. get your joke now.

Framo Reyes homered again. He's 28% O, and I think we will save him and some other hot hitters for tomorrow's show, including Nick Williams, who has three homers in his last seven games. Jason Kipnis is on a nice little run here over his last 10 games. We'll talk about them tomorrow. Let me read some emails. Eric from North of the Border, 10 team head to head league. Would you drop Fernando Romero for Carlos Rodon?

No. I would not. From Daniel. Hey, Mike, Roger, Andy, and Mariano. Losers. Losers. They are Yankees. Sunny Gray is available.

Do I drop Gregory Polanco or Marco Gonzalez for Sunny Gray? I'm okay with dropping Polanco for him, even though I'm very down on gray. I think you're betting on upside with both Polanco and Gray, so it depends on your team needs. I mean, I'd rather have Gray than Marco Gonzalez. I don't think I would. I'd have an easier time doing that than Polanco. Which Mike do you think? think Daniel's referring to.

Musina. That's got to be Musina. Yeah. Okay. Okay. Yep. That's... From Dylan.

From Dylan. Is Jonathan Scope done? I haven't been a 12-team Roto League and Delano Shields. Dustin Fowler are available on waivers. What would you do if you're the Jonathan's scope owner? I'm not dropping. Yeah, I'm not for those two. I don't think he's undropable in, like, a shallow of league, though.

Do you think that... Do you think that Jonathan's scope is... is due to get really hot and that he's a good by-low candidate? Adam? Yeah. He's going to. I mean, look, he's trying to derail this. He's already relived the Dallas-Kikevilder.

No, I mean, come on. Like, guys get hot, though. I don't understand what's wrong with that question. I swore because of the way my timeline blew up, the last time you two went at this, that I would not get involved. I'm not getting into that. Look, just flip a coin at him.

All right, all right. No, no, you're not answering. Better days are ahead for Jonathan's scope. Whether that means that he goes on a hot streak and his numbers end up where they're supposed to be. Whatever. I don't think that's going to happen. He will be better than he has been so far. I think his 2017, everything went right for him.

Yes. And I think his skill set makes it. So everything kind of needs to go right for him to stand out of the deep position. Yeah, but even in 2016, he hit 25 home runs, you know. Yeah. So. Yeah. I would suspect he hits more than 20 homers again this year.

Okay. He's not bad. I just don't think he's great either. Sure. Two more questions. Alex from Rapid City is as Drewbo Cabrera dropable? In the shallow league. Yeah, like in a 10-team league maybe, but the positional versatility is just so valuable.

And he's pretty good. He was in the last 365 days column, and he had, he has like 21 homers and an 850 OPS during that stretch, a shortstop eligible player. Triple eligibility in CBS Sports Leagues. You're probably going to want to hang on to him. It's a nice guy to have a round. I will sell him to you in our Roto League as Juba Cabrera. Make me an offer. This is from Chris from the east side of Edmonton.

Eastside Edmonton. He says, Bumblebee Tuna. In a 14 team head-to-head points, Dynasty League, I have a middle-of-the-packed team with little chance of winning. I got an offer to give up Justin Upton and get Freddie Peralta. in a 14 team head-to-head points dynasty league. I think you got to do better than that. Like, Freddie Peralta is not a high probability prospect.

And Justin Upton's a borderline stud. I don't know if there are some costs that come into play here that make Upton virtually unkeepable. I would think he'd say that if there was. So you've got to get a better prospect back for Upton than that. It's not multiple. All right, that is it for today's show. Thank you to Scott and Chris.

Thank you all of you for listening. And we will talk to you tomorrow with a Wednesday recap and some by herself on Fantasy Baseball today.