Fantasy Baseball Today - 06/16 Fantasy Baseball Podcast: Worrisome Players and Week 12 Help

Episode Date: June 16, 2017

We're covering a lot on this Kokomo Friday! We start the show with three "Matt"s who could help your roster and are widely available, then it's on to Nick Pivetta's awesome start (8:31) and more from Thursday ... Who are we actually worried about at this point? Justin Verlander (10:20)? Rich Hill (13:48)? Carlos Gonzalez (22:04)? Francisco Lindor (25:25)? ... We discuss the changing MLB landscape and how it affects Fantasy (33:45), plus two-start pitchers for Week 12 (53:00) ... 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

Masara and Parra projected. It's scarier. Bacchato or Bado. Welcome to another Kokomo Friday. Put your feet up, everybody. Scott, as you said before the show, Life's a beach, right? Life's a beach, I don't know.

Just relaxing, heading into the weekend. I like it. What a beautiful slogan. And we welcome you to fantasy baseball today. I'm really excited about today's show. I think it's going to be terrific. Chris Towers is on his first Friday show of the year? I've probably, I'm sure I've been on.

Maybe. Okay. Well, it couldn't have been that good or we'd remember. Who's counting at him, honestly? Not me. Our email address is Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Today we're going to talk about Matt Chapman. We're going to talk about Matt Davidson.

We're going to talk about Matt Strom and Stephen Matt. I don't know. Rank the mats. Yeah, exactly. Harvey Last. Okay, fine. Actually, let's see if we can come up with a clever title for this, ranking the Matt's, like, can you think of anything, like this just in?

No. Welcome, Matt. No. Welcome, Matt. Who are you welcoming to your lineup first? Matt Strong? Okay, yeah, that's fine. Yeah, Matt Strom, Matt Davidson, or Matt Chapman?

I guess just because he's a pitcher, it's probably got to be Matt Strom, right? Yeah, but is he a good pitcher? Probably not. No. But are either of these other two guys any good? Well, they have a lot of power. both Chapman and Davidson. Davidson has actually been demonstrating the power,

homering four consecutive games up to 14 on the year. Terrible contact percentages. Like, what is it? He's batting like 240 despite a 350 Babbup or something? Might be even higher his Babbup. And obviously it's fueled in large part by those home runs, but he also has crazy high fly ball percentage, very low soft contact percentage.

When he makes contact, he kills it. 38% strikeout rate, though. He does not make, like, you just can't, unless you're Miguel, Sano, and even that is still an open question to some extent, you can't be a successful major league hitter while striking out 38% of the time. So my favorite is actually Chapman. All right, before we get into all the specifics and all the data and all that, let me frame it for everybody. These are three players who are owned in 10% of leagues or less. Matt Strom made his first career start, and he struck out three angels in five innings, gave up an under and run on three hits.

And he's having a decent year with bad control, which is different than last year. But everything's been in the bullpen. That's Matt Strom, Royals pitcher. Matt Davidson is the fifth player this season and the first White Sox player since 2013 to Homer in four straight games. That's Matt Davidson. He is batting 259 with 14 homes. home runs, 11 walks and 70 strikeouts, and again, he is homered in four straight games. The other four to do that, by the way, are Salvador Perez, Eric Thames, Mark Reynolds, and

Mike Trout. Those are the other four to hit a home run in four straight games this year. And Matt Chapman is one of the newest members of Major League Baseball. He was called up by the A's yesterday. He went over three. He walked twice, and he struck out twice. Another one of those three true outcome guys, 24-year-old, who in the minors hit for a lot of power. Not only at the PCL. He had 29 home runs at AA in 117 games last year, and Matt Chapman is 10% owned. So Scott says Matt Chapman would be the one he'd welcome first of all the welcome Matt's. Go ahead, Scott. I cut you off when you were getting into it. Yeah, I mean, I'm willing to see if he's as bad of a swing and miss guy as Matt Davidson has been at the major league level

and the hope that it's similar power production. I think the athletics enthusiasm is partially driving my willingness to take a flyer on him in deeper leagues. I mean, most people aren't going to have a big enough need at third base to pick up a prospect is flawed. But the athletics designated Trevor Blue for assignment. So they're kind of just committing to Chapman as their regular third baseman right out of the gate. He's a top 100 prospect, you know. You guys let me have him for a dollar in the auction league. I got him in the 12-team Roto League.

I dropped some scrub and picked up Matt Chapman for a buck. All right. So you know how Joey Gallo's been pretty good this season, but not great for fantasy by any means? Matt Chapman's probably a poor man's Joey Gallo. Like a part of the reason why the A's are excited about him is that he could be a gold glove level defender at third base. Unfortunately, you don't get, if you play in score sheet, you get points for that.

But in regular fantasy, you are not getting points for good defensive plays. And a big issue for him is over the last two seasons, he has struck out 236 times in 793 plate appearances. That's a 29.8% strikeout rate. And that's in the minors. And now we've seen Joey Gallo have some success, but even in the minors, Joey Gallo had really high batting averages on balls and play. He would routinely rack up numbers in the 330 range. Matt Chapman for his career is a 280 badbit guy in the minor. So who's your favorite Matt?

Matt Strom, Matt Chapman, or Matt Davidson, Chris? I think it's probably Matt Strom just by default, but it's about as tepid and endorsement as I could possibly give. All right. All right. You're not feeling the mats. That's fine. I thought, you know. Trump has walked way too many guys this year.

So, like, I know we were excited about him coming into the year, but now. This is now. All right. All right. Look, it's Kokomo Friday. I thought we were going to be in a good mood. Everybody's crapping all over the welcome, Matt. So let me just say, by the way.

No, Matt I can get excited about Matt Carpenter. All right. Two more doubles. Yeah. He has been on fire lately and seems to, like him and Edwin and Carnacian both. They're kind of pulling the Jose, Batista act of

oh man is this guy getting old he's striking out a whole lot more oh look suddenly he's on fire and he stopped striking out as well

for Incarnacion last 17 games he has struck out just nine times hit 339 with five home runs during that stretch and then

Carpenter's last nine games 429 three home runs seven doubles yeah his numbers are correcting awfully quickly and I'm glad I didn't ever lose confidence in him and drop him way down my third base rankings.

And it's a really great segue, Scott, because one of the things we're talking about today is all those players that people are freaking out about. And, you know, we've been saying by low on pretty much all of the struggling studs, we haven't lost faith. And it looks like it's paying off for some of them. But for others, we're still waiting for Carlos Gonzalez to come around. You know, Carlos Santana is in a different category. I don't know if he's a stud.

but he's been bad this year. People want to know about Carlos Santana. People want to know about Francisco Lindor. So I asked you guys yesterday via email, who are you actually worried about? You know, we're 11 weeks, almost 12 weeks into the season. Well, 11 full weeks into the season. And, you know, it's time to start really worrying. And we'll talk about Miguel Cabrera, who homered yesterday,

but it's revealed that Cabrera's been dealing with a back issue. So that's got to be a little concerning as well. I do want to get to all that. Again, emails at fantasy baseball at CBSI.com. We're going to look at the most added list. We're going to do some crazy talk today. I'm going to give you some statements that I think might be a little bit crazy. And you tell me just how crazy they are.

We'll update you on some prospects. Sonny Gray, Justin Verlander, another good start from Gio Gonzalez, who maybe isn't to sell high candidate I thought he was, and some deeply guys other than the mats that you can consider. Of course, two-star pitchers will come up later in the show. Before we get to who we're actually worried about, Is anybody interested in Nick Povetta, who of course must remind you of Dick Povetta, but it's Nick Povetta, Chris Towers, who held the Red Sox scoreless over seven innings with nine strikeouts and a nice 95 mile per hour heater. Nick Povetta, he was one of the true standouts yesterday. Do you care?

I mean, you have to take note of a performance like that, especially when it does come. With a pretty interesting set of stuff. I'm not sure where I was going with that. But yeah, anytime you throw 95 and can do that to the Boston Red Sox, I think you have to take note. But only nine swinging strikes, so he wasn't getting a ton of swings and misses there. And this is a guy with a pretty mixed track record in the major league so far.

So no. So Matt Strom or Nick Povetta? Pivotta. Yeah, I have a little more hope for Povetta, but it's not enough for me to move for either outside of ALNL where they were probably already owned. We have not been very mixed leaguey so far today, so let's change that right now. Did you do your homework assignment? Did you come prepare to talk about players that you're actually worried about? Oh, I see that look on Scott's face.

I don't remember any homework. I said the email. I said the email. Chris, did I said the email? Chris, did I said the email? He did. I did. The dog ate Scots. Let's discuss who we are actually worried about and have actually downgraded. I'll bring up cargo, Lindoran, Santana.

They seem to be on listeners' minds. But please be prepared to talk about a few people who really do suck. Chris Towers, can you help Scott White out here? Okay, let's start with someone who I don't think pitched as well as his final line last night. And that's Justin Verlander, who only gave up two runs and seven innings, but it was against the raise and had five walks to six strikeouts in that game. I'm just not 100% sure what's going on with Justin Verlander. And that's the biggest issue for me is he's not pitching well.

He doesn't look sharp. And I don't have a very good explanation for it. Three walks or more and seven of his last nine starts. So it has been continual ongoing control problems. But the thing is, him. according to pitch effects, he's throwing a higher percentage of his pitches inside the strike zone than he was last season. 49.9% to 48.6% last year. So it's just opposing batterers are swinging a little less, and I guess that has had a big impact.

I don't know. It's bizarre. This is one of the ones where I'm worried, but I'm not sure why. Did you downgrade Justin? Besides just like the bad results. Did you downgrade Justin Verlander? And Justin Verlander is at 4.6 walks per 9. He has been at 2.8 or less in seven of his last eight seasons.

This is very uncharacteristic of him. So has anybody downgraded Justin Verlander? I've downgraded him since the start. I mean, he was my fifth pitcher to begin the year. And now he's 19th. I've moved him to the back of all the pitchers, who I think have a potential. I still think he does. I'm not looking to dump him, but he's toward the back of that group now.

I've moved him down a little bit, but it's more I've moved other guys up. I've got him 11th right now. I'm going to move him behind James Paxton. But like I said, I would feel more comfortable moving him down if I had a really good explanation for why this was happening to him. Okay. Scott, you want to give me somebody that you're actually concerned about actually downgrading this year? Oh, I'm sorry, my homework. I guess I got a see on that one. No, we're going to go back and forth.

We're going to go back and forth. I heard, you put some stink on it. No, I did it. There was an audible sigh. I'm glad Chris is stalling for me. This is like, do you ever have that dream where, like, you, in the dream, you realize there's a, it's like, you're like in college and you realize there's a class you haven't attended all semester and the final is. today and you're like rushing in at the last minute. I got a whole idea what the material is.

That sounds like most of my college classes. You know what? The scary dream I used to have, I still do during the offseason, is that I wake up in the dream, you know, I wake up and realize I didn't go over any of the box scores or read the recaps from the previous day and I'm walking into the podcast not knowing what happened. I swear to a really fun podcast. That's my nightmare. That would be kind of a fun podcast.

I'm not willing to do it, but that would be kind of fun. One of us will know what's going on, I'm sure. As long as Scott's on the podcast. I got my yellow legal pad here. It would be terrible. Did we stall enough for you, Scott? Yeah. Okay.

Well, I think so. Is this a high-end enough guy, Rich Hill? Yes. Certainly a topical. Yeah. Yeah. Who's had his worst start of the year. seven earned runs in four innings last time out, but you look at the game log and no six

innings starts. So already it's like, I can't justify starting him in a points league. What about a roto league? I mean, that's really where he excelled the most last year with the terrific ratios. Yeah, the ratios stink too. Four of his eight starts have helped your ERA and whip. Four of them have hurt your ERA and whip. So not enough consistency really there either. He's not even averaging five innings per start. Yeah, yeah. Now, we've seen that when Rich Hill is bad, even going back to last year, last spring, you know, I bailed on him as a sleeper toward the end of spring training because he was so awful. When he's not on, he's very, very bad. I'm reluctant to give up on him

because we also know how good he can be and because the Dodgers with all their options. I mean, if there's anybody who could kick Rich Hill out of their rotation, it's them. And Dave Roberts is firmly against that. He feels like Rich Hill is going to come around, and he's one of their best five starters, and he's sticking with him. So I'm not starting him, but if somebody cuts him, I'm probably going to put in a claim for him. Okay. So that's because it's like starting pitcher. I mean, what pitcher with clear upside are you going to find on the waiver wire than Rich Hill?

All right. Yeah, that's Rich Hill. quick note, the Dodgers are inserting Kentimaeata into the rotation on Sunday. That's going to make Clayton Kershaw a two-star pitcher next week instead of this week. And it's just to get another arm in there because they have like 20 games in 20 days. But that's just something to keep in mind. Well, something you also have to consider, too, is because Rich Hill has shown a tendency in the past to, like, have this slow buildup last spring, for instance, You know, he's had a lot of been yanked from the rotation, been reinserted,

yanked and reinserted because of the blisters. Like, he hasn't gotten. I also want to. I would guess Rust is factory. I do want to point out something that I mentioned yesterday with Dylan Bundy, who's only thrown about 170 or so innings in the majors over the last couple of years, is that we're still not sure who Dylan Bundy is. Doesn't the same thing kind of apply to Rich Hill?

Like, we're going off 139 inning sample size. 29 in 2015 to 110 in 2016. He didn't even average six innings per start last season. Giving him leash makes sense because we've seen him be very good. But we've seen lots of guys put together really good 110 innings stretches and lose it. This is a, what, 35? 37 year old here. So I don't mind dropping Rich Hill.

Okay, well, one of the crazy things I was going to say, you guys let me know how crazy it is, was this. this, it's time to drop Rich Hill for Joe Biagini and Jacob Faria. Ferrea, yeah, I don't get the Joe Beagini thing. Me either. I could understand if Rich Hill was legitimately the only one you could drop that Faria is more in demand now, and you probably need to own him more. I could understand that.

Okay. Rather not do it. Let me tell you the guy that I am really concerned about and got into the point where I can no longer say, oh, yeah, he's going to be fine. Don't drop him under any circumstance. Alex Breggman. Oh, that's what I was going to say. Oh, it's just, he's just not giving us anything.

I moved him down to 16 at third base, and I thought it was lower, and it probably needs to be. Somebody asked if they should drop Bregman for Ryan Healy. We just got that email like 10 minutes ago. Would you drop Bregman for Ryan Healy? I would guess Chris has really significantly lower than 16th. I mean, 16th sounds like a bad number. I have Bregman 20 in Roto, too. Yeah, well, that's a bit lower.

No, it's interesting that the timing is now on this for you guys, because... He's been hitting better. Yeah, I mean, six of his home runs have come in his last 23 games. Only one of them in June, I guess. Yeah, he's just not sustaining it, you know? It was like a two-week stretch at the end of May where he really did most of his damage. If you need to win now, and Bregman's your starter, like, he can't be your starter. anymore. I can understand stashing him.

And he just, right now, and I, it's kind of the same thing as Omar Mazar, where, like, he's young enough and has the pedigree and the talent that I'm not giving up on him long term. But right now, Alex Bregman doesn't really do anything all that well. He also sits sometimes, you know? They got a lot of guys. Well, now that Reddick's on the deal, maybe it's a little different, but no, not really. They'll put Marvonzalez or Ulyguriel, I think, at third base. So I don't even think Breggman's, I could double.

check on that. I don't even think he's an everyday player right now. He is, I will give him this. He is starting to walk a lot more in the month of June, which is a good sign because plate discipline was a really big thing with him coming up in the minors. He routinely walked more than he struck out, and that has not been the case in the major. So if he can do that, maybe everything else can follow. But he's got an 18% infield fly ball rate. He's only got a 30% hard contact rate. He's striking out about twice as much as he walks for the season. And it's just right now there's not anything in Alex Bregman's skill set that you can look at over the course of 430 or so at bats and say,

I know what this guy does at an above average level in the major leagues. All right. He mostly starts. He'll get an occasional day off. I oversold that. So that's Alex Bregman. We're a little bit worried about him. Give me one more round of guys that you're concerned about, that you've moved down in your ranking.

is then we're going to talk about Carlos Gonzalez, Francisco Lindor, and Carlos Santana. Okay. I will go with... I thought you were prepared. How about Mark Trumbo? Well, he took one of mine. My next guy was going to be Alex Bregman.

I had two. I had a pitcher and I had a hitter. Sorry about that. I'm going to go with Mark Trumbo, who, you know, we thought took a big leap last season, and all of a sudden he looks kind of Mark Trumboe again. Has the strikeouts and walks started to skew the incorrect direction? And wait a second, wait a second.

Mark Trumbo, for most of his career, has been a top-flight power hitter. I don't know what you mean. He looks like Mark Trumbo again. The version of Mark Trumbo that we saw before last year was the two seasons before last year, especially. Yeah. He was a pretty average power hitter. A couple injury-plagued years. Sure.

Well, he played 142 games in 2015. He had a good start, I think, and then cool, and it just... Yeah, he played through injuries a lot. No, I still believe in Mark Trumbo. And I'm actually encouraged by the fact his strikeout rate is way down this year. And his walk rate is up a good bit, too. I think both are career bests looking at... So?

Looking at the year by year. So if he just... If he just gets back to, you know, elevating the ball, making hard contacts wearing it up again. I think it's a small adjustment and he's going to get hot. His strikeout rate is down, but his contact rate is pretty much the same. So I'm not sure how much that. And his contact rate's up a little bit.

And actually, I did look at this yesterday. Contact rate has a negative correlation with with exit philosophy or barrels. I was looking this up yesterday. the lower your contact rate is, generally speaking, the higher number of barrels you will get. And that's generally a good indication of solid contact. So, you know, even if he is striking out less, it's not necessarily a good sign for him. All right.

That's interesting. All right, that's Mark Trumbo, a little disagreement there. Scott, you got one more name? Not really. Let's move on. Let's do Carlos Gonzalez. He has sat each of the last two games. Hey, it worked for Andrew McCutcheon.

He's 0 for his last 24. Carlos Gonzalez is batting 215 home runs this year. Good walk-to-strikeout ratio, 27 walks to 51Ks. Not like great, but certainly not bad. And look, I kept bringing up 2015, because in the first 46 games of 2015, which basically was two months of baseball, Carlos Gonzalez batted 215 with four home runs.

Right now he's batting 215 home runs. The rest of season, after those 46 games, He had a 966 OPS. He batted 294 with 36 home runs. He was unbelievable. However, it's two weeks later now. Okay, it's a little bit longer than that awful slump in 2015. I'm sure people, I know people gave up on him in 2015.

I know he was dropped in some leagues. I remember it. And he ended up being from that point on one of the best hitters in baseball, maybe the best. So do you still feel that that's it? Maybe not that good, but it's in there for Carlos Gonzalez. it would be crazy to drop him at this point? Well, I don't think it's crazy, but the history should give us pause because we've, more than once, I've thought this was the end for Carlos Gonzalez.

And it wasn't. He came roaring back. So, you know, the longer this early season slump continues, he's gradually moving down my outfield rankings. He's down to 29th now after starting, I don't know, 15th or something. and eventually the longer this goes on the more he'll move down and eventually might reach a breaking point where it's like okay we can think about dropping this guy in a standard mixed league but I don't I don't think there's ever going to come a point this year where I could safely conclude okay he's done and I drop him to like 60th or something you know one thing to keep in mind with him you look at the the peripherals and 29% hard contact rate for Carlos Gonzalez is really bad but in this that 2015 season, he was at 30% before the All-Star break. And then he was at 39% after, right? He's a streaky hitter. Yeah. Like, Carlos Gonzalez, if you are just kind of a middling team in a Roto league, you're in like fifth place and don't see how you're going to win. I can't think of a,

because you might as well lose if you're not going to win, right? I can't think of a better player than Carlos Gonzalez to try to trade for right now because he really, he has the history. of being the best hitter in baseball. 966 OPS with 366 home runs in 107 games two years ago after an equally awful start. So I can't think of a better player to take a shot on than Carlos Gonzalez. I definitely feel less confident saying all this than I did whenever the last time we had discussion was two or three weeks ago probably. But I still do believe in him. Okay.

Yeah, I think I'm going to make some Bilo offers on Carlos Groner. Gonzalez for a player that I could do without. Would you give up Mitch Hanager for Carlos Gonzalez? I still have cargo higher. I do have cargo higher, but I don't think I could do that. I mean, it's seven spots higher that I have them. So I'm probably starting Hanigur at every league where I own him, and I don't feel like I could start Cargo right now.

All right. Let's go to Francisco Lindor, who actually is averaging more head-to-head points per game this year, more points per game this year than he did last year. But it feels like he's having a bad year because he's been so, cold for a while. Since May 1st, Lindor is batting 2.25 with five home runs. The home runs have been up. The steals have not been there. Check this out. So you're looking at Lindor, you're saying, oh, why is he not stealing bases? Well, the walk rate is basically the same as last year. But last year, he averaged 0.85 singles per game. This year, he's averaging 0.52 singles per game.

He's doubling a lot. He's got 18 doubles, and he's hitting a lot more home runs already this year. Lindor's got 12. He had 15 last year. So Chris always talks about that. Fewer chances to steal bases. That has been a huge issue for Lindor. But it's also been, let's not kid ourselves. It's been like six weeks of disappointing production after a really hot start. So where are you guys on Lindor?

I think he's got a good read on this. There was an article, certainly on the Indians team website. It may have gone to the different newspapers too where not this exact article, but the same information. Basically, he sat down a video session and noticed that he was pulling the ball a lot more than he ever has and realizing he had gotten away from his game because of this early home run spike

and is working to make those corrections now. I think he'll eventually get back there, and I'm not worried about him. So, I'll look up the splits for the season, or for recently, but for the season, he's pulling the ball almost exactly as often as he did. last year.

And that's actually gone down as the season has gone on, despite the fact that his production has been bad. So I'm not sure. Maybe. Okay, you're less convinced. That's just what the numbers say. Less convinced. Lindor is the number seven shortstop in points, number 10 in Roto.

And finally, let's talk about Carlos Santana, who's the number 19 first baseman in points leagues, and number 38 in Roto. He's always better Carlos Santana in points leagues, because of the walk-to-strike-out ratio. I think he's been striking out a lot lately, though. Career low bab-ip, or bab-ip, career low walk rate this season. And, yeah, he's just having a terrible year.

2-11 with eight home runs. He's always been a slow starter. I'll give you another Carlos-Gonzalez-like thing to be hopeful. Carlos Santana, 2015, the same year cargo had those crazy splits. Pre-all-star break, he batted 221 with a 382 slugging percentage. He was better after the all-star break. Unfortunately, he wasn't that much better. He batted 242 instead of 221.

He slugged 408 instead of 382. So he really wasn't that much better. But he is as typically slow starter. It's getting really slow, and for a really long time, should we be worried about Carlos Santana? No, I don't think so. Most of the skill-based indicators show that he's pretty much exactly the same guy. He's always been.

hitting the ball a little less hard, but not to the point where you're super concerned. I'll say this, though, in a Categories league for Santana. If Justin Bohr is this good, if Logan Morrison's going to keep hitting home runs like this, if Justin Smoke breaks out, if first base is so deep like it's been, then he's really pretty run of the mill. Because his career high was last year was 30 home runs or 34 home runs. I will also point out, he's had two months stretches. as good or better than any of those guys are currently having, too. All right.

I mean, look, Points League is where you're going to see the value for Santana. It's still got a good walk-to-strikeout ratio. Yeah, great value there. Definite by low on points leagues. What categories like you're saying? I mean, I think by season's end, you know, somebody's going to be starting them in your league. So I'd rather hold on to him. He's a bit of a jag in Rota.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. just the guy. Listen, I didn't tell you this, but I had a very nice lunch with a listener the other day. Harry is his name. No, not the Razor guy. He's in our podcast league. He's currently in second place, and he's facing a team that started Mike Fultenevich, Marco Estrada, Tanner Roark, and Mike Leak this week. So, Harry, congratulations on the win. We were talking baseball, of course talking about the podcast, and this is a true story, I promise. Harry said to me that his next suit that he buys will be an Indochino suit. and he better use that promo code F-B-T at Indochino.com. And he asked me if I really liked it as much as I say I do on the podcast.

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Promal code is FBT, as in Fantasy Baseball today, for any premium suit for 379 and free shipping. All right. Let's get into some email, some crazy talk. talks and prospects, two-star pitchers, and everything else from yesterday. Email of the day number one is from Samuel. Would I be crazy to start a one-start burrios against the white socks over a one-start Darvish at the Yankees? Are these matchups not right, Scott, the way you looked there.

Are they not right? Well, Darvish is going against the Yankees and what was the other one, Barrio? Yes, against the White Sox. Those look accurate. Okay. So, yeah, you had that look on your face. I don't think it's crazy. I, but like, you have a worse pitcher than you.

No, don't say that. Don't say that, because he would have asked us if that were the case. What I want to know is, is Jose Barrios in the category now, the conversation where we could even think about, you know, prioritizing him over somebody like. I have them 12 spots apart. Yeah, not season long, but he's that. He's good. He's good. Yeah.

Rios is good. Yeah. I'm kind of with Chris. Like, I don't know if this is one of those leagues where you only are. start two pitchers or something? Why would you have to say either? But yes, given the information we have, assuming he also has Clayton Kershaw, Max Scherzer, Chris Archer, Chris Sale.

And Chris Sale, yeah. Yeah, then I would start Jose Burrios over U.Darvish for this week only. I don't know that I'm willing to go that far, but I can agree it's not crazy. I just feel like U. Darvish is one of those pitchers you never, ever, ever, ever sit. By the way, I was asked if I'm starting Sean Manaya tonight against the Yankees. Absolutely. They will probably be without Gary Sanchez and Aaron Hicks, and Mania pitched very well against them in Yankee Stadium.

So, yes, I will start him. Email of the day number two from Brendan from the North. I'm thinking that's a Game of Thrones reference. Hey, Rod, Todd, and Ned. Those are Game of Thrones fellas. I think. They're the Flanders. By our cell, pitching is bad and it should feel bad.

Pitching is bad. You're right. Ned Stark, though. What? Sorry. Oh, you really thought those were Game of Thrones characters? Yeah. Oh, I thought you were joking.

Yeah, me too. No, those are Sipsons characters. Those are Flanders. Pitching is bad and it should feel bad. Buy or sell, that's the question. Yes, that is the question. Sell. You sell which part of it?

Is that pitching is bad and it should feel bad? Oh, pitching is awful. Pitching is disgraceful. It's so impressive what those guys do. Like, I've had a shoulder thing. The state of pitching in the major leagues is disappointing. I've had a shoulder thing for weeks, and it hurts when I sleep. So the fact that these guys can do what they do, I don't think that's what he was asking.

No, and let me say that I was debating or not if I, debating whether or not I should bring this up on the show. And I've decided, yes, I should. I don't want to make it sound like I'm not enjoying it. I enjoy fantasy baseball. I enjoy it as much as ever. I don't really like the current landscape of baseball. I don't like it for viewing. I don't like it for the fans.

I don't like it for fantasy. I think it's a little boring. We don't have enough variety. We have home run hitters. We have strikeouts. I just, I want to see more triples. I want to see more speed.

I am bored. I'm just tired of the three true outcome stuff right now. Like I said, I'm still enjoying the hell out of fantasy. But I don't like baseball that much right now. I'm hoping that this stuff changes in the next couple of years and we go back to, we get a different look. I'm tired of it.

It does seem to be Robert Manfred's biggest concern. He wants more, you know, action, actual action on the base paths, on, you know, guys going base to base, plays at the plate. Because, yeah, strikeouts, like, if all a hitter is doing is hitting it over the fence or swinging and missing. Like that's just not very entertaining over the span of three hours. Well, I think over the span of three hours is the bigger issue. Yes. Well, I don't know that I agree with that. There was actually, I think it was in...

People watch football for three hours. I think it was SB Nation recently did a comparison of two very similar games in terms of outcomes from like 1980 and 2017. And the 2017 game was like 30 minutes longer. And the only explanation was that pitchers are taking longer between. pitches, that's an issue. Because that's where, that's, there's no action there. It is. And hitters take a long time too.

I mean, Odubo Herrera is the king of this, apparently. He takes forever in between pitches. Let's get, let's speed this stuff up. I'm, what commissioner Robert Manfred has said is that he's not as worried about the length of play as the pace of play. And so that's, you know, with talking about maybe changing the strike zone or whatever else that that's what they're concerned that's what they're focused on improving but i mean what it's kind of made for is this randomness i feel like in baseball among all but the top flight pitchers

and basically all hitters like like how many hitters who don't we didn't even consider having any kind of breakout potential have become fantasy mainstays this year like well we should be yonder alonzo you guys talked about the juice ball earlier this week just no No, but the home run is so important. It's still so valuable in fantasy. The juiced ball is something we really need to discuss. There was a piece in the ringer over the last couple of weeks. First MLB gave them their official testing and said that it's the same ball as had always been.

And then they did their own independent testing and found that around the All-Star break of 2015, something changed with the baseball. lower seams a more a less dense core of the ball and the ball's traveling a lot farther and being hit a lot harder

in ways that aren't explainable by anything but a different baseball I'm not yeah okay that's fine but you know they're not even really concerned about the why is just what's happening and I agree with Adam yeah these are the same people right

and the same person who said the ball wasn't used upon his own investigation previously no a couple of weeks ago he got information, I think it's Ben Lindberg from the ringer, got a study from MLB's official testing of the baseballs. And then he did his own after the fact through the University of Washington, I think, and found that there are legitimate changes that can pretty much explain a lot of what we're seeing. Well, you know, I can understand they wanted to get a little more offense in the game and they juice the ball.

Like, that's fine, but maybe a little bit too much. Are we Well the thing is It's by design No there's no There's no explanation as far as why It's just they're very minute changes They're like the seams on the ball

Are a little bit lower Like a couple of millimeters And the ball is a little bit smaller And they're The ball's a little More dense And it bounces a little bit more And all these things are very minute

Like you're talking a percentage point or two But when you add them all together with how hard the ball is being hit, it tends to magnify these effects. All right. Very interesting stuff. To move things along here, let's do some crazy talk. I already did the Rich Hill thing. I was going to talk about the landscape.

So I only have two more talking points for crazy talk. Starlin Castro is one of the best sell-high candidates in baseball. He's the number one second baseman in Roto, number four in points. Maybe I switched that around. But either way, is that crazy talk? Sell high on Starlin Castro? I... That's just so high, that he's one of the best sell highs.

Yeah, I think I might have moved him into my top 20 yesterday. I'm just not buying it. We have such a long tracker to Starling Castro being a jag. And now all of a sudden he's a superstar, I don't buy it. Okay. Scott? Castro, so high? Yeah, I'm more or less...

More or less agree with that. I mean, it's just second baseman is the ultimate jagged position, right? And so if one of these jags is performing better for a while, but you would trade. Enjoy it. You would trade, if you had Starlin Castro, you would trade him for Rignaudor right now, right? Yes. Yeah, boom.

Yeah, he has 50 runs scored. That is seven more than the next best second baseman. And career high, Babette for Castro. And 42 RBI. He's on pace for 100-100 season. He doesn't look like a different player. He's his batting average is way too high. Okay.

And then how crazy is this? I always start in a roto league. I always start Tommy Conley over a one-start Alex Cobb or any other pitcher that I don't expect to get me a lot of strikeouts. Always. Heath and I do that every week. Yeah, I think more people need to be open to it. I looked at some pitchers who fit that bill. Archie Bradley is a name we've talked about a lot.

But Josh Fields, Jerry Blevins, Blake, Blake, Parker for the Angels has 47 strikeouts, a 201 ERA, and a 1.02 whip. And if you have just like an average starting pitcher who's not going to help you necessarily an ERA and whip, and maybe he'll get you if you're lucky six strikeouts, I'd rather take the three or four strikeouts from the middle reliever and get the ratios. So here's the one thing I would say against that. Okay. Last year, Kyle Baraklaw was definitely one of those guys, right? 14 strikeouts per nine, 113 and 72 and two-thirds.

He has 9.5 strikeouts per night, which is still pretty good, but it's more run-of-the-mill for a relief pitcher. Relief pitchers are so fungible. Yeah, but year by year. But the guy's having a good year. But even in season, I think they're very unpredictable. We were talking about Fernando Rodney. But so are these starting pitchers. I mean, like Alex Cobb is unpredictable. I'm just saying you have to be, it's a fine idea, but you have to. You have to be willing to cut bait on them just as quickly as you will any start. Yeah, they're not like big commodities or anything. You can cut bait on them. Scott, you want to update us on prospects? Ahmed Rosario's still not coming up. Yeah, he's still not. Doesn't look like Chance Adams is going to be the one to fill in for C.C. Sabathia either.

They called up Louis Sessa. And it sounds like he's going to start this weekend. But they're still probably the top two prospects to stash. I've moved them ahead of Yon Moncada in terms of stash ability because Moncada is at least as of two days ago was in a pretty bad slump at AAA that coincided with his return from the thumb injury that put him on the seven-day DL, minor weeks have a seven-day DL

as batting average had drop below 280 and obviously they're not going to call him up if he's not hitting well at AAA. But he's still third on the list for me. Fourth, who did I have four? Oh,

Glaver Torres. Yeah, he's not, he's not going to move out at the top five until he gets called up. He's actually heated up at AAA. So,

you know, in leagues where you are not satisfied with your shortstop. He would be right behind Ahmed Rosario in terms of stashability. And then,

I would probably go with, now that Matt Chapman's up, he moved in the top five, in the column the other day. But Reese Hoskins would probably be fifth just because I don't think there is a clearer. I don't think there really is a great fifth option in terms of how close he is to getting called up

and the kind of impact he's going to make when he does. Well, you know, the Yankees, Aaron Hicks heard his Achilles yesterday. Ellsbury's haven't heard a thing about him. There's going to be some Clint Fraser rumblings? Well, he has heated up. I did write about him in this week's prospects report. He wasn't one of the top five to stash, but he has been on a nice run at AAA.

His numbers are starting to look not so bad anymore. And a ton of power potential. Great bat speed. You know, him Sanchez and Judge in the middle of that lineup, a couple years from now, is going to be a fun time for everybody. So yeah, it could happen. I don't think it's imminent, but other call-ups have caught me by surprise this year. So you never know.

So the top five for Scott are Ahmed Rosario, Chance Adams, Yohan Moncada, Glaber Torres, and Reese Hoskins. Let's get to the big news here, 45 minutes into the show. Edwin and Carnaccio and homered. So I wanted to just talk about him, but we already did. He's just since the weekend, he's been crazy hot, and Scott even said it went back further than that, so that's great to hear. Miguel Cabrera says his back has been bothering him.

I think he homered for the first time since April. No, no, no, no, that can't be right. It's been a while since Cabrera homered. Interesting thing with him is he has a career high line drive rate and a career high hard hit rate. Right. The peripherals say he should really bounce back strong, but he's got this back issue that he's playing through. Does that give you pause to buy low on Miguel Cabrera? No, he's not really.

I think the numbers are so impressive. Like, it's not just his best line drive rate ever. It's the best in the majors by a substantial margin. And he's like 12th in average XIVor velocity right now, I think. I mean, there could be something to the fact that, to the idea that he's not able to get the same leverage with his back hurting. And so maybe he's not elevating the ball the same. way, but he's just hitting it so hard that he's going to come around. Okay, yeah, that's Miguel Cabrera.

Tom Murphy is off the DL. He started for the Rockies. He went 0 for three with a walk and a strikeout. Murphy batted eighth against San Francisco. Would you rather have Murphy or Zanino? Murphy. Murphy. Okay.

Very encouraged to see. Not only that he was in the lineup, but that he got called up at all because there seemed to be some question about that. He was ridiculously hot in AAA. Yeah. There seemed to be some question because Ryan Hanager, who was backing up Walters, is a good defensive catcher too, and they liked him. But he's up. He's up and hopefully can play four times a week at least and make a big impact.

If you don't like the East Coast and you think I have an East Coast bias, just wait to you hear these next eight to ten news items. Matt Harvey has a stress injury in his right scapula. He will be out for weeks. You can drop Matt Harvey. Neil Walker's on the D.L. with a partially torn hamstring. The Mets called up Gavin Chikini and not Ahmed Amid Rosario. Noah Cindergarde will not throw for another four weeks. So he is a ways away from coming back, Noah Cindergarde.

Yeah, maybe not until September. Yeah, I looked it up. David Price and different injury, but David Price started throwing March 25th. He did not make his season debut until nine weeks after that. Ooh, wow. Okay. And obviously elbows different than a lad. He might, Synergaard might be able to move quicker, but that's just a frame of reference. Juan Ligaris broke his thumb that got Michael Conforto off the bench and into the game, so the Mets are just snake-bitten.

Yohanna Sestpis did return to the lineup. Lucas Duda started against a lefty, and that, you know, coincides with the Walker injury, so that's a good thing there. Lucas Duda starting against a lefty with T.J. Rivera at second base instead of first. And Daniel Murphy, against the Mets since going to the Nationals, 26 games, Daniel Murphy is batting 394 with eight home run. runs, 28 RBIs, 7 doubles, and a triple, and 26 games against the Mets. Yikes. It's only like 40 points higher than he usually hits. Yeah.

Yankees News. Gary Sanchez, day-to-day with tightness in his abductor muscle. Aaron Hicks left with an Achilles injury. Greg Byrd suffered a setback in his recovery from the bone bruise in his ankle. Non-New York news. Kenton Ma'eat is going to start Sunday. I mentioned that. Houston signed Cuban pitcher Elion Rodriguez.

Excuse me. Gene Seguera could be back next week. John Gray could be back next week. He's 78% owned. Hector Nerris got the save for Philadelphia. Pat Nishek pitched the 8th. It looks like Harris is the – Narris is the closer.

And Greg Holland blew his first save. Scott White, are you okay? Yeah. Chris, he looks sad over there. Cheer that man up. I guess before we get to the two-star pitchers, Jill Gonzalez with another good start. Am I wrong about him?

Is he not a good – is he not a sell-high candidate? it? I'm starting to wonder that myself, because after that stretch of nine straight starts, I think it was with three walks or more. Last three, the walks have disappeared, and yet he's remained as effective otherwise. It's not like he's been more hitable. And obviously, one of the best supporting casts a pitcher could ask for, so it might just be a reliable option. But actually, you say one of the best supporting casts, offensively, yes. Gonzales is six and one. I heard on the broadcast last night, he's had like five leads blown for him by the bullpen. Yeah, the Nationals' bullpen has been an issue.

And yet, he's six and one. He is six and one. He could be 10 and one with a 289 ERA. I guess, but I mean, that's six and one. What does that make him? What kind of pays it that? 14 wins? Yeah, roughly. Like, whatever.

He's got a 127 whip, Gio Gonzalez. You're not going to have a 289 ERA with that kind of whip most likely. But he keeps the ball in the ballpark, right? Typically. Yeah. Yeah. No, I mean, ground ball pitcher, always. All right. Who's your favorite in this group? Your two favorites. Ariel Miranda, Michael Waka, Jordan Montgomery, Jeff Hoffman, Alex Cobb, Robert Giselman. Miranda, Waka, Montgomery, Hoffman, Alex Cobb, and Giselman.

My favorite? Montgomery and Walker for me. By a pretty substantial margin. I'm kind of losing faith in Waka again Like the results Were better at the start of the year And it's like oh Waka's back

Because you know He used to be good But it's not like anything really changed That much peripherally for him And now he's been getting crushed So I'm gonna go Montgomery And I'll prefer Hoffman also to Waka Even though he has the obvious

Coorsfield concerns Yeah he's got a home start next week, Jeff Hoffman. Arizona at home. It's a little scary. Probably not going to start him. On the road, do you want to start, Jeff Hoffman? He might be a two-star pitcher the following week. Okay. Deep league.

Sorry, guys. Deep leagues. Ben Gamble has hitting 417 in his last 15 games, and that was after two good games at Corse Field. I didn't even count that. But Gamble's a big batting average guy right now. No power. Eric Sogard has been Eric So-good, and he's 6% owned. Eduardo Escobar has three home runs in his last five games.

That's Twins infielder, Eduardo Escobar, and Washington outfielder Brian Goodwin. I believe he does not play against lefties. He's been pretty good. Three home runs in his previous four games. Ben Gamble, 14%. Eric Sogard, 6%. Eduardo Escobar, 3%. Brian Goodwin, 1%.

I mean, I think Gamel probably is the guy to own here, but I'm glad it hasn't really exceeded 14%. Which is kind of surprising because he's batting 3.45. but that's dependent on a 463 Babbitt. So, you know, he's not going to be this batting title contender all year. But he plays every day. He hits a ton of line drive. So he is going to be a high Babbat guy probably. You know, the reason I knew Miguel Cabrera was a distant first in line drive percentage

is because Gamble would be second if he had the abats to qualify. But it's nice to see that he's hitting well now and that he's continuing to play even with Mitch Hanuker back. Good. So then let's take a look at the two-star pitchers. I was going to look at the most added list, but I did not get to that. I apologize. Let me see if there's anything super interesting on the most added list.

Anybody know who the number one most added player is? The number one most added play. I looked it up yesterday. We have mentioned him today. He didn't pitch yesterday. He's a pitcher. I guess I gave that away, but we mentioned him today. Jacob Ferrea.

You got it. Boo-ya. Because I opened up the list. I cheated. You are a cheater, followed by Sean Newcomb. Didn't do my homework, and then I cheated. Malick Smith is fifth on the most added list. Has not really rewarded people this week.

And Louis Brinson was another guy who I added, and I've already dropped. Yeah. Are we done? Malik Smith has two hits this week in 10 at bats. Are you cool dropping him? I'm fine holding on to him. I'd rather have him. than Louis Brinson

just because there's a clear playing opportunity and I don't know that Smith has any utility outside of I mean he's probably just a Roto League guy but I think he can be a batting average and stolen base can help her and you know assuming he stays at the lead off spot and helps in those two things

he's going to help and runs too I'd rather own Brinson just because like the sky's the limit for Brinson he could be you know he could be the outfielder it could be an all-star next year, you know? I don't know.

All right, let's take a look at the two-star pitchers. Brandon McCarthy is 80% owned. Ariel Miranda's 78% owned. Yeah, are you starting Miranda, Detroit and Houston at home? No. Detroit and Houston at home. Tough matchups.

You could do worse, I'm sure. I'm sure that'll be... Yeah, that'll be in the discussion among two-star sleepers this week. Are you starting or sitting McCarthy and Wheeler? McCarthy has the Mets and the Rockies. Wheeler has the Dodgers and Clayton Kirshaw and the Giants and Johnny Quato.

So winning could be a little tough. They all sound like starts to me. But we're what, in the 75 and up percent? Yeah, yeah. Now, let's go to guys who are a little more fringy. Actually, this one's interesting. If he makes the two starts, I'm going to sit Matt Shoemaker at the Yankees and at Boston.

Yeah, definitely. Okay. Now, he's not like he's going on the DL, right? Not necessarily. His next start still up in there. He thinks it's pretty minor. They say that he deals with this like every year, and he usually is fine, this forearm tightness. All right.

Now, we got a couple guys who are owned in the 60s. 61% Ennis and Volquez, 69%. and Brad Peacock. The matchups are quite different. Volquez has the Nationals and the Cubs at home. Brad Peacock. Yeah, easy sit for Volquez. Brad Peacock at Oakland at Seattle.

Start or sit? Easy start. Yeah, I agree. I am frustrated with myself for even bothering with Volquez in a couple leagues. That's the desperate state we were in with pitching that I had to make myself buy-in DeVolquez in some small way. Do you have the matchups in front of you? Yes.

All right. I'm going to read five pitchers at a time here. Tell me if you're picking any of them up. Matt Moore, Zach Davies, Jordan Zimmermanon, Francisco Liriano, and Jeremy Helixson, the most over-owned player in the world at 47%. Matt Moore, Zach Davies, Jordan Zimmermanin, Francisco Liriano, and Jeremy Helixson.

Matt Moore is interesting. Being a lefty, he's going to Atlanta, and then against the match. Matt Boers, you hate Matt Moore. What? That's interesting. Those are decent matchups for him. Yeah, but.

Not at Atlanta. Are not enough to bring you to start Matt Moore? Probably not. With a six ERA? Probably not. But there are hundreds of people listening to this. Dozens of people could be helped. Matt Moore got his ERA all the way down to like 427 a couple weeks ago, and now it's back up today.

Yeah, but he was a former top prospect. All right, you're not starting. You hate Matt more. Francisco Liriano. I will start Francisco Laryano at Texas and at Kansas City. Yeah, I'm not sure, man. Hope he doesn't blow up against Texas. Frankly, hope he doesn't blow up against Kansas City.

I wish Liriano had a one-star week. Until his previous start against the raise, Liriano had been terrible, was not giving you a quality start. Total whip killer, which he always is. But, you know, like just not enough strikeouts, because not enough innings to justify. I'm not sure I'm starting Leriana.

I do have Zimmerman, and I'm still undecided about Zimmerman. It's going to be him over a one-start guy. I'm not sure. I have more confidence in Liriano than Zimmerman. I mean, he's been, he hasn't had a bad start since coming back. He hasn't had one good start, though. Now, Gazellman is at the Dodgers and at the Giants. He's had a bad start.

I disagree with what you said. Really? Yeah, five innings, six hits, four runs, three walks. Oh, no, no, no, four runs, three earn runs. One walk, five strikeouts. Okay, five innings, three runs on six hits. Not a good start. It's not great, but it's not bad.

That's what I expect from Luriano. I don't really want that, but all right. It's a bad group. It's been a bad podcast. No, it hasn't? Yeah. What? Robert Gazellman.

He has the same matchups that Dodgers and Giants. So good matchups, but he was so bad yesterday. that I think we've kind of... We've sobered up on him, right? I was starting to believe again after the most recent start, and he's been better since coming back from the bullpen, but no, yeah, I'm not starting. There are lower-end guys I'd rather start than him.

Well, Gazellman previous four starts before getting roughed up by the nationals, who rough up a lot of people, three and O with a 216 ERA, but seven walks, 18 strikeouts, in 25 innings. And he also faced three pretty bad lineups, San Diego, Pittsburgh, Atlanta. He also faced Milwaukee.

Yeah, I just can't. I'd rather start Francis Martes, assuming he makes his two stars. Oh, goodness. All right, so let's go a little deeper. I'd rather not resort to any of those measures. Let's go a little deeper. Armand Marquez, Clayton Richard,

Jason Hamill, who's been pitching very well lately. Mike Montgomery, San Diego, and at Miami, not Chris Tillman. Josh Tomlin, Francis Martez, Andrew Cashner, Miguel Gonzalez, Matt Garza, Sam Gavillo, Ray Dickie? No way. Not to say that. R.A. Dickey, Chad Cool, and garbage after that. Francis Martes is my favorite out of that group. He's at Oakland

and at Seattle. At Seattle is a tough one, but... Yeah. At Oakland... Is he going to start at all? That's a question. McCullors could come back Monday. It's possible. And then, I mean, I guess they could kick Fires out of the rotation instead of Marte's. I'd rather than do that. But since Fires has been a roll lately. I'm not confident they will. But it's not 100% Claire McCullors will be back.

I'm kind of going into next week thinking one star for Martez and then he'll be out. But, you know, if you're a bigger gambler than I am. That one start would be at Oakland. Yes. And I'd start him with one start at Oakland. Now, I'm going to say that I'm going into next week thinking I'm going to start most of my one-star pitchers. It's just not a good week for two-star guys. But if there were one...

No, like Jason Hamill has the Red Sox and the Blue Jays. They're both at home. If he comes out of this week pretty good, he's going to be like 50% owned. He's only 22% owned at this point, Jason Hamill. Guys, it is Friday as a treat to the listeners. Let's fire away with some emails and go a little bit long here. This is from John in Boston. Dear Take Your L.

As confusing as Chris made himself on Michael Panetta, I still kind of understood what he was saying, but I mean, come on, he backed himself into a corner on that one. And Adam, he missed a huge chance to tell Chris to take his L. So, Chris, take your L. You know who took an L out on this one? Adam. What did? I took an L?

Because you missed your chance to tell me to take an L. Now you take that L. I did take it. Would you drop Jose Paraza for Ahmed Rosario? I already have Angelton Simmons. Sure. Would you drop... Unless you need steals.

Would you drop Russell Martin for Wilson Ramos? Russell Martin for Wilson Ramos. Yeah, I'd do that. Yeah. I mean, you can't start Wilson Ramos yet, so you may need a short-term catcher. It's a Categories league, so that makes sense. If it was head-to-head, I do have concerns about how much Wilson Ramos will play. Also, raisins are better than pizza lunchebles. Yes, we agree. Ridiculous. From Peter, do you realize that EY Jr. rhymes with Iwakuma. Maybe Doc Krozzar can put that in next year's theme song. If you have a top five performing shortstop on your roster, is Manny Machado a jag at third base?

Just the guy? No. Hell no. Mani Machado. He's a first-round pick as a third baseman as well. I can't believe you spent a whole week discussing raisins and did not once mention crazins, a clearly superior product. Oh, God, no.

Is that the generic term for them, or is that a brand name? Who cares? They are not superior to raisins. No way. They're all terrible. I'd rather eat than the raisins Wow Also

This might be a different email Somebody I think Chris said That Chris's regression Musical drop needs to be It's regression From the tune of Under Pressure by Queen I prefer the

Regression Yeah I like that too Nate from Pittsburgh Would you deal Cody Bellinger If you felt secure that McGee would have a good second half. This is a big long email that I made short. Sorry.

Yeah. We think Biggie's going to have a big second half, yes. Yeah. Now, Bellinger's, I think, especially the kind of run he's been on the last few days, you could ask a lot for him and potentially get it. Like a Johnny Quedo or something. That seems like a feasible trade. Yeah.

Let's do some rankings. This is from Jonathan. Rank Derek Fisher, Malik Smith, and Jose Paraza in a Roto League. Derek Fisher, Malik Smith, Jose Parraza. Peraza Fisher Smith Uh, yeah From George John Gray, Marco Estrada

Jimmy Nelson Jameson Tyone Rich Hill John Gray Estrada Jimmy Nelson Tyone Rich Hill Tyone Estrada Nelson Gray Hill Estrada

Nelson Tyone Gosh, I don't know I'd have to open up by rankings You know we keep rankings on the side just for these kinds. Yeah, but you know, I'm going to make another bet with Scott White for absolutely nothing. I will take James and Tyone over Jimmy Nelson rest of season. You will take Nelson?

I like both of them. Sure. Okay. I mean, whatever. I could change my mind next week. That's how close they are in my rankings. They're both must own. And finally, who's going to be better rest of season?

This is from Alex. Baez, Javier Byers, or Angleton Simmons? Simmons. I think so, yeah. Simmons. I'm thrown off because I wasn't expecting Chris to say Simmons, but none of us like Baez. If Baez played every day, it would be an easier call. Yeah.

Or it would be a tougher call, but. Yeah. I think both of them are probably pretty replaceful games. You don't like guys who don't play every day. You're biased. Ha ha, ha, ha, ha, we're done. That's solid. That was a fitting.

No, stop. It was such a good show. I had a great time on Cocoa Friday. Enjoy your weekend, everybody. For Scott and Chris, I'm Adam. Talk to him on. Oh no