Fantasy Baseball Today - 07/25: Worryometer, DeJong, SPs to Add (Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: July 25, 2019

Paul DeJong hit three DeDongs last night. Is he back? What kind of hitter is he going forward? Also, are we buying into Reynaldo Lopez and Zac Gallen (3:50)? And does MIL have a new closer (8:15)? ... News and notes (11:30) and then it's Thurryometer time (19:00) for Nolan Arenado, Khris Davis, Mike Minor and more. Plus the MostOverownedPlayerInTheWorldOmeter (26:55) ... Javier Baez's consistency (32:00), the resurgence of several stud hitters (35:50), Jeff McNeils' impressive season (39:15), Fantasy Regulators (42:00) and more of yesterday's standouts (47:30) like Shane Bieber and Anthony Santander ... Your emails at [e-mail] To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the fantasy baseball today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email fantasy baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. With fantasy! Now here's Adam, Scott Heath and Chris. Paul DeYoung three home run. Very impressive.

Bernardo Lopez has been awesome since the All-Star break. And did I just add the Milwaukee Brewers closer this morning? I think I might have. Probably not, but it's a possibility. Welcome to the show. It is a very special edition of fantasy baseball today. I don't know how to say this. I'll just say it in English.

Heath, this is probably your last show of the season. It's really sad. I'm going to miss you guys. Well, I'm going to miss the listeners. I won't miss Chris because I sit right next to him. I'm certainly not going to miss you. Why? Come on.

Yeah, I'm going to miss talking about fantasy baseball. Maybe I'll move your desk. Maybe you'll finally miss me. Maybe you'll see what you were missing out on. But I'm not missing. I'm missing out on missing you? Yeah. Well, I don't know about that.

But yeah, Heath is going to be focusing on football. Not just that. But we're changing the times of our podcasts. We're going to be doing the football show in the morning at 8.30 in the morning, which is where we're doing baseball right now. And baseball, I'm going to try to record shortly after that. So we still will get it out pretty early. I might even start recording the night before.

So we would get it out even earlier. So you're not going to have to wait until too late. the afternoon or anything to get your baseball podcast. But just letting you know. So with that said, I think it's pretty appropriate since Heath was always the Paul DeYoung guy. Paul DeYoung went from number 13 in points, number 19 in Roto at shortstop, to number 10 in points, number 16 in Roto.

He moved up three spots in both formats. He is on a little bit of a hot streak now. In fact, he had, so that's now five home runs in his last seven games and three doubles. Okay, Heath, Paul DeYoung, triple de Jong's yesterday. We call this a three-dong night, Adam. And yeah, I was going through the box scores last night and this morning and kind of thinking, man, Paul DeYoung, Shane Beaver, everybody really gave me a good send-off on my last show of the year. I had gotten pretty concerned about how South things had gone for DeYoung the last month and a half before this. recent stretch, but I didn't take him out of my lineup in most leagues, and I'm glad.

Last month and a half, I mean, when you break out the season, it's 35 really good games, 57 pretty terrible ones. Terrible. And then he's had a nice week. But you look at the overall numbers now. He's hitting 258, 339 on base, 471 slug. His career is 261, 325, 478. That's probably just who he is. He's probably not as good as he looked in the first month. He's probably not as bad as he looked in the last two months. That's probably just who he is. I don't even have the energy to go through and do the game log thing with you today.

But it just, we don't have to. I did it already. I could say it's the last 40 days of this. Right, but that's what I'm saying. We don't have to. We can just look at his total season line and say that it lines up pretty much perfectly with his career line and say the most likely outcome is that's who Paul DeYoung is. Okay.

Sure, he's just been different this year because he's struck out a 19% rate as it composed to a 25% rate the year before. Like, that's not the same guy. All right, well, Paul, Leon. That's the one thing that's different. Is a trustworthy starter going forward? Yes or no? Yeah. Borderline starting shortstop, solid starting corner infielder.

Middle. Middle. What did you think about the two guys who went head to head in the White Sox Marlins game? Zach Gallin, seven scoreless with nine strikeouts. Rinaldo Lopez, eight innings, two runs, ten strikeouts, 21 swinging strikes. Lopez, one-in-one with a 171 ERA, four walks, 25 strikeouts since the All-Star break.

Gallin, his first start of more than five and a third. He always throws 91 to 99 pitches, but he had been very inefficient. Still, so far, so good. 276 ERA and 35 strikeouts and 29 and a third with a high walk rate. but you know Chris I mocked you on Sundays I did on on HQ on Sundays but the thing is when I mock people and if I'm wrong I'm always there to call myself out always wrong oh okay different it feels that way it feels that way I mocked you for buying into Ronaldo Lopez but what was it that you that you saw about Lopez that you liked and good start here great start against the Marlins he is throwing I mean look velocity's never been something something that Reinaldo Lopez was exactly lacking for, but he's throwing harder than he ever has as a starter in the majors over his last handful of starts. And he's also reached a point. I mean, last night he didn't. He only threw seven curveballs and five changeups, but over the last month or

so, he's been throwing his slider curveball and change up right around 12 to 17% of the time overall for each of them. And that's a good sign for a guy who's really, been a fastball, sometimes curveball, sometimes slider guy. The fact that he's confident with all his pitches, and last night he had the slider working better, so he threw 31 of them and got 10 swinging strikes with it. I just think we're seeing a bit of improvement from Ronaldo Lopez. I don't think he's going to be an ace all of a sudden moving forward, but he had the Marlins last night.

He has the Mets in his next start. I think he was going to be useful for at least this stretch and turned out the Marlins lived up to it. Yeah, I have him as a two-star pitcher, Ronaldo Lopez, Metson, at the Phillies. Yeah, I think you're okay with that. Well, all right, so, and then let's bring in Gowan. So who would you guys rather have, Zach Gowan or Ronaldo Lopez? And do you feel like these are long-term solutions or just hot hands?

I will take Gowan And I think he could be more of This recent stretch from Lopez Has been very good It's three awesome starts in a row And more believable than some of his awesome stretches In the past

But I think there's more upside with Gallon And the thing that he'd struggled with In his last two starts Were the walks, nine walks And ten in a third innings But he did And he has kind of struggled with him all year In terms of the major leagues

But he didn't really have a control problem in the minor leagues. And so we kind of thought that if he could just, maybe he was trying to pitch around guys he was a little bit scared of major league hitters. There was no reason to be scared of this White Sox lineup

and he saw what happens when he just throws a few more strikes. Yeah, and I think I agree with that. I think Gallin's just, the better pitcher has a better arsenal, um, better command, but, you know,

we're seeing that maybe the, the jump from AAA to the majors is, is a little more difficult than we, thought and also just that the stuff isn't overwhelming with gallons so he does have to have really good command and i think we saw last night that he did and in the miners he did and when when that happens i think he's going to be very good so it's just i think it's just some growing pains and that's natural but i think he's someone you look at actually his the results against his pitches

have all been pretty uniformly uh very good his expected woeba against all of them is at least is at most 304. That shows you that he's got four pitches that opposing hitters are having trouble squaring up, and it's really just the walks at this point. All right. So Zach Allen, now if you're just wanting someone for next week, you know,

probably want to go to Ronaldo Lopez because he has two starts against the Mets and at the Phillies, whereas Zach Allen has one start against the Minnesota Twins. That's obviously problematic. All right. Freddie Peralta, I picked him up this morning. he's been very good in the bullpen as a reliever for the Brewers. Two and one, 225 ERA, 1-13 whip, 39 strikeouts and 32 innings.

Last year he only made about five relief appearances, but they went very well. He had a 193 ERA with one-walk five strikeouts in four and two-thirds, and you could see how Freddie Peralta, who is basically a one-pitch pitcher as a start, I mean, put through like 70% fastballs. I might be a little off on that number, but that was his problem. you could see how Peralta would be good in the bullpen. Well, it got the save yesterday. They used Hater for the seventh and the eighth. They used Peralta in the ninth.

Apparently, they're going to be using Peralta in high leverage situations. And guys, I think that there's a chance. If we've got the trade deadline coming up, they could certainly add someone. Could be Hater getting the next save. But I think there's a chance that Freddie Peralta, if he doesn't have to go back to the rotation because they're falling apart, that he's getting saves for the Brewers. What do you think?

And he is like 18% owned or something. We've seen it many, many times in the past. We've seen it with Ian Kennedy so far this season. It is very, very common for bad starting pitchers to be good relief pitchers, even great relief pitchers. And I think Peralta could absolutely be that. I do expect, like, he is someone who is, if he just pitches in high leverage situations and pitches out of the bullpen the rest of the year, he's probably going to help you in ratios. I don't think it's very likely he's going to get 60% of the brewer's saves over the rest of the year.

But he might get 35 to 40%. And that's going to be valuable if he has good ratios and strikes out a lot of guys per inning. And I do want to point out a couple things. One, Adam, you completely undersold Freddie Peralta. He throws his fastball 80% in time. And that was true even largely as a starter. He was above 75% or even as a long reliever. but since moving to the bullpen,

it's been more like 80 to 85% in most of his appearances, but also his velocity is way up. He was someone who averaged right around 90 miles per hour with his fastball last year in the bullpen. He's been closer to 95, 96, and he's got a really deceptive delivery that hitters have always had trouble picking up on, even with that fastball.

It's always been a high-width fastball. The fact that he's now throwing at 95, 96, 97 miles an hour, you can start to get away with that in shorter burst when hitters are only going to see you once in any given game and you're throwing max effort. I think he can be really good out of the bullpen. I think he can continue to be really good out of the bullpen. It's just a question of how they use him.

And the other angle here is that this could really hurt Josh Hader's value. If Josh Hader leaves the closer's role, he'd still be a 100% must-own must-start in any type of Roto or Categories League. But you are going to lose out on a category. there. I mean, you are going to lose out on the saves. And he'd probably be a drop in points leagues. We don't really have a reason to think

like Freddie Peralta is just replaced Josh Hater as a closer. Absolutely not. I'm just bringing it up. If you're a hater owner, as we approach the trade deadline. Stop being a hater. Yeah, but, you know, they could conceivably want him out of the role, out of the closer's role, out of the ninth inning role, so they can use him more freely like they did yesterday.

And that's just something you have to keep in mind. You know, just throwing it out there. All right, news and notes. We got some big ones. I did read in the New York Post yesterday that Domingo Armand would, the wording was, would move to the bullpen if the Yankees acquire a starting pitcher, which everyone seems to think they're going to. I mean, I'm not a Yankees reporter, but it doesn't seem like that would be a very smart move,

considering how bad J. Hap has been. But I obviously have to control Domingo Raman's innings. So if you own Arman, you should be a little bit nervous, I'd say. if you own Joey Gallo you should be a little bit nervous he has to see a hand specialist hopefully we'll have an update but we expect

Gallo on the IL is that fair to say yes there's been some speculation I remember it was comical because they said hamster bone but there's been some speculation as the hamate bone

which would just probably be a seasonender and yeah I mean you're usually looking at like six to eight weeks at least for that so it would not leave a lot of time to get back Willie Calhoun though could become someone that you want to take a look at.

Gary Sanchez is on the IL. Are there catcher replacements that interest you? Travis Darno. I think he's still owning less than 50% of leagues. He's been the best catcher for the last month in baseball. They're trying to get him in their lineup. He leads off some days, plays first base, D.H. It's weird.

Travis Darn, yes. But would you rather have him than like Carson Kelly? Right now. And that's one of the things I wrote about in Waverwire. Yesterday or the day before, I'm not going to think about who I think has the most upside to be a good baseball player in the next six months or in the next two years. I need the guy that's hitting right now. It's time to make the playoffs. He is hitting, though.

They're both hitting. They're both hitting. They're both hitting. No one's hitting like Travis Darno. That is true. All right. Darno, fine. Have him.

Ross Stripling left with a stiff neck. I was wondering why he only went five innings. You saw two strikeouts for stripling. Well, Angels don't strike out, but stiff neck for him. I can't imagine it's a huge deal, but yeah, stiff neck. Addison Russell was sent to the miners. Hey, how about Robel Garcia, guys? He is 10% owned.

He's been pretty good. He has started five straight games for the Cubs. Robel Garcia batting 279 with four home runs, two doubles and two triples in 15 games. Actually, pretty impressive. It seems to be getting a little bit better. Thoughts? Yeah, I'm definitely interested in him. I just like

he's a 26 year old who struck out 34% of the time in AAA and is striking out almost 40% of the time now he's hitting the crap out of the ball though yeah he wasn't the miners too you're going to need to yeah I guess in a deeper league all right

Chris Bryant left with a knee soreness Nick Senzel left with an illness the twins DFAed Blake Parker John Gray left after being hit by a comebacker right in the calf so we'll consider him day to day. Danesby Swanson left with heel soreness. I think you can probably drop Jamison Tyone,

but it's amazing. Louis Severino, James and Tyone, Tyler Glass now, all with these long-term injuries, all head setbacks, Tyone being shut down now, and I don't know that any of them are going to be contributing to your fantasy teams. And meanwhile, Clayton Kirchall just powers right through.

We don't know anything when it comes to injuries. Steven Strasberg and Sean Doolittle. these guys have stayed healthy. Sorry for jinxing them. Expect them on the aisle tomorrow. Yolisha Seen likely headed to the aisle. Rugnet O'Dore homeward again and Manuel Margo stole two more bases.

Do either of these excite you? I don't know if we've talked about Manuel Margo at all. We certainly haven't on any of the podcast I've been on. Yesterday we talked about him. You know what? My thing was we have reached the point in the season where people get excited about Manuel Margot because it happens every year

and he's always bad. He's hitting second pretty much every day. He is. Even against Ritey's, which I don't think makes a lot of sense, but he was batting second yesterday. He's been really good for about a month or so. He's playing every day, Will Myers.

I don't know, maybe they'd like change the directions in his GPS to the stadium or something because I don't think he's played in about a month. He probably needs to be added in Roto leagues. at least. I don't know if it's a big priority, but if he's hitting a little bit and he's got speed, yeah, Manuel Margo needs to be on your radars. And we did a bad job on Rognetto Dore, and I just want, I'm hopeful, Adam, you can go into your calendar and make show notes for this for next year. Rugnett Odor mashes every single July. He has a July OPS of 900. It's not higher

than 772 in any other month. Interesting. And realistically, realistically, he's an extremely streaky hitter who is on an incredible hot streak. And I would not only add him, I would start him for next week. And then drop him once, like start him until August first. He's had a good August before. August has been his third best month. It's terrible in September, though, so don't start him then.

Okay, cool. So John Lester was scratched due to illness and Max Fried is going to start on Saturday. A couple of trade rumors. There are a lot of them. but just in terms of the Mets. The Padres are apparently interested in Noah's Sindrigar. They hit him fairly well yesterday. Sindigar with five walks, and Edwin Diaz is on the market.

We have got the thuriometer, because it's Thursday, and we have to get thuried about somebody. Coming up in just a bit, we have the, I think, a pretty fun show. We have the most over-owned player in the world o-meter. We have the OPS watch for Jose Ramirez. We're not ready to throw that party yet. We have the stat slash quote-scumparison of the day. the slash line alert, look who decided to show up,

the fantasy regulators, the most traded, and hopefully your emails at Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com, and we'll be right back. Thuriameter, Heath, your favorite segment for your final show of the year. Let's get Thurie! Hey, all right. Nolan Aronado, his last 25 games

before the disappointing doubleheader yesterday, a 714 OPS, a 398 slugging percentage for Nolan Aronado, and playing through injuries. So, 0 to 10 on the thurometer for Aeronado. If every game had been on the road, it would be like a 4. So I'll go with a 5. I'm going to go with a 3.

But slightly concerned. Yeah, I mean, we have no idea when he's going to get healthy. He said that he felt like he was close to getting healthy, and then he would, like, foul a ball off his leg. He kept getting close and then regressing. So I've got to believe he will get over this toe injury, but it's been more than that. So I'll say a three.

Yeah, and he just hasn't hit the ball. Well, really, since June especially, but especially in July, he's been really... Especially. Yeah, especially in both. Great Simpsons lied. Especially, Lisa, but especially Bart. All right, Daniel Murphy.

That was Sancho Bob, by the way. Zero to 10 on Murphy. He's just been like kind of Mets. He had a five-game stretch earlier this month, Daniel Murphy, where he went 10 for 20 with three homers and three doubles. But overall, it's just kind of a lousy, eh-ish-year, me-ish-year for Daniel Murphy. At least he's playing pretty much every day.

Yeah, I mean, he was terrible. I questioned him for a long time. Chris had basically no concern. He was really awesome, made me look stupid, and now he's kind of turned back into a pumpkin. Yeah, I don't know. Let me do my stretch first, and then you can do your stretch that you pull up. But his last 10 games, he's 6 for 35 with a high strikeout rate, almost no walks and one extra race hit.

He had a very good stretch, like an awesome stretch just before that. Yes, 10 for 20 with three homers. I view Daniel Murphy as I view most of the Rockies. I am, and I think we got an email about this, that most of the weeks, towards the end of the season, the Rockies are either exclusively at home or exclusively on the road. I'm definitely going to start him

when he's at course field. I'm probably not when he's on the road. That's fair. That's fair. He struck out five times in eight played appearances on May 19th and 18th. And since then,

he's hitting 323 with an 884 OPS. He's been exactly what we hoped he would be. You can parse one way or another and say, well, this 10 games, but like, you know, Let's just, we're smart enough to, we're all a dog here. No, it's, I mean, he had a, he had a 780 OPS last year. He's got a 780 OPS this year.

He's probably just a 780. He's got about a 790 OPS for his career. He's probably just about a 780s. Oh, you cannot look at Daniel Murphy's career, though. That's, yes. He's doing, he's doing a bit because I was saying that about Paul DeYoung. And it seems like he's probably just a sub 800 guy. He's operating in obviously bad faith and we don't have to take him seriously about this or anything.

For God's sakes, just give me a damn number. Three. 11. Okay, that was dumb and dumber. See, operating in bad faith. Three and 11. All right, Chris Davis. Chris Davis, first 19 games, he had a thousand OPS.

106. Last 66 games since April 18th. That was going into yesterday. 603 OPS. He has been bad since like the third week of the season. Got hurt on May 5th. Didn't go on the IL until May 21st. came back in early June

was terrible. It was bad, not quite terrible. Got hit by a pitch on the elbow in June 27th. May have been the hand. First reported as the elbow, but now it's a hand injury. He's been brutal, Chris Davis. A 162 slugging percentage in July with no homers in one double.

Zero to 10 on the thuriometer for Karis Davis. This one might actually be an 11. He can't be healthy. Like that's the only thing that makes sense. Because the established track record here is way too good to believe that he's just lost it all of a sudden. Way too good and way too consistent.

So I had been saying, look, there's no reason to believe Chris Davis won't bounce back to being the same. He's been the most consistent player in fantasy. But 247 batting average 40-something home runs. But, you know, I don't know what to say anymore. It's just if he's healthy, I feel like he will be that. But you can't guess. Can you trade for him?

I have no interest. Really? All right. Thuriometer on Mike Minor. Mike Miner still has a 3ERA, 118 whip, strikeout per inning, but his last three starts, a 606 ERA. No, before yesterday, a 606 ERA, and then he gave up four runs and six innings with two home runs allowed at Seattle. Zero to 10 on the thurometer from Mike Minor. 10 if you were expecting him to be a 3 or below ERA guy for the rest of the season 10 if you decided not to trade him at the point when he was arguably the most obvious sell-high candidate in baseball which has been pretty much the entire first half he is not nearly

this good there's not really a good reason to believe that he had taken a big step forward yes he was striking out more batters, but his overall peripheral suggested that he's still outperforming his expectations by at least a full run. He looks better than he did last season, but not that much. He's got an extra strikeout and a half per inning and an extra walk per per, or strike out to half per nine and an extra walk per nine. That's, that comes out in the wash. Yeah, I think, I think there was, there was, we knew there was some minor regression coming, and there's been some last four games against some mostly very good offenses. I think two of those starts were against the Astros.

I don't think he's like just lost it and he's going to be bad the rest of the year. I don't think there was any hope that he was going to be as good as he had been. But I'm probably going to start him against most matchups moving forward. I mean, he's got a 435 Sierra, 419 FIP, 444 X FIP. It's not like minor regression. It's major regression for Miner. Yeah, I mean, this is a third year in a row. He's outperformed his peripherals.

So two years ago, Miner pitched out of the bullpen and was great. Last year, the overall numbers weren't great, but in his final 16 starts, he had a 314 ERA. This year, he's got a 3ER and more strikeouts. I'm more optimistic about Minor. Chris has always been the low guy on Minor. Top 30 pitchers? don't see any reason to buy it.

So Chris would definitely not say top 30 pitcher. Heath would you? He's a borderline top 30. I feel more comfortable saying top 40. Okay. And then finally, Wuriometer, theoriometer on a guy we haven't talked about a lot, Gordon Beckham.

Guy, Gordon Beckham, batting 199 with four home runs in 57 games. What? What? Is this a bit? Yeah, kind of. like, gosh, Gordon Beckham still plays baseball. He plays for the Tigers.

You meant Tim Beckham, and even then, I would have had the same reaction. All right, good. I'm glad I got some laughter out of it. I was like, I'm going to put Gordon Beckham in the notes today, but I'm not going to put him in the notes that I said to Chris and Heath. It's going to be a big surprise. So it's zero. Major laugh.

Zero is the answer to play along with the game. I am zero worried about Gordon. I am stunned. Yeah, I get that. Okay. Most Overowned player in the World O'Meater. I have three guys on this list. They are owned in 84% of leagues or more.

Jake O'Darizi. Now, they can't all be tens, because only one of them can be the most over-owned player in the world. And that one cannot be Julio Taran, because he just isn't. But Jake O'Reilly, J.Hap, and Julio Taran, where would you put them on the most over-owned player in the world, Ometer? I think I got chastised on this show two weeks ago

for saying that I wouldn't mind dropping Jake O'Oter-Rose. Reisy for some young starting exciting pitcher. He is my Mike Minor, I suppose. And I don't expect him to be someone that I feel great about starting the rest of the year. He's okay. He's 95% owned. I would say he's an 8 on the most over-owned player in the world. O meter.

Jay Hap has just been awful. I think it's him. I think he's a 10. I think he is probably like a 9.5 on the most over-owned player in the Worldometer. But Julio Tehran still exists. I just like how was Jay Hap the only player in baseball who got a long-term contract like immediately last offseason? Yeah, a two-year deal. You got a two-year deal, didn't he?

I thought it was a three or four-year deal. Uh, I'll look it up. I hope it was. I really, really hope it was. I don't think it was four. That's two years, you're right. Two years. Still.

34 Bill. There's an option. Julio Teran's ex-fip and Sierra did go down yesterday. So now they didn't go below five, but they did go down yesterday and his brilliant start against the Royals. But he's still terrible. He's got a 342 ERA, and his last four starts, he's got a 114 ERA, and two starts. and two starts coming up next week for Tehran at Washington and home against Cincinnati. So do you really have the guts, Agro Craig, to drop Julio Tehran?

Yeah, I think it's just as likely that he scores 10 fantasy points as negative 10 next week. I think they're all, I mean, 10 fantasy points would be really bad too. Been a two-star week, yeah. Not for a guy with a five Sierra. Yeah, I think all three of those guys, these guys are probably like a nine on the most over-owned player in the world a meter. So who is the most over-owned player in the world? That I don't know.

Because there has to be a 10. Yeah, I'm sure it's somewhat. I think we should just change the name of this meter because that name's too long. We'll just call it the Julio Toronto meter. The hapameter. But yeah, Oteresee has a 7.97 ERA over his last seven starts. Yeah.

That's bad. Yeah. scientifically. That's no good. Okay, so we'd be okay. dropping any of them, though. Like, would you drop Oterese Hap in Tehran for Ronaldo Lopez or Zach Allen?

Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah, I'm fine with that. You guys don't know about this segment, but you will now. The OPS watch. We're going to have a big party. We're going to play some fun music when Jose Ramirez gets to a 700 OPS. He was at $6.99 two days ago. He ended up at $6.95 after a bad day yesterday. Or after a bad day two days ago, he was at $6.95 yesterday.

And he had a good day on Wednesday. So Jose Ramirez is back up to 698. He stole his 22nd base. Tomorrow we might throw that party. We might get that Jose Ramirez OPS watch to reach 700. So fingers crossed. A lot more. Don't be patronizing.

All right. I'm not excited for him. We're trying to throw him a party. Jeez. Last time I threw. His has been awesome. Somebody a party. Or like a month and nine days.

Let's show some respect. I'm throwing a party in his honor. I don't know what else you want. When we come back on fantasy baseball today, find out the player that has scored the exact same amount of fantasy points with almost an identical slash line as he did last year. Yet for some reason, it feels like his stock is down. That's right after this on FBT. So do you guys think that you're valuing Javier Bayez the same going into 2020 as you did going into 2019? Yeah.

Do you think fantasy owners are? Because we were actually the down ones on Hobby. bias. Fantasy owners are not. And I'm sure you're going to say this because that's what you tease. He's having pretty much the identical season. Yes. To last year. It's shocking.

Not in stolen bases. That's been one place that he's really dressed. But the triple slash line is 5,000th of a point of on base percentage away from being identical. I'm impressed at how he's increased his babbishop. and his home run to fly ball rate and his strikeout rate all in the same year.

The three things that I said that were impossible. But the one thing, well, I don't think you thought it was impossible for him to increase a strikeout rate. The one thing I will say as far as why do we view Javier Baez lower than last year. One is because of the stolen bases, that plays a big part in roto value and he's been less valuable as a result of that. But also, he is doing this in a... a league context in which the average team scores 4.8 runs per game.

And last season he was doing it in a league context where the average team scored 4.45 runs per game. And you look at OPS plus, which is just for league average, even though he basically has an identical OPS, his OPS plus is down from 129 to 118. So that explains it. The league around him has changed while Javier Baez hasn't. Yeah. Okay, it's a great point.

So you can't see the numbers if you're not watching on our YouTube channel. But Javier Baez, 290, 326-554 slash line last year. 293-26-554. This year it's 293-21, 554. I'm having trouble grabbing my mind around this because he's having the same amount of fantasy points per game, 3.32 fantasy points per game. He played 160 games last year, 100 games so far this year. How is his slugging percentage the same?

He's on pace for six more home runs, three more doubles, and four fewer triples. I can't figure out the math how his slugging percentage is the same. But either I messed up. I don't think I did. I did this twice. When you say he's on pace for how many games are you projecting that he might play. The same that he played last year, 160. Do they have 60 games left?

Well, but either way, he's saying that the pace for the same number of games, so how is his rate? I just don't understand what's happening here. I'm trying to do the math. Blowing my mind a little bit. Like, I must have made a mistake, but I do know that the slash line is... It's six more home runs, so that's... I don't know.

I thought I had it, but I don't... That's six more... No, that's... He is averaging three... ...tenths of an abat or played appearance more per game this year than he did last year. That's it. There's your explanation. Oh, that's pretty interesting.

Okay, well, anyway, just last thing on Baez, Last year he was the number six shortstop in points, number two in Roto. This year he's number six in points, number three in Roto. He had a stretch earlier this year where he was pretty bad, and it was directly correlated to an injury that he was playing with, just like Aeronado. So I am interested, if he continues on a tear and actually improves this slash line rest of season,

we might be having a different conversation. Here's a category called, look who decided to show up. Jose Altuvae decided to show up. Since the All-Star break, he has five homers, five doubles, and two steals in 13 games. Paul Goldschmidt's been showing up. In July, he's batting 269 with seven home runs, and he's homered in three straight games. Paul Goldschmidt. And even to a lesser extent, Lorenzo Kane is showing up a little encouraging some signs lately.

But obviously, Al-Tupe and Goldschmidt are definitely showing up. Any thoughts on those guys? Do they look like elite hitters again? I don't know if I'd be comfortable saying both will be elite. I feel a little bit better about Paul Goldschmidt just because he hasn't had the injuries that El Tuva has had over the last year or so. But yeah, I think you feel a lot better about them right now than you did a month ago for sure. Who were we, Adam, who were we talking about with Scott where he was, who? Yuleig Ariel and Goldschmidt, is that we're talking about?

Yeah, yeah, yeah. You're taking Goldsmith. Well, I don't think Scott was also taking Goldschmidt. He just... No. No. Yes. He said Yule Grisle was the best player in baseball.

Oh, that's what he said, yeah. The only player who mattered in fantasy. Direct quote. He's not here to defend himself, but pay no mind of that. Who would you guys rather have Goldschmidt or Al-Tuvae? Goldschmidt, Al-Tube. Oh. And how would you rank Goldschmidt-L-Tubei and Javier?

or Baez rest of season. Baez, Goldschmidt. Al-Tube Baez, Goldschmidt. Al-Tube is not running at all. Neither is Baez, and neither is Goldsmith. Same for Goldschmidt. Sure, but Al-Tuve is... I mean, maybe he's as good of a hitter

as them, but I don't think the evidence would suggest that, let's say. I mean, the track record would say he's a better hitter than them. I don't think the track record would say he's a better hitter than Paul Goldschmidt at all. If you took away his stolen bases, if you took away both of his stolen bases.

Okay, okay. Right. I agree. I agree. I agree. But I would say this. I think Al Tuvei has a better chance to match his track record than Goldschmidt does, particularly in batting average. I think Al Tuvei is obviously closer to his prime than Goldschmidt is.

This is kind of like my Pueig Vado argument a couple months ago that I sounded really dumb, but it was actually making a decent point. Anybody want to talk about Lorenzo Cain? I guess. I think he's another guy who wasn't healthy. He had a wrist injury very early on that I think really coincided with when his season started to take a downturn.

He's a guy with a really good, really consistent, really solid track record over the last three or four years, and this is a big outlier from that. So do you have confidence in Lorenzo Cain going forward? that he's showing signs of being healthy does make me a little more confident. I have confidence in him in categories. I need to see a little more in points.

Would you rather have Lorenzo Cain or a piping hot, Cole Cajun? Lorenzo Cain. Cain or Shinsu Chu? Chew in points, Kane, and Roto. Yeah. Okay. I want to do a little regulating,

but first, here is the stat slash quote, slash comparison of the day. This is a fairly long excerpt that I am going to read from the Associated Press recap of the Padres Mets game. Here we go. Jeff McNeil celebrated the first anniversary of his big league call-up by going

one for three. McNeil, who debuted against the Padres and Singleton is only a bat at City Field is batting a major league leading 342 this season and McNeil is hitting 337 with 57 extra base hits in his first 150 games. Quote, you saw what happened the last two months of last season.

You're like, man, that was really good, Calloway's saying. you go into the season going, okay, hopefully he can do something close to what he was doing, and he's eclipsed all of that. He's hitting like Pete Rose, Wade Boggs, Ichero, it's unbelievable. That's Mickey Calloway. And then that goes on, McNeil's first 150 games do indeed compare favorably to those produced by that iconic trio. Boggs had a 357 average with 35 extra base hits in 150 games.

Rose hit 271 with 37 extra base. hits. Suzuki hit 348 with 47 extra base hits in his first 150 games. So Jeff McNeil with a 337 batting average and 57 extra base hits. That is the same batting average as Boggs, much better than Rose, better than Ichero, and more extra base hits than all three of those guys. A star is born, Jeff McNeil. Well, now compare them all in their age 37 season like Jeff McNeil is. He's only 27. He's an old debut guy. He looks a lot like the post-breakout version of Daniel Murphy, actually.

Right. Comparing his extra base hits to theirs is a little bit silly just because of the difference in era between those guys and Jeff McNeil. But he has been very, very good. Ichero, by the way, debuted at age 27. So he's... I think he's the next Eichero. I think it's pretty obvious.

I think we can all see that. No, but he really is having a very good season. McNeil, he's the number 11 second baseman and points, number 13 in Roto. His counting stats are really pretty crummy. 41 RBI's only 50 runs. That's hard to get that Matt stink off you, Matt. I guess. Well, and he's probably played 15% fewer games than everyone else, too.

Yeah, I mean, he's been playing every day for a while now, but early on he wasn't. That was dumb. But no, his profile does look like he's going to hit, a high average with not a ton of power, but, you know, enough extra base production that, you know, I think you should expect him to be one of the better batting average hitters in baseball. He never strikes out. He's got 72 career strikeouts in about 614 played appearance. I do think he'll be much better in points than Categories League. Probably, probably, although in Categories leagues, he's eligible, what, three, four positions?

I don't know. A lot. I'm not going to look it up. I don't feel like looking at up. More than one. More than one for sure. can confirm that. At least one, I feel comfortable saying.

All right, one regulator's email here. I should regulate myself because I don't have this person's name. He will be double eligible next year. He might be triple eligible if he gets five more appearances at third base for the rest of the season. We're in a 10-team mixed league. It's a three-year keeper league and the league has been in existence for eight years. Keepers have, oh gosh. Do it.

Do it! Keepers have a lifespan of three years once they are kept and then drop back in the player pool. Four players can be kept per season and are accounted for in the first four rounds of the draft. Side note, Matt Coker, friend of the podcast, is our commission. Not to be confused with Matt Coker. These past two seasons, these past two seasons we've had the last place team fire sell their team to a team in the running for the playoffs. and they traded their first and second round picks for the following year. This allowed that team to win the championship with a stacked roster.

In the offseason, the commissioner implemented the ability to veto. A lottery draft order. Normally the four teams who missed the playoffs have the first four picks. Now everyone is a shot at number one. And also moved up the trade deadline to discourage tanking. But the same thing just happened again with the last place team. Now giving up stacking one team and getting draft picks for the next season. Any advice on what we could do to discourage these moves?

the integrity of the league is being compromised. Yes, stop. If you don't want to tie this year's results to next year's draft order, then stop making it a keeper league. But if you're going to have a keeper league, you have to have some reason for the last place teams to have faith that they can compete next year. If you're creating a system in which the best teams get to keep their best players,

and the worst teams do not have a way to acquire very, very good players, you're creating a system in which, and look, you may want that. This is a way to, to, uh, why is this only happening with one team, though? Is it the same team or is it just the last place? The last place. I interpret it as the last place team. But, but, so there's only two teams or one team that's out of the playoffs? Like I would think this

Once this happened and that team won the championship the next year Teams might be more willing to do that And then multiple teams might be competing for it Yeah, I just don't have a problem with this No, I don't either It's a keeper. The whole kind of purpose of having like a keeper or dynasty league Is that teams are not just thinking about this season

And how they're already at a conclusion They can look forward to next year Yeah, or you can incentivize teams To go forward all this season At the expense of their keepers for next year. Like that's a fine balance to strike. I don't think you need to. Like, lottery reform and all that.

Like, just let people run their team in good faith. What Scott does discourage tanking in his league. Dynasty league. Yes, but I did, even with. What does he do? What does he do? He has a toilet bowl, essentially, tournament at the end of each season. And like the top, all draft picks are determined by the playoff.

So it's a 24 team league. And you've got 16 teams in a tournament vying for the number one pick. If you're the 24th team in a Conchert Dynasty League after one year and you can't really compete, you're not going to get the number one pick either. And having the 10th pick in that league is not that valuable. But I did just trade most of my team for prospects in the last week. I traded Zach Brinky. I traded Shinshu Chu.

This is how American sports work. I traded all of those guys for Michael Chavis and the Nd-D-S. We don't have a problem with it. I think your other owners who are in contention should be a little bit more aggressive and trying to do the same thing. And I'll just suggest one other thing. What about having, if it's a pay league, if you have money involved, what about setting aside part of the pot,

maybe upping the entry fee, and having a toilet bowl for the non-playoff team? So they can win that and win money. I don't want to play any more in the regular season's over. All right, but maybe they do. Maybe they do. All right, fine. I'm going to try one thing here with the regulators' music.

Again, send your email is Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com to that address. I'm just trying to kill time here. And put Fantasy Regulators Baseball in the subject line. Fantasy Regulators Baseball. Very important. Yeah, I don't think I'm going to be able to pull it off, but here we go. Let's try it. No, it's too hard.

It's too hard. It's too hard. Too many buttons. I can't play both at the same. same time. Okay. Four bad rotation from yesterday. Shane Bieber, complete game shutout,

one hit, one walk, 10 strikeouts. Marcus Stroman now is a 296 ERA. He has been crushing it lately. David Price had a good start. Not great. Six innings, three runs, eight strikeouts at Tampa Bay. And he will be at the Yankees next week.

That'll be one of two starts for David Price. We'll see how that goes. And Ross Stripling, left with that neck injury. Are you going to start him next week? at Colorado and home against San Diego. No. But it's a two-star week, though. You get both.

Not coming off a neck injury. I am not. Okay. Anything to say about Bieber Strowman Price stripling? You should probably try to sell high on Marcus Strowman if you can. I'm not sure there are a ton of people beating down doors to get Marcus Strowman, although this is the second time in, what, four years that he's had a very good E.R. He's not going to keep a sub three IRA, especially if he gets traded to the Yankees, let's say.

He's a good sell high candidate. I'm like I was extremely in on Shane Bieber coming into this year, obviously. I'm having a hard time deciding what I think his ceiling is. I never expected he was going to have a strikeout rate that was this good. he was always a very good control guy. He was generally a good ground ball pitcher, and he has been in stretches this year, although I think his last two starts,

he's not gotten hardly any ground balls at all. But if he has this type of control and is a 45 or 6% ground ball pitcher and has a 30% strikeout rate, and he has the top 10 starting pitcher. I don't really believe that he, is going to maintain this strikeout rate because he never struck badders out.

Yeah, but he's got a 14% swing. He's right great. He might be a top 10 starting pitcher. Well, one thing about Bieber is his last seven starts before this one, a lot more ground balls than in his first, I think, 13 starts. His first 13 starts,

Bieber gave up 16 homers. In his last seven starts... He's been a fly ball pitcher early on in the season. Yeah, yes, exactly. He was a fly ball pitcher. He gave up. 13 homers. His last seven starts, one home run and a lot more ground

balls. So that's exciting. It's sort of a Jacob deGrom thing, except Jacob deGrom also accompanied it with a big jump and velocity, but in terms of the production and the profile, it actually looks very similar to what happened with Jacob deGrom. It's not

totally unprecedented, and there's a reason why tinstap is a thing. There's no such thing as a pitching prospect. It works both ways. Guys can dramatically improve unexpectedly, just like they can take these big steps backwards. And it's one of the things that makes projecting young pitchers really tough. It's also one of the things that will make Shane Bieber tough to project next season because he may not have an 11K per 9 next year. Fringes, Mike Leek, Chris Bassett, John Means, De Nelson,

Lehmette, Brad Keller, Tyler, Tyler Beatt, Tyler, Beatt. Mike Leak, Chris Bassett, John Means, the Nelson LeMette, Brad Keller, and Tyler Beatt, any interest in these guys? I'm still interested in to Nelson LeMette. He hasn't quite done it yet, but the stuff is really good. He throws really hard. He's got a wipeout slider.

I do worry that he might end up being a reliever, and he might just be a reliever right now. Masquerading as a starter, but I really like his talent, and I'm going to stick with him as long as he keeps showing those flashes. Oh my gosh. You're going to love this, Chris.

team name Tuesday on a Thursday, Beady Little Eyes. I hate you. I am claiming that one. Beety little eyes. Is that why you were on your phone? I was wondering if something like... I texted it.

I have to have you excuse you from the podcast. No, no. I couldn't remember the name that Adam was just this morning. How can you not remember that? It's so good. I texted it to Kreef this morning. No, Heath just came up with it. Beattie little eye.

He just came up with it on his own. Everybody heard it. Yeah, yeah. No, I have the proof. Um, anyway, it's a great team name. But Tyler Beattie was, you know, pitching really well and then he was not. Yeah, and he had introduced a new slider. Yeah.

That had, um, you know, given him really good results so far. We'll see what happens. The Cubs are a tough matchup. Um, I'm not necessarily bought into Tyler Beanie, but among this group of Mike Lee, Chris Bassett, John Means, Denelson Lamat, Brad Cowan, Tyler Beatty, he's probably my second or third most interested player. Interesting. I think the key for Beatty.

The slider's good and he needs some more good pitches. But his control has been absolutely terrible in the major leagues. Now, he's walked two in his last four starts. It's going to take more than four starts for me to believe that's real. But if we get through the rest of the year and the walk rate's low since that point, I'll believe he might be good next year. Okay. So we have to finish.

We have two minutes left. So I need to ask you about Anthony Santander. He's just having a good year. He's an 858 OPS. He's 18% owned four home runs in his last six games. Give me a quick thought on that, and then I want to rapid fire read some emails. Some thoughts on Anthony Santander.

So, Camney Art has always been a hitter's park. No, it's got to be quicker than this. Are you picking up Anthony Santander? No. Okay, thank you. Email from Carl. Would you drop any of these guys for D.D. Gregorius?

Luriano, Olson, Meadows, or Pollock in a points league? No, no. Voigt or Muncie. This one's from Matt and Tennessee. Yeah. Should I pick up Carson Kelly and drop Wilson Ramos? No. Sure.

Why not? Should I drop Carlos Carrasco from Nando? It's completely impossible for us to answer that question. It depends on how desperate you are. If you need help right now, you have to. From Matthew, would you rather add in a Categories League, Ryan Yarbrough or Jose Orchiti? Erkidi.

Your bro. And how about last one? Rapid fire. We got to go faster, Adam. We got to go faster. All right. Well, I needed to pull up the email. Do it.

16 team, keeper league, points league. Who would you add among these six outfielders? Pick two. Malik Smith. Ryan Braun, Fran Mill Reyes, Manuel Margot, Brandon Belt, and Dwight Smith, Jr. The Padres. Malix and Fran Mill. Okay.

Thank you to Creith. Good stuff. Heath, great season, man. Play me out. You want, oh, with that? That's fine, I guess. You want the compilation? Here's the compilation.

Here's the compilation. Here's the copy. E. Do it. Do it, do it. It's the ee that really makes the, right? It's like, who makes that sound?

All right, if you want more Heathcoming, because you listen to the Fantasy Football Today podcast and otherwise we'll talk to you on Friday on Fantasy Baseball today.