Fantasy Baseball Today - 2023 Top Third Base Prospects, Teoscar to the Mariners & Harper's Injury (11/17 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: November 17, 2022

Who leads the top third base prospects in 2023 (3:47)? ... What can we expect from Gunnar Henderson (7:30)? ... Should you be looking to buy Josh Jung (10:50)? ... Will we see Noelvi Marte next season (16:00)? ... Who is Cam Collier (17:34)? ... Josh Jung or Brett Baty (21:50)? ... Where would Miguel Vargas rank among third base prospects (26:10)? ... What can we expect from Spencer Steer and Christian Encarnacion-Strand (28:45)? ... Which other third base prospect should you know (32:15)? ... Teoscar Hernandez was traded to the Mariners (40:02)! ... Bryce Harper will have surgery on his UCL (46:16). ... Rizzo is back with the Yankees while Tyler Anderson signed with the Angels (52:40). ... What did Welsh learn from the AFL (1:03:00)? Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Get 20% off Fantasy Baseball Today merch: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-baseball-today?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-baseball-collection Follow FBT on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1 Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." 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 lead. Where fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Oh boy, the hot stove is heating up. Welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today on Thursday, November 17th. I am Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White,

and Christopher the Welsh is back in the mix. to have them. Hello, Scotty. Based on your Twitter, it appears that you've moved into offseason prospect rankings. Would that be correct? I have. Yes, I have. My mission for the next month or so is researching prospects and reacting to transaction news as it happens. And we did have a little bit of that today too. Oh, yes. We'll get into that a little bit later on. Welshie, what's going on, my man? How sad are you that the AFL is over? I'm sorry. my wife is a little bit worried. She,

she's very familiar with these times a year. And I was like, yep, aiff, it feels all done. She's like, we're going to be okay. I'm like, we're going to be all right.

I'm busy than I've ever been before in this. But it's definitely, this has been a different week for me, especially because I got, I was down under the weather a little bit at the end of the AFL. And now I'm not, you know,

doing a show and rushing out to a game and rushing to get back. I have no games. I have no prospects. Just have video. and this lamp. Just this lamp. That's a jerk reference. So that's it.

You got nothing going for you anymore. Just this thermos and this lamp. It's all that I have. Oh, Matt. You know what? Look, it's my first year going to first pitch to Arizona and seeing the AFL.

And even I felt kind of weird that it was over. I'm like, we don't have any baseball until pitchers and catchers in February. And it's just, it is a sad realization. I mean, you got Dominican Winter League going on, but it's not like televised

and there's not coverage. There's not, I'm not trying to, make this about me. There's not a me or a lot of those type of guys that are out there every day giving you video and stuff like that in the Dominican Winter League, which is kind of a bummer. And there's some real prospects out there. I mean, L.A. De La Cruz is out there. I think Chirio's been out there. So there's some real guys. But to your point, it's like, it's out of our hands right now. So all that we can do, because, you know, idle hands, my friends, all we can do is go and watch

and read about prospects or draft on like NFBC or fan tracks on best balls or whatever it is. Like those are what we can do at this point right now. Well, let me see if I can work my magic and maybe we'll get you a first class ticket out there to the Dominican Republic. And you can watch the prospects first. No, I was kidding. Let's go. Let's go. I don't want to, I don't want to prop you up too much and, you know, tear you down or anything.

Today on the show, by the way, we are talking about the top third base prospects, both in Dynasty and for redraft next season. And we do have some action to Oscar Hernandez traded to the Seattle Mariners. Bryce Harper is having elbow surgery. We have a few other players either resigning or signing with the new team, so we will get into that a little bit later on. But let's jump right in. And these are the Welsh's top five third base prospects in Dynasty leagues. We have Gunner Henderson of the Orioles, Josh Young of the Rangers,

Noel V Marte of the Reds, Cam Collier, also of the Reds, and Brett Beatty of the Mets. First and foremost, Welsh, Noel V Marte stands out on this list because he has not played a single game at third base in the mind. But I assume that you are, this is projection in terms of his position position positionality. I don't know. Whatever position is. Yeah.

No, this is yeah. An apology is on my part because I know a lot of sticklers out there, Pisa Pia, Scott, you guys are both very sticklers to positions played. And I totally understand that. But this is me jumping the gun because Nelvi Marte will 100% be a third baseman. He'll be a third baseman this year. He played it exclusively in the Arizona fall. League. Much has been made to do about his body, which was a lot articles and all this stuff last year. It's kind of full on display here. They've also, you know, they've made these moves where

Nuelve is there. Ellie is their shortstop. They've also got quite a few other players that can jump into those positions that noelvie is, they're not going to even experiment with it anymore. I feel confident about that. He will not play shorts. He will in spring training, he will be a third baseman, he'll be a third baseman. He'll start the year. But I do recognize that, you know, the qualifications might not quite be there. But I wanted to put him on this list because this list of third baseman and a lot of these positions we've done kind of similar to first, we had a lot to talk about with the first two. And everything else is just kind of open season.

I think there's younger guys that don't make the redraft bounce list. There's pseudo prospects that make the watch redraft list right now. But at the end of the day, I do project a little bit more than just go by standard games played because Nuelvee is 100% a third baseman in 2023. All right. Well, while we're talking... I do think there is one notable

distinction here on the opposite end. Somebody who is absent from this list who, by the objective standard of games played, will be in my third base prospect rankings. And that's Jordan Walker. So, you know, Jordan Walker... Good point. Gunner Henderson number one.

I'm fine with that. but Jordan Walker would be like 1A if we are including him as a third base prospect. And I think, I think it's a great point. And we also, I'm totally game with taking off number five. And we can talk about it because Walker will qualify as a third basement because that is the primary position he played last year. The back end of the year, though, he started to play outfield. At the Arizona Fall League, he played this many games.

And if you're looking on the video, it's zero that many games at third base. He exclusively played in the outfield, and he even played center field, which is something that's interesting. Like Nelvie, again, this is about my projection that I do. I don't even have Walker listed as a third baseman anymore because that will not be his position. But he's number two on this list if we qualify. And I'm more than game to talk about it because it's a great spot. We might not talk about in the outfield. He is easy number two here.

And then that would obviously move, you know, move the players down where this would be a strong top three list in my mind of Gunner. Walker, Josh Young, and then it just becomes an open field. I like talking about the prospects in terms of projection, where we think they're going to play. So I think it makes sense saving Jordan Walker for the outfield because the Cardinals have no one Aronado. That means Jordan Walker is not playing there. He is not playing third base. So I do think he will be an outfielder moving forward, but at least for CBS purposes, has third base eligibility as of now. Let's start up top here. Gunner Henderson and Josh Young, We saw both of these guys

towards the end of the season for their respective teams. Gunner Henderson, arguably the top prospect in all of baseball. He projects to be a potential five category contributor. In the minors last year,

he hit 297, 19 homers, 22 steals. When he came up, the exit velocity looked great, the sprint speed look great, steamer projections, like him quite a bit early on as well. And then Josh Young,

who we spoke about on the previous podcast, he also came up. He hit 204, five homers, steals a 38% strikeout rate, which is not really something we've seen from him much in the minors. Well, so I'll throw both of these names at you. What are you expecting from Gunner Henderson this upcoming season, if you're just, I guess, projecting his line? And as of now, Henderson and Josh Young are going about 115, 120 picks apart. Does that disparity make sense for redraft

purposes? You know, I actually don't think it actually makes full on sense when you're thinking about like they're both going to be these young productive guys. The reason why the disparity is there is because of Gunner Henderson's like overall five tool production. Josh Young is not a big stolen base guy. Steamer actually projects them to hit the exact same amount of homers this coming year. But the batting average and stolen bases are heavily in favor of Gunner Henderson. And I think that's why it is. So I think it's more about Josh Young maybe coming up a little bit than I think it is for them trying to meet in the middle because I think Gunner is one of the few guys that you can be aggressive on. I always tend to be a little bit more tentative about prospects in like redraft in

first year, but I think Gunner is going to show out. I think him and Corby and Carol are, you don't want to put all the like Bobby Witt and Julio Rodriguez because that's going to create really bad expectations. But it's a closest example you can think of like primed prospects to produce this coming year because Gunner is a full on five tool player, hit 19 homers, 22 stolen bases, while hit in 300 in the minor leagues this past year with almost a three, four, five slash. I mean, he just barely missed it. And he had a very good stint in the major. So I think Gunner is the guy, Josh Young, you know, I got to see him return. I think part of the strikeout stuff, what you got to remember, this is one of those things I was surprised about that he didn't get to

the AFL because they just pushed him up to the majors. He missed so much time. I got to go to his, you know, season debut. It had been like eight or nine months and he had swung a bat. And he was out here in rookie ball. He went from like rookie ball all the way up to AAA and it was within a matter of like a month. He was back in the majors. So I turned not to read too crazy much into the high strikeout numbers because that's not something that had been a part of his game before. He's a very, very contact oriented player who definitely can get into, he's got some pure raw power. When I saw him returning back, looked like he had really trimmed down his body and was flying around the bases a little bit. But that much missed time, I'm not surprised there's swing and miss. That's why I thought

he would be an Arizona Fall League guy. But what we're seeing now, any of these guys that come up and get Major League run, the teams just don't care to throw them at the Arizona Fall League, even if they need more at Bats. No Gunner, no Carroll, and no Josh Young. And I think those are the top two clear guys. But Gunner is the person that you should have as your main, main target. Scott, usually on these podcasts, I like to do a little dynasty buy and sell,

considering we have so much news, I don't think we're going to get to that today. But I did want to ask you about Josh Young. Some people, they see this small sample size in the majors, and they freak out right away. So someone might see this 38% strikeout rate for Josh Young and perhaps try and move him or they're panicking about it. Would you use this as an opportunity to potentially buy in a dynasty or keeper league on Josh Young? Oh, yeah. I came prepared for that segment that you say what I'm going to do now. The first on my list of by-low third baseman was Josh Young for exactly that reason.

And I'm speaking from a dynasty standpoint when I say that. Like if you've had young stashed away in your minor league system for a couple years, obviously this isn't the time to give up on him when he has his whole career ahead of him. And of course, if it's somebody else who had him stashed in their system and they're panicking, then yeah, it's a good time to buy in on him. If we're talking redraft, though, I am a little troubled by that 38% strike. out rate, it doesn't tell the story of his career, obviously. It's over a very small sample, but my approach to prospects and redraft has kind of shifted the past couple years.

Maybe it's another byproduct of the ball changing, no longer being juiced, but it just seems like the default stance for up-and-coming, for incoming prospects should be that they're going to fail. That's how you should approach them with that expectation. Not that they all will. Obviously, if the price is right, you take a flyer on it. But Josh Young is a prospect I really liked because of how good his back control was coming up through the minors. And the fact that he couldn't make good on that, his first taste of the majors, I think my assumption is he's probably going to struggle in his rookie season. And that's why I rank him where I do at third base.

Henderson, on the other hand, not so much. I mean, he came up and over his small sample, he looked like he belongs. and strikeouts were actually less of an issue than I thought they were going to be. So there's a big gap between the two in my redraft rankings. Less so in Dynasty, though, obviously Henderson. Henderson, I think it's worth pointing out all the conventional prospect rank lists, not even fantasy-specific ones, are probably going to have him number one overall among prospects coming into the season,

not just third base. So obviously- No, we've seen Carol. I think we've seen Carol go ahead of him. Frank, didn't you in some of the drafts you see Carol go ahead of Henderson? Yeah, that's the early ADP. In fantasy, I think it'll be closer, but I'm talking about like conventional, like baseball America. Oh, yeah.

MLB.com, I think, actually, as Francisco Alvarez, number one. But baseball prospectus, I think they're going to have Gunner Henderson number one by and large. One thing I wanted to point out with Josh Young, which I think is just interesting of note, is projection systems, and we haven't seen them all. You know, we're going to see our friend Ariel's come out after everyone else. come out. Derek Carty's The Bat is something I think that is very worthwhile paying attention to. And the bat is usually really critical of prospects. And I think most projection systems are relatively critical of prospect. So something that I think is always an eye-opener. I have this very vivid memory of like, it was 2018 and sitting in the Arizona Fall League,

it could have been 17. So maybe my memory isn't that vivid. But I remember sitting there with Vlad Sedler and Rob Silver and Jason Collette and the projections for Steamer had just released in the Arizona Fall League and Vladimir Guerrero Jr. was given the highest batting average projection of any player in baseball. And everyone kind of freaked out because projection systems just don't do this. So I'm just kind of setting up this table to say, usually they're not super nice about this stuff. And of note, Josh Young's projected strikeout percentage, at least on Steamer, is not only under 30%. It's under 28%. And his walk percentage is double what he did this past year, which also, also is an anomaly in AAA and AA.

He had run a 3% walk rate. But again, I would mention he hadn't really played in over a year. And this is over about 200 played appearances. All of this stuff happened between AAA and double A. So I think it's of note that you see those struggles that are an anomaly and then you see projection systems come back down to earth even on this player because you would think a guy in that sample size with a 38% strikeout rate would probably be given something close to 33% on a projection system.

it's under 28%. So maybe just take that with you. But my cautiousness is exactly the same as Scots with rookies overall is, even though I'm a prospect guy, I don't really like to dip my toes too heavy into them in redraft. I do think that the emergence of rookies that we saw this past season, Julio Rodriguez, Michael Harris, Spencer Strider is going to inflate the price of prospects, at least for this upcoming year. I think people are really excited to draft a Corbyn Carroll or a gunner Henderson because they're chasing the dragon. Who's the next Julio, The answer, probably nobody. But I think that's overall that's going to be something that's in the back of everyone's mind. We spoke about Noel V. Marte, a little bit early on. Just want to point out what he did last season in the minors. He hit 279, 19 homers, 23 steals in 829 OPS at high A. Scott, I'm coming back to you here.

Marte is still just 21 years old. Do you think that we see him this upcoming season with the Cincinnati Reds? Not early. I think, I could see him being a guy who comes up in September. I think a new standard was set this year with high-end prospects being called up at September to get their feet wet for when they're unfurled on opening day the following year to take advantage of the new draft pick incentives. And I think Marte is going to fall into that category. So probably not worth an investment in redraft leagues, but I do think at some point late in the year we will see him.

For whatever it's worth, Noel V. Marte and L.E. de La Cruz were added to the 40-man roster for the Cincinnati Reds. So perhaps that is, I don't know, a little bit telling that we see them at some point this season. I think both or at least one of them could be up later on. It helps, obviously. I assume they would have been eligible for the Rule 5 draft if they weren't, and that's why they were out now. That's usually the story behind it. But obviously, that's one less hurdle to clear when the time comes to call them up. Yeah, and I'm going to highlight some of those names later on. You're right, Scott. I mean, most of the time prospects are added to the 40-man roster to be protected from the Rule 5 draft.

But in some cases, I think these guys are just kind of knocking on the door and potentially ready to make an impact at the Major League level. So we'll talk about some of those names later on as well. Speaking of the Reds, Cam Collier is number four on this list, the top prospects, according to the Welsh at third base. And he was just taken 17th overall in this year's draft. Does not turn 18 years old until a couple of days from now. November 20th is his birthday.

Shout out to Cam Collier. Happy birthday. What I've read about him. they love the hit tool, outstanding bat speed, makes a lot of contact, good raw power, and it seems like there is more to come, more power to come for Cam Collier. Well, your thoughts on him and maybe where he ranks in first year player drafts. Yeah, I think he did a really good job of breaking him down. And this is one of those that, you know, the proximity people are going to have a hard time with

because he's very far away. But he isn't a, he's a very advanced hitter. He actually had reclassified for this past draft because he was just able to. he reclassified to get into it. And I think he is a total package hitter. He's got long arms. He's got a gorgeous, gorgeous home run swing. It's tough to say like what early decisions does a guy make and rookie ball and stuff

like that on pitching, though I would say he was one of the youngest players that was out here overall. And he had really good success. But he's really far away. But I think this is that bet you want to have. And that's always, I think, the gamble and the battle that anyone has when you're dealing with like a prospect system is like, do I care about guys that are three or four years away?

Or do I just want guys in a one or two year proximity so I could take advantage and go there? And this is one of those instances where it's like, yeah, you can be right about just getting your guys now, but there are players you need to get in before it becomes too late and you're priced out. And Cam Collier, in my mind, is one of those players. And he's a top five first year player guy to me.

And that is over quite a few other college bats that are out there because I really, really think he is advancing. It's a good spot for him to hit. Now, obviously, there's a glaring, the hole that we're looking at here is Noelvie is in front of him. But this man, Nelvie's defense was rough. I actually don't think Nelvie is going to come up this year. I would never say never. I think Ellie is the guy. If you were to ask me to put money down, who's the guy that gets run from the Reds this year? It's Ellie. Elie De La Cruz. But I wouldn't discount anything, but he only hit high A. He's new to the team. He had a rough Arizona

Folly. He wasn't a great hitter. Made some horrifically bad defensive decisions. And he is clearly a guy that has to learn a new position. I think they're going to give him the entire year. But then that just kind of like opens up like, what about Collier? Collier's a great athlete, might move to first. But I think when all things are considered, Collier will be seen as a better prospect and a higher ranked prospect when he's

at Nelvie's level than Nelvia is right now. Because I think Nelvie is kind of teapering down a little bit. I think Collier could close the gap. He doesn't steal like Elijah Green or Drew Jones or Jackson Holiday, but he's just outside of that tier. I think that bat really plays. It's a good environment. And I think this is a way, way, more advanced hitter for his age. And he's going to have a really good low level. And people are going to be talking about him this year. You mentioned some of the names there for first year player draft. And Cam Collier, you said, is inside of your top five. I assume the top four ahead of him in some order, Drew Jones, Jackson Holiday, Tirmar Johnson, Elijah Green.

Boom. Yep. I'm all high school. Top five. It's all the young guys. guys. And because the college bats are, they're all right. Uh, I like him Parada. You maybe like Jacob Berry. Brooks Lee is out there. I am Brooks Lee with the fourth pick in the Scott White Dynasty League. I might rather have Zach Netto though. I'm right to have net. I mean, in your league, maybe Brooks Lee, but Nettoe, I think is going to be like a five tool guy. Netto might be my favorite college player of all of these guys because I'm looking for all those tools. But it is weird to have five high school bats that you value more. Um, but netto see, my eyes, Netto is the one that has the most juice because he's already got pushed up to

the AA. He's a guy that could create a lot of value in trades. So that's why, like, if you were to ask me one guy to take over Collier, because there's no chance, I can be convinced to not take any of the top four. If I had a top four pick, taking one of those top four high school guys, I don't care about proximity, not one bit. But I could be convinced at five to go Netto because not only do I think he's pretty dang good and kind of Royce Lewis-ish, he's also going to create more trade value being closer to the majors. Riding out the top five third base prospects, we have Brett Beatty from the New York Mets,

and I do have a poll which is live on the YouTube channel right now. If you're watching us, who makes a bigger impact in 2023, Josh Young or Brett Bady? Scott, your answer is blank. My answer is Josh Young. I think it'll be the Rangers opening day third baseman. And the fact,

Eduardo Escobar had a big September for the Mets after coming back from an oblique injury that he was playing through for a while, he came back and had a big performance. I think that buys him more time, which means, you know, Beatty has to buy it his time in the minors. Beatty's also going to be coming back from a torn UCL and his thumb, not his elbow, but his thumb. Still a significant enough injury that it makes you wonder

if he might be limited at the start of the year. But I really do like Beatty. I think maybe he's closer to young in the long run than maybe the Welsh thanks based on the way he broke down his top 10 there. Very limited sample in the majors, obviously before he hurt that thumb, but we saw some really strong indicators from Brett Beatty.

He hit a ball 113 miles per hour. His exit velocity against left-handed pitchers, specifically was impressive. It doesn't look like same-handedness is going to bother him so much. And the strikeout rate was low in the minors and it continued to be low in the majors.

So he looks to have a really strong hitting profile. So does Young. Again, I like Young more. But I think they profile as similar hitters, maybe Young having a high, ceiling and less chance of being an outright bust than Beatty has. But, you know, Beatty's still pretty strong. Well, Shady was having a big season in the minors this past year. 315 batting average, 19 homers, a 943 OPS. The problem for, I guess, his redraft value,

is that he only played six games above AA. So it was a very aggressive call-up at the time. I know the Mets needed some help. But my lean is that he's probably going to start the year in the minors. How do you feel about Brett Beatty? Yeah, I agree. He was in the AFL this past year, and he was actually, I remember the original, there were two guys we talked about in the AFL that first week. It was Tristan Kossis and then Monster Homer, and it was Brett Beatty because Beatty was putting up just crazy EVs in Salt River Fields. I mean, I think his first game, he had two 110 mile an hour singles that were just pushed out. One was a double. One was a single. And he was showing off a lot of that hard hit.

I think he's a solid prospect. You know, I mean, if I'm underselling, I don't think that him and Young are like worlds apart. I do think they're a different tier, but that doesn't mean that I think they're exponentially far, far apart. I think Beatty's hard hit numbers are going to help subdue some of the contact issues. And if he becomes just a better hitter over time in the majors, that's the thing we're going to have to see. I mean, he's not a crazy strikeout guy, which is good. Those hard hit numbers are going to completely mask some of the issues. We see that with lots of players.

I mean, Pete Alonzo and stuff like that. You see these guys that can absolutely smack balls that they are the guys that are going to be able to kind of curtail some of those issues that follow them. And as long as, and like you said, you've got high EVs against lefties and stuff. I think Brett Bady can succeed, but I believe it's going to be at AAA early on. And I don't know how quick the push is going to be. I think the offseason is going to be really telling of what the Mets end up doing. Because if they fill out that offensive roster and there's very little wiggle room,

I think it's a guy that spends almost an entire year outside of injury and the minors again to really refine him. If they leave some holes in some opportunity, Bady's a guy that could DH. He could play first base. He could play third base. Maybe they could push him into left field if they wanted. So I think it's going to be critical to watch what the Mets do offensively to fill out that entire roster to see where Bady goes. But yeah, I mean, it's one of the better hard hit numbers you see in the minors, and that's something to always bank on. One name we haven't mentioned is Miguel Vargas.

We talked about him on the first base prospect episode. And, you know, he's kind of bounced around so far in the majors, a little bit of first, played one game at third base, some games in the outfield as well. Welsh, if Miguel Vargas was, if we projected him as a third base prospect, where would he rank on this list? So if we also were putting Jordan Walker on here, it would go Gunner Walker Vargas. in my mind. And if, and then so if you take Walker off there, it would go Vargas number two,

and then Josh Young would be number three. So that's how I would do it. And I think Vargas has a better chance of playing third base than Walker does. He didn't make a single appearance at third base for the Dodgers in his first go-around. But Justin Turner, he didn't have his option picked up.

So Max Muncie could easily slide over to third base and maybe that's, I think, the most likely outcome. Unless there's a lot of Cody Bellinger rumors out there. A lot of Cody Bellinger on the move type of rumors, and that opens up even more opportunity, I suppose. Yeah, I mean, as much as the Dodgers like to mix up their lineup, it's hard to imagine Muncie plays 150 games at third base. Like maybe Vargas is spelling him on occasion while playing mostly left field.

Or maybe Muncie sticks at second base, and the Dodgers just introduced Vargas as their third baseman. I think that's at least a possibility, though, I'm betting. Fingers crossed. And the Dodgers like that versatility. They value it. You know, guys like Chris Taylor the past couple of years, Gavin Luck showed that he could play outfield and second base,

Muncie all around the infield. So my lean is that they're probably just going to move Miguel Vargas around quite a bit, outfield, third base, whatever it might be. Or they bring Justin Turner back at a much lower salary. That's a likely outcome, too. Scott, why would you even speak that into existence? existence. Don't even say those words. We want to see Mikhail Vargas play. Justin Turner's not going to sign. We're going to get all excited. We're going to be like, it's Miguel Vargas season. And then it'll be like late spring because he didn't want to do any camps. Justin Turner resigns. And we just throw it all up. Oh, that reminds me of every year. This is, I'm going off on a tangent here. But in football, Julio Jones would not participate in training camp every year. We would say, oh, man, what's wrong? Is the foot messed up? What's going on? He's fine. He just doesn't want to participate in training camp. So I mean, I mean, I kind of get it for some of these veteran players.

Anywho, third-based prospects to know for redraft leagues next year. We spoke about a lot of them already. The top three, Gunner, Josh Young, Brett Beatty. Again, Jordan Walker, Miguel Vargas could be on this list as well. Two names we haven't mentioned yet, Spencer Steer and Christian and Carnaccion Trend. Honestly, this could just be the Reds episode of prospects because we're just talking about so many of them. It's a lot of Reds. It's a good call.

I didn't even comprehend the amount of Reds third-based prospects. that we're talking about. You're totally right about that. Yeah, we've got quite a few. So I'm going to throw both of these names. You're way Welsh. And you give me a little bit of a breakdown. Spencer Stier, he got to play 28 games with the Reds. He's also someone who bounces around a little bit of third, second. He played some first base with Joey Votto down as well. Showed off some solid plate discipline in his first go-around.

10% walk rate, 24% strikeout rate. Big season in the minor leagues for Spencer Stier. The other name is Christian and Carnacio and Strand. And he, both of these guys came over in the Tyler Malley trade. Monster season for, can I call him CES? I'm just going to do that. It's a lot easier to say that. CES.

Monster season in the minors, 304 batting average, 32 homers, a 955 OPS, got 48 games in at AA, has not played at AAA yet. So when are you expecting to see Encarnacio and Strand? And what do you think about maybe buying low on a Spencer Steer at this season? Yeah, I like Spencer Steer.

I liked him when he was over with the Twins. This was a guy that I was excited when he came over. I kind of was making this big old Hadoo when he got traded, that this is the guy they can give him time immediately if they wanted at shortstop. And they didn't. And then it took some injuries for them to give him some run. Good power numbers. Kind of actually reminds me of Brooks Lee.

They're kind of like similar-ish players. I think that would be like a maybe a lower comp for Brooksley if he doesn't become an elite hitter. Strand has got elite power. But the problem you're kind of looking at here is like, how many players can the Reds put out there? Well, they don't have a good lineup. And they don't have a whole lot of players. So again, the offseason is going to tell a whole lot.

I think steer can break camp might be as a super utility, which would be a little bit unfortunate. In Carnation Strand, probably going to take a little bit more time. They're going to want to see him in the miners. But if those power numbers pop again, I think that's something they're going to want to see sooner rather than later. But neither one of those guys do qualify for that whole rookie for the whole season type of thing, breaking camp on the roster

because they're not top 100 prospects. I'd also point out a lot of this is built around what I think when we're talking about proximity for third base, there's just not a lot of good options. I could have said Kobe Mayo, but I think Kobe Mayo is still too far along. I don't think the Orioles are going to bring up everybody this year. They're not going to bring up Kirstead and Gunner and Connor Norby.

They're not going to bring up every single prospect. So I don't really think he's an option. Colt Keith, who was out here with the Tigers in Salt River and the AFL, he's one of those guys. I don't think he's going to play third base, but he just missed so much time last year. hit high A, I don't think he's going to come up. So it's like, you go down on the list, what are the other options we have to really talk about? Maybe in Manuel Valdez, with Boston,

if he gets some run, I think he's kind of sneaky. You could look down at Jordan Diaz as a guy that still, I think, still qualifies with the A's. So that's why I put up two players that I think have some solid offensive potential, though they may have less playing time, at least Strand may have less playing time potential than guys like in Manuel Valdez and Jordan Diaz. But I just think if he's given it, his talent is up there. So I would bet on him. But after steer, I think it's a pretty tough list. Maybe Mark Vientos, but again, you're talking about positions and playing time and Mets again.

So I think it just gets really messy after this. There are a few that we talked about at first base. And so we don't need to go deep into them. But currently, they'll be listed as third baseman on CBS. and that includes from the latest draft class Jacob Barry of the Marlins. It includes Blaise Jordan. That was the 13-year-old who was hitting 500-foot home runs on YouTube back when he was 13. He's 19 now.

I was going to say he's not 13 anymore, guys. Yeah, he's not in the Red Sox system as a 13-year-old. But he could have been with those 500-foot home runs. But yeah, we talked about him to first base. also a couple guys who debuted this year Gabriel Arias of the Guardians Can we can we just go like rapid fire on these guys Gabriel Arias of the Guardians

I'm indifference on I would I'm not interested in Gabriel Arias I used to love him but no Jordan Groshen's of the Marlins Also not that's not a guy for me A lot of other people give him the benefit of the doubt power completely decimated, kind of came back a little bit, good contact skills, kind of a nothing prospect that kind of revitalized, but I'm not, again, I'm not super into Grosians.

Didn't he had like three home runs in the minors this year? Like, Jordan Groshen used to be, like when he was in A ball, when he was a former 12th overall pick and right when he was drafted. Like, he was a person who got a lot of prospect type. Because people were projecting in 2021, he had like seven homers in double A with the, with the Blue Jays and he hit 2991 but then the batting average just started to sink the power never progressed

and yeah last year over two different stints in AAA he hit three total homers so I just not my guy oh you know here's here's a guy who in me sorry you probably heard that buzzer right I was like Scott your washing machine is calling you

I was that was the dryer it has a very loud and long buzzer that I've just learned to tune out clearly and I don't know why the dryer is going and when you got three people on too. Like everyone's probably sitting there like, who's that sound coming from? It's probably going to happen again

just to warn everybody. Maybe it'll buzz the right prospect. Maybe if it buzzes, it'll tell us who we need to be excited about. I wish I could. I wish I had an option to. Well, who's the next prospect you have got. Okay.

So yeah. There's a, there's a pretty big prospect here who, I guess we imagine he's going to wind up at first base, but he's played mostly third base in the minors, and that's Curtis Mead of the race. Curtis Meade would be clearly top 10 and potentially even top five.

If you consider him a third baseman. If I consider him a third baseman, Curtis Mead would probably be number, ooh, would be close. On a redraft one, he would actually be probably number three, I think, on this list. Again,

it's a little messy because Walker would technically be number two if we were considering it, Miguel Vargas, blah, blah, but he would definitely be on this list, except it's the race. It's still the raise that screw me. up with how they do everything. Looks like they're going to move Brandon Lau to first base, which I think is great, opens up some middle infield. But where are they going to do with Taylor

Walls? What are they going to do if Mead comes up? Are they going to keep Diaz there? It's just, it's messy over there. Manzardo. Come on. Don't block Kyle Manzardo. That's what they're doing. That's the talk is they're going to put Lau over at first base and they might platoon. I don't think Manzardo's coming up as early as everybody else thinks he is. But when he does, it might be more of a platoon to start. So Curtis Meade hit 298 with a 922. PS and in 76 games. I love him. Double and AAA.

It's always had high batting averages, low strikeout rates and minors with with enough power that you would expect it to play. You could see him carving out an everyday role in the majors. But yeah, that's a tough team to do it with. Yeah. Yeah, I mean, I imagine he'll be a consensus top 100 guy going into this season, whether or not you consider him a third baseman, I think is fair to ask. Yeah, and he is a top.

I have him run top 50. I mean, that's a type of offensive. of output. He's actually just one of those guys you kind of wish we would just go somewhere else. Just give him an opportunity somewhere else and we would see him shine. I do want to go back to a couple guys we just talked about. I do want to chime in on Spencer Steer and Christian Incarnacion Strand. Two guys, the Reds acquired from the twins. I believe in the, what's that pitcher's name?

Tyler Malley. The Tyler Malley deal. I like Stier more. And Carnacian Strand. has the raw power, but a lot of questions about the hit tool, not great plate discipline in the miners. And that's a profile that's like my least favorite prospect profile, the massive power, but not much else.

I mean, the strikeout rate isn't so crazy that it's obvious in Carnacios Tran's going to fail, but a lot has to go right for a guy who's basically just a right-handed plotting slugger. Spencer Steer has that versatility. And while the raw power, I think, is questionable. He's playing in Cincinnati now. And he's pretty good at pulling the ball in the air. So I think he could get the most out of it. And it's sort of like we saw Jonathan India do as a rookie.

All right. Third base prospects are in the books. If you want to hear more about the Welsh's prospects or I guess read about them, you could do that on his Patreon page. Isn't that correct, Welsh? They can. They can check it out. In Thisleague.com is the Patreon where I got the top 500 list of prospects for Dynasty.

I got actual dynasty list that people can check out. And I do a whole bunch more actually going to be picking both of your brains here in the next two weeks, probably right after Thanksgiving to do another round or the first round of the 2023 prospect 180Ps, where I create a 80P system for prospects by having amazing people like both of you draft. And we'll get back into that. So that will be fun. Check that out in this league.com. I do enjoy doing that quite a bit.

So perhaps we can work that into our content here as well. A hundred thousand percent. All right. Before we hit the break, reminder that we have a new TikTok account where the Welsh has become famous. I haven't got any Scotty TikToks yet. So I'm going to chop up some content.

I'll get Scotty up on the TikTok page. But if you have TikTok, you can follow us at FBTPod. We're doing some more short form original content. You might have seen that on the YouTube channel as well. So we're having some fun. We're missing around here in the off season. But make sure to follow us on TikTok at FBTPod. and subscribe on YouTube, leave a five-star rating

and review on Apple and Spotify. Again, make sure you have those notifications turned on because the hot stove is heating up and we're gonna have some emergency podcasts and you're gonna want to know every time we go live. Let's take a break and then we will get into that hot stove here on fantasy baseball today. So we have a bunch of news, notes, trades, signings to talk about

and let's jump right into the biggest one that happened here on Wednesday. Tiaska Hernandez traded over to the Mariners in exchange for reliever Eric Swanson and left-handed pitching prospect, Adam Mako. Initial reaction, this return is way too light. But other people pointed out to me,

only one year left of team control for Teasca Hernandez set to make $14 million in arbitration so that lowered the price, the return, I guess, in this deal. Still think it's a little bit light. But anyway, let's talk about Teoska Hernandez. He hit 267, 25 homers, six deals this past season. strikeouts jumped back up a little bit line drives came down, ground balls went up

so you don't really like to see that. I looked into the park shift. In fact, if he played every one of his games in T-Mobile Park out in Seattle, he would have hit 31 home runs this year. So Scott, basically, I think Teasca Hernandez is going to be just fine in an emerging offense with the Seattle Mariners.

Yeah, I wasn't inclined to move him at all in my rankings. maybe like I can't imagine his stock really improving but it's not going to go down as much as people might have assumed we tend to think of Roger's center as being a very favorable place to hit and T-Mobile not so much.

Well, the latter is true but T-Mobile actually rates okay for home run specifically as you point out he would have actually hit more if he played all his games there last year and also Roger's Center has become much less hitter-friendly with the introduction

of the humidor there. Actually, a year before everybody else in 2021. So I don't think it's this drastic of a venue shift as some people might believe. A lot of his, a lot of the optimism for Teoska Hernandez next year is the belief that, you know, the version we saw over the last four months is basically the true version. So he had just an 807 OPS for the year, not great. And, you know, single-digit steals, only six of them. But we've seen him be a double-digit steel guy in the past.

And his OPS over those final four months, when it wasn't so cold, it was 867. So much better, much closer to what we saw from to Oscar Hernandez in 2021. So where I rank him, it's kind of in a group that includes like Cedric Mullins and Adolice Garcia. Aloi Jimenez is around there as well. I have Hernandez toward the top of that group still. I prefer him to Adolice Garcia. I prefer him, at least in Roto leagues, to Eloy Jimenez, who's going to be a zero for steals points leagues.

I'll take Eloy instead. But yeah, that's about where I have Hernandez. If you wanted to drop him toward the back of that group, I'd understand. But I don't think I'm going to do that. In early, Scott, I'm sorry, I just want to ask Scott one question. If you had to say he's up or down, you were forced, you can't say it's even. And you had to say he's moving up or he's going down. What side would you take on Teosker?

If I had to say one or the other, down. Okay. I don't see how it improves. But not down enough for me to sincerely downgrade him in my rankings. Well, tell that to Ehuyahenio Suarez, Scott, who had a huge season in Seattle. Maybe we can get Teoscar Hernandez back on track as well. Contract year, potentially a big one here for Hernandez. Let's just talk about the return, I guess, real quick,

and there is a prospect involved here. Well, so you could talk to me a little bit about him. Eric Swanson, for those who don't know, he was awesome last year. 1.68 ERA, 0.91 whip, 70 strikeouts over a 53 and 2 thirds innings pitched. Lots of swings and misses. Could be a good source of holds

if you play in a league with either holds or saves plus holds. So just remember the name, Eric Swanson. The prospect is Adam McO. I don't think he's a big prospect by any means. Did I get that name right? Did I just make up his first name? Okay.

Adam Maco. Sounds kind of fake. It sounds a little fake, but it's not. Yeah, it does not sound like a real player. 3.99 ERA, 1.3A. WIP, 3-8 whip this past season. Lots of strikeouts. Not a lot of endings pitched.

Welsh. Anything on Adam Macco? Yeah, so Macco is out here in the Arizona Fall League. And I think he's interesting. And this is why he's a little bit tough because he's one of those guys that statistically, if you look at the total, it didn't look great. Because I think he had one bad out. as someone pointed out because I was like, I was like, I think this is a, you know, Maco had a pretty good AFL.

And they're like, how could he have a good AFL? He had a six ERA and 12 walks. Well, his final two starts, he went six, struck out seven, walked two. And I actually, one thing I did throughout the Arizona Fall League and I posted it on our Patreon was I had my Arizona Fall League notebook where I would just jump in. It's just a Google Doc. And I would just write notes. And one of the notes I had on Adam Macco because there were a couple was how devastating I thought his curve really was. he would also be able to fling a slider in there.

But my note was, Curve has some bite against Reidy's sitting 77, but it can get inconsistent. Change up seems close, but not quite plus. And that was kind of like the plug on him the whole time. He had a good strikeout minor league season. He's a smaller guy,

though, probably not going to be a starter, but he's got a four-pitch arsenal. Comes from a great pitching organization in the Mariners. And I think this is a solid get, except at the end of the day, what this return is, is just not having to pay market value for relievers. Eric Swanson is a pretty solid get for a guy that you can put in at seven or eight if they want,

maybe a backup option if something happens with their mono. And Maco is a guy that maybe they toy around with stretching out to be a starter. He was a starter in the minors. I just think he's under six foot, you know, buck 80, something like that. Just kind of hard to project as a starter there, but he has the arsenal. Then maybe they play around. And if it doesn't work out, guess what? You can get production out of him probably this year,

want in a bullpen. And I think he could be a multi-inning relief player. So Maco's interesting, but I just don't think he'll be a starter. Swanson's probably the main get. But again, I think it only matters in save and hold leagues as far as fantasy goes. Other news and signings. Big one. Bryce Harper will have surgery to repair his UCL next week,

though the exact type of surgery isn't yet known. If it's Tommy John surgery, we're looking at a June return at the earliest. Otani had Tommy John a few years back in early October. he was ready to DH in May. So obviously it's late November when he's going to have the surgery. So we're probably looking at June the earliest. If that's the surgery, there's another option.

Harper's teammate Reese Hoskins had an internal brace repair following the 2020 season. This is like the shorter alternative surgery. And he was ready for opening day. So that's a little bit more optimistic. Scott, the problem is right now, I mean, thankfully we're not drafting right now or most sane people shouldn't be drafting right now.

but we just don't know. We just don't know when it comes to Bryce Harper. There's a lot of risk involved as of now. Yeah, so this is going to happen Wednesday, day before Thanksgiving, which sounds like an awful time to have a surgery, but whatever. Why would he do it a couple days before or something like that? I don't know. They'll find out then, obviously, when they go in there,

what kind of surgery it's going to be. But it sounds like the Phillies are bracing to be without Harper for a while. Even if he does go the Hoskins route, because it's happening so late, getting close to December now, it still seems likely Harper's going to miss time in the year. And the way Dave Dombrowski is talking about it, you know, he's saying things like,

you know, we have to be, let me see if I can find the exact quote. We're in a situation right now where we're looking at Harper coming back and deaching for some portion of the 2023 season. So I think they're bracing for, a more extended absence. And yeah, if it ends up being Tommy John surgery,

yes, we can point to Shohei Otani as reason for optimism. But again, that was early October when he had it, returning in early May. So late November, if everything goes just as well in Harper's recovery as it did for Otani, late November would translate to late June, in which case they're talking about half the season that he's gone. I just want to say, I actually read that a little bit different, but I also don't think they're going to give you the nuggets.

When I read that and I hear that, I hear that is not them being like, hey, we're going to be out a couple months. I read that as like, he's going to open the season as a DH. I don't read that as significant missed time. I think they are going and walking into this with the expectation that they will get him around opening day and he will be a DH. And when they say that, it's that you're probably going to see him DHing for two to three months. not helping out and contributing out into the outfield, which kind of, which would... I mean, that's just such an optimistic timeline for Tommy John, though. I mean, that Otani return is about as quick as we've ever seen.

And the only reason it was even possible is he bats opposite from what he throws, which Harper does as well. So, you know, the main elbow as a hitter isn't the one that's recovering from surgery. So Harper does have that going for him like Otani does. But even then it was a, let's see, October to May, what is that? That's a seven-month absence. It's hard to see Harper beating that. Yeah, I agree.

And it creates whether, even if he, let's say he's there in opening day, you still have the issues. You've got the potential lingering injury that's floating out there. You've also got a guy, and I know not to steal anything if Frank was going to get to this, but like you also have a guy that it primarily played DH last year and is probably going to some formats as a DH only. And if he's going to play more of that, that creates some serious issues as far as roster construction that you have. So it's like you're already and Frank has a great poll that he put out there.

We can talk about. But it's like you're already, even if he's from day one as a DH only with the injury is a concern. And then if you if you lop two months off of it, you're in a whole other ball game. You're in a whole other ballpark of what you're talking about now. If there's two months production gone, no outfield eligibility and no real sign, by the way, of it any time soon, which also hurts dynasty. Because if you lose Bryce Harper, two years of outfield eligibility, it's not a game changer,

but it's really, it really could restructure a lot of what you're doing with your team. So it's a bigger deal than I think people are really thinking about. And I think that was why, Frank, you were so smart to put out that poll because it should be talked about right now. Let's talk about that poll real quick. And I asked, knowing what we know right now, where would you draft Bryce Harper, if you were drafting today? And rounds one to two, rounds three to five, round six through ten, after round ten. Those are the four options. Rounds three through five is the leader, 43 and a half percent of the vote. Surprisingly, the second highest, round six through ten, 26.8 percent of the vote. So seems like people are- I think the leader there

is too sanguine. I'm more, I voted six. to 10 myself. And, you know, I voted three to five. Obviously, I'm thinking, I'm thinking Tommy John right now. If it ends up not being Tommy John, okay, I'll adjust. I'm guessing that's the most likely scenario, though. And if that comes to pass, then very likely we're talking half the season. I would be surprised if he plays even two-thirds of the season, and I think it'll be closer

to half the season. If he missed this half, are you even comfortable drafting him inside the top 10 rounds? Exactly. Is it DH only? I wrote about this earlier today and, you know,

kind of thinking through the more pessimistic scenario of Tommy John, I said outside the top 100 is where I draft him. Somewhere in like the, comparing it to outfield, even though he's not eligible there, somewhere around like where I'm taking Hunter Renfro or Taylor Ward. Obviously, if it's a shallower league,

you can take a bigger risk and stash him away and make do with whatever off the waiver wire, the shallower league, the bigger risk you can take. But if we're talking like a five outfielder format, yeah, it'd be tough to invest in Harper is more than like a middle round pick. All right. Let's get into some other news. Anthony Rizzo is headed back to the Yankees on a two-year $34 million deal,

which includes a club option for 2025. We know that Rizzo leaned into Yankee Stadium last year. He hit more fly balls, pulled the ball more than. ever before, 32 home runs in 130 games. That was his biggest power output since 2017. Scott has Rizzo ranked as his sixth first baseman for next season. Early APP. Yeah, I've moved him down a little, but I haven't ranked higher than the consensus for sure.

Either way, I mean, early ADP, if you're using Scott's ranks, you're getting Rizzo at a discount. He's a 16th first baseman off the board, going behind Thai France, Andrew Vaughn, Ryan Mountcastle, Christian Walker. Welsh, your thoughts on this, I guess, price tag, this early price tag on Anthony Rizzo. What did you say he's 16th at first base? Yeah, he's going behind Thai France, Andrew Vaughn, Ryan Moucassel, and Christian Walker. I mean, you know, how I have done my rings and stuff, I got him quite a bit higher than that. I mean, there might be a guy or two that I haven't adjusted to put in there that technically

qualifies, but I've got Rizzo inside the top 10. And I don't hate the return. You can ask yourselves a lot of the same questions. about Christian Walker, even though there was, you know, obviously like elite power numbers and he overcame the Babbup and stuff like that. I think he belongs in that territory. I think he's in that top 12. I think he's a top 12 starting first baseman. I think the return to New York kind of solidified that. I think if he would have gone most other places, I probably would have slipped him outside of the top 12. So I'm, I'm with that. Scott, do you have him inside your top 12?

Yes, though he's more toward the back end of that. Yeah, I'm surprised too. I saw a 2022 is kind of a rebound performance from Rizzo, or maybe there'd be more optimistic. Yes, the batting average was really low, and the way he changed his swing to take advantage of the short porch and right field, there was kind of a trade-off there where, okay, it's going to lead to more home runs in Yankee Stadium, but lower batting average. But he does seem like a player who will benefit from the restrictions on shifting. So I think I feel pretty good about him getting back to being like at least a 240 hitter with hopefully that 30 Homer power still.

All right, let's talk about the other signing that happened recently. Tyler Anderson is staying in California, but it will not be with the Dodgers. He is headed to the Angels on a three-year, $39 million deal, a crazy year with the Dodgers, 2.57 ERA, 1.00 whip, and he used his change-up more than he has in recent years,

and it's a nasty one. 179 batting average against 37% whiff rate. And according to Fangraphs, the second best change-up of unqualified starting pitchers behind only Sandy Alcantara. Scott, the underlying numbers do not like Tyler Anderson. You know, early ADP doesn't like him either. 260.1 tells me people are not buying into Tyler Anderson one bit.

You know, he's going to regress. The question is how much? And I think if he leans into this change-up once again, I think he can pitch to a mid-to-high-3s ERA. I don't know that he's just automatically going to have an ERA over four once again. I think he learned some things this past year, and he's going to take that to the angels with him. Yeah, I think so, too.

I like where he's going in drafts right now. I think I'm going to have a lot of Tyler Anderson, if that's the case, because there's so much pessimism, as there often is for guys who don't strike out a lot of bats. But, yeah, changing the grip on his change-up. It's like a trapdoor change-up now. It's a really effective pitch for him, and I don't see why he would lose that

just because he's leaving the Dodgers. And you say the underlying numbers don't like him. Well, he had a 310 XERA. The FIP was high. The other stuff was over for. Yeah, maybe those strikeouts at sub 7K per 9 doesn't really scream fantasy. Yeah, no, it does not. And I also don't like that he's going to a team where he's going to start every sixth day

in all likelihood instead of every fifth day because of the Otani requirements. But yeah, I mean, he's being drafted outside. the right around, right around 200th in early drafts, right? No, 260, Scott. Oh, so even lower. Outside the top 250, that's pretty crazy. That's what I mean. Like, it's easy to be pessimistic about Tyler Anderson, but when you're paying almost

nothing for him. I was going to ask you guys like Tony Gonslyn or Tyler Anderson, but I think that is dramatically different of an ADP because I was just talking with James Anderson on Rital Wire today about Gonson and said Gonson was going around the 12th round of NFBC's, you know, in 15, man. So, I mean, that's going to put him, what, like 160, 100, 70, 180 somewhere in there. So, I mean, that's an 80 spot difference. So never mind. That's, they're not in the same ballpark, I guess. Tony Gonslin is going 80p 165. So nearly 100 picks ahead of Tyler Anderson, which I like Gonson, but it's, you know, it seems, you know,

I like Gonson more. I like Gonson, maybe even a little more than that ADP, too. But, but Anderson's ADP seems that there's just no interest for him. and I'd like to take advantage of that. Right. Martin Perez accepted the qualifying offer and will return to the Rangers on a one year $19.65 million deal. Welsh, who would you rather have?

Martin? Another one who there's absolutely no interest in. At least according to NFBC. And we're going to have a lot draft data from other sources that maybe will help moderate these things. But yeah, like Martin Perez is getting no love whatsoever, which means I'm more likely to invest in him

than I thought I would be. Welsh, would you rather have Martin Perez or Tyler Anderson? I will go with Tyler Anderson. I'm not the biggest, I'm not the biggest Martin Perez guy over for Sierra. Strikeout numbers are relatively low as well. Shockingly enough, I might, you know, feel a little bit more confident about an Angels roster than I will, the Rangers roster and the ballpark factor. So I'll go with Tyler Anderson.

As expected, Jock Peterson accepted the qualifying offer and is headed back to the Giants. Nick Martinez, re-signed with the Padres on a three-year $26 million deal. Japanese outfielder Masataka Yoshita will indeed be posted. The 29-year-old hit 335 with 21 homers in Japan this past season. Big left-handed swing. I saw an awesome homer that he hit this past year. I'm kind of interested. I want to see where he winds up.

You know, there was some early rumors about the Yankees, but, you know, we'll see. Former Guardian's top prospect, Nolan Jones, was traded to the Rockies in exchange for shortstop prospect. Juan Brito, and Jones hit the ground running when he got called up, and then he fell flat on his face. And he wound up hitting 244 with two homers in 28, 28 games, 33% strikeout rate. But there is some interesting, you know, the max EV 112, 14.5% barrel rate. Welsh, this is kind of interesting because if Nolan Jones could actually play for Colorado, it's Colorado. It's Colorado, man. Nolan Jones is a big physical. physical human being who has got, like you said, he's got some big EV numbers.

He was playing third and first and he's moved into the outfield. He's worked in a lot of those different spots. I don't know if you can ever trust Colorado to do anything. But if he's given time, he is absolutely somebody that can step into 20 plus homers if he's getting the fore. He also, you know, he was built off of like incredible patience very early on in his career. And the strikeout stuff got a lot worse as he was trying to be more of an aggressive hitter because he was so patient.

But, you know, he is a higher OBP guy as well. I think he's actually very, this is like the best case scenario for a guy like Nolan Jones to go to is in Colorado where there's potential playing time and just ballpark factors work in his favor. All right. We had a few other trades as well. The race sent shortstop prospect Xavier Edwards and reliever J.T. Chagua to the Marlins in exchange for two pitching prospects,

21-year-old Marcus Johnson and 17-year-old Santiago Suarez. one other trade. Scott, your boy, Miles Mastroboni, was traded to, traded from the Rays to the Cubs in exchange for 22-year-old pitcher Alfredo Zaraga. And Mastroboni, you know, interesting season in the minors, 300 batting average, 16 homers, 23 steals. He's 27 years old, so I don't really know what to make of it, but maybe he gets some run with the Cubs. Wouldn't surprise me. I mean, the dream scenario is that he's the next Jake Croninworth. Like the, the rays develop so many of the, these super utility guys who put up good minor league numbers but don't really have the tools.

And then they just end up having to ship them all off because they can't keep them all on their roster. And Master Browoni is going to have an opportunity with the Cubs to play all over, I think. And maybe we'll factor in steals even, he had 23 of them in this minor league season, in addition to hitting for average, which he's always done and showing more power than ever before. So it's unlikely. He turns into an impact fantasy player, but there's at least a chance Miles Mastroboni becomes somebody worth knowing. And just a fun name. I mean, say that thing three times fast, right?

Good luck with that. Shout out to the Scy Young Award winners, Justin Verlander, and... Sandy. Tell me about it. My man, Sandy Alcantara, taking it down. My heart is so full. I'm so happy for Sandy. I was going to get...

animus winners. Yeah. I mean, look, Justin Verlander first year back from Tommy John 39 years old. I mean, come on, dude. What, just ridiculous stuff. I'm happy. I'm genuinely happy for both guys. And Verlander is a free agent, apparently seeking a three-year contract, something similar to Scherzer, a little bit older. I don't know if he's going to get it, but good luck. I like it. I like the conflict. It's going to be hard not yet. What's the argument going to be when you're like, he's like standing there with his Cy Young, just sets it on the table. And like, I'd like a three-year deal. And they're like, one year for every Syong I've won.

Yeah, exactly. 39 years old. This guy's going to pitch so he's 42. It's like, I don't know. Tom Brady in pitching form? Maybe. I guess we'll find out this offseason. I had a few other things that I wanted to get to,

but man, we are running out of time here. Welsh, I guess I'll just let you wrap up with the AFL is over. A bow. Can you put a bow on the AFL? Any, you know, massive takeaways here or overarching themes that you learn from the AFL? You know, I had the short.

interesting question, not to keep plugging it, but James Anderson and I were chatting today about the prospects. And we specifically got onto Zach Veen. And we're talking about stolen bases. And James had kind of noted like, I just don't even almost pay attention to stolen base numbers at this point in the minor leagues anymore. And I kind of retorted to say, you know, one of the things that the Arizona Fall League's usage of all the new rules that's going to be implemented into baseball really was telling in a lot of different ways, where you saw guys like Matt Mervis succeed maybe even a little bit more than when they would have been shifted on and find a couple more hits.

You saw the inability for pitchers to throw more than twice over to first base and the extended base paths lead to an incredibly increased number of stolen bases like you've never seen before. So I'm actually a little bit different on this idea that like, hey, none of these minor league numbers matter anymore because Arizona Fall League kind of put on display a lot of things that could play itself out in the major leagues where pseudo-stolen base players might be a little bit more aggressive. Teams whose philosophy was against it,

and we're actually talking about how Colorado just won't let their guys run. Garrett Hampson should have 30 stolen bases. But teams might start changing their philosophy knowing that you now have an edge. And baseball players are always looking for an edge. You have an edge to stealing more bases. And there's a multitude of these other things out there, as far as like what catchers are going to be able to do with, coming back and calling on strikes,

players being maybe more aware of the strike zone and calling on an instant replay. But the stolen base ones, I think the shift is massively interesting. There were incredibly interesting players across the board that I could wrap in from Mervis to Edward Julian, talking about the top in players that aren't there. But the stolen bases,

specifically that conversation today is stuck out to me in how we could see as soon as this is enacted with the no throwing twice and the base is being a little bit bigger to see how much more, more aggressive teams philosophy changes. So those guys that stole 15, maybe start stealing 20. And those guys that still 5, maybe still 10. And maybe there's a guy or 2 that goes from 30 back up to 50 or 60.

That's what I'm hoping for. I don't think anybody's prepared for how much stolen bases are going to increase. Even people who acknowledge, oh, yeah, they're going to increase. I think it's going to blow their minds how much it actually happens. I agree. And that's really been the theme of the offseason so far. I feel like we haven't done a podcast. where we haven't brought up, that steals are going to go up next season.

And again, it's like try to wrap your head around it. It would not surprise me one bit if Ronald de Cunia steals 50 bases. I mean, he's already come close to 40 or even exceeded 40. He's fast enough to do it. Would not surprise me one bit. So I think that's a theme you learned in the AFL. And again, we'll see it this next season at the major league level. We're going to wrap there for Scott and the Welsh.

I am Frank. Thank you all for listening and watching Fantasy Baseball today. We'll be back again next week. Bye.