Fantasy Baseball Today - Buy or Sell! Gavin Stone Top-50 SP & Luis Gil Fading? (6/27 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: June 27, 2024

Gavin Stone tossed his first career shutout (4:31). ... What stats are predictive when trying to figure out ERA (7:40)? ... Spencer Arrigheti was awesome against the Rockies (14:10). ... Luis Gil has taken a step back over his last two starts (18:43). ... News (24:30): the White Sox plan to slow Garrett Crochet's innings. ... Buy or Sell (36:11): Gavin Stone, Luis Gil, George Kirby, Jackson Chourio, Carlos Correa, Lane Thomas. ... We got prospect debuts from Jhonkensy Noel and Hayden Birdsong (46:36). ... Jarred Kelenic had a huge day (52:15). ... Do any of these waiver wire pitchers matter (1:00:02)? ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpen updates and streamers (1:01:47). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday Download and Follow Fantasy Baseball Today on Spotify: https://sptfy.com/QiKv Get awesome Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: http://bit.ly/3y8dUqi 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/ 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 league. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Gavin Stone trending up, Louise Heel, trending down. Welcome into Fantasy Baseball today on Wednesday, not Wednesday, Thursday, June 27th. I am Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White. Chris Towers today on the show.

We have by yourself. I have six players that I want to ask about. We had a pair of prospect debuts, waiver wire moves, and much more. Just a heads up. No rankings, risers, and followers today or any Wednesday night, Thursday morning podcast moving forward because we're moving that one day later. Thursday's a lighter slate.

It's easier for us to kind of let that breathe and have more fun with it. And we don't have to rush through it. So that'll be on Thursday nights moving forward. You're kind of overprone. promising there, Frank. Why is that? He said never again will it happen

on a Thursday? I think it might happen on a Thursday at some point. Never again. Never again. We're moving it for now. I guess is how I should phrase that. Rankings tomorrow, we'll get

into all that, but let's jump in. In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened. All right, players of the night, and we will start with Scott White. Who's wearing an Astro shirt, by the way?

I got to get this off my chest. I've been giving Scott a lot of crap before we started here because... I know. You betrayed me. You betrayed me. I didn't know you were such an Astros hater. Frank, are you wearing a Yankees shirt? No, this is a wrestling shirt.

I was hoping we were all wearing shirts of our favorite teams. Oh, Scott's jumping ship. No, not quite. But I do... It's an Astro's Space City shirt. when it's actually a Jose Al Tuve Shurzy. I like the futuristic lettering on the back and I've always

been a big Jose Altuve fan so yeah, snatched that one up. Did not think it would move Frank Stamphle to tears, but that's fine. That's fine. All right, who's your player? Anywho, you won't ever catch me wearing a Yankee shirt, that's for sure.

Anywho, Gavin Stone, was really good. He was really good here on Wednesday. He threw a complete game shutout. Seven strikeouts, no walks. It was against the White Sox. We should probably state that up front.

Far and away, the worst offense in baseball. But, you know, Gavin Stone has been pitching well. Last 11 starts. He has a 190 ERA, a .96 whip. But his strikeout rate during that time is only 6.8 for the season at 7.1. So he's not succeeding in the way. we normally like pitchers to succeed. I have pointed out during this stretch of dominance

that he has been mixing in a slider more. He's not so change up dependent anymore. And his swinging strike rate is like 12%. It's pretty good for the year, that is. It's pretty good considering he has only a 7.1K per 9. So I think overall Gavin Stone is trending up. I think he's a talented pitcher on a really good team that generally knows how to develop players

and probably has a pretty bright future. Is he overperforming? Yeah, he's overperforming. Of course he is. Any time a pitcher has a sub 2ERA, they are overperforming. Yeah. Except or maybe Jacob de Grom.

It's a year full of pitchers overperforming. And so I guess Gavin Stone needs to be treated, but much like them. much like the Reynaldo Lopez's and the Seth Lugos and I guess to a certain extent, even Ranger Suarez, though I have a little more confidence in him at this point than those others. I have Gavin Stone's 74th in my rest of season rankings. We all have them outside the top 70. And it certainly feels low based on the numbers I just listed off.

I will point out that in that same range are pictures like Jake Irvin. Eric Fetty. Let's see, Brandon fought and Reesel. I'd rather have Garvin Stone than Brandon fought for sure. Yeah, I guess I could probably move him up that far at least. But you go much higher than that. I got Yusay Kakucci 63rd, Nestor Cortez 61st, under Brown 60th. You know, it's, as we've been saying all year,

even if a pitcher's pitching really well and we think he's pretty good. And I'm only willing to go as far as pretty good for Gavin Stone. own. The depth that starting pitcher only allows for so high of a ranking. So maybe I can get him inside the top 65 rather than the top 75, but I don't know that I can go much higher than that. Yeah. And look, the thing to keep in mind, and I feel like this goes for, I don't know, we talk about like three pitchers every night who have like a two something ERA that we don't believe in. And there's always comments that are like, yeah, but they keep doing. And it's like, yes, that is true. And maybe they will continue. you to do it. But I think the thing you have to keep in mind is, when I say this a lot, ERA is just not a very meaningful stat. Now, what I mean by that is I understand you may be yelling

at your podcast device, probably your phone, saying, ERA is one of the five categories in Roto. And it's important for points because you lose points for runs loud, but it's not quite as specifically important, but it's important. We all agree. ERA is arguably the most important stat for pitcher value in fantasy baseball. But from a predictive standpoint, ERA is kind of meaningless. I wrote about this for CBSSports.com. You can go check it out. I looked at the last five years of data. I looked at all pitchers who qualified for the ERA title on the first half the season compared their results to all the pit what they did in the second half. And the first thing that jumps out is like 43% of pitchers who qualify for the ERA title

on the first half of the season don't in the second half because pitching is bad for your body and they get hurt. The other thing that jumps out is that the R squared, which is the correlation. It's a mathematical term that I don't quite understand. But it just generally means the relationship between one number. to another number in the same data set. It runs from 0.0 to 1. 1 being a perfect relationship.

First half ERA would explain second half ERA perfectly. The R squared for ERA from the first half to the second half is 0.06. There is basically no predictive relationship between first half ERA and second half ERA. That also holds true full season versus the next season, etc. Which is all to say that Gavin Stone does have a sub two ERA. over his last 11 starts, and that's really valuable and that's really good. It does not mean he is likely to have a sub 2 or even sub 3 ERA moving forward. The skill set that Gavin Stone has, not many strikeouts.

Good, but not Kyle Hendricks control. And good, but again, not necessarily elite quality of contact suppression. You add it all up. He had a 375XERA entering this start. He actually gave up 23 balls and play with a 91.2. two mile per hour average exit velocity on Wednesday. And White Sox hitters went two for six on batted balls with an XBA of over 500. You can do the math there.

You would expect at least three out of six, probably higher. Which is all to say that Gavin Stone's ERA probably should be more like 375. Okay. But he could still be a must start pitcher if he has a 375 ERA on the Dodgers. Probably not quite must start, but still rosterable certainly. I love the analysis, but it begs the question for me. Okay, if the correlation between first half ERA and second half ERA is basically non-existent. What from the first half would correlate well to second half ERA?

So this is the, like the correlation between XFIP and ERA is stronger, but it's like over the last five seasons, it's like point. 16, I think. So it's like twice as predictive as ERA, but still, there's just the bigger thing is that when you're talking about pitching, it's just everything is noisy, especially ERA. There's just so much that can change from one start to the next, from one month to the next, etc., that unless you have a really long and large sample size, you probably should just assume you don't know very much about what pitchers will do moving forward. I do find it a little odd, and maybe X-FIP isn't the one to use. But I don't feel like we're generally speaking bad at predicting who's a good pitcher and who's a bad pitcher.

Yeah, I mean, there are surprises on both ends of the spectrum. There will always be because nobody can actually predict the future. But I don't think we are so bad at it as to not even try, which is what those correlates. numbers are suggesting. We know skill sets that are good. And we know skill sets that correlate to low ERAs. The thing that's the real takeaway is just that ERA is just super, super, super noisy.

So it's just we're over emphasizing ERA is what you're saying. It's hard because you have to. It's the most important stat for pitchers. It's just that it's not predictive. It's not that we shouldn't use it or it doesn't matter for fantasy. It's just that, and we go back to this example every time. Bryce Elder in the first half last year was very different from Bryce Elder down the stretch last year. Just because someone has a good ERA in the first half doesn't mean they're going to have a good ERA in the second half.

And we use a bunch of different things. You know, I wish there was just an all-encompassing predictive stat that we can use to try and, you know, predict second half ERA. but we know what to look at, or at least we think we do, swinging strike rate and XERA and Sierra, and it's just we look at all of those things to try and decipher, okay, is this pitcher overperforming,

underperforming, or is he just right? Yeah, and, you know, when we get feedback on our pitcher analysis, pretty much always like they're just looking at ERA, you know, or they're not looking at ERA, but they're saying this guy hasn't scored as many fantasy points as you make it sound like you should have. And I go and look,

and it's just because he has an upside-down win-loss record, which win-loss record would be even less predict than ERA, I would think. Yeah. So, yeah, it's just a matter of paying attention to the wrong. So it's a very, very circular way of saying here that we are better at analyzing pitchers than you are with your overemphasis on ERA and WIN. So thanks for that, Chris. And I think it's a good discussion to have because people have asked those

questions and what types of things they should look at for pitchers and what is the most predictive. And I think as a community, we're still kind of figuring that out. But yes, it's a good discussion to have. Chris, over to you, Player of the Night. Gosh, we've gone so long that I, that I forgot. Spencer Arrogatti. We basically analyzed every pitcher for the second half. Yeah, we can kind of move on to just talking about hitters now finally. Yeah, basically. Now, Spencer Arrogatti, who had a 10-strikeout zero-walk performance, which is a pretty remarkable showing against the Rockies away from course field. We mentioned him as a potential streamer, worked out really well if you took that advice,

but I can't say I was super optimistic about Spencer Arrogati's chances of doing this. And it just goes to show you that sometimes, talented pitchers who aren't fully developed yet, and I think that's what Spencer Arigetti is, can look absolutely brilliant in the right matchups. I don't necessarily think this is something we should expect moving forward. However, Spencer Arigetti's two best pitches, by far this season, have been his sweeper and his curveball, and he did throw those second and third most, which has not necessarily been the case for him all of the time this season.

So that's a good sign. His fastball velocity was up 1.2 miles per hour. That's also a good sign. So I think Ergeti is someone who has had a couple of flashes, but on the whole has been pretty terrible this season. And maybe if he starts stacking a couple of starts like this, we can start to talk about him as someone who's more than just a streamer against the very best matchups.

That being said, guys like, let me, let me, I had a list of other pitchers who have had 10 strikeout performances with zero walks. Dane Dunning, DJ Hertz, Casey Mize, Chris Paddock, have all head 10 strikeout zero walk performances this season, and are all very much fringe fantasy options. I think Spencer Arrogati is a fringe fantasy option. Yes. But it was a really good start, and it's something to keep an eye on moving forward.

I think there could be a pitcher there. I think what's most notable is the control has been a mess this year for Arrogetti, and he did not walk anyone in this start. He threw 79% of his pitches for strikes. It was actually his first start with less than two walks this season. Every other start, it's been two, three, four walks consistently. So that's been a problem, and I thought it was very encouraging here. Again, I think there could be a pitcher, but we need to see more and develop that confidence in Arogatee before offering up as him as a waiver wire ad.

Scott, do you agree? Yeah, I have no interest in Aroghetti right now. I mean, his previous two starts were horrible. And there have been some signs that maybe he does have something to work with, as you said, Frank, but I'm a long way from being interested in him for fantasy purposes. All right. Let's quickly take our first break. And when we return, my player of the night, someone who let us down. Louise Heel, we'll talk about it right after this. Shout out to the Mets. They crushed my Yankees. They took the first leg of the subway series,

sweeping both games. I saw this tweet from Jeff Passon. The Mets have won 15 of their last 19 games with a plus 52 run differential. And they are now, one and a half games out of the final wildcard spot. Why does that matter? Because they did a lot of that damage against Luis Heel, who has struggled two starts in a row now here on Wednesday. It was four and a third innings, five runs allowed, four walks, two strikeouts, only had six whiffs on 87 pitches.

His last two starts total, five and two thirds innings, 12 earned runs, six walks, three hit by pitches to just three strikeouts. So the control has been all over the place, the inability to throw strikes here. And I think it's a good reminder that he is a rookie. And, you know, we're kind of, we're approaching a territory in terms of innings that, you know, we haven't really seen with Louise Heel. So, Scott, I will throw it your way. This was one of our buyer cells for later. Did we get duped by Louise Heel?

Well, it depends who you mean by we, and it depends what you mean by duped. So I don't know exactly how to answer that. Semantics, Scott. Come on. Did we get duped by Louise Heel or what? I mean, I think Louise Heel has a lot of upside. I think he has a longstanding history of struggling to throw strikes. And it's reared its ugly head here in his last three starts.

He's thrown only 50, what is it, 56% of his pitches for strikes in his last three starts, which is horrible. It doesn't matter how good your stuff is. if you're throwing strikes at such a low rate, you're not going to have success. In his eight starts prior to that, he threw 63% of his pitches for strikes, which still isn't great, but it's a testament to how good his stuff is

that he was amazing, throwing 63% of his pitches for strikes. Is he throwing fewer strikes now because he's getting run down over the course of the season, which we have been acknowledging is a possibility, and it is a possibility. But there's absolutely no way to conclude that that's absolutely what's happening.

It may just be that he, with his longstanding history of control problems, is encountering more control problems. And I have a little more hope for him overcoming it now than when he was having these control issues in April, because we have seen him overcome it for a span of two months at a time. There's a lot of talent here. He has good stuff. but you know he's he's a rookie and the innings are piling up and we'll see we'll see what happens next that's that's all i really i mean it's not a great time to trade him obviously but we'll see this is why heel was one of the toughest types of breakouts to analyze and for me buy into because it wasn't like oh he's throwing harder or he added a new

pitch. It was literally just he had this gigantic flaw and then he no longer had that flaw overnight, right? Because he had 19 walks and 24 and two thirds innings in the month of April. And then he had a two walk start on April 26th. He had 12 walks and 38 innings in May. And then the last four last three starts. And really he had one poorish control start early on in June. So, So you can just say June overall, 14 walks and 22 and a third innings. And so it's was May real? Did he just get hot? Was he just locked?

Like I tended to be a little more skeptical of it. There are also innings concerns moving forward. That's something that the Yankees have talked about. Very similar situation to Garrett Crochet where he just has not thrown a lot of innings. And so, yeah, I think you might have missed your buy, your cell window. That's not to say that Louise Heel is just going to turn into a pumpkin moving forward. But I think the idea that Luis Heel was just an ace moving forward.

I never bought into that. And I don't see how you could after the last couple of starts. I think the main thing I can say with confidence, Louise Heel is uniquely good at is hit prevention. We have a large enough sample of him doing that with, know, the fly ball tendencies, the bat missing ability. It's kind of like when Christian Javier was at his peak. It's kind of the same strengths and weaknesses.

Obviously, Christian Javier fell off for all kinds of reasons. But if we think of peak Christian Javier when he was first turning into a fantasy asset, it's a lot of the same strengths and weaknesses here for Luis Heel. Luis Heel, by the way, last point here, his innings are now up to 85 and two-thirds on the season. He has thrown a total of 29 and two-thirds. the previous two years entering this season. So less than 30 innings, he's already, he's about to triple that so far this season.

I still think it's a possibility he gets shut down or like move to the bullpen at some point in the second half, but yes, two rough outings in a row here for Luis Heel. Quick reminder to sign up for the FBT newsletter if you haven't already. If you're watching on YouTube, you could scan that QR code

and that will take you right to the website where you click on the FBT logo, you're punching your email address and it's easy as that, you'll get an FBT newsletter delivered right to your inbox for free every single weekday. Let's talk news and notes, and we got this report late last night, and it's interesting to transition from Louise Heel to Garret Crochet.

I kind of feel like they're so tied together in terms of how we're analyzing them this season, but White Sox manager Pedro Grifold said that, said this of Garcce, quote, we're going to start dwindling his workload down a little bit, and then he added, it's not something we're going to put out and say, hey, this is what we're doing because nothing in this game is black and white. He might have five innings where he goes 12 pitches or less, and we might let him go six or seven innings.

Even when we're trying to minimize his workload, it all depends on what he does, he being garret crochet. So this is not surprising. It's something we've talked about as a possibility all season long. The question is, is there anything that we can do from a fantasy perspective?

Is there anything actionable here with Gary Krochay? Well, I mean, you could consider trading him if they look at the latest news on him when they have that offer in their inbox. They're probably going to overreact to it and want to buy him for nickels on the dollar, and you don't want to sell him for nickels on the dollar. I will stress the a little bit on Pedro Full's comment. And he acknowledges in it that there will still be times when he goes six and seven. seven innings.

So will there be more five-inning starts than we were seeing before? Yeah, probably. And that's not great. But he's going to be so dominant over those five-inning stretches that I think you're still going to like having him around. I would say it's going to hurt more in points leagues, had to have points leagues, because fewer quality starts and fewer wins. But those are also the leagues where he get the advantage of starting him a relief pitcher.

So if we thought Garrett Crochet's workload would be unlimited the rest of the way, we'd probably have him as a top 10 pitcher right now. I'm not inclined, I guess, to downgrade him in my rankings, at least not significantly based on this news. But if you could still sell him for his full value, it's something you would at least look at least look at. Of course, it's something to consider. Yeah, if you could.

I'm skeptical that you could, but if you could, sure. Yeah. You know, his value like we have him in the rankings. Which for me is 25. I assume it's similar for you guys. the thing that I expect is like what we saw in his most recent start where I think he got to the sixth inning he was cruising I think he only threw 91 pitches total but he ran into a little trouble and they're probably just going to have a real quick pull hook with him once he hits like 80 pitches it's like he's going to throw 80 pitches and if it takes him four innings to get through 80 pitches that's probably all he's going to throw if he gets through 80 with five innings and he's cruising he's going to start the sixth if he runs into they're probably going to have a real quick hook. So I don't think it's like they're going to shut them down or move them to the bullpen.

But yeah, I think six inning starts will probably be few and far between. But in terms of talent level, I actually believe in Garrett Crochet more than I believe in Louis Heel personally. Oh, yeah. Yeah, me too. The Yankees have been less upfront about what their plans are for limiting heel lately, but they talked openly about it early in the season. I would guess the Clark Schmidt injury probably just changed the timeline.

Right? Like if Clark Schmidt was healthy, we might be seeing more discussions of Luis Heel being limited. And so if he's back in three or four weeks, we'll have those discussions again. Zach Allen threw 67 pitches in a simulated game Monday and we'll next have a bullpen session on Thursday. Max Scherzer said on Monday that he was removed after five innings in his season debut due to thumb soreness, a thumb injury is one of the injuries he was rehabbing on his way back. And despite this, he is still expected to make his next start Friday in Baltimore. Zander Bogartz took batting practice on field Wednesday.

He's on the IL with a broken left shoulder and could return at some point in late July. Justin Verlander hasn't resumed playing catch and will not accompany the Astros to New York this weekend. Josh Young said on Wednesday that he expects to resume swinging a bat in a few days. He's now dealing with inflammation in that. surgically repaired wrist. Brewer's GM, Matt Arnold, said Devin Williams could return from the 60-day I.L. sooner than the initial mid-to-late July timeline.

And I did want to quickly find out what his roster percentage is, because now is probably the time to stash Devin Williams, if you could. 60%. What do you guys think? Yeah, I think he should be stashed pretty much anywhere that you're stashing anyone

on the I.O., I guess. I mean, he might be the top closer in baseball from the time he returns to the end of the season. I think I would bet on him being top five during that span. Yeah, I agree with that. Nolan Aronado returned to the lineup after missing two games with a left forearm injury.

Joey Ortiz was removed due to a neck injury. Jamer Candelario was out of the lineup due to hamstring tendonitis. Apparently, he's been nursing the issue for more than a week and is considered day-to-day. The Reds announced that Nuelvi-Martio, has rejoined the team after completing his rehab assignment with AAA, and it sounds like he could be in the lineup Thursday when he's first eligible.

61% rostered for Marte, who had a rough rehab assignment, basically his spring training, re-upping his spring training. Do you think Marte needs to be more than 61% rostered right now? I don't think he needs to be much more rostered than 61%. I just wrote about him for the prospects report that's going to be on the site Thursday. So to give you the specific numbers, he went 8 for 53 and 12 games. That's a 151 batting average. He went 1 for 22 in his final five games at AAA.

Manager David Bell said that they get process grades for the at-bats. So they're not just looking at the results. They're looking at the process. and those have been right on track. They're satisfied with the way Nuel V. Martes looked. And so, you know, maybe it'll go fine. Maybe he just, you know, like you said, it's a spring training and things will click pretty quickly.

But I think given the way things have played out this year for young hitters, the difficult time they've had keeping their head above water in the majors, like you don't want to put someone in your lineup right away who hasn't even come up for air yet, much less keeping his head above water, you know? Yeah. So a lot of upside for an LVV no LV Marte. Leagues where you roster more hitters like Roto.

Sure. Leagues where James Wood is rostered. No LV. Marte should be rostered. But even though he's being activated Thursday, I still view him as more of a stash than somebody you can count on in fantasy. I will say, I do expect him to play more or less every day. Oh, he'll play. It's just will he be? Well, but there was some concern about that early in the season. Yeah, but now. Yeah.

Yeah. When we thought things we were going to play out normally for offense. Yeah. Sure. He's an unproven player. He was great last six weeks of last season. But now, again, it's been a punishing environment for young hitters especially. And he's not, we're not sure he even has his timing down because he was so bad at AAA.

So I think you got to wait to use no healthy Marti. but yeah, I'm sure the Reds will use them a lot. I would say any categories league, probably not all head to head points leagues is where I would say Noah would be Marte should be rostered. And that might just be pretty close to where he's at already. Yeah. Noel V Amarte 25% rostered on Yahoo.

I know those are typically head to head categories, shallower lineups. Shallower, yeah. Yeah, so, but it probably should be higher than 25% there, I think. Lars Newport could begin a rehab assignment as soon as this weekend. He's been out since late May with a strain left left oblique. Spencer Turnbull was removed from his start after just three innings due to a sore right shoulder.

Apparently he felt a little grab in that right shoulder but isn't especially concerned about the injury. Gary Sanchez was placed in the IL with a left calf strain and one prospect update. The twins will promote pitching prospect David Festa to make his Major League debut Thursday in Arizona. Chris Paddock was placed in the aisle earlier this week so that created an opening in the rotation. Chris and I had the chance to talk about Festa on yesterday's podcast. So Scott, a quick opinion on David Festa. He's 12% rostered. Is this somebody you're interested in for fantasy?

Would you be looking at him in deeper leagues? Your thoughts? I mean deeper leagues where we were adding like DJ Hers and Kate Povich? Sure. I think he's, I think David Festa is about on that level. Impressive strikeout numbers in the minors. I've frequently come close to writing about him in the problem. prospects report, but just the number of base runners he allows between the walks and the hits,

always steered me away and towards somebody else. When you're getting strikeouts, you're doing something right. And so I think there's upside to consider with David Festa. And it wouldn't be the most shocking thing ever if he had success, particularly in an environment that favors pitching right now. But I don't think he's a priority ad until we see him have some of that success. Let's take our final break when we return buy or sell right after this. Let's play a little buy or sell and this isn't just, hey, I'll present a player. Are you buying him?

Are you selling him? I'll give you guys a statement and you tell me if you're buying or selling that statement. Gavin Stone, we talked about earlier, just quickly get this out of the way. I had it as a top 50 starting pitcher rest of the season. Do you buy or sell? I undermined that by saying I could get them in my top 65. So I guess I'm selling that. Yeah, I moved him up, but he's still outside of the top 50.

It's hard without the strikeouts to get up there. Luis Heel. Scott didn't want to answer it, but we got duped. Did we get duped? Buy yourself. Are you buying that? Well, I still don't know exactly what you mean because we've always been very measured in our analysis. So I'm going to say no.

We did not get duped. All right. He's selling it. Some of us did. Not like us three, the royal us. I think there were... It's confusing. There were people who thought he was an ace.

And he's probably not that. He may still be the Yankees ace. You missed your window to sell high. You buy that. I'm going to sell. I think Luis Heel will go on another run that gives you another chance to do that. All right.

Let's talk about George Kirby, who turned in a strong start at the raise, six innings, one run, seven strikeouts, 13 whiffs on 87 pitches, and over his last six starts, a 170 ERA, a 0.86 whip, 39 strikeouts over 37 innings. He's been mixing in that slider more. Buy or sell.

Kirby will be the best Mariners pitcher rest of season. I have Logan Gilbert ranked higher, so I guess I have to sell. It's just extremely funny that if we asked this three starts ago, there's no way anyone says bye, right? It's 100% Luis Castillo and then he's had a couple of poor starts. Oh, I didn't even think about it. Luis Castillo. Yes, I have them both ahead of George Kirby. I think it's really close ranking those three starters.

I have those three all as top 15 starters. I have Gilbert one spot behind Kirby. I have Castillo a couple spots ahead of both. They're all awesome. I'll sell because there are two other guys that I think it could be. Any analysis or anything you'd like to add on Kirby before we move on? He's good. I still wish there were more strikeouts.

We got through that so quick. Frank and you want us to drag it out more. I know, I know. I just like, you know, the Kirby fans out there might have been like, oh, well, you, you know, you breeze past George Kirby. He's no Donkey Kong, okay? He just, he, I kind of think he is what he is. And what he is is just south of ace level as a starting pitcher for fantasy. But I also think Luis Castillo and Logan Gilbert are just below ace level for fantasy. So it's not a knock on him. He's really good. good. Yeah. Kirby, great video game, by the way. I do agree, Scott. Donkey Kong better. I loved, loved, love playing as Kirby and Smash Brothers just sucking someone in and then jumping off the ledge.

You both die, but it's annoying for the person you did it to. See, I was going to bring that up because I've been playing a lot of the original Smash Brothers with my kids lately. Donkey Kong is my favorite character to be. And I could, I could probably go five over Kirby, five different. I could have. Oh, yeah, no. I only want to be curvy so I control people by sucking them in and jumping off the left.

I've been reading it up on it online. And you know, Donkey Kong has his flaws, but I just think, I just, I like having a character with big power moves, you know? You can't trust those tier lists, Scott. It's all subjective. Wow. Yeah. I've gotten familiar with all of them because you had to to unlock the characters, which

took way too much time. The amount of time that I spent in my life playing Kirby's superstar for Superniport, that Megaton Punch game where you try to crack the earth is an ungodly amount of time. I don't know if anyone here has played it, but it is so, so, so fun, and I highly recommend it. Let's talk about Jackson Trio. He has been hitting better as of late,

two for four with an inside-the-park home run, his eighth homer of the season. Last 20 games, he's betting 3-11, with three homers, 11 runs, 13 RBI, one steal, strikeout rate is down, still way too many ground balls, but average exit velocity slowly climbing, Buy or sell.

Truro is starting to turn the corner and will matter for fantasy in the second half. Absolutely buying. I definitely think Jackson Truro will matter for fantasy. What does that mean? What does matter mean? He already matters in deep five outfielder leagues.

Right. I... He must start outfielder. He must start. That is matter. Let's say at top... I'm going to sell his... So the numbers I pulled up on

on Jackson Chorio. I always go to reference them and then I can't pick his name out of my mini notes here. Okay, Jackson Chorio. In June, 302 batting average, three home runs,

one steel 840 OPS. It's good, I guess. If you can trust his hottest stretch of the season to be what he does the rest of season, then I guess we could take that. You know, that's probably pretty close to a 20-homer pace

and a 10-steal pace and a solid batting average and all of that. And his strikeout rate is 20% and his average exit velocity, 89.4 during the month of June. So that's up one mile per hour from the rest of the season. It's still not a lot of power. It's still not a lot of speed. And this is as hottest stretch of the season.

And I just, I think he'll be good next year. But I'm going to sell Jackson Chorio being good, being somebody, people care about even in three outfielder leagues. I'm going to sell that in the second half. Okay. I am buying it. 78% rostered. I think if you have just someone on your bench, it doesn't really matter, or just a slumping hitter, someone you could just cut bait with,

I would try and stash Jackson Trio now just in case we get one of these crazy blow-up second half. We saw from, like, Gunner Henderson or Julio Rodriguez in years past. And I'll note also that those three home runs I'm referring to includes this inside the Parker, which was a soft single to center, basically, that the center field are dove for. So it doesn't even really count. His average launch angles. It's not predictive. His average launch angle in June is down to two degrees, which is even lower than it was before.

So yeah, he's hit. And look, given his profile, it might not be a bad idea right now to hit more ground balls, be more of a slap hitter, and then grow into the power. But yeah, I don't think the upside is incredibly high without improvement. But I think we're seeing signs of improvement. He's hitting the ball harder, like Scott said. Strikeout rates down below 20% since start of May. And I just, the chances that he does figure it out, like Frank said, are worth betting on. Let's talk about Carlos Correa, who continued his hot month on Wednesday, three for four with a double RBI, two runs scored.

In June, he's batting 382, four homers, 17 runs, 18 RBI, a 986 OPS, buy or sell. Carlos Correa will be better than Bo Bichet for the rest of season. Oh, that's fun. Here's a list of three short stops I moved Carlos Correa ahead of in my rankings just today. Boba Chet, so bye. Bryson Stott moved him ahead of him. And Anthony Volpe. I'm in Carlos Correa, top 12 shortstop the rest of the season.

His underlying numbers are all terrific. Actually almost as good as his top line numbers. he's driving in runs, which was the problem for him two years ago when he was a really good hitter and just wasn't that great for fantasy because the runs in RBI were low. That hasn't been the problem so far.

So I don't see much reason to be skeptical aside from injury risk, and he's not hurt right now. Yeah, I'm going to sell. I'm going to sell. Doesn't run, gets hurt all the time. I think he'll be worth keeping around in fantasy, but, man,

You guys, man, I was the downer on Bo Bichick coming in, and I still don't love him, but I think he's going to be top 12 rest of season, and I'm not ready to predict that for Carlos Gerea. Let's talk about Lane Thomas, who has been really good since returning from injury. He went one for two with two walks and two RBI here on Wednesday, and 29 games since returning. It's a 287 batting average, six homers, 24 runs, 24 RBI, and six steals. That is a 30-30 pace over 150 games. games. Buy or sell.

Lane Thomas is a top 30 outfielder rest of season. Oh, I'm not far off in my rest of season rankings. I will, let me double check. I have him 33rd. So in the strictest sense, I will sell. But is there a big difference between 33 and 28? Not at all, no. No.

I just think you guys are really low on Lane Thomas. I was looking around the rankings, and I have them, I think, 24th or 25th? Is there a big difference between 33 and 24 or 25? It's a pretty big difference, Scott. This is not. All right, I just wanted to give him his credit.

Last 28 days, Lane Thomas is a top three outfielder in Roto and a top four outfielder and head to head points. So, he's an outfielder. That's been awesome. Yeah, I mean, that's the past month. But the season didn't start 28 days ago. He had roughly half of that,

of his full season was pretty awful before this. So, you know, he was out hurt for a while. It came back. He's good now. Right, but he was healthy to start the season and was terrible. He had a 503 OPS through the end of, through his injury. Even if you look at the full season numbers, 3.4 fantasy points per game that is top 10 in the outfield.

That's, geez, how is it that high? Come on, guys. Lane Thomas, I'm telling you. Moving on up. Move them up. I don't understand that. That's like a, yeah, I guess he's on like a, he's on like 105 RBI pace.

That's not real. All right. Well, that was our buy yourself segment. Let's talk about some prospect debuts. The Guardians promoted first baseman slash outfielder Jean Kenzie Noel. And if you're looking for him, how to spell that name. It's J-H-O-N-K-E-N-S-Y.

That's the first name there, Jean-Kenzie. And he was in the lineup at first base batting sixth. He homered in his very first at bat, which came off of Grayson Rodriguez, 106.5, exit velocity, 413 feet. Very interesting batting stance. Big power, big boy. 6 foot 3, 250 pounds.

He's 22 years old. He was crushing the minors this season as well. 6% rostered on CBS. Any enthusiasm here for Jean-Kenzie Noel? I have a decent amount of enthusiasm for him. He hit a ball 118.4 miles per. hour at AAA, which is a number topped by only three major leaguers this year. So we're talking big time power for Jean Kinsey Noel.

And if you watch that, I mean, just go look at the highlight of that home run. He hit off Grayson Rodriguez, the sound, the part of the park it left. Big time power for Jean-Kinzee Noel. Now, the reason he hasn't been especially hyped is he's got some holes in his game here. He chases a lot. And it actually held him back in the minors the previous two years. He made enough strides this year that he was able to dominate AAA. But that's something major league pitchers, I would say likely will exploit.

And so the odds of Jean-Kinzee, Noel being a big impact player in fantasy, I want to consider them especially high. But there's a chance. I think there's a chance for him making like a Framil Reyes type of image. That's exactly the, yeah. Yeah, and Reyes had a couple of really useful years in fantasy. So there are playing time issues because body-wise, he's really just a first basement, and the Guardians already have a great one of those.

But I was reading Stephen Vogt, their manager said they liked how he looked in the outfield in spring training when they used him some there. And he's played at some of the minors. So it sounds like they're at least open to the idea of having Jean-Kin-Z-Nuel play some outfield. So I think he'll get chances. And I think in deeper roto leagues, at least he's worth a look.

Yeah, this is a guy who like was not even a top 10 Guardians prospect coming into the season by nearly every list. But a big part of that is he's a first basement only. Like he might be able to fake it in the outfield. But from everything I've read, he's not considered a good first basement either. And so the bar as a prospect,

if you can barely play first base is incredibly high. But like, could he be a mid to high 700s-ish OPS bat who hits 25 homers over a full season? I think that's a reasonable possibility. It's on the higher end. But yeah, I'm interested. He should be added in certainly any L-AL-only league, but I'd say even some 15-team Roto's. Let's talk about Giants pitching prospect Hayden Birdsong, who made his season debut, his major league debut, excuse me, up against the Cubs, four and two thirds,

innings, three runs allowed, three walks, five strikeouts, had nine whiffs on 97 pitches. It was a four pitch mix for Birdsong, 54% fastball, 22% change up, 14% slider, 10% curve, easy velocity, average 96.2 miles per hour here. Chris, what did you think of Birdsong's debut? Yeah, so reading about Birdsong, the thing that stood out was when he was in college and early in the minors. He was getting a lot of whiffs with his fastball when he was like sitting 91, 92. He averaged 96 today. He hit 98. That fastball looks like a legitimate major league weapon. And it's a four pitch mix. I mean, he threw the slider change up curve all at least 10% of the time. It wasn't an amazing debut. It wasn't the type of debut that should force you to run out

and add him, but again, in NL only leagues, I think Hayden-Burnsong should be added. It's a great park. And I think even in 15-teamers, he's worth a look if you're desperate for starting pitcher. Scott, how would you rank Birdsong, Festa, and Christian Scott? Just pitching prospects either just called up or getting ready to be called up. Oh, Scott clearly is at the top the list. For the other two, I guess I'll go Birdsong over Festa just because, you know, he looked okay in his debut here and that's enough to inch him ahead. But I put them on about the same level as far as prospect potential goes.

One fact that may not be a fact, but I think I saw it. Hayden Birdsong and Hayden Wesniewski pitched against each other. First time the two pitchers named Hayden faced off in a game. I'm like 95% sure that's true. it's definitely true that it happened I don't know if it's the first time it's ever happened well there are only three major leaguers named Hayden and one of them retired in 2010

so I'm going to say it's true I'm going to call that one that's probably true yeah there you go look at you good call uh I don't know why I said bird song I mean he I guess when I say he looked good like the stuff looked interesting he obviously didn't have a good performance so I don't know maybe that inches fast ahead

I don't know. I don't care about those two as much as I care about Christian Scott. Long story short. I agree with that. Well, somebody I'm pretty sure you do care about is Jared Kelnick. Let's talk Waverwire hitters. And a huge day for Kelnick across the doubleheader, six for nine total with a homer, four RBI, and the steel. Last 16 games, he's betting 3.39 with five homers, 13 RBI and three steals.

What size league does Kelnick need to be rostered in? He's up to 61% rostered. So you could say, you know, 12-team three outfielders, 12-team-five-outfielders, something deeper than that. What do you think about Kelnick? Any five-outfielder league. Well, we're not up to three outfielder leagues yet. He's not a must. Oh, definitely not a must.

Could I see a scenario where I add him in a three outfielder league? Sure. I mean, I had him pretty high on the sleeper hitters list for this week. And so far, so good, as far as that goes. Yeah, I like that he's running more in the lead-off spot. All three of his steals have come. in his, I think, the last three weeks. And he's hitting for some power.

And obviously hitting for average, too, still striking out too much, still struggles against sliders in particular. But... I think he homered off a slider today, though. Yeah, and he had a home run off a cutter, which I know isn't a slider, but it's kind of similar the other day

becoming the first left-hander Homer off Nestor Cortez this year. And, you know, those numbers against changeups aren't so bad. Like, I think, you know, we were talking about Jackson Chorio and your hope for him rest of season. I think I have a little more hope for Jared Kelnick, which maybe is revealing of how I feel about Jackson Chorio because I don't rank Jared Kelnick as the top 50 outfield of rest

of season. But I, in that leadoff spot for the Braves, I think he's going to be, I think he's going to be certainly more useful than Jackson Chorio is. been so far. How would you guys rank these corner infielder's rest of season? They're all less than 60% rostered on CBS. Ryan O'Hern, Nathaniel Lowe, and Jose Miranda. They all did something of note here on Wednesday. I think I'd go Lowe O'Hern Miranda. Man, Lowe has been so bad, but he's the one everyday player of these three, I guess. I mean, he's had the best. I have a check in a while. Yeah, he is.

And he's had the best season of them all and probably the second. Oh, and like in history. Yeah. Yeah. He might have had the second and third best seasons among them as well. Yeah, I guess so. I guess so. Just because of the playing time.

But man, the production has been so lacking so far. But, you know, Miranda's the only one of these three you can play at third base, which might put him at the top of the list in terms of usefulness. But, yeah, I mean, just in terms of all positions being equal, I'll go low Miranda O'Hern. Low O'Hern, Miranda. Any interest in these outfielders? Brandon Marsh had a huge game in Detroit, 4-4-4 with his seventh home run, added 4 RBI. Matt Veerling, 2-4 with his 10th homer, had a huge May but has slowed down quite a bit here in June.

And Miguel Andohar keeps on hitting. It's just kind of empty, 2-4 with nothing else here. in this game. Any interest in those outfielders? Marsh, Veerling, Andahar. I think this was Marcia's first homer in two months. He was on the IL for a while. Yeah, he missed some time.

But I think the last time he had homered was April 26th. This was a good start or good performance. He's had stretches where he's been useful in the past. But we know what Brandon Marsh is. He's a platoon bat who gets hot occasionally and can be useful, but not someone that I think needs to be Ross. Even 46%, like that even feels a little high. Okay.

Some names in deeper leagues. Either of these matter. Andrew McCutcheon, one for five with his 11th home run. Last 38 games, pretty big sample size at this point. He's batting 282 with eight homers, 30 run scored, and right around an 850 OPS. Again, that's McCutcheon, Utah only. and Kyle Higashioca

once a Yankee, always a Yankee. Three for four with a double dong, six RBI, a massive game here filling in for Luis Camp Usano. And if he has a couple more of these, I wonder if we could get a little bit of a Wally Pip situation here out in San Diego. But any interest, Scott, deeper leagues. McCutcheon, Hagashoka.

Yeah, I mean, McCutcheon, not so much Higashioca. I don't think Luis CampuSano is going to be out for long. Higashioca. was cutting into his playing time anyway, but it's still not a question which Padre's catcher. I'd rather have rest of season. But McCutcheon, I'm genuinely surprised. He's been going that well for that long. I think his DH-only status.

It's interesting, you said UTIL-only status, which I guess is the same thing, but it's interesting that you chose that terminology when I like DH-only. Anyway, I guess that makes McCutcheon easy to overlook. I mean, we were having trouble getting J.D. Martinez rostered in 70% of leagues. And so McCutcheon's going to be a tough fit, I think, in standard 12 team leagues. But in deeper leagues, sure. The thing that's really tough with McCutcheon is, and it's actually surprising,

it's the U-Till only is what makes it tough. You use U-Till only too. DH-only, whatever. I think D-H-only is more descriptive because U-Til-only makes it sound like he should be able to play everywhere. It's the one, I think it's just the one link that I have him in. we use UT and so that that's in my mind. I did add him in

Tout Wars because it's an OVP League. I am surprised at how much he's play. Oh, every day. Like, every day. He has started 36 in the last 40 games for the Pirates. And if I'm remembering correctly, he is tore his

Achilles last year, right? Partial. Partial to. Yeah, like that's wild how much he's playing and how well he's playing given that. But yeah, it's just it's hard to say yeah this guy should be 70% rostered when there are at least three other you slash d h only players out there and it's already kind of hard to to fit a jd martinez into your lineup like i'm in one league where i've got vlad grero as my d h i there's no there's no point in me

adding andrew mccutcheon in that league you know chris don't fall for sky you don't have to say dh i just checked three different fantasy providers. They all use utility as the hitter you put in that spot. No, I understand, but they probably list that player's position as DH. It's utility versus DH are very different terms. Right. In baseball. You're going to admit.

Yeah, one is David Ortiz, one is Alfredo Emesaica. Hold on. This whole discussion just goes out the window. I just realized Andrew McCutcheon has outfield eligibility on CBS now. I didn't notice. I have him in the Scott White Dynasty League. I just clicked on his name.

It says, it's his outfit. Yeah, he's only started two games in the outfield, but I guess he's moved there enough that he picked it up. That helps. Yeah.

There you go. 15 team, five outfielder leagues. Yeah, I think. Sure. That just happened a few days ago, yeah. Yeah. Wow.

Look at that. One where he came in as a pinch, two where he came in as a pinch hitter and then played the alfew. What a loophole, my goodness. Waiverwire pitchers. a pretty light night on Wednesday. We spoke about Aragutti. Any interest in these names, deeper leagues.

Luis Ortiz of the Pirates, Joey Estes of the Oakland A's, and then game two of the doubleheader between the Cardinals and the Braves. Both Bryce Elder and Matthew Libertor pitched well against each other. I don't know if they're going to stick around. Any of those names matter? Pretty deep league stuff. I mean, it was interesting for both of them

because, I mean, Bryce Ellis, Elder and Matthew Liberator are pitchers that we haven't, that we've kind of written off in fantasy, right? And they both pitch great. And their velocity was way up on, they made interesting pitch decisions. And velocity was up on their most effective pitches on the day. Like more than a mile per hour.

It was almost up two miles per hour for Elder on both his, his sinker and his four seamer. And then he got all the whiffs on the slider, which he threw way more than usual. And he was on a good run at AAA. His last four starts there, 270 RA 104 whip 12.5K per 9. And then as for Liberator,

he got 10 whiffs on his slider, which he threw more, and which was up 1.4 miles per hour. So like if that continues, maybe they could become, something in fantasy. I think we're a long way from concluding that, and as you said, it's not even clear they're going to stick around, but

I'm interested in seeing how the next start goes for both Bryce Elder and Matthew Liberator. I could at least say that much. Let's wrap up with some leftovers and quickly talk about some pitchers. Dylan Cease ended his recent slump with a dominant start against the Nationals.

Seven shutout innings with nine strikeouts. Grayson Rodriguez, a quality start up against the Guardians. Seven innings, two runs, four strikeouts. Ryan Pepio, a bounce back start against the Mariners. Five and a third, one run, eight strikeouts. Brady Singer, a great start up against the Marlins. Seven and a third, one run, five strikeouts.

Chris, anything you'd like to add on Singer, Pepio, Grayson Rodriguez, and Cease. With Cease in particular, we noted that when he was struggling, what was weird about it was that it wasn't because of control. and that's always been the issue for him. And so the fact that he bounced back here makes me feel justified in my lack of concern there.

He is a top 10 starting pitcher of the rest of the way for me. I didn't move him down one spot in my rankings. Pepio, I don't know, man. I want to buy in. I want to believe that he's good. That fastball is an elite pitch, but I just, I don't know if the margin for errors

is wide enough to make him a must-reform. pester pitcher for fantasy. I think there's lots of upside there, but I think there's consistency is going to be an issue. And then Brady Singer, all that stuff we talked about, about ERA, not being predictive, is very much about Brady Singer. I just don't believe in it at all.

He is a pitcher that I am perfectly content dropping even after a start like this. And one thing that makes it easier to dismiss Brady Singer is only three times, in his past nine starts now. Has he gone even six innings? So how useful has he been really? I don't know what his win-loss record is,

but if he has a lot of wins, there's been a lot of luck with that. I want to mention for Ryan Pepio that the shape of his slider, so he threw his fastball more, it's his best pitch, all of that. But the shape of his slider in this one was a little bit different,

more vertical, less horizontal. It may just be random variation and back to normal in his next. next start, but he got more whiffs with it. It was a more effective pitch for him. And so that might be a good sign for Pepio, something to pay attention to next timeout. I know rankings are tomorrow, but these three catchers, Cal Raleigh hit a home run, Yiner Diaz had three hits, having a big June, and Francisco Alvarez, three for three with

his fourth home run. And in 14 games since returning, he's batting 415 with a 1232 OPS. How do you guys rank Raleigh, Diaz, and Alvarez? rest of season. Raleigh Alvarez Diaz is how I have them ranked, but Alvarez, I think, is the most upside, sort of like Mark Vientos, very encouraged by the reduction in strikeout rate this year.

It's down to 21%. And this could be, this could be the big breakout. We could look back on this season and say it was the big breakout season for Alvarez. It's just obviously kind of been delayed by him missing so much time. They are back-to-back. my rankings.

Alvarez. Raleigh Diaz for me. Yeah, I get it. I have them the exact opposite way, but I don't feel good about it, man. There is something about Francisco Alvarez. I mean, have you heard, like, have you heard the way the Mets talk about him?

Oh, there were quotes. The other day, I think there were three different player quotes where a player said, I love that guy. Like, that was a, direct quote. Like, he is like the most well-liked player in the locker room, that the pitchers adore him. Like, it's one of those situations where it just kind of feels like he's becoming a really

complete ball player in a way that I think is going to show up in the hitting at some point as well. And I heard this recited a few times on the broadcast. It's something we never talk about because it doesn't matter for fantasy. But the Mets win-loss record when Alvarez is in the lineup versus when he's not is hugely different this year. I think they said 19 and 8 or 20 and 8 when Alvarez is in the lineup now.

So now Alvarez is taking Grimmis's credit? What's going on here? No, it's always Grimmis. Don't get a twisted, man. It's always all the credit to Grimmis whenever we can make that happen. All praise be to Grimis. Let's go.

Some other hitting leftovers, Otani became the first Dodger ever to record an RBI in 10 straight games during that stretch. 15 hits, eight homers, 14 runs, 17 RBI, one steal in 10 games. Bonkers. Is he on like 140 run and 140 RBI pace right now?

65 and 61 at the end of June, you probably double those. So like 120, 1.30, but still, my gosh. I mean, we thought the NL was safe for this first year, Shohei Otani is in it. We thought, okay, well, the MVP, the MVP award can go to somebody else at least. least for this one year where Otani's not pitching, but it may not matter.

He would be the first DH to win MVP if that happened, right? In the NL. Has it happened in the AAL? Did Ortiz ever win one? Edgar Martinez won an MVP, didn't he? No. No? Might be then, yeah?

Get out of town. Yeah. Edgar Martinez won an MVP. He hit like 350. It's pretty good. I'm just kind of assuming. because I know David Ortiz. Paul Molliter.

No, I don't know why this gave me Paul Molliter. What's going on? Yeah. World Series most valuable player. What is happening? Why did it give me that as the answer? Google is broken. All right, let's keep it moving.

Aaron Judge became the first to 30 home runs, two for two with his 30th home run. Gunner Henderson is unstoppable right now, three for four with his 26th homer of the season. Big game for Altuve, two for five, with two steals and two RBI. Mani Machado picking things up last 11 games, 381 batting average, two homers, eight runs, eight RBI. Cedric Mullins, heating back up last 16 games, batting 358 with two homers and four steals.

And Willie Castro stayed hot, two for four, with his seventh home run. He's up to 47 runs scored in the season. That is a really good number there for Willie Castro. Some bullpen updates for the Mariners. Andres Munoz entered the ninth with a four-run lead. He gave up two walks and a hit by pitch without recording an out. He was relieved by Trent Thornton, who recorded all three outs for his first save and just been a weird past month or so for Munoz.

I know he's been dealing with that back injury. Some ineffectiveness here and there could be related, obviously. But it hasn't been good for his fantasy value. For the Orioles, Craig Kimball walked one but struck out three for his 17. For the Cardinals in game two, Ryan Helsley gave up a hit and a walk, but picked up his 28th save, which leads all of baseball. And for the Giants, Camillo DeVall gave up a hit, but struck out one for his 14th save. To stream or not to stream on Thursday. We have David Festa, his Major League debut at the D-Backs.

There's Jordan Hicks against the Cubs, Trevor Rogers at the Phillies, Andrew Abbott at the Cardinals, Miles Michaelis versus the Reds? I don't believe that this Davis Daniel is that's an OOTP created player. I have never heard of such things. I drafted him in a draft and hold league. I don't think I want. Miles Michaelis, I think could be decent.

Yeah. Not in Cincinnati, so that helps. and Andrew Abbott, I guess, but I don't really believe his success. Yeah, if you're forcing me to pick one Andrew Abbott at St. Louis, just because that's the worst offense listed here. But I'm not thrilled to do it. On Friday, some options.

Mitchell Parker at the raise, Albert Suarez versus the Rangers. Drew Thorpe is facing the Rockies in Chicago. James and Tyone at the Cubs. I mean, at the Brewers, excuse me, Colin Ray versus the Cubs. Any of those names? Mitchell Parker at the Rays

was a sleeper pitcher for this week, so I don't mind streaming him at all. Okay. My second choice would probably be Drew Thorpe. Yeah, it would be Drew Thorpe for me, and I've been pretty lukewarm on him, so don't love it, yeah. We just saw what Spencer Arrogatti did,

so maybe, Maybe Drew Thorpe can maybe not do exactly that, but have a good start against the Rockies. We are going to wrap there for Scott and Chris. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning into fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. And we will be back again tomorrow. Bye-bye.