Fantasy Baseball Today - Charlie Morton's Struggles, Rankings Movers & Buy-Low Hitters (4/28 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: April 28, 2022

Zac Gallen and Joe Ryan were awesome on Wednesday (1:00). How high are they moving up the rankings? ... Taylor Ward is on fire (9:50)! How do we rank Ward, Tommy Pham, Max Kepler, and Anthony Santander? ... Eric Hosmer deserves more respect (17:08)! ... What is going on with Charlie Morton (22:25)!? Do we sit him for now? ... News and notes (31:41): Adalbert Mondesi is headed to the IL. ... Let's take a look at rankings risers and fallers (37:52). ... Which hitters should you look to buy right now (49:53)? ... We wrap up with bullpen updates and streamers (59:40). 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 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 league. With fantasy! Now here's Frank Scott and Chris. Uncle Charlie, what is going on, man? Welcome into Fantasy Baseball today on Thursday, April 28th.

Frank Stamphill joined by Chris Towers. Today on the show, we've got rankings, risers, and fallers. by low hitters, stack cast edition. We'll have that Charlie Morton conversation, try and figure out what's going on there. And of course, recap all of Wednesday's action. But first, take it away, Susan. Oh, my goodness gracious.

All right, Chris, who do you have? Oh, my goodness gracious, from Wednesday. I blanked for a second, because I've been having internet problems and I was trying to sort them out. But Zach Allen is who I have. He went up against the Los Angeles Dodgers today. and once again was quite good.

No earn runs, two hits, two walks, five strikeouts, and six innings. Not a ton of swinging strikes, only nine on, what was it, 90 pitches. So not a great swinging strike rate, but it had been okay in the previous couple of starts. And I don't know, he looks pretty good. We're kind of in an interesting spot here early on in the season where some of the guys that we had big injury, question marks have looked really awesome. And it raises the question, like, how should you value Pablo Lopez, who was amazing again tonight, and Carlos Rodon, who's arguably been the best pitcher in baseball so far.

And a few other guys like that, and Zach Allen's right there where he had that UCL damage last year, Scott said he was more likely to have Tommy John surgery than any player in baseball. And that still may be true. And so what do you do with that information? how do you value a guy who looks really good right now? You know, his velocity is actually higher than it's ever been. He averaged 94.8 miles per hour with his fastball today. His career high for a season before this season was 93.4 last year.

So he was up 1.4 miles per hour in this start from where he was a year ago. That's not nothing. That's quite a bit, actually. And so it's a question of, yeah, he looks really good right now. He looks healthy right now. But looks healthy right now is a lot different from will be healthy in May, June, July, August, September. And so it can be easy to get lulled into a false sense of security with a Carlos Rodon, a Pablo Lopez, a Zach Gallen when they're pitching well. and say, you know, the reasons that you might have faded them in the off season,

well, they're gone now, right? Look how good he's pitching. And it's like, well, no. Because the question of this is what we talked about with Jacob Bagram. The question isn't just, is Zach Allen healthy right now? It's, is Zach Allen healthy right now? Can Zach Allen pitch effectively right now? And the answer to those two is clearly yes.

But then it's the question of, can he remain healthy? that's a much bigger question mark. And one that frankly we still don't know the answer to. It's tough, but looks really good right now. Indeed, he does. For all the reasons you mentioned, the velocity being up, entering the start, his swinging strike rate on the season was basically where he's been at his entire career.

He's done a great job limiting hard contact and keeping the walks down, just four walks through three starts for Zach Allen. That's routinely been an issue for him. You look at his career over three walks per nine. And again, just four walks. through his first three starts. So he looks great so far. I know we're going to talk a lot

about rankings today, Chris, and I moved him up to SP44 after this most recent starting. And he did this against the Dodgers. He went toe to toe with Julio Arias in this start. Outpinch Julio Arreus, I would say. Inside my top 50 starting pitchers, he is right in that range just behind

Patrick Sandoval, Lazzardo, Tyler McGill, Kyle Wright. So it's kind of like that breakout crew of starting pitchers. Zach Allen's just behind them. but I acknowledge if he continues to pitch this well, given what he showed us in the past, that he could continue to climb pretty rapidly up the rankings.

Look, trying to figure out whether or not you want to sell high, like if you can turn Zach Allen into Charlie Morton right now, which we'll talk about in a little bit, would you do that? Absolutely, you should, yes. Okay. If you could turn Zach Allen into someone like Tyler Malley right now, I think that would be a viable buy-low, sell high opportunity. So I moved Galen.

Not as extreme, obviously. I move Gallin one spot ahead of Tyler Malley. I wouldn't be willing to do that. I haven't put Gowlin inside of my top 50 yet. I think there's some good signs with Malley despite the struggle so far. So I'm not ready to do that yet. But, you know, I guess that's reasonable enough.

I don't know. And I'm going to have some by low hitters later on, but just a little bit of a sneak peek. If you could turn Gowan into somebody like, this seems obvious. Jose Ibrayu, sure, go out and do it. Stackass numbers are still amazing. Mitch Haninger is,

another one where the expected batting average, the expected slug. I know he's missed some time with COVID, but he's going to be back hopefully shortly. Mitch Hanneger is another one where if I could turn Zach Allen into Hanager, I would look to do that as well. Oh my goodness gracious for me. Another pitcher, Chris, and it is Joe Ryan. Another amazing start. This one up against the Tigers, seven shutout innings, one hit, one walk, nine strikeouts, 15 swinging strikes on 90 pitches. Nine of those came on the fastball. Five of those came on the slider. Now three straight quality for Joe Ryan. During that stretch, he has allowed just eight hits, one run, two walks, 21 strikeouts. And I talked about this a few times already this season. I love the increased slider usage

for Joe Ryan because last year he was throwing the fastball a bunch. And it's a good fastball. It's a deceptive fastball. It might not look that way because he only throws like 91, 92 miles per hour. But he's got this whole vertical approach angle thing going on where he hides the fastball. and it just kind of sneaks up on you. But now he also has this slider, which has been a tremendous pitch for him. Entering Tuesday, a 23% swinging strike rate on this slider. So now he has this great deceptive fastball,

the slider that he can go to as well. And the fastball velocity is actually up this season for Joe Ryan. So, man, he's another one, Chris, that's kind of just rocketing up the rankings right now. I was aggressive. I moved him inside the top 50 last week. I now moved him inside the top 40. He's up to SP 36.

just ahead of Carlos Carrasco, one spot behind Logan Gilbert. Is that too aggressive on Joe Ryan? I wouldn't do that, but I do admittedly need to move Joe Ryan up. I've probably been too dismissive of him so far. I think like him versus Zach Allen is a more interesting question. I just, maybe that's indicative of my continued lack of faith, and maybe my continued lack of faith is disturbing. But yeah, I don't know.

Like, yeah, the 169 ERA is great. the strikeouts have been great, but the expected stats aren't quite all the way there. He hasn't been nearly as good at limiting hard contact this season as he was last season. That was the one place he really stood out last season. Got a lot of infield fly balls. I comped him to the patron saint of the fantasy baseball today podcast, Marco Estrada at one point.

And that's, you know, like that is still having. I view, that's my mental model for Joe Ryan, but maybe that's not fair. Like, if he's really going to be a good strikeout pitcher, then there's a lot more upside. Because if you can combine very good strikeout numbers, even good strikeout numbers, with, you know, decent control and good quality of contact suppression, you can be really, really good. I just, maybe this is my own bias because it looks weird, you know? maybe it's because he's not throwing 96. And if Joe Ryan had the,

everything else was the same, but he was throwing a 96 mile an hour fastball and an 86 mile an hour slider, maybe I'd be willing to buy in a little more. Maybe that's my own failing as a person. But I'm still struggling with it. I will point out that, look, he's been lucky so far in terms of BABIP.

He's got a 163 batting average on balls and play against, 98.6% strand rate. You know, these things are going to go down as the season goes along. And he allows a lot of fly balls. So eventually some of those fly balls are going to turn into home runs. That's why you see, you know,

a higher ex-fip than you would expect for Joe Ryan, but he is someone who routinely in the minor leagues, great K-to-walk ratios. He has really good control command as well. He could basically dot that fastball wherever he wants it to. But even with the slider,

he kind of only has the two pitches working. So I don't know, I'm kind of like waffling now, but overall, I'm going to remain higher, I guess, than you guys on him. He's inside the top 40 starting pitchers. I want to see how this plays out, but there will be some level of regression. Obviously, he's not going to pitch like a one ERA

for the entire season. But so far, Joe Ryan has been amazing. Who else has been amazing? Taylor Ward, man. Taylor Ward doesn't look like he's going to get another ad bat in this game, but he, finished a single short of the cycle. Three hits, including a grand slam, obviously a double, and a triple. Now has four home runs on the season, and he is hitting ahead of Shohayotani

and Mike Trout. Scott mentioned him the other day. I believe he was his, oh my goodness gracious player on maybe it was like Monday nights podcast. Taylor Ward is awesome right now. He's 40% rostered. Chris, how would you rank Taylor Ward among this group? They all did something notable on Wednesday. Max Kepler hit a double dong. Anthony Santander hit his second home run in as many days. Tommy Fam seemingly getting hot two for four with his

third home run of the season. How do you rank Taylor Ward, Max Kepler, Anthony Santander, Tommy Fame? That's a really, really good question, Frank. And I haven't given that enough thought. I probably need to, I

definitely need to move Taylor Ward up. The question is how far do I need to move him up. He's been outstanding so far this season. There's no question about it. The underlying numbers, the underlying numbers, everything about it looks great. But it's a pretty big outlier. Like, he was pretty good last season, but this is on a different level entirely. And we're talking about a 28-year-old. So, you know, that kind of leap is, deserves some skepticism. You know, his expected Wobah last season was 344. That would be quite good. That would be making him above average player and a valuable asset, although for someone who doesn't necessarily steal bases,

you know, it's not ideal. I think he can run a little bit though, Chris. I mean, in the minors, he can run a little bit. He stole some bases in the minors. I don't know he's going to run a bunch, but if he stole eight to ten bases, that wouldn't surprise me. Yeah, I mean, he's got six and 582 plate appearances. I would be surprised if it was 10, but, you know, that's splitting hairs.

That's one extra steal in two months or whatever. you know, but the biggest thing right now is just he's clearly playing over his head. He has a 480 ex-woba that I'm assuming that was before today. So it's to say that like what he's doing, he's earned what he's done so far. His numbers are very good and they should be based on how he's hitting the ball. But that's not the same thing as this is who Taylor Ward is. And so what he looks like when he regresses, I'm not so sure. I think it's probably a decent hitter, but probably not a star.

So I'm thinking more like the top 60 outfielder's, but there's been a lot of bad outfielders. And he's good right now. So I'm moving him up to 51 right now. Okay. I'll say that. Just the other day after his two home run performance, I moved him up, I believe, to SP,

outfielder 57 in the rankings look after a game like this I think I've got to move them up again if I'm ranking these four outfielders I think I would put Taylor Ward first on this list I would go Ward fam Kepler and then Santander in that order I'm really intrigued by Anthony Santander and what he's doing I did see

it was weirdly worried but it seems like he's wearing glasses now and wasn't before. I can't, admittedly can't say that I've watched enough Anthony Santander to say whether he was wearing Rexpects before this season or not. I don't remember ever seeing him wearing those. I don't think so.

You know, you're looking at like his walk rate is 19.4%. It was 5.3% last season and 5.9% for his career. So that would certainly be indicative and they're seeing the ball a little better. So, and you know, he's had pop before. So I think like Santander is interesting. It wouldn't surprise me if they ended up being fairly similar

Santander and Ward. But I guess you want to give a tiebreaker to someone, the guy who's hitting in front of Mike Trout and Shohei Otani's a pretty good choice. Yeah. And this isn't to talk down to Anthony Santander because I'm pretty interested as well. He's got 14 walks to 16 strikeouts on the season. He's always put the ball in the air a good amount. He's a switch hitter.

He's going to play every day. He's had trouble staying healthy, Santander has. But when he's in the lineup, I think he's going to do pretty well for the Orioles. I just kind of like everyone else on this list a little bit more. Again, Taylor Ward for the lineup context. Tommy Fam for the home ballpark context. He still walks quite a bit. He hits the ball very hard.

Max Kepler, to his credit, is also very interesting right now. a double dong on Wednesday. He's hitting the ball hard. 278 expected batting average. That was entering Wednesday's action. A 496 expected slug. And his plate discipline is fantastic as well. 14% walk rate, 16% strikeout rate.

So really, any of these should be rostered in points leagues based on their, you know, their high OBP and their strong plate discipline. So, yeah, again, for me, it's going to be ward up top. And then FAM, Kepler, Anthony Santander. Chris, would you take? Randall Gritchick over all of these, because just your nightly Randall Gritchick update, he had another strong game on Wednesday, two for four with an RBI. He now has 14 hits over his last nine games, including two home runs.

Do you take Gritchick over all of them? I think I still would. Yeah. And part of that is just he has a longer track record of success. He's got a longer track record of some failure as well. But, you know, we know Randall Gritchick at least brings good power to the table and playing a course field does seem to have had the effect that we were hoping as far as his batting average. I know there's been some weird stuff with his batted ball data so far, not hitting a lot of ground or not hitting a lot of line drives and fly balls, but that's the kind of thing that I think will normalize. So I think I would still take Randall Gritchick. Okay. I'm getting a lot of questions right now, Chris, whether or not you can

drop Dylan Carlson, who is 83% rostered. you drop him for, say, Randall Gritchick or Taylor Ward? I'm not in outfield assist leagues. Did you see that throw? Was that him today? Oh, yeah, I think he threw. 97 mile an hour. Yeah, 97.

Throw. That's, yeah, that's crazy. 97 miles per hour. That's pretty impressive. But I'm seeing that he left. He continues to. He left Wednesday's game with a toe injury too, so that doesn't help. Yeah, he just continues to not hit the ball well.

There just hasn't been much power there. over the course of, you know, three seasons. I mean, you know, two partial seasons, but parts of three seasons now, there's just, there's not a lot to be optimistic about it in the profile beyond the fact that he's young and was a top prospect, which occasionally that works out.

Often it works out. It's working out for Gavin Luxe right now, who had a similar standard coming into the season. But yeah, I think Carlson's droppable for sure. All right. Well, let's talk about another waiver ad, Chris. Eric Cosmer, I'm just going to keep bringing him up. just going to keep bringing him up.

He needs compliments from you, Chris. Two for two with two more walks, his second home run in as many days. And this one was a bomb. 107 off the bat. 30 degree launch angle, 410 feet. Obviously great ballpark to hit it in,

great pitching staff to hit it against with the Cincinnati Reds, of course. Would you, Eric Hosmer is 33% rostered, so he's widely available. Somebody asked if I would drop Ryan Mountcastle for him. I don't think that I'm there yet,

it's tough because none of us liked Mountcastle coming into the season. I still don't really like Mountcastle that much. The expected numbers are pretty actually better than I thought for Mount Castle, but what do you think, Chris? Would you make that swap? No, probably not. But that's more my lack of confidence in Eric Cosmer than it is my confidence in Ryan Mountcastle, who I've moved down to 20th at first base now.

I don't know. like, yeah, it was Hosmer's second home run in as many days. It was also his second home run in 19 games. So, you know, that context is necessary. He's also batting, he's also batting 410. I don't know. He's batting 410, Chris. So come on, come on.

Chris. I don't think, no Eric Flodby right now. Chris, you're breaking up, bud. So as defined by baseball savant. Chris, your, your connection is kind of lagging. I'm going to restart my computer and see if we can fix this thing. All right, no problem. I'll see you in a little bit.

So I will take it over for now. And Eric Hosmer, I would not drop Ryan Malkastel for him yet. Jared Walsh was the other one I was going to ask Chris about. I would not drop Jared Walsh for Eric Hosmer either. I know he's off to a slow start. Two other names that stood out who I would drop for Eric Hosmer. Hazus Aguilar is right around 78% rostered on CBS. I would make that swap.

I don't think that there's much upside there. And he's rostered in more leagues than I thought. So I would, again, Aguilar for Hosmer is good. and then Miguel Sineau, he's rostered right around 50% of CBS leagues. He's going to get hot at some point. You're going to be frustrated that you drop Miguel Sanoe, but he's very, very inconsistent. So I would make that swap right now.

I'm just kind of intrigued by what we've seen from Eric Hosmer thus far. These names are probably rostered in too many leagues, but check just in case they are lurking around there in some 10 team leagues or some shallower formats. Jerkson ProFar went one for two with two walks. He hit his fifth home run of the season. he is batting just 232, but his expected batting average is 281.

Again, that's Jerks and Pro Far. He's 82% rostered. Might be out there in some shallow leagues. I know Scott recommended him as a sleeper heading into this week, so hopefully you listened. Andrew Vaughn went two for four with his fourth home run of the season, and this one coming off of a tough right-handed pitcher in Scott Barlow. Tony LaRosa, just play this man.

Play Andrew Vaughn, the Prospect Pettigree, former first round pick. Let's see what he can. can do against everyday pitchers, every day at bats, right-handers, left-handers, whatever it is, Andrew Vaughan is crushing the ball right now. 54% hard hit rate. That is in the 90-second percentile. Doing most of his crushing against left-handed pitchers so far. But that's what most of his at-bats and played appearances have come against is left-handed pitchers. So he's going up against them and he's performing. He's doing what to ask of him. So I think Andrew Vaughn has done enough to earn more playing time and he should play more now that Elyoui-Hame.

is on the IL. He is 76% rostered. Might be out there in some leaks. J.P. Crawford, surprised me that he was 75% rostered on CBS, but he's doing some nice things so far with the Mariners. He plays every day. Went one for four on Wednesday. He hit his third home run of the season. He's betting 3.49. He's got an OPS over 1,000. Obviously, we don't expect those things to remain for J.P. Crawford. He is making a ton of contact early on. He is not striking out. Obviously, the lineup context is pretty good that Mariners lineup. So 75% that seems a little high for J.P. Crawford, but, you know, if he's, if he's out there in some leagues, especially points leagues where he's making all this contact, I'm interested in J.P. Crawford. Deeper leagues. Kyle Farmer went four for

five on Wednesday with four doubles to RBI. He's 17% rostered. And Cincinnati is headed out to Cores Field this weekend. So if you play in daily lineup leagues, Kyle Farmer is someone you might want to pick up. Oduble Herrera went one for four with his second home run in as many days. He's a 7% roster. I mentioned him on yesterday's podcast. In deeper leagues, I think you could pick him up. 15 team roto, five outfielder leagues. I picked him up in the Scott White Dynasty League. That's a 24 team head-to-head points league. Those type of formats, I think you can look at Oduble Herrera. And then Chad Pinder, he had two more hits in his return from the COVID-IEL, hit his third home run of the season, 11% rostered. Again, those are deeper leagues.

Kyle Farmer, Oduble Herrera, and Chad Pender. All right, Chris, how are we doing? How are we sounding? Who knows? Come on. Cheer up, buddy. Nobody's more upset about this than I am. It's all right.

You just miss me talking about Kyle Farmer, so you didn't really miss much. I caught the end of it. It was good. Let's talk about Charlie Morton, because you're back just in time. I really did not want to talk about him without you, because we've got to have this conversation. Everybody is freaking out about. Charlie Morton right now. He puts up another clunker

this time against the Chicago Cubs. Does not escape the third inning. Gives up three runs, four hits, four walks allowed, and just could not throw his fastball first strikes in this one. The control is a real issue right now for Charlie Morton. Three plus walks in three straight starts. That is something

he did not do a single time last year, even with the struggles that he had last season. And so far this year, a 7.00 ERA, 1.78 whip. And Chris, something that said out to me, opposing batters are not chasing his pitches as much this season. His O-swing percentage is down to 22% on the season.

And that's before this start. I don't know if it might drop even more. It's 30% for his career. So this seems pretty rudimentary to me, but if you can't throw your fastball for strikes, you're just not going to get opposing batters to chase your breaking pitch later in the count. It's just not going to happen.

And plus you're falling behind in the count too. So I don't know. It's kind of a weird situation right now with Charlie Morton. How worried are you, I guess? Would you look to buy low on Charlie Morton? What do we do? Yeah, I mean, it's especially problematic for someone like Charlie Morton, for whom the fastball and curveball are so key to everything that he does.

I mean, those are his top two pitches. He was throwing them 83% of the time in his first three starts, uh, 73% of the time last season. so no matter how you slice it, like that's the bread and butter for him. That's kind of the whole thing. If you include sinkers, he was actually 85% last season.

So, yeah, like that's, if he doesn't have the fastball and curveball working, if he's not getting chases with the curve on, he can't throw strikes with the fastball. Nothing's going to work for him because that's who he is as a pitcher. And maybe the leg isn't fully healed or the mechanics aren't right or he just doesn't feel right.

Like that, that certainly seems like a. reasonable explanation for what we've seen. I guess the thing I'm struggling with is like he is still throwing hard. He's still getting the physical things, the spin rate on the fastball and the curveball, the velocity, the extension, like things are mostly where they seem like they should be. And so if there's a mechanic issue or something like that, like that would make sense. I just, I struggle to understand why it wouldn't be showing up in the velocity or the spin rate.

You know, like those, it seems like it should show up there as well. And so that's the thing that I'm struggling with, but obviously I can't, I can't say I'm not concerned because he is coming off a serious injury. And maybe that's related. But I don't know. Like that's, I wish I had an answer to that, whether that's why. Maybe that is what's happening. He hasn't, you know, he gave a pretty frank interview after the, after the game today, not the podcast host, the ad adverb where, you know, he just was talking about how like he's just, he seems like he has to pitch better than he has in the past to get the same results as kind of the way he made it seem.

Like when I think I'm going to get a swing and miss, I think I'm going to get a chase. guys just aren't chasing it. And so maybe he's tipping his pitches. Maybe it's something as simple as that. But physically he seems okay. And so that makes it harder for me to get away from him. I think I would buy low on Charlie Morton. Yeah, we listened to that post game interview just before we did this podcast and his body language, he just, he seems so dejected. It was, it was weird to see Charlie Morton like that. And admittedly, I don't watch all of his post game press conferences. maybe this is something that's pretty normal for him. But yeah, he also said something along the lines of, you know,

that his stuff is just is not playing as well now as it once was. And I know that Enosaris on the Rates and Barrels podcast, he mentioned that the stuff plus metric for Charlie Morton has been down so far this season. And I don't think it was down some kind of tremendous amount, but it was down. Like it was something that was notable. So maybe there is something just, you know,

something even beyond what we could see in spin rates and whiff rates and velocity that is down right now for Charlie Morton. But overall, I'm still with you, man. Like, I think a lot of people are concerned, and I would be looking to take advantage. I would look to by low. Scott posted this on Twitter earlier on Wednesday night. Reminder that Charlie Morton allowed 28 runs in his first 39 innings last season. He still had a 4.50 ERA on June 16th.

So he was a slow starter last year. He's one year older. He's coming back from a leg injury. It sounds like we're making excuses, frankly, because we are. But I think they're also kind of legitimate excuses. So I would be looking to buy on Charlie Morton right now. His walk rate was a little bit elevated at the, you know, through that first six starts last season, I think, or I guess what the,

yeah, his walker. He had 16 walks in 39 innings. That's a little higher than you would expect for Charlie Morton. I just, I have enough faith. Like, if he was throwing 90s, then it would be like, okay, yeah, something wrong. But this, to a certain extent, sort of feels like Luis Castillo last year,

where it just nearly everything looked right enough that I just kind of have to have faith that he'll figure it out. All right, so we are in agreement there. Someone tweeted me saying that they gave up Matt Brash and Ian Anderson for Charlie Morton. That's something that I would love to do right now. Yeah, I think that makes sense.

Chris, would you sit Charlie Morton for now? He's lined up for two starts next. week. Pretty tough matchups, the Mets and the Brewers. Not in a points league, but maybe in Roto. You know, the mess he could make of your ratios could be problematic. All right. Let's go from one older clunker to another. No cookies for Carlos Carrasco at the Cardinals on Wednesday. Three and two thirds, eight hits, eight runs, seven of those were earned. I saw the ERA was below two entering the start. It ballooned to over four

after the start. So, I mean, I look at the start, Chris. 11 swinging strikes on 78 pitches. That's fine. Velocity looked fine. 27% CSW. It's a little lower than league average, but it's still fine.

He only gave up three hard hit balls. His batting average on balls and play against was 471. I kind of feel like Carlos Carrasco just got a little bit unlucky in this start, and I'm not worried. Yeah. No, this, I think you've,

you chalk this one up to bleep happens and move on. I don't. There's not, there doesn't seem to be anything. Like, he got a decent amount of swinging strikes. His velocity was fine. Got swinging strikes on the slider,

change up in fastball. Sometimes you just have bad starts. I don't think we need to overthink that one. I did see a tweet from Anthony Tacomo, who covers the Mets for, I believe, MLB.com. And apparently Carrasco left a lot of pitches in the middle of the plate. Going up against a line.

up like the Cardinals where they have a lot of disciplined hitters and guys that can make you pay if you make those mistakes. You know, Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Aronado. Yeah, I mean, that's going to happen if you leave pitches in the middle of the plate. It seems obvious, but overall, not worried about Carrasco. If someone hates him after this start, go out, try and trade for him if you can. Before we hit the break, if you have a team name that you want featured on team name Tuesday, you can leave us a five-star rating on Apple Podcast and drop the team name in the review. We'll read it come next week. We appreciate all of the support. And anyone who's left a five-star rating and review recently, we've got a few questions that were dropped there that

we'll read later on. We appreciate it. We appreciate all of you. Let's take a break. And when we return, news and notes here on fantasy baseball today. Let's jump into the news and notes. And there it is, unfortunately, Chris. At Alberto Montesee will be placed on the IL Thursday due to knee discomfort. He had an MRI that revealed some structural damage. As of now, there is no timetable, but does not sound good for a monosy, someone who depends on speed for a lot of his game. Nikki Lopez shifted back over to shortstop. Whitmeryfield played second base, and one of your longtime favorites, Chris. Edward Olivares was in the outfield. Honestly, he's a name just to watch in deeper leagues because he's been pretty good anytime.

Yeah. Maybe he's been... His minor league numbers are so good. That's what it was. I was going to say he's been good when given an opportunity, but that's not true. He's just been good in the minors.

Like, I don't think you can... Like, he... His AAA numbers are bonkers. He has 956 OPS. I don't think there's anything... Any reason to expect him to do that. But 15 homers, 12 steals and 67 games, 127 games,

128 homers, 35 steals with an 801 OPS. I think there's something there. And hopefully they won't jerk them around like they did last year and they'll actually give him a little bit of extended run and let's see what Edward Olivares can do. I'm waiting with baited breath. Jack Peterson was pulled from Wednesday's game due to right groin tightness, unfortunately because he's been crushing the ball recently. One day after telling us Luis Robert would be in the lineup, Luis Robert was not in the lineup. He continues to

feel, quote, a little discomfort in his groin while moving side to side. You know what? Take the time. Take all the time you need. Luis Robert because last thing we need is for you to come back too soon and re-aggravate this injury. Marco Gonzalez left Wednesday start and was diagnosed with a left of risk contusion after getting hit by a comebacker. Dusty Baker said Wednesday that Ryan Presley is quote not quite ready to be activated from the IL. He's currently out with a right knee injury. And in that game, Hector Nerris pitched in the eighth inning. He faced the heart of the lineup with a two-run lead. Ryan Stannick came in in the ninth. He gave up a run. but he did convert his first save of the season.

Stephen Kwan was out again on Wednesday that makes three straight with that hamstring injury. Brian Reynolds was activated off the COVID IL after just a one day absence. So, yeah, he didn't have COVID. Yeah, it might have been. Is what he said. He said he had the flu. Yeah. Yeah.

They usually play it safe like that. It's just, yeah. It's weird that even if a player doesn't test positive, if they have flu-like symptoms, they're still placed on the COVID-IL. So, yeah.

It kind of makes. analyzing it difficult because if we bring it up, a player could literally be back the next day. There's no way for us to know. Teosker Hernandez is scheduled to take swings against a high-velocity machine Thursday as he rehabs back from that oblique injury. Yuan Moncada will begin a rehab assignment at AAA on Saturday,

even though he's still experiencing pain swinging left-handed. That's really concerning because Yoha Mancada is, he's not Cedric Mullin, like he's not to that extent, but to a certain extent, Yohan Makata is a switch hitter in name only. He's got like an 820 OPS for his career as a left-handed batter and like a 700 as a right-hand or as a,

yeah, as a right-handed batter. He's strikeout rate is over 30%. He's not good against left-handed pitchers. He's not good as a right-handed batter. And so if he's going to be limited at all as a left-handed hitter, it's going to be really tough for Y'an Makata to be a valuable hitter. All right. Chris Bryant was out of the lineup again on Wednesday with that back injury, which makes two days in a row. Shane Boss is expected to throw live batting practice in early May. He underwent arthroscopic elbow surgery before the season and will be eligible to return in early June. I think it was June 6th or 8th, but it doesn't mean he'll be back on that day, but that's when he's eligible.

Dave Roberts said Wednesday that Andrew Heaney has yet to resume throwing. He's on the IL with shoulder discomfort. Sonny Gray is expected to make a rehab start at single A this weekend. He's on the IL with a hamstring injury. Steven Trosburgh threw a 37 pitch bullpen session Wednesday. He hasn't been given a timetable yet. And you know what else thinking, Chris? Just completely random. I kind of miss watching Steven Trosburgh pitch.

So I hope he comes back to like some semblance of his former self. It's not very likely given thoracic outlet, but kind of miss Steven Trosberg. We'll always root for it, but certainly not. not expecting it at this point. Brendan Rogers was scratched from the lineup due to back soreness. He's currently in an 0-17 slump and is batting 0.078. We'll talk about him in just a little bit. Ryan Malthcastle was scratched with neck stiffness.

Paul Seawald activated off of the COVID-I-L. Will Myers aggravated a bruise between his right thumb and index finger during Tuesday's game and was held out of the lineup on Wednesday. And last but not least, how about those feisty Mets and Cardinals? The entire series, it's like seemingly one hit batsman after another. And just watching the Mets games this year, they've been hit by a lot of pitches. It's very weird. I know hit by pitches in general are up in baseball right now, but especially for the Mets.

It is crazy. I saw some analysis that like no team gets pitched inside as often as the Mets do and no team pitches inside less often than the Mets. So weird. It is weird. And even more weird was that the Cardinals, first base coach, like, tackled Pete Alonzo to the ground.

Stubby, stubby clap. First of all. Legend. A plus name. I mean, Stubby clap. I mean,

he's kind of got like, he's kind of like jacked. He's got like dad strength, it looks like. I mean, that's not a good idea, though, Chris. I mean,

going toe to toe with the polar bear, that seems like a recipe for disaster. So, I mean, at least it wasn't Pedro Martinez. Yeah. After the game, Pete Alonzo said that if he,

wanted to put somebody in the hospital, he easily could. Please don't do that, Pete Alonzo. Let's talk about some rankings and movers. The risers for Chris. Anthony Rizzo, Anthony Santander. A couple of Anthony's on the list. Pablo Lopez, Mackenzie Gore, and Drew Rasmussen. I mean, I guess this is as good a time as ever to mention what those last three names did on Wednesday

because they were all awesome. Pablo Lopez, let's see what he did. lowered his league leading ERA to 0.39. That's pretty good, I believe. Six shutout innings with six strikeouts to one walk. He has 23 strikeouts to four walks on the season. Pablo Lopez has been amazing. Mackenzie Gore, his first double-digit strikeout performance of his career.

Of course, it's only his third start. Five innings, one run, 10 strikeouts had two walks. He had 17 swinging strikes, and he threw his slider 26% of the time in the start. far and away his highest slider usage of the season. So I love to see that for McKenzie Gore. And then Drew Rasmussen was the other one here. And he went six shot out with nine strikeouts. He had 19 swinging strikes.

And he actually might be available in some leagues, 48% rostered. So talk to me about those. He's a spark, I believe. Yes, he is. Talk to me about those three pitchers, Chris, who are moving up the ranks. So I'll start with Rasmussen,

who had pretty ugly numbers entering this start. and I would imagine his overall numbers are still pretty mid. Well, 3.5 ERA right now, yeah. Small sample size will do that. But the most interesting thing about him was he was, you know, he unveiled this cutter early on in the season and his first couple of starts. He just got absolutely rocked with it.

Entered Wednesday's game with a 94 mile per hour average. Eggs of velocity allowed against the cutter. That's really bad. But tonight, he threw, 31 of them. It was his most used pitch, 37% of the time. He got nine swings and misses with it. You know, 42% caught strike plus whiff rate. And so that potentially indicates that that pitch is starting to, he's starting to figure it out. He also had eight whiffs with the slider. So last season, he was basically just fastball slider. And he was throwing harder, but largely in

a relief role this season. He's introduced. that cutter and this was a very, very promising star for Jurasmussen. So someone, yeah, definitely going to move up the SP and RP rankings especially. I actually don't know if he's SP eligible yet. He might be one of those guys. No, he is. He has both. Okay. Yeah. So, yeah, that was impressive. McKenzie Gort, I hope they just leave him in the rotation. There's just been, he hasn't been perfect, but the upside that he's shown. Like there was yesterday when we were talking about Patrick Sanneville, I kind of lamented that I had left him on my bench in favor of McKenzie Gore in one league.

And well, it's going to look okay. I guess Sanival technically pitched an extra inning of shutout ball. But McKenzie Gore, 10 strikeouts, a bunch of whiffs with the fastball and slider, 17, 11 of them on the fastball. He's averaging 95 miles per hour at that fastball. He's been everything we could have hoped he would be, really. So questions about what his role is going to be when Blake Snell's back, but I hope they just leave him in the rotation.

He's been awesome. And Pablo Lopez, it's like I talked about earlier. It's really hard to rank him right now because if you were just asking me who the best starting pitchers are for their next start or their next three starts or whatever the number you want to put on it. I haven't ranked 28th right now. Looking at the guys ahead of him, I think you can make a case.

He's one of the 20 best pitchers in baseball right now. You know, like, it's questionable with guys like Shane McClain and Clayton Kirshaw and Alec Manoa who are ranked right ahead of him. But like Jose Barrios? Yeah, I think Pablo Lufus is better than Jose Burrios right now. Yeah, I think he's better than Charlie Morton right now. It's just the question of one, will it stay that way?

But more importantly with Pablo Lopez, given that he's missed time with shoulder injuries three straight seasons, it's how confident can you be that he will be this guy or be on the mound in a month, two months, let alone in September.

That's the hard thing. It is tough to say. And I have him in the Scott White Dynasty League, which is my lone dynasty league, and it's a points league. And it's tough. because pitching is so hard to come by. It's a 2014 points league.

I don't want to just sell Pablo Lopez for the sake of it, but especially in a dynasty league with shoulder, with a injury, a history of shoulder issues. Like, yeah, in that format,

I probably should be looking to see what I can get for Pablo Lopez right now. Chris, classic, buy low, sell high. Would you trade Pablo Lopez

for Charlie Morton right now? I suppose I should say yes. I'm going to have a trade chart out tomorrow and I assume Pablo Lopez is going to be quite a bit less valuable than Charlie Morton but it feels wrong

kind of feels dumb I would do it um I think I would have to but I wouldn't feel good about it yeah and Pablo Lopez looks really good right now his um and he's been a really good pitcher for I mean really two straight seasons but even 2019 we've talked about it a few times but there were like two really bad starts I think

both against the Mets where he gave up like 12 runs combined. And if you took that out, he was like a 3-5 ERA pitcher. He got destroyed by the Braves one start. I think in the short in 2020, they went on to score, I think it was 28 runs for the entire game. Yeah, no, but he really good.

That change-up is like up there with the best pitches that anybody has, I think, right now. And so it's mostly just a question of how long he can do it. But if Pablo Lopez stays healthy, he's going to be really, really good. Yeah, look, as long as he's healthy, I think Pablo Lopez is probably going to pitch like a top 25, maybe even a top 20 starting pitcher.

Maybe even higher than that. Like, he's, he really has been awesome whenever he's pitched. But if you were someone who worries about this, you know, lingering shoulder injury of the past couple of years, then you might want to look to cash in on Pablo Lopez right now. A few risers for me, A. E. E. E. Haneo Suarez, he's inside the top 20 at both third base and shortstop.

I think it's something like 16th or 17th. I love what he's doing so far. The strikeout rate is down. he's walking a lot. He's spraying the ball to all fields. He really looks rejuvenated. Maybe it's playing for a contender. Sorry, Reds.

I mean, I guess they were still kind of good last year. But yeah, no, Suarez has looked great so far. He's a riser for me. Maybe he's just healthy. Yeah, that could be too. I mean, he had shoulder surgery last year, right? That happened in 2020. Was that before the 2020 season?

Yeah. But, I mean, there still could have been lingering effects. So, you know, one year further removed. He looks great so far. Joe Ryan, I mentioned inside my top four. starting pitchers. Kyle Wright, another one that's moved way up. He's inside of my top 45 starting pitchers now. So I mentioned he's in that group with Gallin, Lazardo, Patrick Sandoval. It's a really good group. Some fallers. It writes up to 41 for me and I could see him fairly easily moving into the top

36 even before his next start. Like, I might just do that tomorrow. Some fallers for Chris in the rankings. Brendan Rogers, Randy Rosa Rana, Jared Walsh, Marcus Schroman, and Mitch Keller. Chris is Brendan Rogers dropable. Yeah. He's still 61% roster. You would do it even in a league where you have a middle infield spot, like one of those deeper roto leagues. It's a little bit harder in that kind of format.

Because who are you going to use? Who has emerged this season that you would move ahead of him? Well, Gavin Lux, he was pretty universally rostered, but he's definitely moved ahead of him. I would say Jeremy Pena. I've moved Jeremy Pena ahead of him. And, Eh,

you're hitting a Suarez. Like, that's three. I, I think in a Roto league, you'd rather use Jorge Mateo right now than Brandon Rogers. So, yeah,

it's... That's a good one because Mateo's still out there. So you could probably make that swap in a Roto league if you want to. And like, look, Mateo's not going to be a great hitter,

but the pace that he's stealing bases at and the fact that the Orioles are probably going to let him keep running, yeah, I think Brennan Rogers is going to be okay, but he hasn't given us much reason to think that he will be. And he's one of those players who the faith in him being okay is not based on underlying numbers right now because his underlying numbers are not good.

It's faith in the ability and the talent, which we have only seen a small amount of in the majors. We really only saw it for like half of last. season. Yeah, that's right. Randy or Rosarana. He wasn't like that good last season. He was pretty good, but... He was good, yeah. Yeah. Randy Rosarena, another one on this list for you, Chris. And I know you and Scott were very skeptical of him coming into the year, and his expected numbers on Stadcast are just brutal right now. Randy or Rosarena. XBA is 203. His expected slug is 248. That's bad. That's very bad. I mean, I'm not dropping Randy

or Rosarena, but if you want to sit him right now, it's tough, especially in a roto league, because five outfielders, you sit him one week. Next thing you know, he steals like three bases in a week and you miss out on all that. And that's frustrating, but I can't really blame someone with all these outfielers that are emerging, Chris, Taylor Ward

and Randall Gritchhook, where if you wanted to bench him, obviously I'm not dropping him, though. Yeah, no, you're not dropping him, but I think look, the early season is, is off an exercise in avoiding confirmation bias. Because like it's easy to say, well, I didn't like Randy Roserina and now he's not doing well, so I was right. And, you know, you kind of overlook it when it's someone that you like.

Christian Yell, it's just a good example for me where I'm just like, he's fine. There's enough good signs. And like, you know, you kind of have to be honest with yourself when you're having those conversations. But a Rosarana's underlying numbers were really bad last season. And they're really bad so far this. season and now the production's bad. So it just, I don't know. I think he's still more of a talent than skills kind of guy. I think the skills are still underdeveloped.

All right. Some followers for me, Dylan Carlson, which we mentioned, I'd be okay dropping him for not all of the names that we mentioned earlier. I would drop him for Taylor Ward. I would drop him for Randall Gritchuk. I would drop him for Tommy Fam. I don't know if I would do it for Max Kepler or I think it's a good range though I think that's the right range for all those guys Trent Grisham is another one where again I would drop them for those top two names Taylor Ward

Akeel Badoo it's tough like I really like the guy coming into the season in five outfielder leagues and Roto leagues I would hold in points leagues I think Akil Padu is someone you can cut and then Hunter Green is someone I lowered in the rankings just based on the velocity being way down his previous start and the fact that like

they're skipping him now and they're kind of doing some more things like I've think overall he should be fine, but there are some warning signs. So I dropped him a little bit down the rankings. The thing with Green is his fastball has always been more hitable than you would think. And so that's concerning.

You can overcome that when you throw 102 miles an hour. It's more concerning when you're maxing out in 97, you know? A few bilo hitters I wanted to mention, Chris, according to statcast. So if you have some pitchers that are overperforming, right now. And look, there are a lot of pitchers that have been awesome thus far

because offense is way down. But I mentioned yesterday, you want to buy hitters who are hitting the ball hard, their expected numbers look really good, that hopefully as the temperature goes up around the country, around baseball, humidity goes up,

that we start to see more offensive results. The super high end, these names seem obvious, and we've mentioned them multiple times. Yerdon Alvarez and Kyle Tucker. Sure, go out and buy them. Next tier, Jose... Kyle Tucker is expected.

expected Wobah is like 170 points lower than his Wobah right now. Yeah. Which we saw similar, slightly less exaggerated versions of that last season. And remember, he was one, you know, a top five player in fantasy in the second half of the season. So absolutely by. Euron Alvarez right now. Average exit velocity 94 miles per hour. His XBA is 315.

His XLog is 6.52. Go by. Yudan Alvarez, if you can. Absolutely. The next tier, Jose Ibrahim, the expected staff. He's hitting the ball extremely hard. I'm assuming he's played in some cold weather places so far. Chicago, all the AL Central places, Minnesota.

A lot of those places are cold, Detroit. And he's typically been a slow starter. He's someone who, in the warmer weather months, he typically does perform much, much better. That's Jose Abrae. Mitch Hanager, I mentioned. Expected numbers look really good for him. He's already got a couple of home runs.

He's been on the COVID-I-L. I've seen some people asking me questions like, can I drop Mitch Hanager? What's going on? This is so weird? No, hold on. Instead, you should actually look to buy Mitch Hanager. The next tier of hitters, Reese Hoskins, Josh Donaldson, Jesse Winker, Alex Verdugo. Again, these guys are hitting the ball hard. Donaldson's striking out a good amount right now. It's like 30%, so you don't love to see that.

Jesse Winker, expected numbers look great for him. Verdugo, there's been some nice things in the profile, so I like that group. And then Chris in deeper leagues, Trey Mancini, I was getting ready to tell someone that they could drop him on Wednesday night, his stackass page is all red. I think better days are coming. So again, in deeper leagues, you can look for Mancini, Gavin Lutz. With Mancini, it's worth remembering he was pretty good early on in the season last year and then kind of tailed off and like the fact that he was coming back from cancer, you know, that would be a pretty good explanation for why someone's endurance might be affected. So yeah, now the underlying numbers for him are much stronger.

than the overall numbers look. So hopefully, it does look like he might have a couple of home runs that were already robbed by that stupid new fence in Camden, though, because he's got one that was like 380 feet to left field. That sucks. Yeah, I mean, look, I think the player who will be affected most by it is Trey Mancini, because he relies on very high home runs of fly ball ratios. He has a lot of ground balls.

so, I mean, he probably took a hand. His quality of contact metrics are very good right now. Yes, yes. I would still be looking to buy, but he is someone probably affected more than anyone else on the Baltimore's. Gavin Lux is another one. He's making a lot of hard contact right now.

He's off to a relatively okay start. I know batting average doesn't look great now. Christian Walker, just like in really deep leagues, he is crushing the ball. And he has a season under his belt where he was fantasy viable. So they have him and they have Seth Beer, but Christian Walker's been playing

and he's hitting the ball hard. It's Max EV 89th percentile. So that's a name for deeper leagues. I have a few trade questions, Chris, and these come from our Apple podcast reviews. From Philgist Lover. 12-Team NL-only Categories League, I've been offered Brian Reynolds and Tyler Malley

for Pablo Lopez. Is this the most obvious buy-low, sell high, or am I missing something? No, it's not the most obvious buy-old. low, sell high, but I think you would have to do it just because, I mean, one, just being an NL only league, getting two must start NL only guys, like that, that's hard to overlook, especially when you're giving up a very good player in Pablo Lopez, but someone with real injury concerns, like we talked about earlier, where his next start could be his last,

and it wouldn't be terribly surprising. And I don't know, Reynolds, his underlying numbers don't look good right now, but, but he was good enough last season. I think he given the benefit of the doubt. Matley, his underlying numbers are better than I think he's probably certainly gotten credit for in his results with the 680A, but very good quality of contact metrics reminiscent of 2020. So I think that's a good sign for him.

All right. This next one's from Dan, grade the trade, 10-team traditional categories league with five outfielder, a corner, and a middle infielder. I traded Brandon Woodruff for Kyle Tucker straight up. I needed a replacement for Eloy, and I already have Carl Sordawn and Sandy Alcantara to anchor my staff.

A plus. A plus, wow. I mean, offense seems scarcer than pitching, and we all had Brandon Woodruff ranked below Kyle Tucker to begin with. It seems pretty obvious to me. Yeah, I mean, it seems like a fair trade, which usually for me is a C, but I would rather have Kyle Tucker

in a Categories League. I'll give it a B. This one's from Hammer and Hank. Great to trade. 10 team head to add categories league. I traded Shane Bieber for Walker Bueller straight up. So yeah, maybe this is the one that wrecks the curve for the Kyle Tucker trade

because that's actually an A plus Shane Bieber for Walker Buehler. There are some reasons to be concerned about Walker Bueller. Strikeout rate is way down early on, but much more reasons to be concerned about Shane Bieber. And Walker Bueller just through the first complete game of the season. So it looked pretty awesome. This was from Crafty Gomez. Great to trade head to head six by six with K to walk ratio.

I traded Shane Bieber for Garrett Cole straight up. Yeah, this one might be racking the curve even more because Garrett Cole is better than Shane Bieber. So yeah. A plus. A plus. A plus plus. All right. We got one more.

An email from David 10 team, 12 keeper points league with four out. outfielders, no keeper penalties, keep at current year's ADP. Tradeaway, Patrick Sandoval, Framber Valdez, Joe Adele, and Alex Kirolov receive Luis Robert and Michael Kopeck. I think you'd have to do it. Yeah. I mean, it's a consolidation trade, too, in a 10-team league, Chris, so you're, you're, you are getting the best player in the deal by far.

And in a 10-team league, like, as much as I like Patrick Sanneval, he's not necessarily a must-stop. You know, if you start four starting pair, five starting pitchers every week, he's going to be, you know, in the fringy range. And Adele, obviously, I think is certainly no, by no means a must start. And Alex Kierloff, I'm not sure you're going to get anything from him this season. So, yeah, I think for Robert alone, that's worth it, let alone a very interesting pitcher himself and Michael Kovac. All right. Rapid Fire. Let's get through a couple of the things from Wednesday.

Beat the waiver wire, two-star pitchers. Drew Rasmussen, we talked about. He is 48% rostered. He's at Oakland and at Seattle next week. Go out and add Drew Rasmussen. Michael Waka, Chris, kind of interesting. Now has allowed two run runs or less in all four of his starts. And on Wednesday at Toronto, six innings, one run, five strikeouts.

And it looks like he is in line for the Angels and the White Sox next week. 25% rostered. Any interest in Michael Waka? I think he's a 15-teamer kind of guy. I think the only leagues where I have him rostered are a 15 and a 2014 league. So, yeah. All right, these next two are not quite two starters. Actually, these next three, they're not two starters, but I think they're all interesting.

Paul Blackburn, we talk about a lot. Strong start against the Giants, five shutout innings, four strikeouts to one walk. He has a 1.35 ERA and a 57% ground ball rate. He's only 55% rostered. That is Paul Blackburn. Christian Javier made his first start of the season. He was solid. Five innings, two runs, four strikeouts.

He is 49% rostered, has SPARP eligibility. Last one is Aaron Ashby, who took a no-hitter into the sixth inning at the Pirates. Five and two-thirds, one hit. Five walks, don't love that, but did have six strikeouts. He is 42% rostered. How do you rank those three, Chris? Blackburn, Javier, Ashby. I think I would go...

Blackburn, Ashby, Javier. But in a points league, you know, maybe you put Blackburn at the bottom just because he's not R.P. eligible. Okay. Ashby, I want to see what they do because he's kind of, he's made two starts so far. It's kind of been sporadic.

It's been here and there. Yeah. If they just go six-man rotation and he's in there, then yes, I'm very interested in Aaron Ashby. Although that would limit his opportunities for two-start weeks, which would be where you. really want to spark.

The walks have been an issue for Ashby, but he has over a strikeout for inning and a 70, 70% ground ball rate. That is just fantastic. So he is really, really interesting. If you got him on your team, I would hold for now on Aaron Ashby. The call to the bullpen with Liam Hendricks

unavailable for the White Sox due to a back injury. Ken McGraveman pitched two innings for his first save of the season. Mark Malanson pitched a clean ninth for his fourth save. of the season. Andrew Kittridge gave up two hits and one run, converted his third save. I had to do a triple take and look at three different websites. Josh Hater has 10 saves. That is crazy. It is still April. He has 10 saves. That's crazy. Anthony Bender recorded the final four outs for his fourth save of the season. He is just 31% rostered. A Rollis Chapman

was given the day off. He thought, through 24 pitches on Tuesday. Clay Holmes came in and picked up the save for the Yankees. David Robertson recorded... That's the second. Is second safe? Clay Holmes? Yeah. He's... Of the... I believe so. Three relievers leading up to Chapman,

him, Clay Holmes, Chad Green, and Jonathan Loisaga, Clay Holmes has been the best of those three. He's got two saves this season. Yeah, two saves. All right. Nice little point out for you. Cubs, David Robertson, recorded four. four outs across the eighth and ninth innings with the game tied. Rowan Wick picked up the save in extras,

and I mentioned already what happened with the Astros. To stream or not to stream, let's start with Thursday. Bruce Zimmerman at the Yankees, Jameson-Tayone versus the Orioles. I think I'm going to go to the game, so if anyone else is going, hit me up. Nick Martinez at the Reds, Chris Flexen at the Rays, Bailey Ober versus the Tigers, Brad Keller at the White Sox,

Garrett Whitlock at the Blue Jays, Dakota Hudson versus the Diamondbacks. I would say Tyone, Ober, and Whitlock are my favorites. Yes. I don't mind Dakota Hudson. I don't think he's very good.

I don't mind Dakota Hudson, but yeah. I think there's probably a better chance of him giving you six innings than Garrett Whitlock. So if you're streaming in a points league, Hudson's probably the better option. But in Roto, I would go with Whitlock. And then for Friday, not many options. Eliezer Hernandez versus the Mariners, Madison, Bumgarner at the Cardinals,

Tyler Anderson versus the Tigers. Tyler Anderson at home? Yes. On MLB.com, there's a lot of TBDs right now, so these are the ones. Eliezer would be my favorite of that group, but I wouldn't feel great about starting him. Yeah, I don't really like any of these. Mad Bum has pitched well, but the Cardinals are crushing lefties. Yeah, no, I would avoid that one.

Tyler Anderson's like, okay, but I don't love that one either. For Chris, I am Frank, thank you all for listening and watching Fantasy Baseball today. We'll be back again tomorrow. Bye-bye. Bye-bye.