Fantasy Baseball Today - DeGrom Needs TJ Surgery, Judge Replacements & De La Cruz's Debut (6/7 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: June 7, 2023

Unfortunately, Jacob deGrom needs Tommy John surgery (3:25). ... Alek Manoah was optioned down to the Florida Complex League (7:52)! ... Aaron Judge is going on the IL with that toe injury (10:15). ... Elly De La Cruz flashed some of his upside in his debut (17:42). ... Daniel Hudson might be back soon for the Dodgers (25:45). ... Kyle Schwarber and Lucas Giolito were standouts on Tuesday (28:55). ... This group of pitchers really racked up the whiffs (34:53). ... Are we concerned about Mitch Keller's recent struggles (39:45)? ... News (44:27): Xander Bogaerts was out again with that wrist injury. ... Do any of these hitters matter in deeper leagues (50:41)? ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpen updates and streamers (55:50). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  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/ 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. Well, fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. It was a crazy day of news. Let's break it all down.

Welcome into Fantasy Baseball today on Wednesday, June 7th. Frank Sample here, joined by Chris the Welsh. For those who have followed us all season long, you know that we've had some great prospect debuts on a Welsh Wednesday. So it only makes sense that we're here on the day that Ellie Dela Cruz gets his promotion and makes his debut Welsh. Amazing. Amazing stuff. And so people know this wasn't like, hey, Ellie came up.

Welsh, come on. This was actually planned a couple days ago that I was coming on. So there was no note of this. And of course, like of course it was. was happening that I was going to be on and we have the big prospect, the biggest. I'd tell you, man, like, we've had a lot of big guys come up. We've had a lot of excitement throughout all of this. Maybe it's recency.

The buzz about Ellie was bigger than anything I felt this year. Anything I think I felt in a while, you know, like Gunner and Corbyn coming up at the back half of last year. It just, you didn't. The closest, I guess, is maybe Julio Rodriguez when we found out he was making the roster in spring training. but the buzz around this call up is everything. Everything that you wanted.

I saw people kind of reliving, hey, who's the prospect you got most hype for? And I saw people putting out some weird ones. I can tell you guys, I have a vivid memory. The most excited I ever got, and this is going to date me a bit, was I remember being into prospects and so freaking excited

when BJ Upton got called up to the raise. And it was like appointment watch. It was midday. I want to say it was against the mess or something like that. I was like, oh, my God. BJ Upton's here. This is it. This is everything.

It wasn't. Ellie, a little bit more exciting than B.J. Upton. Yeah, it's just the gravity of the situation. The gravity of the player, right? I mean, this is a hulking human being, and maybe that's why it feels different than like a Corbyn Carroll, as great as Corbyn Carroll has been. You know, he packs a punch.

He's kind of a smaller dude. But we'll talk about Ellie Dela Cruz in just a little bit. Today on the show, a bunch of injuries to talk about the Jacob deGrom news, Aaron Judge going on the I.L. Lucas Gilito through six no-hit endings. We'll get into all of Tuesday's performances and much more before we get started. Please like this video and subscribe

on YouTube if you haven't already. And if you're listening on the audio side, download, follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. And let's just get into that news first and foremost. I hate to start things on like a somber note, but we've got to talk about this, Jacob deGrom's situation. How else you're going to get into this show?

This is the most newspack single day I can recall, not just about the whole like, Ellie, it's exciting with prospects. I don't remember a day that was filled with this much of like, here's this thing and here's that thing. It's crazy. So there's no way, Frank, we could get away from negativity. Because unfortunately, negativity kind of

ruled the day in so many fronts outside of Ellie De La Cruz. Yep, it sure did. And look, one of the best pictures of this generation, right? Jacob de Grom needs Tommy John surgery. We'll miss the rest of the season. I saw an interview with him earlier in the day, too. He was choked up. He could barely get

words out. It was just, it was tough to watch. It felt so bad for the guy. And, you know, it's so unfortunate, but it feels like we've kind of been building towards this for so long, so many arm injuries over the past couple of years. Jacob de Grom hasn't thrown more than 92 innings in a season since 2019, which does coincide with this otherworldly rise in velocity that he's taken on his arm the past couple of years. He turns 35 years old later this month and is in the first year of a five-year, $185 million deal. with the Texas Rangers. My guess is we won't see him

until the second half of next season, if that. And I have no idea what to expect from him at that point. So obviously in redraft leagues, you could go ahead and drop Jacob de Grom. But Welsh, I know that a lot of your content is centered around Dynasty leagues. What do you think here?

Like, what is the expectation the rest of Jacob de Grom's career once he returns, I don't know, July or August of next season? I mean, I think there's a legitimate, like, if you look at where Verlanders at, like if he comes back at like 36 and maybe he's not right till 37 could you still get three good years out of Jacob de graham it's possible i live in a three year window a lot of what i do in

looking at dynasty it's kind of looked over like a three year span so in that way you could still have some value to it but there's so much working against it like i was one of the last bastion of people that was like hey listen we don't have to hate jacob to grom injuries i know blah blah like I can't defend it anymore. Like it's just always hurt. Tommy John. This is horrible. This is horrible news.

And he's going to be close to 37 when he's right again. So what does that value look like? It's a bottom barrel. Like sure, it's going to be great in a year and a half. It'll be fun. It'll be cheaper. But this is an older arm that's broken apart.

And, you know, I have a source in that organization. And this is like a goofy thing I'd been kind of defending. But like everyone saw the 60 day and was like, ooh. And I was like, eh. It's clerical. It's kind of a clerical thing.

Like getting on the 60 man opens up a 40, 40 man roster spot. So that's why you would do that. The source that I know said that it was 100% clerical, by the way. Like this was, they didn't make that move in knowing that Tommy John was coming on. They made that move as a paper move. And then this jumped into the whole organization today.

So those things didn't actually coincide. So I think everybody was kind of caught off guard, probably why the emotions were even higher. But, you know, at the end of the day, you can't sell Jacob de Grom at this point. You can't really buy the pennies on the dollar. The expectations have to be absolutely bottom barrel because he ain't doing anything for you for probably close to. I'm not going to buy the 12 months back end of next year like he said. That means nothing to me.

It's 2025 at the earliest he's going to be able to contribute. And what does that even look like? You know, they're not going to push him to 200 innings after that. So it's still limited. So dynasty value is absolutely rock bottom. I could see it right now, Welsh. 2025, spring training. Jacob de Grom is punching.

He's hitting 100 miles per hour on the gun. Next thing you know, he's like a borderline first round pick. People are just talking themselves into it. It's going to be crazy. I'm there taking pictures from 40 feet. I'm like, look, Frank, Greg Maddox is talking to Jacob deGrom again. It's happening. Like that we can't fall for it.

I just promise me everybody. Don't be mean about it because some of you are mean. Don't be mean about it. But remind me because it's going to get to my. head. I'm going to get a little flighty. I'm going to see him throw a pitch in like 12 months, 10 months. He'll probably do it out here in Arizona in the complex league. I'll see it in person. Don't let me get overzealous about Jacob de Grom. I need, I need, uh, I need DeGrom rehab. I need a couple steps to walk out of it. So just everybody watch my back so I don't start pushing the Jacob

de Grom thing because we all need to move away from it. I'm very saddened. I was very, very much rooting for him, not just my own interest here, but it stinks. And this is like the, he's like the Torel Davis of baseball players. You know, it's like he had this great moment. And maybe Torel Davis, you know, Hall of Fame, I suppose, Jacob deGrom not. But what could have been with Jacob deGrom is what we're going to, uh, we're going to ask ourselves for quite some time. Yeah. And I think this will open up all different kinds of conversations and talking points about is he a Hall of Famer. Frankly, I think he is, but we'll save that for another day. The other big pitching news of the day was that Alec Manoa was optioned, not just.

just to AAA, not just a double A, not even to A ball, Florida Complex League. We were talking beforehand, and when you see something like this Welsh, this means they're starting it all over here. They're sending him down there to work on his mechanics. They very clearly don't want to just throw him back out there. I don't think they want cameras on him. They kind of want to do this behind closed doors, build those mechanics back up, build the confidence, and hopefully we can get Alec Manoa close to the level he pitched that last year. I mean, it's so hard to say at this point, right? But he's still 86% rostered. We have no idea when he's going to be back. I assume that we could feel pretty comfortable dropping him in redraft leagues. Yeah, I completely agree. And this isn't like closing your browser and opening backup or defragging your hard drive. This is unplugging and plugging a back in. That's the hope of what they're going to do because that's what I was telling you. Complex League is not just like, hey, let's get your findings down there and you can work on some stuff. This is retooling.

And you could see it in his pitch mix, if you guys paid attention. He went away from his four seam-ish, was leading with his sinker this year. But his sinker is more in the zone. His slider, which he really was able to get like a good heat map right under the zone. It's in it. So he's making more contact. I think a batting average against is like over 300. Fastball over 300 batting average against.

And the XBA on the sinker was over 300. he's just pitching to so much more contact. He had a little bit less juice on those, less spin on the slider. Everything was less effective. So I don't know what it's going to be. You know, obviously, I think the shift has affected him. Clearly, the pitch timing and, you know, his pace of play has affected him.

I really wonder if they're going to try to fix and rework how he pitches and moves that they can kind of work through the actual motion and maybe the pitch clock was affecting him. And I wonder if they're going to tinker with the pitch mix because this is all. and this is something that you work on at Complex. This is bad, bad news, but I'm a glutton for punishment. So like in a dynasty if he was cut, I kind of would be tempted to like, pick them up just in case they get fixed. But I have no interest in redraft this year.

I am out. He's a cut and it is very sad to see. Well, let's stick with the negativity here and we'll move over to the hitter side of things. Aaron Judge has a strained ligament in his right big toe and is going on the IL. I haven't seen anything about a timeline at this point. I would imagine it's probably going to be more than the minimum time, but we'll see what happens. I also saw that he got a PRP injection in that toe. So hopefully that can kind of keep things moving and get them back on track.

But who knows? I'm a relative toe injury expert. I don't know if you know about this with me. I have hurt my toe countless times. I actually have a pinky toe that I broke three times in a six month period. So I'm super clumsy guy. So the injury definitely takes quite a bit. I've had turf toe.

I have had so many big feet, size 14, Frankie. So a big foot out there that smashing onto things. And he's probably size 16 or whatever. Not that any of that matters, but relative toe expert here. And from a toe expert, I can tell you the recovery time for him to really probably be able to like have

full functioning movement. I can't imagine it's going to happen under a month. But I, you know, I'm not a doctor, just a toe injury expert. Gosh. You say that. And then my mind just starts going to the All-Star break at that point, right? I mean, a month from now where the All-Star break is, what, July 10th, 11th, it's right around there.

So the positive is this is a strained ligament. Like mine, like I shatter my toes. They just blow up. And this is like a strained ligament. So that's good, except at the same point, like you put so much pressure on those points that, you know, you really have to make sure that strain has just healed because you're just going to reagravate it really quick. So it might still be that time period.

But, you know, we'll see it stinks. It really stinks, especially with how we were all kind of building back up. Like, hey, Aaron Judge is kind of back on pace. And look, even in this down year, he's still looking even better. And taking him out is just a brutal blow. And I know it hurts. I know it hurts you, Frank. This is the one that really hurt.

DeGrom hurt me. This one hurts you. Yeah, it's impossible. You know, my wife and I were planning to go to the Yankee game on Friday. Yankees Red Sox, right? It should be a lot of fun. And there's some, you know, rain in the forecast already. So we're kind of monitoring it.

And I told her, I'm like, Aaron Judge just went on the I. Like, do we really want to go see the Yankees Friday? I'm like, I don't know. And I'm not into like plugging all the other podcasts or whatever, but I will point out that Judge was on a podcast with Mookie Betts recently. I think it was with Bleacher Report. Awesome. It was kind of like chronicled the whole free agency and the arson judge and all that.

And it was really cool. So I do highly recommend checking that out. Anyway, the Yankees started Willie Calhoun, Isaiah Kinearflefa, and Jake Bowers in their outfield on Tuesday. You don't want to go pay for that? I mean, I do love me some Willie Calhoun, but gosh, I mean, have you been the Yankee Stadium Wells? It's pretty expensive, man. I don't know.

I never been to New York. I've told you that. I'm dying to go to New York. Never been. That probably won't be my first place to go, though. We'll make it happen one day. Harrison Bader is also on the IEL at the moment. So that's why they're stretched pretty thin here.

Out in Minnesota, Byron Buckson also went on the IL. So we're looking for some outfield replacements here, Welsh. And here are the names that I found that did something notable on Tuesday. Scott and I spoke about Brian Dale La Cruz. yesterday who's up to 78% rostered. And I think he's kind of head and shoulders above the rest right now. The way he's playing, the batting average,

he's providing a little bit of power as well. I think he had a three-run double on Tuesday. The other names here, Lane Thomas went two for four with a sock in a shoe, his ninth homer, his fifth steal. Your boy, Jake McCarthy, one for three with a walk and two steals. In 10 games since returning,

he's betting 290 with 10 steals. 10 steals and 10 games, crazy. Lamont Wade enjoyed his first day in Corse Field, he went three for three with three walks, three runs, and two RBI. Taylor Ward went one for four with his seventh homer. And in his last seven games, he's coming back around, bat in 367, three homers during that time. Welsh, how would you rank that group? Taylor Ward, Lamont Wade, Jake McCarthy, Lane Thomas.

Ooh, rank them. All right. I think there's a little bit of need you can play in here because I think the clear answer is like if you're looking for stolen bases, Jake McCarthy is that. I'm actually astonished with the level that he's running again. I believe last week he led the way of the most stolen bases of any player last week. And he's just back on it again. He's already up to 12, which I had a preseason prediction.

I was like, oh, Corby Carroll is going to have more than McCarthy, which now sounds silly. But during preseason draft time, that was a bold prediction. But Jake McCarthy is right behind him again. He's found a little bit more of a rhythm. He's hitting lower in the lineup. He's not getting pressed as much as he was. I think the pressure was on him. the whole like would he hit three and whatnot.

He's just hitting the ball better. So I'm encouraged about that. Lane Thomas, I think, is maybe the best complete player, absolutely destroying lefties this year, hitting 347. So there obviously is like a potential platoony type of thing, but just came off of a May where he hit 300. I really like Lane Thomas.

And, you know, Taylor Ward, I got a lot of crap about everybody who wanted to be like, ooh, Mickey Moniac. He's leading off. And Taylor Ward stinks. And you suggested Taylor Ward. Well, Mickey Moniac stinks. and Mickey Moniac has the 400% strikeout rate.

And that whole him leading off and him the next thing was never going to work. When Taylor Ward, yes, was struggling, but still was walking, keeping his strikeout rate down, getting a little bit of rhythm here is the best thing for him. So all those things aside, I think I would probably personally rank it. McCarthy, Ward, Thomas, and then Wade. Maybe I'm being a little dismissive of Wade. And then I think I could even move Ward up a little bit because if he starts getting hot, I think he's the best of all these guys.

But I'll go with McCarthy because of those stolen bases at the top. I think if you're playing a points league, Lamont Wade might make the most sense because his OVP is crazy. 429 on base so far this year, batting 285 as well. So obviously that does help out in a points league. In Roto, I would agree with you. I think Jake McCarthy and Lane Thomas there are up at the top,

specifically if you need speed. If you need a combination of the power and speed, then yeah, it's Lane Thomas for me. If you play in deeper leagues, Hazu Sanchez went one for four with his fifth home run. He's batting 287 with a 905 OPS recently returned from the IL. And Scott and I were talking about Luke Rayleigh yesterday. He went out and went two for three with a walk, a triple, and his 11th homer.

The home run, 108.6 exit velocity, 450 feet. Luke Rayleigh now batting 261 with a 945 OPS. Strict platoon play. Does not play against left-handed pitching. He only has 14 at bats against him this year. So you have to pay attention to the same. schedule and make sure there's a lot of righties on the schedule for him. But well,

shiny thoughts on Luke Rayleigh and Hazu Sanchez and deeper leagues. Yeah, I mean, I'm just glad you brought up Luke Rayleigh because I'm very much about him right now. I mean, the hard hit stuff is through the freaking roof top four percentile and hard hit. He's at the top of E&V, Ex Wobah, and add the barreling on top of it, 98th. So top 2% in the league in barreling. And this is a thing we've talked about, at least I've said before. I don't have a problem with platoon players.

Like put them in the best position to succeed. Josh Lowe has kind of been that. Give me that with Rayleigh. I think he's like a great bench piece to have because 11 homers and crazy seven stolen bases. I'm for it. I'm very much. I've actually tried to pick him up in some spots.

Deeper-ish leagues, but I think even in 12 team, you can justify Rayleigh being at least one of your bench outfielders. All right. So again, Aaron Judge going on the aisle with a strain ligament in his right big toe. Those are some of the replacements you can look for. Let's move into some positive. here. Well, so let's talk about Ellie Dela Cruz and his debut. Crazy game between the Dodgers

and the Reds. Ellie went one for three with two walks, a double, and a strikeout. We got the whole experience in his first game, basically. No homers yet or anything, but he's flying around the bases. You saw some of that improved plate discipline in the two walks that he drew. The strikeout was looking and frankly, it was an amazing pitch by Evan Phillips. The two batted balls from L.A. Dela Cruz, 112 exit velocity, and 108.7. So already kind of flashing what we expected coming into this one. And I was watching this game very closely. It seemed like the Dodgers were being very cautious with L.A. LaCruz.

Lots of respect for him already. Felt like he had a good feel for the strike zone, laid off some tough pitches as well. Welsh, your overall thoughts here, man, because Scott and I did an emergency podcast earlier in the day, people could go back and listen to that. we really kind of broke down every different facet of L.D. LeCruz's value, trade value, all that kind of stuff. What's his upside? What do you like about him? Things that we might have to worry about. Just your overall thoughts on him. Yeah. So I had this conversation with Enosars, Saras, I'll say sorry, Saras, about this. And he was kind of putting some cold water on it. And we came to

this conclusion that the downside based on like maybe some historical stuff as far as what he looked like in the minors, looks like when he came up with the Cubs, Javier Baez. The upside, in my mind, and this is kind of a thing I've been pushing, because L.A. has moved to my number one overall prospect, no shocker, but it had happened before the call up. And one of the things is, I see a lot, and I wonder if we're going to have a similar path into the first years of Fernando Tatech Jr. Obviously, physically, they look different. Ellie is so huge. But, you know, if you remember back in 2019, there was this big debate going on about like projections versus Fernando Tatis.

You know, the prospect community was kind of like, Fernando Tatis is great and the projections don't know how to work him. And projections are like, we're math, we're numbers, we don't care. And then Fernando Tatis was awesome. Well, why was that such a big issue? Because Fernando Tatis had like 28 and 29% strikeout rates in the minors. And that was a huge piece of all of it. And looking back in 2018, because he played three different years in AA,

Fernando Tatis did, but his main year had a 27, almost 28% strikeout rate and an 8% walk rate. And then he went from AA straight up to the majors. Well, Ellie, 14% walk rate with around a 26% strikeout rate. So he had cut it in a similar fashion, doesn't chase like Javier Baez, chased a little bit more like Fernando Tatis, has similar skill sets. And I think that's the type of impact because you're also looking at a player that was finding improvement and hitting the ball really hard. So like, what does that look like?

How do you project that out? And I see it like a, I really see a Fernando Tatease upside, the good and the bad. And we'll have to see, you know, does Ellie improve it to a level like Tatease has? Or is he going to sit in the 23, 24 percentile? That'll still be really good. But he can hit, he can run. I'm very much in being aggressive on him. I had picked him up in NFBC League two weeks ago.

He was available. So someone must have drafted and cut him. And I was able to get him for like 40 bucks, which looks like a deal now. But, you know, early projections, if you want to look at those and believe those, had them around 60 games, 10, 10, let's just call it, average. So I think the easy just number game you could play is basic projection system, see how it's a 15-15 guy rest of year playing like 100. I legit think Ellie can put up 20 homers,

and I think he can steal double-digit stolen bases in around 100 games that are left on the year because he's playing in a great hitter's environment. and I had speculated before we even got the lineup. I'm like, they might hit this guy four. Look at what they did with McLean. And they did. He's hitting right in that top of the order. And we really have to consider, look at what the Reds are doing for themselves.

Matt McLean, offensively better. Jonathan India, getting better. CES will be up at some point. There's a point where they're getting rid of this dead weight in that offense, the Stewart Fairchild's. And they're putting in really good players. That's only going to benefit Ellie. It'll be interesting to see how he's a pitched and approached through the year.

I'm worried about some strikeout issues, but I think from this point on, it is not unfeasible to say that you could get a 2010 season out of Ellie. And Frank, I think that could put him, I know this is like so reactionary and people are like, shut up, he could be a top five shortstop rest of season.

I really think that is legitimately in consideration here. Look at what we saw of O'Neill Cruz last year and then in the adjustments meet he made in the final month. I think Ellie represents some better trade. than O'Neill Cruz with all of the upside that O'Neill Cruz had. So I'd be treating it as far as pickups and FAB and whatever in that capacity. And we could go through the numbers of the guys, you know, like you're going to take Bichette over him.

You're going to take Franco. You're going to take Trey Turner. But then you're starting to get into a crew like, is Lindor like that much better at this point in what he's done? I don't know. Yeah, I don't know any. I'm trying to think of any other names off the top of my head. I moved away from a list that I had.

I don't, I can't think. of like slam dunk other short stops that you say yes, this guy over the potential of what Ellie has. So Tatease, I think is one that would be in there. Mugie Betts has shortstop eligibility on CBS. So I think that's fine to say. Like Corey Seeger is a different player. But for what he does, I think we'd rather have him over Ellie.

And then Bobby Witt Jr. has shortstop eligibility. See, Bobby Witt is a fascinating one. I think that's the line. I think that's right around the line. he's going to improve a little bit, but like at what level he's stealing and he's hitting homers? Like I think Ellie has that same downside. If he's hitting like 230,

he just hits the ball so hard. And when he gets on base, he's going to run that, you know, you have the same Bobby Witt like, hey, I'm hitting 230, but I could still hit 12 homers and 13 stolen bases.

So I think that's the downside. So maybe because you know what you have out of Bobby Witt that's safer. So maybe it's safer to say like top eight shortstop rest of season for Ellie. I think I'd put my foot down on that. Wow. So you and, Scott are basically in lockstep because he moved. Oh really?

He moved Ellie up to his ninth ranked shortstop just behind Seeger, Bobby Witt, and Lindor. And I moved Ellie up to 13. So I still had him behind names like Nico Horner and Tyro Estrada and I don't know. Maybe I'm just playing the floor game with those guys. But you guys are talking me into it. So I think I've got to. Come on. You're a risk taker.

You're a gambler. I can gamble a little bit. But also like I understand people should when you hear this like this is a contact. We're not saying like go and drop Lindel. it's nothing like that. It's just like, hey, listen, Ellie's value should be treated on that. So your advantage in your leagues is if you have someone that looks at Ellie and goes, hey, cool, I got the shortstop that I could maybe sell as a top 15 shortstop,

go and buy him because I think he can be a top 10 shortstop. But you might have people that are like, this is the next greatest thing. I need everything. And then you just move on and you don't have it. But it's not about cutting players to have. It's just this is what the value of what this guy could do. But you should understand the same downside that O'Neill Cruz had, I think L.E. Dela Cruz represents that as well.

There is some swing and miss issues in there, but the guy's walking more than O'Neill did. He hits it harder as hard as O'Neill Cruz does, can steal, can run. He's just an incredibly exciting player. And, you know, Dynasty ranks, I have a Dynasty update coming up this week, will be representative of, like, how high he belongs. And, you know, it's going to probably be over some of the top prospects from last year.

Like, Ellie Day, LaCruz versus Gunner Henderson and Dynasty, I think that's a cool conversation. to have, but I think it starts with Ellie and ends with Cruz. So I don't think Gunner's in that. Yeah, I think so too. Let's take our first break and then we'll get into the red, the rest of this Reds and Dodgers game. We'll do that right after this.

Welcome back and let's get back into this Dodgers and Reds game. We already spoke about Ellie De La Cruz and what he did in his debut. The Dodgers jumped out to an 8-3 lead early on in that game. Thanks to Freddie Freeman, he hit a grand slam, continues to just crush it this year. J.D. Martinez hit a solo homer, his 15th. The Reds just kept chipping. chipping away. Evan Phillips pitched in the eighth inning with a two-run lead. He faced the heart of the

Reds lineup. Caleb Ferguson came out for the ninth. He allowed two runs to tie the game and then he left with the bases loaded. Matt McLean then hit a walk-off single, which was nearly a grand slam. He went three for six with a run and RBI continues to play very well also. And I wanted to talk quickly about this Dodgers bullpen Welsh because you mentioned something to me beforehand that obviously you're out there in Arizona. You get to see some complex League games and action there. And you saw Daniel Hudson rehabbing recently. And it kind of got my, the wheels turning. I'm like, yeah, there's a chance that if Daniel Hudson returns to the Dodgers, he could take over as the closer or at least kind of factor into the back of that

bullpen. Yeah, it was a couple hours ago. I actually put it in the private chat. I don't know if you want to share the video. I put some video. We don't have to, but I put a video up on Twitter of one of the batters that he just absolutely mowed through, which you would expect, by the way. Arizona Complex League started up yesterday. I've been out the last two days. And I didn't know this was happening. It was Dodgers versus Mariners. And I see the guys walking up. There's, you know, some Lizarro Montes and Wilma Dias. And all the sudden, his old dude walks in. I'm like, who's this guy? Daniel Hudson. He comes in the first. He looked great throwing strikes against these guys. Struck out Victor LaBrata. I think he only put up nine to 10 pitches. He pitched one inning.

He had team officials with him. He came in with two guys. He did the pitching. He left in the third inning. Both officials were with him. I think he got everything that he wanted out of it. And it was really windy. He was commanding. He was dropping pitches under the, I mean, again, these are complex guys. You wouldn't expect them to really get in on it. But I've also seen a complex guy hit a grand slam off of, or inside the park home run off of Jacob de Grom, so anything can happen. But Daniel Hudson looked great. And a lot of people ask me, like, what is this going to lead to? He's just probably going to do a couple more of these. But it looks like he's a couple weeks away. I don't, you know, maybe that was his only complex one and he'll go and pitch in double a or something like that,

but looked good, felt healthy, and I think he can go right back into the back end of this bullpen as soon as possible. So I wouldn't put it past them, and they had a lot of hands on Daniel Hudson in this complex level thing. Like I said, it was like four hours ago that I watched him pitch. Daniel Hudson, 21% rostered on CBS. He's recovering from a torn ACL. So if you do play in a deeper league or categories league where you're desperate for saves,

I would say go out and stash Daniel Hudson now before he returns from injury. This is officially the latest that we've ever done, oh my goodness gracious, into a podcast, but that's the kind of day that it was. DeGrom, Judge, Ellie De LaCruz, we've got that all out of the way. Let's get into the games. Hi, oh my, Welsh, who is a standout you'd like to highlight from Tuesday? I just want to bring up June Schwerber. If you're not a familiar with June Schwerber, because Kyle Schwaber,

he might be familiar with and might have had a lot of expletives that have gone and you're drafting and you've been very upset about it, but you might not be familiar with what June Schwerber does. And what he does is he smashes baseballs. And so far in the month, he's kind of getting back at it. He's starting to pick back up. I talked, as you know, my Twitter you could see, like a week or so before June that just kind of get ready.

This is what he ends up doing. So far in the month, he's had two multi-hit games. He's had hits in four of the last six games. He's had three homers since the start of June. He hit a homer tonight as we were recording this. And he is starting to get going. The matchups a little bit more favorable, Washington, Detroit. But this is the thing that ends up getting Kyle Schwerber going.

So, you know, the performance tonight isn't necessarily like the biggest, you know, oh my, oh my goodness gracious or anything like that. All he did was hit a homer. But this homer is representation of like, this is one of the, those guys because of that poor batting average to start paying attention to. He just hit 115 in May. He hit 200 in April, March. But before today's game, he was up to 238 and the homers were starting to fly. So you can start. I think the best Kyle Schwerber is ahead of us. And this is one more reminder. June Schwaber is something to jump in on three homers since the start

of June, Frank. And I love that you highlighted this specific month. too, because if you look at what he did last year, he had 12 home runs in June, and then the year before in 2021, 16 home runs in the month of June. So there's just something about this month, the weather heating up that Kyle Schorber does seem to like quite a bit. Let's see. Nope, he's a March birthday guy. March 5th, so happy late birthday birthday. She's just a June guy. He's just a summer guy, likes the heat, likes it warming up. Usually big guy, I'm a big guy. I kind of don't like the summer. I like the winter, but you know, he just breaks the trends. it's Kyle Schwerber for you.

All right. Hopefully he does get it going because I've been getting lots of questions about Kyle Schwerber and I get it. Oh my goodness gracious for me. Lucas Gielito, who threw six no-hit innings

at the Yankees. He allowed three walks with seven strikeouts, 10 swinging strikes on 100 pitches and did give up some hard contact in this one, 91.8 average exit velocity against. His velocity was up across the board.

His slider of 2.1 miles per hour in this one. His fastball was up 1.5. 3 miles per hour. He averaged 94.2 on the fastball. And that's closer to the 2021 velocity for Gialito, which was frankly his last elite season that we saw. So we didn't really see it in the whiffs in this one, but if he can maintain this velocity jump, then I think we could get better outcomes moving forward from Lucas Gialito. At this point in the season, he's got a 375 ERA, a 1.2 whip just over a strikeout per inning.

I think I have him ranked around SP 35, and that seems appropriate. I think if he doesn't maintain this velocity, we're probably just going to continue to get lots of ups and downs, but when it's all said and done, it's probably like a mid to high 3 ZRA, which sounds like a low end SP3, high end SP4, but I do want to pay attention to this VLO jump and see if it maintains.

Yeah, you know, I think it's actually really key, and he's such a tinkerer. He is like adjusted the way he approaches, the way he pitches and his arm slots and angles. One thing I love about this to point out is, yes, the whiffs in general weren't great, but the slider, 58% whiff rate in this game. Seven of 12 swings were whiffs. And then check this out.

On the fastball, 15 called strikes on the fastball. To point this out is he had guy, he obviously had guys going at that slider, looking at the fastball. His slider had a 26% zone percentage, and he still had all those whiffs. So he had the right pitch mix in there. He was setting up with the fastball and he was eating them up with the slider. This is exactly how he wants to live. Might be why he's had so many freaking walks.

He's at like 16 walks or something over his last three starts. It's been crazy. I wonder if this is built around maybe a newer approach or just trying to establish who he is with set up fastball, kill him with the slider. This game was pretty representative of that. And I was pretty encouraged. It's pretty awesome. I want the walks to go down, but I'm buying this on Gialito. It is worth mentioning going up against that Aaron Judge List Yankee lineup.

Batters 4 through 9 in this lineup are batting 185, 191, 234, 223, 213, and 227. So that'll be $700, Frank, for you and your wife to go watch the game, by the way, to watch all those guys. That'll be $700. and you actually have to sit outside the stadium. You can't even come in. Yeah, that sounds about right. So, look, I'm not trying to pour cold water on it or anything like that, but obviously, let's keep it in perspective.

I guess from that way, you can look at trying to sell Gialito, but I think most people kind of know who Gialito is at this point in the season. And I don't think you're going to be able to get anything crazy from them. Have you, I know we've done this a few times. Are you, Golito or Cs rest of season? I still have CIS ranked higher, but it's got a lot of. closer. I think I have C-S-P-29 or SP-30, and I have Gile-Lito right around 35 or 36. So, look, you can make the argument either way. It's that close of a call. But I know C-Sice's most recent start, he had over 20

swinging strikes, and I still think that his upside, at least based on what we saw last year, is higher than G-Lito's at this point. So I think I would still lean with him, but it has gotten a lot closer from, you know, opening day when we saw, you know, the best pitcher ever in Dillon C's. Let's stick with the good pitchers here, and we'll talk about four names that had 15 plus swinging strikes on Tuesday. Kevin Gosman tied a career high with 13 strikeouts up against the Houston Astros, seven innings, one run, 13 strikeouts to zero walks, had 17 swinging strikes on 101 pitches. James Paxton had a great start at the Guardian, seven innings, two runs, nine strikeouts, with 24 swinging strikes. of all the things you could have told me happened this season, getting Ace James Paxton back is

not one that I would have expected, even for whatever, five or six starts, whatever it's been. But, you know, for the most part, he's looked really, really good outside of one start. Freddie Peralta, nice bounce back start, five innings, two runs, nine strikeouts with 20 swinging strikes, and Jesus Lazzardo also had a nice bounce back. Seven innings, one run, nine strikeouts with 15 swinging strikes. Anything you'd like to add on this group?

Kevin Gosman, James Paxton, Freddie Peralta, and Jesus Lozardo. Yeah, I mean, first, you're a genius. You know, we talked about this on the mock draft. You did with me and Bogman the other day. And, you know, you made the case for Gosman to be five and maybe go in the top two rounds. And he's just been a strikeout machine. He has been an absolute monster so far. And the splitter, 57% whiff rate in this, that splitter has just been dominant.

I have been so dismissive of James Paxson all year. It's frustrating when you just want to be dismissive of someone and they just keep being good. Funny enough that both Freddie Peralta and James Paxson both had over 30 swings on their fastball and induced 15 whiffs apiece on their fastball tonight, which is those are crazy numbers. I mean, that is the majority. And also the cutter is where Paxon got the rest. So technically, Paxton, 24 total whiffs, but 22 of them came from a fastball-based pitch, which is crazy, which it's also not sustainable in my mind. It's not, but like, listen, I'm just going to shut up and you just roll with him. I'm very, very encouraged that Peralta is looking better, but I don't trust him.

The slider looked good. The slider was up in Velo, which is good, but it's still maxing out under 85 miles per hour, which I don't love. But he got a 50% whiff rate on this. But Paxton, I think, is actually the pseudo story. It's like, Gossman is elite. And you brought up a great question. Gossman or Gowman be available or should be ranked over Gowan rest of season? I think it's a great question.

And Paxton really is a real deal. It might end up being like a waiver, wire winner for so many people. And I just hate that I was so dismissive of it. But I just never thought this would work. I didn't think this would work at all with him. I think you're splitting hairs with Gossman versus Gowan. The K-Midus walk rate is so great for both of those. I think at the rate that Gossman is getting whiffs right now,

you probably have to rank him ahead of Gowan, but I mean, again, it's both of those guys, I think are top five, top seven starting pitchers rest of season. Do you think it's sustainable? Do you think Gossman is sustainable the rest of the year? Like, do you think when you look at the pitch mix of who he is and what he is is more sustainable than a guy like Gowan? I think that he could run into more inconsistency

because whenever your best pitch is a splitter, you're always kind of prone to that. because the splitter is such a hard pitch to master and to depend on it, start in and start out, and especially as much as he's throwing it, you see in the starts that he gets hit hard, he doesn't have the splitter, he has to use his other stuff and winds up giving up a lot of hard contact,

but as you pointed out, I mean, that splitter looks like it's on a different level this year. So maybe the best that we've ever seen from him, and again, the K-minus walk and stuff is great for Gosman. If he could just keep that hard contact down, I think he's, yeah, he's a bona fide, SP1 top five pitcher. Yeah, and I'm glad you said it,

Because that's what I was alluding to, was like the splitter usage and living off of the splitter like that. Like when the splitter's on and you have a great one, awesome. But when it's off, I worry about that. And look at what his damages. 17 whiffs, 13 came from the splitter. So it's like when that pitch is off, you know, then you get into like the splitting hairs of looking at a guy like, you know, Gowan who, you know, he got squeezed in his last start because he was trying to get his calls. He was trying to pinpoint. But that guy is a tactician.

You know, I mean, it is like four pitches of double digit. usage, kill you with the change of, kill you with the curveball, and just smack fastballs in there that you can't get to. I feel like there's a better probability of consistency with Gallen rest of season, but you're seeing the upside of Gossmann when he's on because he is a monster right now. James Paxson, by the way, 78% rostered. So it could be out there in some shallower 10 or 12 team leagues. And if you picked him up for a two-star week, hold. Let's see what happens moving forward for Paxon. Obviously, he has to stay on the field.

That's been the biggest issue for him. but right now he looks like a very useful pitcher. A bunch of two-star pitchers got touched up on Tuesday night. Some of these names got rocked, and we'll start with Mitch Keller, rough outing up against the Oakland A's of all teams, right? He gives up five runs over five in a third innings, four walks to one strikeout.

It just did not have anything here. Only three swinging strikes, 11 hard hits allowed. He threw more fastballs and sinkers in this start, and even those were not really effective. Over Mitch Keller's last three starts, He has a 7.79 ERA, a 1.85 whip. And he's given up a good amount of barrels during that time. The Babbat is sky high.

So look, he's giving up some harder contact here. Welsh, are you worried about this recent blip from Mitch Keller? Or are you trusting the bigger sample of what we saw earlier and still looking at him as like a low-end SP2 type? Still looking at him is, I'm worried. I don't want to say I'm not worried because it's not good. This was not, I mean, this felt like one of the smack starts. It's like it's the ace.

It's Mitch Keller. Though Vegas knew something, by the way, those strikeouts were sitting at weird low numbers today. Like they knew this was coming and Vegas just beat up on him. But like why I'm still encouraged is because I don't think we're seeing anything abnormal. Like big Vila was down or spin was down for the majority of it. Actually, Vila was up in this start. He just didn't have the zone. He didn't have it whatsoever.

He wasn't able to. get anything off of it's it's incredible between his sinker and his fastball 26 swings not a single whiff was put across any of those he had a lot of stuff in the zone he just wasn't beating anybody but i think this is a blip and i'm gonna i'm at least going to pretend that he's still like in that sp2 kit territory because i really do believe in Mitch keller i think he's in a good spot just not right now yeah all the underlying numbers still love him to 10.6k per 9 he's got a 3.17 5 3.23 x-fip even after this start so again those underlying numbers So buying Mitch Keller as a buy opportunity.

It's like a buy opportunity right now. If you want to get into that game, it's kind of tough like pirates and we get weird about that, even though they're good. I would look at this as I would embrace this as a buy opportunity. Take the risk on because I've talked about this a lot, but like there are just players that their production doesn't, doesn't initiate the name value that other guys would have.

So what I'm getting at is like Zach Allen doesn't feel like a top four SP. so he's really never treated that way. Like, he's probably treated more top SP 10 or something like that. Mitch Keller's the same way. He's a pirate, never had it together. A couple bad starts. Even an owner who's had him all year

is going to kind of freak out a little bit. So the buying opportunity is just more worthwhile with guys like him. And I would go and try to, you know, I try to poke around, get myself some Mitch Keller for him to get right. The other name here, Louis Varland, a rough outing at Tampa Bay.

Obviously, one of the best lineups in baseball. He gave up seven runs over six innings pitched, five strikeouts to four walks. He gave up two homers in this start, and giving up hard contact and barrels and home runs in general has been an issue for Louis Varlane so far. He's up to a 4.40 ERA and a 121 whip,

and I'm just kind of worried about who gets the boot from this rotation when Kenta Maida returns, or do they go with a six-man, or do they just put Kenta Maida in the bullpen? I think that's feasible if they wanted to do it. Well, do you actually have concerns here that Louis Varland could lose,

his job when Kent to myeda is back. Yeah, I mean, at the end of the day, it's, it's result-oriented. You know, he's going to have to, you know, he's going to have to keep them into games. I'm encouraged that the K numbers look good. He's walking at an incredibly low rate, top bottom, or I guess it's the top 10% of the league of least walked overall. The expected numbers are really not necessarily in his favor. You could look at like a young pitcher and innings and maybe why they would actually want to like transfer that. Maybe Maeda would take the And maybe they want to take Varland off of that, maybe push him to the bullpen so he doesn't get too behind.

So, yeah, I would say, like, there's like a, I mean, what's the average on the worryometer? Five is five like, you know, we're baseline. And then four is I'm not worried at all. Because if that's the case, I guess I would say like a six, but I feel like six makes it sound like I'm like terrified of Varland. I'm not. I'm just, I am thinking about it a little bit more. I'm worried.

I want those strikeouts to get back. And I want him to get back to the guy he is because there is someone breathing down his neck. Yeah. Typically, it's 10 on the worryometer is you're freaking out. One, not worry whatsoever. So. I may probably more like a three or four would be something like that would be my line.

All right. Let's take our final break. And when we return, we'll have some other news and notes. I've got some deep league waiver wire hitters. We'll do that right after this. Let's get into the news and notes. Byron Buxon, I already talked about that earlier. Great job, Frank.

Xander Bogartz has missed three straight with nagging soreness in his left wrist. Julio Arrillas through live batting practice Tuesday, his first time facing live hitters since he went on the IL back in May. He could be back as soon as this weekend at the Phillies. No surprise, but Royce Lewis was not in the lineup Tuesday following that nasty spill that he took on Sunday. Oh, so scary. It was so, I'm so, I'm a baby. I'm the biggest baby on the planet.

I don't like injuries. I don't like gross stuff. People know, I'm telling you every now, I will block you if you send me gross injuries. Like there's people that love that stuff. I hate it all, all of them. And that one, people were like, oh, Rush Lewis. And I was like, okay. And I watched it.

And like, as of dad, it's exactly what I'm terrified about with my kids are at jump parks, where they just like jump and, you know, those trampoline parks where they're going to jump and bend their net. It, I cringed when I saw it. And thank God he's okay. Because that's the type of stuff. It looks like you're going to break his neck. If you haven't seen it, don't.

Yeah. I'm completely with you on like the watching gruesome videos. Like my friends are always watching the Sid Vicious breaks his leg off the top rope. I'm like, no, I don't want to watch this. Oh, the Kevin Ware, like basketball. Oh, no, no, no. No, no, no. No, no. Stay away.

Carlos Correa did return to the lineup after missing the weekend with plantar fasciitis. Frankly, I was a little surprised to see that. C.J. Crone is at least a week away from beginning baseball activities. He's on the I.L. with discomfort in his lower back. Speaking of baseball activities, Chris Bryant played catch and took. part in batting practice Tuesday. He's on the IL with a left heel bruise. Eduardo Rodriguez was cleared to play catch Tuesday,

his first time throwing since going on the IL last week. He remains with that six to eight week timetable at this point. Braves pitching prospect, AJ Smith-Schauver will officially make his first start this weekend against the nationals. And yesterday I asked Scott Andrew Abbott or Smith-Shawver. And Welsh, I'm going to ask you the same question. What do you think?

I asked, I brought this. I've had this exact same debate across the fantasy world here. I feel like I have got, I have no idea what Scott said, though I kind of think he's going to go with the brave, but you know, I'm not trying to call him a home or anything like that.

He actually said Abbott. Okay, okay. Because that's where Eileen, everybody else is with Smith Schaver. His name is a nightmare, by the way, wish it was. We call him Schaver. That's what we need to do.

We can't use his initials because that's going to get a little too dicey. But like, I think the stuff, might be better with Shaver, but I think the long-term ability for him to pitch belongs to Abbott. I just don't see Shaver taking over a rotation spot for the rest of the year.

I think he had 60 innings pitch last year, and he's already like half of those. So like how, like, they're going to push him to 100? I don't know. I don't think they're going to. So I think, I know a lot of people are focused on like the now. I'm focused a little bit more on viability for the rest of the year. I think Abbott can be serviceable,

worried about the long ball with him, I am going to lean Abbott, even though I do acknowledge that Chavar might be a little bit better on the stuff overall. And long term in Dynasty, actually might, might be a better option. All right. A.J. Puck was activated from the I.L. and I assume we'll regain the Marlins closer role. Dylan Floreau did a solid job, but had some blowups mixed in there as well. Alec Bome hopes to return from the IL when first eligible this Saturday.

Trevor Rogers will make another rehab start at AAA this weekend. Omar Nervaaaaa has started his first game. back with Francisco Alvarez on the bench. Thank you, Buck Showalter. Tyro Estrada, Jack Peterson, and Anthony Rendon all returned from the IL on Tuesday. Estrada went three for five with three hard hit balls, so just picking up right where he left off. Nick Sanzel was placed in the aisle with right knee irritation. Michael Conforto was back in the lineup for the first time since last Wednesday. Lordes Gris L'O.Riel was out of the lineup with right-goyne-tightness. Josh Outman also out of the lineup against a right-handed pitcher amidst an extended slump.

He is batting 161 since the start of May. Well, are you okay dropping James Outman at this point? I don't want to, but I think you can make the move. Like 10 teams, you're all golden. 12 team, maybe. Like, if there's some other serviceable options, you probably can do like, how long can you really sit with it? Yeah, yeah, you know what?

I guess there's just like talking about it out loud. Like, I would love to not and hold to see if it could get right. But you can do it. This is bad. I have them on my NFBC main event team, and that's a 15-team-5 outfielder league. And even there, it's kind of getting tough because you just need as many at bats as you could possibly get. So we're getting close. We're getting close on that.

Like if Luke Rayleigh was out there, I would drop out in for Rayleigh. Yeah. No, he's not out there in my league. But if he's out there in yours, that's a move that you can really. It really is too good. Yeah. The Mariners said that Brian Wu will remain in the rotation for the time being. He got hit hard by the Rangers.

seems like everyone gets hit hard by the Rangers. Does the Welsh like the Wu? Ooh, the Wu. I have a long history with the Wu. I was just telling everybody this exact time last year, he was pitching in Complex League. He opened up his career. He pitched in the opening day of Arizona Complex League,

and a year later, he's pitching in the Biggs, which is wild for him. I'm not like, he's fun. He's like a cool project long term. I think people get, excited about newer names and he had some good success in the miners. I'm not the biggest Wu guy. Big major living off the fastball and then going to Slider.

I feel like we're seeing so many of these guys right now. I've seen him get hit early on in games a lot. And I worry about him being able to go deep into games. I think he'll have a couple good outings. But no, I'm not the biggest Wu guy. I think he is a very streamy pitcher. But I do love that he is going to get to stay in the rotation for a little bit. I think that's encouraging because if he has some good matchups,

then we can play ball. Everybody against a Ranger stinks. But yeah, I'm a little bit indifferent. Most of the other pitching prospects, I probably would pick over Wu. All right. Let's get into some waiver wire hitters available in deeper leagues.

Josh Donaldson went one for three with a walk. And his fourth home run, he now has three homers in three games since coming off the IL. Will Brennan went three for four with two doubles and an RBI. He has multiple hits in five of his last seven games. And during that stretch,

He's batting 560 with one homer and one steel. Ryan Noda went two for four with a walk, a double, a run, and RBI. He is up to an 861 OPS. Whilst we're talking, you know, 14 team leagues are deeper here. Any interest in Donaldson, Will Brennan, or Ryan Noda? I mean, if I'm being honest, it's pretty minimal. Like, Noda kind of has been interesting to me, but like you said, like I play in like deep leagues. You play in deep leagues.

The hard hit stuff has stood out to me over the month of May. he was kind of near the leaderboard of like barrel and hard hit percentage, which that could be fun. But where he walks almost 20% of the time, he struck out over 30%, 33% of the time. So I think we've seen a lot of flash in the pan type of stuff. Rookers kind of come back down to life. None of these guys really do it for me. I may be best track record with Josh Donaldson, but these aren't the guys. These are not the droids you're looking for.

In deeper two catcher leagues, Patrick Bailey went three for five with two doubles, a triple, and two runs scored. He's batting 309 with an 866 OPS in a small sample with the Giants. Yesterday, Scott and I were talking about Gary Sanchez, Nick Fortez, and Yainer Diaz as deeper two-catcher league options.

Welsh, would you take Patrick Bailey over all of those names? Or none of them. Gary Sanchez, Nick Fortez, and Yainer Diaz. It's a very depressing conversation you guys were having, by the way. That was a segment.

We were talking about this. Yeah. Yeah, I would go. with Bailey. I think Bailey is a phenomenal defensive catcher, which I think holds his position. The bat has kind of come alive a little bit in the majors, which I'm encouraged about. The barrel percentage over 10 percent, hard hits over 40. I think those equate to really good stuff. And I think defensively he gets to stick around. So yeah, I would side on him over those other names, Nick Fortez. I think I have this ringlight on too strong because my face

is really red on video right now. Why is my face so red? A little fly. Is it hot in there? Yeah, I mean, I didn't think it was that hot, but I just caught a glimpse of my face. I'm like, wow, that's a pretty red face. That's a similar face when my wife has like one glass of wine. I can immediately tell because it is just like, whoa, boom, red. I don't think he's. I don't drink wine.

Do you drink wine? Oh, okay. I do. You don't drink any wine? No, no, no. It's not for me. I enjoy the beers and the other stuff, but yeah. If you had to, white or red.

Dude, I really do not drink wine. ever. You come back out here in November. You'll have a sip and you'll spit it out and you'll be like, this is gross. Give me a, you know, Coorslight or something. Ah, not a Coors Light. I didn't you went back. Scott's still blonde.

Scott's still blonde. Remember, Scott still blonde? Yes, that was actually a great beer. I enjoyed it while I was out there. I had a good red though. I don't think these names matter, but anything here. Corey Jolks went two for three with two steals. That's one day after hitting a grand slam.

Jace Pearson, five for five with a double don. for the Oakland days. And Emmanuel Rivera with your Arizona Diamondbacks, went two for three with two walks, a run, and RBI. He is batting 348 with an 844 OPS, has started four straight games. Anything with that group? Yeah, I'm going to homer out a little bit.

They love Emmanuel Rivera. And guess what? You clearly know I watch the Diamondbacks. This guy gets hits in every game I watch. He's not magnificent. He's not going to have mounds of homers. He doesn't steal bases. But this team hits him three a decent amount.

He makes tons of contact. So in deeper leagues where you're trying to pad some runs in RBI and batting average, I think he's good. He's probably going to be a 10 to 12 homer guy at best. He's only got one on the year. But he makes a ton of contact. The Diamondbacks have a lot of guys in position to score. So in deeper leagues, I do think he can fill a couple categories.

And he's just not going anywhere. Guys like him and Pavin Smith, they're ruining the time for some of these other guys that people were banking on. they're going to continue getting playing time, whether we like it or not. And Manuel Rivera is just a trippy one. Josh Rojas has really been struggling, and Rivera is getting some of that third base time too. I saw that Pavin Smith has been leading off a lot recently. Yeah.

But he's betting 206, so it's kind of confusing. Homer tonight, I think he had three hits to hit a six homer out of the leadoff spot. The dimebacks have done, they've really done whatever they can do to not bat Corbyn Carroll leadoff is what they do. Corby and Carroll has just locked into hitting number three. they've gone between Pavin Smith. They're like lefties against righties. They always want a lefty. So it's like Josh Rojas or Pavan.

Pavan has kind of become the righty leadoff guy, but they do need to get him out of that position. And I don't know, Kattel plays it sometimes too. But Paveen is another deep league guy to take a look at. He's starting to get into some power. He's getting a little bit more playing time right now. And Dimeback should score some runs, man. Let's get into some leftovers.

We'll start with the pitchers here. Zach Eflin turned in another great start up against the twin. six and two-thirds shutout with nine strikeouts he is down to a two ninety seven er a point nine six whip Kyle Gibson a solid outing at the brewers five innings two runs seven strikeouts with fourteen swinging strikes but the one I want to focus on here is Shane Bieber just an okay start up against the Red Sox look it's a tough matchup the red Sox have a good lineup five and two thirds one run allowed two strikeouts to one walk he had 10 swinging strikes on 95 pitches he allowed 10 more hard hits in this one, 92.7 average exit velocity. His K per 9 is down to 6.1. That is the

fourth lowest along qualified starting pitchers. It is lower than Kyle Gibson, Martin Perez, and Zach Granky. I am telling everybody that I still believe this is going to spiral out of control. You cannot afford to pitch to contact and allow as much hard contact as Shane Bieber is doing right now. And at some point, it's really going to blow up. And we've even seen it recently. Some of the some of the numbers are, you know, he's had a few blowup starts recently. The whip is up at 1.28. If you could still sell him for top 20 SP value, please, please do it. That is what I'm telling you to do. Yeah. As soon as you said, you're going to talk about Shane Bieber. I don't know if you've seen that show or that meme. You sure about that? You sure about that? You want to talk about Shane Bieber? Because the people

get riled up about it. I'm going to guess all you guys that traded Shane Bieber and then got upset about it. You're feeling okay right now. You know my feelings on this. Maybe I cut it too soon, but I've been to sell on Shane Bieber for quite some time. He is an anomaly in some aspects. You know, he's still a great command pitcher and can hit zones

and has a great team to cover him, which is going to get wins. And saying you're out on a player does not mean that they are garbage and they'll never have good performances, which people get confused about. But I'm with Frank. I want no part of Shane Bieber.

This is worrisome as hell. And when guys are like this, They're not covering any other basis. He's not striking out when he's suffering. You know, when like, Sandy Al Contra has been another one of those issues. But we see plenty of guys that, hey, you give up four earned runs. You're a little bit wonky. You've got eight strikeouts.

That's not Shane Bieber. Hard contact, low strikeout rates, spin going down. These are all recipes for disaster. I don't want it. And we're not the only ones that are out on him. There have been multiple reports that the guardians are looking to move Shane Bieber before the trade deadline. So that should tell you something as well.

if the guardians don't really trust in Shane Bieber anymore, or maybe they're just the guardians and they don't want to pay him because obviously that makes sense too. But got a lot of good young pitchers too that you know, find room and you can maybe, you know, acquire new assets while you've got good pitchers that probably could perform at similar levels of Shane Bieber. We had a bit of a pitcher's duel out in San Diego. Logan Gilbert up against Joe Musgrove. Gilbert, seven innings, one run, six strikeouts with 14 swinging strikes and Joe Musgrove on

the other side, five innings of one run ball, eight strikeouts to one walk. He was kind of lacking the whiff so far this season. So nice to see the eight strikeouts, 16 swinging strikes for Joe Musgrove in this outing. And Welsh, I'll tell you right now, if I could turn Shane Bieber into Logan Gilbert straight up, I would do it. I am 100% with you. Logan Gilbert has been a guy that has been screaming bigger strikeout numbers and consistency all year. I am very much with it. Probably wouldn't do it for the San Diego guys, but boy, what a blast from the past. I just want to point out, too. Blake Snell and Joe Musgrove going like back into these great performances, which I'm not ready for. I thought we were kind of cooked with them. But yes, I would join you in the Shane Bieber for Logan Gilbert.

I don't think that this last one matters, but let's pay attention. Taiwan Walker had one of his best starts of the season up against the Tigers. So, you know, look, the Tigers lineup is not very good. But he went seven shutout innings. He allowed just two hits, eight strikeouts. And his velocity, was way up across the board. All four of his main pitches were up at least 1.6 miles per hour. The cutter was up 2.3 miles per hour for Taiwan Walker. So he's 48% rostered. I don't think he need to go out and add him,

but let's pay attention to see if this Velo jump remains moving forward. Some hitting leftovers, Luis Arise. Two more hits is now batting 401 on June 7th. Just crazy. How many homers? One. How many stolen bases? Uh, one.

Gotcha. Still really good into points league. Great points league. Awesome points league player. Awesome points. From a roto league perspective, it's just so weird. It's so weird. So I want to be careful how we talk about Louise Rise on this show, but just making sure it was one homer, one.

How many runs, RBI? That I don't know. Any in the 30s? 30 maybe runs. No 20 RBI. George Springer went one for four with his ninth home run. And since the calendar flipped to May, that's 32 games. He's batting 276 with six homers and five steals, which sounds a lot like George Springer.

Josh Nailer went two for four with a double, an RBI, and two runs scored. And over his last 34 games, he is batting 311 with six homers and 33 RBI. That's nearly an RBI per game over the past month. And I guess it would be five weeks at this point. So Josh Nailer is up to 77% rostered. If you need a first baseman, if you're someone who drafted Jose Abreu, go out and get Josh Naler on your team. Who'd rather have in fantasy, Luis Riser, Josh Naler?

I would rather have, I would still take a rise. In all formats? Yeah. Not in, for me, not in the head-to-head or maybe Roto, maybe, but probably still not. Maybe I'm crazy. I mean, look, the lack of power and speed, I get it. But look, a 401 batting average still does help quite a bit in Roto categories. Two categories are fun, but, you know, we don't play three category league.

That's true. I do like Josh Nailer quite a bit too, but yeah, I think I'll still take a rise. Christian Yelich went three for four with two steals. He had three hard hits in that game. He's up to seven home runs and 16 steals just very quietly on like a 20-40 pace this year for Yelich. So yeah, he's been pretty good. Sweet. Jordan Walker went one for four with his third home run, his first since returning from the miners.

That homer, 110.2 exit velocity, 430 feet. Adoli-Skarsia went four-for-four with his 15th home run. He's been awesome. Only four steals, which I think is a little surprising. His sprint speed is down to 39th percentile this. season. Shohei Otani launched his 16th home run. Julio Rodriguez hit his 11th. He's really turned it on recently. Hopefully some signs of life for Teoska Hernandez. He went two for four with his 10th homer and Pete Olanzo hit his league leading 22nd home run of the season.

Some bullpen updates for the Phillies. Craig Kimbril struck out the side for his ninth save and is still 67% rostered. So if you need saves or a relief pitcher, even in a points league. I think you can look at Craig Kimberl. For the White Sox, Kendall Graveman pitched a clean eighth inning. And then the big guy, Liam Hendricks,

got the ninth with a two-run lead. He did allow a solo homer to Josh Donaldson, but picked up his first save of the season. You'll love to see it. So happy that Liam Hendricks is back. For the Red Sox, Kenley Jansen, pitched a clean ninth for his 13th save.

Will Smith for the Rangers, struck out one for his 11th save. Ryssel Aglacius. pitched a clean ninth for his eighth save. And Carlos Estevez, I'm just pulling this up now. He continues to pitch it. Amazing. He picked up his 15th save, and I saw for the 12th. Yeah, Paul Sewell picked up his 12th.

Andres Munoz actually made his return. He pitched in the eighth inning of that game. And hopefully for the Seawald owners out there, Andres Munoz doesn't mess this up too bad. I don't think that he will. No, they haven't allowed it. I don't think it's going to happen. Seawolf has just, he's pitched so well.

well too. Let's wrap up with to stream or not to stream. We'll start with Wednesday. And who did we say yesterday? Edward Cabrera up against the Royals. That's a yes. Yes. Big yes. Maybe the number one yes of this group. I think absolutely. And there's not much else. I think Dean Kramer at the Brewers is okay. He's pitched well recently. Jaime Borea up against the Cubs. That Cubs lineup has really, really slowed down. So yeah. I hate all of these. I can see the Patrick Corby narrative with Arizona, but nah, offense has been too good. Nah. I don't like any of these others. Even Roenzy against the, uh, the A's. I'm just, I'm just Edward Cabrera.

Okay. On Thursday, it's a smaller slate and anyone here, Kyle Braddish again, same thing at the Brewers. I think he's fine. Josiah Gray against Arizona. Maybe. I think that that might be one I could get down with. the rest I don't like, like Clevenger Strike. I'm not doing that against the Yankees, even though Judge, I mean, you know what?

I'm being dismissive about that. Maybe your $700 ticket for those, you know, a sub $200, sub 200 batting average hitters. Maybe that's sneaky, but these are a lot of risky ones. Like, dude,

how much would we have screamed about Redetmer's like two months ago? We'd be like, oh, Redetmer is the number one here and he's not. Right now, he's near the bottom of this list. Josiah Gray, I might.

play. Yeah, so it's Josiah Gray, Kyle Braddish, and then a maybe on Mike Clevenger on Thursday. We're going to wrap there for the Welsh. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning in to fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. We'll be back again tomorrow. Bye-bye.