Fantasy Baseball Today - Evaluating 2025 Preseason Sleepers & Breakouts! (10/9 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: October 9, 2025

Before we get to our preseason sleepers and breakouts, the Yankees have officially been eliminated (2:30). ... The player we were most wrong about this season was Pete Crow-Armstrong (4:55). ... News (17:35): Jackson Chourio keeps battling this hamstring injury. ... Who were the sleepers we got most right before the season (21:20)? ... Chris is the catcher whisperer (28:34)! ... The preseason hate for Jesus Luzardo went too far (34:45). ... Who were the sleepers we got wrong (40:25)? ... What went wrong with Kristian Campbell and Bowden Francis (43:48)? ... Let's talk breakouts we got right (48:20). ... Jonathan Aranda and Kris Bubic played well outside of injury (52:20). ... Tyler Soderstrom made the most of his opportunity (56:20). ... Let's wrap up with breakouts we got wrong (57:35). ... Lawrence Butler turned out to be a letdown (1:00:22). ... Jasson Dominguez faded and Spencer Schwellenbach's elbow couldn't hold up (1:04:57). Subscribe to our YouTube channel: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Download and Follow Fantasy Baseball Today on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://sptfy.com/QiKv⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow our FBT team on Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@FBTPod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@CPTowers⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@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/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 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. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Hey there, welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today on Thursday, October 9th. I am Frank Stample joined by Scott White and Chris Towers.

Every year we talk up a bunch of sleepers. breakouts and I guess we would talk down, bus. So today, we're gonna look back at all the picks that we made, not all them, but the ones we got most right, the ones we got most wrong, we'll evaluate our thought processes, and yeah, try and go from there and see what we learn. Before we get to that, it is official, for those watching,

you might be pointing at the screen and laughing at me, the Yankees have been eliminated. While most of the baseball world rejoices, I'm pretty sad. You know, like there's no. way around it. This podcast is going to be a little bit more somber on my end. I'll try to, you know, turn this frown upside down and have fun. But here we are. Congrats to the Blue Jays, by the way. I mean, they're the better team all season long. They're going to be a tough out, man. They are completely relentless and they did it without Bobauchette. So it's just

incredible showing by them. They've got some pitching, especially if your savage can keep it up. It's a deep lineup. If, I mean, if, if, if, if Bichette comes, back and Santander shows like anything, that's a real tough out. I mean, they don't even need those guys, right? I mean, the way that they're playing right now, which sounds crazy, but it's what, they put up 10 plus runs and back-to-back games to start the series. Four runs across four games, I think is what it was. Yeah, they were just completely ridiculous.

Vlad is locked in. They just make so much contact. You know, I will say. I do want to say, because we've gotten our jokes in. we made fun of his postseason shrinkage Aaron Judge Wow he was incredible

in this series right up through the end two hits today I think a double off the wall to try to spark a comeback late like he he showed up and they just man they need one of these young guys to be more than just a guy

like that's really like it's just been like nothing it's just Aaron Judge in like the last decade right like young guys who have become legit more than just starters for them yeah

like Ben Rice I mean I think Ben Rice Ben Rice might be great yeah their offense was great their pitching was great like they could have easily run the gamut here but Ballinger's a free agent they got to figure out what to do with him they've got some sure they've got

They have to conduct an offseason like every team. But they got the resources. Aaron Judge does finish his postseason batting exactly 500, by the way, 13 for 26 with a Homer 7 RBI at 1273 OPS. So he did do his job, but not enough around him. And again, we're not going to just sit here and cry about the Yankees. Let's get things started with Pete Crow Armstrong, right? because probably the most polarizing player on this podcast this season. Because for the first-

When he wasn't polarizing on this podcast, we were all in Loxta. Polarizing, I guess, among the baseball world, right? Because there were a lot of people that I think agreed with us that he was not going to be a great offensive player, or at least not this good right away. But obviously, just within this season alone, there are kind of like lessons to learn about P. Crow Armstrong. So all three of us had PCA as a bus coming into the year. And again, for the first three or four months, that we looked, you know, completely wrong about that. He had a preseason ADP of 127.4. Still finished as the 29th best player in Roto, the 21st best hitter in head to head

points leagues, even with the bad plate discipline. He went 30, 30, 90, 91 run scored, 95 RBI, tremendous stuff. Before we get to that second half, and we talked about this in the first half of the season. What do you think we can take away just from Pete Kro Armstrong's overall season and the fact that on the whole we were wrong about it, right? I guess prospects can improve, you know, freak athletes can do things that we've never seen before or didn't expect. What do you guys take away from just the overall season that PCA had? Well, yeah, I mean, I think it's appropriate to point out that he was not a bust.

So, calling him a bust. Based on where he was drafted, he was still, Amazing. We were like, oh, it's Dylan Cruz, Pete Crow Armstrong, and Jason Mingus. They could all be good. Turns out only one of them could be good. Right. Yeah. And, you know, it wasn't, among fantasy baseball analyst, I think that was the prevailing view.

And that's why Pete Crow Armstrong went as late as he did in drafts. To a point that, like, there wasn't a lot of downside to taking him, I feel like. And maybe that is the big. biggest lesson to take away from this. And something I've tried, it's a half-baked idea, but I've dabbled in this idea some this year. You know how one of the central themes of Moneyball was the scout sitting around the table. And, you know. He's got an ugly girlfriend.

The, specifically that we're not looking for Fabio line because they're, they're, they're mostly focused on evaluating players on physical attributes rather than production. The key question was, how do they perform? Like, great, he's got whatever tools going on, but how do they perform? That was one of the themes of Moneyball. And I feel like it's almost become like this horseshoe theory thing where we've swung so far the other way looking at underlying data characteristics, like data-centric attributes for players,

and we're still overlooking the but how does he perform question that was central to Moneyball. So it went from being great tools, yeah, but how does he perform? To great data, yeah, but how does he perform? And Picrow Armstrong performed in the minors. The data always raised questions. low on him relative to the average as a prospect because I was like yeah okay maybe he's a great defender and that that makes sense for you to rank him so high if that's the case but we don't

care about that so much for fantasy we just you know we we need him to hit well and I'm not sure he's going to hit well just because he's in the minors well he came up to the majors and he hit well yeah it was uneven the performance it was it started great it ended poorly But I don't think either version of Peacrow Armstrong was the true Peacrow Armstrong. I think just the volatility we saw from him this year is inherent to that swings at everything profile. And we saw it to some extent with Seidon Raphael and Michael Harris. Yeah, Garner Diaz. Sure.

Like it just comes with the territory for that kind of player. So I think maybe the full stat line for Crow Armstrong this year ends up being a little beyond. we should expect from him going forward. But, you know, we don't want to over-emphasize the last two months either because he's good. He's a fantasy asset. He's a power speed threat. He's probably going round three for for roto leagues, I would say. And so, you know, obviously that is an upgrade from how I thought of Crowe Armstrong coming

into the season. And I would say that the lesson learned ultimately, I mean, there is a new. is the smaller lesson of, you know, don't back off your convictions when he's looking like an MVP candidate through two and a half months. I talked about that last episode. But the bigger lesson for Pete Crow Armstrong is if a guy is productive in the minors, even if you don't really understand why, you can't rule out that he's just going to remain productive. Like that counts for a lot. We saw it with Jacob Marcy. We saw it with Ian Seymour. We've seen. We've seen. seen it with a lot of players over the years. And so, like, just, yes, the data we have available to us takes us a lot further toward evaluating players, but it's still no substitute for production. Production still counts for a lot.

Yeah, and one thing I would say is, like, this is true of basically every player, not just Pekar Armstrong, but, like, I think the mistake to make in analyzing Pekar Armstrong, and then you kind of said this, is trying to figure, out which version of him is real. That is, I'm not saying you can't do that and hot streaks can't turn into something, but like, one thing that a lot of people said at the All-Star break when Pekar Armstrong looked like one of the five best players in fantasy, a lot of people said, yeah, but he had this great

finish to last season. Well, he didn't really. He had a great August and a bad September. And you could try to make the case either way. Really what it was was what he did across, August and September is kind of just what he did in 2025. Overall, he was a slightly above average major league hitter. He had a 109 WRC plus.

287 on base percentage is really bad, but he's got a swing that's really geared towards maximizing what is, honestly, like slightly above average raw power. But I think the mistake to make is to try to figure out, of he just does what he did in the first half or I'm going to avoid him because of what he did in the second half and I don't I don't think that makes sense because look 157 games is still not a big enough sample size to say for sure who any baseball player is that's just the nature

of the game we've people have been doing this advanced analysis for a long time we know that like one season is a pretty big sample size but it's not definitive. Anytime you try to slice up one season, you're just going to, you're more likely to mess it up than not. So I think you look at it and say, okay, maybe I don't personally expect another 31 home or 35 steel season. I think maybe you have to bake in some volatility just inherent that like, man, what if

he just gets wrong? You know, there were some mechanical stuff. Matthew Trueblood wrote about it in September. There was something about he moved up in the batters box and it screwed up his timing and he was trying to get that back. I saw some stuff in the postseason about how he had kind of fixed that and was having better success. Overall, it's been pretty rough so far in the postseason.

But I think you just look at him and it's a really good fantasy player, probably a better fantasy hitter than a real-life hitter. as long as he's, you know, walking 29 times a year. But it's a really good fantasy profile, especially in a Roto League. In a points league, I don't know, 70 spot difference between where he should be ranked in points versus Roto. I haven't done that process yet, but. That's a little much. That might be much, but maybe like a 30 to 40 spot difference.

Yeah, but he, it's terrible plate discipline, but a really good skill set overall. He's also an impossible player just for projection. right? Like, it'll be interesting to see once projections come out because projections just spit out one number, which is a 50th percentile projection set. But I know Ariel Cohen who does the ATC projections we usually have on in the preseason,

so we'll be interesting to ask him about this. He kind of, he has a metric that points out players who have the biggest error bars among projections, right? Guys who have the most volatility. And I have a feeling Pekker Armstrong might be one of those players, right? Because he might just project, all right, maybe, you know, 20 to 25 home runs and 30 steals. But on the high end, he could be a 35-35 player, maybe 44 or 40-40.

On the low end, he might be a 15-home or 25 steel guy with a 220 batting average. So just, I guess, keep that in mind for next year. I think there is inherently a lot of volatility there with Pete Crow Armstrong. We were also very wrong about Jacob deGrom. We'll save that for a little bit later on when we talk about some other busts and things that we got right and wrong. some other playoff updates real quick before we hit our first break. We got an epic comeback by the Tigers

to force a decisive game five with Terrick Scoobel on the mound. That will be a very interesting game there. The Cubs are on the board with a close win over the Brewers. They still trail two to one in that series. At the time of recording this, the Phillies are winning by a smidge here,

three to one, trying to keep their season alive down 2-0 against the Dodgers in Los Angeles. Reminder that we'll have an FBT Express episode in our FBT feed tomorrow morning, Friday morning, the toughest pitchers to rank for next season. And big thanks to those watching live.

Make sure to hit the like button and subscribe for fantasy baseball content all offseason long. Let's take a break, and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back in fantasy baseball today. We'll quickly run through the news and notes. Not too much going on this time of year. Jackson Trio continues to battle through this hamstring injury. He left in game two.

That right hamstring continues. used to give him issues, but he was back in the lineup here for game three. Some players and things that are not currently going on in the offseason, Colton Couser was diagnosed with two fractured ribs after colliding with the outfield wall back on June 12th. So it sounds like that's something he might have just been playing with under the radar, and obviously had a down season this year hit just 196. You know, in deeper leagues, five outfieler leagues, I kind of think Colton Couser could wind up being a, you know, deep bounceback candidate for next season,

but we'll see where the ADP winds up for him. Twins' outfield prospect, Emmanuel Rodriguez. We'll play Winterball this offseason to rack up some at bats after he missed so much time with injuries this past season. Scott, where are you at on Rodriguez? Because he was a top prospect. I mean, I guess he still is a prospect, obviously,

but there was a lot of expectations for him. He's still just 23 years old, but he's just dealt with so many injuries. Where are you at on Emmanuel Rodriguez? Yeah, I mean, I think the upside is still the same. Just as he gets closer to the majors and you don't see much improvement in the very high strikeout rate and he keeps getting hurt like this, inhibiting his development. It just seems riskier. The closer he gets to the major, the riskier the profile gets the more downside you worry about.

Ultimately, there's only going to be one outcome. And he may, Emmanuel Rodriguez may end up being a stud out. field for the twins. That's still very much on the table. But I think he's probably gone from being a top 15 overall type prospect for fantasy to maybe a top 25, 30 overall prospect for fantasy. Speaking of prospects, Philly's prospect, Aidan Miller will no longer participate in the Arizona Fall League due to some nagging injuries, things that he's dealing with physically. The AFL, by the way, is up and running. So we'll get you some updates over the next month or so. Again, Chris and I will be out there early November, so we'll get our eyes on a few games while we're there.

One of the top prospects in baseball, Sebastian Walcott of the Rangers, went two for four in his first game. Interestingly, I want to keep an eye on this. Guardian's pitching prospect, Daniel Espino struck out two in his lone inning of work so far in the NFL, formerly a top prospect in all of baseball, but he has dealt with so many arm injuries over the past couple of years. This is just his second appearance back since 2022. So still, uh, still. trying to work his way back and we'll see, you know, what he could do in the AFL and where he builds off of that and perhaps where he starts next season in the minors for the Guardians. He was arguably the top pitching prospect in baseball in 2021. I think baseball perspective

has had him there and it was like 41, 45 percent strikeout rates. Yeah, he's made like four appearances in the last four seasons, but it's certainly a name to watch. We've seen Tristan McKenzie kind of had a similar track record where he just lost like multiple seasons in a row before ending up being a pretty useful pitcher. Some non-fantasy news, but Ray's new owner, Patrick Zalupski, said he is targeting 2029 for the opening of a new ballpark in Tampa Bay. There are tons of logistical things and political things behind the scenes that need to happen before That is, I guess, taken seriously as a date, but that is their long-term plan here

to get a new ballpark in Tampa Bay. The sleeper that we got most right this year, or sleepers that we got most right this year. Don't worry, we'll talk about things we got wrong as well. Scott will start with you, Boba Shett and Nick Povetta. I mean, look, we all love Boba Shet. I know you loved him. Might have been the player you loved on Valentine's Day.

I don't remember. It was. I know I know Esok Paredes was one of them too. But yeah, two names that you kind of aced here. Boba Shet finally. being healthy again. Nick Povetta, the change going from Boston over to San Diego. I maybe framed this in my head a little differently than you framed it here because, I guess,

peek behind the curtain. You sent us an email earlier today where you picked out from our articles, a bunch of sleepers we got right and wrong, breakouts busts, same thing. And you said, highlight one or two of these guys that you want to talk about. And so I highlighted the ones I wanted to talk about, not necessarily the ones I thought were most right, but just are wrong when we get to those, but just the ones that I thought you could take the clearest lessons from. Yeah, that's fair. I mean, that's a fairer way to frame it. So let's go with that. Okay. Yeah. All right. So anyway, Bo Bichette, I think I was kind of dumbfounded.

And I think we all were to a degree how late he was going in drafts because it seemed like normally a player in the prime of his career who had as reliable of a track record as Bichette, did would get a pass for the obscure bad season that was afflicted by injury, no less. Even if it wasn't afflicted by injury, just the fact that every year, 300 batting average, 800 OPS, and then there's this one year where it's out of sync. And it's like, okay, well, you know, probably just one of those years. And he's still in his prime. So it's probably fine.

But people weren't approaching Bichette that way. and you could get him really late and lo and behold he hits over 300 with an OPS over 800 again just like the rest of his career you know he's not a base dealer anymore but he only was for like a year and a half so that's that's been true for a while

but you know even entering free agency I think you can feel very confident in what Bichette's going to deliver for you next season and I think he's firmly like a second tier shortstop for you And then Nick Povetta, I guess it's just even somebody who's been around for a long time, even somebody who's disappointed us countless times in the past, a change of an environment is something to take seriously when it's such a clear case of a guy who was in venues that were ill-suited for his skills, fly ball pitcher, in, Philadelphia and Boston ran higher ERAs than it seemed like he should have for as good of a badmissor as he was.

He goes to San Diego on the opposite end of the spectrum for a fly ball pitcher and emerges as this borderline Cy Young candidate. I think the question for Povetta going forward, I mean, as well as it worked out, how should we approach him going? Like it worked out almost too well, right? He overperformed his expected stats instead of underperforming them previously. And interestingly, his strikeout rate actually dropped in San Diego. So he wasn't, I mean, he missed more than a, he had more than a strikeout per inning, but he wasn't like 10 plus strikeouts per inning like he had been previously, which might explain why he overperformed the expected stats.

So my sense from like dynasty leagues I'm in where there's still activity going on in the off season, it doesn't seem like people are taking Pavetta seriously. So, you know, I haven't ranked starting pitcher yet. That's going to take multiple days to do. But just my sense without having ranked him is that he's probably going to be priced pretty reasonably relative to what he did. So, you know, there's always a danger when you get something really right like this. It's like you want to hit your wagon to that guy forever, even if the, the, the, the, value changes there.

And so I'm a little wary of doing that with Povetta, since I can see the expected stats too and know he overachieved a little bit by them. But at the same time, if nobody's taking seriously, it becomes like a jerks and pro far situation where, you know, maybe just pick him and hope for the best. Like there were reasons why he was so much better in San Diego than he was previously. Yeah, I ended up with him at 19 at SP. Um, that's, which is a little lower than he finished, but certainly higher than he's ever been drafted. What are the five names you have behind it?

Carlos Rodan, Blake Snell, Shohe Otani, Tyler Glass Now, that's a fun. I just, I just threw those three Dodgers together. I have no idea. Uh, and then I had Nathan Avaldi at the end of the season, but knowing that there are further issues that he's dealing with that may need to be, uh, he'll move down. It's see, Ranger Suarez or Jesus Lizardo. after him. I would rank almost all of those guys you listed ahead of Povetta myself. So if I

turn out to be in the minority there, I guess I won't have any Povetta, but I would rather have Otani Glass Now, Snell, Luzardo. That's totally fair. Yeah. I was going to say just to give some numbers on Paveta, it was 287 ERA, 0.99 whip, but a 349 FIP and a 4.0 XERA.

So he outperformed those by quite a bit. So it'll be interesting to see where people land on that Povetta coming off this where he was the SP 13 and finished 37th overall with a preseason ADP of 174. Now obviously I don't think he's going to be a top 40 pick, but, you know, does he go around top 75? That might be enough of a discount to be in, but I'm not so sure. He'll be an interesting one.

But what do you want to say, Chris, about him? Oh, no, I was just going to point out the XERA being four is the, that's the most worrisome thing because he was about a half run ahead of his FIP, which that's something you. you can explain away by Petco, being more than a run ahead of XERA, even at Petco where you would expect, you know, a flyball pitcher especially, but any pitcher to outperform their peripherals at least a little bit. You know, maybe you expect them to outperform by like 0.1 run,

and he was 1.1 run, basically. So there's a lot of room for regression there for sure. I think, and I don't want to drag this out too long, But I think part of the reason why I don't want to just evaluate him by his expected stats, which got worse, even though his overall stats got better, is because – and I'll have to look into it more, but I'm not sure the decline in strikeout rate is something that I would expect to continue for Pavetta. Because that's a big reason why the expected stats look worse than in previous years is, like I said, he used to be more than 10 per 9.9. He was 9.4 per 9 this year. All right, Chris, let's take a look at these sleepers that you delivered on this season. And it turns out you are the catcher whisperer because you sent over Hunter Goodman.

But you know what? I'm going to mention Yvonne Herrera because that is probably the sleeper or the catcher that I associated most with you this season. Because I know you liked him very early on in the process. Yeah, Herrera, part of it for me is when I do sleepers, it's just based on ADP. And I try to stick with that. and Herrera was just so cheap that even though I viewed him more as like a traditional breakout candidate, he was outside of the top 280P, so he just kind of naturally fell into the sleeper discussion. But yeah, he was, Yvonne Herrera was honestly basically just what he was last season.

And he just did it over a larger sample size. And now we've got, you know, the 179 games dating back to the start of the 2024 season, where he's basically been like a 370X Woba guy. And he's underperformed that a little bit in both seasons to the point where, okay, maybe there's a little bit of that. You know, he doesn't have a huge pull-de-air rate. You know, maybe there's something there. But he's a very, very strong source of batting average who should hit for a pretty good amount of power.

He will not be catcher eligible to open next season. but it's a situation where, at least based on what we know right now, it shouldn't take more than a couple of weeks. Even if he's not the primary catcher, if it catches a couple days per week, DH is the rest of the time. He played a little bit of outfield, but I don't really think that's in the long-term picture for him.

And he did all of this while playing through a knee injury, right? Yeah, I think that's what he missed time with early on in the season. And he did there some kind of procedure at the end of the season? Elbow injury prevented him from making throws as a catcher, which is why he had to move off the pitch's position. At the time, we just assumed he's a bad catcher, so he's not going to catch anymore. But it turns out he needed an elbow procedure done. If I could rank Herrera as a catcher, a catcher as a position I've done completely, he would come in eighth for me, which would be directly ahead of Augustine Ramirez and Drake Baldwin. So, even I think I'd be in the same spot, yeah.

Even in one catcher leagues, there's cause to take them late with DH-only status. He could be that sneaky pick. I mean, catcher's deep, so it's not the game changer. It's been for other players in that situation in the past who don't qualify a catcher on opening day, but you expect them to pick it up. But I think Herrera is so good that it's even with as deep as catcher is, it's still going to be worth doing. I mean, how many catchers are you sure? sure are a better hitter than Yvonne Herrera right now. Cowrally.

I'll still go with William Contreras. Yeah. Yeah. I think I would go Ben Rice. It's a similar sample size, but his underlying numbers were even better than Yvonne Herrera's. Probably Will Smith. Well, I think it's right around five, though. Will Smith sits twice a week.

Oh, no, I'm just saying who, how many catchers do you think are a better hitter than Yvonne It's certainly not more than six at most. Yeah. And the other name here that I mentioned, Hunter Goodman, not as great as a hitter as Yvonne Herrera, but certainly a better slugger who finished with 31 homers, 91 RBI in 843 OPS. We saw him put up huge numbers in the minors.

The biggest question entering this season was just, how much would he play? Where would he play? And he wound up getting 579 played appearances. He played 104 games a catcher, 39 at DH. And based on the way he performed, then the team he plays on, I don't expect that to change at all next season. No, and, and, you know, there are, there are and were strikeout concerns for him. He struck out 26% of the time. That's manageable. If it stays at 26%, you know, some of the underlying stuff, he chases a lot, he's got a lot

a swing and miss, but Corsefield helps cover for that. You know, and that's, when you're talking about the reason why I ranked, I had him as the sleeper I wanted to talk about is just, he was the number two catcher in fantasy this year was going outside of the top 300. He was the perfect example of a guy just,

rather than bet on the, the boring Cabert Ruiz type guys, just take a chance on someone with some upside for your number two catcher spot with Hunter Goodman. And, you know, Maybe that's less of a priority this year when the position's deeper, but. Apply to some other position. Yeah, there will be boring options to fill out your roster if you need them.

But this is a good example of why you should be chasing upside anywhere. And the Goodman example kind of goes back to what I was saying about Crowe Armstrong at the top of the show. Where, like, he produced in the miners. Now, I kind of, I kind of ridiculed you guys for your. interest in Hunter Goodman coming into the year just because I thought, well, he's not really a catcher. And he's this, you know, strikeout prone, plotting right-handed hitter. Like, where are the Rockies even going to play him? But it turns out his defensive metrics is a catcher ended up fine.

He was their starter from the beginning of the year. It was clear they planned to make this guy a starter. And his performance was so steady all season long, month by month. It was amazing. I kept waiting for it to drop off. Yeah, and it never did. And his splits overall, too, left, right, home road, first half, second half, all great, too. Not something we typically see from a Rockies player, too.

So, I mean, I think there's a little bit of give and take there. He might get a little bit better at Corus Field next season. Maybe he's a little bit worse on the road. But overall, I mean, I've started to kind of dig into catcher so far. I'm just starting there and, you know, doing deep dives on every player. I looked into Hunter Goodman, and everything seemed pretty legit based on what I looked at so far for him. The sleeper I wanted to talk about, and probably the one I, got most right as well is Hazus Lazardo. Preseason ADP was

240 as the SP 72 being drafted. He finished as the SP 28 and honestly could have been even better. We had those two massive blow-up terrible starts in the middle of the season where he was tipping his pitches which raised the numbers. He finished with a 392 ERA that also came with a 290 FIPP a 331 XERA. Those are close to elite level marks there for Lazzardo. And it's top 12 than both. I said it before the season. The ADP hate had just gone too far the other way with Lazzardo.

I understand he's dealt with some injuries. Last year he let people down. The ADP was higher and obviously he didn't come through. But we know he's talented. It came down to health and velocity. We saw in spring training. He was throwing over 96 miles per hour with the fastball. He basically maintained that all season long.

So he also added a new sweeper, which was his best pitch. I think that was a big help there for Hazo's Lazzardo. my only pause with him, and I think I've said this before, I see a bit of Dylan Sees and Blake Snell here, and Chris, you bring this point up all the times, like, buy when the price is down,

sell when the price is high. I don't know how high the price is going to be for Lazzardo, but undoubtedly it's going to be a lot higher than it was last year, and because of that, I might just be out by default. Ultimately, I think the way to look at it is just there's a lot of good pitchers out there. And so it just comes down to,

how much do you need Jesus Lazzardo in 2026? Knowing the risk for injury, the risk of the inherent volatility and his skill set, how bad his fastballs are is really the issue. I don't know if he's a top 20 starting pitcher if I'll necessarily want to take that plunge. Even if I think the price is fair, it's just there are other risk-reward propositions who will be cheaper, who might be just a better fit for most. teams, but I think that's probably the right spot. The thing is, is so I don't think he'll be top 20.

He'll probably be top. I'll probably rank him top 25. I don't know that he'll go that early, but that's probably how old. I think that fringe SP2, SP3 range probably. Yeah. You know, you brought up Cease and Snell. When they are ranked high, they're ranked in the top 10. So you're talking about serious draft capital for them.

The top 25 pitcher, you know, all the stud hitters are gone by that point. It's not as critical that you get it right. And I'm not saying Luzardo is like somebody I'm going to zero in on at that stage of the rankings at that point in the draft. I don't think there is a starting pitcher I'm going to zero in on. I think they're all potentially fringe Siong contenders who could. get hurt or go belly up for some other reason. You know, they're all, they all kind of fit that same description.

And so it's, it's probably going to be a situation for me where I'm just going to take multiple of them. Or if I take one, like I'm going to let other people decide their favorites and just take whoever's left. I'm going to be pretty agnostic about it. All right, let's take our final break

when we return a sleeper that we got wrong. What can we learn from that? We'll talk about that right after this. Welcome back. in fantasy baseball today, recapping our sleepers, breakouts, and busts from before the season. What can we learn from some of these picks? The sleepers that we got wrong here, Scott. We'll start with Ryan Mountcastle, who dealt with another injury-plagued season,

but even when he played, he didn't really deliver like we thought he could. Yeah, and I was really confident in this because the last time Ryan Mountcastle played, the year prior to them pushing the left field fences way back at Camden Yard. which just totally crushed power for right-handed hitters. The last year before that, Mount Castle hit 33 home runs. And his exit velocities remained excellent thereafter. It just seemed like that decision to push the walls back 30 feet all the way across just completely destroyed his power production.

So, okay, they move him back in at least half the way. then a lot of that power is going to come back, right? He certainly hits the ball hard enough. It didn't happen. And what I know now that I didn't know then to get back to lessons learned the other day is Ryan Mountcastle's pull air rate. It's in the blue. It's very consistently been in the blue. He is really bad at pulling the ball in the air, which neutralizes his own power.

It's not just a fence thing. He's doing it to himself. The one year that was an exception where the pole air, rate was in the red instead of in the blue was 2021 when he hit 33 home runs. So it could be that, you know, since every year after 2021, his pull air rate is in the blue, it could be that he adapted his approach because he knew he couldn't hit the ball over the left field fence in Camden Yards and he's not able to just adapt it back at the snap of a finger. but now it's to the point where I'm not sure he's going to get the chance to try again because

He's not in Baltimore. Yeah, I mean they got Kobe Mayo who they were playing more consistently, the Mount Castle down the stretch. He wasn't doing much with it, but he was getting the chance. They got Samuel Bessio who was able to play catcher, but won't next year because Adley Rushman will be back. So first base will be an option for him. Maybe they even bring in another first baseman just because they're tired of messing with these guys who don't perform. I don't think it'll be Mount Castle.

And because Mountcastle is a right-handed hitter who doesn't walk much and has no defensive versatility, I'm not sure any other team's going to be eager to take a chance on him. It would have to be one who says, I know exactly what's wrong with this guy, and I think we can fix him. And I'm not sure any team that actually has an opening at first base or DH is going to do that with Mountcastle. Or it should just be a bad team that has nothing to lose by taking a chance on him. why wouldn't the Rockies just call him up and say, hey, we'll take... I was going to get to the Pirates.

We'll take Mount Castle and let's see if we can, you know, turn him back into a 20 to 25 home run hitter and flip him at the deadline for something. Like, you know, something like that. But I could see a bad team trying that. But yeah, I mean, as of now, if Mount Castle remains on the Orioles, it doesn't look like there is a, there is everyday playing time for him. They still have Tyler O'Neill on the roster too,

who I know he's kind of penciled in the outfield right now. It kind of feels like he should just be a DH at this. point. The guy just cannot stay healthy too. So it's just they have some decisions to make there. And I don't know that Ryan Mountcastle is a big part of that. Chris, let's go over to you for Christian Campbell, another player who we were all pretty excited about, had himself, I think a pretty good. Actually, no, wasn't his. It was a really good April. His spring training wasn't very good, but that he still, he was terrible. He still made the team and had a good April and then just completely faded. Yeah, his spring training was terrible. He had a great April.

and kind of justified the Red Sox faith in him, despite the struggles in spring training. And then just completely collapsed. He got sent back to AAA and was okay, but it was still a higher strikeout rate than he had at any point last season at any level. It was like a 118 WRC plus in AAA, which is fine, but not exactly superstar production. And I guess the lesson here,

it's not so much the spring training struggles or anything like that. it's just buying into the lack of track record. You know, a comp that I made, at least in my head, I don't know if I ever brought it up on the podcast, was to Dylan Carlson, who was a prospect who, I think Dylan Carlson was a first round pick and Campbell was a fourth round pick, but it was similar in the way they developed in the minors,

which was Carlson didn't really do a ton. And then the last year before he got called up was this huge breakout. and that was basically the only track record of him playing at that level. And sometimes there's one-year breakout stick, but I think in this one it just came down to a lack of track record. And Campbell was cheap enough. You know, his ADP never even broke into the top 200,

which I thought was kind of crazy, but ended out working out pretty well. But, you know, the price was always reasonable enough that it didn't really matter, that he struggled, but there was definitely a lack of track record here if you're looking for, you know, a reason to be skeptical of a guy who only has the one good year in the minors. Campbell's another data point there. And I don't want to write him off because he's only 23 years old, but he was, you know, kind of a lower end prospect entering 2024 and then he had that huge breakout season and then

everyone was so excited for him coming into this year. So as it pointed out, he wasn't great when he got sent back down to the minors this season, played 73 games at AAA. He was also being asked to learn multiple new positions. True. Yeah. I think he was just the second baseman in 2024. And then this year he was playing outfield at times. He was playing first base occasionally, at least at, you know, working out there pregame.

So it's a lot to ask for a player that young who broke out that quickly. So in the long run, you know, he's under contract. The Red Sox gave him an extension. So I still have faith that he's going to get the opportunity. He'll certainly be cheap again in 2025, so I'll probably take some chances. But I ended up drafting him a lot and having a lot of confidence and having some really fun victory laps after the first month or so. Yeah. Sleeper that I got most wrong or someone I want to try to learn a lesson from here.

I mean, the list is massive. I've got to be better because the sleepers, when I went back, I was like, all right, I have like 10 different names to choose from here. I'll go with Bowden Francis, who at the end of last year, he looked like one of the best pitchers in baseball. Final nine starts, he had a 153 ERA, a 0.53 whip. I believe he took a no-hitter into the ninth inning two different times over that nine-star stretch.

His pre-season ADP was 216. He was the SP-65 being drafted. Figured we'd take a shot, see if it were. was real, it clearly was not. He made 14 starts with the Blue Jays this season, a 605 ERA, a 153 whip. And look, he didn't have an extensive track record. It's not like he had great numbers in the minors. You know, if you slice and dice, you would find some, you know, good partial seasons, I think from Bouton-Franc. And I think this is another example where if you look at individual pitches, Bout and Francis didn't really have much working for him before the season. And I think

just kind of turned a blind eye to that and figured, all right, well, let's see if, let's just see if this was real from the end of 2024. It turned out it wasn't. Also, Nick Pollock tried to warn me, and I should have listened. He's like, no, Baden Francis is not it, and he was not. So, yes, a sleeper that I was very wrong about the entering this past season. What about a breakout that we got most right? None of us chose Junior Camerreiro, but I feel like we just, we have to do an honorable mention here for Junior Camerero.

I think we all wrote him up as a breakout. Obviously, Scott loved him so much. He made a song about Junior Camerro last offseason. We got to get another song this off season. We got to figure out who that's going to be. Oh, and there's immense pressure, Scott. Amends pressure. You're Carly Ray Jepson trying to follow up, call me maybe.

Which she did, emotions one of the best albums of all time. I have kind of thought about, you know, kind of thought about some potential. lyrics. It's the difficulties would be higher on this, but for Will Vest, sticking with my parodying of 1990s Simpson songs with Mr. Burns, see my vest for Will Vest. But like, there would be a lot more lyrics for that one. So that would be tougher to pull. I don't know that I'm actually going to do it, but I have, I have thought about it. And I just wanted to give us another pat on the back for Junior Camerreiro because that was.

was a pretty pivotal decision in a lot of drafts. People were deciding between Camerro and Mark Vientos. That might have, you know, made your season or broken, I guess. So that was a pretty big talking point there. Chris, one of the breakouts you got very right was Brian Wu, someone who I was very wrong about. And basically, this just came down to health. We knew that he was a talented pitcher. I thought he wouldn't be able to stay healthy. And it turns out he was one of the most reliable workhorses in baseball this season. Yeah, and, you know, one thing that I've always said is if the only thing you can say about a player is that they can't stay healthy and they're discounted, that's usually not a bad bet

to make because we're not as good at predicting injuries as we think about. And look, I was very wrong about Jacob de Grom and Garrett Crochet for exactly the same reason, but those guys cost a lot more. They were both top 12 starting pitchers and AP. Brian Wu was like the 140th player drafted. And I had no concerns about the performance. He's got multiple great fastballs. I know a comp that Nick Pollock has made a few times that I love is Zach Wheeler.

I think in terms of their approaches, the way they pitch, very, very similar there. I'm a big Brian Wu fan. Brandon Woodruff has a lot of similarities as well. And yeah, ultimately it was just can he stay healthy? Can he avoid the 40% percent chance? chance of a major injury that, you know, he probably had coming into the season. This time he did. I know he had the, what, lat injury at the end of the season, but, or peck. Yeah, peck. I don't have too much. I know the kinetic chain, you know, maybe there's something there,

but the other thing with Brian Wu is there were a lot of forearm and elbow scares in 2024, but one, none of them ever ended up being serious. It was all like, he left his in, his start with a forearm strain and he'll make his next start. There were also a couple of like hamstring injuries or groin injuries, something like that throughout 2024 that I think maybe got conflated with the arm injuries and made it seem more severe. But once he showed at the end of 2024 that he was able to pitch deep into games, that really answered the biggest performance question I had.

And at the discount, it was a bet worth making. The workhorse numbers, by the way, for Brian Wu, six plus. six plus innings in 27 of 30 starts, including his first 25 starts of this season, which is unheard of in today's game of baseball. So awesome, awesome call there. Preseason ADP of 130.6 for Brian Wu. He finished as a top 5 SP in both Roto and hedgehead points this past season.

Scott, let's go over to you. Two names, both missed time due to injury. But when they played, they looked pretty good. It looked like it was happening. And Ronda and Chris Bubich. Yeah, I'm going to address Bubich first because it kind of plays off your, um, your Bouten Francis call. So the lesson here, I feel like is tiny samples can still tell us something.

They're obviously not conclusive at all, but they can still suggest something. And sometimes they're all we have to work with because prior to Tommy John surgery, I believe it was early in 2023, right? We saw some substantive changes for Bubich and his arsenal and he had just, I think, two starts.

One was a nine strikeout effort. He looked like a different pitcher, but it was just a couple starts to go on. Then he has Tommy John surgery. Then he comes back in relief the next year, but is dominant in relief. But I think, you know, then we find out in 2025

he's transitioning back to the rotation. And I don't know. that people really took him seriously because his overall track record as the starter was not very impressive at all. But we had those couple turns prior to Tommy John's surgery where he showed a different arsenal

and was dominant. And so I figured, okay, maybe this will go really well. And the key difference here between him and Francis, who were also talking about a small sample of great success, boobitch was going

about 350th on average. He was going after Charlie Morton, for goodness sakes. While Francis, on average, was going ahead of actual good pitchers like... Jesus Lazzardo. Like Nick Ladolo. Yeah. And so, I mean, part of it is just, yes, small, tiny samples, inconclusive. You can't treat them as fact.

but if they give you an inkling and the price is essentially nothing, why not? He may have figured it out. And if he hadn't, you'll know real soon and you'll move on to something else and it's no big deal. So that's the lesson for Boobitch. For Ronda, it's just persistence, you know. My love for Ronda had reached like we were kind of parody. it on this show. Like, here it goes Scott again, talking about Jonathan Aronda.

But like when the underlying indicators or even the top line numbers of AAA are that strong for a player, they're both that strong. And it's just opportunity and health holding him back, even if it's repeatedly holding him back. Like, you've got to give the guy a chance. And people who gave Aronda a chance in 2025, I think we're pretty pleased by what they got and he'll be drafted much higher next year obviously. I just want to remind people about Chris Bubbage because he's been out of mind out of sight out of mind for so long now.

But in 20 starts, he had a 255 ERA, a 118 whip right around a strike out per inning. Great swinging strike rate underneath. His season ended with a rotator cuff strain in his left shoulder. He also was throwing a lot more innings than he has in previous years. And we were kind of worried about that, kind of adding up. But I think he might be someone that kind of flies into the radar a little bit here. And definitely in early drafts, but even, you know, once we get to February March, I'm going to be very interested to see, A, how Bubich looks in spring training, as long as he's healthy part of the rotation.

I could very much so being in on Chris Bubich again this upcoming season. He made my top 48, and that might be low. Yeah, we'll see. Tyler Soderstrom, I wanted to mention here. He was a name I wrote up, wait. early on, like late January. And it was basically just off the basis that he was a former top prospect. He had great numbers in a small sample size the year prior in 2023.

We're talking really good exit velocities, really nice numbers in the minors as well. And I figured that he would just have an everyday job with the A's. You know, they're kind of a, you know, team that's trying to get back on track, a rebuilding team here. And who knew that their offense would turn out to be as good as it was, mostly thanks to Nick Kurtz. Tyler Soderstrom, no slouch here, wound up hitting 25 homers, 93 RBI, eight seals and 820 OPS. It was rocky at times. He got off to the great start and the middle part of the season.

He kind of slowed down a little bit, but then picked things back up here in the second half, all while being asked to play outfield, something he's never done before. So I guess the lesson here is a former top prospect who we had a small sample of the previous year, the metrics looked pretty good, and he played for a bad team,

so figured he would have every day playing time, and he made the most of it. So yeah, Tyler Sotershom, I'll be looking for next year's Tyler Sotterstrom pretty soon right now in the offseason. What about the breakouts that we got wrong? Mason Wynn told us that he was going to steal 30 bases. It didn't happen, Chris. Yeah, I fell just short with nine in 129 games.

And this is, you know, we've talked a lot about like, betting on Saddam Rafael and Pekkar Armstrong and these guys who were productive minor leaguers and had good pedigree. And even, you know, we've made the point. And I've seen some comments or suggested that like the fact that they were really good defensive players should also play into it because they're just good baseball players. And these guys tend to figure it out. And all of that is true of Mason win, right? Like he he wasn't like an incredible hitter at the minor league level. But he hit 285 at AAA with 20 old.

20 homers in 108 games, 17 stolen bases, 838 OPS, made a decent amount of contact, pulls the ball in the air, like does a lot of the things that P. Kro Armstrong did and that turned him into a really good player. But ultimately it's just there's not enough pop there. At least there has not been. I know he's played through a ton of injuries this season. Maybe that's why he still has not become a better base runner. but at the deepest position in fantasy shortstop,

I don't know how much it makes sense to keep waiting on Mason Win. He's not terribly old. I think he'll be 24 on opening day, but this was a bet on pedigree and minor league production that did not work out. So it's worth keeping mind that that doesn't always happen. Jason Dominguez, another example. Dylan Cruz, another example, although his minor league. production has never been great either.

Yeah, and he dealt with an injury as well, so I guess it's harder to kind of put that on Dylan Cruz. Mason Wynne, you mentioned he kind of played through injuries all season this year. He missed time with back spasms. He had tightness in his calf. And then towards the end of the season, we find out that he had a tear in his meniscus in his right knee and actually already underwent arthroscopic surgery

to be ready in time for the start of spring training. He is such a fantastic defender that I'm not really sure the Cardinals, obviously they would want to get offense from him, but they don't really need to press that issue as much, just because everything he adds defensively is just so valuable already. Like, even if he turns into a 260 hitting 10-10 or 15-15 guy, that is still a really, really valuable player for them. But to this point, he, I would say he's underachieved offensively,

at least based on what we were expecting. Andrewton Simmons was a great baseball player. He wasn't necessarily a great fantasy player more often than not. Right. Scott, let's go over to you. You got two big names here. Lawrence Butler, who was an industry darling breakout this season now. Another one who also dealt with some injuries this year and didn't have a terrible season. He wound up going 2020, but he definitely wasn't letdown based on, you know, his ADP wound up right around 60 by the end of draft season. And then Billy Ober is someone that we thought we could just kind of set it and forget it. Really great whip. You know, maybe the ERA will be a little bit higher. but just got bombed. Also was playing through a hip injury, which kind of derailed his entire season. Yeah, I think the lesson with Lawrence Butler is just fade industry darlings. It sounds counterintuitive because it's like, well, if everybody likes this guy, he must be great.

But like everybody liked him for the same thin reasons, which was he was a monster for about two and a half months last year. Maybe it was closer to three. But basically half a season, he was turned. Terrific. But half the season is still not a very compelling sample for a player who didn't have much of a reputation prior to that. It's not like he had some great prospect pedigree. So we've been a lot. Good, but not like elite minorly production.

And it may have been a legit breakout. I'm not saying you should ignore what Butler did. But when everybody has to be the one who gets him, it raises the price to a point where the odds are, against him living up to it. Like he, he, the industry as a whole and, and the draft body as a whole became too certain about Butler.

And that was really the problem. And I think we all kind of caught on to this as it was happening. I only drafted Butler in two leagues for as much as I liked him. But, you know, once he was verging on top 60 status, that was too high. I mean, you said he finished 1.30th.

Like, if he was drafted 120th, like that would be more reasonable for a guy with with his his kind of resume coming into the year and that's probably what should have happened. I will also point out in his case he had the awesome July, awesome August, September was still okay. He hit 280, but it was only two homers, a 739 OPS. when I see the small sample size breakout. This is the year prior, right?

This is 20-24, yeah. Yeah, this is 23. September of 24. Gotcha, got you, got you. Would have been his best month in 2025, I believe. Oh, wow. But when I see the partial season breakout that doesn't run all the way through to the end, that is where my red flag goes up a little bit.

Hey, Jacob Marcy this season. Pay attention for next year. A little bit. I guess, yeah. He didn't. He had a huge August, but his September was actually kind of bad. I was looking into it. I don't, yeah, I just, you have to allow for some variance. You have to, he's not going to cost anywhere near. Yeah, I don't, what? I don't think he'll even be a top 100 pick, but you know what? I'd be pretty surprised. Maybe Marcy will wind up being drafted where Butler should have last year, maybe around 120. Just real quick, I feel like I have to address Bailey Ober since that was one of the ones I was highest on.

I don't really take a lesson from this. I think there's still reason to be optimistic about Ober and the price is going to be next to nothing. What went wrong for Ober was he got hurt prior to the season. He had a hip issue that threw off his mechanics and he just wasn't able to get it right after that. But the reason I was so high on him to reiterate,

elite control pitcher, who's swinging strike rates in both 2024 and 2023 were higher in both of those years than Paul Skeens and Garrett Crochet had this year. So, like, talented guy. I originally looked into this thinking, oh, did I do, did I make too much of him having those two runaway starts and subtracting them? And this is what his ERA would be without him. But that really wasn't the central point with Oper.

It's that he's really good at missing bats when his. mechanics are right, obviously, really good at missing bats in a way that the strikeout rate hasn't fully reflected, and then he's an elite control pitcher on top of that. So, you know, I have some hope for a bounce back next year for Bailey Oper. I agree. All right, breakouts that I missed on here, lots of names that were ruined by injury, Spencer Schwellenbach, Dylan Cruz, Jordan Westberg, Tristan Kosses, Jared Jones, Spencer Arroghetti, but that is part of the game. I do want to focus on Jason Dominguez, who wasn't injured and still obviously did not live up to expectations. And I'll mention Schwellenbach in just a little bit here. But Dominguez, you know, he wasn't awful, but he lost the grip on a starting job here with the Yankees. Trent Grisham actually had the breakout maybe we thought Dominguez would have.

John Carlos Stanton hit well once he returned. We had, you know, Judge's elbow getting hurt and having to only play D.H kind of put a strain on the Yankees. and what they can do defensively. But Dominguez wound up hitting 10 homers, 23 steals, solid average exit velocity. His swing is just not optimized for power. His pull air rate is just 12.6%. His barrel rate just 7%.

It's a lot of line drives. He hits to all fields. Not giving up on the kid. He only turns 23 years old in February, but we're getting closer to kind of a crossroads here with Jason Dominguez, where he needs to, to make himself more useful as a player.

He's a really bad fielder. He's really bad against lefties. And it just kind of makes him a limited option for the Yankees to use and to trust moving forward. So he can get better. He's young enough where he can. But I think we just need to see more from Jason Dominguez moving forward.

And I think Spencer Swellenbach is kind of an interesting case too. I wanted to bring this up. There were people, and we definitely mentioned this before the season, that were worried about Shwellenbach's innings jump from 23 to 24. He went from 65 innings in the minors all the way up to 168 and 2 thirds in 2024.

Over 100 inning jump here. And then this year he comes out, he's throwing one mile per hour harder on his fastball, and his arm just couldn't hold up. He suffered a fractured right elbow. So I think Schoenbach is kind of a, I think, more interesting talking point because we'll have a bunch of other pitchers that have big innings jumps year over year.

guys that we saw velocity jumps this past season. This is a sample of one with Schwellenbach, but will that make you more nervous about taking a pitcher who had a big innings jump or maybe we saw a velocity jump this past season? I think the biggest thing with Schwellenbach is not just the innings jump, but there was no track record there. That was the first time he had ever thrown 100 innings in a season at any level because he was a shortstop, I think, in college and a reliever.

Yeah. And so that for me, where like, you know, Yuri Perez, big inning jump. He didn't pitch at all. 2024. He pitched, what, 100-something innings this year probably? That's less concerning just because we have seen him pitch more or less a full season. But if you've never even thrown 100 innings, that that is a red flag for sure. I am less concerned about the loss.

I'm sorry. I almost said it backwards. I am less concerned about innings jumps. when the jump is like to 130 innings from 70, you know, versus 110 things too much. Like, we almost had our first offseason Robo, Scott, but I think it's all right for now.

You pulled through. I think that's a holdover from the era where you had like Mark Pryor in his sophomore season throwing 225 innings and oh, look at that innings jump. No wonder he got hurt. Okay. Yeah, but that was more because he was throwing 225 innings. I think pitchers are very brittle in general.

And so, of course, somebody who hasn't been a beginning jump one year could then get injured the next because like anybody could get injured the next. But I think the one that probably contributed more to the injury Schwellenbach actually suffered was the velocity jump because it was a stress fracture in his elbow, right? It was a usage-based injury. It was the sort of injuries that we saw from DeGrom when he had the big innings, the big velocity jump. Gosh. And so that's not to say like a velocity jump is a bad thing when you're evaluating a pitcher for fantasy. It's going to make them more effective, but you have to recognize that it probably brings more injury risk too, because I think we're seeing that pretty regularly when it happens.

All right. instead of rushing through our, the busts that we wanted to talk about, names that we got right, names that we got wrong, we've got all off season, we'll save it for the next podcast, we'll lead off with that, and I think we've got some other fun things planned for next week. We'll draft the first two rounds for next year, and then I think we start to jump into our position recaps, and we'll start a catcher, and we'll work all the way through, but again, no, no need to rush it here in the off season. We are going to wrap there for Scott and Chris. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning into fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating

on Apple or Spotify, and we'll be back again next week. Bye-bye. Paramount Podcasts.