Fantasy Baseball Today - Interesting SPs, Prospect Updates & Week 6 Sleepers! (4/30 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)
Episode Date: April 30, 2021There were SO many interesting starting pitcher performances on Thursday! Let's start with Shane McClanahan (2:22). How good can Adbert Alzolay be? ... What about Dylan Cease, Yusei Kikuchi and Kyle ...Gibson after their great starts (11:07)? ... Is now the time to sell-high on Carlos Rodon (17:45)? ... We have news and notes (22:35), starting with Corbin Burnes to the IL, Matthew Boyd leaving his start, and more. ... It's time for our Week 6 sleeper pitchers and hitters (25:08)! Which two-start pitchers can you trust next week? ... We have updates on some of the top prospects in the game plus some risers in dynasty (35:35). ... A few former and current prospects showed up with the bat on Thursday plus a few more deep waiver wire names (41:30). ... IT'S GONNA BE MAY (46:24)! Who were the biggest standouts from April? ... We recap the rest of Thursday, update you on some bullpens, provide streamers for the weekend and answer your emails (50:06). ... Email us at fantasybaseball@cbsi.com. 'Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts. Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank, @AdamAizer 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
Transcript
Discussion (0)
Happy Kokomo Friday and welcome into fantasy baseball today presented by Lining Kugles
more on their great variety of beverages later on in the podcast.
Frank Stamphill joined by Scott White.
I want to give everybody a special shout out.
If you are watching us live right now on YouTube, it is past midnight.
It is officially Friday, April 30th, and the first round of the NFL draft is over,
which means it's time to talk about baseball.
No one else wants to talk about football.
What's going on, Scott?
Man, I was just appreciating that rendition of Kokomo.
I know we hear it every Friday, but it's so good.
The thing is, like, the actual song is not that good,
but this version of it, not even having to do with the lyrics.
He just elevates the sound so much.
Dot Kratzer did the few years ago, a few years back when he wrote that.
And it never gets old.
It never gets old.
I don't know how he did it, but it was,
It's a work of genius.
Yeah, I mean, the best jingles, right, for commercials or whatever it might be, certain businesses,
they just have this lasting effect.
And Kokomo Friday really does capture that.
Some people tell us to play it more, which we're never going to do.
It's a Friday thing, which I think is what makes it special.
It used to be every episode that we played it.
Oh, my gosh.
Then we had to go all corporate and fantasy baseball today with Frank and Scott and Adam,
even though he's never on.
That's true, right?
We do still give him the shout out,
even though he's never here.
Today on the show,
there is no shortage
of interesting starting pitchers
to talk about,
so they're just all going to take up
our, oh my goodness gracious segment, basically.
We have some prospect updates,
a week six preview for you,
and some April standouts and more.
But let's jump right into Thursday's action.
Oh, my goodness gracious.
All right, Scott, pick whichever one
of the awesome.
starting pitchers, which we had on Thursday that you want to talk about?
I will pick the one who I think is probably the least rostered.
He was making his first major league start, not his major league debut.
Actually, it wasn't technically his major league debut.
Did he debut in the playoffs last year?
I've delayed it long enough.
The name I'm going with is Shane McClanahan.
Yeah, I guess this technically counts as his major league debut,
even though he debuted in the postseason last year because I learned earlier.
That's how it worked with.
with Alex Kirolov.
So anyway,
Shane McClanahan looked
overpowering, I think,
would be an understatement
to describe his first major league start
today against the athletics of all teams,
one of the hottest teams in baseball.
Four innings,
two run,
struck out five,
walked none.
Okay, that all is finding good.
15 swinging strikes
on 59 pitches,
and over 25% swinging strike rate,
which you never see.
I mean, I guess occasional start you'll see it,
but that's basically what maybe DeGrom can do
and nobody else in the league can even come close to,
you know, over the course of several starts.
And, you know, we haven't seen several starts from McLeanahan,
so maybe it would regress, but,
I mean the stuff, just the pure stuff,
I saw Jeff Passon saying that
if McClanahan keeps this up,
he's basically going to be the hardest throwing
left-handed starting pitcher ever.
He reached 100.5 on his fastball.
And he threw 41% sliders.
It's not like he only had the fastball.
It was 41% sliders, 41% fastball.
I mean, that's, you'd like to see more of a third pitch at some point,
but that kind of pitchmigs should lead to a lot of whiffs.
So it's the race who handle their pitching in the most unconventional manner
and are not very forthright about their plans
and are extra cautious with their pitching assets, how they deploy them.
So the usage is going to be a real concern here.
I'm not even confident.
Are they keeping them in the rotation?
Did you see anything about that, Frank?
Or they're being secretive about it, right?
So I saw this little tidbit from before the game earlier on Thursday.
Manager Kevin Cash said they plan to use McClain-Han as a starter as opposed to an opener
to join a pitching staff impacted by injury and will give him the opportunity to grow into that role.
To me, that kind of sounds like they're going to let him start and remain in the rotation,
at least for now.
I think as long as he's performing.
Based on what we saw on Thursday, I don't think there's any reason to think he won't perform well.
Yeah, I think that's what it sounds like.
That last little clause at the end kind of brought it all the way there.
But still, who knows?
I question the usage.
Somebody asked me if I dropped Michael Kopeck for McClan, and I would not, even though there are usage questions about Kopeck too.
I just, over the long haul, I trust Tony Larusa to handle him in a more conventional manner.
And I just think he's more talent.
I mean, McClanahan looks great, but Kopeck is Kopeck.
So not a bad person to have on your bench, though, McClanahan,
because it does look like the potential is very, very high.
And what makes the swinging strikes in the start even more impressive?
Coming into Thursday, the Oakland A's had the sixth best swinging strike rate in baseball.
So for him to get 15 on 59 pitches, it just makes it even that much more impressive for Shane McClan.
Scott, I'll just ask you him versus a few of the most added starting pitchers in fantasy baseball right now.
According to CBS, would you rather have McClanahan or Alex Wood, who looks like he's back?
He does look like he's back, and I can't quit Alex Wood, just like Chris couldn't quit Byron Buxton.
I don't think that's going to turn out as well for me as it has for Chris, but that's my guy.
I can't quit on.
And got to go with Wood for those usage concerns.
I imagine I'm going to pick the other pitcher in most of these instances because that usage is,
issue is such a big deal for McClanahan, but just really impressed by the talent he showed today.
How about McClainahan versus Kyle Gibson? Gibson now has five straight quality starts,
six endings of one-run ball against the Boston Red Sox on Thursday.
McClanahan versus Gibson. Yeah, I think you got to go, you got to go Gibson unless you're
talking like a dynasty scenario. And McIntymanan's already probably rostered in a dynasty scenario.
Gibson is 59% rostered on CBS, but I think he's, you know,
He's, this new cutter that he's throwing has really elevated his game.
And he has a deep repertoire.
He threw six different pitches Kyle Gibson did on Thursday at least seven times in that start against Boston.
One of the, I would say best lineups, at least in the American League, maybe all of baseball.
So Kyle Gibson, he's giving you some length as well going deep in the starts.
Definitely helps you in points leagues.
But Shane McClainahan for sure.
If you have a dead roster spot, get him on your team just to see what comes of it.
If you have him in a dynasty or keeper league, you should be jumping for joy.
he is a very exciting player.
Oh my goodness gracious for me, I'm going to go with,
look, there's no shortage of starting pitchers.
So I'm sorry to you say Kikuchi and Dylan Seas.
We're going to get to these guys.
But I want to talk about Albert Alzali,
who actually had his longest start of his career
the first time he has completed six innings
and he did it at the Atlanta Braves,
which is no small feat.
Six endings of two-run ball with six strikeouts,
14 swinging strikes on 94 pitches for Alzali
through his slider, wait for it,
54% of the time in this start,
that was 44% on the slider usage
entering this one.
And I started thinking about it,
can he have long-term success
throwing his slider that much?
And I don't know the answer to that.
But then I thought,
it reminds me a little bit of Denelson Lamet
from last year who used his slider
over 50% of the time.
So he's not as electric as Lamet.
He doesn't throw as hard.
His slider might not even be as good,
but can he be to Nelson Lament light,
at least in the short term for this season?
I think the answer is yes.
I really like Al-Zali.
We spoke about him a little bit
heading into the season, Scott,
as a sleeper slash breakout-ish-type starting pitcher.
He's only 21% rostered.
How about Al-Azalai versus Shane McClan
in a redraft league?
I think I got to go Al-Zalai,
who I'm pretty excited about.
Yeah, I was excited about him
as far back as the off-season
because I think throwing your best pitch,
is always a good move.
So I definitely approve of what he's doing with the slider.
The amazing thing for Alzalai is that he didn't have the slider two years ago.
You know, he was a halfway decent prospect before he even developed his best pitch.
And it's clearly his best pitch.
And it should make him a pretty good bat misser.
Really, it comes down again to usage.
And I just have a hard time believe.
leaving McClanahan will at any point this season be used like a conventional starter.
I'm not saying he'll never make a six-inning start,
but I think there will be a lot of four-inning starts.
I think there will be a lot of stretches where he's removed from the rotation,
and it's just going to be hard to get real impact out of that,
which is disappointing after all the good things I said about him and how good he looked today.
But I just think that's the reality of the situation.
I get where you're saying that, Scott, with the Tampa Bay raise.
But I'm actually a little bit more optimistic.
The fact that they let him throw, I thought it was going to be maybe two innings,
three innings max.
They let him go forward.
They let him throw 59 pitches.
And if the plan is to build him up, I would imagine next start he has the opportunity to throw
60 to 70 pitches.
Maybe he gets all the way up to 70.
And if they're trying to stretch him out, maybe the next start after that, he throws more
than 70 pitches.
So I'm actually a little bit more optimistic, but I understand.
hard to trust anything that Tampa Bay Reyes do.
McClanahan is awesome, but I agree with you,
I would take Aalai over him in a redraft league.
Now, not in Dynasty or Keeper Leagues, anything like that.
Not that I think Azzalai is a bad keeper,
but yeah, McClanhan's upside wins out
in those longer-term formats.
Let's talk about a few of these other starting pitcher,
Scott, Dylan Seas.
He just completed a seven-enning, complete game shutout
because it was the second leg of a double-header,
so they only throw-
It's not a complete game shutout.
It's kind of, you know, it's a,
A modified complete game.
Shoutout we'll go with...
Did he go the whole game?
Where's Chris when you need him?
Did he go the whole game?
Was that how many innings were scheduled?
Yeah.
I think technically he did, right?
Well, yes, he did.
Dylan Seas finishes with nine strikeouts to zero walks.
Zero walks, the key, obviously.
They've just been a huge issue for Seas.
I think it was six walks per nine entering this start for him.
16 swinging strikes on 91 pitches,
eight on the slider in particular.
But it comes with the caveat.
not that I want to take anything away from him.
He was going up against a Detroit Tiger.
So, all right, let's keep that in mind.
Does this give you any more confidence in buying back in on Dylan Cscott?
His roster rate is 53% on CBS.
Well, it's bad news for Michael Kopeck because this seemed like his easy as in.
And Cs has bought himself more chances, probably, with a start this good.
The number that stood out to me, though, remember what we talked about for Chris Pappell.
the spin rate on Dylan Sees' four seamer was up 139 RPM from his season average in this start.
And everything was suddenly more effective, including the fastball.
And that was actually something I read this spring.
What I kind of started to get a little hyped for Seas toward the end of spring training
is because just as they said they were doing with Carlos Rodan,
their new pitching coach on the name now white socks pitching coach anyway i forgot it as well i'll
look it up for you yeah uh they were doing similar things with both of them uh incorporating the lower
body more make the delivery more repeatable and one of the things it was supposed to do is put more
spin on the fastball make the fastball more effective in that way and we didn't see that play out in
Cesar's first few starts, so I just figured, okay, well, I guess so much for that.
But seeing it happen in this start makes me wonder if it's starting to take effect here.
I mean, in terms of just raw stuff, C CES is really good.
You know, it just doesn't seem like he knows how to get the most out of it.
So he's been pretty useless in fantasy so far.
I'm not as interested in picking CIS up as I am like Aalai or even McClan.
because of all the failure on his resume.
But there's reason to think with this start
that there's still a chance he makes something of himself
and of this season.
Ethan Katz is the pitching coach
that you were looking for there, Scott.
So I agree with you.
I would rank CIS behind McClanahan, Aleslie
in terms of waiver wire ads.
I would even rank him behind Kyle Gibson.
Is that going too far, Scott?
No, no. I had Gibson ahead of McClanahan, remember.
Okay. And let's just figure,
figure out where you say Kukuchi fits into all this because he was at the Houston Astros on Thursday,
seven shutout with seven strikeouts, 17 swinging strikes on 95 pitches, mentioned what Shane
McClain did against the Oakland A's and how impressive it was. Houston entered this game
with the best swinging strike rate in baseball, 8.6%. And for Kukuchi to go out there and get
17 swinging strikes, it's very impressive. And also, he's gone six plus in four of five starts.
I thought that was pretty interesting as well.
So 48% rostered is Kakuchi.
Where does he fit into this whole waiver wire glob of starting pitchers?
I guess I'm going to say number one.
I was...
Really?
Wow.
Well, there's a lot of reason to think Kakushi is good.
I mean, look at his expected ERA last year.
Look at his ex-fip last year.
Two starts ago, we were all feeling great about it.
I mean, begun the year with back-to-back quality starts
and 16 strikeouts in 12 innings.
And then two bad starts where he had a combined four strikeouts in 11 and two
thirds innings and was walking a bunch of guys.
And the swinging strike rate has not been very good either this year or last.
But then he had, you know, 17 against the team that doesn't swing him as much.
I don't know.
He's getting to be kind of a headache, to be honest.
You say Kikuchi, I could just see him being someone who I'm in and out on all season long.
Right.
but right now I feel like I got to say I'm in, you know?
Yeah.
For me, it's the overall numbers coming in were bad for Kukuchi,
and then the underlying numbers were not really much better
in terms of expected ERA on Stadcast and X-FIP and skill interactive.
Yeah, I'm talking about last year, how good they liked, even though his-
They were great last year, but so far this year for Kukuchi, they haven't been great.
So I do think he's going to be inconsistent.
I think he's capable of giving you these starts every now and then,
but I would rank him behind personally.
McClanahan, Alzali, Gibson,
probably just ahead of Dylan Seas,
but it's just really because of that inconsistency
more than anything else.
So, yeah, I mean,
look, no shortage of starting pitchers from today.
And you heard Scott's order?
That's my order on him.
I think Chris would agree with me for what it's worth.
Yeah, he probably would.
I'm getting a lot of stuff right this year.
I know he loved Kukuchi.
Honorable mention to Wascar, you know,
I didn't talk about him on yesterday's podcast,
So I completely flubbed that one up.
But five and one-third shutout with nine strikeouts against the Cubs on Wednesday night that was.
So he's 70% rostered.
You know, he's probably available in some 10-team leagues, 12-teamers, anything deeper than that.
I think Enoa's probably already rostered.
He's been great.
I don't know if there's anything you want to add on him, Scott, since you weren't on yesterday's podcast.
No, I think he's most roster.
I'm skeptical he can keep it up.
Two-pitch pitcher really kind of doing a McLan.
a hand thing where the slider he throws just as much, if not more than his fastball.
And I think that's been what's allowed him to succeed in spite of two pitches, also the fact
that he can crank it up to 98.
But he didn't come with much of a pedigree.
Minor league numbers don't look great.
I'm skeptical, but it's been too good for too long for you to leave him out there and
look like an idiot when it does work out, you know?
Yeah.
Last name I wanted to mention, he's not available in any leagues,
but we just got to talk about it.
Carlos Rodon, six innings of one-run ball,
12 strikeouts against the Tigers.
They're obviously very prone to swinging and missing.
23 swinging strikes for Rodon,
and he has a 0.72 ERA on the season,
0.64 whip.
The problem, which we've mentioned before,
he hasn't thrown more than 160 innings since 2016.
So I just wonder if
Is he going to be on an ending's limit at some point?
I would have to imagine yes,
but Tony LaRoucce is just letting him go out there
and throw as many pitches as he possibly can.
So, Scott,
anything to add on Carl Shorton, Scott,
or would you be looking to sell high on him
based on that track record that he has of injury
and not being this great, obviously?
Yeah, actually, I think it was a week ago today.
I wrote about 12 streaking starting pitchers
and whether or not you should sell high on him.
I had six that I said yes, sell high, six I said no.
Carlos Rodon was one of the yeses
and it was exactly for that reason.
I buy into the improvement.
I think I don't want to trade him.
I want to enjoy him in my lineup
because I think it's going to go well.
But this is his first full year back from Tommy John,
surgery and teams understandably handle pitchers carefully when they're having when they're taking
on that big workload again for the first time and and rodon's case you know coming off a down
year where he hardly had any innings anyway that I think that would be more so and the fact that
they're letting him throw 110 plus pitches yeah I could I could see him running into a wall at some
point and and yeah you're not having him available for a while so again in carlos rodon's case
as much as anyone else when i say so high i'm stressing the high he should deliver a haul for you
for the kind of start he's off to and if he doesn't then just enjoy the ride but it's worth dangling
him to see because he's obviously generated as many headlines as any pitcher in the early going and
probably has a lot of trade helium right now as a result.
I'll give you a few names and you just tell me yes or no,
would you trade Rodon for this player straight up?
And I realize starting pitcher for starting pitcher trades are harder to pull off.
So I'll give you a few outfielder as well.
Work in some hitters here.
But first name, would you trade Rodon straight up for Charlie Morton,
if you could, Scott?
I'd want more.
How about Kenton Maida?
I, again, I'd want.
want more. Like, I feel like if you're going to trade Rodon, go for the kill. And these are not,
these are not go for the kill type moves to me. Luis Castillo? No. Someone emailed in today and said,
they traded away Carlos Rodon for Lance Lynn and that they felt terrible about it after seeing
this start. And I said, and it was a points league. I said, no. You should feel very good about
getting Lance Lynn in a points league for Carlos Rodon. Yeah. So that's a little bit higher end.
But if you can pull that off, that's something you should look for.
Yes, I agree.
You're just below the line with those three names for me.
I just think I have enough, you know, I give it at least a two-thirds chance in both Castillo and my Ada's chance.
Both the case of Castillo and my eight, at least a two-thirds chance that they bounce back and are fine.
But there's enough concern there that that doesn't seem like a good enough sell high based on what Rodon's doing now.
A few outfielers. Would you trade Rodon for Marcel O'Zuna?
I'm reluctant to trade inequality pitcher for a hitter.
It would be a needs-based thing, but I'd lean no.
How about Kyle Tucker?
Same answer.
Okay. So I'm not even going to ask you about Austin Meadows because he's ranked even lower than those guys.
And yeah, in both cases, I think I'm talking about only a categories league, too.
I don't think I'd consider it in a points league for either one of them.
It's Kentucky Derby Week, and Sportsline has,
you cover don't lay a wager before visiting sportsline.com for the best racing analysis from
legendary handicappers. Hammering Hank Goldberg has the inside scoop from Bob Baffert. Jody Demling
has nailed nine Oaks Derby doubles horse racing guru. Gene Manez will be on the early
edge podcast, dishing out his picks and getting you up to speed on how to bet the first leg of
the triple crown. Sportsline has you covered for everything related to Saturday's run for
The Roses. Some news and notes from Thursday, Corbyn Burns was placed on the aisle for unspecified
reasons, which sounds like a COVID situation. If he himself tested positive, he'll likely be out
at least 10 days. It could last as long as two weeks. I hope he's all right. So it's always
weird for me to kind of talk about benefiting from a situation like this, because obviously
you know, my concern is that he's safe, first and foremost. But I think this isn't the worst thing
for his fantasy value because I think this means we could have Corbyn Burns at full strength
later into the season now if we were worried about an inning's situation.
So I'll just mention that.
Well, yeah.
When I first saw the news before I saw COVID speculation, I assumed it was a phantom I'll
stent actually.
I assumed it was a strategic move.
It might?
Probably not, but.
You never know.
Yeah, I mean.
We've seen a bunch of people go on for these unspecified reasons,
and it turns out to be COVID.
Matthew Boyd left Thursday start against the White Sox with left knee tendonitis.
Max Fried impressed during his live BP session.
He could be back early next week.
Marco Gonzalez was placed on the aisle with a mild forearm strain.
Yerdan Alvarez is undergoing tests on Thursday.
By the time you're listening to this, he underwent those tests,
and could return to the team for Friday.
Nate Pearson was reinstated from the 10-day injured list,
an option to the alternate training site.
He will travel with the Blue Jays' triple A team to Trenton,
which I didn't really want to hear because I just traded Julio Arias
for Nate Pearson in Scott White's Dynasty League.
So I want to see Nate Pearson,
but they probably want to build them up
and get them back on track before they bring them back to the major league team.
Both Christian Yelich and Lorenzo Kane participated in a simulated game on Thursday.
Luis Robert was reinstated from the COVID-IL.
Javier Baez was back in the lineup Thursday.
after missing two days with a hamstring issue.
Mike Fires will return to the A's rotation for at least one start on Friday.
Matt Olson was out of the lineup due to an eye injury.
Mitch Hanager was not in the lineup for a second straight day due to either an illness or fatigue.
I couldn't find just one answer, so we'll go with both.
Luke Voigt was taking live at Bats on Thursday.
His timeline remains mid-May.
Aaron Judge was out for a second straight day with lower body sorenserness.
Chris Davensky was activated off the restricted list for the Arizona Diamondbacks.
Let's jump into the week six pitcher and hitter planners presented by lining coogles.
And before we get to Scott's two-start pitchers that he likes for next week,
just want to let everyone know how is the schedule shaking out for this upcoming week?
12 teams have seven games, 16 teams have six games,
and only two teams have five games next week.
That includes the Chicago White Sox and the Cincinnati Reds.
So, Scott, I'll throw it your way.
Some two-start pitchers that you are looking at that are rostered in...
What are we going with this time?
Under 75% of leagues?
Does that sound kosher?
I've moved it up to 80.
Okay.
Well, it turns out they're all rostered in less than 75 anyway.
Alrighty.
So a few notes from the top, just about two-star pitchers.
in general, it's really messy right now.
The messiest it's been so far this season
in terms of who lines up to pitch when.
There are pretty much every week I put together
a little table like this,
the whole week's worth of pitching matchups for every team.
And there are TBAs in there.
I'm able to figure out who the TBA is probably going to be,
and I fill in the name.
There are so many TBAs that I just had to leave TBAs.
So, yeah, teams are having to go deeper into their pitching reserve this week.
And it makes it less predictable.
Another thing I wanted to point out is that this week, provided nothing changes and things often change,
is shaping up to be the rare week when Shohei Otani lines up for two starts,
being part of a six-man rotation.
It's not going to happen often.
So you might want to take advantage of that.
obviously he's well-roastered already.
Okay, so who might you actually be able to pick up?
He was in line for two starts.
Jake Junis, my boy, I said his roster rate should double after that last start.
It has not.
It's gone up only 5%.
Still available in 65% of leagues.
It's gone up 5 percentage points, I should say.
Some people get nitpicky about that.
Anyway, Kansas City and Cleveland are his matchups.
I'm sorry, he's on Kansas City.
Cleveland and the White Sox are his matchups.
One of those is good, obviously.
And he's been good.
Kyle Gibson, who had another good start today.
He gets the twins and the Mariners.
Domingo Hermann, he was supposed to make two starts last week.
Then they inserted Davey Garcia, and they moved Cory Kluber up a day.
So Hermann did not make two starts.
He's in line for two starts this week.
Matchups aren't as good, Houston, and Washington,
but he's earned a little more leeway based on the way.
his last start went
some really deep guys
has en rostered in less than 50% of leagues.
Nick Povetta,
Detroit and Baltimore are his matchups
and he's coming off his best start of the year.
Now, I saw
somebody make a joke on Twitter.
Who was it?
It was Jeff Zimmerman.
Jeff Zimmerman, I think it was,
made the joke that
Nick Povetta is shaping up
to be this week's Austin Gomber
or Joe Ross, who were, I guess, highly talked about two-star pitchers the last two weeks, who imploded.
And I don't have a lot of confidence in Povetta, but I have more confidence in him than I did in those two, especially with those matchups.
So Pavetta, J-Hap, I have very little confidence in J-Hap.
This is one of those.
I'm forced to give you more names, so this is a name I'm going to give you kind of picks.
and J-Hap's going against the Rangers and the Tigers coming off two seven-inning starts.
Maybe he keeps it going.
I don't see a lot I like in the underlying stats.
But, hey, the matchers are good.
All right.
I just wanted to touch on the few of the names that you mentioned there.
Jake Junis, actually in my homekeeper league,
my dad actually outbid me for Jake Junis, which is hilarious.
So, thanks, Dad.
$5 bid in a 12-team points league, so where Jake Junis was available.
So he won him there.
And Nick Povetta, I will just point out, he has a 5.96 walk per nine right now.
So he is walking quite a few people, but I do like those matchups.
I mentioned that on yesterday's podcast as well.
Scott, a few single-start pitchers that you were looking at for next week who have nice matchups.
So, incidentally, you say Kukuchi's set to go against the Orioles.
I think you need to run him out there again.
Brady Singer, who's been on a good run.
He gets the Indians this week.
those are my favorites if you want me to give you a couple more one i will give you is
alex wood and it's very dangerous because it's at colorado i don't know i don't know
like i see myself doing it and i want to reach out and stop myself recommending a pitcher
who is available on waivers in nearly half of all leagues at colorado but colorado hasn't
played like colorado so far maybe that'll change with the weather warming up
and he's just, you know, he's flirted with a no-hitter, his past two starts.
So it wouldn't be me starting Alex Wood, but you want a recommendation, there it is.
And one in that same vein, I would say Madison Bumgarner against the Marlins, if you're feeling lucky.
The Marlins are what I consider the one of the best matchups in baseball, maybe the best,
without stalling Marte in their lineup.
Though, Jesus Aguilar, the guy is red-hot right now.
Scott, let's, speaking of Aguilar, I don't know if he's one of your sleeper hitters,
but he is a hitter.
So give us some of your sleeper hitters
heading into next week.
Yeah, that's actually the first name
I was going to mention, Aguilar.
Nice.
Marlins didn't play on Thursday, right?
So that he's still at five home runs
in his last six games.
I imagine that would be reason enough
to keep him in your lineup.
But if you needed another reason,
good matchups against the Diamondbacks
and the Brewers.
Three more revenge games
against the Brewers, Scott.
Yeah, basically the only good pitcher
he's facing during the week
is Zach Gowan.
So if you were all on the fence about Aguilar in a shallower league,
that might be enough to put you over.
C.J. Crohn's been hot,
and he gets three games back at Coorsfield this week.
I don't know.
It'll be a matchup of Crohn versus Wood, I guess,
and we'll see who wins.
Luis Arise, I've been waiting for this week,
waiting for the week when the twins play,
they have nothing but right-handed pitchers on the schedule.
And him being a left-handed hitter, the splits are like you'd expect them to be.
He bats lead off, typically on the days they're facing right-handers.
So it's shaping up to be a good week for Luis Arise,
provided you can live without him hitting home runs.
I like J.D. Davis's matchups this week.
Austin Riley, as hot as he is, I think the matchups are good enough to stick with him.
And I think those are the only ones I'm going to highlight here.
There'll be a few more in the column, of course.
Oh, I didn't mention this for a rise.
The twins have the best hitter matchups.
on top of everything else.
So looking good for him.
I don't know, maybe he rolled the dice on Mitch Garver
after that two homer game,
considering the twins have the best matchups.
I think you have a catcher instead.
I think Alex Kirolov is probably rostered
in a good amount of leagues by now,
but you should have confidence to start him against
an all righty week as well.
It actually hasn't changed that much.
65% rostered is Kierloff.
That number should be higher, at least I think.
Scott, you mentioned the twins are one of the teams,
with the best hitter matchups,
give us the rest of those teams
and then the ones that have
the worst hitter matchups as well.
So the twins have the best,
like I said,
then the Rangers,
athletics,
Mets, and Mariners.
The worst hitter matchups
are the Reds,
or one of the teams
with five games,
the Royals,
the Phillies,
the White Sox,
and the Cubs.
All right.
So there you have it.
The week six pitcher
and hitter planners
presented by Lining Cougals,
and by the time
you are listening to this
on Friday. I'm going to be out on the Wiffa Ball field with
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We're going to take a quick break, but when we return, we're going to hit the email of the day.
Talk about a few prospects.
We'll do that next on Fantasy Baseball today.
The email of the day comes from David, and he says,
I was lucky enough to get Wanderfranco and Jared Kalanick in my league,
but I have no idea what to do with them now.
How much longer should I hold on to them?
Also, what other interesting prospect do you see coming up soon?
So the updates that we do have,
Wander Franco is starting in AAA for the Tampa Bay raise.
Someone asked me a timeline on Twitter.
Look, it's all speculation, it's all guesswork.
I'm thinking mid to late May for Wander Franco.
So that's what I'll put out there.
I did see this update from Jared Kelnik.
It was back on April 23rd, so there hasn't been anything since then.
I was searching Twitter furiously earlier in the day.
They said,
Kelnick will quote, play in the big leagues in the not too distant future.
according to general manager Jerry Depoto,
but the team's current outfield depth depth chart
doesn't presently offer the 21-year-old
an opportunity for promotion.
So that's Wander Franco and Jared Kelnick.
I did also see on Thursday that the Blue Jays announced
Alec Manoa will start in AAA,
Austin Martin and Jordan Groshen's will start in AA.
Speaking of Alec Manoa,
there's an article on CBSports.com right now,
some of Scott's biggest dynasty risers and fallers in fantasy baseball.
And the prospect risers, Alec Manoa is one of them.
So Scott, if you'd like to tell the good people why he's rising up, now is the time.
Obviously, there's little to go on for minor leaguers.
They're just, you get the occasional observation from the alternate sites.
There's not really like any data to cite or anything.
So it's mostly they've risen over.
dynasty value over the course of this first month based on what happened in spring training.
What happened in spring training for Alec Manoa is he was untouchable.
He was untouchable.
15 strikeouts in seven innings, no walks one hit aloud.
I mean, that's amazing.
And the thing is, he was doing it mostly against major leaguers.
Baseball reference has an opponent quality stat for spring training.
It's a one to ten scale.
And, you know, a lot of times you'll see players with seven, eight's pretty,
high, you know, for a prospect who comes in late in games, you might have like a three or four
for opponent quality.
Alec Madoa's opponent quality this spring was nine.
So he was just, he just looked dominant.
And I don't know.
I didn't consider him that big of a deal before this spring.
So it certainly seems like he's more of an asset than he was then.
The other five prospects who I had is gaining value in dynasty leagues over this first month.
I'm going to try to do this once a month.
the others were Bobby Witt, no surprise there.
Jaron de Ron of the Red Sox,
who showed power for the first time this spring,
and it looked pretty legit.
Always had good batting average ability and speed.
I had Jax Chisholm in there because I needed a fifth,
and he still technically qualifies as prospect six a bat short
of losing that status.
And trying to remember who the other guy was, it was...
Dalton. Did you mention Dalton Jeffries?
It was Dalton Jeffries.
Yeah.
Yeah.
In a fair world,
Dalton Jeffries would already be
in the athletic situation
because he was their best pitcher
this spring.
And look at his minor league numbers.
That strikeout to walk rate is ridiculous.
He walks nobody.
At least in the minors,
he has walked nobody.
I saw somebody make the,
look, I normally don't like
when people automatically make a comp
to one of the best players in baseball,
but someone said based on what their minor league stats look like, them being equal,
that Dalton Jeffries kind of looks like Shane Bieber based on his minor league track record.
No.
You may have heard me say that, Frank.
I'm pretty sure I said that at some point.
It might have been you.
I thought I read it somewhere on Twitter.
It might have been your Twitter.
I don't know, but I saw it somewhere.
And the minor league profiles are apparently very similar between Jeffries and Bieber.
Yeah.
He's not going to turn into Bieber.
I would.
Odds are against that.
It's already against that happening.
People take offense to those kind of pie in the sky comps,
which I guess I get,
but I feel like that's understood, right?
Not every prospect is going to become Shane Bieber.
Almost no prospects will become Shane Bieber.
But Shane Bieber showed similar strengths,
and look what he ended up being.
So, you know, most likely outcome for Jeffries,
as for any pitching prospect is,
maybe they get a rotation spot for a couple years before fizzling out.
That's the default expectation.
But I think the upside case for Jeffries is higher than his prospect ranking would have you believe.
There's no such thing as a pitching prospect.
And the reason why I said it annoyed me, Scott,
the always making player comps like the best players in the league is I was watching the NFL draft
and every single player is just compared to, you know, one of the best in the NFL.
and it was, oh, Travis ETIN, this guy reminds me of Alvin Camara.
Like, okay, what are the chances of that actually happening?
This is a baseball podcast, but that's what got the early rise out of me.
So that's why I said that.
So you can find the rest of Scott's Dynasty risers and followers, of course, on the website.
Where do we want to go from here?
Promote one more thing.
The NFL draft has arrived.
And the Pixixix podcast is your audio outlet for immediate reactions.
for picks from Trevor Lawrence to Mr. Irrelevant.
Want to know how your team fared.
Each night of the draft, the pick six crew will analyze all selections,
dishing out winners and losers and team by team grades.
Follow the pick six podcast wherever you find this one.
That's where I wanted to go.
I wanted to talk about a few other former and current hitter prospects
that are showing up recently.
Scott, you mentioned Austin Riley.
He's one of your sleeper hitters for next week.
We talked about him a ton on yesterday's podcast,
but he went two for three on Thursday with a walk.
He is now betting 301 with an 868 OPS.
He's 55% rostered.
Nico Horner picked up two more hits himself.
He's now 9 for 25 since being recalled by the Cubs.
38% rostered.
And don't look now.
But Andrew Vaughn went 3 for 3 on Thursday with two doubles
and two runs scored.
He is now batting, wait for it, 279.
Kind of looks respectable.
He hasn't hit a home run yet.
He's hitting way too many ground balls.
But chances are, in deeper leagues,
you probably held on to this guy.
He's 63% rostered on CBS.
So he's still on someone's team.
There are signs that he is turning it around.
So I thought I would give him a shout out.
Yeah, best game of his career so far, right?
First three hit game, maybe the first game
with two extra base hits.
And here was LaRusa's quote after the game.
He's showing his teammates coaching staff that he's a contributor.
He's really a very heady, stable kind of guy.
Early on when he was like, oh, for 10, he was just pressing for a hit.
Can't force hits.
Makes it a very deep lineup, doesn't it?
I don't know.
Maybe that sounds like he's about ready to play him more.
I don't know.
I don't know. I hope so.
But I think Vaughn will be good someday, and I think it will be sooner than later.
I would agree with that.
Let's talk about a few other deep waiver names.
Brett Phillips outfielder for the Tampa Bay raise.
He went one for two with two steals.
If you are in the deepest of leagues and you need some speed,
he has started three straight games.
Josh Rojas all of a sudden,
I wrote 8 for 22.
I think he got another hit after that.
So we'll go with 9 for his last 23, Josh Rojas,
with two homers, one steal.
He was crushing it in the spring,
got off to a slow start, but he's available.
He's only 12% rostered on CBS.
So in deeper leagues,
if you need a middle infielder,
some pop and some super,
speeds from Josh Rojas.
Martine Perez was at the Texas Rangers, five and two-thirds, two runs, seven strikeouts to zero
walks.
Eric Lauer, remember the name, versus the Dodgers, five shutout with three strikeouts.
He is only one-percent rostered on CBS.
And the last name I wanted to mention, Luis Garcia versus the Seattle Mariners, five
innings of one-run ball, six strikeouts, and Garcia has been good this year.
2.70 ERA, 1.05 whip, 20 strikeouts, and 20 innings pitched.
So, Scott, anything you would like to add to these names?
Brett Phillips, Josh Rojas, Luis Garcia, Martin Perez, Eric Lauer.
I think Luis Garcia should not be featured this late in the program.
I think I could have picked him as, oh my goodness gracious, I think,
because he just keeps doing this.
He had 14 swinging strikes in this one.
Basically, his three longest outings of the season,
four plus innings,
14, swinging strikes and all of them.
He just keeps doing this.
And you look at his minor league numbers
from the last minor league season 2019.
Luis Garcia had a 2.98 IRA,
a 107 whip,
13.9 K-per-9, 168 strikeouts,
and 2-thirds innings.
Maybe the most impressive thing to me,
especially given his level of experience,
the fact that he wasn't like a hype prospect or anything
is just how full his arsenal is.
Those 14 swinging strikes,
four came on the fastball,
four on the changeup,
three on the cutter,
three on the slider.
Usually there's one pitch
that does the heavy lifting with that WIF stat.
And the same was true in his last star,
how evenly distributed they are with those pitches.
It seems like he has a lot going for him,
including Jake Oterizzi being out with a strained forearm.
That sounds like a long-term absence.
We do hear reports of Framber Valdez
possibly returning in the next two to three weeks.
So keep that at mind.
But for now, Luis Garcia has a chance to make some hay,
and I think he needs to be picked up.
I think he does.
Behind all those other names we mentioned,
McLeanahan, Alzalai,
even Dylan cease, I would put Garcia behind,
but the roster ship is basically non-existent now,
and so it needs to go up quite a bit from there.
Luis Garcia rostered in just 9% of CBS leagues,
plus he has SPARP eligibility.
So for those who play in points leagues,
that's a nice little cheat code there for you with Luis Garcia.
Scott, this weekend, there's something very important
that's happening on Saturday.
Do you know what it is?
Hmm.
No.
It's gonna be May.
It's gonna be May.
It's May 1st.
Yes.
Anytime you have an opportunity to play an in sync soundbite,
you gotta do it, obviously.
So I did want to take a look at a few statistical standouts
as May approaches,
and who had your mean Mercedes leading baseball
with a 423 batting average by the end of April,
which as baseball, right?
Which we talked about last night,
Nate Lowe and Hazers Aguilar are each tied for the league lead with 22 RBI.
So the American League, the National League, there you go.
Your two leaders, Nate Lowe and Hazerz Aguilar.
Eugenio Suarez currently has the lowest batting average among qualified hitters.
He is batting 1.25.
Should we bench E.ohenio Suarez for now, Scott?
He seems like one of these guys where once he gets hot, he can hit four home runs in a week
and you don't, I obviously don't want to miss that,
but he is actively hurting people right now.
Yeah. Yeah.
I think it's the difference between Roto and points.
Roto, I mean, obviously you're not banking losses along the way.
And you have a bigger lineup to work with.
So there's fewer alternatives to begin with.
Yeah, I think if I had a hot hand play,
I could go within a head-to-head league with a smaller lineup.
But, yeah, particularly since the Reds have the worst matchups this,
week. I think that makes it an easier call.
There is a four-way tie
for the home run lead at this point. Ronald
Coonja, Ryan McMahon, Reese Hoskins,
and Byron Buckson each have eight.
Shout out to Ryan McMahon. He's been
awesome this year and he's hitting more fly balls.
And if he keeps that up,
I saw Chris talking to someone on Twitter about this today
or yesterday. If he was breaking out,
Ryan McMahon, this is what it would look like. He's making
more contact. He's hitting more fly balls.
And he looks great. So I really like
what I've seen from Ryan McMahon.
Ramon Loriano and Whitmerfield each have eight steals that leads baseball.
Ronald Acuna has 24 runs scored and is tied with whom?
Mark Kana, 24 runs scored to this point, leading off for the Oakland A's.
They've been one of the best lineups, one of the hottest teams in baseball.
He's a high OBP guy.
So actually, someone emailed in today, Scott, and they said,
do you know what my recipe for successes?
I forgot how he phrased it.
But he said, I draft everyone who,
who Scott White likes the year later.
So he's like, I drafted Marcana this year.
He's like, I drafted Vladimir Guerrero
because he said,
I think you liked Vlad two years ago
when he was a rookie or something.
So he's like, yeah, he's like,
I just draft guys a couple of, like the year
or a couple of years later.
And after Scott likes him,
and it works out.
So there you go.
Kenta Maeda has a 6.56 ERA
and a 1.76 whip.
Both of those are highest among qualified starting pitchers.
Danny Duffy leads qualified starting pitchers with a 0.39 ERA move over Jacob deGrom
Danny Duffy's coming for you I would imagine Carlos Rodan passed him today he
he mentioned I think Rodon has a 0.72 ERA after today he does yeah Danny Duffy is still
Duffy's is half bad 0.39 for Danny Duffy there you go Corby burns leads baseball with a
0.55 whip Jacob Dgram has 59 strikeouts and the leader in saves
Mark Malanson has eight saves for the San Diego Padres.
A few other standouts from Wednesday that we haven't mentioned to this point.
It wasn't really a standout, but Jordan Montgomery has just kind of been mad.
Five innings pitch, two earned runs, seven swinging strikes against the Baltimore Orioles.
Scott, would you drop Jordan Montgomery for some of the names we spoke about earlier?
I think so.
Because I think he must.
might just be a met pitcher. It was last year. He's been that this year. It's not like there's
any, it's not like there's some underlying number that says, well, actually, look what's about to
happen. So I'd even drop him for cease. I might drop him for Garcia. I might not. Okay. But I think I'd
I'd drop him for C's. All right. So that means you definitely would drop him for McLanagan, Alzalai,
Kikuchi, Kyle Gibson, if they're available.
So if you have Jordan Montgomery on your team,
that's a move that you can make.
Tray Mancini went three for four with his fifth home run.
He has 10 hits over his last seven games,
showing signs of life there.
Still had a 57% ground ball rate entering Thursday,
which is not great.
Matt Chapman went two for four with his fourth home run,
back-to-back multi-hit games.
Some signs of life there.
Chris Bassett, we were talking about him before the podcast, Scott.
At the Tampa Bay raise, six innings, two runs,
nine strikeouts, all of a sudden he has three straight quality starts, 25 strikeouts,
over 18 innings pitch during that span. Where is this coming from? Or has it just been the
matchups? They've been really good matchups. They have been good matchups. I will point out,
though, the progression of the swinging strike total, start by start for Bassett, 6, 8, 8, 16, 14, 15.
I mean, it's like a different pitcher there. And I think his three best,
swinging strike starts last year were his last three also.
I happened to go back and look.
Those were also very favorable matchups for Chris Bassett.
His last three starts last year.
Maybe that explains it.
I don't see a clear explanation otherwise,
but I am not such a slave to the matchups that I think,
you don't see somebody turn on a dime like this.
not in baseball, based on,
okay, I'm facing a good opponent versus a bad opponent.
Like there's some crossover effect.
Like, you know, maybe on the whole,
his matchups against the bad teams
will be a little bit better
than his matchups against the good teams.
But you don't see, like, a night and day difference like this,
not over a stretch of starts, especially.
So I don't know.
I don't know, but a little more,
open to the possibility that Chris Bassett is actually good.
Especially when he's looked as good as he has over the past three starts, it's kind of like,
I was just imagining a triple beam balance got, where it's, some of it is the matchup,
some of it is, you know, he's probably, even though we can't see it in the pitch mix or anything,
he's probably doing something differently that's working for him. So take both of those things
into account and Chris Bassett has looked pretty good over his past three starts.
The call to the pen, some bullpen updates. Speaking of those Oakland A's,
Lou Trevino was used in the ninth.
He picked up his fourth save of the season.
He now has the last two saves for Oakland.
He is 61% rostered on CBS for the Mariners.
Kendall Graveman was used in the ninth,
picked up his third save.
Raphael Montero was used in the eighth inning on Wednesday night.
He gave up four runs against Houston Astros.
Is Kendall Graveman the guy right now, Scott, for the Mariners?
He's 40% rostered.
I thought he had all the momentum.
over a week ago, right,
after Montero blew his third save
and then they still went back to Montero.
Okay, I guess they really want Montero in that role.
But now Montero's up to four blown saves already.
And Montero has twice as many blown saves
as Graveman has allowed hits this season.
So it's getting really hard to justify
not just turning it over to Graveman.
that is not my decision to make.
And so I don't.
But I have to think, like, all the momentum is there now.
I'm just reluctant to drop Montero again in those, like, deep leagues where saves, you know,
everybody's throwing a ton of fab dollars at every new saves option that emerged.
Because somebody did that in the 15-Team Tau Wars League, and it looked like a mistake
just a few days later.
Maybe it wasn't actually, but we need to see more.
The man who replaced Raphael Montero for the Texas Rangers as their closer is Ian Kennedy.
He picked up his fifth save on Thursday.
Cesar Valdez, as soon as we talk him up, a couple of days ago.
He picks up his second blown save of the season, gave up two hits and two walks and a hit in a one-run game against the Yankees.
For the Cardinals, Alex Reyes pitched a ninth and the 10th in a tie game.
He did not allow a hit, and he racked up three strikeouts.
He picked up the win there.
For the White Sox, Liam Hendricks picked up his fifth save.
Josh Hader got his sixth save of the season for the Brewers.
To stream or not to stream, we'll hit Friday, Saturday, and Sunday.
Scott, choose three of these for Friday.
J.T. Brewbaker versus the Cardinals.
John Gant at the Pirates.
Robbie Ray versus the Braves.
Brady Singer at the Twins.
John Gray at the Diamondbacks.
Mad Bum versus the Colorado Rockies.
And Andrew Heaney at the Mariners.
Okay, I'm gonna say Heaney.
It's tough because there's good pitchers with okay pitchers with tough matchups.
I'm gonna say Heaney at Seattle, Brady Singer at Minnesota, and I'm gonna say Mad Bum versus Colorado.
Really rolling the dice on that one, but that's what happens when you stream pitchers.
Yeah, I think Chris last night took John Gant over Brady Singer solely because of the matchup.
So yeah, no.
Not that John Gant is any good.
Streamers for Saturday.
Matt Shoemaker versus the Royals,
Griffin Canning at Seattle,
Anthony DiScoffani at the Padres,
Austin Gomber.
I just had to throw the name in because it's hilarious.
At the Diamondbacks,
Matt Harvey at the Oakland A's,
and Spencer Turnbull at the Yankees.
This is a real who's who of starting pitchers.
Yeah, this is,
man, I thought that last group was bad.
I don't know that I won't pick
Gomber to be honest. Like, I don't think he's good, but
I think Desclafani at San Diego.
I don't know. It seems kind of suicidal, but you're making me pick, Frank.
Esclanee at San Diego.
I think Canning at the Mariners.
I've just lost a lot of faith in Canning, but okay, fine.
It's a bad group, man.
Basically, don't stream pitchers on Saturday if you can avoid it.
Yeah, it's a bad idea.
If you make me pick a third, I'm going to pick Gomber just for the lulls.
Do not start Austin Gobber.
Even though, just don't, please don't do it.
Sunday streamers, Trevor Williams at the Reds,
Garrett Richards at the Rangers, Brad Keller at the Twins,
Adam Wainwright at the Pirates,
Jose Urania at the Yankees, and David Peterson at the Phillies.
Wainwright at the Pirates,
feel pretty good about that.
Yeah, I don't feel good about any of the others.
Richards at Texas, I think I'd pick here coming off that 15-Wiff 10 strikeout game against the Mets.
He'd made some mechanical adjustments prior to that that caught my attention.
And I actually picked him up in a 12-team league, just to stash him for now.
That's a good matchup, Gary Richards of Texas.
And my third choice would be probably Trevor Williams at Cincinnati.
I don't know.
Question mark.
Yeah, that's a bad one.
I'm Ron Burgundy.
Wrap up with some emails here.
This one's from Brett in Jersey.
Dear Devante, Devante, Devante,
and Devante.
It's relevant with the NFL draft.
Devante Smith drafted to the Philadelphia Eagles.
Those are four different spellings, by the way.
Oh, yeah.
It's, if you are a fantasy football writer or an NFL writer,
that is one of the,
one of the trickier ones that you need to be on your toes for.
10-team, 5-player, keeper, weekly points league.
Mouthful.
Pitchers are really valuable.
I have Corbyn Burns, Glassnow, Erod, Gore.
All right, blah, blah, blah.
You have a lot.
Guy wants Carlos Carrasco and Mitch Hanager for Kyle Tucker.
Would you give up your Carasco and Hanigar for Kyle Tucker in a five-player keeper points league?
In a points league, if I'm being honest, I don't think you're probably going to end up
keeping Tucker, especially with all these pitchers you're going to end up having to keep.
As Trevor Rogers in there, Luis Castillo.
I think I'd stick with the pitching depth.
Maybe I'm a nut.
Maybe I'm a pitching nut.
But I got to be more, I got to be impressed more than that.
You've heard of the pitching ninja.
We have the pitching nut here on fantasy baseball today.
If it was not a points league, I would do it.
If it was a Categories league for Tucker, Carasca.
and Handiger, okay. But points league's like, I just assigned so little value to hitters in a
points league right now. Scott, close your eyes. Okay. Okay, I got to read the next one and I don't
want you to see the answer because it's right here. From Kyle. Hey, Pablo, Pete and Keisha. Um,
you had to play it, Scott. You had to play it. Is that backyard baseball? That is backyard baseball.
Pablo Sanchez, Pete Wheeler, and Keisha Phillips. Thanks to you guys, I find myself in first place in my
14-team Roto Salary Cap League, led by podcast favorites, Byron Buckson,
Sandy Alcantara, Corey Seeger, and others. I am top three in every category except Steels.
All right, Scott, start thinking of some by-low steals candidates while I read the rest of this question.
Who are some good by-low-low-stiles players in Rodo that won't torpedo all my other
statistical categories and could realistically carry me rest of year?
Actually, one that comes to mind is Kyle Tucker.
Yeah, that's a good point.
And Nixon Zell, who I spoke about on yesterday's podcast.
I think he's a great by-low right now.
My mind went to jazz chisholm because he's heard.
It might not be possible.
How about a buy high?
Colton Wong, because I think you could get him for cheaper than what people value him as right now.
And I move them ahead of Keston Hero, Scott.
I'm all in.
I love what I've seen from Colton Wong.
Wow.
I move Castanero way down
but yeah
yeah I'm not I'm not going that far
with Wong yet
I like him
I'm looking
let's see I'm in outfield
I mean
I'm just thinking of the most obvious answers maybe
but is now a good time to buy
at Alberto Mondesi
because we haven't really heard any
clear timetable for him
or his return is getting closer
and he will make a huge impact
in steals when he does return presumably.
Yeah, I mean, he's probably answer number one.
How about Francisco Lindor?
Not that he's going to carry you,
but can he steal 12 to 15 rest of season?
Probably.
There's never going to be a better time
to try and acquire him, so.
We'll throw Francisco Lindor in that mix.
I'll enter a few more here.
This one's from a different Kyle.
Hey guys, I'm in a 12-te-to-head categories
with OBP instead of average.
Five keep people.
League. Should I be patient with Jonathan
India or drop him for either Colton
Wong or Nick Senzel. Both are
on waivers. I would drop
him for either. Who do I
want more at 12 team?
With OBP, I'll go with Colton Wong.
He's a good OVP guy.
Wasn't Senzel too?
I think I'd go Wong also.
Yeah. Yeah.
I need to see more from Senzel
and
not totally trusting in the playing time with
Tyler Naquin hanging
around. From our buddy, Shine Dog. Ten team head-to-head points league with deep rosters.
I gave three years of, it's also a keeper league. I gave three years, Wander Franco, one year
Matthew Boyd. I received one year of Trent Grisham. Wee. Yeah, I don't, I don't like it.
I mean, it's a 10-team league trying to consolidate your talent. Give up best prospect and
baseball for the next three years.
I mean, you're probably close to winning and you're desperate for an outfielder.
Probably could have got someone better than Trent Grisham in a points league.
I would think so.
Yeah.
I don't hate it, but I don't think I would have done it.
So I'll give it a C minus.
Using Wander Franco for a Trent Grisham rental, especially in a shallow league, I think.
Seems like a bad move.
Using Franco, you probably...
I shouldn't say especially in a shallow league.
It'd be even worse than a deep league, I guess.
But I don't think it's good either way.
Yeah, I agree.
This last one's from Dwayne.
In a 10-team category league,
I give up Julio Arias and Nelson Cruz.
In return, I get Lucas Gialito,
Eduardo Rodriguez,
and Matt Chapman.
Grade the Trade.
Yeah, you get the best player in Gialito.
I will give it a B.
A B. B plus. B plus.
B plus for Dwayne.
For Scott, I am Frank, thank you all for listening and watching fantasy baseball.
Today, we'll be back again on Monday.
Bye-bye.
