Fantasy Baseball Today - Jac Caglianone TAKES OFF! Week 14 Sleepers & Two-Start Pitchers (6/20 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: June 20, 2025

Jac Caglianone is on the board with two homers (3:39)! ... Jacob Lopez looks like a dude (8:50)! ... Spencer Strider makes it two strong starts in a row (17:30). ... News (21:00): Kristian Campbell is going back to the minors. ... Colton Cowser or Jo Adell (32:50)? ... Edward Cabrera and Charlie Morton are pitching well (41:05). ... Carlos Rodon, Yamamoto and Gausman are coming back down to earth in June (46:13). ... Let's preview Week 14, looking at the schedule, two-start pitchers and sleeper hitters (49:16). ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpens and streamers (1:00:07). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Subscribe to our YouTube channel: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Download and Follow Fantasy Baseball Today on Spotify: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://sptfy.com/QiKv⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Get awesome Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠http://bit.ly/3y8dUqi⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow FBT on TikTok: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ Follow our FBT team on Twitter: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@FBTPod⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠@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/⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ 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

And welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today on June 20th. I am Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White. Today on the show, it was a huge slate of action to recap 16 games on the schedule. Spencer Shreder made two great starts in a row. Jack Caglione is on the board, not once but twice. We'll preview week 14 and much more. But before that, Scott, you know what? Love getting out to a game, day baseball, but I got to say,

It takes a lot out of you. And then to come home and try and recap all this baseball, I'm kind of poop, man. How you doing? I admire the attempt to go to a baseball game on a workday. Some people have to for these teams to stay in business, for the whole sport to stay in business, I suppose. But I could not even attempt it.

It would not go well. Yeah. Yankee's skit is over, but man, it was, it was, hot it was rainy we had two rain delays I think this is the first game that I went to that had an extended rain delay in my life and it was fun just seeing people dance around and saying you were there even longer than a normal game it was it was a long it was a long day my very long day my hats off to you sir yes if I were to wear a hat mm all right well let's get into Thursday's action

holy Toledo the element is surprised all right Scott here we are players of the night and I'll just get things started here with our guy. Jack Caglione, he is on the board. Two for four with a double dong. First two home runs in the Biggs. Both came off of lefties here. The first one was a pitch

up around his eyes. The second one had a 110 exit velocity 439 feet. The overall stat line still doesn't look great. It's been a very slow start here for Caglione. But as we just said with Nick Kurtz yesterday, sometimes it takes

a little bit of time for these prospects to figure things out before they get going. And honestly, even before this game, Scott, the data under the hood looks really great for Caglione. We'd like to see him walk more, obviously, being nipicky here, but he's hitting the ball hard, expected stats look great early on. You picked up Caglione.

Obviously, you love this game. And based on the data, Scott, it looks like bigger days are coming. I mean, if this is the start of, him finding his footing in the majors, him figuring it out and becoming the sort of player he was in the minors. That was basically no time at all. And so seeing him home or twice in the same game.

And the second of the home runs in the ninth inning was like a trademark Jack Caglione home run. It was hit 110 miles per hour. It was hit 439 feet. You're going to see a lot. of home runs from this guy just like that because his power is top of the scales. The biggest thing problem I see in the data other than the low walk rate, which, you know, that was one of the knocks on him as a prospect.

Why he didn't rank as high as a Nick Kurtz, for instance, is because he does tend to swing a lot, swing more than his ideal. He's not good at taking a walk, is Caglione. So I'm not sure. He might become such of a power threat that he eventually just gets pitched around a lot and walks a decent amount for that reason. But that's not like a natural part of Caglion's skill set. So the lack of walks, not a total surprise there. But the other issue I see is just that his pull air rate was very low.

So he was making hard contact. It wasn't in the most beneficial directions. But that's something that's likely to come around. and hopefully this game on Thursday was the start of it. If he went 0 for 4 again instead of having this two-homer game, I'd still want you to stick with him. I think the upside is so high, and I think he deserves patience given that.

Going back to, it was really Julio Rodriguez and Bobby Witts, their rookie seasons, very consistent pattern of elite call-ups on the hitter side, needing about two months to get going into majors. And maybe it'll be less for Caglione. That would be great. Yeah, you mentioned the poll air percentage being down so far for Caglione. Well, both of these home runs to the poll side.

You like to see that. And again, both of those were off of lefties. I put this poll out on YouTube. If you look on the community tab, you can go ahead and find it and answer along. But since we talked about him yesterday, Scott, Nick Kurtz or Caglio rest of the season I have them right next to each other

in my rankings I don't feel like I don't I don't feel like I can distinguish between them right now to be perfectly honest their upside I think is very similar Nick Kurtz walk is going to walk more as I already pointed out Caglione is probably going to make more contact

overall so there are pluses and minuses there for each of them like I kind of don't want to take a stand because the one I prefer is the one who ends up performing best. But if in that oddball scenario where somebody actually has to choose between the two, I think I'm going to say Kurtz

just because he's gotten a little more time to figure things out and is also showing, I think, clearer signs of maybe going on a run here. So I'll lean that way, but not for any particularly good reason. Wait a second. I am just seeing right now that Nick Kurtz did it again in extra innings. A walk-off two-run homer against Josh Hader of all people, too.

Lefty on lefty. And Nick Kurtz is, he is on one right now. He's on a heater to do that against maybe the best closer in baseball right now. Mm. All right. Yeah, take a bow, Nick Kurtz. Like both of these guys, but, uh, yeah, I think maybe it's recency bias, but I'm going to go with Nick Kurtz over a Caglio. But hey, uh, big games for both.

And Nick Kurtz is, is on fire right now. So good for him. All right, Scott. Let's, uh, stick in Sacramento for your player of the night. Sacramento. There was a pitcher in that game, too, for the athletics in his name. was Jacob Lopez. Jacob Lopez did it again.

Struck out nine over six innings against the Astros. One run, three walks, which isn't great. But it was a great start overall. 21 swinging strikes, which is a ridiculous number for anyone. And I think that's a new high for Jacob Lopez. But this makes three of four starts now. Three of four with nine strikeouts. for Lopez.

And the one prior to that four-start stretch was eight strikeouts. So it's becoming a real pattern for this guy. And remember, it was dominating a AAA too. His time down there this year, 233 ERA, 0.89 whip, and 12.7K per 9. He had a 15% swinging strike rate, which would put him among the best in the league if that was in the majors. So Lopez was getting the job done down there. And again, with three nine strikeout efforts in his last four, seems to be doing it in the majors as well.

He gets a lot of whiffs on the changeup. I actually hadn't featured it that much prior to this start. I think that's a big reason why he got the 21 whiffs. He threw the change up 33% of the time. It had only been about 7%. So maybe he's figuring out that's his best pitch and he hadn't been really leaning on it much until now, which is a scary thought.

The fastball is surprisingly effective because the velocity is low, like low 90s fastball, but it has uncharacterist, like unusual movement. It's not in that middle area that just makes hitters sit dead red, you know,

just makes it easy for hitters to, to impact. Normally we think of fastballs that are swing and miss on. We think of them having a very high. I'm forgetting what the word is. Induced vertical break. Very high induced vertical break, but Lopez is on the other end of the spectrum.

It's very low. And so hitters are not connecting with it. They're swinging and missing more often, even with the low velocity. And because there's something of a track record here between the majors and the minors and because he has at least one secondary pitch that looks really good and a couple others

that are getting pretty good results also. I'm kind of starting to buy into Lopez a little bit. This is not a guy with much of a prospect pedigree. He's a 27-year-old, but the results are what the results are, and sometimes this happens. You know, Rich Hill was this kind of pitcher who, I'm talking about the first iteration of Rich Hill

because I know he had kind of like two separate careers but just kind of came out of nowhere and was a great bat missing pitcher despite not having the sort of velocity you'd expect. Also a left-hander like Lopez, it can happen. And I think we're to a point now where if you need a pitcher and who doesn't,

Lopez is somebody that you have to seriously consider picking up. I don't love him as a sleeper for, next week Jacob Lopez's matchup is against the Tigers, pretty good offense there. So I'm not eager to like start him, but if he has another nine strikeout

effort, or even if he doesn't, even if he's just solid, then I think you'll be glad you have him and he will probably line up for two starts the following week. Yeah, as you pointed out, that change up was awesome. The fastball,

it comes from this kind of funky sidearm delivery thing and Lopez gets a lead extension too from the left hand side which I feel like is something we don't normally see too often so it's just kind of a unique profile here for him and mostly very good minor league numbers as well here he's only 6% rostered

so widely available I'm pretty intrigued by this especially when you consider in this start 21 whiffs against the Astros I just look this up against left-handed pitching this season the Astros have the second lowest strikeout rate as a team against lefties. So even more impressive here for Jacob Lopez to do that against this Astros lineup. So yeah, at 6% rostered, I'm not saying Adam in all leagues, but if you have a spot to mess with,

I want to pick them up and see where this goes. I am very intrigued by what Jacob Lopez did here. Unfortunately, Scott, I've got to ask about Emmett Sheehan, who we got news here on Thursday, one day after we spoke so glowingly, or I guess if you listen to this on Thursday, the same day that we talked so glowingly about him, was option back to the miners. Apparently the Dodgers need some bullpen help right now,

and he can't come back for 15 more days. So would you just hold and stash in Emmett Sheehan, or would you maybe just swap him out for Jacob Lopez now? I want to hold and stash Sheehan because I think he'll be back soon enough. Can't be back. you know, unless somebody goes on the IL, which is always possible. Maybe the Dodgers have somebody in mind to put on the IL even to bring

Sheehan back earlier than that 15-day window. But I do think he'll be back. And everything we said about him performance-wise still applies. If he does spend some time in the miners, that'll just help stretch him out further. I think he's as stashable as like a Logan Henderson at this point. So would I drop Logan Henderson for Jacob Lopez? I don't think I would, especially since, as I said, I'm not ready to entrust Jacob Lopez with a start even next week against the Tigers.

So it's not like he's an immediate fix to a lineup problem. So I think I would hold on to image Xi'an over Jacob Lopez. Somebody pointed out that I was saying, and have always in fact said Emmett Sheehan, but is Sheehan? So, I don't know. That's the first Sheehan slash Sheehan I've ever met. But it's true. I verified it is Sheehan.

Emmett Sheehan. All right. Well, good to know. I'm pretty sure I've been saying it wrong too. So bad job by me, host Frank, supposed to know stuff like that. Before we hit our first break, if you enjoy this podcast, feel free to leave us a five-star rating and review on Apple and Spotify. You can also drop a team name Tuesday in the Apple review if you have a good one.

We do appreciate it. And big thanks to those watching us live. I realize we went late. We went live very late here, but there was just so much to get to. And so it took some time. But here we are. Make sure to hit that like button and subscribe on YouTube as well. Let's take a break.

And then we will talk about Spencer Strider's. Great start. We'll do that right after this. Welcome back in Fantasy Baseball today. Before we get to the news and notes, just wanted to quickly address Spencer Strider, who looks like he's back. I mean, if there was any doubt after the previous start, okay, it was against the Rockies.

Obviously, that's an awesome matchup. And then Grant Holmes went out and did something very similar the next day. Well, this one came against the Mets. So a much more formidable lineup, six innings, one run, eight strikeouts for Strider, 18 whiffs on 97 pitches, 14 of those on the slider.

And the fastball velocity was up a bit. Once again, he averaged 96 miles per hour on that pitch and maxed out at 98.4. It's got the last hurdle for me, and maybe this will just continue to take a little bit more time. It's not very sticky and small sample sizes. Just giving up a lot of hard contact. That's the one thing that's, you know,

the last thing that I want to see from Strider is if he can get that average exit velocity against down. Entering the start, it was a 427 XERA, and 92.6 average exit velocity against, and in this game it was 92.9. So to me that is the last thing that I need to see from him. Yeah, and that may be tied to the fastball,

not quite being all the way back yet. It's making strides. It was up over a mile per hour in his previous start against the Rockies and he was hitting 98 again. And he had 98 a couple times in the first inning in this one, but the fastball velocity was up overall

what it's average of this season, but down a little from that rocky start. And in fact, this didn't start out well for Strider, even though he hit 98 a couple times in the first. He really struggled through those first three innings. And the game could have gotten away from him a couple of times. And he wasn't, it's like he turned it around midgame when his slider just, he started getting great results with the slider,

really ugly swings on it. And that's when he began to pick up strikeouts one after another. And so he really turned it around midgame and ended up with a great final result. But I was preparing to kind of have to explain what to do with Strider now because it looked like it was going to be a disappointing follow-up to that rocky start. I think sustaining the velocity on the fastball is something that still needs to be worked on, because he did lose velocity over the course of that Rockies game too. But overall, trending a very positive direction.

A direction, you know, after these two good starts in a row, where at the very least, you can trust Strider in your lineup again. I mean, that's a big hurdle. He's still not back to being the guy he was pre-elbo surgery, but he's back to being must start, I feel pretty confident saying. and the fact he can at least reach 98 with that fastball. Very encouraging. So still stuff for him to work on.

But yeah, things seem to be trending the right direction here. And next week, Strider is at the Mets. So he gets the Mets two starts in a row. Typically, I don't love that. But again, I agree that Strider is back to that must-start territory. And that will be another test. It's facing a really good lineup, two starts in a row. And let's see if Strider can continue to build off these two really,

really good starts for him. Let's get into the news and notes, and we already addressed Emmett Sheehan and Sheehan. I just did it again. I need to kind of like retrain myself now. I know. Sheehan, who is 37% rostered and Scott is telling people to hold. If you can, what about Christian Campbell?

Are we holding there? The Red Sox are expected to option Campbell to AAA on Friday. He had a huge April, but from May on is hitting 159 with a 465 OPS. 64% rostered still. Scott, are you holding in redraft leagues? Not in most, I would say, in certain roto leagues where you go deeper into the outfield and the middle infield pool, the two positions where he qualifies. And you're, if you're in a league deep enough where you look at my top five prospects to stash

every week and you're like, okay, I got to get as many of these guys on my roster as I can. if it's that sort of league where you're stashing prospects, I think Campbell needs to be stashed. I think it's basically like, okay, here's another high upside prospect who is close to reaching the majors. Even though he just got sent down, you know,

it wouldn't take much to bring him back. I feel pretty confident saying. So that's the kind of format where I'd stash Christian Campbell. But anything shallower than that, certainly a head-to-head lineup with no middle-in-field. field spot. I just don't think, I don't think,

one, I think the waiver wire is going to be abundant enough that you can find something pretty exciting on it. And two, you don't go deep enough at the positions where Campbell is eligible to really bother with it. If he does turn his season around, get back to producing in a big way, then you'll have a chance to react to it then. Sounds like Williareu is expected to return on Friday.

which is good news for the Red Sox lineup. And David Hamilton, I believe, will be the one filling in at second base. I think he's a name in deeper roto category leagues, 8% rostered, stole a ton of bags last year. That's a legitimate part of David Hamilton's skill set. So if you do need speed, he's the name. Shohay Otani's next pitching start is set to come on Sunday.

Bryce Harper threw and took some dry swings on Thursday. He's working his way back from right wrist inflammation. Gabriel Moreno was placed in the aisle with a right-hand contusion and my first thought was Adrian Del Castillo, could we get him? Remember last year he came up and kind of lit the world on fire? He's currently batting 305 with five homers and an 1120 OPS in the miners, but it looks like the debacks have already called up a different catcher. And plus I'm pretty sure it's going to just be a short-term thing here for Moreno.

So no Adrian Del Castillo yet. Orinola was shifted to the 60-day I.L. Which means he can't return until after the All-Star break, which was the expectation at this point anyway. Max Scherzer is dealing with soreness in his right thumb following his latest rehab start, but apparently it was expected. At this point, Scott, it's really just pain tolerance. It's how much can Scher, how many pitches can he throw, how many innings can he throw while this thumb is an issue? Because it's just not going away. It feels like it's just, it's there.

for as long as he wants to continue trying to pitch. Yeah, and like I said yesterday, my expectations are low for him. I think there's a chance he can end up being a useful contributor in fantasy on a per inning basis last year. He still looked pretty good, but I'm not convinced this thumb injury is ever going to go away. And we've seen it. I mean, he's pointed out that the other injuries he's dealt with in recent year, it all stems from the thumb.

So things could go wrong even beyond that. Noel V. Marte will begin a rehab assignment on Friday. He's been out since early May with a left oblique strain. He was hitting 294 with three homers, four steals in 19 games, and he's 53% rostered. Scott, are you looking to re-add Noelvi Marte and stash him right now? And if you need a third baseman, and I'm sure a lot of people do,

It's one of the thinner in-field positions this year, and he was looking great before the oblique strain. He was a prospect from the time he was 17 years old. His immediate contributions in the majors two years ago were great, and then he had the PED suspension last year, and didn't seem like himself after returning, but he looked great for the time he was up this year, and I suspect he's going to get a lot of playing time with the Reds.

All right. Next up, we have U. Darvish is scheduled to throw another simulated game on Friday. If all goes well, he could head out on a rehab assignment after that. I didn't know if you wanted to get in there and talk about Darvish because you kind of like reacted. No, but just collecting my breath. All right. Just a deep breath there. Yeah, you Darvish, he can take your breath away.

Tony Gonsolin was shifted to the 60-day IL. He's out with right elbow soreness and can't return until August 7th at the earliest. scary moment in the race game as their reliever Hunter Biggie was struck in the face by a line drive while sitting in the dugout, which is just, you know, it's extremely unfortunate, obviously. I mean, a scary thing that can happen in, I guess, in any baseball game, but he had to be stretched it off. Thankfully, he is coherent and never lost consciousness there. So some good news from a scary situation. And lastly, the Braves are promoting Didier Fuentes from AAA to start Friday against the Marbley. Orleans. And in nine starts in the minors this season, a 481 ERA 112 whip. 48 strikeouts over 39 and a third. The underlying numbers look much better than that. Scott, do you have any insight here on Didier Fuentes? Does he matter at all? It's an interesting talent who has kind of emerged this year. I do think this will be a spot start. The intention is just to kind of give everybody a little extra rest. Of course, they'd like to do that with Chris Sale anyway.

It probably wouldn't hurt to do it with Spencer Strider as well, coming back from injury. Just turned 20, I think I saw Didier Fuentes is going to be the youngest starting pitcher the Braves have had in like 50 years or something like that. So it does feel a little bit born out of desperation and put them losing AJ Smith Schaver that cut into their rotation depth again. Look, they're good evaluators of their talent, especially on the pitch. side. So I'm not saying, I'm not saying Fuentes doesn't have a prayer, but I think even if he pitches well, he goes back down and, you know, just be a nice little sneak peek for somebody who could be in the Braves future plans. Shout out to those bravos, by the way, Scott, big sweep of the New York Mets. And I'm not saying this to be facetious or to mess with you. I didn't realize their record was

so bad. I mean, five games under 500. I knew that they, you know, got off to a slow, start, they kind of went through it, but I mean, based on run differential, they're plus 24. That's better than the Padres and the Brewers who, I mean, the Padres are in a wildcard spot and the Brewers are half a game out. Thank you for pointing that out because if I pointed it out, I would be accused of homerism. Yeah, no, it is their run differential is better than the Brewers who have a 533 winning percentage. It's better than the Mariners who have a 507 winning percentage. it is not that much worse than the Phillies.

It's weird. It's one of those things where like if you if you're given infinite iterations, like just playing out games from now until the end of time, the win-loss record would eventually sync up with the run differential. Baseball season's very long, 162 games, but that's not always enough time for win-loss record to sync up with run-differential. but there are a lot of games to go still. And so, no, that's not to say that the run differential right now is permanent,

that it couldn't change for the worse. And, you know, maybe it will. But I do think run differential is a better reflection of how good a team actually is rather than win-loss record because of what I said about if you give it infinite. iterations. So, you know, we'll see.

We'll see. They got a lot of ground to make up. They should have swept the Rockies, but they've won five of six now and are about to face the Marlins. So there you go. And I know you will be at the game Saturday,

huh? I will. Flanagan's night. How about that? With Didier Fuentes, yeah. With, I'm sure everybody knows what that is. It's a local restaurant, Jane.

Chris and I were raving about it the other day. It's, I don't know, it's akin to like a Chili's, Applebee's, I guess, something like that. But it's kind of just in South Florida. I went when I was there and I loved it. It was awesome. But you're not a fan. I mean, sometimes people see me drinking out of the big green cup

with Mr. Flanagan's face on it. But no, I'm not as into it as you seem to be. What was I going to say? Oh, yeah. So Didier Fuentes, his promotion, pushing everybody back a day, it looked like that meant Bryce Elder would be starting the game we're going to. And I informed my children and they were very disappointed with that news. Just tears start leaking from their eyes. But now MLB.com is saying Grant Holmes is going to start.

So I guess they bumped everybody back a day except Grant Holmes, which would be better than Bryce Elder. That is certainly true. Let's take our final break. And when we return, we'll run through some of the waiver options. We'll preview week 14. We'll do all that right after this. Welcome back in fantasy baseball today. Let's run through some waiver wire hitters here and talk about what size leagues, if any, do they need to be rostered in. And Colton Couser is heating up. We talked about him on yesterday's podcast. Two for four with his sixth home run. He has homered in three straight and in 13 games since returning from the IL. He's hitting 239. Five homers, one steel, 895 OPS, 62 percent rostered. The next step, Scott, because that kind of covers, you know,

roto and category leagues and all that stuff. Points leagues for Colton Couser. We're talking three outfielder leagues. He has a 34% strikeout rate. As hot as he's been since returning, I don't think we're there yet. I don't think so either, especially since outfield's been kind of deep.

Yeah. Keep it up, Colton. Colton Couser. Keep it up. What about Joe Adele, who leads Major League Baseball in home? runs this June. He has eight in the month. He has a 995 OPS, two steals as well. Actually, has 13 home runs since the start of May. So this has been going on for about two months now for

Joe Adele. And it's a similar question. Like he's 52% rostered. I don't think we're in range of, you know, three outfielder leagues, but Joe Adele has been one of the better hitting outfielders this month. So what do you think? He has. And we've pointed out before that his expected stats look a lot better than his actual stats. He's starting to close that gap. And they look the best they ever have either. Like his strikeout rate is lower than we're used to seeing from him. Not low in a general sense, but not terrible.

His polar rate's pretty good. There's a lot to like here from Joe Odell, but he's a terrible walker, which hurts his points league prospects. And I think he's ultimately going to prevent him from mattering in that format. unless he, you know, becomes really, really good. Unless he actually lives up to his 266XBA and more specifically the 542X lug, then I could see him mattering in that format. I do have Joe Adele as a sleeper hitter for this upcoming week

with the Angels having the fifth best hitter matchups, but we'll get to that a little later. Who do you like just in a vacuum rest of season? Joe Adele or Colton Couser? Who do you like more, I should say? I think Adele has let us down enough over the years that I'm going to side with cows are there. Okay.

Let's talk about Alejandro Kirk, who snapped a mini slump here, three for four with a double dong. He is hitting 313, 7-Homers, 34 RBI at 796 OPS, 61% rostered. And he is a name that we've talked a lot about recently. You know, besides this mini slump,

it's like over the past month, hitting way over 300. You see that in the overall number. numbers here. I got Kirk up to 16th in my catcher rankings, Scott. It was hard for me to get him higher than that. But I acknowledge if you play in a one catcher league, if you wanted to drop like a JT Real Muto or Austin Wells, who I don't know, they just have been a little bit, you know, more cold recently and just ride the hot hand. I'm okay with that. I just don't have a rank that way. What do you think? Yeah, that's, I think that's, I agree with it. I mean, one catcher

leagues that are only 10, 12 teams deep, there's more than enough to go around. So if you were swapping out those on the fringes for the hotter one, I think that totally makes sense. And in a points league specifically, because Alejandro Kirk strikes out like 11% of the time, and this has always been true for him, this is something he's always been good at, is just making contact. That obviously helps his points league value. Obviously, he's doing more right than that this year.

His average exit velocity is actually 92nd percentile. And we saw him hit the ball hard with this much consistency early in his career. I don't know what happened in more recent years that led to that exit velocity falling and people losing faith in Alejandro Kirk. But he was a masher in the minors. He always made contact an elite rate, like I said. and now he's mashing again. So I don't think it's far-fetched that he could end up surpassing

the JT Real Mutos of the world, even if we're not ready to commit to that yet. Two names who have multi-position eligibility. They've been hot here for a while now. Alec Berluson, who went four for eight with his seventh home run across the doubleheader against the White Sox, obviously great matchups there. The batting average up to 313,

the OPS over 800 now. And Willie Castro continues to do his thing. He reached base four times, one for three with three walks and three runs. He's hitting 356 with an OPS over a thousand in the month of June. Both are between 50 and 60% rostered. Do you think those numbers need to be higher, Scott, for either Burleson or Willie Castro? I don't think Castro is this good. So I'm totally fine with you using him as hot as he is, as many positions as he's eligible at,

quadruple eligibility, I believe it is, yeah. Everywhere but first base and catcher. That's fine. If you want to use Willie Castro now, you have an opening at one of those four spots. Go for it. I just don't think you can expect him to sustain this kind of power production. We've never seen him do it before. And he isn't the base dealer he was earlier in his career either.

So eventually, eventually it's going to run out. Burles and I have a little more hope for. I've always liked the profile. I wish you walked more is the main thing. I think that might keep him fringy in a points league context, even if he is a 300 hitter all season long. But I do think he has the skill set to be a 300 hitter. Strikes out only 14% of the time.

It's a lot of line drives. And not a lot of fly balls, which works against his power potential. He hits the ball hard, but just doesn't. It's not optimized for home runs, but that works in the favor of his batting average. So it's a little bit of a tradeoff there, and Burleson comes out more on the batting average side. Actually, I'm looking at his flyball rate on fan graphs, and it's higher than I expected, higher than last year. But I was surprised to see that batting average back over 300 for Burleson. It shows you how hot he's been lately.

Yeah. And the playing time is ticking up as well. Well, it looks like he has started seven of the past 11 games against left-handed pitching for the Cardinals. So they are giving him more opportunities, and he's been coming through. I made this comp with Chris the other day. I always looked at him, and I thought, like, maybe Josh Naler. I don't know that he has the power to get to where Josh Nailer is, but the ability to make contact and he drives the ball, and this year he's hitting the ball hard as well.

So I always thought maybe he could be like a Josh Nailer-Light-type player if everything clicks. here for Alec Berluson. So I like who he looks like to me as a hitter. And I've been saying this since he was in the minor leagues, Burleson. He looks like Brian McCann at the plate. And if you'll remember early in McCann's career before, before the infield shift became popular, he was like a 300 hitter as a catcher.

So that's who Burleson reminds me of. He is very slow like McCann was, but he's not a catcher, obviously. Yeah. And one name for deeper leagues, a big day for Andrew McCutcheon, four for eight, with his eighth home run across their doubleheader with the Tigers, and he is hitting 271, he's got a 355 on base percentage,

eight homers, 787 OPS, very deep league stuff here, NL only leagues, I'm sure he's already rostered, but continue to use him in those. 15 team, five outfieler leagues, all right, as hot as he is, you know, again, ride a while it's hot, and let's see how far this can go for Andrew McCutcheon, just in deeper leagues.

Let's take a look at the Waver Wire pitchers. Edward Cabrera turned in his first quality start of the season against the Philly. Six and a third innings one run with five strikeouts. He had 14 whiffs on 82 pitches. And in eighth start since the beginning of May, 223 ERA 121 whip over a strikeout per inning here for Edward Cabrera. The other name is Charlie Morton, who continues to pitch well turning back the clocks here at Tampa Bay, six innings, one run, seven, strikeouts for him and last five starts since rejoining the rotation 242 ERA 135 whip. That's very bad.

34 strikeouts over 26 innings. Any interest here, Scott, and these two, Edward Cabrera and Charlie Morton. Not zero interest, but I would definitely favor Jacob Lopez over these two. Agreed. So this was Edward Cabrera's, I think he mentioned it was his first quality start. It was his first six-inning start this year. and everything was up one to one and a half miles per hour. So you can understand him having more success for that reason.

He did only throw 57% of his pitches for strikes, which is terrible, and he wouldn't be able to get away with that most of the time. So between the velocity jump, which, you know, well, if it happens again, maybe I'll take it more seriously. But between that and the fact that he did have such a low strike percentage, I'm not really putting much, putting much on this Edward Cabrero start.

There have been, people have been a little, have expressed some enthusiasm for recently mixing in a sink or more. They like that more than the four seamer. But I don't know. One quality start where he didn't throw that many strikes. Just, I'm not sold on it. I'm not sold on it. And then as for Morton,

there's enough history of success here that I'm not going to be totally dismissive of it. You point out the whip during that stretch is awfully high. A lot of that has to do with the one really bad start he had during that stretch. I think it kind of inflated it. The other starts have all been great, but probably he's going to have a high whip, just because his last couple of years in Atlanta were the same way too. So if you need strikeouts, sure, if you need wins, Maybe. But if you need to protect WIP, then no reason to go near Charlie Morton, I would say.

Charlie Morton, for what it's worth, a solid matchup against the Rangers next week. It just, it feels like we're waiting for the other shoe to drop, right? If we start to recommend Charlie Morton, oh, good matchup against Texas. It feels like, boom, that's going to be the start where it just all kind of blows up in our face here. So hopefully that isn't the case, but he's pitching well right now. Good matchup next week. It takes a lot of courage to start Charlie Morton, I would say. In the year 2025, indeed.

Three names in deeper leagues, Michael McGrady, who pitches for the Cardinals, had a nice start at the White Sox, five innings, one run, five strikeouts. Good numbers in the minors, 251, ERA, 120 whip is high, but over a strikeout per inning, lots of ground balls down there.

Looks like he's sticking around for another start next week against the Cubs. Don't love that. Ryan Nelson pitched well at Toronto, 5 and 2 thirds, one run, four strikeouts. He gets the White Sox next week, and Chase Dolander turned in a quality start at the National six innings, two runs,

but only two strikeouts here. The problem is he faces the Dodgers next week. So I don't think we're recommending Dolander, but he's a prospect, he's got pedigree, want to see him succeed, a name to watch, but not recommending adding. What about these other two, Scott, just in deeper leagues? McGreevy, Ryan Nelson, any interest in those two?

I think it was just a spot start for McGreevy. I think he's going to start next week. They have seven games on the schedule. And I read somewhere that he's going to stick around. Okay. Well, I'll need to adjust my two-star pitcher rankings, if that's the case. But I would just be removing Eric Fetty, who we don't care about. Anyway.

So, I would say, Nelson, he has been more good than bad in the rotation. in the last two years, and I can't figure out why. It seems like when he throws his fastball 60% of the time or more, that's when he's at his best, and that was certainly true in this start. But I'm not sure why that's, like it seems like not a good enough fastball,

too limited of an arsenal, just not good enough stuff to begin with, and yet he keeps finding success with it. So I don't know. I can't get a, excited about Ryan Nelson, but if it's a deep league scenario and you just need to fill a spot in your lineup, he feels safer than other choices in that sort of league. All right, let's talk about three pitchers who seem to be coming back down to Earth a little

bit here in June. Carlos Ordone, a quality start against the Angels six innings, three runs, seven strikeouts, had 15 whiffs on 92 pitches. He also gave up a season high three. home runs in this game and I got to see up close and personal it was very hot Scott the ball was flying out there was multiple

home runs hit by the Yankees as well so maybe you give Rodon a little bit benefit of the doubt here but um that is three starts in a row where you know he's looked a little bit more human here with Rodon Kevin Dawson same thing four and a third seven runs allowed

two homers allowed in June 765 ERA 175 whip underlying numbers still seem to like Gosman. I don't know, maybe a buying opportunity here. And last name is Yoshinobu Yamamoto, who had a quality start against the Padres. It was an okay start.

He didn't get many whiffs in this one, but has, you know, just looked a little bit more human recently. And I am scrambling to pull up his June numbers to make sure that they are updated here. Yeah, four starts in June for Yamamoto, 523, ERA 165. whips. So any concerns over these three?

Yamamoto, Kevin Gosman, Carlos Rodon. A little bit of concern. Not a lot of concern. The most would be for Gosman, who I think is just a different category. He's not nearly on the level of those other two for fantasy.

What's weird about Gosman's struggles here in June with the ERA over seven is that it seems to coincide with him getting a lot more movement on a splitter, which is what we were asking for. It's gone up. It's looked more like it did. during his best years with the Giants and early on with the Blue Jays. And yet that's when his season's kind of falling apart.

So I'm not sure how to square that circle, but he's difficult to trust in your lineup right now. Not that you're anywhere close to drop in Gosman. Just you may want to sit him until we see signs of a turnaround. Yamamoto, I noticed in this start. So this is two straight stars. for Yamamoto with just six swinging strikes and over 100 pitches. Tiny, tiny swinging strike, right?

Definitely out of character. And since it's two starts in a row, it's a little harder to dismiss this fluke. I noticed in this most recent start, his splitter, which is its best swing in this pitch. It had three less inches of vertical break. So it wasn't breaking as much, and he wasn't missing many of bats with it. Now, I don't know why it's not breaking as much. that's for Yamamoto and his pitching coach. Mark Pryor, right?

Isn't that the pitching coach in L.A.? It's up for them to figure out. Sounds right. But it might explain why the whiffs have gone away for him. Not that I would consider benching Yamamoto or anything like that. It's just a little curious.

All right, now it's time for the week 14 preview brought to you by Travis Matthew, apparel designed for confidence and comfort no matter where the day takes you. And let's start with the schedule 24. four teams with six games next week, and there are six teams with seven games. The Braves, Cubs, twins, Mets, Mariners, and Cardinals.

What about the Rockies? They have six games, with three of those in Cores Field against the Dodgers. Starters, these two-star pitchers, and first up, Scott, Bailey Ober gets the Mariners and at the Tigers. Not for me.

I don't think. We know he is dealing with mechanical troubles. He's talked about it a lot. We've seen the velocity slipping. I think I need to see Oberg get back on track, even in a two-star week, before I entrust him with the lineup spot. What about Tage Bradley, who is at the Royals and at the Orioles?

Same thing for him. We don't have as clear of an explanation for what's going on with Bradley as we do for Ober. But those are two good matchups. I think it's still too dangerous with the way he's looked recently. Ben Brown at the Cardinals and at the Astros. So it's not the greatest matchups, and he has not been the most consistent pitcher.

We've seen some good stretches from him recently with the strikeouts and swinging strikes, both being decent. I do have him among my sleeper pitchers for this week, but partly because I, just couldn't come up with 10 good ones and he's near the bottom of the list. So, okay, yeah, if you need, if you really want to shove that extra start into your lineup in a points league, especially, I think you could do it with Ben Brown, but I, I don't have a good

feel for how these two starts are going to go for him. That's my bad, by the way, because I don't usually like to include your sleeper pitchers as part of these questions here, but I didn't realize that. I understand why you did it. my notations and the two-star pitcher rankings, I sent you were a little different. What about Severino at the Tigers and at the Yankees? No, not with those matchups.

And Ryan Yarbrough at the Reds and Home Against the Athletics. I'm going to pass on him also. Seems those matchups are just, they're too dangerous. All right, Scott, let's get into your two-star pitchers to add and stream for next week. Look, the first one here, call me, Maybe I'm just imagining this. Hasn't Shane Smith been a two-star pitcher for like the past three weeks or something? Yeah, it does feel like that.

I suppose one of these weeks it's actually going to happen and we can finally take them off the list. But hey, people like Didier Fuentes get called up? Not that that's who's pushed Shane Smith back because he's not all the white socks. But you get what I'm saying. Like surprises come midweek. I think, and wasn't there, the White Sox were one of the teams that got their game reigned out, right?

Yeah, they played a double header here on Thursday, yeah. So that probably messed things up for Smith. And Smith's last start was his worst of the season, but he has been good overall. He's been getting, actually, the strikeouts have been trending up over the course of the season, as he maintains an ERA below three still. I don't love the matchups,

diamondbacks and giants. but I would say among the two-star pitchers who are actually available who meet the roster ship threshold that allows me to include them here, Shane Smith is the most interesting. And the same goes for Matthew Libertor, who's second on the list here. Don't love the matchups, he gets the Cubs, which is, of course, terrible. Cleveland's not so bad. But he did bounce back nicely in his most recent start.

And if you're looking for a two-star sleeper, sort of like Shane Smith, Matthew Libertor, you're just not going to find many better rostered in less than 80% of CBS Sports Leagues. Chad Patrick, I don't think he's as good as Shane Smith and Matthew Libertor and his last couple starts. You know, it seems like it's catching up to him. He had been an overachiever most of his rookie season.

But Chad Patrick's matchups this week are the Pirates and the Rockies. not at Coorsfield. Pirates and Rockies. Can't ask for two matchups better than that. So I think we got to treat Chad Patrick like a sleeper. Further down the list here, and these are certainly ones I'd only look at in a points league. Edward Rodriguez, two great matchups, White Sox and Marlins. His last three starts have been okay, nothing that impressive about them.

So you're just hoping he has a couple starts like that with matchups that good. and can give you a nice 30 points or whatever in a standard CBS league. Justin Verlander, kind of the same thing. He just returned from the I.L. Wasn't a great start, but he gets those same two matchups just in the opposite order, Marlins and White So in a points league, you might want to take advantage of that. Mentioned Biden Brown already against the Cardinals and Astros. Some one-start sleepers here.

We've got Hayden Birdsong against the Marlins, other than that start where he walked a bunch of guys. I feel like he's basically looked how I hope he looked since joining the rotation, and that's obviously a good matchup. Michael Waka against the Rays, he just had a fine outing here on Thursday going against the Rangers.

One run on two hits in six innings for Michael Waka. And if you look at his splits, this year. Not surprisingly, given where the Royals play their home games, much better at home. His Michael Waka. He has a 2508 ERA at home compared to 441 on the road.

Much better K-R-A at home too. Even though the Rays don't seem like a great matchup from Michael Waka, the fact he's at home and is coming off such a good start, I think that makes him someone to consider. Jose Soriano coming off two excellent starts. He gets the nationals. We're kind of a

mid-tier lineup, but certainly one he could take advantage of. And then finally, Will Warren don't love the matchup against the athletics in New York, but he's coming off that 11 strikeout effort, and maybe you can do it again. And I could be wrong about this, but I think Will Warren's best start of the season,

or at least his deepest start of the season, also came against the athletics. Yeah, seven and a third, one run, seven, strikeouts. So perform well against them once before. Let's see if you could do it again. Yeah. Let's slide over to the hitters for next week. The best matchups, Mariners, D-backs, giants, brewers, and angels. The worst hitter matchups, Phillies, Astros, pirates, twins, and athletics. Scott, who are your sleeper hitters for week 14? So Addison Barger at the top of the list for a second straight week, even though his roster rate has gone down.

So I recommended him as the top sleeper hitter. His roster rate went down. And he's had a good week. And he's had a great week. You should have listened to me. What? My influence apparently isn't what anyone thought it was. People doing the opposite of what I said.

But don't do it this week. Addison Barger. Only one lefty on the schedule for the Blue Jays was the main reason he's on here. Decent matchups. And he's just good. He's shown it lately. Sal Freelick is all. Also on this list, the Brewers, you mentioned,

they have the fourth best hitter matchups for this upcoming week. But more than that is the fact that the brewers are playing all six of their games at home. The stat I love for Freelick, yes, at home, Sal Freelick is batting 350 with a 9-11 OPS this year. Love it. Sounds like a good reason to use them. You could use Reese Hoskins, too, who just homered here on Thursday, but he's been so cold lately. apart from that home run that I'm reluctant to recommend it.

Okay, we do have a favorable split situation here for my next sleeper hitter also, who is J.P. Crawford. He is this year batting, 328 batting average with an 874 OPS for J.P. Crawford this year against Ritey's six on the schedule. All right, let's clean it up here. Joe Adele, he's been hot. We talked about that underachieving the Angels have the fifth best hitter matchups. Lordus Gurriel with the Diamondbacks having the second best hitter matchups.

This is the third week Guriel's been on it. Whatever, the Diamondbacks have decent matchups. It's worth recommending. He's pretty good. He probably shouldn't qualify for this list. Michael Tolia, who's come back from the miners, hit a bunch of home runs. Only half the week is in Corse Field for the Rockies, but he seems to hit most of his home runs on the road anyway.

It's true for the three hits since coming back. And it was true last year for him as well. Alec Berluson, we've talked about how hot he is. Seven game week for the Cardinals. They're one of just six teams playing seven games. Javier Baez has been hot for the Tigers and their matchups are favorable. Luis Garcia with only, well, not a single lefty on the schedule for the Nationals. And finally, Mike Gistrimpsky Giants have the third best matchups.

Also, zero lefties on the schedule, which is to his benefit. All right, that was the weekly preview. brought to you by Travis Matthew, apparel designed for confidence and comfort no matter where the day takes you. All right. Check out the new gear. This is their featherweight poolside paradise polo, part of their summer collection, and it is the softest, lightest polo that I have ever owned.

And it looks awesome. Look at this floral print. Got the American flag on here. Perfect for the 4th of July, the rest of the summer months as well. Look at you, Scott. Scotty Dubbs all decked out in the white polo. as well. Yeah.

Looking spiffy. The Zena 2.0 polo. That's what this one is called. Mm-hmm. Also from the summer collection. It's a very bright white. If you can't see it. And yeah, love the feel of it.

Very summery. 100%. Big thanks to Travis Matthew for making clothes for any occasion that are not only comfy but stylish as well. Let's wrap up here with some leftovers and three hitters who had slow starts then pick things up

in May and beyond. They just continue to hit well here. TJ Friedel, 42 games since the start of the May. Start of the May. Start of May. 309 with seven home runs, 32 run scored, four steals, and an OPS over 900.

Vinnie P. Baby! Vinnie passed Quantino, awful April, 44 games since the start of the... I almost did it again. Start of the May. What is going on?

331 with seven home runs and OPS up over 850 during that time. and Wilson Gertreras, 40 games since the start of May. 270 padding average, seven home runs, 38 RBI, and an OPS over 850, Scott. So all three have picked things up. They've looked great. T.J. Friedel, Vinnie P. and Wilson Contrars. I mean, T.J. Friedel, he's performed even better than he did two years ago, which seems so out of reach for him, given his exit velocities.

And I don't think anybody was drafting him this year. like he could do that again. He's at 3.17 head-to-head points per game. He ranks not even points per game, but just total season-long head-to-head points production. T.J. Friedel is right behind mooky bets in the outfield. So I think that puts him, I mean, he's clearly been a top 20 outfielder so far.

And I don't, I mean, I kind of think you just need to treat him that way, as good as he was two years ago. is explicable as his struggles were last year dealing with all the injuries. Yeah, then he passed Guantino's turned things around. He's looking like a must start again. And Wilson Contreras, because he's catcher eligible, really can't complain about what he's been doing either,

especially lately. Some other hitting leftovers here. We have Byron Bucks in two more home runs. He's up to 15 homers, 12 steals, in just 57 games. He has been awesome this season. James Wood has also been awesome. Two for five with a double dong,

four RBI, including a walk-off homer. His full-season pace, James Wood, 43 homers, 120 RBI, 19 steals as a 22-year-old. He has been incredible. Mike Trout has hit well since returning, hit his 12th home run, 19 games since coming back,

hitting 324 with three home runs, 95 mile per hour average exit velocity. Hey, Eugenio Suarez, three for five with his 22nd home run. Could be a trade candidate here if the debacks continue to fall further. Nolan Aronado hit a milestone home run, the 350th of his career. He is just the seventh player in MLB history with 350 home runs and 10 plus gold gloves. An awesome career here for Nolan Aronado. Big game for Zander Bogart's 4 for 4 with his fourth home run.

would be nice to get some more power out of Bogarts here. We're nearly at the halfway point, and he's on pace for like eight homers. You know, can we get 15 at least? Something like that. I mean, the steel pace has been great, but man, the power, there's been an outage here with Zand and Bogartz. This is a guy who had less than a 700 OPS last year.

Even after this game, going 4-4 with a home run, his OPS is 653. Yeah. Oof. Yeah, there's a lot of years left on that contract for Zander Bogartz. It didn't look great at the time, but it is not, it's, it's looking even worse now. Already one of the worst in baseball. I mean, he's signed through 2033.

Zander Bogartz. It's 2025. He has a sub-700 OPS. This is terrible. And Pete Crow Armstrong did it again, one for three with his 20th home run. He is tied for the fourth fastest player ever to go 2020. He did it in just 73 games. But Scott, why don't you rank him as a top 12 outfielder?

What's funny is I did. And then Kyle Schwerber picked up outfield eligibility. I did the same exact thing. I put Schwerber one spot ahead of Pete Crow Armstrong. Yeah, I don't know. Like it's never going to be good enough. I feel like I've conceded a lot on Pete Crowe Armstrong against my own sensibilities somewhat.

And 13th, and outfield seems like a really high ranking and make him a borderline second rounder if we were redrafting today. Maybe by seasons end he'll be in the top 10. Maybe if he sustains this, I'll keep benching him up. There's some that I could see him surpassing,

but there comes a point. Like, I'm not going to move him past Ronald de Cunia. I'm not going to move him past Gordon Carroll or Fernando Tatis, probably. It's just not going to happen. Let's get into some pitching leftovers here. Terrick Scuba, solid outing against the Pirates, five and two-thirds, two-runs, six strikeouts for him there.

Paul Skeenz, turned in a quality start, but uncharacteristically wild. Had a career high, five walks in this one, six innings, two runs, nine strikeouts, 21 whiffs, a welcome sight there for Paul Skeens. And Christopher Sanchez, a great outing at the Marlins, eight innings, one run, four strikeouts. Scott, anything that stood out for Sanchez, Skeins,

and scuba. Like that Sanchez now for the third straight start, we've seen him throw a ton of strikes. This was the most yet. And he's got seven plus innings in all three. Understandably, because he's thrown a lot of strikes. That's obviously making them more efficient. The walks have come down,

which were becoming a concern there for Christopher Sanchez. It was 77% strike rate in this star. Basically, he was throwing nothing but strikes. And we see that his. stuff is capable of, of, of, you know, he succeeds when he does that. Like, it's, it's not like his stuff is so hittable that he can't get away with doing that. Gets a lot of ground balls. Not quite an ace, but clearly a must start, I would say, is Christopher Sanchez.

Three more pitching leftovers. Logan Webb, another great outing against the Guardian, seven innings, one run, nine strikeouts for him. Michael Waka did not allow a hit until the sixth inning of this game at Texas. six innings, one run, five strikeouts, and Gavin Williams, a strong start opposing Logan Webb, six shutout with six strikeouts. Anything to add on Williams, Waka, and Webb. Oh, look at that, alliteration. Mm-hmm. Three dubs. WWW. So Gavin Williams, what was interesting about this start, is he led with his cutter. It got a good result, obviously, but he threw his his cutter 33% of the time.

And this is the second time in three starts he's done this. He's made his cutter his primary pitch. Not a bad idea. It has the lowest exit velocity of any of his pitches. But what's weird about it is he wasn't even really throwing that pitch until May 21st. Remember that was a talking poor for Gavin Williams earlier this year? Like, oh, his cutter was actually good last year. Why is he ditched it?

Well, I came back, began using it at a reasonable level, May 21st. And now he's using it more than anything and getting good results. The walks are still way too high. And I don't think we're to the point yet where we trust Gavin Williams outside of good matchups. But the shape of his season is changing constantly with some of the pitch selection. decisions he's making. Gavin Williams, 45% started on CBS and he's

home against the Blue Jays next week. What do you think about that matchup for him? It's not a bad matchup. I wouldn't be afraid to use Gavin Williams in it, but, you know, just got to weigh your options. All right, the call to the bullpen for the Rocky, Seth Halverson got the 11th inning

with a one-run lead. He gave up a walk-off home run to James Wood. For the Brewers, Trevor McGill walked one. but picked up his 16th save. For the Royals, Carlos Estevez pitched a clean ninth for his 21st. For the Giants, Camillo DeVal got the ninth inning with a one-run lead. He struck out one for his 11th save. For the Phillies, Orion Kirkering got the ninth inning with a one-run lead.

He allowed a hit, but picked up his second save. And the last four saves for the Phillies have gone. Kirkering, Strom. Kirkering, Strom. So I don't know that there's any rhyme or reason, but these are the two to roster for fantasy. And I think they both should be rostered in

12-team Merto Leagues or deeper, I guess. Yeah, I think things might be trending toward Kirkering here. Because Strom has been kind of shaky his last couple outings, and he's the left-hander, which, you know, the usage patterns are always working

against the left-hander. I would say Strom's peripherals look better than Kirklander. but Kirkering has had closer and waiting hype for a while now. And I think the Phillies may be open to using him in that capacity. All right, for the Cardinals in game one of their doubleheader, Ryan Helsie struck out one for his 14th save. And then in game two, somebody named Andre Grenio picked up his first career save.

And for the Orioles, Felix Batista struck out two for his 15. save and I did see in the Padres game that Yuki Matsui wound up getting the final out for the save because Robert Suarez got ejected for hitting Otani with a pitch. I mean that whole series was just crazy like hit by pitches left and right. Tatis got hit in the hand in the eighth inning and then benches cleared. I actually just I saw a quote after the game that Machado said the Dodgers better pray that the x-rays come back, you know, negative for Fernando Tatis. So it is crazy, man. There is some serious bad blood between the Dodgers and Padres.

So he was removed, Tatis? I don't. Let's see if he was removed. He was, yeah, removed, yep. Hmm. So getting hit on the pitch with a hit on the hand by a pitch. So we're still waiting to hear the state of that hand then. Yeah.

And I believe he's been hit. by the Dodgers six times this season. Wow. Yeah. Not great. No, definitely not. To stream or not to stream for Friday, we have Tomoyuki Sugano is at the Yankees. Mike Burroughs gets the Rangers.

Brady Singer at the Cardinals. Jeffrey Springs against the Guardians. Clayton Kirshaw against the Nationals, Hunter Dobbins at the Giants. Okay. I would say that the best of these bad choices, is, I guess, no. Yeah, I guess Mike Burroughs against the Rangers,

because the last couple starts have been good, that change up is playing well for him. You know what? I prefer Jeffrey Springs against the Guardians. I take it back. Jeffrey Springs against the Guardians. That's where I figured you were going to go. I think Kershaw against the Nationals could be okay.

So I'll recommend that one. I'll say Kirshaw and, yeah, Mike Burroughs. I think both of those two are fine to use. On Saturday, we have Jose Soriano against the Astros. Brandon Walter is at the Angels. Luis Ortiz at the Athletics. Mick Abel gets the Mets. Noah Cameron at the Padres.

Kumar Rocker at the Pirates. Brian Beow at the Giants. Cade Horton gets the Mariners. Some okay options on Saturday. Yeah. I think my favorite of these is Soriano against the Astros. As good as he's looked his last two starts. I don't mind.

I don't mind. Who don't I mind? I don't even know who I don't mind. I guess I don't mind Horton against the Mariners. I don't love it. I don't mind Noah Cameron. At the Padres, I know they don't strike out very much, but they're 22nd in WoBug against lefties,

and he's been rock solid, Noah Cameron, so I'd be okay with that one. Yeah, I guess so. And then on Sunday, we have, Zach Lattel gets the Tigers, your boy, Bryce Elder at the Marlins, David Festa gets the Brewers, Slate Ticone at the Athletics,

Gialito at the Giants, Gusto at the Angels, probably could get some strikeouts, of gusto there? Yeah, but I don't think I could start Gusto with gusto, even knowing the matchup there. I know. It's painful. You went there, Scott.

Ah, man, the pitchers I could get interesting. Yeah, I guess Gusto is probably the most interesting. Geolito at the Giants could go okay. I just wish the matchup was better. Letell against the Tigers, he always seems to come up with quality starts. but this is a tough matchup. I honestly don't think Elders a terrible choice if you're looking to maximize volume,

but he would probably be behind those other three, Gusto, Gioito and Leto. All right, we're going to wrap there for Scott. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning into fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star writing on Apple or Spotify, and we will be back again next week.

Bye-bye. Thank you.