Fantasy Baseball Today - Jordan Lawlar Promoted! Glasnow's Dominance & Injury Replacements (9/7 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: September 7, 2023

The Dbacks are promoting Jordan Lawlar (3:14)! ... Jasson Dominguez just had his best game yet (11:05). ... We need outfield injury replacements (19:30). ... Tyler Glasnow has been amazing (24:45)! How high might he go in 2024? ... Spencer Strider had a rough start (34:35). ... The Astros just went off against the Rangers (37:00). ... Who are some Sandy Alcantara replacements (41:31)? ... News (46:27): Shohei Ohtani was out again. ... Drop we drop Lance Lynn again (51:00)? ... JP Crawford continues to hit in the second half (53:00). ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpen updates and streamers (56:17). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Get awesome Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: http://bit.ly/3y8dUqi Follow FBT on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1 Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Last week we got Jason, Dominguez, and Ronnie Maricio. This week we get Jordan Lawler.

Welcome into fantasy baseball today on Thursday, September 7th. I am Frank Stantle, joined by Giac. Chris the Welsh today on the show. A crazy day of news and injury. Sandy Alcansher went to the IL. We lost some outfielders as well. Tyler Glass now was amazing, has been amazing. I think I have a fun conversation for his 2024 value as well.

And much more. Before we get started, help us out by liking this video and subscribing on YouTube if you haven't already. And if you're listening on the audio side, download, follow, and leave a five star rating on Apple or Spotify, Welsh. It's time to celebrate the promotion of Jordan Lawler. Let's talk about it.

The sixth overall pick in the 2021 draft, a 21-year-old shortstop. This season in the minors, hitting 278 with 20 home runs, 36 steals and 874 OPS. A little cup of T at AAA, 16 games there where he hit 358, five home runs, three steals, a 10-50 OPS. He's 27% rostered. He's got seven games next week with the debacks. where did Jordan Lawler rank in your top 100 prospects and what size we leagues

would you be looking to add him in fantasy? Lawler is five four five I didn't I don't have it up he's he's been top five the entire year he doesn't move a whole lot for me just I'm more stubborn I'm a tiny bit more stubborn with prospect stuff than I think some people so like if I feel confident it's like this is the talent of the person then I don't want to make big crazy aggressive moves if they struggle just in different spots. And he's had his moments.

He had his moments from a batting average perspective in AA, but he had 33 stolen bases in AA, cut his strikeout percentage in the PCL, four-game multi-hit streak, hitting 600 in September. Jordan Lawler, he's that dude. I mean, he's almost a 20-40 minor league season, hits the ball really hard,

he's got sneaky power, he's going to be aggressive on the base paths, plays really good defensively. And it's just, it's a funny thing, because, Frank, as you know, I do a lot of shows. The last 48 hours, I just felt it in me that I wanted to be very vocal about Jordan Lawler. And I know it's like, L.O.L. at this point when I do this with Diamondbacks and stuff like that. But I just felt very vocal that it's like, hey, listen, the Diamondbacks were a game out.

And they have, they had a shortstop in Nick Ahmed who couldn't hit a buck 50. He was hitting, he was hitting under 0.05 for the last. I think it was like, I, I, like, less 10 games. He's been, it doesn't matter. He's been atrocious completely across the board. Podomo, it's been all right, but it hasn't been great hitting 250 since August 1st or in the month of August hitting like a buck 11 going into today in September. He's been struggling. So it just made sense. If they're going to be competing, why would you not bring this guy up who's absolutely destroying the minor leagues and is the future? And then they did it. They did that today. Tori Lavello announced that he is going to start 100.

percent of games versus lefties. They said they're going to try to get him in in other spots. And they also said, because apparently I didn't even know this, the game prior, so this was like the hell is that Monday. Again, I didn't even know what today is, Frank. He had played third base. And Lavello confirmed that third base is something he might do and probably will do on days where they want, you know, they've got a righty in.

They've got Pridomo at shortstop. They might put Loller in there to get him every day at bats. He is going to be the future shortstop for this team. maybe they play around with third base because Pradomo is just like is really solid but it's Jordan Lawler time and this is a 12 team mixed. I

immediately want to go to outfield thinking of Jason Dominguez. Outfield doesn't matter here but I think Lawler's in play to be a middle infield play right now. It's going to be tough on what you're going to cut I was thinking about Davis Schneider. You know, Schneider's been like unreal and I wouldn't want to cut him but if I'm chasing stolen bases

like it's in the vein of like tears below that like he's just been so good. There probably is replaceable stuff. Easily on your bench, you can make room here. Just do it because the diamondbacks can be very hyper-aggressive. He can steal bases. The power's in there. And similar to my exact same thing I said with Jason Dominguez,

in these short stents, I don't know how much adjustments can be had on these guys. And I'll talk about Jason here in a minute on how he's being pitched, which is kind of interesting early on. I just don't think there's going to be a whole lot of adjustments. And Loller's on a heater right now. So I think this is a great fantasy bias, if you're chasing your stolen bases with a little bit of power. I'm going to pick him up,

even if he's going to be hitting seven for the Diamondbacks. It's going to be most days. 12 team roto leagues are deeper. I think I agree with that. I think you could make the argument for 12 team head-to-head category leagues, daily lineup leagues too, where you can just kind of throw them in the lineup whenever he's playing. And again, especially if you're chasing speed, I think Jordan Lawler is a player that you're going to want on your teams. Ronnie Maricio is an interesting name. freaking knew that's what you were going to do. I got to do it. He had another strong game here on Wednesday, two for four.

With his third steal in five games, he hit a single 11.5 exit velocity. And through five games, he's got eight hits, three steals. He's 44% rostered. Maricio has seven home games next week. I don't think there's really any question about his playing time. I think he's just going to be out there playing. Who would you rather have, Maricio, or Loller? Yeah, it's a great question.

I mean, he's in like 400, and there's huge EVs. every day when he gets going. I mean, I'm going to say, like, from at this point on, I'm going to take Lawler. I think they're going to play about the same playing time. I really think it's going to be hard-pressed that we're going to have multiple days without Lawler. And I don't think it's going to be a Saddam Rafael situation where we're like, shucks, really wish he could get him some playing time.

Like, he's going to be out there. Maricio's a stud, and it's probably way closer. But, you know, I'm going to go back to, like, my evaluation of Jordan Lawler is a top five prospect. Maricio is not quite there. I think there's some more swing and miss in his game. And I actually kind of thought there might be more playing time issues there. And it doesn't really seem to be the case right now.

I think it'd be super tough to drop Maricio for Luller. That's one where someone's going to get some butt hurt feelings if it doesn't work out. And they're going to be like, you told me to blah, blah, blah. But I personally would go with Loller. I would go with Maricio. Maybe it's just because of what you said about the playing time. I guess there's a chance that Loller could just sit a little bit more than Marie. And just to be clear, Lawler is a much better prospect than Mauricio.

So from like a dynasty and a keeper league perspective, that's not what I'm talking about. Like Lawler is the higher prospect, pedigree, all that. He has a higher upside. But I think for the rest of season this year, I'm going to go with Ronnie Maricio over Jordan Lawler. It is very close, though. Mason win. I think this one's probably not as close. He went one for five with his first career home run.

It's been a rough start for him so far. 16 games, batting 161, one homer, one steel. I assume you're going Jordan Lawler over Mason win. Yeah, there's going to, yeah, 100% I'm going to go with Jordan Lawler. This to me is similar to my approach with Jason Dominguez, where we're like, all right, you know, Parker Meadows or Jason, you know, like Raphael or Jason. Like, Lawler is going to be the guy I'm going to go with because this is, this is equivalent to have Jackson Holiday were to come up.

You know, like this is the same thing. This is Jackson Churio. Like if you want to look at the top five, six prospects, this is this guy. in a team that is competing, that's aggressive on the base paths, and we'll move the ball. I mean, like, this is a pretty good spot. Now, they're not going to do what the Yankees have done with Jason

and hit him three, but Luller's got a decent opportunity to move into some significant spots, but more so, like, I think the whole, like, he's going to start 100% versus lefties. I think it's going to play out where he's going to be out there most of the time with that third base playing. I think they're going to have a harder time getting him out of the lineup, especially with, you know, three or so weeks of whatever.

maturation is going to happen here. So I don't mean to dismiss anything you're going to ask me, but like pretty much any of the rookies you're going to ask me of the recent call-ups, it's going to be Lawler over them. Okay, I'm going to take Lawler over Mason-Win as well. But again, you know, just for redraft, I'll take Maricio over Jordan Lawler. Again, one of the top prospects in the game getting called up here by the Diamondbacks. Let's get into the rest of Wednesday's action.

Can you believe it? Wow. Can you believe it? it. Jason Dominguez, what he has done so far. Three for four with his third home run in just five games with the Yankees. And yes, I know what most people are going to say, but it was a Yankee Stadium Homer. It barely got over the wall. That's true. He still hit it. A hundred ten miles per hour off the bat. So whether or not it was a home run, even if it was a double, I think I would have been pretty impressed by that exit velocity there. The first five games for Dominguez, seven hits,

three homers, five RBI. This was a cool stat I saw on Twitter. first NLB player in the modern era with a hit, a run scored, and a win in each of his first five career games. So that's pretty awesome there for Dominguez. 69% rostered. Welsh, we've talked a lot about him.

Scott and I have talked a lot about him. I don't know how much more we need to go in depth, but you said you had some interesting information on the way pitchers are pitching Dominguez so far. Well, yeah, I just wanted to bring this up and also like his approach because one of the things I brought up was just like, hey, listen, you know, I think you'll probably get punt.

pumped a lot of fastballs. You also got to think of like egos in baseball. This is like, you know, this ridiculously big top prospect as a Yankee. You're going to have pitchers. All right, let's see if this kid can beat me type of stuff. Obviously, the game isn't, you know, like held down to just that. But, you know, I figured we're going to see a lot more fastballs. And the thing I liked about that was in the short period of time, I just didn't think there was going to be enough adjustments. So if Jason continued to do what he's been doing, he was going to succeed. And guess what? That's exactly true. But the pitch mix thing is kind of interesting because he is seeing predominantly breaking pitches,

but it is a almost even split of like 33, it's like 30, 33, 35% between all different pitch mixes. So it's a very, very small sample size. So like four more games, this thing can completely sway in another direction. But just early on, it hasn't been primary fastballs. It's actually been breaking pitches. And he's hitting 500 against them.

Now it's like four at bats. And as they're trying to register all these things. But he's got an expected batting average over 340, both against fastballs and breaking balls, in these first five games. He has struggled a little bit with off speed, and we'll see where that ends up going. But he's hit homers both. And I can see this now. This actually, as baseball savante is, this isn't accounting for today's game because it's not registering the new Homer, though some of the stats on the top side are. The pitch distribution, I think is interesting because he's heating the call.

He's showing the patience. he is cranking off speed, breaking pitch. He just looks really impressive. His plate discipline is also one of those reasons why this team was comfortable putting him three. You don't see that. Though we are seeing prospects be thrown into wild situations very early on in their career.

Nolan Chanel is leading off for the Angels every single day. And he has an over 430 OBP. Jason Dominguez is hitting three for the New York Yankees and he doesn't know what it's like to not have a hit as a major leaguer yet that's a crazy he's got a multi-hit game the homers the hard hit is there like you said we have talked about it you guys have talked about it but through those first five games you're seeing an over 55% hard hit percentage the barrel percentage is still up there at 14 you'd love to see all those things the xBA's there and he's not striking out he looks elite man and i don't know what it's going

to look like in the off season when we're talking about redraft it's either going to be one of two things, I think. It'll be extremes. We are going to be way undervaluing him or we are going to be way overvaluing him. There will be no middle in my mind with Jason Dominguez. And I'm going to probably be hyper aggressive next year because I think these are some really, really great things we're seeing across the board with the strikeouts not happening, the way he's hitting the ball, the decisions he's making. This is maturity and it happened rapidly. So I just wanted to point that out in the pitch distribution because it was something I had been talking about, like, oh, he's going to see so many fastballs.

He ain't. 33% fastball so far. At least through the four games, we'll have to see what this is added when baseball savant updates on the fifth game. Quick note for next year on Dominguez. I agree with you completely. Depends how he finishes out the rest of this season,

but if he continues to hit well, if he starts running to, think about what happened with Jordan Walker and Anthony Volpe after all that steam, right, top 120 picks, top 100 picks. But without all the steam, he'll just be there, right? It'll be Dominguez being drafted inside the top

120 picks next year. Whether or not we agree with it, I could see something like that happening depending on how he finishes out the rest of the season. I think you copped a little bit because I was going to say like, Frank, top 100 pick. I think Dominguez is pushing himself

in a spot where we are going to consider him a top 100. Think of Carol. Think of every year we do this game. Who were the guys last year? Who were the guys a year before that? Bobby Witt and Julio, we needed Julio to push up. All these guys became top 100 picks.

Most of the graduations we've had. So who are the big prospects we're going to be focused on that have not exhausted their eligibility next year? Jason Dominguez, Jordan Lawler. Maybe Chanel we can look at. I don't think Raphael, I don't think Maricio fit that mold. We're talking like the elite superstar guys. Maybe if Holiday gets brought up.

And unless we are dealt serious questions about them starting and breaking camp with the team, I don't think we are going to push off of the, and also unless they, like, massively struggle, I don't think we're going to come off of them being top 100 guys. If he continues at this relative pace, hitting three for the Yankees, there's no way he's not going to be the center fielder day one next year.

And based off his skill set, I don't see how any of us, outside of like the people that are just like, no prospects and blah, blah, blah, sample size, like the little kid in us of fantasy, we're going to be like, anything could happen. You know, he could be a 30-30 guy. We won't be able to help ourselves.

And especially when you're looking at guys like, remember when we were looking earlier this year, like Jose Abraeu in the 90s? We're like, oh, it's going to be so cool. Would you rather take the boring old dudes? Are we going to take the upside plays in the 80s and 90s? I think you're going to have some vets get pushed down more this year in place of how aggressive teams are with rookies

and the opportunity for look at these insane years we're having out of some of these prospects. So I'm oversimplifying it. It's not for everybody. and it's not going to be like this mass thing, but it does, I think it's going to be bigger than in previous years before. And I think Jason will be one of those players kind of at the center of all of it. My early lean, and this is not just a pessimistic Yankee fan thing, but if he is going that high, I'm probably not going to have a lot of Jason Dominguez next year. It's just, I feel

like I kind of, I don't know, I guess I was humbled this year a little bit with how aggressive I was with prospects, with Jordan Walker and Volpe, wound up with those guys on a few teams. And, you know, It was disappointing and just some other names. It just, I feel like I'm forgetting some guys right now. Walker is the big one. Like Miguel Vargas, Miguel Vargas was one that I was like, we were all super excited for. And look at how that worked out. You know, it's just we don't know.

It's like a six letter word now for Vargas. Yeah. And I want to point out like, I'm not saying I'm going to do it or I am, I'm trying to be the conductor of backing that train. I'm just saying it's going to happen. Like it's going to happen. That's going to be the conversation. Also take what he's doing.

doing right now and then go and put like steamer projections on low K rates, high hard hit rates, good barrel percentage, Monster minor league numbers. And you tell me that we aren't going to get spit out when you and I are sitting drinking those Scottsdale blondes that I introduced you to next year. When we're not doing that in November and we look at those steamer projections and we know you're going to see like 20 and you know there's going to be adjustments too because how embarrassing everybody projected Corby and Carroll. You're going to see like 22 homers, 28 stolen bases with a

270 batting average or something, something like that, and everyone will lose their mind. So I'm not saying, I advocate for it, but that is what is going to happen in some capacity. And that's like you.

Like, I might be out. That's why I said, it might be too much where I get out, because I'm not the biggest take all the prospect guys. And I don't mean,

I'm making this so much about next year. But I tend to shy away. But if you give me value, Jason is going to be one that, I'm not going to make it quite Corby Carrollish, but he's putting himself in a very good position. Let's bring it back to this year, and I mentioned there were a lot of injuries on Wednesday, and we did have some with Corbyn Carroll.

It's kind of a bittersweet day, I guess, for DeBacks fans, but sounds like he's going to be good. You were reading me some quotes beforehand that looks like he'll be in the lineup over the next couple days, so it should be fine, but he was diagnosed with a right wrist contusion after getting hit by a pitch twice on Wednesday. Adoli-Scarcia left with right knee discomfort. that could potentially be a big loss. Jorge Soler was placed in the IL with a right oblique strain,

and this is more so for deeper leagues, but I have some five outfielder leagues with Andrew McCutche, and he was placed in the IL with a partial tear of his left Achilles. He'll be in a walking boot for the next six weeks. So Jason Dominguez, I think, is in this mix in terms of replacements. The other two names that Scott and I have talked about a lot recently, Sayas Suzuki, who is red-hot, he had that little mental break in early or mid-August,

And since then, the dude has been on fire. He's 73% rostered. And Nolan Jones, 67% rostered. He's been running lately. The Rockies have seven home games next week. So obviously, I think we're pretty excited about that. Welsh, how would you rank those replacements? Sayas Suzuki, Nolan Jones, Dominguez.

Oh, man. I got this like the exact Sayas Suzuki, Nolan Jones, one came to me today. And I did cite Nolan Jones because of the home games and how hot he's been and he is running. I love Sayas Suzuki. I feel bad, though. someone's probably going to hate. I'm he's last. It's this to me. I got to stick with Jason right now in that Yankees lineup hitting three. I'm going to stick with him and Nolan Jones is right behind him. We have to focus on the now. And you know, had this really great thing he said today on the show I did with him and I'm completely forgetting what it was. But it's it's along the lines of like a player is only as good as their current production right now and the hyper focus on what they can be. It just we all know this. Like what does it matter at this point? There's maybe days left in our fantasy season. Jason Dominguez, I think, is one of the hottest bats.

He's number one. Nolan Jones right there. Suzuki is three. That's my for now investment, especially if I'm trying to replace all of these injuries. And I just wanted to note, it wasn't like just me. Tori Lavello said that the x-rays were negative on Corbyn Carroll

and that he is putting him in the lineup on Thursday. So not just like me speculating. Lavello said he's playing on Thursday. So that's a great sign. In deeper leagues, if you need some outfield replacements, Michael Brantley hit his second home run of the season here on Wednesday.

And he's, you know, I think he's sat the previous two games before this, but it's a really great lineup, obviously. So I think whenever he's in there, he's going to be pretty good. And the other name is Nelson Velasquez, one for four, with his 12th home run. 23 games with the Royals now. He's batting 253 with nine home runs, 16 runs, scored 17 RBI, the strikeout rate, very manageable at 26%. He's hitting the ball hard, he's putting it in the air.

I know it's a bad ballpark, but the dude is playing right now. and I think there's power in deeper five outfielder league. So again, if you lost like a Jorge Saler in that format, I think Nelson Velasquez at 5% rostered is a totally fine replacement. Let's take our first break when we return. We're going to talk about Tyler Glassnow. The Astros just swept the Rangers. They had a massive series.

We'll talk about all of that right after this. Welcome back into fantasy baseball today. My player of the night is Tyler Glassnow. He tied a career high with 14 strikeouts. against the Red Sox. He allowed just one run over six innings. He had 22 swinging strikes on 103 pitches, 11 on the slider,

six on the fastball, five on the curve. The slider was up 1.3 miles per hour in this start. And Glass Now has been incredibly consistent this year. Three earned runs are fewer in 15 of 17 starts. Six plus strikeouts in 16 of 17 starts. He's got a 307 ERA, a 102, Wib, 12.1K per 9.

51% ground ball rate, 17% swinging strike rate. Tyler Glassnow does pretty much everything you can ask for from a skills perspective for a starting pitcher. The only knocks on him, he does give up some hard contact, and the injuries. He's yet to throw more than 111 and 2 thirds innings in a major league season. And I posted this question on Twitter,

and it's completely hypothetical. Nobody can guarantee how many innings Tyler Glassdown was going to throw next year. But I thought it was a pretty fun one. If I can guarantee you, Glass Now throws 150 innings next year, where should he go among starting pitchers? Because I think there's an argument that him and Spencer Strider are in a category of their own when it comes to skills right now. Your thoughts.

Oh, man, that's such a good one. One of the things I guess I, that I'm probably going to have to reckon with is, obviously we have to be prepared and we have to understand these guys that have, you know, if they show us that they can't get to this level of playing, you know, certain amount of innings, like we do have to believe it to some degree. But I also become a little injury agnostic sometimes where it's like, I do want to make the bets on the most talented players. And if you give me 150 innings out of glass now, you're going to get 200 plus strikeouts.

You know, you're probably going to get 250. And I think it's hard to argue that he's not a top 3 SP if he gets 150 plus innings. The only problem here, though, and he's getting a pass, is this feels very deGrom-esque. This feels, I'm like a de Grom guy. I'm sitting here. I'm like, hey, it's the best pitcher when he pitches. This feels very degrami, and it just blows up in our face. So I, with you, the experiment, it is Strider number one.

I think I would still go Cole number two, just because we know he's going to eat innings. I don't have to play hypotheticals. There are things with Strider right now that are a little bit concerning. But his strikeout numbers are just absurd. And then it's probably Glassnow if you give me $150. But, you know, say like the same thing back to DeGrom. Like if you got 150 out of DeGrom, you would say he's the number one pitcher in the game. We just know it's not going to happen.

I had a similar question to Eno, and I set it off here to you, Glassnow or Brano Woodruff. And those two are like going right near each other in some recent drafts. Because I think if you take pure talent, it's Glass now as a top three or four pitcher. but we have to bring it back. So now if you're talking about building in some of that concern, it is kind of like where DeGrom was going as like pitcher nine or 12 or somewhere between like seven and 12, Glass Now is going to fit in that world.

If he finishes out strong, I think we are going to blind ourselves next year and we're going to do something silly because of his numbers. Because if you want to talk about pitchers that can do silly things, it's strider. And I think it's Glassnow. I'm trying to think of like who else does this. the silly like, you know, 13, 14 strikeouts on any given night relatively consistency. It's those

two guys. So we might do something silly. But if you're baking it in, how about bake it in against a guy that has been great for years, has had some injury issues, as of recent in Brandon Woodruff, who's got a 270 IRA or a 23 ERA and I think a 27 expected ERA versus a guy Glassnow with those strikeouts, like what side would you want? I think it's a great question. And I was just looking at both pitchers. They're both 30 years old. Glass now in Brandon Woodruff, they both have dealt with injuries recently. I think the answer might actually be Woodruff just because more recently he's shown

that he could throw more innings in a season. Like we saw a near 180 inning season out of him in 2021. So I might lean that way. And again, this is just an experiment, but you won't have to draft class now as a top three starting pitcher next year. This was just if I told you he was getting 150 innings.

People are still going to bake in that injury risk, which they should. And I think he's probably going to be drafted more like a top 10. to 12 starting pitchers. So that's just kind of where my early draft mind for next year is going. But man, in terms of just skills, let me read this off for you from Glass now. Among starting pitchers with 90 innings this season, he's second in K per nine, he's first in FIP, he's first

in FIP, he's first in K minus walk rate, he's second in swinging strike rate. He's actually first in FIP and XFIP ahead of Spencer Shrider. So just to put that in perspective. Yeah, I'm looking. He has, of 90 innings or more. He has the second best K percentage in all of baseball. We're going to you said K per 9, so you're going to guess it's going to

be there. But it's a second bet, 31.7%. It's above Otani. It's above Gosman. And he has got a better walk percentage than Strider. But Strider has this absolutely absurd, you know, 38K percentage. Their ERAs are almost mirrored. He's got a little bit higher of a Sierra than Strider right now.

So it just, and actually, looking at this of all the top K percentage guys in the top, dude, this is wild. I mean, the innings are a little bit low. I'm looking at a top 30 leader board and Glass now has the second best Sierra of anybody

in the top league leaders in K percentage. I mean, it's a 3.18 Sierra. Name a pitcher that's not Strider and they don't have a better Sierra. It doesn't matter who you throw out. Gossman, Otani, Cole has a 367. So So yeah, I mean, you draft off of the potential, the high end, if it works, Glassnell's the guy.

The only problem is, I feel like we might be stacking those players up. I know Scott had this really interesting tweet he put out. You guys should check it out. Our beloved Scott White, who's not here tonight. He put out about like, you know, the pitcher, God, what was the exact of it? He was talking about the glob. And it was like the pitchers with 19 plus point performances and then our average. 19 plus points and then it was like here's it was one and then there was like 14 to 16 or something

like that and there was less than the year before and then it's just massive his glob of pitchers that scored between like 12 and 14 points per game and it was this huge huge glob and the only thing I worry about is not only do we have this big old core glott and I've someone's you know passed out now from me saying globs so many times but also like not only are we getting those guys we're stacking players that have what ifs on their names. We are continuously stacking them. It is Glass now. It is Woodruff.

It is DeGrom. I mean, not next year. We're continuously stacking these what if problems. Sandale-O-Contra. Now what-if. Strider's almost getting a little what-if-y. And that's the balance of what you're going to do between taking the risk early and just saying,

screw it, I want the best upside because they're all messed up. Or I don't want to touch this, and I will get this big old group of pitchers that don't have big variations. Here's the exact tweet from Scott White. Fantasy points per game breakdown among starting pitchers. Last year, there were five starting pitchers who averaged 19 or more fantasy points per game. This year, there's only one.

And his name is Spencer Shreder. Last year, pitchers who averaged between 17 and 18 fantasy points per game, there were 17. This year, four. Four that are doing it. Last year, those who averaged 12 to 16 fantasy points per game, there were 48 of them. This year, 66. So there's just not as much elite, reliable pitching this year as there was last year. And instead, there is just this bigger middle class of starting pitcher, which has been the point Scott has been trying to make for a while now.

So what does that make you do? Does that make you say, screw it, I'm going to play the upside of a guy like Glass now. Or hands off, ain't touching it. That's great that they're five guys that are elite, but it's the odds are so against me. in taking a picture of the top four or five rounds that they can produce those elite numbers, it's not worth it. Because I think it's becoming like one of those two things. Like you're going to reach, you're going to just take the guy, you're going to draft, have to draft a guy like Glass now higher because you want the potential or you say,

I can't touch it. And that's, I'm curious where you are on that. You want my completely honest answer here, Welsh? Of course. Of course. I don't know. I haven't figured it out yet. So I need to kind of just sit down after the season ends and kind of reevaluate and kind of

think what the best way to attack starting pitching is. For anybody interested, there is a way too early 2024 mock draft that is going on right now. It's a slow draft. 15 different Tout Wars participants are in this draft. And I had picked 12 out of 15 and I started my team. Wait for this. Because it's the only time you're going to hear it. There's no way this is going to happen next year. Freddie Freeman and Yordaun Alvarez. There's just no way that that's going to happen for next season. So again, like everyone's brain is kind of scrambled and we're trying to figure out what's happening for next season. But we are 29 picks in. There have been three starting pitchers drafted. Spencer Shrider, Garrett Cole, and Luis Castillo just went

at pick 28. So it looks like people are going to be waiting on starting pitching, at least in this early draft. I tweeted out the link if anyone wants to go check it out. Let's quickly talk about Spencer Strider, who got crushed by the Cardinals here on Wednesday, two and two-thirds innings. Six runs allowed, five strikeouts, only through 65 pitches in this start. The problem for Spencer Strider, where he gets in trouble, are these starts where he walks too many and he gives up hard contact. His fastball got crushed in the start. 97.9 exit velocity against. He's now up to a 383 ERA and a lot of people are going to say, well, look at that ERA. How can you talk about Strider as an elite pitcher? Well, like I mentioned with Glass Now, Glass Now was second in a

of those categories, right? Spencer Strider's number one. He's first in K per nine. He's actually third in FIP. He's second in X FIP. He's first by a mile in K minus walk rate. And he's first by a mile in swinging strike rate. So from a skills perspective,

Spencer Strider, I think is still the best pitcher in baseball. But frankly, it is frustrating that we get these kind of blowups as often as we have this year. You would love to see a chance just work in a couple more changeups. He threw 54 forcing fastballs, and I don't have the number in front of me of how many were outside the zone. But what I can tell you is he had, there was a zero swing percentage against fastballs outside of the zone. So there was not a single swing.

They had a dead red read on his fastball, and that's not good. I can probably, we don't have time for it. I could probably look at like the chart from the game on where those fast balls were. But that's, you know, that's been kind of like a common thing. if the fastball is not working, the changeup is, or the sliders are less effective. That was something Brandon Fott dealt with. He's, this is a true two-start pitcher with the dominant fastball. Nothing was swinging outside the zone.

So he's got to be effective. He's got to pound it. And I just wish there was a way that he could maybe add just a little bit of variation into it. But, you know, they were being picky here for a guy that's going to strike out 300. Yeah, I do think there's a chance that the workload is kind of adding up to. He's up to 162 innings this year. And last year he was at 131 and 2 thirds, so he's already 30 past that.

He's probably going to make another, what, five, six starts before, eh, no, probably four or five before this season ends. And then he's got the postseason two. It's going to be interesting to see how he bounces back, because I do think the workload is a big part of what's happening with Spencer Strider right now as well. I want to quickly talk about the Houston Astros who just swept the Texas Rangers in a massive series there in the AL West.

and the Astros, I saw this stat, the first team in MLB history to score 12 plus runs and hit 5 plus homers in three straight games. There are 16 home runs in the series against the Rangers. They're most in a series in franchise history. Here on Wednesday, the Astros put up 12 runs

on 14 hits. Yoron Alvarez, one for three with his 25th homer. Michael Brantley, I mentioned earlier. He had his second home run, a name you could look at in deeper leagues. Chas McCormick hit his 20th home. run and Jose Abraeu had a monster game three for five with a double dong one of those home runs 113 exit velocity he had seven RBI in this game and now over his last nine games

he's got 10 hits four homers 17 RBI 17 RBI in the last nine games for Jose Abraeu he's back he's back we're back we're taking him again it's so funny that I was talking about him like that yeah I mean it's crazy what a What a complete collapse that the Rangers are showing us right now to the injury. They can't stay consistent. It's like Marcus Simeon is on. Everybody else is off. Verlander has been really inconsistent as well, and he just found it in this game.

I kind of thought, to be honest with you, it might have swung the other way going in, that Scherzer might have been consistent. Couldn't be further from the truth. Verlander had his stuff going again. This was, this is a frustrating thing to see, but it is a phenomenal time to be rostering any Astros you can. can. And that further the point of what you talked about with Michael Brantley, why, you know, just ride the coattails. Brantley always been a really good points league player, but throw him out there

right now as well to ride that streak because the Astros have got something going. You want to hear something awful Welsh? No. Well, I'm going to tell you anyway. In Tout Wars, we're in the first round of the playoffs right now. I'm trying to go for the three Pete. I had Jose Brayu on my bench this week. No, you didn't. Who is it? Who is in place? And I feel so awful about this. I can't even tell you. I can't even tell you. Give me the initial of the first name.

I didn't check the lineups before before everything kind of started on Monday or Tuesday whenever the Red Sox played. I have Alex Verdugo in my lineup right now. He's dealing with a hamstring injury. He's not going to play until Friday. Jose O'Brien put up 19 fantasy points today. And I'm down by 30 points.

So it's just, oh my gosh. It's such a terrible feeling. Such a terrible feeling. We'll see. if I could come back and make it come back and try and go for that. These two, I just want to point out, this, like what you're doing right here. This is what the fantasy like play. I personally, I'm a big playoff guy.

I've always been ahead to love playoffs because you will have players cemented in your brain forever for what they do. They don't do or what could have been. I have 100 pence in my brain forever for years and years ago. He had a two homer night on Sunday night baseball, which got me. I tied the guy I played. which got me the win because I had the season long record against him. Just cemented for not great reasons, Jose Abraeu, if you don't repeat, and you lose by, let's say, 18 points, you might always remember what could have been.

And I can't even blame him. It's just my own fault for not noticing Verdugo was out of the lineup the other day. And that's it. That's the way the cookie crumbles. To bring it back again to this year, the now, Jose Abraeu's 71% rostered. He's got six games next week. He's facing the A's and the Royals pitching staff. one of them is against Cole Regans who's like

Cy Young Regans right now but those are pretty good pitching matchups would you rather have Abraeu Josh Bell or Nolan Jones for next week? Oh I would go I'm gonna have to have man I'm gonna have to go Nolan Jones for I want to play the complete package

here and all those games in Colorado I can't not do that so I'll go Nolan Jones Jose Abraeu and then Josh Bell and it sounds like you probably agree with me I was going to quickly pull up Josh Bell's schedule for next week just to see what that's looking like

and he's got seven games next week. The Braves and the Brewers. Kind of tough matchups there. That one's close. Yeah, I think it'll go with your order, but I could be talking to Josh Bell too. He's been really good since... Over a Brayu?

Yeah, yeah. I mean, that's the way... Against the A's and the Royals? Yeah, it's close. But Abraeu's kind of like been sitting out here or there too. Yeah, that's true. I don't know. Let's talk about some of those other injuries

and replacements. Sandy Alcansura placed on the IL with a right forearm flexor strain retroactive to September 4th, and apparently he felt something on the last pitch he threw in his previous start, and it's been a down year. Immediately my mind starts thinking, well, how long has San Diego Contra pitched through this? That's not necessarily the case. It could be a lot more simpler than what we're making it out to be. San Diego Contra threw so many innings last year. There's a chance that this was just always bound.

to be a down season, right? I mean, coming off of throwing 230 plus innings last year, it's just, we don't see that in baseball anymore. So I don't know, maybe I'm just kind of simplifying things, but it's unfortunate that we're losing Sandy Alcansara at this point in the season. I know he's, you know, again, he's been mostly a letdown. If you want to replace him, how can we look to do so? The early look at two-star pitchers for next week, Jordan Wix just turned in the first quality start of his career. He went six and two thirds innings. Nine hits, two runs, only one strikeout against the Giants here on Wednesday.

And Hianjin Ryu, another solid start, five innings, two runs. Five strikeouts for him. He's yet to throw more than five innings or 86 pitches in any start so far, but does have a 265 ERA and a 106 whip. Welsh, who do you prefer between Jordan Wicks and Heungin Riu? I believe Wix has Arizona and it's isn't it two away games in Coresfield and at Arizona next week yeah I wanted to say Wix though the problem was his short sample size of this but like VLO was down from the first start we weren't getting

strikeouts I think that changeup is awesome and by the way you know coming back to Sandy like we could say the innings were a big issue but also the biggest issue with Sandy was that just the depleted change You know, it was buck 43 hit against his changeup last year. That sucker was over like 280, I think, this year. So, I mean, the changeup was just less effective. That's how he eats. That's a Jordan Wixies.

He eats off of that changeup with not big Velo's. So I got to go Riu, even though he's not going deep into games, just because, like, I can't take, I loosely say a soft tosser going on the road to Colorado and to Arizona. even though that Cubs Arizona game is going to be hyper competitive because that's the game that is probably going to be a big determination of the wild card, I would, I guess I would go with Ryu. I very much worry about Wix in those situations. Okay, I'm looking at the other names that could be available.

Some of the players we've talked about a lot recently, Jose Kentana, Javier Assad, Kyle Hendricks, Kyle Harrison. Kyle Harrison is, looks like he has one start against the Guardians next week. That's a pretty good matchup for him. Javier Assad is actually a one-star pitcher in Corpus Field. So I think we're kind of off that for next week. What about Kitana? Kentana, I think he's going to wind up being a two-star pitcher.

But I was just looking that up real quick. He's 45% rostered. So he's widely available and he's pitched awesome. I feel like that's my guy here. They have seven games next week, all at home. He's facing the D-backs and the Cincinnati Reds. That's the one I'm going down with the ship with Kintana versus if I had to decide and I've got Wix and I got Riu and I got Kintana and I got these others.

Kintana is my two starter if I need to go down that road. Yeah, I think that's the right way to go. And again, if you lost San Yau-Konsra, you're probably considering a few of these different options here, but Jose Kintana is up at the top of the list. You know, one thing to throw out. I don't know if you have it on here, but Edward Cabrera made his return today. He did not start, but he came in as like the third pitcher went for, walk two, struck out eight in this one.

That might have been enough with this injury for Alcantra for him to get revved back up and maybe another opportunity. Maybe Edward Cabrera is the guy that you go with. I mean, you want to talk about diciness. We'd have to probably look at the, where he would line up here.

But if he is fixed, he cut his walk percentage down at AAA. It was like six in the majors down to around three, three and a half per nine. He was in the, um, in AAA. K percentage went down a little bit,

but he had a 2-2-2-E-R-A. So he was really good, and he carried that back over. That makes me think that might be a guy that he's not lined as a starter right now, but might be able to be thrown back into it. He might be a sneaky one.

All right. Again, that is Edward Cabrera, four innings, eight strikeouts here in his return, pitched out of the bullpen. For me, I think we just need to learn more, right? Is he going to start? When is he going to pitch? I think it's kind of undecided.

It's up in the air right now. So he's a name to watch, but let's pay attention to the information there on Edward Cabrera. Let's quickly hit the news and notes. Shohei Otani has missed three straight with inflammation in his right oblique. Major League Baseball placed Julio Arias on administrative leave. Following his arrest on Sunday, Ryan Pepio will be recalled to start Thursday against the Marlins. And I think that's a name you could look at too.

You know, last week we were hyping up Ryan Pepio, and I have a pretty good feeling he's going to be in the Dodgers rotation moving forward. Luis Robert rejoined the White Sox. lineup after missing four games with a quad cramp. Lane Thomas has missed two straight with back discomfort. Alex Verdugo has missed three straight. Tell me about it. With left hamstring tightness, but is hoping to return on Friday. Jonathan India could begin a rehab assignment at AAA on Friday if he continues on a positive

path. Apparently his left foot is pain free. Kyle Wright expects to make at least one more minor league rehab start before rejoining the Braves. Matt Manning left his start after getting hit in the right foot by comebacker. Turns out he broke his foot on that play. I think Stanton hit the ball 119 miles per hour off the bat. Next thing you know, it's it breaks your foot. It's like poor Matt Manning. It sounds like an awful situation to be a part of. He's going to miss the rest of the season. James Paxson

will receive extended rest before rejoining the Red Sox rotation Tuesday against the Yankees. Michael Soroko was placed on the aisle with right forearm inflammation. Darius Vines was recalled actually pitched out of the bullpen here on Wednesday. But not sure how much value he's going to have with Kyle Wright soon to return. Last but not least, poor Randall Gritchick. Place back on waivers by the Angels on Wednesday. Let's take our final break. When we return, I've got some other waiver wire hitters.

We had some catcher injuries. We'll talk about that right after this. Welcome back into fantasy baseball today. And for those watching us on YouTube, you probably just saw our NFL promo, Welsh. By the time people are listening to this podcast, The football season is getting ready to start here on Thursday. Dun dun dun dun dun dun. Yes it is.

Yes it is. My Niners. Are you hyped up? Oh, my Niners, huh? I'm a 49ner fan to Bay Area. Absolutely. Diehardt. All the Seahawking Cardinal fans are hating.

Yeah, it's, uh, it is a tough time for baseball fans because there are definitely some that are like, don't you talk about that football. But it's a great time for sports. It's going to be an awesome week. And that is right. People are going to be preparing for, uh, Thursday night football, little chiefs and uh, Lions action. Yeah.

the hard knocks and you know the Jets on hard knocks I'm a Jets fan which normally Jets and Yankees it's not really how fandom works here in New York but hard knocks wrapped up and remember the prediction there from the I think they had like a magician on the show or whatever it was the 49ers in the Jets in the Super Bowl that would be let's go let and if it happens where is the Super Bowl this year I don't even know I think it's in Vegas can you oh I can drive there if we can get a CBS to cover some tickets Frankie and the Welsh can celebrate big time. I'll drive out to Vegas, baby. Let's go. Yeah, let's do it. All right, let's talk about the catcher injuries. Gary Sanchez has a fractured wrist. He's out for

the rest of the season. Patrick Bailey was placed on the seven-day concussion I.L. I highly doubt you were relying on these two in a one catcher league, but if for some reason you were, you can go out and look for Mitch Garver, Kbert Ruiz, and M.J. Melendez, they're all under 70% rostered. If you play in a two-catcher league, I think Gabriel Moreno and Bo Nailer are fine options right now, the way that they're hitting. And in deeper two catcher leagues, you've got Austin Wells and Renee Pinto, who? He's been starting for the Tampa Bay race. Let's talk about Lance Lynn.

Time to drop him again? I feel like we've had this conversation. I don't know. Ten different times this year. Groundhogs day. Four and two-thirds innings. He was at the Marlins. Seven hits, eight runs.

Three homers allowed. He's now allowed 15 earned runs over his last two starts. He's still 94% rostered. Welsh, did we drop Lance Lynn again? here okay the positive is they need them they need pitchers they need bodies they're you know they're falling apart over there clayton kershaw is a disaster velo down almost three everywhere um saying that he's not fully right they're bringing up pepio so like you can trust that lyn is going to continue to be out there so that's good the problem is is like i i just i don't see any of the consistency

he's the type of guy he might have just single-handedly ruined your playoff off-run if you're going here. Yeah. And coming back to it, here's the other thing. Look at the pictures we were just talking about that are available. Those stink. So if you can find a good matchup and you can, if there's a good streaming option, I would say Lance Lynn is easily cutable for a serviceable streaming option. So I guess the easy way to say this is like, yeah, there's nothing. There's nothing that is holding us in. He has been wildly inconsistent here.

12 swing and whiffs. It was all on the four seam. Everything else doesn't. Everything is getting hit hard. 2 by the way, 113 max on his 4 seam in this game, 108 on the cutter and 103 on the fastball. So guess what? He throws anything, anything that is touching 90 or 85 and above and it's getting smacked. So I'm not interested in Lynn at this point. He's gonna ruin your fantasy season. The problem is for next week, he's in line for two starts.

He's facing the Padres and the Mariners, but how can you have any confidence right? Those aren't good match. So I thought you were going to be like the A's and the Royals like we talked about. I'm like, hey, that's sweet. I don't want that. No thanks. Yeah, I think I would take Jose Cantana and his two matchups over Lance Lynn for next week. Let's talk about a few other waiver wire hitters here. J.P. Crawford continues to hit well, one for five with his 15th home run. He added three RBI. Now in the second half, he's betting 308 with seven homers, a 440 on base percentage and a 961 OPS.

He's 65% rostered with six home games next week. Welsh, are you taking J.P. Crawford? over Jordan Lawler and Ronnie Maricio. I knew you were going to do that. This is just not going to be probably liked, but no. I'm like he's awesome. J.B. Crawford might be the epitome of like he's just like an awesome real life player and he's so much more valuable.

This is nice. These things are nice, but like I'm going for, I think I'm going to go for bigger counting sets. Even though I know I'm saying this and it's like seven homers in the second half, that's been great. OBPs there. it's going up against the Dodgers,

which might not be ideal early on if you're looking at next week. I am going to play the upside of Lawler over Crawford, but I would also note that maybe there's another option you can do. Maricio, Loller, Crawford, Maricio.

That's my rank. In a points league, I'll put J.P. Crawford at the top of the list. Agreed. In a Categories league, I actually think I would put Maricio at the top of the list and then, yeah, it's tough.

I mean, Crawford's just playing so well. If you need speed, I would probably go loller, but if you're just looking for, like, I don't know, batting average and run scored and like a little bit of pop, I think I'd probably take J.P. Crawford. You need more bats at Crawford hitting higher in the lineup, so you got that. The two-second basement on the list,

Brandon Lau, one-for-three with a walk in his 19th home run, 109 exit velocity. He hit at 416 feet. And I hadn't noticed this, but since returning from the IL in early July, Brandon Lau has played pretty well. 266 batting average, 10 homers,

33 RBI, 4 steals. He's only 73% roster. It's interesting. I just thought it would be much higher for some reason. And Davis Schneider, who we talk about basically every day, one for two with two walks, and his seventh home run

has hit second, third, or fourth in eight straight games for the Blue Jays. He's played 20 games with them so far. He's betting 385, with a 512 on-paced percentage. seven home runs, a 1358 OPS. He's 56% rostered. You know, as good as Brandon Lowe has played,

I think I have to take David Schneider because he's just been better. Yeah, and things I didn't think I would think in September is I would have dead. I mean, I remember David Schneider coming up and you hate when you do it, but sometimes you get like that. I was just very dismissive like,

oh, you know, that's cool. This is the cool opportunity for Snyder. Let's see what goes. And then it has been nothing short of consistent. you know, 20 plus percent barrel percentage, hard hits there. He's just making an impact at every point in the game. And like you said, here's the big important part. He's hitting in really important spots in the lineup in what is, you know,

still that Blue Jays solid lineup. So, yeah, I would go with Snyder here over. I'm not the biggest Brandon Lau guy. I love the comeback. I just think he's just wildly inconsistent. And I just don't want to do that. So it is Snyder over Lao. But surprising on all ends, that Lao has gotten better and that I am picking Snyder.

All right, let's hit some leftovers here. We'll start with the pitchers. Zach Wheeler dominated against the Padres, six shutout innings with seven strikeouts, and 19 swinging strikes. He's made 10 starts in the second half, a 260 ERA, and a 0.82 whip. You want to talk about somebody who will be ranked

inside of the top 10 starting pitchers next year? It's Zach Wheeler. Justin Verlander bounced back after a rough outing at the Rangers, seven innings, two runs, six strikeouts with 14 swinging strikes on 100. pitches and Gavin Williams wild but effective against the twins five innings one hit one run four strikeouts four walks and he has a 334 ERA with a 126 whip so far in his majorly career welsh any thoughts on Gavin Williams Verlander and Zach Wheeler nothing I mean wheelers is consistent verlander

still has me a little bit edgy but that offense is so good and how he performed today just makes you feel a little bit better. The Gavin Williams one is interesting because I got this question today and I was like, you know, I just don't, I don't feel confident about where he's been and where he's going. And it was still, you know, like he said, it was kind of wild. He did throw a couple really nice sliders. One in particular, it was a strikeout on a, on a left-handed hitter, which, you know, you would think he might have played the other. So I thought he was like, you know, pitching backwards a little bit, which I'd like to see. But I think the confidence is kind of lost. And that was against a team that is kind of wildly swinging in Minnesota.

So all of this to say, I don't feel great about Gavin Williams. It is a very start-to-start-start basis, and it's probably going to be where I'm at in my own categories or points or whatever. At points a thing, I'm probably a lot more comfortable throwing him out there in losing negative point starts. But in roto and head-to-head categories, I'm a little bit more dicey, and I'm going to take it start to start with him. Earlier on, we spoke about the Astros offense and all this crazy stuff they did.

here on Wednesday. Who were they going up against? Max Scherzer. He was crushed following his forearm injury. He left with that injury in his previous start. He allowed seven runs over three innings. He gave up three homers in this one. The velocity in the pitch mix looked mostly fine from what I saw,

but gave up a lot of hard contact. He's up to a 391 ERA, a 113 whip. And I know this sounds crazy this time of year. It's just people are going to say, oh, start your studs. First of all, Scherzer has been pretty inconsistent this year. I don't know that we can call him a stud. He's got two starts next week.

He's at the Blue Jays. He's at the Guardians. But he's like kind of pitching through this injury right now. I think it's an interesting conversation for next week. Boy, I don't want to be like start your studs because you're 100% right about like where Scherzer's been. But again, I just don't think what is out there gives you choices unless you're playing in a 10 team league. I don't, I think you got to get him out there. I think you got to push him out there.

You got to hope that he's going to be able to push back on it. Unless you have got the way you can manipulate your start. So you know your roster better than we do. If you can manipulate and what's out there that you can't avoid it, Frank might be right. Like you might want to like pay attention a little bit more to Scherzer than just blindly throwing him out there. But this is a tough situation.

And something you should register in the back of your mind when drafting next year about these type of players that, But when push comes to shove and you invest in them in the top 100 and you can't even play them at this time, we really, whether that's rookies or pitchers that are wearing down, it do seem like we got a lot of 35 plus year old pitchers that are wearing down here in August here, Frank, Clayton Kirshaw, Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, something we need to pay more attention to because what are we doing? It's great that they got us here. But then when they're leaving when it's most important, that ain't going to do it. Let's talk about some hitting leftovers. I got a bunch of names here. Well, Shiff, there's. Is anyone you want to jump in on? Just feel free to do so. Willie Adamas coming on late in the season, two for four with his 23rd home run.

In his last 17 games, he's hitting 281 with five homers and 17 RBI. Cody Bellinger did it again. Two for four with his 24th home run. He's batting 321. He's got 19 steals, 920 OPS. This off season, there's obviously huge storyline. Showe Othani.

Does he have surgery? What does his contract look like? I think Cody Bellinger is, One of the more intriguing storylines this off season. Where does he go? What kind of contract does he get? I mean, dude,

if anybody made more money in like a six-month span than Cody Bellinger is going to, like in the year, year over year, I'm trying to think, what's a player this year in any sport that has gone from what that projected would have been at the beginning of the year,

which was garbage, to what he's going to get $200 plus million dollar contract or something crazy. He's going to get something crazy. That guy has made himself, so much money. You hold a 321 batting average. We do have to pay much closer attention.

And next year, drafting is going to be fascinating with him. Yeah, I'm really interested to see. I'm purposely not going to take Cody Bellinger in this mock draft just to see where he goes. Like who else is going to take him and how early is it going to be? Because I have no idea what to do with him. What will be your line though? Like if you're in the 50s, are you going to be like, all right, right. It's a 15-team league.

I will not take him with one of my first four picks. So if he comes back to me, I pick 72. Yeah, I'd probably consider him there. No way, no. He's not going to make it that far, but... You got Freddie Freeman at 12, so that's dumb enough. You never, yeah, who knows?

Who knows? Kyle Swarber remains locked in, two for four with his 41st home run. And in his last 18 games, he's betting 302 with 11 home runs and a 96 mile per hour average exit velocity. I feel awful. There's nothing I want more than for him to not hit 200. I just want him to hold that sub 200 batting average with not only the 30, but the first ever to do for 40 homers. And he is fighting against it so hard. That might be the most exciting race at the end of the year.

It's not the playoff run. And who makes it is Will Schwerber hit 200? I will be locked in every single day for it. I also wouldn't mind if he just slowed down a little bit because A, I don't have any Kyle Schwerber. And B, I still, I have that preseason bet for Matt Olson to lead baseball and home. runs which he currently does but it's getting close man that one's gonna like is that like a big cash it's like 20 bucks to pay out 600 or something so no oh pretty fun hey first pitch money all right first rounds on Frank let's go let's go

let's go jazz chishim two for four with his 16 home run he's heating up over his last eight games hitting 371 with four homers and two steals CJ Abrams one for three with a walk and two steals he's now up to 40 on the season in 52 games since moving up to the lead-off spot for the nationals. Abrams is hitting 261, 8 homers, 29 steals over the past 52 games. Nolan Gorman, one for four with a Gormo, like, what was that? Gormone. Gorman, hey, Nolran Gormone Gormon. Please tell me more. One for four with a sock in the shoe, his 27th home run, his seventh steal. That's two massive games in a row for him. Wilson Contreras, two for four with his 17th home run. Since July 1st

on, he's hitting 324 with D. nine homers. Okay, it's pretty awesome for Contreras. Matt Olson, I mentioned three for four with his league leading 46th home run of the year. Andrew Vaughn, three for four with his 19th home run. That's back-to-back games with three hits and a home run in each. Nice to see that from Andrew Vaughn. And Marcus Semyon had a massive game, four-for-four with two socks and a shoe.

He's up to 22 home runs, 104 runs, 85 RBI, 14 steals. The dude is just as consistent. as they come. Call to the bullpen. A few updates here for the Pirates. David Bednar struck out two for his 33rd save. It's been a truly great under the radar season for David Bednar. He's got a 198 ERA.

Good for you. For the Guardians, Immanuel Class A struck out one for his league leading 38th save of the year. For the Oakland A's, Trevor May gave up a hit but picked up his 18th save. I feel like I've said that a lot here in the second half. I know the A's are gross, but Trevor May is only 26% rostered. So if you need saves, he's out there. For Tampa Bay, Pete Fairbanks struck out two for his 20th save. For the Yankees, Clay Holmes struck out one for his 18th.

And for the White Sox, Gregory Santos entered in the eighth inning with one out and a one run lead. He got those final two outs. And then Brian Shaw came in for the ninth. He walked one but picked up his second save here with the White Sox. Wow. Yeah. Two pitchers returned in relief. We mentioned one of them, Edward Cabrera.

He's 37% rostered. Mason Miller also made his returning through two perfect innings with three strikeouts. And the velocity looked good. His fastball was actually up to 99.6 miles per hour. I just don't know what the utility is for him. I guess if you play in a deeper categories league and you're looking for some ratios and strikeouts, that's where Mason Miller can help you. But I wouldn't expect either A, any starts or B, if he does start,

he's not going to go very deep into it. Yeah, and they've already said like he's not going past 50. innings and they want to use him more in this role. So the only sneaky thing, if it were any other team but the A's, maybe you could trick yourself into like he comes in the third, pitches three innings and he gets a win. Probably not going to happen. Your better case scenario would be, again, if they were in a position to win, he comes in, pitches three innings at the back end of the game, and gets a save. But I think he's just a ratio play. He's nothing more than that right now. All right. To stream or not to stream, we'll start with Thursday. And we do have Ryan Pepeo at the

Marlins. I think that's pretty good. I also, think Javier Assad against the D-backs is fine and Griffin Canning against the Guardians is also fine. Pepio and Griffin Canning for me. Pepio probably at the top of the list. Well, no, Pepe. Yeah, I would go Pepeio and then Griffin Canning. Those are the only two that I would want to touch. On Friday, I'm looking at Christopher Sanchez. Mike Levinger versus Detroit. Got to keep doing that one. Dude, you gave up eight runs against the Tigers last time out. It's but I got to go back. We got to go back. We got to go back. It's one start. He was put on waivers. All right. Christopher Sanchez against the Marlins. I think it's pretty good. And Kyle Harrison against the Rockies in San Francisco. I think that's.

Oh, yeah, yeah. In San Francisco, I'm down with that one as well. Yep. So we're looking at a I would probably rank it Sanchez, Harrison, and then Clevenger in that order for those three. You had Clevenger. Um, I would go, oh, you know what? Yeah, maybe I'm with that. I mean, I'm, I think Clevenger might be the best out of here. but obviously he got lit up that he's a little bit more volatile. You know what? I'm going to go Colorado. I'm going to go Harrison, Clevenger, and then Sanchez. But we agree on the dudes. I'll give a shout out to Reese Olson against the White Sox, too.

He pitched well against them last time out, and he's done some interesting things. So if you're in a deeper league, I think Reese Olson is fine. We're going to wrap there for the Welsh. I am Frank. Thanks, as always, for tuning into fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify, and we'll be back again tomorrow.

Bye bye.