Fantasy Baseball Today - Latest Trades, Prospect Debuts & Weekend Waiver Wire Adds! (8/3 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: August 3, 2026

Freddy Peralta was traded to the Rays (2:50)! ... Luis Garcia Jr. to the Yankees (7:00)! ... Kevin Gausman to the Cubs (12:30)! ... Tyler Mahle to the Braves (16:40). ... Max Clark and Quinn Mathews made their debuts (22:05)! ... Gavin Williams is on fire (29:45). ... News (34:50): we had other small trades. ... Royce Lewis keeps producing (50:17). ... Let's rank waiver wire pitchers (58:03). ... What's up with Skenes (1:08:38)? ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpens and streamers (1:19:43).Subscribe to our YouTube channel: ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠Sign up for the newsletter at ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters

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. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Hey there, welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today, and welcome to Deadline Day. Monday, August 3rd. I am Frank Staple, joined by Scott White and Chris Towers.

today on the show we have a bunch of trades to break down from Sunday. We actually did an emergency, I don't know, rant-type podcast about Terrick Scuba earlier in the day. So if you want to hear about Terrick Scuba and the state of baseball and paying and not paying and teams who are going for it and who aren't, make sure to check that out. We did get a bunch of prospect promotions this weekend, so we'll check in on how those guys did. latest waiver ads.

We'll do a temperature check on some polarizing starting pitchers and much more, but let's just start with all these trades because there was a bunch. In fact, there was one that actually happened while we were live, and then we didn't realize until afterwards. So, here we are. Freddie Peralta traded over

to the raise in exchange for three prospects, Aidan Smith, Amelian Petre, and Gary Gil Hill. As we've talked about a lot, Freddie Peralta has had a brutal season definitely needed a change of scenery. And it's hard to ask for a better landing spot than the race.

They're usually pretty good with stuff like this. So are you guys, I don't know, Arrow seems like Arrow pointing up for Freddie Peralta? I mean, can't go down. What's been frustrating about this season is entering this season. I think the Mets were kind of viewed maybe not quite at the raise and Brewers level, but not far off in terms of their. ability to maximize and develop pitchers.

We saw the success that they had with like Shamanaya and Clay Holmes and all their pitcher prospects who really took a step forward over the past couple years. And for some reason, it just hasn't worked with Freddie Peralta. He's completely lost the feel for his slider, especially. We've seen him mixing in a sweeper for the first time in his career because the slider just has not worked at all. What's weird is the whiff rate on the slider has still been really good. he's just gotten hit hard.

And so I do wonder if there might be some tweaks that they can make there to get that back. That seems like the biggest change for Peralta from last season to this season. His arm slot has dropped about five degrees, but it's back to where it was in 2024 when he was still good. So, you know, the peripherals don't look that much different than they have in the past. The strikeout rate is down. But you look at everything with Freddie Peralta, and it doesn't quite make sense why he's been done.

this bad. And so I think just kind of natural regression and, I don't know, better vibes might be enough to turn around. But also that it's the raise, you know, better defense and better, you know, development. I think you can have some optimism about Freddie Peralta for the first time since March. Yeah, I think when we talked about him on some podcast recently, I don't know if it was like by low candidates for the second half, something like that.

I was pretty much done with Freddie Peralta, but I left the exception if he went to one of the organizations that's really known for its pitching development at the trade deadline. I listed off three, and one of them was the race. So he goes to the raise.

Scott Codamas. I think it's mostly about bringing back that slider. He's basically abandoned it second year in a row. but the characteristics on it are still good. And I think the raise, I mean, as careful as they have to be, when acquiring players and the reputation they have for redeeming much lesser pitchers than Freddie Peralta,

I think there's a good chance they bring him back to life and that they already have a plan in place for doing that. So as long as this trade, doesn't inflate his cost in your league. Like, whoever has him is still approaching Freddie Peralta as this guy with a $499 EER who he's on the verge of dropping. As long as that's still the case, I think he makes for a fine by low candidate now. And Peralta will now pop up in AL-only leagues.

So for those who lost Terek Scouble to the National League, look, he's not Terek Scouble, but, you know, it's a small consolation prize here. So you can be pretty aggressive on him in Fab in AL-only leagues. Again, that's Freddie Peralta, who is also nice insurance because Shane McClanahan was placed in the IL Friday with mid-back tightness. They believe the injury is pretty minor, and McClanahan will just miss two starts,

but he's dealt with a lot of injuries, and I think they probably want to, you know, watch those innings. So we'll see when McClanahan can get back. But a nice little insurance pickup here with Freddie Peralta. We did have some other decent-sized trades, it's here on Sunday, and the Yankees acquired Luis Garcia Jr. from the Nationals for three minor league pitchers, Ben Grable, Yovani Cruz, Jack Seabert, and reliever Jake Bird, Garcia having the best year of his career, 283, 23 homers, 76 RBI, and 873 OPS. And I think you have to

like it from just a left-handed hitter being in Yankee Stadium perspective. The fit when the trade came across just seemed kind of odd because the Yankees have first baseman NDH players like this isn't exactly what they need offense. They just didn't exactly need this position of offense. Paul Goldschman's been pretty terrible

for a while now. He's kind of turned back into the guy we all expected him to be 523 OPS since the All-Star break. 495 in July. I think that's I mean, look, he's better than that, but I think he's clearly not an impact bat

anymore. He's clearly not a guy you can rely on. So I think it makes perfect sense in that regard. I just think unfortunately for our purposes, it doesn't fix the fundamental problem for Luis Garcia. He's not going to play every day. Yeah. Yep. Right.

And in fact, I think that's even more assured now that he's with a team that's trying to win something when he was a team that wasn't. So he's locked into that platoon role. You know, hopefully Hopefully the move to Yankee Stadium makes them a little,

like it's hard to be much better than he's already been. Expected home runs by Park, I think give him six more home runs if he'd played every game in, or is it four more? I'd have to pull it up. I may be saying you're wrong. Either way. It's over the course of two months,

how much of a difference do you expect it to make? And how sure are we that he's exactly who he's been to this point anyway, which I think he is, but obviously there's no track record of this. I think the oddity of the fit is just like, well, if you're a Yankees fan, would you rather them get a third basement? Wouldn't you rather get somebody who can hit at a premium spot

as opposed to, well, now your DH spot is occupied fully in case by some miracle John Carlos Stanton's ready to go at some point? So not ideal, but you'll take a better bat, sure. Yeah. Yeah, my first thought was like maybe, I know nobody was happy about Jazz Chisholm playing third base. But my first thought was maybe they pushed Luis Garcia back to second. He hasn't played a single inning at second base this season. He was pretty bad there last season.

But it doesn't sound like that's the plan. It could be a break glass in case of emergency thing if Stanton does prove healthy. But I think you can also read this as they're not expecting Stanton to be healthy. Yeah. And I mean, Another part of is, if Judge makes it back, you probably want the DH available for him someday. I don't know that you just want him to go out there every day in the outfield and just like let it rip coming off a, you know, a fractured rib or whatever the exact injury is. So kind of a weird fit, but I think for Garcia being in Yankee Stadium, career high pulled air rate, you know, I think that's something that could be good for him.

But he's not going to play against lefties. I just hope. Like I'm thinking next year too, because Garcia is under control next. year. Yep. I just hope this doesn't tempt Aaron Boone to sit in Rice against lefties again, presuming next year they got Goldschmidt still. Stanton is off the IL.

they're both right-handed bats, platoon them with the two lefties. I don't think there's any way. They, I think there's no way they can go back. He would have to completely collapse down the stretch. I mean, he has solidified himself as like an MVP candidate.

Yeah, he's a top time. I should hope so. I should hope so. Never say never, but geez. I don't. You know, we were ahead of them on rice for a long time, and it took, you know, it's easy for us to say,

but we're ultimately not the ones calling the shots. For what it's worth, expected home runs by ballpark. 20 in Washington, 25 at Yankee Stadium, 23 is how many Luis Garcia's actually hit. So over the course of two months, I don't know that, you know, that data, I treat it more as a rough guy, than gospel truth anyway,

but that's, that doesn't particularly move me. And it's also a mild lineup downgrade. You know, for whatever the park downgrade is. Nationals lineup has been better than the Yankees one this year. Yeah, that's fair.

Garcia, another one going from the NL to the AL, so if you play an AL only plan to be pretty aggressive on Luis Garcia. On the national side of things, a couple names that I would just look out for here. Yovani Cruz has been pretty good in the market. minors this year. The whip is a little bit higher, but he gets a lot of whiffs. And whenever he's pitched, it's a really small sample size up with the Yankees this year. He's looked really good.

So perhaps he can work his way into the saves, the closer mix there with the National. So just a very deep league name, Yovani Cruz there. And also Abamelek Ortiz, who I would guess is probably going to get another opportunity to get called up, get some playing time. He's hit for pretty good power in the minors. So two very deep league names there, Yovani Cruz. and Abamelik Ortiz with the nationals. Next up, the Cubs acquired Kevin Gosman from the Blue Jays for Brett Bateman and Ty Southazine. And Gosman, we know, he got up to a great start

and it's just kind of been rough over the past month or six weeks or so. 438 ERA 129 whip. He's right at a strikeout per inning 2.5 walks per nine. The underlying numbers, the ERA estimator, say that he should be better than this. So perhaps some regression. and what helps that is that the Cubs have the best defense in all baseball.

So I think this could actually be a slight uptick here for Kevin Gosman, if he can, you know, throw that splitter anywhere near the zone. It just depends if he's as washed up as he's looked the past couple of months. Yeah. I mean, he's just been really bad for a couple of months now. And it's, you know, he is 35. And so you wonder if it sometimes just falls apart for guys like that. But we've also seen a lot of ups and downs over the,

the past couple years from Gosman. He tends to figure it out. I have said that a lot about Framber Foltes this season and it hasn't worked out. But Gosman obviously in a much better situation now with the Cubs defense behind him. This is still a team I look at and like, I think they need at least one more pitcher. Right now it's like you're looking at whatever Kevin Gosman has left and then Matthew Boyd and Shody Minaga in the playoffs. Like this is a team that could be a contender with the right pitching.

and I just don't know who that is at this point, but I would still think there's a chance, one of those, Pedro Ramirez, James Triantos, Matt Shaw, one of those guys is on the move somewhere, I would think. I want to point out with Gosman because you've mentioned the ups and downs because I found this to be encouraging with him. So the swinging strike rate, the walk rate, the ground ball rate, are all about the same as the previous two years.

And also the previous two years, 2024 and 2025, he had an ERA over four in the first half, just like he does now, and pulled it all together in the second half to end up putting together a pretty good season. So it feels like he's worse. Actually, quality of contacts been better for Gosman this year than the previous two years.

So, you know, he is 35. You can't just count on the same thing happening just because it happened to previous two years. But I'm sure that's what the Cubs are betting on, I think it's, I mean, how many better pitchers are on the market right now? Maybe Hunter Green gets moved, though I think that's a long shot. Especially in division, that would be tough. The two Angels guys are still out there.

I don't know that they're definitively better than Gosman. Yeah. Yeah, the only other one I think, I would say pretty confidently, is better than Kevin Gosman, is George Kirby, if you actually believe that the Mariners are actually shopping him. But there was a report earlier on Sunday that, the pitchers that the Cubs are looking into are Detmer, Soriano,

George Kirby, and Emerson Hancock. The Mariners are a weird fit with the Cubs just because their best players are short stops in second base, or their best young players are short stops in second baseman too. I guess depends if you think Brendan Donovan's a long-term piece.

I think he's only got a year or two of Club control left, but that's an awkward fit with the Cubs given their overflow. Yeah. You know, the Cubs have all these young, interesting hitters. Can Pedro Ramirez play in the outfield? I feel like he's only been an infielder, right? I think he's appeared in the outfield this year. Oh, all right. So perhaps that could work with the Mariners.

He has four, five appearances in the outfield. It's something. Six in his career. Yeah, just one in the majors this year. Maybe James Triantos, that could make some sense. or, you know, I've kind of heard Sey's name floated out there. He's an expiring deal, so I don't know, Sayy Suzuki Plus

for George Kirby, something like that. Could make sense. Does he have been? Suzuki expiring? I believe, yeah, they're both expiring. Okay, that's an interesting. Interesting wrinkle for the Cubs. And the last trade for now, the Braves, your brave, Scotty.

They are on the board. They acquired Tyler Malley from the Giants for 24-year-old reliever, Anthony Molina. And Malley's overall numbers this year are bad. But in seven starts since returning from the IL in late June, he has

a 379 ERA and a 118 whip. He's only 20% rostered. Scott, do you have any interest in your new Atlanta Brave, Tyler Malley? Not really. I mean, I'm not ruling out a return to form here. He

did have that a 218 ERA for the Rangers last year, injury short and season. And he's actually regained some velocity from then his velocity was down, then it's a little bit better this year. But it's, it feels like,

it feels like, uh, a team that needs some innings filled, got some innings for cheap. So I, Scott, correct me if I'm wrong. I was trying to remember.

I was trying to go through every pitcher of the Braves have acquired on a major league contract, every starting pitcher on a major league contract, since they got Chris sale. and I came up with Rinaldo Lopez and Tyler Malley. Can you think of anyone else? On a major league?

On a major league deal. So, okay. Because I think Martin Perez and Carlos Carrasco were both minor league deals. I just, like they've... Yeah, I'm not sure that I... It's crazy how little they've done to upgrade. And like, it's amazing that they've been as good as they've been.

Because they've also, in that time, they've lost Max Friedian Anderson, Kyle Wright, Spencer Strider, Mike Soroka, Spencer Trellumbach, like, I just Meshavar. I'm sorry to bring that all up, but it's just, that's another team that could really use a, yeah, yeah, another starting pitcher.

And Alex Othopoulos just kind of, I don't know, he got Chris Allen, he's like, good, I'm done, never upgrading my rotation again. Yeah, man, he does not like to pay for pitchers, clearly. And I understand the rationale behind it, but like, at some point you have to be irrational. Well, I say, not going to win without pitchers. Like, they basically had, on their

World Series run, they had Max Fried and Charlie Morton. Yeah. And then just a patch job after that. Like, Kyle Wright came up from the minors. I think AJ Mentor started a game. Was he Ian Anderson around by then? Oh, you know what? Ian Anderson was around.

He was really good in that postseason. So they had three legit starters. Yeah, fair enough. All right. So that's it for trades for now. We do have a couple other smaller ones. We'll get to a little bit later on. But speaking of trades and the deadline, we will have a live stream extravaganza here on Monday, 5 p.m. Eastern Time. So come hang out. We'll break down all the trades from the day. I'm sure there'll be a lot of stuff going on leading up to 6 p.m. at the trade deadline. And then we'll

stay live past that because I'm sure a couple other trades will trickle in after the deadline as well. And if there's nothing going on, we'll just take some of your questions and hang out. Oh, sparkle quizzes, you know? Yeah. Yeah. Why not? So I'll get. trade deadline live special YouTube only Monday 5 p.m. Eastern Time be there. Let's take a break and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back fantasy baseball today recapping the weekend and wanted to take a look at what the prospect promotions did this weekend. Pretty nice debut for Max Clark who went three for four with two runs and an RBI on Friday. He went two for five with his first career home run on Saturday, added another hit, another run scored on Sunday. He hit. He hit. He

hit seventh in all three games for the Tigers. Obviously, there is room for him to move up this lineup. But he was having pretty good season in the minors. He gets on base. There's good contact, solid speed as well here for Max Clark. 66% rostered. Do you guys just consider him a must add, must roster? Is this a like three outfielder name for you?

Max Clark. Pretty close. He made as strong of a first impression as he could. I mean, I could nitpick, you know, one of the doubles was a flare to left field. The home run was hit less than 100 miles per hour. So I could nitpick. But, you know, he walked three times in the three games. And I, you know, obviously was doing really well in the minors before he got called up.

His very good play discipline. I made the comp to AJ Ewing when he first got called up, that he could be that impactful. and I'm not saying you drop AJ Ewing for him at this point, but I was putting in my claims in some of those three outfielder points leagues. I didn't need an extra outfielder in all of them, but anyone I did, Max Clark looked like the best one on the waiver wire. Yeah, and I saw some big bits for him too. I don't know who had this much money left,

but in my TGFBI, which is a 15-team Roto League, he went for 253 out of a $1,000 budget. and in our beat FBT League, that's a 12-team roto, he went for 97. So, you know, smaller league doesn't go for as much, but in a more scarce league, he was, he went for almost 25% of the budget, which pretty big number there for Max Clark. I'm not sure how many other big name hitting prospects will get the rest of the way. I think, like George Lombard is someone I have my eye on, the Rockies with Charlie Condon and Zach Veen. So those are probably some of the next, you know,

Joshua Baez, I think, is still in play. Walker Jenkins. Yep, yep, yep. For the twins. So there's a, there's a good handful. But, you know, Max Clark is up now. So let's see what he can do. 66% roster with him.

And the other prospect promotion was Quinn Matthews of the Cardinals. He was okay in his debut at the Blue Jays, five innings, three, two runs, three walks, three strikeouts. But he had 12 whiffs on 97 pitches. he only allowed four hard hits, 83.1 average EV, and he threw 65% of his pitches for strikes. When he struggled in the minors,

it's been a lack of control and lots of walks and things like that popping up. So under the hood, I actually thought this was a pretty encouraging first outing here for Quinn Matthews. He's 39% rostered, and looks like he lines up for the Rockies in St. Louis. So long term, I'm pretty interested here, Chris,

but especially this week, like, you're getting the Rockies on the road. Yeah, let's fire up Quinn Matthews. I thought this was pretty impressive. I thought, you know, obviously the results weren't incredible, but he missed bats. The four seamer looks like it's going to be a weapon. You know, you look at the various models. He's got a low release point and good shape and 94, 95 from the left side.

Like it all looks like a plus pitch. I think the slider also looked very good. The changeup looks pretty good. But the curveball, that's the one. He didn't have great feel for it, this one. And it's a big slow curveball. We've talked about that a lot where, you know, those can be hard to command. And, you know, he has struggled with command a lot in his career.

But I think just as a general rule, everything that I saw looked like it was going to work. And I, you know, I'm not going to say I'm like putting $150 bids in for Quinn Matthews. But he's someone I think I want to be pretty aggressive with. at a time when, I don't know, unless there's Roki Sasaki available in your league, I'm not sure there's another pitcher that I'm more into than Quinn Matthews right now. Maybe Kate Anderson, I think they're rostered roughly the same. I would definitely take Kate Anderson. Oh, yeah, no, no, that's what I mean.

No, I was just talking about the roster rate. Matthews is 39% Anderson, I think, is like 6 and 7. So, sure. There's a lot of leagues where Kate Anderson is rostered and Quinn Matthews isn't. I think among pitchers rostered in 70% of leagues are less, though, I think Sasaki and

Anderson are the only two that I would prioritize ahead of Quinn Matthews right now. So in one of my leagues, I do have a claim for Walbert Arania over Matthews, but it's a close call. I mean, Irania's just been so reliable.

I'm not expecting huge returns for Matthews. I'm hoping he'll be good enough to keep on my roster. It was three walks to three strikeouts in this first start. I was encouraged by the 65% strike rate, but you know three walks and five innings is not good and fits in with what we saw from him

the last two years in the minors especially. He seemed to have a little trouble putting guys away. That was what I was watching this start. So I think he's high among the pitchers to prioritize off the waiver wire, Quinn Matthews, but I could, if I looked at the list, I could probably come up with some more names beyond Kate Anderson and Walbert-Orania.

And like, I do want to stress. We don't know exactly when Kate Anderson is coming up. I think it'll be at most two weeks from now. It may be this week. And regardless of when he comes up, with Louise Castillo out of the picture, maybe George Kirby or Emerson Hancock as well, we'll see. But even with just Castillo out of the picture,

like, if Anderson is, is still available in your league. He has to be the top priority. Must, must, must. Yeah. What about Shane Drohan versus Quinn Matthews? I think Matthews is more talented. I think I'll, man, droin.

I like drawing, man. I like drawing too. I like both, to be honest, but I think I like drawing a little bit more. Yeah, I have a hard time. What we've seen from Drohan recently, he's gone now six innings and four straight starts. Five straight. Five straight starts. And the strikeouts are decent.

The contact quality is, am I mixing them up with gasser? I might be mixing them up with gasser. So sorry about that. Drohan, I think, is even better than gasser, but I need to refresh my memory on what I'm talking about here. Okay, 12% swingy strike rate. That's pretty darned. good. 88.3 mile per hour average exit velocity.

That's pretty good. And he doesn't have control problems either. 2.5 walks per nine. I mean, look at the ERA estimators for drone. He's actually underperform them. They're all low threes. So, yeah, I got to go with Drohan over Matthews or Walbert-Irania, for that matter.

Yep, I would agree with that as well. Your, oh, my goodness gracious shout-out of the weekend. Oh, my goodness gracious! goes to Gavin Williams, who was awesome again on Sunday. Five and two-thirds shutout, one hit, one walk, 10 strikeouts, 21 whiffs on 89 pitches. He took a perfect game into the sixth inning when, can you believe it, those D-backs tried to bunt for a hit?

Why would they do that, Chris? Cannot believe they tried to do that. Velocity up here for Gavin Williams. He's leaned more on his sweeper over his past couple starts, and it has been amazing for him. I know that we tell ourselves every time. You can't get too high on Gavin Williams. You can't get too low on Gavin Williams.

But, dude, five straight games with 10 or more strikeouts and one or fewer walks. The only other two pitchers to ever do that are Clayton Kirshan in 2016 and Chris Sale in 2018. So I don't know. Maybe Gavin Williams is just entering another stratosphere. I mean, you don't have to go there is the thing. like he's doing something historic

he is and I think he's capable of doing this like I don't I don't think if you had told me coming into the season that Gavin Williams would have a stretch like this I wouldn't fall in out of my chair you know it's like it's impressive but like I think he's capable of impressive things it's

it's you know we've seen the other side of the coin too and I don't think that's gone away So, you know, I don't want to downgrade or like poo-poo anything he's done here. My only critique really comes down to, I think he's more like a top 20 starting pitcher in fantasy than a top 10. And right now he's looking like a top 10. But I don't think it'll continue such to make him a top. 10, but top 20 is still really good. Yeah.

Yeah, I mean, and that would be higher than I think we've ranked him pretty consistently all season, right? At least for me, I had him closer to 30 for most of the season. Yeah, and the thing that I'm really struggling with is, and maybe this is dumb. I'll grant that, um, is the last time I did this. The last time I was like, you know what? I was wrong about Gavin Williams. Gavin Williams is really good.

And this was probably in May, I would guess, when I, I finally was like, you know what? This skepticism is just making me look stupid. I'm going to buy in and I'm going to put Gavin Williams as a top 25 or 20 starting pitcher, wherever I ended up getting him. And then he opened June with like, like, he had a 60RA in June. And like his peripherals didn't change very much from May to June. He just gave up a lot more home runs. And that's just a kind of thing that might happen sometimes for Gavin Williams.

It certainly has been this season. And so I think he's pitching really exceptionally well right now. I think he's the kind of inherently volatile pitcher that it's just you are bound to get burned by overreacting one way or or reacting one way or the other, frankly. But this is clearly the best we've ever seen from him. And there are enough underlying changes in his pitch mix, you know, really, really leaning into the that's fastball and sweeper combination. And the velocity consistently being up. Yeah,

that maybe this is just the light going off for him. But we've seen, you know, his release point tends to fluctuate. His extension tends to fluctuate. He tends to have, or at least has in the past, had a lot of trouble sustaining his velocity throughout starts.

And these are all things that have just made him very, very volatile. And maybe that's done. but I don't know I just it feels like it's setting myself up to look dumb

if I finally get rid of all my reservations and I've certainly gotten rid of a lot of them it's Lucy with the football but yeah there there is and again I will grant maybe that's dumb maybe like worrying about the ups and downs of a player's past and like maybe

we're just missing the forest for the trees here by focusing on that stuff. But maybe he's also you know, full season statistics are more predictive than partial season statistics. As good as he's been this five start stretch. He has like a 356 ERA and most of the peripherals

are in line with that. The XERA is actually around four. Right. I don't know. Nobody's ever as good as they are at their best. And you should probably just take the overall track record at face. value with Gavin Williams. And what that is is a 350 R a and 11K per 9. That's an awesome

pitcher. And there's nothing wrong with just being that. He might be a top 10 pitcher. But I do think we need more than the five starts to fully buy in. Yeah. Let's hit the rest of the news and notes from the weekend and some other smaller trades that went down. The Braves acquired Elaine Thomas and Bailey Falter from the Royals in exchange for Carter, Holton and Lucas Braun and Thomas just wrapped up a nice July where he hit 255 with five homers, 14 RBI, three seals, 820 OPS. Scott, do you think Lane Thomas plays every day with the Braves or is this just a short side platoon situation?

I think he's short side platoon with Mike Yistremski. Kind of taking the Eli White roll away. Yeah, it's a little nifty little platoon. I'd prefer better. but we can't always give what we want. Yeah. That is bad news for Lane Thomas's value because he was playing every day

with the Royals before this trade. So not great for Lane Thomas. Maybe a Cooniel will get hurt again. Oh my gosh. All right. Wow. Why would you even put that out into the universe? What is wrong with you?

I just didn't like seeing you sad, Frank. Oh, man. Anywho, the twins acquired Dean Kramer from the Orioles for Yom Nardo Rayus and to make room for Kramer, the twins options, Zebby Matthews to AAA. Kramer, streamer type, he's flashed a little bit with the splitter that he throws and gets swinging strikes with it at times, but I don't know that this move to the twins really change as much for me with Dean Kramer.

Yeah, it's been, but there was a moment where we were like, oh, Dean Kramer, throwing that splitter more. Maybe there's something here because it's a really good pitch. Kind of went back to the typical usage after that. now goes to the twins with an ERA over six. They sent Zebby Matthews down. I don't know that their nests probably better off with Dean Kramer than Zebby Matthews, but that's where things currently stand.

My interest level in Dean Kramer has not changed. It is very low. All right. The Brewers acquired Bow Nailer and Cody Hoyer from the Guardians for Craig Yoho and Blake Perkins. Very deep league names. I don't think there's much that matters there. Would have been cool.

Like, can we get Craig? Craig Yoho to the Pirates. Exactly. Like they need a closer. He couldn't be any worse than what they have. Like Craig Yoho became the Pirates closer for the next six years. That would be electric, man. Yeah.

I'd buy a jersey for sure. Yep. The Blue Jays acquired James and Tyone from the Cubs for cash considerations or a player to be named later. And the pirates acquired Camillo DeVal from the Yankees for a pair of minor leaguers. Deval has been really bad this season. He does have closing experience. The pirates used him on Sunday. It was in a non-closing situation.

It was like they were losing 9 to 2 or something like that. And he gave up a home run. So maybe he could work his way into things, but I think it would have to take a lot to happen here for that to actually come true for Camilla Duval. Bobby Witt Jr. is on track to return on Tuesday, so make sure to get him back in your lineups this week. Nick Kurtz has missed two straight due.

to a lingering hand injury. He was hit by a pitch on Wednesday of last week, and Kurtz had an MRI and x-rays. Mark Katsay said the x-rays were kind of unclear. Kurtz is expected to visit a hand specialist on Monday.

This one seems kind of scary. Doesn't seem like you can start them. No. Yep. So, look, at least there's a lot of first baseman out there if you need a replacement. Oh, a non-corner infielder leagues. I mean, there's got to be somebody good you could use.

But it's still a bummer because this is the best first baseman. I feel like I'm having trouble keeping up with injuries right now. Like, they're just happening with such frequency lately. And obviously trade stuff is going on. There's a lot going on right now. Yeah, I just, every day I look up and I'm like, what? He's got a red cross next to his name. What's that about?

And it's like, oh, Nick Kurtz being one such example. Kyle Harrison is expected to make his next start with the Brewers during their upcoming home series against the Pirates. And his loan rehab start five and two-thirds, shutout innings, five strikeouts to three walks. He got up to 68 pitches. So probably in that 75 to 80 range, would you guys use Kyle Harrison first start back from the IL this week?

I think it's okay. I would think if you were ranking every starting pitch for this week, given how good he's been this season, you'd probably go top 50. So, yeah, I think you'd probably lean towards starting him, but it's not... Anytime it's the first start back from the IL, I don't mind giving a guy a chance to show that he's okay.

It just kind of just depends what your options are. For what it's worth, Pirates is the matchup, right? They're much more ordinary against left-handed pitchers. Yep. So you don't necessarily have to think of that as a bad matchup for Harrison. All right. Next up, another injury.

Ryan O'Hern was placed in the aisle with a left quad train, and he will miss six to eight weeks, which basically knocks him out for the rest of the regular season. And he had first base in outfield eligibility. So if you're looking for first base replacements, again, like Bryce Eldridge is 68% rostered, Royce Lewis is 57%. Thai France still on fire.

He's 51% rostered. If you need help in the outfield, if you were using Ryan O'Hern there, there's Max Clark, who he mentioned, there's Dom Kanzone, who's been playing against lefties, homering against some lefties as well,

Herberto Hernandez with the Marlins, and even Spencer Jones, who's getting a chance to play every day, homered against two lefties this weekend, and he was moved up to the cleanup spot here on Sunday. So there's a name for you. Spencer Jones. He's also still striking out like 40% of the time,

but yeah. That he is 37% I think to be exact. But, you know, he's super athletic. He's like, steals bases too. So I don't know. We'll see where it goes. Bunch of Braves. If Spencer Jones was going to break out, this is what it would look like.

Yeah. But still a big if, whether it's sustainable with a strikeout rate that high. He just doesn't, I don't know how to explain it. He doesn't look like a normal human being, you know. He feels like the way he looks, it feels like he should be smaller, but he's just, he hovers over everybody. It's so, like, Aaron Judge, he doesn't look as big as he is. Like, Aaron Judge, his body just kind of matches.

Like, it makes sense when you look at him. Spencer Jones, it doesn't, it feels like he's 6-1, but he's actually 6-7. I also just think like. I didn't do that on purpose. I still don't think that bad stance is going to work. There are way too many moving parts in there for a guy that big. It is. very wonky.

Yeah. But I'll tell you, like, I watched him pretty close this week, and, like, his at-bats have been a lot better this second or third time around since getting called up. So we'll see. A bunch of Braves pitcher updates here. Spencer Shrider appears unlikely to pitch again this season. He landed on the aisle with right elbow inflammation back on June 13th. Spencer Shwellenbach will likely throw a few more bullpins before being cleared to face live hitters.

He hasn't yet regained his full velocity. and Ronaldo Lopez was placed in the aisle with left knee inflammation. J.R. R. Ritchie was recalled to start Sunday and it was more of the same for Richie. Four innings, two runs, three walks, four strikeouts for him. Ryan Helsley has resumed a throwing program. He's on the 60-day I.L. Not eligible to return until August 29th. Will Smith will need at least three to four weeks to ramp back up, including a rehab assignment.

He's been on the IL since mid-June with neck inflammation. Michael Garcia is scheduled to see a hand specialist this week. He's been battling a left-hand muscle strain since late June. Brendan Donovan will finally rejoin the Mariners on Tuesday. He is 70% rostered second and third base eligible. I know that number's already high, but if he's out there in points leagues, that is the format that Donovan is typically really good in.

Yeah, and J.P. Crawford went on the aisle this weekend. So, you know, the playing time concerns aren't there right now. They did say he'll play second base, third base, and corner outfield. So could gain eligibility there. Yeah, I think he's worth the look. Zach Gelloff is expected to begin a rehab assignment Tuesday at AAA. Nick Ladolo through 50 pitches over three simulated innings on Friday.

He's working his way back from that recurring blister issue. The Astros move Tatsuya Imi to their bullpen this weekend. We don't have to do it anymore. I, you know, it was so. liberating to drop him in all my leagues this weekend. I just... Finally. We don't have to react. Frustrating pitchers that I have covered in the six years that I've been here at CBS. Joe Musgrove... Don't disagree.

Joe Musgrove felt strong after a bullpen Saturday and thinks he's ready to go on a rehab assignment. 27% rostered. Probably going to take pretty long to build up. Do you guys have any interest in stashing, Joe Musgrove? This is actually your seventh baseball season, Frank. Six and a half? Six and a third? Just your seventh season. Yeah. I didn't want you to sell yourself short.

Did the math real quick. You joined us right. Right in 2020. Hey, there's a pandemic going on. Host this baseball podcast. Yeah. Okay. Who were we talking about?

Joe Musgrove. Do you have any interest in stash? Joe Musgrove. I mean, if you have a free IL spot, I'd rather stash Nick Povetto, who I think is about to go on a re-enstrove. rehab assignment too. I was putting in some claims for him in leagues where I have a spot to play with dropping like Ben Brown for him. That sort of thing. I think I'd rather stash Clay Holmes as well

than Joe. Yeah, he'll be back the soonest. Yeah. And the last item I have here, D-Backs reliever Justin Martinez will begin a rehab assignment on Tuesday. He underwent Tommy John's surgery last June. But when he's right, he is awesome. He throws really hard. He is nasty. Paul Sewell has been removed from the D-Backs closers role and lefty Brandon Garcia has the last two saves for the D-backs and I saw a lot of people picking him up this weekend, rightfully so. Garcia is 20% rostered. How do you guys see the D-Backs bullpen playing out here?

Do you think it's all right, Brandon Garcia until the wheels fall off or once Justin Martinez is back, they just kind of work him back in as well? I mean, if Garcia's going well, I don't see why they'd remove him. But looking at his history, even just this year in the minors, I don't have supreme confidence that he'll last in this role. He's been really good, the time in the major so far. I don't know what clicked for him to have that about face with his performance. But it's gone well so far.

As long as it continues to go well, then I think he'll close, unless the Diamondbacks acquire someone else better to close. which is, and we're not hearing much about the diamondbacks, but they are currently in a wild card spot. Seven games over 500, I think. I did not realize that. Right?

They're like 59 and 52. They're suddenly. They are in a wildcard spot. Yeah, have a pretty good season. Yeah. The one thing I would say is the diamondbacks are invested in Justin Martinez long term. I wanted to check and make sure because I thought they had signed them to an extension. They did last year.

that can go either way, right? I think when they signed him to it, that was kind of a, oh, they really like this guy. They really think this is the closer of the future. But it's also, you know, they don't have any financial incentives to not put him in the closers role, which you'll sometimes see with smaller market teams

with relievers. But, you know, I have a hard time. Teams generally don't take guys out of this closer role when they're finding success unless there's a, guy, you know, an Edwin Diaz or something with that kind of track record. I don't know if Justin Martinez is that kind of guy yet. So I think Brandon Garcia has a chance, but it's probably 50-50 as to whether he takes advantage of that chance.

I didn't realize how good he is, man. 210 ERA.80 whip, 26% K-minus walk rate. His last 30 innings have been awesome. And he has a 66% ground ballroom. It's kind of only those 30 innings. The control in the miners was terrible. It was 7.3 walks per 9. This year, it was 5 something last year.

And then it's just like a switch flipped once he got to the majors. It's 2.1 walks per 9. So we've gotten faked out by that with pitchers before. Like, oh, they've cleared that hurdle control-wise and then it doesn't last, but sometimes it does last too. So to anybody's guess at this point, he's going well right now. If it continues, he'll probably stay.

But don't presume anything with Brandon Garcia. All right, let's take our final break when we return. I've got some waiver names, temperature check. What's the latest on Paul Skeens? We'll talk about that right after this. Welcome back, Fantasy Baseball today. And taking a look at Waver Wire hitters from the weekend. Obviously, Max Clark is the big name.

But just someone who's been rock solid, Royce Lewis, 2 for 4, hit his 12th home run, 3 RBI on Sunday. He also homered on Friday. Updated numbers since being recalled, 47 games. 254, 9 homers, 7 steals. OPS right around 800, 57% rostered. He's first, second, and third base eligible. When did he get second base eligibility?

Did I completely miss that? This was his ninth appearance today. So I'm waiting to move him to second base or middle infield in Tau Wars, where the standard is 10 appearances rather than five. Okay. That's the only started. He's only started a few. I think it's been a lot of late inning appearances.

I think he started for it appeared in nine at second base. Yeah, because I think like Luke Heschel no longer really plays second base. He's a strictly out for he. I think he's starting at center field now for them. Yeah, I think so. So, yeah, hey, I wouldn't mind 11 more appearances from Royce Lewis. Let's get him second and third base eligibility for 2027. He's been really good since he came back.

It's like a 25, 25 pace since he came back, OPS over 800. I think he's because he's been around and has disappointed us for so many times, I think people are just kind of over it. but I think Royce Lewis is fine. I don't think he's a superstar but I think he's better than he's getting credit for with his current roster rate. I think he's most useful at

third base, just the position of scarcity. I would take him over Nolan Aeronado. I think at this point I would probably drop Eugenio Suarez for him. Suarez has just done nothing this year. And then, you know, Caleb Durbin versus Royce Lewis, I feel is pretty close.

Durbin's been really good since like the start of June. Durbin's been doing an even better hitter. I have even less faith in him as a hitter. But he's been like a 900 OPS bat for the last 45 games or so. It's been kind of crazy how good Caleb Durbin has been. Yeah. So who would you guys say Durbin or Royce Lewis?

Lewis. I think so. Yeah. That one is close. I think there's a little bit more juice with Lewis there. But yeah, Durbin's playing well. Cooper Pratt really picking things up post All-Star break here. Last 14 games, 349, two homers, four steals, 932 OPS.

He is 47% rostered. Scott, how high do you think that number needs to climb here for Cooper Pratt? Obviously, tough position at shortstop, but I think in any leagues with the middle infield spot, I'm pretty interested in what Cooper Pratt's doing right now. Yeah, you should be. The stolen bases alone. I mean, we're usually talking categories, leagues, roto league specifically with the middle infield spot and he can do he's been prolific with the

steals also been getting on base a ton if on base percentage matters in your league or even if it's points league you don't have to go as deep into the shortstop pool in a points league but i don't know that in that format particularly colson montgomery is better than cooper pratt things have gotten pretty rough for colson montgomery lately i don't know that i want to keep you keep starting Bo Bichette in a points league if it was at shortstop. And if I had a chance to swap in Cooper Pratt instead off the waiver wire, I'd at least have to consider it at this point because we're in August, you know? I still think there's life in Bo Bichet, but I think it's late enough now that if you haven't seen it yet this year,

like you kind of just have to take what you can get, where you can get it, you know? A couple outfielders in five outfielder leagues, Spencer Jones, who I just mentioned, he homered on Friday and Saturday, both off of lefties. He was putting a lead off, elite, no, no, not lead on, clean-up spot on Sunday against the right-handed pitcher. Last five games, he has six hits, three homers and two steals. 34% rostered is Spencer Jones. Jake Mangum, a big game on Friday for the Pirates,

two for four with a sock into shoe. He had another two hits on Saturday. I think the playing time is pretty secure. Ryan O'Hern, again, is hurt. We're still waiting for O'Neill Cruz to return to the Pirates as well. Just in a vacuum, if you need an outfielder in a five outfielder league, who would you rather take a shot on Spencer Jones or Jake Mangum? A Mangum for sure for me.

I know Jones is more talented, but I just don't really have, like, unless he's suddenly going to be a 30 homer guy but he hasn't been anything close to that. I think Mangum's just going to be the better hitter. Yeah, like the thing about Mangum is he gives you no power. And Spencer Jones, he may not give you anything, but if he gives you something, he's definitely going to give you power. It's pretty opposite profiles for the two.

Yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah. So I'm more excited about Jones. Like, I think, yes, God, yes. Like, I think there's a limit to what Mangum can do for you, and it's not going to reach relevance in all but deeper roto leagues. I think he's fine.

And a five outfield or 12 team points. Or, yeah, five outfield or 12 team roto league. I think Mangum's fine. I don't think he's a difference maker, but like a guy who, okay, he probably won't keep hitting 300, although he's been doing it for a pretty long time. But, you know, a 280 hitter who I think is a legit 30, 35 plus. plus steel guy who's going to score a bunch of runs

at the top of that lineup. I don't think he's incredible, but I think he's useful. I think there are, if there are 100 multiverses, I think Spencer Jones probably actively hurts you in like 90 of them in the future. At least the rest of

this way. I just think the limitator are so glaring. Yeah, I guess probably I'd rather be starting Mangum right now in such a format. Only five outfield would you even consider it. but if it's just for a bench spot and I want to gamble on upside,

I might go with Jones instead. Okay, yeah. I have two very deep names. Is there anything here with either one? Eduardo Valencia, a catcher with the Tigers. He's also been playing some DH. He actually doesn't have catcher eligibility yet.

He needs one more game, but he went two for four with four RBI on Sunday. He had a two-homer game earlier in the week. He has started three of the past five games. And so far in 11 games with the Tigers, 452, four homers, an OPS over 1,400. Pretty good power numbers in the minors as well. Again, that's Eduardo Valencia.

And on the National League side, Oslavis Basabe of the Giants, he homered on both Saturday and Sunday. Numbers in the minors, not very good this season. The deepest of leagues, but do you guys have any thoughts or intrigue in Eduardo Valencia or Oslavis Basabe? And the deepest of leagues.

I feel like because I'm looking them up so often, Valencia, oh man, he must be playing a lot. He really isn't. And maybe that should change. Maybe it will. Now that, I don't know, maybe it won't. But he hasn't played a lot so far. So it would have to be a pretty deep two-catcher league for me to consider Eduardo Valencia.

All right. Some Weaver Wire pitchers and some shallow league names between six. and 70% rostered on CBS. All had strong match games this weekend. Will Warren against the Cubs, six and two-thirds shutout innings, seven strikeouts to zero walks. He used his change-up and his curve a lot more in this one,

and that change-up looked great for Will Warren, so a bit of a change. It worked for him. He gets to Cardinals this week. Shane Boz took a tough loss against the Phillies, six and a third, one run, four strikeouts to one walk. Last 13 starts, 292 ERA. The whip is higher, 127 for Shane Boz.

He gets the Angels this week, so that's a good matchup on paper. Shane Drohan, another strong start, six innings, two runs, seven strikeouts to one walk. He had 13 whiffs on 86 pitches. He gets the Pirates this week again. They are much better against right-handed pitching than they are against lefties. And Walbert Arania out-duled the Mizz. How about that? Six shutout innings, seven strikeouts for him, 14 whiffs on 90 pitches.

He has a quality start in three straight, and he is at the, Marlins this week. Chris, how would you rank this group? Robert Arrania, Shane Drohan, Shane Boz, and Will Warren. I would go Arrania, Drowen. I don't really have a lot of interest in either Warren or Boz. I think they're both just streamers. I guess I'll go Boz over Warren just because I think they're pretty similarly talented and Boz is getting better results lately.

I don't really have much confidence in either of those guys. I think there's a little bit of a gap between Iranian and Drowen and then Bos and Warren. Yep. Yeah, my only disagreement with any of that is I'd take Drone over. Sure.

Irania. But we already covered that. All right. What about some mid-tier names? Between 30 and 60% rostered. We have K there, Montero, another solid outing at the athletic, six shutout innings, two walks,

two strikeouts. He is 56% rostered. He's at the Giants this week. Kyle Leahy continues to pitch well. This time at the Blue Jays, six innings one run, three strikeouts to one walk. Last seven starts for Kyle Leahy, 121 ERA, 0.88 whip, and he is a spark for those who play in points lees. He's at the Yankees this week, and Martine Perez had a great outing against the nationals, right? They crush lefties. Martin Perez goes in there, seven shutout innings, six strikeouts, 11 whiffs on 78 pitches,

and he is also at the Yankees later this week. More mid-tier name, Scott, definitely in that streamer conversation. But do you have any interest here in Martine Perez at the Yankees, Kyle Leahy, also at the Yankees, and Cader Montero at the Giants? I don't think any is a big deal. I'm most interested in Kyle Leahy, and I was kind of surprised to discover he was already rostered in all my 15-team leagues. So I guess a lot of people have been,

noticing him. But, so basically, you mentioned the numbers one, his last seven starts. Yes. So I broke it down his last eight. It's 166 ERA.9.95, what day, 0.9K per 9 during the last eight, which aren't quite as good as the numbers you gave. But they're still really good. And the reason why I sectioned off eight starts for Leahy is because that's where the control drastically improved.

it's 2.1 walks per 9 and those 8 starts versus 3.5 previously. And also, the ground ball rate has gone up double digit percentage points during that same stretch. And to the point that Lahey's now like

getting tons of ground balls. And if you're getting tons of ground balls and you're not walking anybody and you're getting at least eight strikeouts per nine innings like he has during this eight start stretch, you're probably going to be pretty good. So, I mean,

it very much fits the mold of a Cardinals pitcher. The season stats are still kind of meh, especially the whip. But I think it's possible Leahy has turned himself into at least like a fringe 12 team guy. All right. And then some lower end options between 20 and 30 percent rostered. Andrew Painter returned to the Phillies with a solid start at the Orioles. Six innings, two runs, six strikeouts. He changed up the pitch mix.

He threw his sweeper and his change up a lot more, which is a good recipe for Andrew Painter. Anthony Kay, he was at the raise on Sunday, six and a third shutout innings with three strikeouts. Definitely just a streamer type. He's a spark. He gets the Guardians this week. They are really bad against left-handed pitching.

David Peterson racked up the whiffs against the Yankees. He had eight strikeouts over six and a third innings, and he gets to Blue Jays this week. and Matthew Libertor, a great outing at the Blue Jays, six shutout, seven strikeouts to one walk. He gets the Rockies in St. Louis. So pretty deep names here. Chris, any stand out to you, Andrew Painter, Anthony Kay, David Peterson,

and Matthew Libertor. Kay Peterson and Libertor, I think all are what they are and what they are is not very exciting, but, you know, as streaming options, let me know what the next matchup is. You know, it's possible they could be worth it, K, especially in a points league. Painter is the one that I think clearly stands out just from a talent perspective.

And he was a different version of himself than what we saw earlier on this season. He was not just throwing the sweeper more. He used that as his primary pitch. And anything to get off the foreseamer is always going to be a good idea for Andrew Painter because despite averaging 97 in this start, it got hit hard again.

99 mile an hour average X velocity in this one but it wasn't just the sweeper that he was throwing more that also got hit hard by the way he also swapped out the splitter for the changeup he went from I don't think he threw

a change up at all this season earlier he was throwing the splitter as his primary off speed pitch this time he threw the change up as his fourth most used pitch 16% of the time still not a huge usage rate, but he got a couple of whiffs with it.

He didn't give up much hard contact with it. So it's different from Andrew Painter. Is that good enough to make him worth rostering in 12-team leagues? Probably not, given how bad he was earlier. But it's definitely something I'm going to keep an eye on for Andrew Painter. And if I was going to add any of these four with an eye on the future, such as it is, I would prioritize Painter over the other guys. Yeah, I mean, if you're in a deeper league and there's just not much out there, seeing what Andrew Painter did here and knowing his prospect pedigree, you know, you could just kind of take a stab and see where it goes.

But, yeah, I think an aim in deeper leagues for sure. And for the other three, you'd have to be pretty desperate to consider any of them. But if you're in that position, all three of them have good matchups this week. Anthony Kay against the Guardians, David Peterson against the Blue Jays, and Matthew Libertore again against the Rockies in St. Louis. In the deepest of leagues, Robert Stock started for the Mets on Sunday, and he looked kind of good. Five innings, one run, four strikeouts, zero walks. He had 12 whiffs on 70 pitches.

He only threw two and two-thirds innings last year. This is also his first start since 2021. It's been a long road back for him. But his velocity was up a lot from where he was last year. So kind of interesting there for Robert Stock. Max Scherzer, he was back quality start against the Cardinals. Kyle Freeland threw a

complete game on Sunday. I don't really think it matters, but hey, complete game against the Royals. One run, eight strikeouts at two walks, he had 19 whiffs on 115 pitches. The only one that really stands out to me, Scott, is Robert's stock. I don't know.

I kind of want to follow this and see where it goes. Yeah, that's all there is to say about it at this point, really, because it probably goes nowhere, but you mentioned the velocity was up from when we had last seen him. 12 whiffs on 70 pitches against the Marlins.

And in the minors this year, eight appearances, six of them starts. 291 ERA.8.83 whip 12.9K per 9. Maybe he's figured something out, but it's like I put in some $0 claim, some, I put in a $0 claim for him in my NL only league. That's as far as I'm going with,

Robert Stock right now. But yeah, we'll see if he builds off this. So I just want to add a couple things. He had thoracic outlet surgery last year. That's what he's coming back from and he's starting harder. So that's incredible. Also, good follow on Twitter. Robert Stock.

He's a big nerd who loves to talk through the statistical process of pitching. He puts a lot of like advanced stats into his approach to pitching. So if you ever want to get a feel for that kind of stuff, Robert Stock is a good Twitter follower. A pair of Astros pitchers that I saw get picked up in quite a few spots on Sunday. Christian Javier and Hayden Wesneseke, they're both 10% rostered or less. And Javier coming off a good start, he gets the Blue Jays and at the Padres this week. And then Wesnesey, five and two thirds, three runs, four strikeouts at two walks.

Looks like he's home against the Blue Jays. Do you guys have any interest in these Astros pitchers? I saw them get picked up in a few spots. I mean, not at this point. Like, I don't think... Anything can happen. Yeah. They're not any less hopeful than Robert Stock.

So I don't want my dismissiveness here to make it seem otherwise. Like, they're all probably nothing. But, you know, it's a noteworthy performance that if they then do it again next time, it becomes even more noteworthy. And maybe if they do it again, then we talk about picking them up. But that's kind of the point we're at now. The latest temperature check on some big name pitchers. Paul Skeen's, a rough outing at the Reds this weekend.

Four innings, five runs, four walks, two homers allowed. He did have 15 whiffs on 100 pitches. and he averaged 96.6.6 miles per hour on his fastball, which is down a little bit. But I just thought this tweet from Codify was very illuminating for Paul Skeens. He has made 48 starts in his career where he has averaged 98 or more miles per hour

on his four-scene fastball. In those starts, he has a 173 ERA. In 30 starts where he has averaged less than 98 miles per hour on his fastball, 383 E.E. Seems pretty straightforward with Paul Skeen's. Well, and this, if you go through, if you continue through the thread through Cotify,

which I think I've been pronouncing it wrong. Oh, you thought it was Codafi too? I thought it was Codafi. That's being stupid, I'm sorry. You'll notice, and this kind of gets to a point Chris has been making a defense of Paul Skeens. Like the fastball, even though the velocity's down, it's still getting its usual results.

And that's true. The change-up isn't. So I think losing something off the fastball has made the change-up less effective because off-speed pitches, so he's combining change-up and the splinker. So those two pitches. 2024-166 batting average against, 2025-189 batting average against 2026-286 batting average against. So that's where you really see the difference with that change-upy-one.

of velocity for for skeins i'm i don't know i i i remain moderately concerned not enough that i'm not going to call him a top ten pitcher rest of season but i i'd be worried like it particularly if i had him in a if he was if i had him in any kind of fantasy league dynasty or uh retraft i'd be a little worried Yeah. My guess is that ERA gap stat is 2026 is carrying a lot of weight. I would guess he was probably fine when he was below 98 miles per hour before 2026.

And it's just that he's been below 98 miles per hour, what, like eight starts in a row, probably something like that. And they've all been mostly bad starts, I would guess. So I'm just saying, My read is that his velocity is down now and he's pitching poorly, and that's why that stat is as stark as it is. But it probably wasn't before. And I'm not saying that's not related.

I'm just saying he's pitching worse right now. You know, like regardless of the velocity wouldn't have been, this stat wouldn't look like it does before this season, is my point. Yeah, but he, there weren't many starts before where. Yeah, there were like eight last season. there were a handful before 2020 in 2024 there were two in 2020 there were eight in 2020 where he averaged less than 98 yeah but then you look at the the initial tweet in the thread which is number of pitches 98 miles per hour or harder thrown in every start for paul skeins and it's

oh yeah it's gone way down basically two dozen or more every start until this year where it's mostly zeros, once and twos. So it's... Yeah, no, there's something here. I just don't know what it is. Is it Paul Skeens has hurt? Is it Paul? Like, I have no idea.

He's clearly not pitching as well right now. What I find especially frustrating about it is, as I've said, every time we've had this conversation, the underlying numbers, it's not showing up there. It's only in the number of, earned runs he's allowing. And maybe that's all that matters. It certainly is for the results that we're looking for. But from an analytic perspective, I'm struggling with how to analyze that because the things I care about most are not how many earned runs are you giving up multiplied by nine

divided by innings pitch. Like I know that's the thing we care about, but from a, from a predictive standpoint, it doesn't matter very much. What matters is strikeouts and walks and how hard you're getting hit. And that stuff looks very similar. I don't want to say identical, but it certainly doesn't look as different as it has as the ERA does. And I don't know what to make of that. My inclination is to say the ERA doesn't matter as much as the predictive stuff. But maybe the ERA is the canary in the coal mine here because he was.

always a guy for whom the predictive stuff didn't matter all that much. His predictive stats were very good. His ERA was always better. And so maybe the ERA is the thing that matters for Paul Skeens and not the other stuff. Maybe there is something about his unique ability to limit hard contact and limit damage that makes the ERA the thing we should look at moving forward. That would be uncomfortable for Paul Skeens from a perspective of trying to to predict him because you should not expect any player to be an outlier. But maybe he is.

I genuinely don't know. I don't want to say there's nothing to be worried about here. Clearly, you know, his two worst months of his career have been the most recent two. He had never had an ERA below 320 in a month before the most recent two. It's 358 and 625. There's something going on here.

Well, what it is ain't exactly clear like that one song says. I mean, it'd be one thing if it was just, if it really was just the ERA, but it's the ERA in conjunction with his peak fastball isn't nearly what it was, the first two years. And that to me is, that to me raises alarm more than just,

okay, his ERA's a couple runs higher, but he is throwing his heart and everything is performing the same. I, yeah, I remain. a little bit concerned. The pitcher who opposed him not at his best either. Hunter Green, six innings, four runs, four strikeouts to two walks,

his fastball got hit hard, couldn't locate a slider, and he is given up four plus earned runs in three of five starts since returning. It's a 683-ERA-137 whip. If your trade deadline hasn't passed yet, buy low or heck no, Hunter Green. I would buy

low. Depends how low we're buying. But I probably need to adjust him in my rankings a bit, but I suspect he'll still be in my top 25 rest of season. And I think you can get him for less than that. All right. Next up we have Bryce Miller, who was solid, but the velocity is still down this time against the

twins, five and a third, three hits, two runs. He had three strikeouts to two walks. and with Bryce Miller, his first seven starts this season. His four seam average 96.5 miles per hour. He had a 197 ERA, a 0.72 whip, 10.6K per 9. And his next five starts, the fastball down to 95.4 miles per hour, 413 ERA 124 whip, 6.4K per 9. So where are we on Bryce Miller?

I am definitely concerned here too, especially given that he has an injury history. His fastball looked dominant when he first came back from it, both in terms of velocity and the kind of results it was getting. He has a combined one whiff on his fastball on his last two starts. I don't think Bryce Miller can survive that way. and I again, I have to be concerned, given his injury history, that he's dealing with something again.

He is a do not start for me right now. I haven't dropped him anywhere, and I hope it doesn't get to that point. But we need to see a turnaround pretty soon here, given how late it is in the season, and given that you can't afford to throw away weeks anymore, And we need to see a turnaround here soon for Miller for him to keep that spot on the roster. Last name on this list is Jacob de Grom, who's been trending down a little bit at the Astros,

three and a third, seven hits, five runs, five walks in this one. His velocity was up across the board. Perhaps that just made it harder for him to command his pitches here. Five earned runs in two of his last three outings. He has gone five innings or fewer and four straight. Chris, are you concerned about taking? DeGrom, do you start him to speak against the Orioles? Yes, I would start Jacob de Grom.

Yes, I am concerned about Jacob de Grom. It clearly seems like we are at a point where the decline phase has happened. And given everything he's been through and the fact that he's 38 years old, that is not terribly surprising. His strike rate's actually up a little bit from last season. His walk rates up a little bit. He's giving up a lot more hard contact. It just doesn't seem to have been quite as precise as in 2025. The one thing I'm surprised with is he's always had such a dominant four-seamer and slider combination,

really since he really broke out that he hasn't needed anything else. He throws those pitches about 80% of the time, maybe a little more. And the change-up and curveball sit there, and they both look really, really good on the rare occasions that he does throw them. obviously maybe the judiciousness with which he approaches those pitches helps explain it, but it does feel like a, you know, kind of a break glass in case of emergency move that Jacob de Grom could do. Well, you know, my four seamer and my slider, they're good, but they're not quite as dominant as they used to be. Maybe mix in a few more of the third and fourth pitch and see if that can get him back on track. I think he's good.

he's probably not like an ace anymore. All right, let's wrap up here. I do have some other pitching leftovers. And the first group, I'm not going to read off all the stats and stuff. I'll just read off the names. But Scott, did you see anything here on the Miz, Jacob Mizziarowski, Christopher Sanchez,

Max Fried, and Dylan Cease this weekend. Those four names in particular. Mizorowski's velocity was down, but of course it was way up in his previous start. and the results were dominant in both cases. So I don't think it's anything to worry about, but it is worth noting. Only 83 pitches.

He still got through seven, but... Yeah. It's his first time going more than five innings since July 7th, but the pitch count was still a little limited. He still got through seven, so I don't want to say that I'm worried, but it's something to note. Dylan Cease, his velocity was down for a second straight start.

Now remember in the first start of those two where the velocity was down, complete game, one hit, shut out with 12 strikeouts. And the way the velocity drop broke down is it was especially low in the first inning, and then it picked up over the course of the game. So the average ended up low, but by the end, he was throwing plenty hard. I didn't see a breakdown like that for season this one to see if it followed a similar pattern. he's still got a good result, one run and six innings with seven strikeouts.

So I don't know that it's anything to be worried about, but something to keep an eye on for Dylan Sees, who's had a great year, obviously. Christopher Sanchez walked five after walking three last time, and both of them were quality starts. And we have seen these weird stretches from Sanchez in the past where he just seems to kind of be a little shaky with the control, a really good control pitcher overall,

so it's out of character. But we've seen a stretch like this before. Again, I don't think it's anything to worry about, but it is worth noting because all of these could become things to worry about if they persist and the results do drop. So something to keep in mind with all three of those guys. Four other names who pitched well this weekend. Drew Rasperson, Chase Burns, Sandy Alcantara, and George Kirby. Chris, anything that stood out to you. Kirby, Sandy, Burns, and Rasperson.

It's nice to see a good start from Kirby. Things are a little up in the air with him as far as the potential trade because I think it's true. We didn't really talk about it with Castillo, but it wouldn't be surprising if, like, Luis Castillo just didn't matter for fantasy at all. now that he doesn't have half his games in Seattle. I'm not saying that's necessarily the likeliest outcome, but it's extremely on the table. Any pitcher that leaves Seahoeuvred, Seymot, Timo Woolfield.

Sometimes I do stuff like that. I'll occasionally just forget the Brewers in the National League. They've been in the National League for like 25 years. Sorry. But yeah, if George Kirby left Seattle, I would definitely have to downgrade him quite a bit. that's one that, you know, I was reading Nick Pollock, actually, I think he said something like he was kind of excited about the idea of George Kirby getting out of Seattle because there's something about the Mariners general approach to pitchers that he doesn't think works best with Kirby's arsenal. It was something about the slider and fastball combination.

But, you know, that's an interesting wrinkle from a smart guy. But I think generally speaking, leaving T-Mobile, you'd be. be worried about it. So that's something to keep an eye on with Kirby. Other than that, I think Sandy Alcantor is just he's having an awesome season outside of one bad month, basically. Yeah. I think he's pretty good.

I saw something, I wish I could find the tweet, but the gist of it was word that maybe it was Nick Pollock because he uses the word sequencing. He thinks the issue is sequencing.

for George Kirby. But I feel like I saw it more from a reporter type who was saying like a lot of teams are interested because they feel like his issues are sequenced. More about sequence. Why am I can't say that word? Sequencing. Sequencing.

Do you have some hitting leftovers here. Massive weekend for Ceylon, Raphael, at three for five with a sock into shoe on Friday, two for four with a double dong on Saturday, and then two for five with another. homer on Sunday. In his 17 games, post All-Star break, 329,

seven homers, three steals, and OPS over 1,000 for Saddam-R-Faella. Chase DeLauder, he hit his 12th home run on Saturday. He went 2 for 4 with 3 RBI and his seventh steal on Sunday. His updated numbers since returning from the IL, 29

games, 3-10, five homers, 17 runs, 21 RBI, 5 steals, OPS right around 900. Chase the Latter has looked really, really good over the past month. Hunter Goodman did it again. He blasted two more home runs on Saturday, four for five, double dong, five RBI. He has 20 homers in 48 games since the start of June.

That is pretty crazy. And Jeremy Pena is going off so far in the second half. This weekend, seven hits a homer, five RBI, 14 games post-all-star break, 433, seven homers, 18 runs, 14. RBI, a 1336 OPS there for Jeremy Pena. Big names here, doing lots of good things. Anything you guys would like to touch on? Raphaelah, DeLotter, Goodman, Jeremy Pena.

Chase DeLotter's really good. Ever since you said that Michael Brantley comp, I can't get out of my head. I mean, the steals, I love to see the steals because I was like, oh, Michael Brantley without the steals, well, hold up. Maybe he's going to be like a 10, 15 steel guy, and all of a sudden, I mean, I know Brantley early in his career was a lot better than that,

but he doesn't have to be quite as good. Like Michael Brantley, I think was like a second round pick at his best. He doesn't have to be that good. But you just look at the month by month. He has had one month with an ex-Wobo below 329. And even in that month, he was making a ton of contact

and had a 95-mile-per-hour average. Hex of a loss. He was just hitting it in the air too much. I think Chase Lauder's a legitimately really good hitter. And if he can be a 10-to-15 steel guy too, all the better. I think he's someone you can probably always get a discount just because the injury risk, but

if you get 120 games out of him next year, I think he's going to smash whatever his ADP ends up being. The call to the blue. Scott, did you want to see something? Cut you off. Well, I was just, so Saddam Rafael is now hitting about 40 points higher

than the previous two years. His line drive rate is higher. I don't know if that's more of a symptom than a cause, if you know what I mean? Like it may just be that he's happened to had a stretch where he hits more

line drives. So the batting average is higher because of that rather than the other way around. But I don't see much else that's changed for him. In fact, he's hitting the ball not as hard this year. He's striking out a tiny bit more than last year. I think

he's been hot and he had a stretch in the middle of last season, I want to say, where he got that batting average high to, but it didn't last. I don't think it will in this case either. So the nice thing I will say about him is he has traded, he hasn't traded line drives for fly balls, and that's the kind of thing that can be a little iffy. But if you look at the baseball savant page, his line drive rate last year is 21.4%. His fly ball rate was 26. This year, it's 26.5% line drives, 25.6 fly balls.

So what he's done is he's taken a few ground balls, hit more line drives, but mostly he's cut the pop-ups down. So cutting out the extreme launch angles. And that's where you can really make a big difference with your production, is taking the extreme fly balls, which are worth nothing, and turning them into either slightly more productive flyballs or even more productive line drives. The problem is line drive is an incredibly noisy stat.

It has very little year-to-year predictability. And so when that is the biggest change that a player is making, you should probably bet against it. And in this case, he actually has a significantly worse, expected Wobah than he did last season. So I think I've never been a big sit on Raphael, a believer. And I'm not currently one either, I guess.

The call to the bullpen for the Orioles on Friday. Tyler Wells got the ninth. with a two-run lead, he picked up his fourth save. For the Twins on Friday, Ewingris Gomez, got the ninth with a two-run lead. He walked two but picked up his 14th save. Then on Sunday, Gomez got the ninth with the game tied, single, strikeout, single, walk-off RBI single, and Gomez took his first loss. For the Pirates on Saturday, Gregory Soto got the ninth with a three-run lead.

He struck out one for his 14th save. The Pirates had five saves in July, and three, well, I guess this is... Saturday was August 1st, but you know what I mean. Three went to Soto and two went to Mason Montgomery. So I don't really know what to do with this pirate. Just trade for Luke Weaver and let's get a closer in here. That is kind of annoying because I had kind of thought

that it was just going to be Mason Montgomery moving forward. Yeah, it feels like Montgomery is their highest leverage reliever. Like they just use them in the biggest spot. So not always the ninth inning. For the Cubs on Saturday, Jacob Webb entered in the eighth inning with a two-run lead, facing the heart of the Yankees lineup. He picked up the hold. Lefty Caleb Thielbar got the ninth, and he picked up his third save.

So the Cubs still mix and match there as well. For the Angels on Sunday, Ryan Zephyrjohn got the final five outs, four via strikeout, for his fourth save. And for the Padres on Sunday, Mason Miller was unavailable. Adrian Morehon got the final four outs, three via strikeout, for his second save. perhaps the Padre is just trying to show other teams that Morejohn can close it out so I don't know come get him come trade for him if you haven't already let's do it

to stream or not to stream on Monday we have Michael McGreevy at the Yankees subject to change because obviously there could be trades and stuff but Michael McGreevy at the Yankees Arandola against the Nationals Bubba Chandler at the Brewers Brandon Sprode against the Pirates Shane Bieber at the Astros Christian Javier against the Blue Jays Ian Seymour at the Rockies

Womp Womp, Wamp, Wamp. And Brandon fought against the Padres. Oh my. Goodness gracious. I like, I don't, Seymour's a flyball pitcher, a Homer prone pitcher. Yeah. And, you know, he doesn't have

like a lot of heat. The fastball plays well, but it's the movement on it. And yet, I still probably trust him over anything. these other options, even with all those downsides in Colorado. So it's not a good day to stream, bottom line. I could give the passing

thought to Michael McGreevy to. At least that's a ground ball pitcher at Yankee Stadium, so maybe he'll do okay there. But that's all the enthusiasm I can muster. I would probably go McGreevy first,

and then I think all three of these are very combustible, but yeah, Seymour, fought, and Javier against the Blue Jays. but yeah, I mean, those could all end very, very poorly. On Tuesday, we have Sean Mania at the Guardians

J.T. Ginn in his return at the Reds, Brady Singer, home against the athletics, Zach Lattel at the Phillies, Grant Holmes against the Marlins, Hayden Wesneski against the Blue Jays. There are lots of TBDs because of the trade deadline, so

there's not much to choose from right now. for Tuesday. Again, but it could go really poorly. I think he's the best pitcher on the group of the group. Manaya, I don't hate, you know, decent matchup. He's pitching okay, but he's not pitching great, just okay. Singer's been doing some good things. Yeah, I mean, Singer is what he is, but it's, I mean, it's still in Cincinnati,

but at least it's not in Sacramento. I don't have a ton of faith in him, but that one, Grant Holmes could be okay. I don't really love any of these options. This is the time of year where it's just really hard because I don't know if any of these guys are going to get traded. Maybe. Probably not. Maybe Lattel.

Maybe Singer. Maybe Singer. Yeah. Maybe all three. Maybe all of them. Maybe every single pitcher gets traded. But yeah, it's, um, I, I wouldn't be optimistic about any of them. Yeah.

If I had to choose, I'd probably say Singer Mania again in that order on Tuesday. We are going to wrap. there. For Scott and Chris, I am Frank, thanks as always for tuning in to fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. And we will be back again tomorrow. YouTube 5 p.m. Eastern Time. Trade deadline special. Be there. Bye-bye.

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