Fantasy Baseball Today - Lindor Concern? Injury Updates & Top Five At Each Position (5/4 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: May 4, 2021

May the fourth be with you! How encouraged should you be with Kenta Maeda's start (2:07)? Shohei Ohtani is amazing! Is there any hope for Francisco Lindor? ... News and notes included Dustin May who needs Tommy John surgery, Luis Robert is out 3-4 months, Keston Hiura was optioned and more (15:57). ... Let's take a look at the top five at each position in Fantasy Baseball, starting with the infield (29:21). Notice there's a lot of Ryan McMahon! Are Carson Kelly and Jared Walsh legit? What's the deal with Chris Taylor? ... Let's take a look at the top five outfielders and starting pitchers (46:24). How is Mark Canha off to this great start? ... We recap the rest of Monday's action including Tyler Anderson, give you streamers, plus Team Name Tuesday (51:15)! 'Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank, @AdamAizer Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. I drive. Center field is magnificent. Got a fantasy question. Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy. Now here's Frank, Scott, Chris, and Adam.

What is up, everybody? Welcome into fantasy baseball today on Tuesday. It is officially Tuesday, May 4th. May the 4th be with you. Frank Stamphle, joined by Scott White, End the returning Chris Towers. Chris, what's up, man? You haven't been around for a while.

How's life? How was the NFL draft? It was a lot. You know, the NFL draft happened. I didn't really love it for fantasy. Like, especially like rounds two and three where like the like interesting players go. A lot of them landed in pretty crappy spots. I don't really like, I know people will like fall in love with some like random fourth round wide receiver every year and be like, oh, that guy's.

And it's like, it never happens. So it's like once the first two days are done, my interest level really decreases. But it's fun. You know, fantasy football today newsletter. I've been covering it all the way through. Going to have updated post-draft position rankings all week.

So, you know, subscribe cbsports.com slash newsletters. And I'm back now. And I have been watching baseball, even though I wasn't talking about it the last few days. Yeah. And even though there really was,

not much going on on Monday, but don't worry. We'll find a way to make the best of it. Tyler Anderson currently has a no-hitter in the sixth inning. Well, he just completed six endings against the San Diego Padres. We'll take a look at the top five at each position in fantasy baseball one month into the season. What is going on with Francisco Lindor? Anything that we can find there? We got some team named Tuesday. We got your questions. And of course, Vince Velasquez chatter for the eighth year in a row. But let's jump right in some standouts from Monday. Oh my goodness gracious.

Scotty, what's going on, man? Why don't you get started? You are here. That is a fact. Yeah. Let's talk about Kenta Maeda. Why not? There wasn't a lot going on today.

But there was a lot of interest in this Kinta Maeda start, certainly from yours truly, because as has happened so often this year, when a heretofore good pitcher has an extended run of badness to the point that you're thinking about benching him, it turns out he lines up for two starts, usually with very good matchups. And that was the case for Kinta Maeda this week, getting the Rangers for today's start

and lining up against the Tigers later in the week. So in all but one league where I would, it's like a 10-team league where I'm especially deep in pitching, I went ahead and started Kintamaiata, and at least the first, for at least the first half of the week here, it's paid off because he had probably his best start of the season, right?

Five and a third shot out innings. Two hits, two walks, eight strikeouts. Really, the only thing you can complain about is the fact that he didn't make it six innings, right? He threw 94 pitches, so, you know, it made sense to take him out when they did. But I don't know.

A start like this makes it seem like he's probably okay. there weren't really clear underlying problems to begin with. So it's not like with Cory Kluber where I can point out, oh, he corrected this and this and this. I suspect most of Maida's problems were just with locating his pitches and giving up a lot of long balls as a result. But that seemed like something that would correct in time. And hopefully this is the correction.

Yeah, this was far and away his best start of the season. It was his first start where he did not allow any runs. and a third shutout with eight strikeouts. He only allowed three hard hit balls. That's what really stood out to me. That is something that he has prided himself on as long as he's been in the majors is limiting hard contact.

And that's been a real issue for him this season. So to mix things up here and keep the Rangers off balance enough to just allow three hard hit balls, I was encouraged by that. The only other thing I noticed was he had two walks in this start. He's had multiple walks now in three starts this season.

He only did that twice. and 11 starts last season. So it seems to be something going on with his control, or perhaps it's just, you know, people are laying off of his breaking off speed pitches a little bit more this season.

But the control and the hard hits have been the biggest problems for him. And, you know, two walks in a five and a third. It's fine. But, yeah, the limiting hard contact was what I really wanted to see here. Chris, anything you want to add on Maeda? If not, you can just go on to yours.

I think the key thing actually so far has just been the his splitter hasn't really been getting whiffs. I think there are two things. One slider has just been getting hit really hard. I'm not that worried about that. The splitter hasn't been getting swings and misses. His extension on all of his pitches has been lower than it was

or shorter than it was last year. Last year's extension on all of his pitches was at least six feet. This year, none of them are over five foot nine. So he's releasing the ball a little bit further from the home plate. Maybe that's giving hitters a little bit of extra time to react, but that also just seems So he's releasing the ball earlier, you're saying? Yeah.

Yeah, it was slightly, like three inches, but, you know, that's... Where did you find that? That's interesting. That's on a baseball savant player pages. If you go down to the pitch tracking, and like, I don't know if that matters. His, you know, his splitter hasn't been as good, but none of his pitches have really been as good so far.

But this is a good start. I'm not really worried about him. I was maybe a little bit lower on, him coming in than Scott, but I still had him as like a top 16 or 18 pitcher. So I haven't moved him down. I've moved guys ahead of him, but I haven't moved him down. My eight is probably not going to live up to his price tag or where we had him ranked as a top 12, 15th starting pitcher. There's still a lot to go. So maybe he does turn it around and makes me eat my words. But, you know, if he just gets back to the pitcher that he was before last year, he's going to be a top 25ish starting

pitcher, which will not sink you. Chris, oh my goodness gracious, from Monday. Yeah, really not a lot of options today. So I'll just go with Shohei Otani, who just continues to be, I don't know, one of the 10 best hitters in fantasy, probably. I mean, he's got, was it, nine home runs, six stolen bases now? Yeah. He's continuing to just crush the ball. He's really, really good. And the only concern. He has a double and a home run today. The double shouldn't have been a double. A little home cooking from the score there.

If it hits the guy's glove and bounces off, that's an error. That play should have been made. But still, he hit a ball really hard that the fielder couldn't get to. He's really, really good. And I think at this point, if you have to choose to start Otani,

I can't really see a situation where I would start him as a starting pitcher right now. Maybe if he has a two-star week, but that's really rare. I think he's just must-start as a hitter. Yeah.

I can't imagine a scenario where you would, even in a two-star week, I haven't been a few leagues, and I wasn't really even considering, coming into Monday, he was lined up for two starts, but he was scratched on the pitching end

because he had a bruised elbow. He got hit by a pitch over the weekend. But, yeah, I mean, he's averaging four fantasy points per game. which is 12th among all hitters in baseball. It's just behind names like Jose Ramirez, Vladimir Guerrero, Fernando Tatis, Chris Bryant, Nick Castiano.

So, man, Otani is, I wish that they would, I understand this spectacle of a pitcher-hitter combination, but I kind of just wish that they would just let him play 150 years. I see that. I don't agree with that. I think he's only been out of the lineup one game all this year. Yeah, I think so. One of the three starts he's made, he didn't get to bat,

but the other two he did, and he hasn't taken a day off. And I think I have that right. So, you know, that, I wonder if he can sustain that pace for six months. I kind of doubt it. But right now, there's really not much downside to him pitching in addition to the hitting. I want to talk about Francisco Lindor. He's my oh, my goodness gracious player from Monday. And for no good reason, he is currently in an 0 for 20.

one funk. He's now batting 163. He has one home run. He's got a 486 OPS. The underlying numbers, the expected numbers, 238XBA. That's 32nd percentile in baseball. 359 expected slug. That's 19th percentile in baseball. It just seems weird. I guess there's an adjustment period, potentially, for someone coming over to a new team, a new league. It's the first time in the National League. New League especially. That is definitely a documented thing. The Mets have had a really weird start of the season with all their postponements. We're getting past that, so I don't know that we can still use that as an excuse, maybe a little bit earlier on.

But do you guys see anything that actually has you concerned that Francisco Lindor is not going to break out of this? Coming into this season, he had a 285 career batting average with an 833 OPS. That's 777 career games. I don't really see anything, but we keep getting a lot of questions about Lindor. people are worried. Yeah, I mean, I understand their high draft pick has basically

done nothing for them and that doesn't feel good. I would say my concern level is it would be precisely zero if he didn't kind of underwhelmed last year too. As it is, it might be a one. You know,

like the strikeout rate, you mentioned he struck out two more times. He hasn't struck out much this year at all. He's definitely putting the bat on the ball. He's hitting it in the ground too much. Uh, that's something I see. And the hard hit rate's actually pretty normal, the average exit velocity down a little. But I mean, nothing, nothing seems like obviously broken here. Nothing that he can't turn around very quickly.

We've seen, uh, just over the weekend we saw Conforto and McNeil kind of snap out of their slumps. And I imagine Lindor, that's going to happen for him here, right around the, corner. So let's do a little buy low, sell high. If you can acquire Francisco Lindor, would you trade any of these gentlemen? Would you give up Carlos Ordone for Lindor, straight up?

Yeah. Yep. Yep. How about Julio Arias? Yep. Yes. Kevin Gosman? Yes. Let's look at some I'm going to have to jump a tier or two. I was just looking at some overperforming starting pitchers that were honestly ranked in, I think it was the top 10 or 15.

so that I felt like it made sense for those. Byron Bucson. I think you'd probably have to. Yeah. Man, that's, uh, it's just risky though, because if this is the Bucson breakout, I mean, we could be talking about drafting Bucson in, I don't know, second round next year.

No, you can't stay healthy. There's no way. Yeah, that's actually, I agree with you, Chris. Byron Buston could be anything. He could even be Francisco Lendor. You're right. How about showing? That's shit.

I think you'd have to do it. I wouldn't feel great about it, but you'd have to do it. How about Shoahe Otani? Do that? Yeah, you'd have to do it. Before we get to news and notes, I did want to get your thoughts on Daniel Lynch's debut. We were pretty excited about him getting the call for Monday,

one of the top pitching prospects for the Kansas City Royals. He was going up against Cleveland, four and two thirds, three earned, four walks, three strikeouts. All kind of, ma'am. Did you guys see anything on Daniel Lynch? Slider looked really good. There were a couple of really ugly swings on that. That was his really only swing and miss pitch.

He got six whiffs on the day with the slider, only one with his other three pitches, and he was mostly fastball slider. But, you know, I think he looked good. Like, he average 95 miles per hour with his fastball. That's really good for a lefty. You know, we'll see you first start. You can sometimes get a little spike,

and I'm not sure if he sustained it through the start. But all in all I think I think, looked pretty good. The scouting report actually said he could touch, he was hitting 99 at times last year, so I was kind of a little disappointed that he only topped out at 97. Well, that seems unfair, Scott.

Not everybody could be Shane McClanahan. Come on. That's true. I also was surprised at how heavily he just went with the fastball on the slider, because I thought one of his strengths, too, judging from the scouting reports, was that he had really full,

Arsenal. So of the 74 pitches, 63 of them were either the fastball or the slider. I mean, it's not uncommon for a pitcher just beginning his career to lean heavily on two pitches. Yeah.

But I don't know. I mean, if I won the sweepstakes last night for Daniel Lynch, I'm not ready to drop him after this start, but I had hoped to see a little better. Should he be...

He does look like John Krasinski in the office. He does. keeping that in mind. I tweeted that out. It's kind of uncanny. I first noticed it when I was clipping a photo for him in last night's waiver, or this morning's waiver wire column.

But then like somebody tweeted a screenshot of him and it was just so... Yeah. I think like the center fielder made a really good catch and he, the screenshot of him reacting to it was very much Jim. Yeah. Yeah. Like right down like the hair,

the way the way the, ears are positioned on the head. Like, it's just, it's weird. The creases on his face when he smirks. It's real, it's like, it's bizarre. The camera's going to cut him. He's just going to be making like this face. Right after he pranks Dwight.

Does Daniel Lynch need to be rostered in more than 43% of CBS leagues? More than how what percent? 43%. Yeah, I would say more like 63. I would say that's like every row. or, yeah, probably most roto leagues, every L-only league, and then like, I don't know, half points leagues? All right. So let's get that number up, says Scott, 63% for Daniel Lynch.

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With Stitcher, you can listen to your podcast anytime, anywhere, so give the all-new Stitcher a try, download it in the app store or at Stitcher app.com slash download. Let's get to these injuries because, we didn't get new injuries. We just got updates, which were very ominous updates. So the news and notes from Monday,

Dustin May, set to undergo Tommy John's surgery next week, which means we will likely not see him again until the second half of 2022, maybe even later than that. Tony Gonsoline, we mentioned yesterday, is being built up as a starter, but is still three to four weeks away.

He is 36% rostered. So, Chris, you were the Dustin May, guy, I'm sorry, do you think that we should get Tony Gonsolin on more than 36% of CBS teams right now? Yeah, I mean, he threw 120 pitch bullpen session. He'll probably throw, I think the next one's going to be like 35 pitches from what they've said.

That tells me he's still probably at least two weeks away from actually getting into a major league game, if not longer. Yeah, I think three to four weeks is the timetable that came out over the weekend. I think it depends on your league. I had to drop Tony Gonselin in my main Roto League because we've only got three IL spots and I've got seven players on IL. It was eight before I dropped Gonsolin

and at some point I had to, I just had to make a call. Yeah, I'm sure most. I'm sure most leagues have fewer than five IL spots. Yeah. I would say like now, the difference between now and before was we don't know what Tony Gonselin was

building up to do. Yeah, we knew he was, they were building him up to start, but would there be an opening for him? Now there's definitely an opening for him. The Dodgers of all teams are short on starting pitchers. They're talking about maybe going with Trevor Bauer every fourth day until Gonsolin comes back, I guess. So I think it's more urgent to pick up Gonsolin now than it was before, definitely. And there's a chance he's a must-start pitcher when he comes back.

Yeah, I mean, that was saying that was my assumption. Where would you guys rank Tony Gonselin among Framber Valdez and Mike Soroka who were the other

IL stashes that we could see, I don't know, maybe within the next month or so? I think I'd put him ahead at this point. I think so. Prior to the main news, I would have had him

at the back of them, but now I think he's ahead. And I think he might just be better. than those guys. He might be. Certainly inning for inning. Yeah, I mean. The jury is still out on Valdez.

I mean, we don't have to tell you how good he is. Scott knows how good he was last year. He was a borderline top 30 ranked starting pitcher before he got hurt for Amber Valdez. So we like him, but Tony Gonsland is really, really good as well. So if you can afford to stash him, it's very hard right now with all these injuries going on, but it's something you should be,

should look into doing. And if Trevor Bauer does start every, whatever, fourth day on short rest. I mean, the guys is going to have a bunch of two-star weeks over the next couple of weeks. If they actually do that, it would be pretty big for his fantasy value as well. It could make him by far the best player in points leagues. Yep. Like if he could sustain pitching even at a slightly lower level than he currently does,

but pitch legitimately pitch every fourth day, he would be the best player in head head points league. And there wouldn't be a close second. The other big news from Monday, Luis Robert out three to four months with a grade three strain of his right hip flexor. Do we, I mean, can we drop Luis Robert? This is good news for Andrew Vaughn, right? We assume he could get more playing time as a result of this. Yeah, well, that's the hope. I would think that Tony LaRussa would say, gee, I need more offensive in my lineup.

Now, obviously, Vaughn can't play center field like Robert was doing. but some of the guys who had been playing over Vaughn a third of the time can so I hope so I hope this is I hope this is a stockup for Vaughn situation but of course just really really bad news for Robert and for the White Sox who already lost

Aloi Jimenez to a multi-month injury I suspect Jimenez is going to be back first between the two of them and he's only like 50 6% rostered in CBS leagues himself. So if you don't have a free IEL spot, like he's being shut down. Robert is from baseball activities,

I think it's for 12 to 16 weeks, and that's being shut down from baseball activities. That doesn't mean he's going to be back at 16 weeks. So that's, like unless you just have an unused IEL spot, or it's such a deep league that anybody you'd pick up is really not anything to get excited about, then I don't see much reason to hold on to Robert.

Dynasty, obviously, very different story. I will point out, you know, we have all our discussions about, like, injury prone and injury risks and all this stuff. Louise Robert had only really stayed healthy for one full season in his career, and it was last season. You know, even his breakout 2019, he only played 122 games between three levels. Before, like, he had struggled to stay healthy in the minors, and it was just, you know, this is in his history.

And so it's going to be interesting to see, you know, whether that gets taken into account when people start thinking about him next year. And there was some speculation, Chris, that Robert was playing through injury last year in September, which contributed to him playing terribly during that time. So that could have been an issue for him as well. We spoke about a few of these names on yesterday's podcast as outfield waiver wire ads.

Chris, I'll go back to you on this one. If you just need a replacement for Luis Robert, obviously there's no replacing him. But between Tyler O'Neill, Willie Calhoun, Andrew Benintendi, Austin Hayes, I'll even throw Lorenzo Kane in that mix, who returned on Monday.

He went one for three with the home run. O'Neill, Calhoun, Benintendi, Hayes, Kane. Who's your favorite of that group? First of all, I wish any of these guys were available in any of my leagues because I need outfield help in nearly all of my leagues

and the guys who are out there stink. You know, all these names Chris are rostered in 50% or less of CBS leagues so yeah they're out there

somewhere I play in 50% or less of CBS Sports leagues and they're rostered in all of them I think my favorite here is probably

I think it's O'Neal there are there are risk factors with all of them I think O'Neill and Benintendi would probably be at the top for me in a Roto league

because they bring the potential for stolen bases but you know I think any of them could flame out. So, you know, it's certainly a low probability proposition on all of them.

I was noticing O'Neill is 98th percentile speed, at least this year. Yeah. He's never been much of a base deal. He's stolen two bases. He was in the minors. He is just a freak athlete. Yeah, I mean, he's been like 95th percent on sprint speed pretty much as Hulk. 98th or better, 97th or better every season. He's striking out almost 35 percent of the sprint speed. time yet he's he's been drilling the ball he's been drilling the ball so like his his xBA is 294 in spite of that his ex slug is 652 i know that's gone up a lot just over the past week

both of those he must be on some kind of tear right now in terms of the kind of contact he's making i'm skeptical anytime the strikeout rate gets over 30 percent but uh but that's interesting it's interesting personally my favorite of those is willie calhoun but he's not going to bring the speed element, obviously. Yeah, and a point, like, he's probably the best option. I mentioned Lorenzo Kane returned on Monday, as did Christian Yellich. They were both back in the Brewers lineup, Tyrone Taylor, and Kestanheera were both optioned back to the miners.

Kesson Hira is still 74% rostered. Chris, is this the end of the road? Do you drop Kessonhira? No. Maybe. You said it so confidently, and then you're like, Maybe. End of the road for him as a fantasy relative.

No, no, no. It's not think that. It's the end of the road for the next at least two weeks, let's call it. Yeah, I would be shocked if we saw him within the next couple of weeks. I would guess the timing of this makes perfect sense. Minor league rosters were announced, I think, pretty much across the board today. The season starts two days from now, three days from now. It actually starts today.

Happy minor league opening day, yes. There you go. So, I, I don't think it's a coincidence that he was sent down today. I think they want to see him get games, get his confidence back, probably rework his swing. But I would guess we see him set the over under May 30th, or are there 31 days in May if there are 31st?

There's 31 days in May. Yeah, May 31st then. May 30.5, noon on May 31st. And I probably take the over. I would think it's not until June that we see. see him, but look, you probably can't afford to stash him. Yeah. Given the way the injury landscape is right now.

But if you somehow, if you are the one person who has the flexibility to stash a minor leaguer, I would still hang on to him if I can't. This is how I'd characterize it. Kestin Hura just treat him like a yet to be called up prospect. So, you know, if you're in a league where Jeter Downs is being. being stashed. You know, obviously not Kellnick or Wanderfranco because they're a different level. But if you're in a league where prospects beyond them are getting stashed, then I think Kestin here is still worth stashing. I think this is the optimal time to buy him in a dynasty league

because even though that's how I think you should treat them in terms of rosterability and redraft, I know players, prospects who get called up and then don't perform up the expectations, they, it's like driving a car off the lot. You know, they immediately lose value unless they deliver on their upside right away. And Kestin Hira has done far from that. But still very young, still a lot of potential. And I might think it's a good chance to buy in Dynasty. Good chance to buy in Categories League, too, and deeper ones.

I'm going to be paying close attention to see if he gets dropped in any of those. And if he does, then I would be looking to acquire Kestin Hira and stash him in the meantime. Heung-Jin Ryu is on track to start this Thursday against the Oakland A's. George Springer's absence from Monday's lineup was a scheduled rest day, apparently. He's expected back on Tuesday. Alejandro Kirk will miss six weeks with his left hip flexor strain. Adelberto Mondesie could begin a rehab assignment next week. We'll probably see him at some point this month.

It's been a while, so we would like to see Mondesie back. Bryce Harper was out of the lineup after re-agravating his. His wrist injury on Sunday, Joe Girardi said he doesn't expect a trip to the IL, but that Harper could miss a few days. Luis Arise was removed from Monday's game against the Rangers due to concussion symptoms. Tommy Lestella likely needs an IL stint due to a hamstring strain. J.D. Davis was placed on the I.L. with a sprained left hand. Christian Walker and Tim LaCastro have been reinstated for the D-backs. Nick Heath and Andrew Young were optioned to AAA Reno.

Christian Walker is only 43% rostered. And I would say in categories leagues with corner infielders, I would look to get Christian Walker if you do need some pop on your team. Gene Seguro will embark on a rehab assignment this week. And I wrote in here, Shoah Otani was scratched from his scheduled pitching start on Monday. But he was in the lineup, as we know now, and he is awesome. He hit a home run off of Tyler Glassdown. We are going to take a quick break, but when we return,

We're going to look at the top five at each position. We are one month into the season. What is going on? We'll talk about it next. Fantasy baseball today. Let's start things off with the catcher position. Top five, and this is according to points leagues right now, CBS scoring format.

And if there's any crazy difference between Roto and head-to-to-head points, then I will point that out. You'll see why when we get to shortstop with Javier Baez. But let's start with the catcher position, your number one catcher on May 4th. is Carson Kelly, who is petting 339 with six home runs and an 1184 OPS, rounding out the top five. Wilson Contreras, Salvador Perez, Will Smith from the Dodgers. Actually kind of surprising to me.

Buster Posey, looks like he's fully back. And just outside of the top five is J.T. Real Muto, but he hit a home run on Monday, which likely pushed him inside of the top five. Is there anything you guys would like to say about this list? Carson Kelly, is it finally happening? Are you legitimately buying this Carson Kelly breakout? One of the things that stands out to me is 15 walks compared to 10 strikeouts. And when we saw him going well two years ago, the plate discipline was good.

It wasn't that good, but it was good. That was always part of his tool kid as a minor league. He was routinely doing like 40 strikeouts to 40 walks in like a 300 plate appearance minor league season. The big question is, can he keep hitting righties? Yeah, because that was a big problem for two years ago. And his numbers against lefties are messed up. His numbers against lefties are stupid. Yeah.

He has 25 plate appearances, three home runs, seven walks, zero strikeouts. And that's just dumb. And it's the kind of thing where if he can be, I mean, gosh, he's got a 1009 OPS right now, 1009 OPS right now. Oh, actually, no. am I remembering this wrong? He's always hit lefties well, right? Last year was the out, yeah, he's always hit lefties really well.

But it's the kind of thing where even if he's a 750 OPS bat against Ritey's, he's going to play more. And his overall numbers are going to be pretty good because he does crush lefties. So, you know, it's, I don't think he's the number one catcher moving forward, but I think he's probably got to be a top 12 catcher in all formats. Well, I moved them up to fifth in my latest rankings audit. because, I mean, other than the real Muto Perez, Wilson, Contrard, like the real standouts at the position, like there's just so much malleability at that position that, I mean, whoever's going well,

unless there's, unless it's clear that it is a mirage, and in Carson Kelly's case, it's not. I mean, the expected numbers all look great. You know, I love the plate discipline. I don't see I don't see any reason not to buy into it at that position You don't have No downside to buying into it unless you

You know I'm not saying you unload Half your roster for Kelly Like's JT Real Muto in a trade But just in terms of rostering him And playing him and enjoying him I'm fine with that I would probably not trade for him Yeah

Would you do you have him ahead of Yousalemani Grundahl I do Yeah In points And points. I mean, I was down on Grandal coming into the season, and he certainly hasn't done anything to relieve my concerns. Yeah, I just moved him up to 8th, just behind Christian Vasquez and Buster Posey.

Would you, speaking of Grandal, would you try to buy low on him? He's batting 127 with a 606 OPS. The underlying numbers look pretty good, though. And he's got that strikeout rate down. That was the biggest issue for Grandaul last year. Would you buy? Yeah, I mean, I wouldn't want to give up my. for him, but I think he's still a top, you know, 10 catcher. And I, I haven't really moved him

outside of my top five yet. So I think I would. At the first base position, the top five that we have here, Vladimir Guerrero, Carlos Santana, Ryan McMahon. You're going to hear a lot of Ryan McMahon today. Hazers Aguilar and Jared Walsh. Is Jared Walsh legit? We had this small sample size last year where he was making a lot of contact. He's hitting all these home runs. And he's kind of just done the same thing so far this year. So he has outfield and first base eligibility. Top five first baseman, Jared Walsh.

Yeah, you know, we actually got, we do, we do, we do, like a survey every week between the three of us where we're presented with five questions that we answer. And one of them this week was, it was like a buyer sell about hitters. And do you buy Walsh as a top 10, first baseman. I originally was thinking, no, I sell that because, you know, it's tough threshold to meet.

There are a lot of underachievers early on, blah, blah, blah, blah. But then, you know, I was like, you know what? I'm going to buy it because I think there's enough of a chance. I think he's shown at this point in the season combined with what he did last September that he's just become much more of a contact hitter than he was in the minor. So strikeout rate isn't quite as low as it was last September, but it's right around 20%. I mean, it's good. And the power was

not really a concern. The splits against lefties, he's doing well. I think he's pretty legit. I think he's pretty legit. And I don't know if he's going to remain ahead of all of Anthony Rizzo, Paul Goldschmidt,

Eric Hosmer, that whole class of first baseman. But those guys don't really feel like sure things right now themselves. So, yeah, I think Walsh is about on their level at least. Let's take a look at second base, the top five. Whitmeryfield, Chris Taylor, Ryan McMahon, Eduardo Escobar, and Nick Solek.

This is not really the best position here. I don't, what are we? Whitmeryfield's awesome. And he had another home run on Monday. Chris Taylor is one that is kind of surprising. We talked about him a little bit last week, Chris. And we haven't talked about him much, but he just continues to get it done. It's a combination of him playing well

and the rest of the second base position not playing well. Yeah, I mean, that's the thing is that like, I'm actually shocked to see that when Merrifield's like got guys in his company right now because I would have assumed he was far and away the best second baseman. And maybe for Roto leagues, he probably is because of the eight stolen bases. But yeah, it's been a really rough start for the position. DJ Lemayhew looks like he's about 23rd at the position. Obviously, Catea was on an incredible pace to start the season, but we haven't seen him in a while.

Ozia Obie's been fine. He's like 10 or six, actually. So, yeah, it's just, it's not a good position. There are some guys up there who, like, I'd still rather have Max Muncie than any of those guys except Whitmerfield. I'd still rather have Jeff McNeil over most of them, I think. But yeah, it's not a good position. It's really bad. Yeah, Ozzy Albies is coming around too. 10 for 26 over his last six games with five doubles and two home runs.

He's batting 229 with a 309 XBA. So better days coming for Ozzy Albus. I would say Chris Taylor is the one that I would definitely not have up here. I mean, I think Eduardo Escobar too. I think Eduardo Escobar just had a had kind of a home run surge here at the start of the season that put him up this high. And, well, it's not like he won't hit any more home runs. Obviously, it'll hit some.

It won't be close to this pace. But Taylor, I mean, he's not even an everyday player. So it's, he has 20. He's only taken, like, I don't think he's only been out of the lineup like three or four times this season. I mean, there have been injuries that have contributed to him getting a little more. But he was an everyday player last year, too. I think he might just be an everyday player. He came an everyday player last year.

year. Yeah, I don't, he's not quite an everyday player. No, he's not quite an everyday player. And I think what everybody's healthy when to get Bellinger back, it's going to be harder to get him in the lineup, especially with Pollock performing well. I mean, I guess Lux could get kicked out for Taylor. But there's not really an opening for him otherwise once everybody's healthy. So yeah, I would not count on him being an everyday player. Chris Taylor has started seven of the last eight games for the Dodgers, but I do agree that once everyone's healthy, he could lose playing time. So if you just want to sell him, sell high on him now based on that possibility, I think that is a... The nice thing when you can play literally everywhere is there's always going to be someone hurt.

Fair enough. He's always going to play some. I agree. But I don't think the goal is to have him in the lineup because, unless it's a second base. Like I said, I mean, Gavin Lux has been pretty awful since that first week. So maybe he won't hold up. Yeah. At third base, Numero Uno, you know who it is. Chris Bryant. Number two, Jose Ramirez, then Justin Turner, Rafael Devers, and you guessed it, Ryan McMahon, your top five at the position right now. Mani Machado, not seen here, but if you can get him on the cheap, I would. He's betting 230. He's still making things happening. He has four homers, five steals.

but a 280 expected batting average, 512 expected slugging percentage. So I do think better days are coming from a chado. Anything you guys would like to add? Chris Bryant's amazing. Said that yesterday. Yeah, I mean,

he was good when the batted ball numbers weren't that great in the past, and now the batted ball numbers are really good. And the only question, I guess, is where is he going to get traded when that happens? I would like it to be just across town. I think that would be a really great fit for everyone involved. Um, they can't do that right.

Would they? I don't know. I'm sure they've made a trade before. Yeah, but this is a pretty high profile. It was former league MVP, helped you guys win a World Series. There's history there. Yeah, I, um, I recently moved Brian up to eighth. And I can't move him any higher, I think.

I guess one thing I could do was, would be to move DJ LaMayhew below him. Um, but I think LeMayhew's going to come around. so I don't know like I don't want to move him ahead of Nolan Aronado yet definitely not ahead of Bregman so I think he's kind of stuck there

yeah I think I think it's borderline Bryant and Breit and Brian and Aronado right now I agree I think it's close yeah yeah I still don't think we're going to see

I mean it's probably no surprise I don't think we're going to see Kores Aronado in St. Louis I mean my worst fears have been relieved here. He looks kind of like what I expected him to look like.

Yeah. But I, you know, will he even hit 280? If you look at Nolan Aronado's fan graphs page, everything looks normal for him

and then when you get to babbip and I just found it so funny because I'm just like, that's so stereotypical, right? Like you take the guy out of cores and his babbip just kind of plummetz, whatever it is it.

It was like, DJ Lemay. It was like 30 or 40 points, but I was like, yeah, it makes sense. This is exactly what we say about Colorado hitters. So two things I want to point out here at the third base position, Justin Turner being third so far in total points.

He's sad as often as we're used to seeing him sit. And that's going to go on all season. So I think he's clearly a cell high guy. Yes. And we haven't actually talked about Ryan McMahon, have we? No, I guess not. So I don't know that I'm buying him to a top five player at all these positions and points at least because I don't think the plate discipline is good enough to keep him up there all season long, but just the idea that he's broken through. I'm pretty much on board with that.

The things that were keeping him from meeting his potential were strikeout rate was bloated, so he wasn't making enough contact. And too much of the contact he made was on the ground. And average launch angle is twice as high as it's ever. been. I mean, that, that goes a long way to helping him take advantage of course field. If he can sustain it, obviously. That's a big if, but it's, it doesn't look like there are signs of underlying change here as opposed to just, he got hot. So I'm, I'm, I'm pretty good with McMahon at this point. Let's take a look at, what do we have to? Shortstop. Chris Taylor is number one. Seriously? Is that, is that real? Chris Taylor's number one.

Trevor's story is number two. It is worth saying. Like, we're skeptical of Chris Taylor. He is playing every day and he's been awesome. He's been really, really good so far. He was really, really good last year, too. Yeah. The number that stands out, though, is 24 runs scored.

I, it's at lead the majors? Right, but he's got a 413 on base percentage. And he's playing for the Dodgers. Like, he's not going to keep scoring 20. He's not going to have a 413 on base percentage. No, no, no. That's all that he is playing extremely well right now. Like, yes, it is surprising.

Yes, I think. he's playing over his head, but like he's not like a statistical anomaly. You know, he's actually just playing really well. He's earning these numbers. The expected stats actually mostly back it up. He just

won't keep playing this well. So 24 runs not quite major league lead. Ronald Ocuna and Mark Kana both have more. Ronald Kuhnia's the number one header in points league by like 20 points right now or something. Yeah. And he missed half a week

last week as well. Rounding out the top five, we have Chris Taylor, Trevor Story, Zander Bogartz, Corey Seeger, and Bo Bichette. Fun fact that Fernando Tatis

is still first in fantasy points per game. He's averaging 4.2, but he missed, you know, whatever, 10 days. It was exactly 10 days.

I ate my hat because of it. And Javier Baez is ninth in points, but first in Roto among short stops because he has seven home runs and six steals in 24 games.

but way too many strikeouts 39 strikeouts to one walk and you know it should be pointed out Trey Turner's hitting 310 and he's on like a 35 homer 40 steel pace yeah he's been awesome too

shortstop sure stuff's good for the most part it's lived up to expectations we actually skipped over one name there unless your name is Francisco and door of course yeah we skipped over one name

on both third base and shortstop who's that Isaiah Kiner Folefa he's having an awesome start to the season. I don't know if he can keep it up but I remember last spring

Scott was starting to get a little bit excited because he was talking about trying to hit him for more power and then it just kind of never showed up in games. But now he's got five homers, five steals, hitting 277 playing every single day.

I pointed it out yesterday. That's about a 30-30 base that he's on. Yeah, I mean, he might be like the number two catcher. in Yahoo links moving forward. Oh, because he's still eligible. Yeah, he still eligible catcher.

What a cheat code. He, like, he deserves to probably be in, like, the top 20 at shortstop and third base. I just moved him up to 21st. I might have him there. I like him a lot coming in see. I have him in a bunch of categories. Makes a ton of contact. He's got speed.

If you set the over under for home runs, total, not rest of way, but total because we're saying he's on a 30-30 pace. If you set the over-under for his season total at home runs at 20, I would still take the under. I was thinking you were going to set it at 15. And I would, that would be tougher. Yeah, I'm thinking he hits about 10 more home runs the rest of the way. So, yeah, kind of right at 15.

His ground ball rate is almost 60%. And it was actually a little higher last year, actually. That's really high. That's like going to be. maybe tops in baseball high, and it's obviously hard to hit home runs if you're putting it on the ground that often. So I would take the under on that.

But, you know, if he does just hit 10 home runs the rest of the way, and he steals 20 to 25 bases the rest of the way, because as much as the Rangers run, I think there's a chance he sustains the steals pace. And that's obviously going to be a pretty valuable player. Let's quickly hit the rest of these positions. We do have a few other things

that I wanted to get to. In the outfield, Ronald Cooney is first. J.D. Martinez, number two. Number two. Chris Bryant is third. Nick Castianos is fourth. And Mike Trout is fifth. Worth mentioning Byron Buxon's 4.9 fantasy points per game are second to only

Ronald O'Cunia, but he has missed a few games here or there. Mike Trout does not have a single stolen base attempt on the season, though he is 97th percentile in sprint speed. I mean, yeah, you look at number six, Byron Bucson's got four. He's four for four now. He's actually the all-time leader in stolen base success rate after tonight's stolen base. I mean, Trout could easily steal 25 bases if you wanted to right now, and Buxton could probably easily steal 40,

and it's just a question of desire for those guys. I'm glad to see Byron Buxton's back on a 20-steel pace, and I think he can get there. Trout, I just have no idea. You know, he's been on base like 50 times already, and he has no stolen base attempts. So I don't know I would still expect he ends up with like seven or eight

But I don't know if that's part of his game anymore He's only the best hitter in baseball now So you mentioned Buxton at sixth, right? Just off this list After Buxton is Maryfield Who we talked about earlier After Maryfield checking in at eighth among outfielders As a guy I mentioned a second ago

Mark Kana Who is reaching base at like a 390 clip I mentioned the 26 runs. He's stolen five bases, too. I don't know where that came from. He showed good power two years ago, which is why I was so high on him heading into last year. I wouldn't say that's back.

He's slugging 417, has four home runs. He's just been an on-base machine, which he's shown signs of being in the past, and for some reason, he's running more. I don't know. I never knew he was this fast, but he's been like 70th percentile in sprint speed for most of his career

right around there. He's 76th right now. I had no idea. Markana had wheels. I think he's going to remain like top 30 in points leagues just because he's so good at getting on base. I don't know because I don't expect the batting average to be especially high.

I don't, like he'll have to keep running like this to be top 30 in Roto. And I'm, I bet against that. But he's certainly made up for, he's certainly making up for last failure. At starting pitcher in terms of fantasy points per game,

these are the top five. Carlos Rodon, Jacob Grom, Garrett Cole, Trevor Bauer, Shane Bieber, so four pitchers taken in the first

15, 20 picks of your draft. And Carlos Rodon, just missed the cut. Danny Duffy, Tyler Glassnow, Aaron Savali, Corby,

Corbyn, and Clayton, Curshaw. If you guys want to add anything, let's keep it brief. 30 seconds or less. Go.

Those guys might all be the top five starting pitchers moving forward. Well, I bet against Rodon. I think the endings are going to be an issue later on. Okay, I'm looking at something different. Yeah. Okay, because for me, it's Cole, Bauer, Beaver, Glassnow, DeGrom. That might actually be. For starting pitchers, I went fantasy points for game, Chris.

Okay, okay, okay, okay. Yeah, okay, that makes sense. I was going to say, yeah, just one start can make such a big difference, especially this time of year. Rodon's only made four starts. Yeah, that makes sense. And I didn't include All right. would because he's only made three and that seems cheap.

Okay. Yeah. I mean, I don't think Rodon's going to keep doing what he's doing. It's been awesome to see. I love seeing a guy who's gone through through so much. But, you know, you take out the, you take out the no-hitter and he's averaging right around five innings per start, I would guess. And that's five innings per start with a manager who can't keep track of how many runs or outturn an inning and leaves his guys in way too long.

So yeah, like I think Rodon, he's in like the 30 range right now. But it's tough to get past that. And maybe he's a little lower. Mercy! You went way over our 30 second time limit here, Chris. You know what? You just kept letting me talk.

So that's on you. You're the ref in this game. You got to move the clock forward, man. And you can't let some idiot rant and rave and linger. Keep going, Chris. Anything else? At relief pitcher, Mark Melanson is number one. He leads baseball with now 10 saves.

He just picked up another one for the Padres. Freddie Peralta has been great. He's number two. Josh Hader is third. Matt Barnes is fourth. And Alex Reyes is fifth. I am not going to let you guys talk about relief pitcher because there are a few other things that I want to talk about.

Like Tyler Anderson, who had a no-hitter through six. He wound up going six and two-thirds against the Padres, two runs, three walks, five strikeouts. On the season, Tyler Anderson has a 3.24 ERA and a 1.14 whip. He has been very serviceable.

Only 26% rostered. Are we excited about Tyler Anderson? So there may be something there. The whiff rate is way up this year. Interestingly, the strikeout rate is not so much. JT. Bruebaker and Tyler Anderson both. I'm kind of curious about both of them.

Brewbaker really stands out for the ground ball rate, but it's just not, neither of them has done anything quite impressive enough for me to move to the point of picking them up. Yeah, and like Anderson's pitch mix isn't really that different from what he's done in the past. He's throwing his cutter a lot more now, but he threw his cutter a lot more in 2018,

you know, about the same rate. So I think he can be. a league average starter moving forward maybe. I don't think you need to get Tyler Anderson on 12 team leagues, but I do think he's someone you can get in anything deeper than 12s. I have him on a few 15 team category leagues. Again, the name there. Tyler Anderson, he's pitching well.

If you want to pick him up, you got to drop somebody. Can you drop? Stephen Matt's, Chris, is he falling apart? He was at Oakland on Monday, five runs and five innings. He did have six strikeouts. he has now allowed 14 earned runs over his last three starts. The ERA is 4.78. Yeah, you can drop him.

Stephen Matt, so you can drop him. What about Scott Adam Wainwright in his return from the COVID-IL? Five and two-thirds, five runs. He has been very inconsistent. Four plus runs in three starts. Two earned runs or less in the other three. Somehow, he's 84% rostered on CBS. Yeah, it's been that way kind of from the start of the year.

I think it's just because he was so good. good last year. Sure. He's expendable. I think even in leagues shallow enough where he's being dropped, though, there will be times when you pick him up just to stream him.

Anything to see here from these deeper names from Monday. Josh Naler, two hits. He hit his first home run of the season. He has eight hits over his last six games. 7% rostered. Anything to see? I need to see more than just that.

All right. I think. I'm very skeptical of him. Stephen Piscotti had two hits on Monday, including his third home run. Anything to see? Not really. No, he's established enough that we kind of know what he is. Vince Velasquez, guys, I mean, come on. This is just fantastic start. Six endings, one run, six strikeouts? No, not nothing, not really anything that stands out other than the fact that he made, he made, he, he made, made it six innings without there being a disaster. Good for him. It happens sometimes.

He will, yeah, he'll do this five or six times a year. Yeah, sounds about right. Last name wanted to mention was Dean Kramer, six innings, one run, four strikeouts against the Mariners. But the Mariners are very hot and cold. I feel like you can stream guys against them. Yeah, they're not a particularly great lineup. Yeah, I don't see a lot here with Kramer. His curveball is supposed to be good. And that's That's what they keep saying. But even in his good starts, it's not like, wow, look at what the curveball did.

Some bullpen stuff. Hector Nerris picked up his sixth save of the season. He recorded five outs. Taylor Rogers gave up a two-run homer to Joey Gallo, but recorded his six save, a second save, rather. Emmanuel Class A got his sixth save for Cleveland. And Alex Reyes, he did walk two.

He has not allowed to run all season, got his eighth save for the Cardinals. Some team named Tuesday. these are from Samuel you say goodbye I say Cacucci Yeah No doubts

Gwen DiSclafani That's really good That's very good Screw you and the horse you rode on on Well wouldn't it just be Screw you and the horse you rode on Isn't that better? Yeah I guess rode did on

Although like you know Like I know you is like the easiest name in baseball to do a pun with. I like that one. It's pretty funny. But yeah, that's pretty good. It's not as good as no doubt's Gwendo Scalphani, but still pretty good. From Andy, a team has Enoa name. You might have done that one already.

From Michael, your mean one, Mr. Grinch. Yep. Hmm. From Terry, here ago again on my own. Yep. Yep. White Snake. That's the name.

From Mark. These are Counting Crows team names, specifically for Chris. A Wong December. Yep. Yep. to think of some. Yeah.

Gosh. There's somebody more. Mound here. I mean, I don't know anything. I don't know anything about counting crows except for, what is it,

Mr. Jones, I guess. Great song. It's a great song. A few other than I'll mention here from Billy, Nolitorious Bigio. Yep. The Sixth O'Fran million dollar men.

Yep. You be Rieu, Al B's me. Sure. to stream or not to stream for Tuesday. I actually did think of a counting crows one. It's technically a wallflower's one featuring the lead singer of the counting crows,

but 6tho Avenue heartache. That's... You guys don't know that one. I'm sure there are people listening at the 108 mark that love it, but... I appreciate it, Chris. To stream or not to stream for Tuesday,

got quite a few names here. Cease at the Reds, Paveeta versus the Tigers, Adbert Alslai versus the Dodgers. Kyle Gibson at the Twins. J.Hap versus Texas. Mike Miner versus Cleveland. Alex Wood at the Rocky, Shane McClanahan at the Angels.

Three, man. I can't remember who I said yesterday. Do you remember who I said? I think I said Gibson and... I think you said Gibson, Povetta, and Alex Wood. Yeah. I think I would go cease Povetta and McClanahan.

All righty. How about for Wednesday? John Gray versus San Francisco. Luke Weaver at the Marlins. Martine Perez versus the Tigers. Brady Singer versus Cleveland. Luis Garcia at the Yankees. Robbie Ray at Oakland.

Weaver, Ray, and... Singer. This is not very good. I will go... I will go Ray, Luis Garcia, and Singer. All righty. There you have it. For Scott and Chris, I'm Frank.

Thank you all for listening. watching fantasy baseball today. We'll be back again tomorrow. Bye-bye.