Fantasy Baseball Today - 🚨Luis Castillo Traded to the Mariners - Emergency Podcast (7/30 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: July 30, 2022

If you support the show, please nominate Fantasy Baseball Today for The People's Choice Podcast Awards in the "Sports" Category: https://www.podcastawards.com/app/signup/ The first trade deadline domino fell Friday night as Luis Castillo was traded to the Mariners in exchange for three prospects and a reliever (1:00)! Does Castillo's value go up? ... Will George Kirby get the boot from the rotation (7:15)? ... The Reds received a huge prospect haul, headlined by shortstop Noelvi Marte (9:05). Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Get 20% off Fantasy Baseball Today merch: https://store.cbssports.com/collections/fantasy-baseball-today?utm_source=podcast-apple-com&utm_medium=web&utm_campaign=buy-our-merch&utm_content=fantasy-baseball-collection Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Now here's Frank Scott and Chris. We have our first big trade of the weekend as Luis Castillo was traded to the Seattle Mariners. Welcome into a slightly delayed emergency edition of fantasy baseball today. On Saturday, July 30th, Frank Sanfell joined by Chris Towers. And this was a big one, Chris. Let's get into it. Luis Castillo traded to Seattle for a huge hall that included three of the Mariners' top five prospects, Noelvi Marte, Edwin Arroyo, and Leave V.

Stout. The Reds also received a minor league reliever, Andrew Moore, in the deal. Castillo, we've talked about it a lot recently, throwing this four-scene fastball more, Chris. He's really, really come on, and he's having a really good season in general. 286 ERA, 107 whip, up over a strikeout per inning, 11.7% swinging strike rate is good, a little bit lower than we're used to seeing from him, but it has been creeping up recently. What do you think about Castillo's value now that he is in Seattle? Yeah, I mean, he's a borderline ace as is for fantasy. And, you know, for the most part, he has been for what, the last five years. There's always been like this assumption that Luis Castillo would take a step forward.

And it never really happened. But it might now, you know, because this is arguably the biggest park shift that a player could have. At this point in Major League Baseball, if you look at Baseball Savants, park factors over the past three seasons great american ballpark is actually tied with course field as the best offensive environment in baseball while t mobile t mobile park is the worst offensive environment in baseball so yeah that's a massive massive uh improvement and you know castillo at his best is the type of player who you wouldn't think is necessarily impacted too much by this kind of traded because when he, you know, back in 2020, 2020, 2019, he was running, you know, 55 to 58% ground

ball rates and he was getting, you know, strikeout rates in the 30% range. That's not really the guy he is anymore. He is, you know, with that change away from the sinker to the four-seam fastball, he's become less of a ground ball guy, still a pretty good ground ball rate, 47% this season. But also, you know, 25% strike, a 26% strikeout rate. So it's not quite the same guy. So it actually is the case that this move could potentially make him an even better pitcher. And he's on a heck of a run right now. His last five starts since he swapped the sinker for the four seam fastball as his primary fastball. He's looked like an ace, 159 ERA, 41 strikeouts and 34 innings pitched. He's been going consistently deep into games. The Reds have been using and letting him throw a ton of pitches.

Over 110 pitches, it looks like in one, two, three, four, five of his last 10 starts. So, or five of his last nine. So yeah, he's, um, he's really, really good. And I think this should make his value even higher moving forward for fantasy. All right. Well, let's talk about how much higher you have him at SP 27. That's Luis Castillo. I have met SP25. I have met SP25. I mentioned recently, Jacob deGrom will start on Tuesday. Obviously, we're excited about that. I'm still kind of skeptical. I'm going to leave DeGrom at S.P.20.

We even got a note that he was dealing with leg cramps in his most recent rehab start. So it's just like... Jeez. One thing after another. Hopefully it's fine. What do you think about moving Luis Castillo? I mean, up into that top 20 range, up ahead of a Jacob deGrom? Do you think that makes sense?

Is that, you know, too bullish on Luis Castillo? What do you think? I think you definitely could make that argument. you know i i have like you said number 27 eyeballing it i think i could move him as high as 20 you know that's where i have logan web frankie montas clayton kershaw tony gonsolin in order and i could see him jumping those guys i don't know if i'm going to do it yet because i'm not sure it's like super actionable either way you know in a mixed league like maybe you have a window to buy louise castillo but he's been so good lately that i'm not sure you know

like the 286 ERA that he has right now, that's probably in the ballpark of where he's going to be moving forward. So, you know, I think it changes his value. It's as good of a park shift as you can get, but I'm not going to dramatically shift him in the rankings, at least not yet. We'll see what it looks like,

but my first initial reaction is just to leave things where they stand for now. All right. Kind of moving into that, you know, SP2 range. for Luis Castillo. And I think you're right. I mean, for years, we kind of overvalued him.

And I think either last year or two years ago, I had them ranked as my SP5 or SP6 overall going into the season. And that was just too much. And I think now we kind of have Luis Castillo adequately ranked for fantasy purposes. Chris, I think this goes without saying. You mentioned mixed leagues,

but this is a huge ad in AL only. So going from NL to AAL only, I think it goes without saying. But if you saved your fad to this point for the trade deadline, which I think a lot of people do in these mono leagues. you're willing to throw all of your fab budget on Luis Castillo if you need him, right?

Yeah, I mean, I suppose you can make the case that like Juan Soto getting traded to the American League would be a bigger impact player. But the, what's the saying? Something about birds and bushes, a bird in the hand is worth more than one in the bush, right? That's what they say. I don't understand that saying. Something like that. I don't understand the saying. But, yeah, there is a saying like that.

But, you know, it means that, you know, the thing that you actually have is more value. than thing that you might have in the future. And like, let's say you don't blow your fab budget on Luis Castillo, on the, you know, hope that Juan Soto gets traded to the American League. And then he gets traded to the Padres or the Cardinals or the Dodgers who, you know, by all accounts seem to be the leaders for his services anyway. Exactly. Then you've got nothing.

Or you've got, you know, a middle relief David Robertson to use your fab on. So yeah, no, I think this kind of situation where, you know, he's the first big domino to switch links, you probably want to make that move. Although, you know, if your Fab runs on Sunday night, maybe you don't have to until that. All right. Let's talk about how this is. And remember, the trade deadline is not the 31st this year. It's the second. So there will be a couple of days of trades, or at least theoretical trades after this week's fab run. Yeah, so Tuesday, August 2nd. I think it's like 4 p.m. or something like that for the MLB trade deadline, which I am appreciative

because last year it was on a Friday. And for those who don't know, Scott and I usually don't work Fridays. And we were just doing like emergency podcasts after emergency podcast. And it was just, it was bonkers. What does this mean for the rest of the Mariners rotation? I think the biggest takeaway might be George Kirby, right? Does he lose his rotation spot now? I think you can justify the Mariners, you know, maybe moving off of a Chris Flexin or something like that. Just to get the highest upside out of their rotation, but Scott mentioned it recently. George Kirby was likely going to be on an inning's cap, have his earnings, you know, kind of curtailed as the season goes along here. Chris, do you think that George Kirby is out of the rotation? And would you drop him for someone like

Brax and Garrett? That was a question I got last night. I don't know if it necessarily means he's out of the rotation right now. But yeah, I mean, he threw 67 innings in 2021. He's already up to 96 if I'm doing the math off the top of my head correctly. His career high going back to college is 90. So yeah, I think that you were likely to see. Well, I guess no, his career high would be 111 if you include college and the pros in 2019. But still, with George Kirby, you know, maybe he has 35, 40 innings left on some kind of, you know, soft cap. And, you know, maybe they decided the best way to use him is to,

take him out of the rotation occasionally, use him in long relief for a few weeks, and have him available for some kind of hybrid role down the stretch. So, yeah, I think I would be surprised if George Kirby was just a member of the rotation, you know, the rest of the season. So, yeah, I think this definitely gives him the flexibility to be more flexible with him.

Dropping him for Braxton Garrett, I think that's fine. I think Kirby's probably better than Brax and Garrett, but Braxon Garrett probably has more upside the rest of the season. Especially in a points league too, right? Like if you can't expect George Kirby to consistently start, then it's obviously going to hurt you because in points leagues, we need endings, we need volume. So I do worry about that there.

The Reds, the Red side of this deal, they did phenomenal, Chris. We were talking beforehand. This is just a crazy haul. Now, Luis Castillo does have another year of team control. Next year, he's arbitration eligible, but still, I mean, the Reds got three of the Mariners' top five prospects in this deal headlined by Noelvi Marte, a 20-year-old shortstop, regarded as a top 20 prospect in all of baseball.

And this season in the minors, he was hitting 275, 15 homers, 13 seals, an 825 OPS at high A. And from a Dynasty perspective, Chris, look, moving from Seattle to Cincinnati, you broke it down earlier, how great it is for a pitcher. I mean, I think you've got to be pretty excited about this from a hitter's perspective if you have Martean dynasty.

Yeah, and especially when you talk about power, the biggest impact that Grand American Ballpark has. If you look at the park factors, it's good across the board, but it's got a park factor of 153 for home runs. The next best park is guaranteed right field, the Chicago White Sox field. And that's a 124. So it's just a massive, massive upgrade in terms of power potential when Marte gets to the majors, which is probably, I mean, next season is possible. You know, he'll likely start at double A next season. Once you're in AA, you're kind of, you know, a good month away from making the jump potentially. But, you know, more realistically, you're looking at 2024 when he's really going to be ready to be an everyday player, presumably.

So, you know, there's still some time for Marte to develop. But yeah, in terms of the long-term outlook, this only helps. You know, anytime you get traded to a team with a ballpark like Cincinnati, it only helps. The other two prospects received in the deal are Edwin Arroyo, an 18-year-old shortstop, second round pick in 2021, and a 24-year-old starting pitcher Levi Stout. He was a third-round pick in 2019. Just got to mention, Chris, Arroyo, look, as great and highly regarded as Marte is, Arroyo rushing it this year at A ball, 316 batting average, 13 homers,

21 seals in 899 OPS. Look, I guess it's a good problem to have. They have two great shortstop prospects. Of course, they can move these guys around, but this guy, Edwin Arroyo, looks pretty damn good too. Yeah, I mean, there's no such thing as having too many shortstop prospects in particular. Because if you look at like, if you look at the MLB draft or if you look at even lists of former top prospects, there are always so many short stops on there who end up moving.

And that's just kind of the nature of the position, the best defensive player often just get to put a shortstop. And then, you know, if they can't stick at shortstop, they move to center field or second base or third. based depending on what their specific skill set entails. And so there's no, there's certainly no concerns about, uh, Oroyo and Marte blocking each other, you know, especially on a team like the Reds. They're, they're just whatever their best play. It's like the Orioles taking Jackson Holiday when they already had Gunner Henderson. Like it, right, you figure that out when you, when you're just looking for talent. And that's the, the place that the Reds are at. So now there's no concerns about, you know, the fact that they play the same position.

I don't think so, at least. And both guys are awesome again. Great Park Shift long term if they're here in Cincinnati. The latest trade rumors have the Yankees focused in on starting pitching, Frankie Montas, Jose Cantana, the Astro is still pursuing Josh Bell. They've been linked to Wilson Contreras as well trying to upgrade their catcher position. The Mets, speaking of Wilson Contreras, you know, maybe the asking price is too much.

It sounds like they've turned their attention to J.D. Martinez and Christian Vasquez. So lots of rumors swirling right now. Any other big trades that happened this weekend? Montas. Wilson Contreras, I think is kind of on the fringe there. We're not going to do a Jose Cantana

to the Bronx emergency pod. Actually, I think he wasn't originally a Yankee farmhand, Chris. Now that I think it might have been, yeah. But no, I don't think that we would do that. Anything with Juan Soto, obviously, we would do that. Otani goes without saying, but I don't think it's going to happen personally.

We're going to wrap there for Chris. I am Frank. Thank you all for listening and watching this emergency edition of Fantasy Baseball today. We'll be back again on Monday. Bye-bye.