Fantasy Baseball Today - Mize vs. Dunning; How good is Trevor Bauer? (08/20 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: August 20, 2020

Oh hey, Chris is back! And he has a curly mustache (make sure to watch us on YouTube). Frank owes Trevor Bauer an apology (2:20). What's behind Bauer's transformation? What is his value ROS? What lessons can we learn from this? For our OMGG players of the night, Scott went with Dane Dunning (10:24), while Chris went with Rafael Devers. Is Dunning a must-add? Onto news and notes, Alex Bregman left Wednesday's game with a hamstring injury and Yordan Alvarez is set for season-ending knee surgery (17:32). Also, Seth Lugo is headed back to the Mets rotation and Nate Pearson landed on the IL. We had a ton of interesting pitching performances Wednesday, including Casey Mize's debut (28:27). Is it time to add Brad Keller? What do we make of the struggles for Jack Flaherty, Rich Hill, Luis Castillo, and Julio Urias? We saw some big bounce-back performances from Paddack, Glasnow, and Luzardo (38:50). Is Framber Valdez must-start? Should we really sell-high on Aaron Civale? ... Hey, hitters are a thing too (49:38). Ian Happ, Dominic Smith, and Jesse Winker are all inside Scott and Frank's Top-40 OFs ROS. Randal Grichuk hit two more home runs and can we bench Josh Bell? ... Email us at [e-mail]. Subscribe to our new YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday '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: @CBSFantasyBB, @AdamAizer, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday 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/ Download our printable Draft Kit from CBSSports.com/draftkit! 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, and swing. This is magnificent. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank, Scott, Chris, and Adam.

If you're looking for pitching, you've come to the right place. Welcome to Fantasy Baseball today on a Thursday, August 20th. Frank Stamphill here with Scott, White and Chris Towers, another crazy day in baseball, a pair of doubleheaders. Lots of Wednesday recap today on the show. Lots of rankings talk as well. We'll figure out where players are shuffling around. I know that Scott, your latest trade chart is out.

How's everything going, guys? Going good. It's not just you and me today, Frank. We're joined by a special guest, Chris Towers. Oh, a special guest, Chris, it's great to have you on the show. I don't appreciate the sarcasm here. I don't know. first of all, like, I do a lot. I don't know if anyone at this company realizes how much work I do.

All right. And second of all, like I was here three days ago. It's not like it's been like months. You look completely different. You have this Raleigh Fingers mustache. I am. I'm starting to curl it out. That is beautiful. Just to see. It's been a while since I've trimmed it. And, you know, I'm going to have to trim it soon because it gets to a in length. And then it gets start starts to get caught in your mouth while you're eating. Oh, I know that feeling. It's a terrible feeling. And then you'll like just get like a little bit of hair that you bite off. It's disgusting. It's a really unpleasant. And it's like really hard to eat ice cream and I cannot relate to this. There's a new ice cream shop in my life. In my neighborhood that I've been really wanting to to try out. And so, you know, it's it's just

a lot that goes into having. It's not just, uh, it's it's not just for sex. Ape. There's a lot that goes into it. If you needed another reason to watch us on our YouTube channel, YouTube.com slash fantasy baseball today, you have Chris Towers with a curly mustache. The guy just continues to embody hipster. I love it. Way to stay on brand, Chris.

But we've already talked too much about non-baseball-related items. Let's jump right in. Oh, my goodness gracious. All right, guys, I'm going to get us started because I'm not going to allow either of you to steal my, oh, my goodness gracious player of the day or night. and it's Trevor Bauer. And this is really kind of just,

how do I want to say? This is a monologue. This is an apology. This is a hindsight is 20-20 because... In 2020. In 2020. That's right. There you go, Scott.

Hindsight is 2020 in 2020. You might make that a segment, Scott. I would like to apologize for ever doubting Trevor Bauer. I would like to apologize for telling people not to draft Trevor Bauer. Hopefully you listen to Scott and you didn't listen to me on that one. on a night where Bauer was supposed to wear his free Joe Kelly cleats, which were awesome, by the way. I've got some thoughts once you're done, by the way, on these cleats.

A complete game as part of the second leg of a double header. So seven innings, one hit, zero earned runs, three walks, nine strikeouts, nine swinging strikes, on 97 pitches for Trevor Bauer, who has been utterly ridiculous entering Wednesday. He was a top three starting pitch. in both head-to-head points and in Roto. His turnaround is completely unconventional,

but when we're talking about Trevor Bauer, what is not unconventional? His four-seem fastball usage is up 17% this year, and he's really riding that fastball to his success, even though the velocity on the pitch is down. What has really helped him is that he's not walking as many. He did have three walks in this start, but entering today his walks per nine were under two.

He has the lowest line drive rate, the lowest hard contact rate and the highest soft contact rate among qualified. Starting pitchers, his entire Stackcast page is just filled with red and I was going to make the argument that

all right, well, you know, he's had an easy schedule. This doesn't really, like, you know, he's a sell high candidate. Luis Castillo has had the same schedule and he has not been nearly as good. So Scott, I know that you moved him up to SP6 in your rankings and I think it's probably about time that I get him inside my top 10 as well. Trevor Bauer, I apologize.

Okay, two things. One, literally two days ago, Trevor Bauer tweeted that people should stop throwing at players' heads. So, clown stuff to wear free Joe Kelly cleats, utterly ridiculous. And two, look, I don't want to say what is probably going on with Trevor Bauer. all I will say is that Trevor Bauer made a big stink about the Astros supposedly using foreign substances to increase the spin rate on their pitches

and he has basically unprecedented increased spin rate on his fastball in particular it's up like 17% but also all of his pitches. I'm not saying anything. I'm just pointing out what a weird coincidence that is. Presumably he will keep doing whatever it is that has made him miraculously add 400 r pms to his fastball,

which is what makes fastballs more effective. He has the highest spin rate among fastballs in all of baseball right now. Like, yeah, he's good. Yeah, he's... It's Kyle's body. Check out his body of work. He's figured some stuff out. Trevor Bauer. No, in all seriousness.

In all seriousness. This was always a possibility. Right. And I said that. Before the season started, I said, It can go two routes. He can return second round value or he can be a free agent

by the middle of August. Well, we're clearly seeing what route it's gone down thus far. Scott, I was trying to like figure out a lesson that I've learned throughout this process of doubting Trevor Bauer. And I really don't know

that there is one because he's just doing something that we couldn't really project heading into this season. He's not even doing it the way that we've seen him do it before. And this happens all the time. So while I would like to take a lesson

from this with Trevor Bauer, I don't think that there's anything that I can actually really learn from it. Yeah, I don't think it was a bad process. You kind of give me too much credit saying you should listen to Scott instead of Frank. I obviously wasn't as much of a downer about Bauer as you were. But I think it mostly came up. I was having to defend like the one and only where I took him in the one and only draft I did.

So it's not like I have a ton of Trevor Bauer I'm enjoying now either. I was also reluctant to take him. But I was, I had a more open mind toward Trevor Bauer than you did, especially since it didn't seem like he was going for a, like, he wasn't being drafted according to his 2018 production. Toward the end, things did start. He did start to go like inside of the top 70 to 75 picks over like the last week before the season.

You know, when people really start to throw ADP out the window and just grab guys wherever they like them. Yeah. And I just think the lesson is to not think about things in. terms of one outcome, you know, in terms of the most likely outcome. Sure. You know, especially when you're talking about, you know, a mid-round pick like that. We've had a series on the football side where Ben Gratch is looking at, like, key decision

points throughout the draft, like, you know, the third running back versus the fourth, because that's one of the big choices you'll have to make, but then also like running backs in the fifth round versus each other. And one of the things he's trying to show in this is, like, some guys are more likely to have a good season, but less likely to have either a really, really good season or a really bad season. And some guys, you know, they have, they're, the, the number of outcomes is much wider. And they're much less likely to hit any of them than that first guy is. But in the case of a Trevor Bauer, we've seen the up, up, upside, which is arguably a best pitcher in baseball.

And we've seen the downside is like fringe starter. I love this. I love what you're talking about here, acknowledging the full range of outcomes and that it's different for different players. I mean, that is what I mean when I say I don't believe in projections.

Like, that's the most incendiary way of saying it, and I say it that way on purpose. But like projections, presume one outcome for a player if you follow them, if you draft according to them. And there's like,

there's a lot of lessons. to be learned from that just more generally because it's something we've talked about a lot with like the the comp I always come back to was like Hunter Pence you know like five years ago where he would always finish like 23rd

at outfielder but throughout every point in the season he was never more than like the 30th best outfielder and so it's like was he ever really the 23rd outfielder or was he just active and healthy and so that's you know

that's part of the lesson is yeah, we should talk about ranges of outcomes more. And when you're building your team, what kind of team can you build to where Trevor Bauer makes sense? I think is an interesting thing that we should think about. Yeah, and I guess with that, the lesson for me,

now that we talked through it a little bit, was the price for Bauer was, most realistically, you can get them as your SP3. So it's like at that point, why wouldn't you take the risk on someone who has the potential to be a top 10 starting pitcher or one of the best pitchers in baseball. All right, the downside is he's terrible,

but who else has upside like that in his range? Most starting pitchers after the third, after the second round, really, most starting pitchers, there's like a 50% chance they'll be terrible. That's just how starting pitcher works historically. After the first two rounds, you're basically 50-50 if you're going to get a good player.

And so that's another thing is that Trevor Bauer's at like the lower end range in terms of price this year for those kind of pitchers. All right, Scott, oh my goodness, gracious. Give me a standout from Wednesday's action. So the Tigers White Sox, they had an interesting game today. Casey Mize's Major League debut, and it was great. I'm sure we'll get into it.

He may have been upstaged by his opponent, who was also making his major league debut, Dane Dunning of the White Sox, who neither one of them went five innings. Okay, but for a major league debut, their numbers were both good. 4.1 innings for Dunning, five hits, three runs,

one walk, seven strikeouts. And the most eye-popping number for me was 17 swinging strikes, a great number, no matter how you look at it, on just 73 pitches. It was like he had a 23.2% swinging strike rate, which would be, you know,

obviously nothing nobody could ever. do over a full season. But Dane Dunning is interesting because you look at his minor league track record. He missed all of last year for Tommy John surgery. But the previous two years, well, 2018, 271, ERA 119, 10.4K per 9. Really good numbers, right? You look at his scouting report in baseball America, fastball, 55, slider, 60, curveball, 60, change up 55, control 55, like great ratings.

across the board, great grades, and then they give him only a 50 overall. And that's something I've noticed with Dunning tracking him as a prospect over the years is the numbers are great. The scouting reports, they seem reluctant to get fully behind him, and there

even seems to be a, there seem to be even lacking an internal logic like that. So I think he might be really good, and I am definitely excited to pick him up based on this performance. Yeah, Dane Dunning, is only rostered in 11% of CBS League.

So he is widely available. And, you know, the minor league numbers are tremendous, too. So he's coming off Tommy John's surgery, former first round pick in 2016. Career in the minors, 274, ERA, 113 whip, 300 strikeouts in 266 innings pitched. You know, mainly four seam, two seam slider curve. But, man, he was, he really was tremendous.

that's a full arsenal. And I just told you, baseball America says he has four pitches grade of 55 or above. You know, on a, like 50 is average, right? So 55, 60, like, that's good. That's a really good grade. And he has it on four pitches and control.

And, you know, that's a subjective measure, obviously. But the numbers look good too. So I don't know why the scouting reports, even with those grades, they kind of speak like he's just, some, you know, back end rotation guy. The one thing I will point out, he did get hit pretty hard in this game. Average exit velocity 91.6 miles per hour had, I think, four or five batted balls above 100 miles per hour.

So, you know, maybe it's something where as the lineup settled in against him, they started to figure something out. I'm not exactly sure, but that's the only thing I would add there, I guess. Yeah, he finished four and a third. He allowed three runs. It was a home run to Jamer Candelario that honestly was almost robbed by Adam Engel. I was watching this start. And honestly, it was probably my favorite game that I've watched all season. Because him and Mize, they were just, they were really special.

So I'm excited about him. And Dunning might be a two-star pitcher next week, Scott. So we'll kind of see how the schedules shake out. And hopefully he remains in the rotation. I don't see why he wouldn't. But he could potentially be a two-star pitcher as well. Chris, a standout from Wednesday, good or bad? Oh, my goodness gracious. Rafael Devers is fine. His second three-hit game in a row hit a bomb to just left of center field today. He's got, you know, his overall number is still not where you want them to be. You know, an OPS below 600 or 700, but, you know, he's hitting over, you know, 350 over his last six games. He's got four at three extra.

base hits in that time, Rafael Devers is fine. Like the strikeouts aren't really, they were a concern early in the season. They've mostly slowed down. Yeah, two in his last six games.

Yeah. I think it's fair to say Rafael Devers is going to be just fine. Which tells you, I mean, you know, it's one thing to say, oh,

the bad bit is low. The expected stats look good. But over a short sample, which is what this season has been so far, even things like strikeouts, even things like hard hit rate, they can still be skewed by sample. Yeah, I mean, that fluctuates all the time for most players.

You know, that's the, we even, even stuff that we think of as relatively stable. You know, we talk about like Babip and home run rate and all these things that, like, ground ball rate and strikeout rate and walk rate, those like, those things fluctuate a lot in season as well. And just because you strike out 25% of the time in 20 games doesn't mean that you're going to be that guy forever. Yeah, especially with these short samples. And we talk about this a lot. don't think people realize. Like, when you go into statcast and you go into fan graphs and look at the numbers, like these things change very quickly. If Rafael Devers goes out and has a four-hit game where

he hits four-line drives and all of them are counted as hard hits, like that's going to skew the numbers tremendously in just one game. So he finished on Wednesday, three for four, home run, three RBIs, that's back-to-back three hit games. He has 11 hits over his last seven games. And need I remind you, last year he did not hit a home run in his first 32 games. of the season. That would be more than half the year this year. Wow. He had a 748 OPS over his first 32 games,

which means he hit 32 home runs, all of his home runs over the final 124. This is someone that can get hot in a hurry. So this is kind of like what we're talking about when we say bet on the talent. Yep. And by the way, since we're kind of down this path already, George Springer Homer today,

he had been a little banged up recently. He's off to a bad start. everybody's laughing at him because he's an astro. But in contrast to even Jose Altuve, like the expected stats for George, like George Springer is basically in terms of the data having a typical George Springer season. He's not at the level he was last year,

which was an outlier season for him. But, you know, 261XBA, 461X slug. The strikeout rate right around 20% like always. He's George Springer, and he just hasn't gotten good results yet, and I think it's going to start here very soon. Yeah, and it wouldn't surprise me if it takes even a little bit longer for him because he was dealing with a wrist injury,

which is something that can obviously hamper a batter for a couple of days, a couple of weeks. Ronald LeCunia has landed on the I.L. With a wrist injury, so I could just take even a little bit more time for George Springer, but he is coming around. Corse Field will help with that. Some news and notes, Alex Bregman, speaking of the Astros, left Wednesday's game with a hamstring injury.

Scott, are you interested? in, if he's out of the lineup, would you be interested in Abraham Toro who came in? It's just cheap exposure to a pretty good Astros lineup. Not really. It would have to be a pretty deep league. I'm unsure of the skills there, and I think I'm not even confident

he would play every day if Bergman missed his time. The other name I wanted to ask about in the Astros lineup was Taylor Jones, I know was called up a little bit earlier this season. But now with Yurdon Alvarez out, might get the opportunity to play pretty consistently. Last year in the minors, a 291 batting average, 22 homers, 889 OPS. Chris, I'll throw this one your way. Any interest in Taylor Jones in deeper leagues?

It's got to be another one where it's a deeper league. You know, he's... There's like some swing and miss in his game, right? I'm trying to remember, but he's someone who doesn't... Not as much as I thought, I guess. 158 strikeouts and 164 games. That's really not that bad. Yeah, I guess the problem is there's no stolen bases there.

And so he's really got a hit and play every day. Yeah. And there's not much of a prospect pedigree here. It's kind of like Tyler White in that way, I guess. The numbers look pretty good. Yeah, I think I'd probably be more interested in Abraham Toro, but neither one is outside of an AL-only league, really someone I'm super interested in.

Not to just to make sure we don't bury the lead. We talked about Jordan Alvarez. He's out for the year now, right? Well, I was about to hit it. It was part of the news and notes. Dusty Baker said he may be out for the year. Oh, no. There's been a report since then.

Okay. He's having season-ending surgery to repair a partially torn Patel attendant in his right knee, which obviously, season-ending injury, bad news. But we've been wringing our hands over Yorna-A-Rez's dynasty value because what's going on with his knee.

If this is what's going on with his knee, he's probably going to be fine in the long run. Problem solved. I understand the disappointment of drafting Yordan-Alvarez in 2020 and getting nothing. But I think in the long run, this is good news. I mean, look, I'm going to draft Yordan-Rexam. Alvarez in the sixth round in every league next year.

And everyone's going to say, oh, he can't stay healthy. He's going to have a huge season. He's never going to get hurt again. As always happens with these things. And I'm very excited about that experience. Oh, man. There are so many things I could say right now. But let's move on.

Mitch Garver left with right side soreness on Wednesday. So that does not help his case. We've talked a lot about Mitch Garver recently. Seth Lugo is starting Thursday's game. the plan is to stretch him out to stay in the rotation. So, Edwin Diaz is back, I guess, question mark. As the closer, he came in in the bottom of the 8th on Wednesday. They were up one run.

He walked in the tying run and then stayed in the bottom of the 9th once the Mets grabbed a two-run lead because Brandon Kinsler gave up a two-run homer to Michael Conforto. What an unfortunate blown save. It gets four outs, both only one base runner allowed, strikes out three. and he gets the blown safe. Gets a win too. He's been a lot better recently. I think obviously it's great news for Edwin Diaz's fantasy value.

This is just the Mets broadcast team was speculating. This is what's going on with Lugo, right? This isn't confirmed him moving to the rotation. He was unavailable today. And that's how I'm just going by what I saw on Twitter, but it was from the Mets broadcast team, I think. I don't know, Chris, you're saying you don't like it. I just don't believe in Seth.

Lugo as a starter. I think that that's happened before and it never really worked out. He didn't really find himself until he got to the rotation. So I would expect that's probably not going to go too well. I know he might be someone that people are excited about, but I wouldn't look too hard at him out of the rotation. It's it's an upside play at a position that's exhausted a lot of upside options already. I would I would just say that.

Like I'm not sure. I don't have a lot of confidence is going to work out. I don't have a lot of confidence in any incoming starting pitcher at this point. Sure, I'd rather Dunning for sure, Mies for sure. I would throw him probably behind Tariq's scubal as well.

Yeah, that would be, that, I could see that. Yeah, I could see not wanting to move on from scubal yet. So if you guys owned Lugo as a reliever in a Roto League, just hold on to him and kind of see how this plays out as a starter,

see if, you know, it somehow translate the success that he's had in the bullpen over to the starter role. So we're not driving. I was, yeah. I guess. And that's another R-Pass. That's a relief pitcher as a starting pitcher. So Drew Pomerant is one we've spoke about recently,

and Seth Lugo, another one now. Yadir Malina might be ready to return to the Cardinals' lineup on Thursday. Someone who will not return to their lineup on Thursday is David Dahl, who is placed on the IL with a back injury. Brendan Rogers has been recalled. Chris, does this matter? I sure hope so.

He's got all kinds of prospect pedigree, pretty good minor league track record, did not do well in his first taste in the majors last season before he separated his shoulder. And it's possible that he's still recovering from that and won't be ready. But this is a guy who in 56 games at AAA has hit 311 with an 881 OPS.

There's a little bit of potential for speed there. He stopped running once he got to AAA, but it's a small sample size. I just think he could be the kind of guy in course field. He could be a Charlie Blackman type hitter in course field, just a ton of contact, really good skills as a hitter. Not going to have the speed Charlie Blackman did, but playing in course field could be really, really good for a guy with a plus hit tool. They just need

to find, they just need to be intentional about getting him in the lineup. And I don't have the confidence they will be. Yes, Moni Grandal and Luis Robert remained out on Wednesday for the White Sox. The Dodgers optioned starting pitcher Tony Donselin to their alternate training site.

Scott, if you added Tony Gonsolin recently, would you drop him? Do you hold on to him? It depends how shallow. of the league is how big your need for pitching is. I think he'll be back. I think he's pretty good.

Like I said, just a minute ago, we've quickly exhausted a lot of upside plays at starting pitcher, I feel like. It's to the point where I see about 50 starting pitchers that are any level of trustworthy, and I'm including Rich Hill in that group. So that shows you how far I'm stretching the definition of trustworthy.

So anyone who does anything, good is on the verge of being a top 50 starting pitcher. And I would include Gonsolin in that group, but they apparently don't need a fifth starter. Oh, no, they actually, they were going six-man. They were going six-man with Gonsolin in there. So, yeah, I mean, I feel like he should already be taking striplings place. You have Alex Wood set to come back soon, I think.

I'm not sure, but I know Gonson will get a chance at some point. Yeah, Scott, you mentioned top 50 starting pitchers. I think we're at like 35 right now. Honestly, it's like... Well, like I said, yeah, I was including Rich Hill and Trustworthy. Yeah, it's... Once you get past for me, and we don't even trust James Paxton, but I have Paxton and Julio Arias,

someone will talk about who couldn't even escape the second inning on Wednesday night. I mean, those are my 35th and 36 starting pitchers. And it's like, after that, you get into PlaySack, when is he going to pitch? Kichel, he's five. Marquez still has Corse Field. Lance McCullors has been up and down

so it's honestly for me it's like outside of that top 35 it's you're right man starting pitchers is kind of all over the place right now. I remember like a week and a half ago when starting pitchers were doing better than hitters

that ended really quickly. Gosh, man. You know what? I'm going to say 45. It's 45 because Rich Hill is number 45 for me Tyler Chatwood 46. Like the thing is Lance McCullors

you're pretty much just starting him, right? I understand it's been up and down. Framper Valdez, I'm including him in this group now, especially after a great start at Coors Field today, one where I was afraid to use him. But he's just been the best possible version of himself, and it's such a good groundball pitcher that, like, I don't even care that it's a low swinging strike rate.

I think he could keep this up. So, yeah, that's, that's, I mean, Pablo Lopez is on the verge of joining that group after, you know, a couple good starts in a row. Honestly, he might be there, too. Like, I have him inside my top 50, and, like, you can make the argument that he's better than Dallas Keikle or Rich Hill. I'm pretty sure I heard the Marlins broadcast today

compared Jacob de Grom's change-up to Pablo Lopez's unfavorably. So things might be getting out of hand, hype-wise, in Miami. I will say the change-up, I looked into the, Beautiful. The pitch specifically entering tonight, the swinging strike rate on Pablo Lopez's changeup was 30%. So this is a...

That's pretty good. This is an amazing pitch that we're talking about for Pablo Lopez. The last news item, Nate Pearson, I am sorry, Scott, has been placed on the IEL with right elbow tightness. Might explain, you know, some of the terrible performance that we've seen thus far. Chris, are you okay dropping Nate Pearson? You know, I would say just put them on your IL, but everybody's on your IL. Yeah, that's the thing.

There are a lot of leagues where I just don't have IR spots. So, yeah, if you've got one, sure keep him, but it's not someone who, based on what he's shown so far and the struggles that he's had, who demands to be held on to, especially because we just don't know if he'll be back this season. It's entirely possible that this is something they just keep him on the shelf for. All right, let's look at some of these pictures. we've already mentioned a ton of them that were on the mound on Wednesday. And Casey Mize, one of the top prospects in all of baseball,

the splitter is as advertised. And he was leaving it up in that final ending. I mentioned, you know, I was watching this start very closely, and it got hit around a little bit that final inning. But for the most part, while it was on, it was on. It was an amazing pitch. Four and a third, seven hits, three earned. Love that there was no walks in this performance.

Seven strikeouts. Scott, what did you take away from this? I mean, this is the debut we've been waiting for from all these prospect call-ups coming up doing nothing. This is the one that should energize you the most. And there's a lot of swing and miss in that White Sox lineup and that the question for Mize coming in was, okay, less than a strikeout per inning in the minors last year,

is he really going to be enough of a bat misser to be a standout in fantasy? Well, acknowledging he was facing a lineup that whiffs a lot. The whiffs were certainly there. The splitter was very good, like you said. This is a guy who was the number one picking in the minor league in the amateur draft two years ago. And was pretty much viewed as someone who maybe could have stepped into a major league rotation. Right. I mean, before he hurt his shoulder last year, his numbers were absurd.

It was like an ERA below one, a whip around point five. Yeah, and the velocity was down. Like when you mentioned the strikeout rate not being great last season, a lot of that was the post-injury return. Yeah. And the velocity was more like 90-92. So the concern, I mean, in terms of just as a pitcher, he's right there with McKenzie Gore in terms of the most talented prospects.

And so for me, it's just like he's healthy right now. So I think he's going to be really good. He looks aesthetically a lot like Max Scherzer. Very similar delivery, that kind of cross-body sidearm thing. You know, that's a lofty comparison. But that's what he looks like and profiles like, you know, given the fastball slider change up heavy arsenal. I think he's going to be really good as long as he's healthy.

That's really the only question for me, both in the short and long term, is just, you know, he's already had elbow, or shoulder injuries. Shoulder injuries can be oftentimes for pitchers even more, you know, difficult than elbow injuries.

So that's the only concern. And I mentioned this when we spoke about Mize getting the call the other day. I like that he hasn't really been babied like other prospects that we've seen before like Lazzardo. Last year he made 21 starts, between high A and double A ball and in 10 of those he went six or more

innings. I don't know hitter. Yeah, so I don't think that he's going to be babied. He did throw just 73 pitches on Wednesday night in his debut, but I think that's just because he was kind of running out of steam and running into some trouble there as well. And because he hadn't been pitching in real games.

Right. Like I was looking at some of these player pools. Like some of them aren't even carrying eight hitters so I don't even know how they're doing. I mean, I guess they just simulated games, three players come on. This is the great unknown. with your, especially with your guys like Luis Garcia and Kristen Pash. Pache.

Pache. Pache. These guys who haven't put up really impressive numbers, but are really, really young, is sometimes with those kind of players, that switch gets flipped, and they're just awesome all of a sudden. And we have no way of knowing whether that's happened for these guys, because nobody's keeping score. Right.

You know, occasionally you'll see a grainy cell phone video from one of these scrimmages. But for the most part, we have no idea. And that makes me more inclined to bet on prospects now. Another pitcher who was great on Wednesday, actually during the day in game one of their doubleheader, was Brad Keller and he's been great all season long. Six and two-thirds, three hits, zero earned, three walks, five strikeouts, nine ground ball outs, 13 swinging strikes on 95 pitches for Keller. Seven of those swinging strikes were on the slider.

Mike Mathini had this to say about Keller after the game. I think he got into a rhythm where his breaking ball was just as good as his fastball was. He had his fastball going to both sides of the plate. He had it cutting at times and had good sync when he needed it. Scott 51% rostered a two-start pitcher next week at the Cardinals and at the White Sox is Brad Keller. Yeah, I'd roll with him with those two matchups. He's always been a really good ground ball pitcher.

He was top 10 in ground ball rate last year, and that makes him a high, high floor pitcher, low ceiling pitcher on a bad team, which makes him pretty fringy. If that slider develops into a swing and miss pitch, which so far it's been this year, much improved swinging strike rate on that, and he's throwing it more.

That could be a game changer for Keller. I think he deserves to be on the version, of that top 50 given that it doesn't take much to move a pitcher up to that point. Am I the only one

who thought he was like 29? Like I saw this before the season. I could have sworn he was like 28, 29 and he just turned 25. Yeah. He pitches more like he's 35.

Yeah, he feels like an old guy. Right. He's just like, you look at his career numbers and it's a lot of 6K per 9, it's like, oh gosh, but Scott, this group could not last

could not go four innings on Wednesday. And it's an interesting group of names here. Luis Castillo at the Royals allowed four runs, only three earned over three and a third. Jack Flaherty. I know that the Cardinals have really have not let their pitchers go deep into game since returning here from COVID. He only recorded five outs.

One earned, two walks, one hit by pitch. His command seems like it was non-existent. Rich Hill's return, yikes, did not go well. two and two thirds, four earned three walks, and in Julio Arias, less than two innings as well, only five outs, all recorded via the strikeout, but they pulled the plug rather quickly. Scott, is there anyone on this list

that you are legitimately worried about? I mean, we didn't really know how Richel's season was going to shape up, obviously based on track record. We had high hopes, but there's been a lot of tumult. and yeah I'm not dropping him based on this outing but I need to see him put together a good start before I'm willing to start Rich Hill I do want to comment on a couple of the others Flaherty his last start was July 24th it's August 19th almost a month without starting he's probably going to need a couple turns after this start to get back to to where he's you know taking on a big workload and

And Luis Castillo, don't freak out about Luis Castillo. This might be the most obvious by-low candidate in baseball right now, no matter what metric you look at, hard hit rate, swinging strikes. Like, he's doing all of it. He entered today with a 304-X-FIP, a 284 XERA, which is Statcaste IRA Estimator. He's number two in swinging strikes. He's eighth in ground ball rate. he's he's yeah he's pitching every bit like an ace can without getting an ace result and it's weird

but it's just it's just one of those fluky things that happens in baseball over a small sample which by the way that's that's still all it is so far sky high babb it really low left on base percentage like he's he's someone that tends to get hit a little harder than you think he would you would think with how much movement he gets he'd be hard to square up but when he does have contact made You know, it tends to get hit pretty hard. But still, there's no explanation for this. Well, Chris, let me ask you, a classic sell high, buy low situation. Would you, if you can, trade Kenta Maeda away for Luis Castillo?

Sure. Yeah. Yeah, I thought you were going to say someone like Aaron Nola. That would be a no. But, you know, Kentimaiata, yeah, like, I love Kenta Maeda, but he's not as talented as Luis Castillo. Well, how about Bauer, Chris? You know a trade I love?

not to cut up, Chris. Zach Wheeler for Luis Castillo. If you could get Luis Castillo for Zach Wheeler, I mean, that's... I think you could. Look, you should definitely try. If that's...

But, man, that would be a really bad trade for the person giving up Louise Castio. And I think Zach Wheeler's fine, but yeah, I mean, Luis Castillo is still... I don't think there's any reason to think he's not a top 15 pitcher. Just by virtue of Zach,

hasn't had a good start yet and Luis Castillo has only had one good start yet I think hasn't had a bad start you mean Zach Wheeler yeah Zach Wheeler hasn't has only had good starts Louise Castillo's only had one good start like I think somebody who's not nearly is plugged into baseball stats as we are would go for that because like it's not like Wheeler was a scrub coming into the year who's pretty highly regarded himself yeah that man you'd have to be really unplugged on anything from like the last 20 years to to give up Luis Castillo for Zach Wheeler. All right.

Look, maybe I'm wrong. I hope the people listening who have Zach Wheeler can do it. But if you have Luis Castillo, please don't. I think you overestimate the average fantasy baseball player. I would assume that anyone who's listening to this podcast would not accept Zach Wheeler for Luis Castillo because every time Luis Castillo pitches, we prop him up as a by-low candidate. At some point, he's got to perform, though.

That's the one thing I will say, but all the underlying numbers say that he should be better than he has been thus far. Scott, a few names that bounced back on Thursday include Chris Paddock versus Texas. Six innings, four hits, one earned, five strikeouts. Tyler Glassdown at the Yankees, I said last week that I would not start him in this start. And you got the old quality start tease here, five and two thirds, two hits, two earned, three walks, eight strikeouts. As long as outing of the year. Glass now has at least two walks in all five of his starts this season. He had two or more walks in just four of 12 starts last season.

So that's an interesting little tidbit on Glassnow. And then Jesus Lozardo, who last time he started, he was filling in for Montas. He didn't even know he was going to start that night. Six and a third, four hits, two walks, seven strikeouts. Outside of that one start where he didn't know he was going to start, Lazardo has been ridiculous, Scott. So that's the bounceback crew. Yep.

He has, and I think this was the longest start of his career, meaning majors and minors. This was only the second time he went six innings, right? And he almost went seven. It was very, very efficient. Like, I, like, 92 pitches. No concerns there.

The one I might still harbor some concerns for is, it's actually better. You know what? I'm not sure Chris Paddock. And Tyler Glass now are going to live up to our expectations for them coming in, but they are not exactly players you should worry about either, especially given how few competent starting pitchers there are to go around. So, you know, I think they're going to have more starts like today than otherwise,

and you should just roll with them. The only thing I will say is until, and unless he develops that third pitch, I'm getting strong Jose Berrios vibes from Chris Paddock where like everybody thinks he's an ace and he's just good. That's a pretty good strike rate, swinging strike rate's not there.

Swinging strike rate wasn't great last season. Yeah, he threw only three curveballs today. I think part of that was one of the first curveballs, maybe the first curveball he threw was hip for a home run Rognetto door. It wasn't a bad pitch. It was on the corner at the knees. It was one of those

like Routonado just hits bad pitches sometimes. So I don't know. It's something I wish he threw it more. Yeah, that's actually a good call. I kind of like that comp. Although Paddock does have better command and he's not going to walk as many as burials, he might just be that, you know,

like an SP3, which is fine, you know, but it's just maybe, he's not that top 15 type starting pitch. It took like into like three years of Jose Barrio's career as like an everyday starter to for everyone to kind of realize that he's just good. And I'm not saying Chris Paddock will definitely be that. That's just the vibe I'm getting from him. And I thought that kind of before the season.

And like to be clear, since Barrios is off to a bad start, that's not a bad outcome. That's still. It's somebody who's a must-star player in fantasy. It's just not someone who has top five potential. And I think Chris Paddock does have top five potential, but he needs to improve, at least, I think, quite a bit. Yeah.

This was really the test that we were looking for when it came to Framber Valdez, going into Colorado to see how he would fare. Seven and two-thirds, seven hits, three runs. Only one of those were earned, one walk, five strikeouts, 12 ground ball outs, 11 swinging strikes on 101 pitches. Scott Framber Valdez is a must start starting pitcher by or so. Until he gives us a reason not to start him. I mean, this was the one venue where I wouldn't have been willing to say that

and clearly he came through in a big way. So, you know, he's had, he obviously has walk issues in his past. and they could come back to bite him again. But for now, he's doing exactly what he needs to do to be a great pitcher, and this is the result. You want to know how I know? It was a crazy day. We are about 45 minutes since the podcast,

and we haven't mentioned the man that actually threw a real complete game, not a double-header complete game, and that's Aaron Savale, nine innings, five hits, one earned, zero walks, six strikeouts, 15 swinging strikes on 109 pitches. I don't think there's anything to add. I just think Savale is really good. He's like a top 30-ish starting pitcher.

I am having trouble finding a narrative that meets the result at this point. Because it was before, okay, he stopped emphasizing his fastball so much, going more with his secondary stuff. Last couple starts, he's been throwing the fastball as often as he did last year. One of them, today, 15 swinging strikes great. But his overall swinging strike rate is looking not so great again. And he's not a ground ball pitcher. and I'm not saying,

I'm not saying like dump Aaron Savale but if you're looking for sell high candidates I would put him on that list. Yeah, a lot, a lot depends on whether he can keep being kind of an outlier home run the fly ball rate guy.

He's at, you know, I think like 8% for his career down 9.4% so far. He's only made 14 stars. But, you know, he did have a high infield fly ball rate last season. That can help. He was a high infield fly ball rate, low home run to fly ball rate guy in the minor. So there are ways you can get around. Like a high infield fly ball rate can help substitute for a low ground ball rate. But it's, it's a tricky place to, yeah, it's a tricky balance to try to strike. And, you know, the increase of strikeout rate obviously helps as well. So Scott,

But it's less than one per inning now. It's dropped with nine innings, six strikeouts. It's less than one per inning for the season now. It's down like one, like 24%, which is just a little bit better than average. So, Scott, you would obviously, if you can trade Savale for Luis Castillo, that's something you would do.

That's a classic sell high situation. Yes. How about for like Frankie Montas who's coming off a game where he got bombed? Yeah. You would trade Savale away from Montas. I would trade him for. Paddock, of course, based on what we just said about him, it's worth bringing that up.

Would you do it for Dylan Bundy, who just had a bad start? You would do that as well. Yep. All right. Yeah. I agree. He is a sell high candidate if you get one of those names, but like I have M SP 32, you have M SP 36. If you can sell him, I don't, just because we tell you to sell high on someone doesn't mean you just have to sell him for the sake of selling him, right? It's why I'm always reluctant to call anybody a sell high because I feel like people interpret that is, oh my gosh, I got to get him off my team. And that's not what I'm saying. I'm saying there is enough reason to think this is the best he will ever look. And you think you can trade him for someone you think is better. Right. That's the whole point. Yeah. Like we think a bunch of those guys

are better. It doesn't mean we think Aaron Savali is bad. Well, Scott might, but. No, I don't think he's bad. I just think it's, yeah, it's just like if you think Luis Castillo is better and you really should. Or Chris Paddock. It's a smart trade to make. There were a few other aces on the mound on Thursday. Don't really have to get into it, but

Garrett Cole, Jacob de Grom, Lance Lynn, they were all very good. You didn't really need me to tell you that, but that's it. Anything else to add there, guys? On those three? Lance Lynn got hit hard. It was kind of a weird game where he had like 11 hard hit balls or something ridiculous against him, but

you know, you got to get lucky in addition to being good, and he's good. So, you know, I don't think there's anything there. That was just something I noticed while watching the game. All righty, it's a late break, but let's take it anyway. We come back. We'll look at some of the hitter performances from Wednesday night. We'll do that here on fantasy baseball today. We're back here on fantasy baseball today.

And throughout our break, Scott pointed out to me that Adbert Alzellay, a prospect for the Cubs, actually pitched. Pretty well on Wednesday, Scott. What do you got? Yeah, he pitched really well. It was actually the longest start of his career, only two hits in five innings, and he threw just 70 pitches,

six strikeouts in those five innings. He was a guy I got excited about when he got called up last year because he started out with back-to-back starts, allowing just one hit. Both of them were right around four innings. And went on a pretty good run at AAA prior to that call-up with strikeouts and everything.

The final numbers didn't look. so great. He collapsed in the majors and went back in the minors and struggled too. But here he is back again doing good things. I do think there is talent here. And I'm not sure if they'll be able to keep him in the rotation as bad as Alec Mills was. You know, maybe there's room for Alisalai. Probably not. But it's a name to remember. How dare you besmirch the name of Alec Mills? No, I'm just kidding. It's probably over for Alec Mills. It was fun while it lasted. Scott, I noticed among you updating your rankings, as did I. We both have Ian Hap, Dom Smith, and Jesse Winker inside of our top 40 outfielders, and all of them were pretty good

on Wednesday, as they have been all season. Ian Hap has now led off two games in a row in lieu of Chris Bryant's injury, and he hit a home run in three games in a row. He is currently a top 25 outfielder in both formats. Dom Smith has multiple hits in six of his last eight games. Think about that six of his last eight, multiple hits. He is batting 323 with an 1156 OPS. Dom Smith, his barrel rate, and his ex-slug are both in the 92nd percentile, according to Stackcast. Jesse Winker hit his sixth homer of the season.

He is now betting third in the Redsline. Double-header. He had a home run in one of those games, and he walked three times in the other. Very Jesse Winker day. Yeah, I don't think there's much else to add, except for those guys really good. I hope you picked them up there.

They're top 40 outfielders with the potential to continue climbing. Maybe there's a lesson with Jesse Winker. Don't give up on guys if they struggle. Michael Conforto, another example that I can think of. Don't give up on guys the first year they're back from shoulder surgery. Right, yeah, that is definitely fair. I remember a couple of years ago, Scott was banging the drum for a winker. I was banging it hard.

On the other hand, I did the same thing with Gregory Polanco. and did not work out quite as well. We might have a sound drop there, Scott. I'm going to have to look into that one. The brew crew. That's just the name of the player, too. It doesn't help, but that's fine. Oh, man.

The brew crew, the bats woke up on Wednesday. Kessinheera, Yelich had big games. They combined for five hits and a home run each. But as did Ryan Braun, who has now let off against lefties, two times recently in his last four games. He hit a home run. He has 55% rostered.

Avicayel Garcia, two hits, including his second home run of the season. He is 50% rostered. The Brewers have seven games next week. Chris, any interest in either Ryan Braun or Avi Garcia? I'm trying to look up how many. So, Braun has started six of the last eight games. So that's a decent rate. Look, I think Ryan Braun's going to hit well whenever he's in the lineup.

And so, you know, if they play seven games next week, you know, hopefully he plays five. That makes him pretty fringy. Garcia, you would expect, you know, at least could play every game, whereas Braun, you know, almost certainly will not. So I'd probably have more interest in Garcia, although I think Braun is probably still a better hitter at this point in their careers. Oh, yeah.

Speaking of bearing the lead, something I've already done on this podcast, so why not continue? 53 minutes in Fernando Tats, he hit his 12th homer of the season. He just continues to be the best hitter in fantasy baseball. he is now inside Scott's top 10 in Roto ranks. Randall Gritchuk, a double dung, five multi-hit games in a row, six homers in his last six games.

He is still just 43% rostered on CBS. In a points league, I like him in Roto either, but in a points league specifically, Scott, I will drop David Dahl, Adam Eaton, Victor Robles, Lourdes-Guriel. I would drop all of them for Randall Grichuk. David Dahl, Lordeus Gureel. Who else? Adam Eaton and Victor Robles.

Yeah, I don't see any reason why you want to try the hot hands compared to that group, especially in a points league. You know, Victor Robles in a Rotel league for the Steel's potential, even though he doesn't have a steal yet. You don't hold on to him there. I'm just... It's very likely. Gritchick is just hot now.

Yeah. We've seen him get really hot in the past before. Right, like he hit 31 homers last year. Yeah. He can hit. The main things I'm looking at are, you know, the battered balls are the strikeout rates down the batted balls are manifesting more as line drives than fly balls which is probably a good thing in his case it's just such a small sample that you don't really know if that's

you know it's a chicken and egg thing is he hot and therefore those numbers look better or are those numbers better and that's why he's hot there's just there's so many outfield you know scott you had your piece uh yesterday yeah i think on tuesday about like ranking these 10, you know, hot outfielders. And he'd be relatively low on that list. Like, I think I would still rather try for Dylan Carlson than Randall Gritchick right now. I might still rather try for Robbie Grossman,

who was the bottom of that home run today, today, didn't he? I don't know that he hit a home run. I saw he had a- He drove in two runs. A couple of ribbies. Yeah. Two walks. His OBP is up to 452, Robbie Grossman.

Yeah, it also helps Gritchick that he's been facing the Orioles and the Red Sox. I know Chris, you pointed that out during the break. So that also helps. But I am willing to pick him up. I'm very bullish on him just in case, just to see if this kind of transformation he's gone through, walking more, striking out less, lots of line drives, less pop-ups, hard contact is up. It might be a legit transformation for Gritchick, so I'm a little bit more bullish on him.

Josh Bellwood 0.4-3 with a walk. He has a 378 OPS versus left-handed pitching this season. And he faces three lefties next week. So I don't really mind benching him. Is that right, Scott? Yeah, it's all right. I did a thorough reworking of my rankings yesterday and still couldn't bring myself to pull Josh Bell out of the top 10 first basement for rest of season.

You know, it helps that there are a lot of first basement underachieving here in the early going. I have some concern for Josh Bell. keep trying to remind myself like how often we look back at a player splits at the end of the season and there's just this dreadful April that we've all forgotten about because he had the season we expected him

to in the end. And it's just such a weird it's easy to play head games with that because like the season's about halfway over and yet we're not even a month in and that's just like it's hard to reconcile those two realities.

That all being said, Paul Goldschmidt or Josh Bell? Goldschmidt has been awesome. He has been. He has. I think I kept Bell ahead of him, but I debated it. I was not a Goldschmidt guy coming into the season. I will take Goldschmidt over Bell at this point. Chris, let me throw one your way.

Luke Voigt, another one on fire. I assume at this point you have to take him over Josh Bell, right? the only thing is he has still at times sat against right-handed pitchers. What will that look like if the Yankees are ever at full health? In my eyes, there has never been a reason to sit Luke Voight against any pitcher because he's a really, really, really good hitter. And he has been that ever since he joined the Yankees with the exception of like 20 games when he was playing through a hernia.

And so, yeah, I think Luke Voight, I think I would take him over Josh Bell at this point. I think he's, you know, clearly healthy and clearly the guy that we were hoping he would be. The last hitter note that I will add, Austin Nola two hits on Wednesday, including his third homer. He is 40% rostered.

So if this Mitch Garver injury is, you know, legitimate, if it's one that lasts, then you have a catcher there. But, you know, for any struggling catcher, if you just need someone you want to stream who's hot right now and is actually playing a decent amount, I think Austin Nola is a name to look at. All right, guys. Wednesday, bullpen notes.

Rafael Dolis for the Toronto Blue Jays picked up the save up five to two. Anthony Bass. I was about to see Brandon Bass. Is that a person? I don't know. Probably is somewhere. Former Orlando Magic and Boston Celtics. Right. That's who I was thinking of. Oh, why do I have that in my subconscious?

That's very weird. Anthony Bass pitched two days in a row, including two innings on Tuesday. So I assume he needed the day off. I don't think this is anything really noteworthy. The Cubs in the Cards game produced a lot of noteworthy bullpen notes here. Andrew Miller entered the game, tied two to two in the top of the seventh. That is the final inning of a double-hitter. And he loaded the bases.

Giovanni Gallegos came in and allowed a two-run single. Then pitching the bottom of the seventh, Craig Kimbril, in a four-to-two game. Rowan Wick pitched the past two days. Seventh being the ninth, basically. Yeah, he picked up the save. Craig Kimbril. Right, because it was a doubleheader, seven-dating double-heder. Yes, and it struck out the side and has looked great. Well, I guess it's really just three outings, maybe four, where he's looked a lot better.

But you never get a big sample with a reliever, of course. and I think it's very likely that we see him used again as the closer based on how well this outing went. So I would be looking to pick up Kimberl if he was dropped in your league. Obviously it's a scary situation still, and it could unravel for him again very quickly. But you know you're playing with fire anytime you pick up a new closer candidate. We already spoke about Edwin Diaz.

Brandon Kinsler allowed a two-run, home run to Michael Kinclair with the game tied. We'll go over to Marlins Man here, Chris. Is there any names worth paying attention to in the back end of the Marlins bullpen? Not really. No. This team is kind of falling apart. They don't have a lot of talent. I'm sorry.

No, there's not really anyone there that, like, Brad Boxberger's been okay so far. I guess he's got the wily vet status that could get him an opportunity in the ninth inning. But I'm not really that worried about Kinsler's job security personally. Yeah. Yeah, like this was really his first bad outing. Raphael Montero pitched a clean ninth and then gave up a grand slam into the 10th to who?

Mani Machado. It's also worth mentioning that he was, he had over 40 pitches at that point. This was just dumb management. He had a, there was 17 pitches. in the ninth inning in a tie game, set him down one, two, three. And then I think it was like two pitches to the first batter, six to the next batter, a nine or ten pitch walk to Fernando Tatis, and then they still left him into face manny Machado.

And it's like, this is a guy who is still not really throwing his slider because of concerns about his elbow. So why are you leaving him in one for a second inning after he just threw 17 pitches and two for 42 pitches just in general. This is not a Rafael Montero blown save. This is on, I assume it wasn't Chris Woodward

because he's suspended. So whoever was managing for the Rangers, that was bad. Bad job. Bad job, guys. All right, Thursday Probables to stream or not to stream, let's quickly run through this list.

James Paxon. You throwing him out there, Scott, against Tampa Bay? I think so. Chris Spencer Howard at the Toronto Blue Jays. Probably not. On the other side, Chase Anderson against the Phillies, Scott. No. In game two, Phillies and Blue Jays doubleheader, Chris Vince Velasquez at Toronto, or at Buffalo, I guess. No. No.

no no Scott Trent Thornton against the Phillies did Spencer Howard pitch tonight I thought I saw that I'm sorry I well he might have I'm just going off of probable pitchers on MLB.com no okay he didn't sorry I saw something different

alright who did you ask me about Frank forget it it doesn't matter anyway that guy stinks Spencer Turnbull at the White Sox would you start him Scott if I really wanted to squeeze an extra start in there but I don't have a lot of faith. Lucas Yolito is a must-start. Chris, Christian Javier at Colorado, Eke. Uh, no.

I would prefer to avoid the Rockies at home. Scott, Hermann Marquez at home in Coorsfield against Houston. Yeah, I think I would do that. I agree I want to start Javier, because that just seems like the kind of profile that could get crushed at Coorsfield, but I'll go with Marquez. Chris, Seth Lugo, back in the rotation at the Marlins.

No. No, I would expect he's probably only going to throw 50 to 60 pitches at most. Shane Bieber is must start, obviously. Trevor Williams at home against Cleveland, Scott. No. Clayton Kirshall must start at Seattle. Chris, you say Kikuchi at home against the Dodgers. No.

That's a really tough matchup. Brandon Woodruff is a must star, Jose Burrios. I assume still a must start. Nathan Avaldi, Scott, at Baltimore. I know he got hit hard last time. But he was still using the curveball a lot and got a lot of swinging strikes, so that's a good matchup. I will say yes to Avaldi.

On the other side, Asher Wojikowski, Chris, at home against the Red Sucks. No, I just, I don't think he's that good. Kyle Gibson at San Diego, Scott? No. To Nelson Lemette is a must start. He's going up against Texas Rangers. Sunny Gray at St. Louis. They must start.

Chris, Adam Wainwright, at home against Cincinnati. No. Alex Young at Oakland. Do you want to say something, Frank? No, Wayne Rates just pitched well. Alex Young's pitched well too, but Oakland's good. And I think I need to see more from Alex Young before I trust in him. Chris, Shawmaniah at home against Arizona.

Just say no. No. Last but not least, Scott, Kevin Gousman at home against the Angels. Ooh, that's a fun one. If I was looking for more strikeouts, yes. If I was looking to preserve ERA and whip, I think I'd play cautiously. For Scott and Chris, I am Frank, thank you all for listening and watching Fantasy Baseball today on our YouTube channel. We'll be back again tomorrow.

Bye-bye.