Fantasy Baseball Today - Pasquantino Called Up, Kuhl Shutout & Yepez Double Dong (6/28 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: June 28, 2022

Hey, Vinnie Pasquantino was called up by the Royals (1:40)! ... Is it time to stash Jarred Kelenic (10:20)? ... Juan Yepez is coming back around (11:55). Do we make anything of Chad Kuhl's shutout? ... Pablo Lopez has been mediocre recently (19:05). What about Montgomery, Martin Perez and Tyler Anderson? ... News (30:15): Bryce Harper needs surgery on his thumb. ... The Twins and Orioles' offenses both broke out on Monday (37:35). ... Kevin Gausman had an awesome start (46:55). ... Gavin Lux or Luis Garcia (51:10)? ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpen updates, streamers and Team Name Tuesday (53:25). 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

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question, email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your lead. Where fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Did Vinnie Pasquantino get called up today? He sure did. Welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today on Tuesday, June 28th.

Frank Sample joined by Scott White and Chris Towers. I guess technically when you're going to play. you're listening to this, he was called up yesterday. But don't worry, we'll talk about it. Big prospect, promotion, and unlikely complete game. Shout out more pitcher regression. And team name Tuesday, which I can assure you will get done about an hour and two minutes away from now, right, Chris? That's my prediction. Yeah, Scott said it's going to be the shortest show of the season. And I said, there's no way. Because anytime we have these shows where we're like, oh, really much to talk about, it's like somehow ends up being like an hour and seven minutes.

So yeah, my prediction is team name Tuesday starts an hour in. Frank promised us a game today to fill in the gaps, but he did not come through. Didn't. So I'm shaming him by predicting the shortest show of the year. I had this weird complex, I think, where when we have less games, I overprepare because I always think that we're never going to fill the show. And then we always overfill the show. So it's a minute down, baby.

Yeah, we're up to a good start. We are making great time. Let's talk about Vinnie Pasquantino, who got called up on Monday, also known as the, quote, Italian breakfast. That's his nickname. I've also seen Italian nightmare. The common denominator is that he's Italian.

So you can take that away from Vinnie Pasquantino. Apparently the nickname, the breakfast one, comes from Billy Butler, who was known as the country breakfast. So they're both first baseman. They have similar builds. Alas, this is how we get that nickname. Vinnie Pass Quantino did slow down a bit in June in the minor leagues, but overall, he was batting

280 overall with 18 home runs and a 948 OPS. I updated the first base ranks. I moved him ahead of Luke Voigt, Nate Lowe, Alex Kirillov. Might be way too aggressive. Scott, what do you think? I mean, I don't know that I'd have those three in that same order, but that sounds about right. I had him just ahead of Alex Kirillov on my top prospects to stash the last time they were both in that column. So, yeah, anywhere you were excited about picking up Kirillov, you should be excited about picking up Pasquantino and then some. Vintendo 64, I like to call him, because last year, Vinny Pasquantino had 64 extra base hits, 64 walks, and 64 strikeouts, which is interesting, not just. for the parallelism, but because that's not many strikeouts. That's a lot of walks for the number of played appearances you get in the miners,

and that's a lot of extra base hits. So this guy is a really good hitter, at least by the raw stats. This year, you know, one more walk than strikeouts, so he's continued to feed at AAA. And for a while there, you know, toward the end of May, he was looking like, he was looking like an absolute monster. It cooled off in June, as you pointed out, Frank. But I think, what was it?

I think in June he has 12 walks versus six strikeouts. So, you know, even though the numbers haven't been good, he's still done hitterish, impressive hitterish things that would lead me to believe, you know, hopefully, hopefully he's going to have a smooth transition here to the majors. Of course. That's what we assumed for Andrew Vaughn and Spencer Torkelson, who I think would be the two most relevant comps.

The difference between those three players would be, one, Pasquantino's numbers are just better, at least in terms of the plate discipline, certainly, but also, you know, I think the fact that he actually did it at double A and triple A, which Torkelson and Vaughn didn't really do. That's, of course, also because those guys are two and three years younger, respectively at the times that they made their debuts than Pasquantino is

and didn't go to double A or AAA. They skipped those levels almost entirely. And so, you know, it's, I don't know, it's, it's, I'm trying to figure out whether the fact that Pasquantan, past Guantino, like, he's older than those guys. He's 24 and he's a first base only, potentially, you know, future DH likely, um, which explains why he was never a top 100 prospect for real life prospect rankings,

because the bar for those types of players is really, really high. But the fact that he is a little more proven at the high level of the minors than Andrew Vaughn and Spencer Torkelson does maybe make it so that he's less likely to have those early struggles that we've certainly seen from both Torkelson and Vaughn. Von, turning it around this season, Torkelson, kind of showing signs lately, but not really. So I think the read there is probably like Pasquantino maybe has a higher floor and a lower ceiling than those guys. But the quality of contact metrics that we have for him are pretty good. His max exevalo, according to Baseball America last season, was one of 16.5 miles per hour, which is more than enough.

Yeah, very good. He's a fly ball heavy hitter, 40% fly ball rate basically every year. every stop in the miners, heavy pull rate guy, hits a lot of infield fly balls. You know, he actually kind of reminds me of coming up is Reese Hoskins when he got called up. You know, maybe not like the most raw power, but a swing that is geared towards getting the most out of it.

Hoskins struck out a lot more and walked more for what it's worth. But, you know, could be a situation where maybe that pull-heavy approach and maybe the fact that hits a decent amount of interest, field pop-ups throughout his minor league career, although that's been better this season. Maybe he's not quite a standout in terms of batting average the way you might think based on the minor league numbers, but all in all, I do expect or at least hope for a pretty smooth transition for Pasco Antino. Yeah, I mean, that's that's probably the least predictable part as the examples you've given have shown and others in recent years beyond just Vaughn and Torkelson. Really high-end prospects have come up and

struggled right away and I don't think I don't think I'm equipped really to say who's going to yeah who's going to sink and who's who's going to swim right away I think yeah he kind of got overlooked in traditional prospect rankless because of defensive limitations and because he hardly you know he wasn't he wasn't like a first round pick and he spent just last year and this year in the minors he was hardly there as a college player who got drafted in round 11 you know so it's kind of like the college football rankings if you don't start out at a high point. It's hard to break into that top.

I'm sure if there were any top 100 re-releases, he'd be in them now. So I think I don't want to put limits on Pasco Quantino's upside. Obviously, he's not going to be a base dealer. But I think if he's good right away, he could be really, really good right away. And, you know, part of that's going to depend on playing time. he's a left-handed batterer.

He was out of the lineup against the left-handed pitcher his first day in the majors. Is that going to be a regular thing? I imagine if he hits well, it won't be. But it may start out that way. The Royals may play games with Pasquantino's playing time at first, and we'll see if he can play his way out of it. But I think I don't want to sell the upside short. It's really just a question of, you know,

is he going to be ready to deliver right away? The comp I came to when I wrote about this for the site for CBS Sports. come today was like the good version of Yuli Guriel. You know, maybe not like huge power, although I think probably more power than you usually get from Yili Gurriel. But like hopefully, I think in a best case scenario, probably a similar approach, similar outcomes, you know, a contact-heavy approach that, you know, remember, Guriel did have a season where he hit 29 homers.

You know, we didn't think he was going to repeat that and he hasn't. But, you know, I do think that's like good batting average, good power, maybe not elite power, but I think that's within the realm of possibility for him. Vinny Pass Quantino, 45% rostered over on CBS. So pretty widely available if you need a corner infield bad, if you need a utility, whatever it might be, lots of intrigue, lots of upside there with him. Hopefully does get the opportunity to play against lefties. He's actually been pretty good against him so far in his career in the minors.

Why was he called up? Well, Carlos Santana was traded to the Seattle Mariners for right-hand to pitchers. pitcher's Wyatt Mills and William Fleming. And in the month of June, which we've referenced a few times, Carlos Santana has actually been very good. 357 batting average, two homers, 13 walks to seven strikeouts, and hitting the ball very hard.

Chris, do you have any interest in Carlos Santana, deeper league's corner infielder, the way he's playing right now? No, I think he's probably going to play about as much as he did, at least for the foreseeable future with Ty France out, because that's really the thing that, led to this, you know, if you go back far enough, is Ty France going on the aisle with that flexor strain? And I think Santana can still be a solid player, but it's not like he didn't

switch leagues. So it's not like he becomes available in only leagues. I think that's probably I'm not going to say that's the only place that he's relevant because he can be a viable 15 team option, but I don't think he's a different to make or even in that format. All right. While we're just talking about prospects quickly, someone on Twitter asked me, about stashing Jared Kellnick, and it might not be a bad idea. So far in June, hitting 276, five homers in 887 OPS, has the strikeout rate down to 21% in the month. And I read an article by Curtis Christensen from Prospectinsider.com, highlighting some mechanical

adjustments to Kellnick's batting stance, a toe tap in two strike counts, and being more loose with his hands. 37% rostered is Jared Kellnick. Scott, what do you think about stashing him? while he's been relatively hot here in June. Yeah, I thought about adding him to the five on the verge and the prospects report. I mean, he's technically not a prospect anymore,

but neither was Kirloff, and I was adding him because, I mean, what he was doing, the AAA was so impressive, wanted to shed some more light on it. Overall, as of last week, you mentioned the strikeout rate was down in June, but as of last week, when I considered it, it was over 30% still at triple.

for his entire time there. And maybe that's corrected a good bit. But if you're looking for an extra outfielder to stash, I'd rather stash Calnick at this point probably than Joe Adele, who's been hovering around the Mendoza line at AAA. Obviously, I'd much rather have Pasquantino than Calnick. But that could have probably gone without saying. All right.

Let's move into Monday's actual action here. Oh my goodness gracious. All right, oh my goodness gracious standouts from Monday. And we will start with Chris. Let's talk about Wanya Pez, who got off to a really good start at the beginning of his major league career, then kind of hit a rough patch. But he's been quite solid for the last couple of weeks, culminating in a two-homer game on Monday. I think he had three batted balls that were at least nine. 95 miles per hour in this one.

He's, I actually think Juanio Paz is kind of a decent comp for Pasquantino. I think Pasquantino probably has better plate discipline, but their production in the miners was relatively similar at the high levels. And yeah, he's hitting 326 over his past 13 games, two home runs over 100 miles per hour, the quality of contact has been improving. And yeah, I think Juanio Paz, 32% rostered is a, a, decent consolation prize of Pasquantino's not available in your league. Yep. He has started the last eight games for the Cardinals with Tyler O'Neill back on the IL.

And Scott, I know this is something you've referenced before where, you know, prospect comes up, he hits well, you know, kind of falls back a little bit. And then bounces back once again, which is what Juan Yippez has done here. He's 32% rostered. Let's just say, who would you rather take a shot on right now, Yippez or Vinnie Pasquantino? Pasquantino, baby. like I said, I'm not putting limits on the upside. I think Chris's comps that he's been giving are on the conservative side,

which is, you know, there's nothing wrong with that. It's, it's, I don't mind, I don't mind dreaming with prospects, though, of what could be. I mean, he could hit 282 with a 30 Homer pace. What is that? What one you have passed? is currently doing. Yeah, he could. Do you think Juan Yuppez is going to do that?

I don't think he's likely to continue to hit this well moving forward. I think he's overperforming his expected stats a little bit. The quality of contact metrics aren't all backing up what he's doing, especially, you know, the max exevalo is there. He's 95th percentile there, 114. Max Exezyvelo. but he's been inconsistent with the quality of contact, I would say. And that's reflected in the fact that early on when he had, what, three home runs in his first seven games or whatever it was, the quality of contact was pretty middling.

He was getting a bunch of multi-hit games, but it was a lot of like 84 mile per hour line drives over the second baseman's head or whatever. But I think the minor league production, you know, I don't think Pasquantino has like a huge edge there. They're similar build, similar profiles, same age. So I think they're pretty similar players. I want to say Pasquantino is quite a bit more disciplined than Yuppez and the minors. Yes, that would be the main difference, yeah. And that's probably the thing I care about most of all, which is maybe why I'm higher on Pasquantino than you are,

is like if you're walking 12% of the time and striking out 12% of the time, like Pasquantino is, like, I don't care what level you're at. That's, that is, that is impressive. All right. Yepes did hit for more power, I would say. Chris, would you, you did have a 972 OPS at AAA. Chris, if you had to add one, who would you take, Ypez or Fini P? I would go with Pasquantino.

You know, I think Yipaz is kind of the, the consolation prize if you miss on on Pasquantino. All right, fair enough. While we're talking about Ypez, Cardinal outfielder, Dylan Carlson, I wanted to mention he went two for four with a double and triple. Low key has been solid since the start of May, hitting 2.95, four homers, 12 doubles, two steals, a 16% strikeout rate, 10% walk rate. Not hitting the ball all that hard. He's 61% rostered. He looks like a slap header. It's weird.

Yeah. There's not a lot of power, but in a points league, the doubles, the plate discipline, it seems pretty helpful. Scott, what do you think about Dylan Carlson? I don't think much of Tilling Carlson I'd be honest All right Well I tried Dylan if you're listening Oh my goodness gracious for you Scott Who do you have

Okay I'm going to go with Chad Cool Who did a cool thing On Monday He was at course fields He was facing the Dodgers He threw a complete game Shutout

Wow Good for him Yeah I don't see much to excited about here. He has a bad walk rate. He has a bad strikeout rate. He has a bad fly ball rate. He has, after the shutout, a 349 ERA, very solid.

His ex-fip is 458. And I will point out, X-FIP, one of the qualities of X-FIP is that it normalizes for venue. And his venue happens to be the worst one for pitchers. So if it was taking into account Cors field, which X-FIP doesn't do, but if it did, it would be even worse than 4-58, is what I'm trying to say. And yeah, it's don't go getting excited about Chad Cool or anything. I always find it so interesting when a player, hitter, pitcher, whatever it might be, has this dominant game, but is this a player we don't believe in whatsoever? We still bring them up early in the podcast because obviously we have to, but. It's, it just kind of reminds me of like when Reid Dettmers do that no hitter and then, you know, we just kind of poo-pooed him the whole time and then we get yelled that for it.

The good news is there's no Rockies fans. There's no Rocky's fans out there, so we won't get yelled at. I mean, where's Reed-Detmers? Yeah, where's Reed-Detmers now, baby? Yeah. Chad, cool, I was surprised to see still 40% rostered. Scott, we were talking beforehand. You made a good point that he was dominant early on.

So I think people might have just added him and held on. But he is a spark. I believe. So this is a two-starred week for a SPARP. So, you know, I started him in one points league. I can't say that it's like the smartest thing I've ever done. Yeah, two cores fields start. One again, the Dodgers.

I don't even know who the second one. Diamondbacks. Diamondbacks, yeah. But still, course, field. Like, no, I'm glad it worked out. Wouldn't have done in a Roto League. Don't think he has any value in a Roto league. Fortune.

favors the brave for one, Chris Towers, who rolled out Chad Cool, two starts in Corse Field. I will also point out, I think this might have been a little circumstantial. The Dodgers played a long Sunday night game. Then they were in Atlanta. They had to travel to Colorado, play the very next day. It's a lot going on there. So we love you, Chad, cool, but not enough to recommend adding you in fantasy baseball. Oh my goodness gracious for me, Pablo Lopez, and this will kind of lead us into a discussion about more pitchers regressing.

I don't know if this has happened to you guys but I have roto leagues that have completely flipped where the first month of the season I had like no hitting points now my hitting is great and my pitching has gone down the drain and part of the reason might be Pablo Lopez

so let's take a look at what is going on with him. You know I do have a league like that and I have Pablo Lopez on it well let's talk about it. Seriously enough A recent run of mediocrity this time at the Cardinals where he gives up five runs over five innings pitched. He did have 13 swinging strikes. Good amount of hard contact against him. Average exit velocity up over 94 miles per hour in the start. And over his last eight starts, Pablo Lopez, a 4.89 ERA just under a strikeout per inning. The walks and the home runs have gone up.

Obviously, that's going to lead to a bunch of issues. The overall ERA is still very good. 2.98. But Chris, if we kind of break the season down into segments so far, it's been the first six, seven starts. We're great for Lopez, but the last eight have not been. What do you think about Pablo Lopez here? Yeah, there have been ups and downs within that eight. And if you go, you know, one start further back, you end up with the three or seven innings,

one earned run, 11 strikeout starts. So, you know, we're kind of dealing with arbitrary endpoints here. I think in this case, the overall record is, you know, high 2's low 3 ZRA, XERA, all the peripheral stats, mostly suggest that he's a low 3 ZRA. And I think that's what he is. So it's not really, for me, a question of, is Pablo Lopez useful or is he good? I think he is good. he's not one of the seven best pitchers in baseball or like whatever he looked like early on in the season he was never going to continue to be that but i still think most of the eri estimators suggest that paba lopez remains quite good and the strikeout rate has gone down a little bit um you know in the the last eight starts but still good enough for a guy who does a pretty good job of suppressing quality of contact and i i i

I think he'll continue to be pretty good. But you missed your so high opportunity. The swinging strike rate during this eight-start stretch has been about 14%, which is still a top 10 among qualifiers kind of swinging strike rate. So I don't think, you know, it's not like Pablo Lopez was faking it earlier. His stuff is legitimately high-end. And, yeah, it's been a little...

Let's see, so what does this... So in the seven starts leading up to this start, which was, you know, a run per inning, obviously, in this start. It was a 431 ERA in the previous seven. So it was shaky, but it's not like he was getting crushed. And as you mentioned, Frank, his ERA even now is only 298. So, yeah, I think, I think of anything, you could possibly make a buy-low argument for Pablo Lopez. Just, you know, if somebody's looking at the raw numbers, they still look. look great, but maybe the experience of having him recently, uh, the person who has Lopez will

have soured on him. So I don't look into. Even during this stretch, it's really only two bad starts. It's the one where he gave up six or six earned and five and a third and then this one, five and five and five. As than that, he has one start with four innings, four and runs and seven innings. Another start with four and runs and seven innings. That's obviously that's not a good start, but like you'll live with that. Not every time out. That would be a, you know, five-ish ERA. But you can live with those kind of starts. That's not too concerning.

So I don't know, he's been prone throughout his career to these blow-up starts or stretches that kind of wreck his overall line. And I think that's the bigger concern for me with Pablo Lopos is actually just the shoulder. You know, the fact that he's had multiple shoulder injuries and multiple seasons. That's the bigger concern. I think he's going to be good when he's healthy. But, you know, I think you can still make a case that potentially you sell high on Pablo Lopez just because the injury risk does linger. Or loom, I guess would be the better word. All right.

So you ask Chris, he'll tell you to continue to look to sell high. And Scotty says to buy low. Well, if you can. If you can. If you can. I think he's a, I would rank him as a top 20 starter. Yes. Rest of season.

So if you can, I don't know what a good comp is. but if you could give up who's somebody who's been kind of hot recently. I don't know, I'm choking, sorry. Loken Gilbert. Sure, if you can give up, I would... Or Zach Galen. Definitely Galen.

Yeah, Galen's good. If you could give up Galen for Pablo Lopez, I would do that. What about Goncelain for Lopez? That's good. That'd be hard to do. Yeah. Would I do it? I think because of the injury risk, I wouldn't do it.

Lopez's injury risk. It just doesn't really feel like it makes sense to do, you know? I don't like, yeah, I don't like doing trades where I feel like it's basically a lateral move. And that's what I feel like that would be. Yeah, fair enough. All right, Pablo Lopez there. A few other pitchers who have been regressing as of late, Jordan Montgomery, up against the Oakland A's. Come on, the Oakland A's great matchup.

He gave up five runs over six and two-thirds innings. Six strikeouts. He settled down. It was, it was all right. 15 swinging strikes in this start. The ERA is now 3.27. It seems very obvious to me that the Yankees are consciously having Jordan Montgomery and James and Tyone pitch to contact the season. They're really not walking anybody. I think that they're just trying to fill up the strike zone. And for the most part, it has worked. But obviously, you know, you pitch in the strike zone, things are going to happen eventually. and we've seen that with Montgomery and Jameson recently. Martin Perez. Don't doubt yourself too much, Chris.

Another blast start. His second in his last four outings, he gave up four runs over six innings pitched, six strikeouts. Okay. Tyler Anderson has now allowed exactly four runs in three of his last four starts. He was at the Rockies where he gave up four runs over six innings with 10 hits allowed in this one. Chris, do you actually have any concerns

with Tyler Andrews? Martin Perez Jordan Montgomery I think Anderson you can give him the the courts field benefit of the doubt and then I just don't think Perez or Montgomery are all that good so I it doesn't change how I think about them but that's because I don't think particularly highly of them so I think both of them are still sell high candidates all right any different thoughts here Scott well look like Perez is getting crushed at first those pretty solid bounce for him almost getting a quality start out of it just to run high on that.

So that was, you know, if you had him in your lineup for the two starts, that could still turn out favorably for you. Yeah, Anderson is the one that I think, yeah, it was a bad, it was Coorsfield and you could maybe give him a pass for that. But it's been a while now since he was racking up strikeouts. His past six starts, Tyler Anderson, it's only 6.6.6. K per 9. The swinging strike rate is respectable,

but it wasn't prior to tonight. He had a pretty good swinging strike game. Actually, he didn't. Okay, so I probably calculated it wrong. I think the swinging strike rate is only around 10% during that six-start stretch, too. I was trying to calculate it with this. Today he had 10 swinging strikes on 96 pitches.

That's not a great rate. So probably about 10 per 9, or I'm sorry, 10% swinging strike rate over that six-start stretch. not what you'd expect, not what you'd call a strikeout pitcher, either of those numbers. And we were kind of hanging,

the breakout case for Tyler Anderson really depended on that about him establishing this swing and miss change up and throwing it more. And he may be doing, he may be going the way of Eric Lauer here where he was able to sustain that for half a dozen starts.

But in the end, the track record is catching up to him here. I'm not ready to say that for sure for Tyler Anderson. The Dodgers have a really good track record of maximizing pitchers output, their potential.

Maybe this is the blip for Tyler Anderson, but the track record would suggest that the earlier run of success was. I think for him it's just he might have a really, really thin margin for error. He doesn't the feel for the change up, things could be, things could get ugly quickly. Yeah, he had to throw his fastball more in this start. It just seems like he really didn't have that changeup or cutter going.

And his foreseen fastball is a bad pitch. That is Tyler Anderson we're talking about. So someone, again, like the others, just kind of quietly shop him around, see what you can get for Tyler Anderson. Again, sell high. High is the keyword there for him. Before we hit the break, just a reminder, if you listen to us on Spotify, help us out. say five star rating there.

In fact, if you listen to us on Apple, you can help us out there too. You can drop a question, a team name in the Apple podcast review, and we will read it on an upcoming episode. We do have team name Tuesday coming up a little bit later on, and we'll take a break. Be back right after this. The news and notes, Bryce Harper is expected to undergo surgery to repair his fractured left thumb, but he plans to return this season, which, what would that bring him to mid-August, something like that.

It's rough. Yeah, I saw it back by the end of August. Ugh. So there's not going to be much time left. I mean, any six-plus week injury at this point in the season, you know, you're... Probably the rest of the regular season in a points league. Yeah, right. Like if you're not going to be in the playoffs, you might not get anything from that player anymore.

And of course, any one setback could make it officially. season ender. It's amazing that we're already halfway through the season. And we're saying that about these players, isn't it? Yeah. Is that just me? No, no. It took me by surprise as well. We're not technically there yet, but we're close. Yeah, I mean, I guess the end of June technically, right?

Like, first three months? This is kind of like our friend Heath Cummings arguing that 30 is middle-aged. You know, we're at the midpoint of the season because we're in the middle third of the season. You know? We're at the season is six months long, and we're at the end of the third month.

Yeah, I would say, I mean, look, it started the first week into April, so I guess it technically wouldn't be until the first week of July. But yeah, I typically look at the end of June as like the midpoint of the baseball season. Speaking of being 30, Chris, I saw your tweet about getting old and struggling with softball recuperation. I played in Frank's softball game on or games on Sunday. day two games. Embarrassed myself misplaying the first bad ball hit to me out in right field. It was really real bad. Then I had softball today and boy I feel like I'm going to die. Yeah, that's basically me every Monday of my life. My elbow hurts so much between like flag football

and on Wednesday softball yesterday and then today. I just like my elbow feels like it's going to fall off. You raise a good point though, Chris. What is middle age these days? You're going to have to talk to Heath about this. Heath is adamant that like 27 is middle-aged because the average lifespan is like 78. And so if you break the life into the average lifespan into thirds, everything that falls in the middle third is middle-aged. It is a bonkers theory.

And I just wanted to throw it out there. A couple years ago, I described myself to a doctor as, entering middle age and he rejected that notion. And I was like, well, well, you know, I'm, I'm 30, I'm 38 now. So I was probably like 36, 35 at the time. And I was like, you know, I can't define it. I can't define it, but I know it when I see it. Okay.

Yeah. I mean, my hair is turning gray as, you know. I've got like four or five white mustache hairs now. I feel much older than I actually am, but. People don't want to, people don't care about that. Jack Flaherty was placed back on the IL with a right shoulder strain as we unfortunately suspected. His teammate Harrison Bader also went to the IL due to plantar fasciitis. Dylan Carlson started in centerfield with Lars and

Knutbar in right field. Apparently Newtbar can start against right-handed pitching moving forward. Chris Sale will throw three innings in a rehab start at AA on Thursday. Looks like Sale is being prepped for a post-all our break return to the Red Sox. Suspensions have been handed out for Sunday's brawl between the Mariners and Angels. Angels Mariner, manager.

Phil Nevin suspended 10 games. Rightfully so. What did he actually do in the middle of everything? It sounds like he started, I can't remember the relief pitcher's name, but it sounded like he started him with the explicit intention of having him throw at the Mariners'

batters. All right. Well, Jesse Winker got seven games. Sounds like he's going to appeal, but yeah, could miss a big portion of this week if you started him, unfortunately. I mean, that's like 8% of the rest of the season, depending on how long he pushes it. If it goes another couple weeks, you're talking almost 10% of the rest of the season. Yep. J.P. Crawford got five games, Julio Rodriguez, and Rice-Eliglacius each got two games. Glebert Torres was out of the lineup on Monday after receiving a cortisone shot in his wrist. He'll miss at least one more game as a result. A roll as Chapman will make his final rehab appearance

at AAA on Tuesday, and they continue to say that Clay Holmes will operate as their highest leverage reliever, which could be the eighth or ninth innings. I did see a quote from Aaron Boone today that may challenge that idea. Now, it was, I don't have the full context for this quote. It was tweeted by Laura Albanese maybe have pronounced that name to the sports writer for Newsday

Clay has certainly earned that closer role is what Boone said. In the beginning the tweet goes on they plan to give Chapman a few appearances to get in a good spot delivery-wise and then

another quote that'll give the Yankees a new it'll give the Yankees a second back-end monster. So I don't know. Based on that tweet and what she decided to exclude from the quote, it seems to me like they might at least be on equal footing, Chapman and Clay Holmes. I did a horrible job describing it. I'm sorry.

That's, I thought it was a worthy tweet to bring up. No, definitely. I don't know. We'll see where it goes from here. Clay Holmes has, arguably, maybe not arguably, been the best reliever in baseball this season. I don't see why they would take them out of the ninth, but alas, politics. I got one of the best closers in history still on their roster. That would be why, but yeah, I mean, Clay Holmes looks like one of the, arguably the best closer in baseball right now. So that's going to be a tough call for Aaron Boone. As expected, both Jaron Duran and Tanner Halk were placed on the restricted list while in Toronto. Mitch Hanager remains on track for a return sometime around the All-Star Break. He's been out since late April due to a high ankle sprain. Trevor Larnick is expected to miss six weeks after undergoing core muscle surgery on Monday. Brian Anderson was reinstated by the Marlins and it will be interesting to see how they divvy up playing time between him and John Birdie, the rest of the team.

They have a few names and players that they can move around. I know that Jazz Chisholm is dealing with some back spasms, so that allowed both Brian Anderson and John Birdie to be in the lineup on Monday. Tyler McGill was transferred to the 60-day IL, which means he will be out until mid-August at the earliest. Let's take a look at some offensive outbursts here on Monday. The twins put up 11 runs on 14 hits. Carlos Correa hit his eighth home run,

and he's having a monster June, 3.43 batting average. five home runs in the month. Gary Sanchez went three for five with his ninth homer. Gio Orchello went three for five with two doubles, two RBI. Last but not least, Alex Kirillov breakout week starts with three hits and two runs scored. Let's see if he can build off of that. Who did they score all of these runs off of Trista McKenzie? You want to talk about regression.

He has now allowed 13 runs over his last two starts, which includes five home runs. He did have seven strikeouts in this start, 15 swinging strikes. You like to see both of those things. But, man, as much hard contact and fly balls as he allows. I mean, I guess we should have seen this regression coming. But, Chris, this was a pretty rough start to the week if you used McKenzie as a two-star pitcher. Yeah, I think he needs to go the way we saw Josiah Gray pitch on Sunday, where it was just really heavy slider and curveball usage.

They're very, I think they're kind of the Spider-Man meme, except McKenzie throws his fastball 60% of the time. He probably needs to fix that moving forward. Yes, I would agree. Scott, would you look to buy low on Tristan McKenzie after these recent two starts? They were both against the twins, so it could just be the twins own him or something.

No, I think Tristan McKenzie has flaws that he will have to overcome to be a reliable pitcher in fantasy. I think he's a useful one as it is. these last two starts haven't changed my opinion, but vulnerable to home runs, just like Josiah Gray. I mean, Chris makes a good comparison there, I think, where you definitely see the potential for more

from both of those pitchers, and maybe Josiah Gray is figuring out how to get the most out of what he offers quicker than McKenzie is. But for now, I see them both as pretty risky and vulnerable to blowups just like this. All right. On the other side, Sunny Gray turns in his first quality start since returning from the IL at the Guardian's seven shutout innings with three strikeouts. Only had five swinging strikes. He did lean into the sinker in this start. So that probably explains the lack of swinging strikes. ERA is down to 2.17. Scott, do you think that we just kind of undervalue, I guess, disrespect Sunny Gray?

Because whenever he's pitched, he's been pretty good. It's been ups down. one year this year to that, but overall for his career, 3.57 ERA, it's, you know, solid for Sunny Gray. Sunny Gray is the bane of my existence as a fantasy baseball analyst, so I don't feel confident assessing our assessment of Sunny Gray, as you just asked me to do. You're always either too high or too low on him. Yes, yes. I think it's interesting that he has... sort of faded his best swing and miss pitch. He only threw five sliders in this one.

And that's historically been when he's been a strikeout pitcher, which hasn't been very consistent in being a good source of strikeouts. But when he has been one, it's usually because he's leaned on that slider more. And he's been throwing it less and less over the course of this season, and nonetheless has a 217 ERA and 0.97 whip. So I don't know what I'm supposed to make of that. I think I think Sunny Gray is pretty,

pretty firmly in the mid-tier pitcher camp and not somebody that we should consider must start but deserves to be rostered widely like he is. All right, let's move over to

another amazing offense. The Orioles, really? They matched five home runs at the Mariners. Anthony Santander hit his 14th. Ryan Moucassel hit his 13th. Austin Hayes hit his 11th, Jorge Mateo hit his sixth home run, and Adley Rutchman, two more hits for him, including his third home run of the season, and he is having a solid June as well.

271 batting average, 10 doubles, three homers, 91.6 mile per hour, average exit velocity for Adlead Ruchman. You know, this is how things used to be. We've talked about it a lot. Prospects come up, they struggle, you know, start to gain a little bit more confidence, and then they get going, and that looks like the case for Adle Ruchman. Who did they do all this damage against? George Kirby got crushed.

He gave up seven runs over four endings pitched, including four home runs allowed. The ERA is now up to 4.08, and Chris, admittedly, I just kind of struggle to figure out George Kirby, which is fine. I mean, he's a 24-year-old rookie pitcher. I'm not going to judge him too harshly, but his best skill right now is control.

He doesn't walk anybody. His seven walks and 10 starts, but outside of that, he just doesn't really have another standout skill so far. What do you think? Yeah, it doesn't really have a standout pitch either except for the maybe the fastball. I think he's probably someone who would benefit from throwing outside of the strike zone a little more and trying to get more chases. Because his whiff rate on all of his secondary pitches is really low. His best whiff rate on any of his pitches is fastball at 27%. slider's 21, changeups 21.

His curveball has a 9% whiff rate. That would be incredibly low for a fastball. That would be incredibly low for a sinker, let alone a curveball. So yeah, I think he's still, he probably pitches in the zone too much and he's going to have to rely on getting a lot of weak contact. And I don't know if, you know, we can say for sure he has that skill yet.

So I think he's probably a somewhat limited pitcher right now. All right. So George Kirby, use them in the right matchups. Look, two-star week. I started him in a few different leagues. It sucks. This is what makes fantasy. This is what makes fantasy baseball so frustrating

because you have George Kirby against the Orioles in Seattle, and then you have Chad Kuhl against the Dodgers in Colorado. Turns out Chad Kool is the right one to start. Yeah. So frustrating. On the other side, Tyler Wells was starting for the Orioles and had allowed three earned runs or fewer in every start, but one. It's a little misleading because he doesn't go that deep into his starts.

But he was solid here, five innings, one hit, one run, three strikeouts allowed, lowers the ERA to 3.23. Underlying numbers, not very good for Tyler Wells. 41% rostered. Scott, what do you think of him? He has SPARP eligibility for those in points leagues. I don't think much of him He's generally not a bat misser

And he has an extreme fly ball rate So you can you see You can see It happens sometimes that extreme fly ball pitchers like this Have stretches where they're able to sustain a really low ERA Just because not enough of those fly balls Are clearing the fence to To inflate the ERA the way

Flyball pitchers are vulnerable to the way we've seen Tristan McKenzie do in his past couple starts. And it usually catches up to the pitcher. Occasionally, you'll find an extreme flyball pitcher like Christian Javier, for instance, who the flyballs just don't get hit that hard. They manifest as a lot more infield flies than the sort of flyballs that are going to threaten to carry over the fence. But I'm not ready to say Tyler Wells is one of those exceptions. That's what Wells has done this season.

He's getting a ton of infield fly balls 13% rate. He's got a 29% fly ball rate, only a 20% line drive rate. So like, if he was to be successful, this would be the way to do it. But like Christian Javier also has a strikeout rate that's nearly double Tyler Wells.

So like that's, that's really where I think Tyler Wells falls way short. It's just unless he's going to be, you know, one of the five or so best pitchers in baseball in terms of quality of content, tech suppression, it's probably going to go south for him pretty quickly. Yeah, and he's actually done a solid job in terms of limiting hard contact, Tyler Wells, but not at an elite level or anything.

So, need to see more. I picked him up in one of her, I think a podcast points league and starred him just because I was desperate for a reliever. Yeah, it's a spark. The danger in that is that for this profile of pitcher, if it is going to go wrong and we think it's going to go wrong, it's likely to go. very, very wrong. So I would just steer clear of Wells personally. I'll tell you what, Scott. If there's ever a year to be a fly ball pitcher in Camden Yards, I think it's probably this one,

given their changes to dimensions. Other pitching leftovers from Monday, Kevin Gosman tied a season high with 10 strikeouts against the Red Sox. He went seven shutout, added 18 swinging strikes. Adam Wainwright gets back on track after two subpar outings. He's He was up against the Marlins, went seven shutout with nine strikeouts. And Lucas Gilito tosses his first quality start since June 5th, this one at the Angels, six innings of two-run ball with six strikeouts,

14 swinging strikes, still gave up some hard contact. I'm not sure that he's fixed, but, you know, it was a strong recovery, though, because I think he had all six of those hits allowed through three innings, and I'm like, oh, man, Lucas Jolito's getting knocked around again. And then he recovered to have. have a really nice looking line against the angels.

You know, three innings were, if not perfect, close to it to finish out the day. Yeah, it's pretty rough when you've got Gavin Sheets in the outfield, too. I saw he was trying to catch a ball that Brandon Marsh hit, and it hit off of his glove, and it went over the fence that he originally called it a home run, and then it was ruled a triple after review, but it doesn't help with those kind of outfielders out there. I'll tell you that for sure. Chris, anything you'd like to add on Gialito, Wayne right, Kevin Gosman from Monday. I think Gosman's perfectly fine.

I never dropped him outside of my top five starting pitchers once I moved him in there, despite his relative struggles. And I think he may have found the answer. There was a belief among the Blue Jays that he was tipping his pitches, and I don't know if you guys watched this start. He's using like a softball mitt, and it's kind of hilarious. He's got this giant glove now that he's using. He said he can barely field with it.

but he, uh, it's helping him hide the ball better. So, hey, whatever works. Interesting. I'm not joking. It sounds like I'm joking. I, I'm not. He's using like a, it's like a soft, it's like a 14 inch mitt. I started writing in Gosman on Twitter and it just went to Gosman glove.

It's just like all filled out. So I guess everyone's looking up Kevin Gosman's glove right now. Is it like that Mickey Hatcher glove and the famous baseball card? Yeah, yeah, like that thing. Yeah, I actually do know what you're talking about. I was surprised to see that his whip was 1.24, despite, you know, having a very good season for Gossman. I mean, his BABIP is 366. It's, you know, much higher than his career mark.

So I would imagine there is some regression coming in the Bavip department for Kevin Gossman and hopefully better whip moving forward for him. Ironically, I'm watching the game right now, and he just had a ball hit right back to him with his giant club. He fielded it perfectly fine. So he's perfectly fine. Hey, that'll help the bad, but let's do it. Anything with these two, Scott, I know Eric Fetty, we recommended him as a two-star pitcher. He was fine, five innings, two runs,

four strikeouts. The other one is Connor Seabold. He started for the Red Sox. He got hit hard, he gave up seven runs over four and two-thirds. He had 21 swinging strikes, and he's actually had a pretty good minor league career. He's 26 years old, 3% rostered. What do you think?

Anything with Fetty and Connor Seabold? Yeah, Fetty was just totally a match-ups thing to favorable ones in a week where there weren't many two-star pitchers to choose from. So, you know, the needle doesn't really move with this start. Fortunately, he didn't ruin you if you did follow through with that. Yeah, Sebald is, I got to be honest, I didn't. I saw the line and I didn't bother to look into it further because it was such a bad performance.

But yeah, AAA this year, 209 ERA, 0.99 whip. right at a strikeout per inning. I'm going to have to look into him more. He's 26 years old, so that's kind of a red flag. Yeah, he's on the older side. I'll need to look into it more. He is the 14th ranked prospect in the Red Sox organization, according to nlb.com.

So I don't know. Just pay attention, throw him on the scout team. Connor Seabold, the name there. Let's see where it goes from here. A few waiver-wire decisions for hitters. I think I know the answer to this one. But Chris, Gavin Lux or Luis Garcia, I'll point out, in the month of June, Gavin Lux is hitting 3.47.

He's got one homers, six doubles, two steals. What do you think about those two? I like both of them. There's a lot that Gavin Lux is doing right. His quality of contact has been pretty good in the month of June. His zone contact rate is really high. I think it's like 85% or something. He's starting to look like what the Gavin Lux

the version of Gavin Lux who would be good would have looked like. I think if I was going to add one of them it would probably be Garcia but I don't know people have been so slow to pick up Garcia despite the fact that he's hitting like 330 that

I don't know maybe there's a better chance that Lux gets picked up and the opportunity cost tips that way but I do think I like Luis Garcia better I definitely like Garcia better I'm kind of over Lux he'll go on these stretches where

he hits for average but not much else and yeah I don't know I just I just don't see much there I see a lot more there for Garcia and I'd go with him all right if you need a I guess either position corner infielder or outfielder they both play both Garrett Cooper went three for three is now batting

386 with two home runs a 952 OPS in June and Connor two hits Connor Joe goes two for four once again now has multiple hits in four of his last five games Scott I know you recommended Connor Joe as a sleeper this week

and Garrett Cooper last week but if you're just kind of projecting rest of season who do you like more? Garrett Cooper, Connor Joe. I think I like Cooper more I can see going with Joe over him in a points league where you

know you don't like Cooper's probably going to hit for a better batting average. Joe might reach base at a higher rate. So it's, and I don't think either one of them has significant power. So it's a close call, but I'd probably say Cooper and Roto, Joe in points. All right. Some hitting leftovers. O'Neill Cruz hit his first home run of the season, a laser.

This was a ridiculous, ridiculous home run. I don't know if you guys saw it, but it's like... The hang time was, I think they said four seconds or something. It's like off the outside corner, like high and outside, and he pulls it to the right side. And this thing must not have gotten more than about 30 feet off the ground at any point. It looks like a double to the gap that just keeps going. He's ridiculous. Yeah, 109.8 miles per hour off the bat there for O'Neill Cruz.

And I don't want to poo-poo the Pirates broadcasters or their fans. You should be excited about O'Neill Cruz, but they call this home run like they just won the World Series. It's, it's interesting. I just want to see everything O'Neill Cruz does just for how they call it on the Pirates broadcast, because it's pretty entertaining right now. Anthony Rizzo hit his 20th home run. John Carlos Stanton hit his 18th. The Blue Jays, they hit a couple of dingers themselves. Vlad Jr. hit his 18th. George Springer hit his 14th, and Matt Chapman hit his 11th. What do you know? John Birdie, he hit a single, and what he do? He stole a base. He's now up to 22 steals on the season. Paul Goldschmidt went four for four with

with his 19th Homer. He's betting 3.47. There could be someone that I'm just completely missing right now. But is Paul Goldschmidt the favorite for National League MVP? I don't really think about those things. Me neither.

Oh, Machado. I mean, Goldsmith's having a better season than Machado. Like, it definitive... Machado's like half a win clear of him, but I guess it's a lot defense. Goldschmidt is... Goldschmidt does lead the Fangraph's offensive value metric

by a significant margin. among all players right now. Yeah. I mean, the Padres have been a very good story, so I get it with Machado. Colchman has just been ridiculous. Mitch Garver went two for four, hit his eighth home run.

Good to see as he battles through that forearm injury. And Whitmerfield went two for five with his 11th steel. He now has four steals over his last 10 games, which helps when you consider he's betting 233. So, not great. So it took me a long, a bit, longer to look up, but according to

baseball reference war, which is calculated differently from FanGraph's War, Goldschmidt actually is ahead of Machado. However, there is an NL hitter tied with Goldschmidt who isn't Machado. Any

guesses who that might be? I'll give you one each because you're never going to get it. Now I want to think of a completely obscure player. I don't have anything good. Who is it? Tommy Edmund. Ah, his teammate. Which is mostly defense as well.

Yeah. It's not. He's 10th overall in Fangraph's War. I guess that's, he's like fourth. Danesby Swanson's actually tied with Paul Goldschman and Fangraphs War. Danesby Swanson, man. That guy's going to get paid, hopefully. I'm rooting for you.

Get your money, kid. Call to the bullpen. The Nationals, Kyle Finnegan, picked up his first save. Tanner Rainey had pitched three of the Nationals. previous five games. So Kyle Finnegan gets it there. And then for the Angels, Rice Lake Glacius pitch a clean ninth

for his 14th save. To stream or not to stream, we'll start with Tuesday. Zach Pleseck versus the Twins. Jose Kintana at the Nationals. Ross Stripling versus the Red Sox. Michael Waka at the Blue Jays. Dakota Hudson versus the Marlins.

John Gray at the Royals. Johnny Quato at the Angels. And Dean Kramer at the Mariners. John Gray I'm going to keep saying it you want to start him against the Royals and otherwise Dakota Hudson against the Marlins I'm okay with

all right on Wednesday we've got Mitch Keller at the Nationals Dane Dunning at the Royals Zach Rankie versus the Rangers Chris Flexen versus the Orioles anybody else Dylan Bundy

at the Guardians that's fun Andre Palante versus the Marlins. And, yeah, I'm Justin Steele versus the Reds. Okay. Nah. Dain Donnie at the Royals? I'm not buying Mitch Keller, like, you know, being good,

but I'm fine with it against the Nationals. Yeah. He's been okay. He's kind of turned into, I don't know. Mitch Keller normally is, you know, he gets rocked. or he's awesome and now he's just kind of been mediocre all the time. So it's, I don't know. Yeah, I saw this stat that was like no pitcher,

like no pitcher had thrown more than six sliders with more than 20 inches of horizontal break at harder than 85 miles per hour all season and Mitch Keller did six of it, did that six times in his start on Friday. And it's like, all I can think was, man, it's fitting that that happened in a start where he gave up three runs and five innings.

Yeah, it's just, That sounds about right. Yeah, it's Mitch Keller. But maybe he'll give up two runs in five innings tomorrow. All right. Team name Tuesday. 58 minutes. Take that, Chris.

This one's from Big Daddy Lowry on Twitter. Captain Kirk and the Enterprise. Okay. He sent a screenshot of Alejandro Kirk doing the Star Trek thing as well. I didn't see that the other day. Yeah, that was awesome. Emails. This one's from John.

Well, these couple are from John. Daddy Schwabucks. Yep. Cacuna Jr. For my Pokemon fans out there. Kiroloff to see the wizard. Yep. From Mark, if you're having Gurio problems,

I feel bad for Ryu, son. Yep. Is that a yupp? That sounds like Heath came up with it. I like that. From Thomas for Frank Star Wars Education. Let the Mookie win. Yep.

from Dylan Morel of the story Yep And from Willie Commish on Apple Podcasts reviews Billy Bean is not my lover I thought

That was pretty good All right we're gonna wrap there For Scott and Chris I am Frank Thank you all for listening and watching Fantasy Baseball today We'll be back again tomorrow

Bye bye