Fantasy Baseball Today - Rankings Risers & Fallers! Shōta Imanaga Top-30 SP? (5/2 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: May 2, 2024

Shōta Imanaga continues to dominate (3:08)! ... Is Jurickson Profar doing anything different (7:40)? Regression is coming for players, whether you want to believe it or not (10:45)! ... News (20:42): Gerrit Cole isn't throwing off a mound yet. ... Nick Lodolo, Jack Flaherty and Steven Kwan were some of the biggest rankings risers (26:46). ... Chris Bassitt, Joe Musgrove and Mitch Keller are moving down the rankings (37:30). ... Four quick questions on Musgrove, Ronald Acuña, Zach Eflin and Jackson Merrill (42:20). ... Any interest in Oswaldo Cabrera, Tyler Black or Willi Castro (50:40)? ... Luis Gil outdueled Corbin Burnes in Baltimore (53:28). ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpen updates and streamers (1:00:45). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday Download and Follow Fantasy Baseball Today on Spotify: https://sptfy.com/QiKv Get awesome Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: http://bit.ly/3y8dUqi Follow FBT on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1 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/ 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. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. What's up and welcome in to Fantasy Baseball today on Thursday. May 2nd, I am Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White and Chris Towers. Today on the show, we have rankings, risers, and fallers. Shota Imanaga continues to dominate.

I have four quick questions for the guys that will come later on and much more. Let's jump in. Go crazy, all right. We will start with Chris. Okay. That's a weird noise you made. I know Scott was all hyped up to get us started, but we'll start with Shota.

If you want to pass it on to Scott, it's all you. No, the big story of the day is Shota Imanaga, who continues to pitch like an absolute Ace, it's a 0.78 ERA through his first six starts. I can't remember the exact stat, but I saw something on Twitter that it was the best ERA through six starts since Tungsten Armo Doyle in 1917 or something. I think it was Fernando Valenzuela's first six starts. Remember that guy, Fernando Mania? That was a big deal.

Yeah, I wasn't alive for it and you weren't either. None of us were. But we all remember it. Oh, yeah. No. I remember I did in fourth grade. We had to do a biography. We had to like stand in front of the class and like give some person's biography.

And Fernando Valenzuela was the book I found in the library of a baseball player. So I did him. So I stood in front of the class and talked about it. But that is the extent of my memory of it. Well, we all remember Dantra Willis. And those were very similar. Yeah, that was good. Shota Imanaga anyway.

Had another excellent start. seven strikeouts over seven shutout innings at the Mets, three hits, one walk, one great quote about how he looked out his window and recognized a building from the Spider-Man movie and he said, hey, that's where Spider-Man lives.

So that was fun. He's awesome. I don't know exactly how awesome he's going to be moving forward, but Shodeminaug is clearly awesome. His fastball is, this is a word that gets thrown around a lot in sports, but I think it applies here. It's a unicorn in terms of shape and velocity. It's got 20 inches of induced vertical break, which I'm told is a really high number, especially given his arm angle. It makes his fastball really, really tough for opposing batters to make contact with.

And when they are making contact with it, they're not really doing anything against it anyway. and then he's just burying that splitter, which looks like a truly elite pitch consistently at or below the strike zone, nine whiffs with it today. His sweeper has looked good when he's had to use it, although that's been very rarely because he's been so good with the fastball splitter. Regression is coming for Shota Imanaka. I think it's fair to say that he is not going to have a sub 1 ERA moving forward.

I moved him inside my top 30 starting pitchers in my rankings update today. I know Frank, you did as well. Scott, he's 31 for you. You are the show to me, Imanaga hater. Still. That was up like 20 spots. Yeah, no. He's.

And there have been a lot of rankings risers at starting pitcher. He is, I think after Jared Jones, the most significant one, right? Is it fair to say? I mean, there might be other guys who have moved more just because like Garrett Crochet was not really on our radars before. I have Nicola Dolo. You know, I might move Imanaga ahead of Lodola. I have Lodolo 28th now and I might slide Imanaga up to 28th ahead of him after this start.

But they're basically on equal footing as far as risers go for me. And I think that still allows for plenty of room for regression, but also allow Shodianaga to clearly, clearly be a must start pitcher the rest of the season. That's my expectation. Now, he is still a fly ball pitcher. It was an extreme flyball pitcher in Japan. He has been less of an extreme flyball pitcher so far in the majors. I think it's a 38% ground ball rate, which is below average, but not alarmingly so.

But like there will be more home runs when the weather warms up and the wind is blowing out at it Wrigley and all those things. But there's not a lot of holes to poke in Shodhame Minaga's game right now. Yeah, I would say there will be days where you riguelly. regret having Imanaga, but those days will be few enough and far enough between that you should probably treat him as a must start going forward. I agree. Yes, we're all in agreement. I moved Imanaga up to SP 25. I do agree, Chris, there will be some regression here, but what extent of that regression will it be? Because it's a 224 FIP and it's a 319 X-FIP. So he's pitched really, really well, Imanaga has. And yes, deservedly inside of the top 30.

starting pitcher ranks. Scott will slide over to you for your player of the night. Okay, my player of the night is Jurekson pro far, the Jurekson store called they're running out of you. Four for four

on the day raising his batting average to 3.42. He's been excellent as the Padres left fielder. But he's still Jurekson pro far. Okay? He's still Jerks and ProFar. I talked earlier this week about how I trust every player to regress to the

mean with two exceptions if I see a skills change or I see an approach change. And I don't see that with Jerks and ProFar. I think the clearest skill change for a hitter is hitting the ball harder than you ever have before. And he hasn't. His max exit velocity this year is the same as it's always been. Average eggs of velocity is up, but... It's up a lot. It's up a lot. Right, but when you're hot, your average eggs of velocity is going to be up.

You know, just like your batting averages up, up is when you're hot, your average egg's velocity is up. When you're hot, when you cool off, your average exit velocity goes down, your batting average goes down. And that's, I think, in the before times, before statcast, and even before, you know,

the baseball info solutions, hard hit data and all that stuff that was much less granular. When we said a guy was hot, what we meant was they're locked it. They're seeing the ball while. They're swinging the ball. Like whatever version of that you want. And then we got kind of he's hot means, oh, it's a high Babbap or a high home run to fly ball rate was what hot man. We were like, well, now we know that's not real. And we can write it off. And then we have the the stack cast data. And then we can see,

oh, Shoddy Minaga, average X velocity is up to 90 miles per hour. Last year, it was 86.5. That's a skill change. But like, what it probably is

is that he's hot in the way we meant it for most of baseball history. Right. We can just quantify it now. Yeah. So yeah, that's what I think's going on

with Juerks and Profar. I think a skill change would be, like the clearest skill change, like I said, would be hitting the ball like a max exit velocity, a new max exit velocity, or it might show up in the plate discipline. Your strikeout rate may be way down. Even that's not totally sticky,

but I would buy into it more than average exit velocity being up. And so looking over everything I can find to look over with Jerks and ProFar, I don't see that skill change, that approach change. You know, I read an article about him today where they were asking, what's changed for you jerks in profile? And he said, I don't know. I didn't really see this coming either. So it's not like, you know, he's pointing to his stance changed or his hand plays or whatever.

There's like nothing to validate what he's doing. He's crushing fashion. He is, I think, the clearest regression candidate among many regression candidates around baseball. And so I'm saying this not because I'm being. stubborn and I'm refusing to embrace Jurekson Profar, I'm saying this because I think it's what's going to happen. And I feel very confident in that. And no amount of pressuring me to say he's amazing now is to anybody's benefit. I feel like there's this impression people have where we hold the line on a player

despite whatever he's doing for however many weeks we hold the line on the player and it's just because we're too stubborn to say we were wrong. I like being right, don't get me wrong, but I like knowing what's right more. And so I'm not just going to turn a blind eye if I think I was wrong about something. I'm not.

The reason why I think jerks in ProFar and Alec Bohm and to a certain extent, Ranger Suarez are going to regress is because I've been doing this for a long time. 17 years now, I think. And I know that that may be like a dissatisfying answer, but the reason I bring that up is because I've been down the road before of buying into a player prematurely before I really saw the underlying evidence to support it. with the only reasoning being, well, this has been going on for so long, it has to continue.

And I'll tell you, almost every time I've done it, I've regretted it. The player came back down to earth. He regressed to the mean. And I'll give you an example just from last year. Oh, wait. Can I? Ders some pro far from 2022. Let me continue with my rant first, if you don't mind.

Bryce Elder last year. dominant for three months made the all-star team and it wasn't controversial made the all-star team in july we're talking Bryce elder was one of the best pitchers in baseball and i didn't see any justification for why he could be that good he seemed like an obvious regression candidate and one day somebody for fan graphs wrote an article saying well here's why it is he has this sinker that's so uniquely suited to getting ground balls unlike any other pitcher in the league, and he's going to continue to give up this weak contact forevermore. And so I said, okay, it's been three months.

I'm tired of fighting it. Maybe Elder is just a unicorn, and this is going to continue forevermore. But what happened almost immediately after that? I remember... Crash and burn. I remember specifically there was like a June or July podcast where I think you and Frank had both like, fine, Bryce Elder's good.

And I was like, no. And I remember it distinctly too. And not to toot my own horn. I get plenty of things wrong. Believe me. But yeah, that's, you've got to have a process. And you've got to apply that process as consistently and as fairly as possible when it comes to player evaluation.

And I think that's ultimately. the thing that we're all trying to say is you start to make exceptions and say, well, I apply this process to 99% of the players, but you know what? Jerks and ProFar is the except.

Like, maybe, you know, like I'm not going to say it's definitely not the case that Jerks and Profar is a significantly improved hitter. A month isn't enough to say that. And this is the-

And to use the Bryce Elder example, three months may not be enough to say it. A full season is probably not enough for most players to know what their true talent level is. And we also just kind of did this with Jerks and ProFar literally in 2022. He had the batting average was much worse, but he had a 928 OPS on April 27th that year. And I think a little later on in the season, there was another stretch where he got hot and hit some home runs. and I remember there being another similar, like, why are you guys being so mean to jerks and pro farm?

And it was just, we're the jerk, Ricksons. We, he's 31. And he was 29 back then, but he's 31. And he's got 3,700 plate appearances before this season. Like, it's not unheard of that a player could make a big jump forward, but usually you hear about like, Justin Turner rebuilding his swing

or Daniel Murphy like those guys those are kind of the the two JD Martinez maybe a little earlier in his career but you usually hear

this guy fundamentally changed his approach and that's not the case with Jerksson Profar so I just it's fine to add him it's fine to ride it while it's hot

but if you want me to rank Jerksson ProFar in the top 50 at Outfield which like honestly given the state of outfield, top 50 is not a high bar. Top 50 is not that much. Yeah. And I still don't want to do that.

So yeah, I, it's fine, but even mediocre hitters have stretches like this. And yeah. Okay, a few things. I'm noticing a theme. Scott is off on Tuesday nights here on the podcast. He works on his rankings. Maybe people see those rankings. They yell at Scott.

And then he comes in here on Wednesday nights and he is fired. fired up and he's ready to go. That's two weeks in a row. We get a Scott White rant on a Wednesday night. Okay, hold on. Can I make one more point? Shows a quarter over. Yeah.

You might be thinking, yeah, but why are you guys buying it as Joe Adele? Joe Adele has like 200 career played appearances at the major league level before this season. 400. He's got, he's 25 years old as opposed to 31.

And there are at least before he struck out four times today, there were contact-related improvements in his skill set that you could at least dream on that aren't there for Jerkson Perfor. I'm sorry, continue, Frank. Last point on Jurexson ProFar, I do not think he's going to hit 342 or have a 954 OPS. But, and maybe this just is all intertwined with him being hot right now.

He is hitting the ball harder. He's hitting more line drives this year. His own contact is 93%. and he's walking more than ever before. He also has a pretty good spot in the lineup leading off for the Padres. So I will just leave it there. I think there are some interesting things,

but again, I do agree. The most likely outcome is that he's going to turn back into jerks and ProFar. He is 68% rostered. Scott, we are looking for Mike Trout replacements. Who would you rather have ProFar or Andy Paez? Pahas. Who would rather have between ProFar and Joey Lo Perfito?

Low Profito. Yeah, I mean, Lo Perfito. I could understand starting pro far over low perfido right now until we know what low proffito is, but I would say low perfeito. I'd rather roster him nine times out of ten. Last one, Profar or the aforementioned Joe Adel. All right, I don't get a player of the night

because we have to keep things moving. Let's quickly promote something. Thank you for watching. Make sure like this video and subscribe to the channel if you haven't already. That's YouTube.com slash fantasy baseball today. And you can scan the QR code to sign up for the FBT Newsom.

It is free. You go to the website, you click on the FBT logo, punch in your email address, and it's easy as that. Let's take our first break, and when we return, we'll get into the news and notes here on Fantasy Baseball today. Welcome back in. Let's get into the news and notes. Aaron Boone said that Garikull had a, quote,

heavy day of throwing off flat ground on Tuesday, but they're unsure when he'll be ready to throw a bullpen session. Boone was asked if the All-Star break is a realistic date to return. He responded, quote, I wouldn't even want to guess on that. And while there hasn't been any reports of a setback or anything, this just feels kind of like Yankee, injury, ambiguity. I don't like it.

Do you guys have a response? Because it seems a little weird. Yeah. Nothing different from what you said, really. Okay. I mean, like, I thought he might be ahead of schedule relative to, Khodai Senga and now he's clearly not because Sanga's throwing off a mound and Garikol isn't. But I'm not too worried about it, I guess.

It's like all along throughout the process, it sounded like he was going to be ready for activation close to when he was eligible. And now they're talking like that's not even a possibility. So I have no idea what's going on with him. Grayson Rodriguez was placed in the aisle with right shoulder inflammation. John Means was activated as the corresponding move. This one came out of nowhere. I saw some speculation on Twitter. Is this like a phantom I'll stint to, you know, limit his endings, whatever? I'm not going to speculate, maybe, but, you know, hopefully we see him back soon.

I saw they've done some testing. They're going to do more testing, but they're pretty optimistic right now. So I don't think it's a phantom situation. All right. Tyler Glass now has been cleared to make his next start Saturday against the Dodgers. Nope, not against the Dodgers. He plays for the Dodgers. That would be against the Braves.

He left his last start with a cramp in his right hand. Zach Gallen, on the other hand, will not start Friday. in an effort to provide him extra rest. He left his last start with a hamstring injury, but apparently he isn't having any issues. Tori Lavulo just wanted to get gallon more rest. Walker Bueller threw five innings of one-run ball in his rehab start on Tuesday.

Dave Roberts indicated his next start could be with the Dodgers that has not been confirmed yet. Francisco Lindor was removed Wednesday due to flu-like symptoms. Josh Lowe will resume a rehab assignment at AAA on Thursday. He was close to being activated last weekend, and then tweaked his hamstring. Zach Gelloff fielded grounders and played catch on Wednesday, his first time doing baseball activities since landing on the IL.

Both Christian and Carnaccio Strand and Tyler Stevenson have missed four games each, four straight with hand injuries. Chas McCormick was placed in the IL due to right hamstring discomfort. The Astros had Joey Loperfito, Maricio Dubon, and Kyle Tucker in the outfield on Wednesday. Masataka Yoshita was also placed in the aisle with a left thumbstress. spring. The Red Sox started Rob Reff Snyder, Jaron, and Willier O'Brien in the outfield with Tyler O'Neill at DH. Byron Burenne was removed Wednesday due to right knee soreness. He'll receive

an MRI. Vaughn Grissom is hopeful to return from the IL on Friday. We had multiple suspensions handed out for that Ray's Brewer's Brawl on Tuesday night. Jose Siri, a three-game suspension. Freddie Peralta got five games. Abner-Ribay got six games and on top of that, insult to injury, he got demoted to AAA as well. Kyle Hendricks will begin a rehab assignment. How does that work? Yeah, like when he gets recalled, does he just have to serve the suspension? I don't know.

It's a good question. Kyle Hendrix will begin a rehab assignment at AA on Thursday. Mike Clevenger's next start could be in the majors with the White Sox. Last year, a 377 ERA and a 123 whip. 9% rostered any interest in Clevenger in deeper leagues. I mean, I've been stashing him in AL only because it's AL only and you take all sorts of big swings just hoping to get lucky. But no, I don't think Clevenger is going to be viable in many fantasy formats.

Last but not least, Miguel Sino was placed in the aisle with left knee inflammation. And did you see who the angels called up to take his place? You know, I saw some jokes in the chat that your player of the night was going to be Willie Calhoun. I did not see that he had got called up, but now it all makes sense. Willie Calhoun is inevitable. And I hope he is amazing. But it is more likely not going to happen for Willie Calhoun. One add on Walker Bueller, he pitched Tuesday.

And his velocity was down 2.3 miles per hour on his four-seem fastball. It was down across the board. He only had six whiffs on 75 pitches against the AAA lineup. So that doesn't seem like a great sign. I still have some optimism about him, but I'm not necessarily expecting ace level production from Walker Bueller. Also, Denelson Lemaett is starting for the Dodgers

at Oklahoma City tonight, which I had no idea they were stretching off the start. Probably the most pitches he's thrown in like eight years. Interesting. Yeah, I mean, with Walker Bueller, we've learned over the years, you know, just more studies being done on the second Tommy John surgery.

It's about a 50% hit rate that a pitcher returns to what they were beforehand after getting that second Tommy John. I don't think he even needs to be who he was before. I mean, if he could be 75 to 80% of that pitcher with the Dodgers run support, he still could have a lot of value for fantasy. It's just we haven't seen him pitch for so long now at this point.

And, you know, another point not to prolong the discussion, but like he was supposed to be ready at the end of last year. He was gearing up to return then, and it was going so poorly that they shut him down then. And now all these months later, same issues. It doesn't bode well. It certainly does not. Let's get into the rankings, risers, and fallers. We all had our heads in the computers and the laptops, whatever you guys are working on the past couple days. I mean, there is just so much movement

at outfield and starting pitcher. There's lots going on right now in the rankings. And Scott, we will start with you. I know you had an article come out. Who were some of the biggest risers for you this week? Okay. So, I mentioned Nicola Dolo into my top 30. I first want to point out that like the 50 to 60 range in my starting pitcher rankings looks a lot like the 30 to 40 range for me. And it's a big mess of pitchers that are hard to rank. Much more interesting pitchers than the glob was last. I guess you could call it a glob, but it's like a more attractive glob because it's mostly pictures I like in that range.

I'm having every time I move a pitcher up I'm having to push down a bunch of pitchers I also like So You know this could all change a lot next week When we're talking about the starting pitchers But I think Nicola Dolo's upside is so high That I have him in the top 30 now

Jack Flaherty I've been high on him all along And following that 14 strikeout effort yesterday I got him up to 40 It's lower than I feel like it should be But at the same time putting Jack Flaherty 40 means he's ahead of Chris Bassett, who I'm holding out faith on,

and it means he's ahead of Hunter Green and Ranger Suarez. He's ahead of some good pitchers, just getting him to 40. So that's as high as I was able to justify. Bryce Miller, Tanner, how can Reed Detmer's, a few other risers from this year are directly ahead of him just inside the top 40. So that's the range we're talking about for Jack Flaherty.

let's see Stephen Kwan I moved him up about 15 spots in both Roto and head to head which means he's like top 15 now and head to head because he was already so much higher there obviously the advantage of not striking out much but now he's like top 30 in Roto for me and part of it's just

there are so few outfielders to get excited about that I'm really hoping Quan is able to sustain something like this and there were reports in spring training that the Guardian's encouraging them to swing harder. The exit velocity readings aren't really up, but the barrel rate is up and certainly the impact is up.

The expected stats are way up. And I thought he underperformed with batting average anyway last year. So I'm treating Stephen Kwan as a must start outfielder now across the board. I guess high end outfielder. I should say, he kind of already was must start. Ryan Jeffers is now my 13th catcher.

I've moved him ahead of preseason favorites, Bo Nailer and Mitch Garver, since Jeffers seems to be playing a lot more and a strikeout rate is way down too. I'm not sure we've mentioned that before. And then I'll end here with Jake Croninworth, who hit a grand slam, I believe, here on Wednesday. And his production has been good, better than expected.

but you look at the expected stats for him. I mean, XBA, X-SL, X-Waba are all 90th percentile or better for Jake Cronidworth. So as good as he's been so far, it's possible he could be even better. And so I've moved him into my top 15 at second base in points leagues, and he's a bit lower in Roto because I have guys like Ryan McMahon ahead of him. but I think it could continue to rise from there. I think we might be back to seeing Jake Croninworth, valuing Jake Croninworth not so differently than we did in,

what was it? What was his great year? 2022, I believe it was. It might have. Yeah, sounds right? It might have even been 21, but yeah, it was around there. And we haven't seen. 21, you're right, Frank.

2021. Yeah. He had 266 with 21 homers and an 800 OPS that year. Yeah, and very clearly, I mean, the stack has data is way up. The expected numbers look awesome for Jake CronoWorth so far. Great spot in the lineup hitting their cleanup with the Padres. He's up to 24 RBI already, so that's a great number for Jake Crono Worth. I moved him up as well.

You know, I came into today's podcast thinking, wow, you know, I'm really high on Stephen Kwan now. I moved them up to 25th now in the outfield rankings. Scott's like, nope, 15th. For points. points. If we're talking Roto, then I probably have him about that same. I'm 28th in Roto behind Colton Kowler and Tyler O'Neill. I moved him up to Kwan up to 25th in headside points and I think he's in the low 30s somewhere like that in Roto. Chris, who were some risers for you? Some risers for Chris. Salvador Perez, who has kind of steadily been rising for me and he's only up to my number six.

catcher. So it's not like he hasn't jumped Janor Diaz or Will Smith or any of those guys. But I think Salvador Perez kind of looks like the 2021-2020 version of himself. And it's easier to buy into that when we've seen it from him before. I moved up Ryan Jeffers quite a bit as well.

I think he is a top 15 catcher for me now. something like that. No, sorry, I don't want to get into it. But sometimes you make changes and then they don't get saved. But Ryan Jeffers is a top 15 catcher for me now. He is playing a lot of DH for the twins. He's batting lead off occasionally for them.

Been very high in the lineup for the most part. So really like what we've seen from Ryan Jeffers so far. Willie Adomas had a huge game or huge, double header today, a couple home runs, but he's been really good all season. Gunner Henderson finally moved him into the top 20 overall. Joe Adela, big riser, showdei Monaga, Big Riser for all the reasons we talked about. Jack Flaherty, Nick Ladolo. Rinaldo López, I still have a lot of skepticism about, but I also moved him up significantly.

I think he's top 20 at RP for me now. Yeah, he's still only eligible at RP, unfortunately. Top 25. He has the SP now. Oh, he just got it with the SBA-based start. Yeah. So I moved them inside them. I moved them up to SP-64.

So he's right in a similar range as Jordan Hicks and Rennell Blanco for me. Yeah, that all sounds about right. He's a little lower than Hicks for me, but similar range. And then... Yeah, I'd agree. Mason Miller is my number... Again, I don't think it's saved. is my number 15 closer.

That's it. Oh, man. Wow. I thought you were going to blow me out of the water. I hate Mason Miller, I guess. Oh, my. Oh, sorry,

I was looking, hold on, I'm looking at, uh, head to head. He's probably higher. I'm like, wait,

am I the Mason Miller guy? Okay. I put him 14th. I might have, I might have went crazy. I put him seventh. No, I don't think it's like I wrote,

so I have this rankings, uh, rankings movers article I write after I update my, rankings most every week and um i wrote in there i so mason miller entered my r p rankings for the first time finally eligible there i put him 14th behind uh uh ryan helsley and alexis diaz but it feels kind of stupid saying it now that's what i wrote and i kind of think after the obvious there's there's not like an obvious number four closer after edwin dias josh hater and a and Emmanuel Class A,

I think you could make the argument that Mason Miller is the best candidate to be that number four closer. I'm reluctant to do that because I don't think the A's are actually the third place team they've been so far, so I think his safe opportunities will be fewer and farther between.

And there's still a pronounced injury history here. I know it came with him as a starter, but it's not like he's free from getting in. now that he's working in relief. So I'm reluctant to do that to go that far with it for those reasons. But I don't think you're wrong to do it, Frank. I just, I'm playing it a little safer. Yeah, my top.

Go ahead, go ahead. No, no, go ahead. I was going to say my top seven at relief pitcher. Cole Regens is a little bit different for obvious reasons. But then Edwin Diaz, Class A, hater. I moved Yuan Duran back up to fifth. He's healthy, and that's basically where I had him before the season. Ryan Helsley, who's been amazing.

and then Mason Miller. And I guess just a little behind the scenes, for my pitcher rankings, I lean heavily on K-minus walk rate and Sierra. So just to give you like, hey, what is Frank looking at when he's ranking pitchers? That's what I lean on most. You've been much more heavy-handed

with updating your relief pitcher rankings than I have, which I'm not saying like I've been neglecting my relief pitcher ranking as I've just been more cautious about making big moves this early in the season. Fair enough. Chris, did you have anything else on RISER? I'm just trying to figure out

whether it saved my rankings updates. And I'm kind of, I'm maybe having a little bit of a meltdown because I can't tell if it did. And I don't know. I feel for you. And I imagine you're seething on the inside right now. I'm fine.

It's funny to me, actually. I'm laughing. You may have lost hours of work there. It's fine. I think it, It just seems to have saved. I hope so. I hope so too.

By the way, I move Salvador Perez up to fourth in my catcher rankings because I think there's an obvious top three there. And after that, it's kind of like, you know, I have no favoritism for J.T. Real Muto anymore. And is Yiner Diaz definitively better than Salvador Perez?

No. Yeah, I just think Perez could be, this could be the second best version. of Perez we've ever seen. And if it's not, and he regresses some, I don't think I'll be that wrong by having him forth. I wrestled with moving him ahead of JTR. I haven't done it yet, but I totally see the argument for doing that with Salvador Perez. Let's just quickly list off some of the fallers in the rankings this week, because we do have to keep things moving. Scott, who are some fallers for you? So I will clump together Chris Bassett, Joe Musgrove, and Mitch Keller. And I'll

actually put Jose Barrios in here too. Jose Barrios has done nothing wrong, of course. He's pitched great. Bassett, Musgrove, and Keller have done something wrong. They've pitched poorly. But I think given the amount of interesting starting pitcher, up-and-coming starting pitchers, there are right now that attractive glob that I referred to earlier, it makes it harder for those boring innings-eaters types to hold their place in the rankings.

I still have confidence in Bassett. especially, but also Musgrove, who had a nice bounce back start here Wednesday, and Mitch Keller to bounce back to some degree or another. Bassett completely bounced back. But I've moved him out of my top 40, just because there are more exciting pitchers who I'd rather have when push comes to shove. I'd rather chase that upside in most circumstances. So those are three of my followers there, listing off a few others.

Michael King, he's outside of my top 75 now. David Bednar, I've moved him behind. Kirby Yates and Robert Suarez because I think those guys are fine. I think there are enough closers who feel very solid that I don't know why I need to show favoritism toward Bednar

when he's struggling so much. Jackson Holiday, I've moved him to about 20th in both my second base and shortstop rankings. Jackson Chorio, I've moved to about 30th in the outfield, which isn't so bad, but when you look at who's behind him, it's pretty significant downgrade. There's like 14 good outfielders who are healthy right now.

And honestly, that might be an over-exaggeration. Outfield is a disaster. Yeah, certainly is. Chris, any fallers this week? Like what I, like an hour and a half of the time I spend on my rankings is just staring at outfield, wondering why it's so bad and not actually making any changes. Fallers in my rankings, Henry Davis,

I think for a lot of obvious reasons, I worry about playing time moving forward. Nico Horner has been hitting really well since moving to lead off spot, but he stole a base on Wednesday. Two on the season? Four attempts. Christopher Sanchez, I've lost a lot of faith in him. Michael Kopeck, just hasn't been quite as effective as I thought he would be. I will say I'm the high guy on Musgrove right now.

I think I'm 10 spots ahead of Frank and like 20 ahead of Scott at SP. now. I feel bad about it. I just like, no, I get it. There's a lot of getting forced down. Part of it is just that I was like, I clicked over to the SP portion of the drop down menu at the same time that I saw that he had five strikeouts in the first three innings. Today and I was like, all right, I'm not going to drop him.

It's fine. But I get it. Like, I can definitely see the case for Jack Flaherty and Nicodolo and all those guys ahead of him. I'm just not ready to do that. now that I saw a Joe Musgrove start where he looked like Joe Musgrove. Mm-hmm.

And we will talk about Joe Musgrove in just a second. Let's take our final break. And when we return, we'll get to four quick questions right after this. Welcome back in. All right, guys, we have 20 minutes left. I need you guys to be short, sweet, succinct. Get to the point.

And let's start with this. Four quick questions. Is this the beginning of the turnaround for Joe Musgrove? Who we just mentioned, six innings, two runs, nine strikeouts to zero walks, up against the Reds with 14 swinging strikes on 87 pitches. He did change up the pitch mix in this one. He used the fastball cutter and curve more.

He also completely scrapped the sweeper, which I thought was interesting because Max Fried has done the same thing each of his past two starts as well. Scott, you're up. Is this the beginning of the turnaround? I can only guess, but I expect a turnaround to come and this start was so impressive that I'm going to lean. Yes, I don't.

really understand what changed for him. He did fade the slider and sweeper for more fastballs and cutters, but the fastball and cutter both had a batting average over 400 coming in, so it's not like he was using more effective pitches more often. I presume it was just a, he was hitting his spots better. His command was improved, and his velocity was up slightly like 0.5 to 0.8 across the board, but I don't know. I think Joe Musgrove just started to look more like Joe Musgrove in this start.

And hopefully, I think there's a good reason to believe, just given his track record, it will continue. Next question, is it weird that Ronald de Cunia only has one home run so far? It is now May 2nd. And yeah, Ronald Cunia is batting 252. Only one homer. He still has 29 runs scored and 13 steals on the season. The strikeout rate has jumped way up this season.

he's not hitting the ball as hard batted ball like distribution is just weird there's lots of infield fly balls and lots of ground balls so far so that kind of explains it but Chris is this weird Ronald de Cuneal only one homer yes it's very weird

anything else on Ronald Cunias we've said I mean we did a version of this in 2022 and it never turned around in 2022 It was actually, it got worse as 2022 went on. And he was a significantly worse power hitter as the season went on.

And maybe that's what will happen here. But I'm going to just keep saying the same things that I said when I ranked him as my number one overall player heading into last season. Historically, if you bet on players who are as good as Ronald Acuna at his age, it works out. And nobody has a ceiling as high as what he did last year. even if he's a diminished version of that, he could have been about 25% worse across the board last year and still been the number one player. I am still going to continue to rank Ronald Acuna as the number one player.

He's going to be the number one player in my trade values chart. I still need to be absolutely bold over to even consider trading him. I think trading him right now is a gigantic, gigantic mistake. And I'm really not particularly concerned. I am not either. I will say that I made a change in head-to-head points. Mookie Betz is my number one player. He is ahead of Ronald Kunia.

And it's kind of a combination of, okay, Akuna's off to a slow start, but Mookie Betts has just been so amazing too. But he also has eight steals, so why not do it in Roto? I did make a change with Mookie Betz. For Roto, I dropped Bobby Witt behind him since it seems like Mookie Betz

is back to being a base dealer. I think in the long run, a Coon, he's still going to be better than him for points. That strikeout, like, is he going to have

an 11% strikeout rate again? That's, that's the part I would be most skeptical of. But if he's, you know, unless he has a long IL stent,

I expect he'll get to 30 homers. Next question. Would you be looking to buy on Zach Eflin right now? He had two great starts in a row earlier in the month and then his last two have been underwhelming.

He was at the Brewers, five and two-thirds innings. Three runs allowed. Six strikeouts to Zeefflin. Zero walks did have 13 swinging strikes. He's changed up the pitch mix a little bit this year. He's throwing his sweeper more, which he kind of figured out a formula that worked. I don't really know why he's moving away from what he did last year.

But Scott, would you be looking to buy on Zach Eflin right now? I suppose, though given the amount of starting pitchers who I struggled to continue to rank behind him, for all the reasons we talked about earlier, I'd have to be buying pretty low. I just, I don't think, I don't think pitching is going to be so hard to come by on the trade market right now that you have to, that you have to really take a chance on buying into Zach Affleman.

I think I'll probably be fine. I don't know if I'm expressing what I'm thinking well, but hopefully you get what I'm saying. Last question here. Would you consider dropping Jackson Merrill in shallower leagues? He has slowed down over his last 13 games. He's betting 156. Still not striking out very much. Still hitting line drives. Might just be unlucky. It's a 200 babbip during that time. He's also been pretty bad against lefties so far in a really small sample size.

But Chris, in shallower leagues, let's say head-to-head points leagues. Would you consider dropping Jackson Merrill? And head-to-head points leagues, sure. Yeah. I think he's... I'm going to guess he's not owned in most of mine. Yeah, I think he's pretty fringes. in that format. Three outfielder league, like I don't know if he ever reached a point in my rankings.

Still 88% rostered though. Yeah, so he's number 47 in my outfield rankings. And I, like that feels pretty fringy in a three outfielder league. It's not definitely drop him, but it's okay, yeah, if you need somebody, like, I think Jackson Merrill will be better than jerks and pro far the rest of the season. But if you, you wanted to start jerks and profile while he's hot instead of Jackson.

Merrill, that's fine. Would you drop Merrill for any of the young outfielders? Well, he is also a young outfielder. So, Lebrito, Pahas. Yeah. I technically rank him ahead of all of them. But I wouldn't be opposed to it, especially Pahas. Pahas is the one I feel best about.

He homered again here on Wednesday. his strikeout rate has not been that bad below 20%, I think. And his own contact rate is above 90%. So, like, he is not, for a young power hitter, he's not doing a lot of swinging and missing. He hasn't walked yet. But I think the fact he's in the Dodgers lineup, I'm not going to stress so much about the walk rate.

And I'm thinking I probably need to go ahead and move pahas ahead of Merrill. If you want to shoot for upside, I'd take Joe O'Dell over Merrill. I think there's a good chance you'll reverse that move at some point. Joe Adel struck out four times today. Maybe he's going to totally come back down to Earth. But I do think his ceiling, especially for 20, 24, is higher. And shallow leagues, a lot of times you sell out for ceiling. So I wouldn't be opposed to that.

Andy Paez, by the way, he's only played 14 games with the Dodgers. He has 12 runs and 10 RBI. I mean, it's just the counting stats upside, just being in the bottom third of the Dodgers lineup. It is just so massive. Has he sat yet? Ah, it's a good question. I don't think he has. I don't think so.

I didn't think he was capable of playing center field, but he has been playing center field for them. So that's the thing I've been most surprised by is 80. He hasn't sat. He hasn't sat. 83rd percentile sprint speed. I was, from everything I read, I did not think he was like a plus athlete, but that's what he's. And there was a lot of talk about how he's in much better shape this year than he had been in years past. So maybe that's just a new thing for him. But I've been very pleasantly. I don't know how surprised I am, but I'm certainly happy with what we've seen from Andy Pahas so far. Let's continue on with some other waiver wire hitters. We already spoke about ProFar and Pahez. How would you rank these three corner infielder slash utility type options? Oswaldo Cabrera had a big game, two for three with a sock and shoe.

His fourth homer, his second stolen base, the home run came off of Corbyn Burns. He's batting two. Counting stats have been good so far for as Waldo Cabrera. Tyler Black got his first start on Wednesday. It was against a righty, and I feel like he's only going to play against righties for the time being with the Brewers. He also was batting cleanup, and he started at first base, so I think he's going to gain some other position eligibility.

And Willie Castro is turning things up. He went three for five with a double, a triple, and his third stolen base. over his last eight games, Castro is batting 457 with one homer and one steel. Scott, how would you rank these corner slash utility options? Cabrera, Tyler Black, Willie Castro. I mean, I guess I'd gamble on the unknown here with Tyler Black, just because Oswalda Cabrera and Willie Castro by comparison are un...

Not exciting. Not exciting, let's say. underwhelming. That's the word I was trying to think of. And, you know, Willie Castro, he could be a stolen base standout like he was last year, but so could Tyler Black. That's the thing I trust him to do best. He has a really good hit tool, a really weird looking swing. Probably won't hit for much power. But hopefully we'll walk a lot and steal a lot of bases as he did in the miners. Connor Wong, if you need a second catcher, he is just raking right now. Three for four with two doubles, a run and an RBI. He's betting 366 with three.

five homers, 14 RBI, and a 10.7 OPS. He has started seven of the last nine games for the Red Sox. He's 33% rostered. Chris, would you drop someone like,

you mentioned Henry Davis as a follower? Would you drop Henry Davis for Connor Wong? Just ride the hot hand for a second catcher? I thought I was going to open Connor Wong's baseball savant page and see a bunch of red and be like, okay, yeah, he's locked in. He's hot and out.

His quality of contact metrics are actually, worse than they were last season, at least before this game. Strang out a lot less, but yeah, I think there's basically nothing here. Okay. Two names in deeper leagues. Tommy Pham is off to a nice start,

two for four with his first home run, two runs, and two RBI. If you need a Mike Trout replacement in a deeper league, Tommy Pham just makes so much sense. And he's 10% rostered. He has seven games next week. I don't know if you guys have heard of this player. Tyler Nevin, he's the son of Phil Nevin.

He continues to hit. He went two for four with his fourth home run, added three hard hits in this game. You know, in deeper leagues, who would you guys rather speculate on or add, I guess? Tommy Fam or Tyler and Evan? Tommy Fam. Let's talk Waver Wire pitchers.

Two names in Shalower League. Tristan McKenzie turned in his first quality start of the season. He was at the Astros. Seven innings, two runs, six strikeouts with 13 swinging strikes. He's still 74% rostered. And if this is correct, he would line up for the Tigers and at the White Sox next week.

Luis Heel out-duled Corbyn Burns in Baltimore. It was six and a third shutout, the longest start of his career. Five strikeouts, just one walk. It was his first start with less than two walks this season as well. He's 63% rostered. It looks like Luis Heel lines up for the Astros and at the raise next week. Chris, any interest here in Shower League? Mackenzie, Louise Heel for next week.

I guess if you haven't dropped Tristan McKenzie yet, the last two starts are reason enough to not drop him, but I remain very pessimistic about everything going on with him, including the fact that that story that came out in the athletic about a week and a half ago talking about how he's pitching through a torn UCL last year and just trying to avoid surgery for as long as he can. 95.4 mile per hour average exit velocity today. He had 12 hard hit balls.

I think 10 of them had a bad expected batting average of at least 400. Four of those 10 were outs. Yikes. So yeah, four of nine, I think is what it was. So I see very little with Tristan McKenzie to be optimistic about the problem is just if you missed out on Fetty and Reese Olson, there haven't really been a ton of performances this week that I would say you have to drop Tristan McKenzie for.

So there may just not be a better option on waivers. Louise Heel might be a better option, though. Like, it's really funny that this guy had like a 55% combined walk plus strikeout rate entering today. And then he had just five strikeouts in one walk. It's like the anti-Louise Heel game. So I don't expect that this is like the start of, him figuring out and I remain pretty skeptical that he's going to be useful for fantasy, but I also don't have a strong opinion one way or the other about him versus Tristan

McKenzie. Okay. Four names between 30 and 50% rostered on CBS. Jose Buto turned in his third quality start. He was up against the Cubs where he allowed just one run over six innings with six strikeouts and 15 swinging strikes. Graham Ashcraft turned in a quality start at the Padres. It was six innings, two unearned runs with four.

strikeouts. Kent to Maeda has turned in two solid starts in a row. He was up against the Cardinals. Six innings, one run, five strikeouts there. And Patrick Sandoval had his first double digit strikeout start since July 9th of 2022. Five innings, two runs, 10 strikeouts, but only 10 swinging strikes up against the Phillies. He's got any interest in Sandoval, Maeda, Ashcraft, and Jose Bouttoe. Not really Sandoval. who did not have the whiffs to back up this kind of strikeout total and really has an all year and has all the problems he's always had. I just, I don't see enough reason to be encouraged there.

I see reasons to be encouraged with Budo, Ashcraft, and Maeda, though understand they would still rank outside of my top 80 because that's how many more interesting pitchers there are. but Ashcraft, the addition of this sinker, give him a third pitch to go with the slider and cutter, it's made, it's not that good of a pitch, but it's, the slider and cutter have been more effective.

A swinging strike rate is up. His whiff rate on those two good pitches is up. And I could see him being kind of Seth Lugo like. Maybe that's a bad name to draw because Seth Lugo's ERA is microscopic. But, you know, the true Seth Lugo. The Seth Lugo we saw last year. That's what Ashcraft could be, potentially.

Kenta Maeda, his velocity was down early on and he was getting crushed, but it's basically all the way back now. His last two starts, the velocity's been much improved, and they were both solid starts. So Maeda may get back to being who we drafted him to be. Again, that would still be outside of my top 80. Jose Budo has better than a 60% whiff rate on his slider. he got 15 swinging strikes in this game.

The slider especially, that was a ridiculous whiff rate. It's his fourth most used pitch, but he throws it like 20% of the time. And I don't know. It's one of those weird cases like Christopher Sanchez last year. Jose Budo was never much of anything in the minors, but he keeps having these impressive starts in the majors. And I'm at least open to streaming them now and then, if it continues.

How would you rank those three, Scott Buto, Ashcraft, and Maeda? I will go Maeda. Ashcraft, Budo. Okay. And then we had four names in deeper leagues who pitched well. Andrew Heaney, Colin Ray, Ross Stripling, and a gentleman named Rotary Munoz of the Miami Marlins.

He threw six innings, one run, seven strikeouts. I didn't know anything about this guy, so I watched some of the highlights. His pitches get nasty movement. With all that being said, his minor league numbers are atrocious. I will give you the exact minor league numbers for Roderie Munoz at AAA in his career.

a 639 ERA and a 168 whip. Is that bad? That's bad. It's not good. It's going to take more than two decent starts in the majors for me to look past that. Any interest in these names in deeper leagues? Munoz, Stripling, Colin Ray, and Juhni. So the one thing I will say about Munoz is the biggest problem for him in the minors was control.

He had massive, massive walk rates. And that has not been an issue in two major leagues. starts, so I don't want to say that it is not an issue. You know who that reminds me of? Joe Boyle, baby. Okay. But it is just to say that, like, if his control is decent now, maybe there could be something there, but you've got to be in, yeah.

Even a 15-te-Team mixed roto, I don't think Roto. That's one of those. I pick them up in NL-only. just hoping to get lucky because there's nothing to pick up it. Hope you're not, but hope it's not in like a tout wars or labor situation

where you're forced to start him right away. You have to start him if you add him. That's such a stupid rule. I would be very wary of actually doing that if I was in an NL only league where I had to start him next week. Yeah, let's just totally handcuff

all the control you have over your roster for some stupid reason I don't even understand. God, it's because that's what they did in 1984. Well, you know what? In 1984, they mailed their lineups to their commissioner too, and we figured out better ways to do it, you know? Let's get into some leftovers here. We'll go into the pitchers. And the first group, Seth Lugo, has eight plus strikeouts in back-to-back starts. He was at the Blue Jays, where he threw seven innings of one-run ball with eight strikeouts.

Chris Bassett turned in a quality start against the Royals, six innings, three runs, four strikeouts, barely a quality start, I guess. Chris Sale has six plus strikeouts in all six of his starts. He was at the Mariners, five innings, one run, nine strikeouts with 21 swinging strikes. And Zach Wheeler was just okay. At the Angels, five innings, one run, six strikeouts there. Chris, anything to add on Wheeler, Sale, Bassett, and Lugo. So Scott made the point of comparing that Ashcraft group to Lugo and then walked it back because Lugo's ERA is so good.

But like, right. No, Lugo is an obvious regression candidate. I just, I just didn't want to confuse the audience. Yeah. What I wanted to say with Lugo in Ashcraft, I think are the two most primary examples of this is just,

there are stretches like this for these guys every year where in Ashcraft's case, there are underlying reasons to think maybe he's a better pitcher. But like, Lugo has stretches where he looks really good. and it's fine to use him against good matchups and in the right situations and all that. I don't see any reason to think Seth Lugo is a dramatically different pitcher, but he might have two starts next week if the schedule.

It's not 100%, but that's what it looks like. So like, yeah, if he's available in your league, go at him. That's Seth Lugo you're talking about? Yeah. Or I guess don't don't drop him. I guess would be the way to say it, which you're not going to drop him after the last two starts anyway, but yeah. Yeah. He's a high floor pitcher, Seth Lugo, 90% rostered, 75% started. So if he's in line for two starts next week, my guess is you probably want to get him into your lineups. The pitching leftovers part two. Corbyn's turned an A quality start against the Yankees. It was six innings, two runs, six strikeouts with 14 swinging strikes.

Carter Crawford has allowed two earned runs or fewer in six of seven starts. He was five. facing the Giants, seven innings, two runs, six strikeouts there. Justin Verlainter had the longest start of the season, his longest start of the season, up against the Guardians, seven innings, two runs, three walks to two strikeouts, you know, two starts in a row with three plus walks. I think he's still kind of, you know, getting his legs underneath him, I guess you could say. And Yoshinobu Yamamoto has turned in three straight quality starts. He was at the debacks where he threw six shutout innings, five strikeouts, with 13.

swinging strikes. It's got anything to add on Yamamoto, Justin Verlander, Cutter Crawford, and Corbyn Burns. I'm a little frustrated with Corbyn's strikeout rate. That's why I moved him behind Zach Wheeler in my starting pitcher rankings rest of season. Yes. Cutter Crawford is another part of that very attractive glob at starting pitcher where I just don't feel confident in my ranking over like a span of 30 spots in the starting pitch of ranking. So where does Cutter Crawford a lesser strikeout, like a strikeout per inning guy, so probably doesn't have that huge upside that we're seeing from like a Nicola Dolo or Shoda Imanago

or even like a Tanner Hauk. Where do I put Cutter Crawford alongside that group? and then also the Chris Bassick boring innings eater group and I have Cutter Crawford behind all of them I have him 47th in my starting pitcher rankings which is of course still must roster and it's not meant to be a slide on Cutter Crawford

but that's I'm just kind of expressing my frustration with ranking starting pitchers right now because it just everybody feels wrong and everybody feels right all at the same time Some hitting leftovers. Chris, you mentioned. Willie Adomis is off to a nice start. Two for four with a double dong.

Four RBI. He has six homers and four steals already on the season. It is a contract year for Willie Adomis, and he is off to a great start, as we mentioned. Spencer Steer has slowed down a bit, but had a big game. One for four with a sock and a shoe. It was his fourth home run and eighth stolen base.

Juan Soto, the Speedster. One for three with a walk and two steals in this one. He obviously is off to a great start as well. 325 batting average, eight homers, four steals, a 10-14 OPS. Nico Horner stole a base, as we mentioned earlier. He also added two hits and a walk. Kyle Tucker is a name we have not talked about

because he's a first-round pick and he's doing what he's supposed to be doing. But he has been great. One for four with his eighth home run. He's got 21 runs, 21 RBI, five steals, a 97-OPS. More walks and strikeouts on the season. He has been money.

Anything to add here. Tucker, Horner, Soto, Stier, and Adamas. I'm not sure what to do with Horner either because he hasn't been running. The whole Cubs team hasn't been running, even though Craig Counsel has a history of managing teams that run a lot. So I think that's going to change at some point. I was especially worried about Horner, though,

when he was batting seventh in the lineup, just because that's a lineup spot that doesn't traditionally run, and sometimes that gets in players' heads, and they decide they're not supposed to run down there. but now that Horner is batting leadoff most of the time, right? Yeah, it started like... It was like 14 games or something. Yeah, something like a dozen straight games.

I'm hoping he starts to run more. He's been hitting fine after a slow start. The problem is... I'm reluctant to sell him short, is what I'm trying to say. He didn't start hitting lead off until Ian Hap and Sayas Suzuki got hurt. So what happens when those guys are healthy? That's my question. say for sure.

I'm hoping Horner has entrenched himself by that point but it may not happen. And look, when I say I moved him down, he's 12th for me

because a lot of other lower still. A lot of, yeah, you're 14th. But like, there's kind of a glob

at shortstop where, where, like, Dansby Swanson and Zander Bogarts and O'Neil Cruz and

even Anthony Volpe after the really hot start has kind of slow down. And so it's, there's kind of a stretch from like 10 to 16 at shortstop where everybody's moved down a lot in my overall rankings. And I'm not necessarily sure where I want to rank any of them. To kind of illustrate, to further illustrate that point,

Luis Arise just picked up first base eligibility. Luis Arise is my number 12 second baseman. Mm-hmm. He's my number 23 first baseman. That sounds right, yeah. Just because there's that many first baseman that I feel more confident in than that glob at second base. Time to eat, kitty cats. Wow, we are...

One of the doors, the door is closed. I got to open the door because the fat one's in the room and the skinny one's not. And I got to, this is like a five alarm fire. I got to open the door right now. All right. Go do it. And we'll talk about bullpens for the Tigers.

Jason Foley was unavailable. Alex Lang got the final four outs for his second save. For the Braves, Reisel Iglesias gave up a hit and a walk, but he picked up his eighth save. For the Phillies, Jose Alvarado got the eighth with a one-run lead, facing three, four, and five in the Angels lineup.

He did give up three hits, did not allow a run. Gregory. That was a day after Jeff Hoffman got a save with Alvarado working the eighth. So what? A complete and total committee they have in front? Philadelphia, just a mess.

Yeah. I just feel like this is how Alvarado is going to be used all season, basically. For the Yankees, Clay Holmes got the final five outs, three via the strikeout for his tenth save that is tied for the league lead with Ryan Helsley and Robert Suarez.

For the Marlins, Tanner Scott entered in the eighth with a one-run lead, two outs, a runner on first. He walked one, but then got out of it. The Marlins extended the lead. It was a three-run lead, now heading into the ninth. Anthony Maldonado came out, with a three-run lead, struck out one for his first save.

Anything weird here, or do you think they were just kind of preserving Tanner Scott? This was Tanner Scott's third day pitching in a row, I believe. So I think that explains nearly all of that usage. The only thing I will say about this gentleman, Anthony Maldonado, is that he does have 20 saves in the minors in his career. I'm not saying he's just the closer now, but... He's got really good numbers in the minors. Yeah, so last year,

162 ERA, 0.9 whip 14K per 9. But he throws like a low 90 sinker. So it doesn't seem like a swing and miss arsenal really. And I don't know, something to keep an eye on. I mean, Tanner Scott's been bad all year. But I agree most likely it was Scott's gotten a lot of work lately. And when they extended the lead, it's like let's not, let's not push him further. For the Cubs, Hector Nairis got the ninth with a one run lead.

He gave up a hit by pitch and a single, but did. escape with his fifth save. Did you guys see this last play, the challenge play for the Mets and Cubs? I said that I did. I saw the Mets were really mad. Yeah, so there was a sacrifice fly to left field with one out,

and Pia Lanzo wound up getting doubled off at home plate. He was clearly safe, in my opinion. And they even challenged it. They did a replay review, and they still said he was out. So I thought Hector Nairis was pretty fortunate to wind up with the save here.

but, like, why do we have replay if we're still getting things wrong? And yes, that is an open invitation for all Cubs fans to come yell at me tomorrow. For the nationals, Kyle Finnegan struck out the side for his 10th save, also tied for the league lead. And for Emmanuel Class A,

he struck out one for his ninth save of the season. To stream or not to stream for Thursday, I believe it is Edward Cabrera or bust. Yeah. Among the selection of pitchers that we consider for this segment, which are those rostered in what less than 70% of leagues? Like 75% or less, yeah.

The only reason I clarify that is because the number of people who sat Jack Flaherty the other day I feel bad about. I mean, just the fact that he was going up against his former team, the Cardinals, I made sure he was in every single one of my life. Yeah, and also the Cardinals are. He was in my Sleeper Pitchers. He was very high in my sleeper pitcher rankings. But we didn't do him in the streamer segment because he wasn't a,

he was too roster. to mention for the rules of this segment. So I just wanted to clarify that. Correct. And then on Friday, I believe Martin Perez is facing the Rockies in Pittsburgh. I think that's fine. Reese Olson at the Yankees. I just don't have the matchup or the park.

Right. Ryan Weathers and J.P. Sears are facing each other. I don't know. Either of them could be good, but I'd put them both behind Rees Olson, who I just think is a better pitch. Sure. Martine Perez is probably at the top just because it's the Rockies on the road, but I don't love any of these guys. All right.

We're going to wrap there for Scott and Chris. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning into fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. And we will be back again tomorrow. Bye-bye.