Fantasy Baseball Today - Recalibrating Rookies, Double Dongs & Sandy Bounce Back! (6/28 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: June 28, 2023

Andrew Abbott has picked up more whiffs in his last two starts (2:42). ... Ranger Suarez is on quite the run right now (8:55). ... Shohei Ohtani and Ronald Acuña are both on fire (12:43)! ... We had five players hit double dongs Tuesday night (15:45). ... Sandy Alcantara bounced back at the Red Sox (24:27). ... Ezequiel Duran remains under-rostered (27:05)! ... What's going on with Cody Bellinger (34:50)? ... News (36:55): Shane McClanahan will make a start this weekend. ... Joe Ryan got destroyed at the Braves (45:05). ... We wrap up with waiver wire pitchers, leftovers, bullpen updates and streamers (50:56). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, Stitcher and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  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/ 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 league. Well, fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. Hello, and welcome into Fantasy Baseball today on Wednesday, June 28th. Frank Stamphill joined by the Scott White.

Today on the show, recalibrating some rookie, pitchers and what to expect moving forward. Ranger Suarez is moving on up, a whole bunch of double dongs, and much more. Before we get started, please like this video and subscribe on YouTube if you haven't already, and if you're listening on the audio side, download, follow, and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify. We really do appreciate it. Let's jump in. So that's a new call, Scott, and I got it Tuesday night from the Pirates Broadcast. That was the call for Nick Gonzalez's first career home run. How about that?

I don't know. Was it unbelievable? Not really. The guy was just out of his mind, but... I guess he didn't have a lot of faith in Nick Gonzalez. They have a propensity to kind of overhype things I've noticed on their broadcast. It was a 440-foot home run, so I guess that part of it is pretty impressive. Bad job by me. We've done, what, two podcasts since the weekend?

and I didn't even know Nick Gonzalez got called up. I just discovered that today too. It was the quietest prospect. I mean, it kind of shows you how much his stock is like collapsed as a prospect because this is a guy who was drafted seventh overall in 2020 and started out pretty high on prospect list. But the production was not so great, particularly once he reached the higher levels of the miners.

And so now he's up in the majors, the Pirates looking for a spark. and he had been hitless prior to today's two-for-four performance with that long home run. I don't think he has enough natural power to make up for the amount he strikes out, but there is a chance. There is a chance. I would leave Nick Gonzalez for the deeper leagues for now, but if he gets hot, then maybe that'll change. 10% roster for Nick Gonzalez.

We'll talk about him a little bit later on as well, but let's start things off here, Scottie. Oh, my goodness gracious, your player of. the night. All right. I'm going to do Andrew Abbott, who had what appears to me

to be his most complete start here at Baltimore. He allowed one run on two hits in six innings, struck out eight, did walk three,

and we'll get back to that in a second. But, I mean, he hasn't had a bad start yet. I mean, just in terms of what the box score says,

he hasn't had a bad start yet. early on he wasn't getting many strikeouts at all. That's changed here in his last two starts. Okay, so early on he wasn't getting many strikeouts. He was given up a share of walks. He was given up hard contact, but no damage was being done against him, really. And then in these last two starts, the strikeouts have come way up.

He had 10 in his previous start against the Rockies and then eight here against the Orioles. So that's a good sign. That is a skill he's going to need if he's going to succeed in the majors, because it's the only thing that put them on the prospect, Matt, to begin with, was just the crazy strikeout totals that Andrew Abbott was delivering in the minors. The swinging strike rate in this one was, you know, more pretty good than great. And on the fastball specifically, he had a 26% width rate. Again, that's pretty good for a fastball.

And like, he needs to have that. So, okay, that's the good news for Andrew Abbott here. In his previous start, even though he had all those strikeouts against the Rockies, he did allow three home runs. They were Great American Ballpark home runs and that they weren't hit very hard or hit very long. But you know what? Andrew Abbott's going to pitch half his games

at Great American Ballpark. So I don't want to discount that. No home runs in this start. It was in Baltimore with the very deep left field fence. So he had the park effects working for him this time when they were working against him last time. And, you know, still had the swinging strikes. Okay.

So trending the right direction overall. What I think we have here in Andrew Abbott, now that we're seeing, okay, he can miss bats against Major League level hitters. Maybe not to the extent he did in the minors, but enough, maybe, that he can be a real asset and the majors. I think he's trying to be kind of the second coming of Joe Ryan because you look at the fly ball rate, which has always been very high for Ryan. It's actually a little lower this year. but historically it's been high for Joe Ryan and that's how he's kept the batting average against down. Andrew Abbott has a 56.7% fly ball rate

or at least he did come into the start, very high. And very dangerous in Cincinnati. But if their weekly hit flyballs by and large, you know, maybe he can overcome that particular life. He's going to have a pretty good strikeout rate. What I think is the main thing that I think is separating Andrew Abbott from Joe Ryan right now is those walks that I refer. referred to. Three in this start and how many was it in the Colorado start? It was zero in that

start but the overall walk rate has been high and it was something that was an issue for him in the minors as well as well. Joe Ryan hardly walks anybody. So for that profile, for the extreme fly ball pitcher profile, you know, kind of a soft tosser who still manages to get a lot of swings and miss is just because his fastball has those modern characteristics with the rising effect and all that. You know, that's mainly what Andrew Abbott and Joe Ryan have in common. But Andrew Abbott has two dings that Ryan doesn't. Really tough home environment for that and not the pristine control Joe Ryan has. So I don't know if you follow all that. I know that was not, my thoughts may have not been amazingly organized there. but I see a path to success here for Abbott. But it's the Joe Ryan path,

and he still has some hurdles to clear, I think. So I'm not saying, like, I'll drop him. I'm not even necessarily saying trade high, so high. You could look into that if you want. You could look into that for most players who are doing well. But I'm just saying the jury's still out as to how good he's going to be. More hope for him now than I had two turns ago,

but the jury's still out. And with everything that you just said, Scott, it's a reminder that even Joe Ryan, as great as he's pitched, look what just happened to him on Tuesday, right? Where he gave up five home runs in his start. Granted, he's going up against the Atlanta Braves, one of the best teams in baseball. But if you give up that many fly balls, eventually you could be prone to having some of these blow-up starts. And you're spot on, Scott. The fact that Andrew Abbott pitches in Great American Ballpark, it's not just a bad ballpark

for home runs, it is the worst ballpark in baseball to be a fly ball pitcher. It has the highest home run park factor in all of baseball. So I know this is gonna sound like, oh, we're talking down Andrew Abbott and all that kind of crazy stuff. He's pitched well. If you wanted to come here and just have us read off,

whatever, stat lines and go through box scores of what Andrew Abbott has done, that's not what we're gonna do. We're obviously gonna dive a little bit deeper and tell you, can this be sustained? But the last two, as you pointed out, Scott, have looked much better in terms of the swinging strikes and racking up the strikeouts for Andrew Rabbit.

Yes, they have. We'll see if it continues. Yeah. I wanted to go a little bit further with that rant, but I think I'm just going to end it there because... Nobody understood what I said. The comments are coming in. They're like, what's he talking about?

I don't understand. Oh, man. Well, what I'm saying is it's a weird profile in the same way Joe Ryan profile is weird. They both had amazing minor league stats. People were skeptical of them coming into the majors. It's worked out for Joe Ryan in the majors, but he has a much better home environment and throws a lot more strikes. Boom. If you don't understand that, get Joe ears checked. We've heard of the mic drop. Now we've got the pen drop from one, Scott White. We'll talk about a few other rookie pitchers in just a little bit. Gavin Williams was awesome. Tage Bradley was not. But another

pitcher I want to highlight just up top Scott and the way that he is pitching right now is Ranger Suarez who I don't know that we have to spend all that much time on him because we've talked about him a lot recently but in the same way that we've talked about moving Reed Detmer's up the starting pitcher ranks quite a bit maybe it's time to kind of give ranger swarez that same kind of respect inside the top 60 close to the top 50 starting pitchers whatever it might be another strong start here on Tuesday seven and a third innings, one run allowed, eight strikeouts to just one walk for Ranger Suarez. He actually did it a little bit differently in this start.

He didn't throw his curveball as much, a pitch that has worked very well for him this season. He used his cutter a little bit more, which ironically has not been a great pitch for him this season. But even with that, he went out and had another great start up against the Chicago Cubs. He is allowed two earned runs or fewer in six straight starts. The ERA, the overall ERA is down to. 3.18. But during this six-start stretch,

Rangers Swarres, a 135 ERA, a 0.98 whip. He's up to 87% rostered Scott, so he can't really talk about waiver-wire moves or anything with him. But what do you think about getting Ranger Suarez kind of way up the rankings the way he's pitching right now? I mean, I've moved him up quite a bit already.

I don't know how high you're talking. I think there are limits to how high I would put him. he did two years ago have an incredible run as a starting pitcher. That was the year he had the 136 ERA overall, but a lot of that came in the bullpen. Let me see what was the number when he moved into the rotation. I pulled up the wrong year here. 2021, Ranger Suarez, after he joined the rotation,

he had a 151 ERA in 12 starts. I think because he's a ground ball pitcher, he could potentially have an ERA in the low threes. He can't have a 151 ERA again. He can have an ERA in the low threes. In fact, that's what I was hoping he'd do heading into last year. Didn't happen.

The curveball has been credited for his success mainly during this stretch of now six starts where he's had a lot more success. And he didn't throw it nearly as much in this one. He had been throwing at about 25, 5% of the time in the previous 5 starts. There's only like 10% of the time in this one. So I guess you could take that as,

okay, so he doesn't have to live and die with the curveball. I know Lance Brasdowski has brought up the point that he's locating his sinker a lot better, more away from hitters rather than up and in. I don't know that I could find the data for that in this particular start. But like if that, like, it is more than just the curveball that's led to this turnaround for Ranger Suarez. So he looks pretty stable. right now. And because he's not vulnerable to home runs, that gives him a higher floor than a lot of

pitchers. But I do think the ceiling is limited to. So as, you know, like a top 50-ish type, okay, I could get behind that. But I don't think I'd go like top 30 or anything like that. No, I think that's fair. And when I was looking into the profile more on Tuesday here, it reminds me a lot of Bryce Elder, right? Someone we spoke about just last week, spoke extensively about someone who gets a lot of ground balls. He has a sinker. He has a few secondary pitches that work well. You know, the command isn't great,

but he gets enough strikeouts. And I was just comparing side by side. And I'm like, yeah, this is, this is kind of similar. Ranger Suarez is just the Philadelphia Phillies version of Bryce Elder. So I guess however much you like Bryce Elder, I might like Ranger Suarez similar. Probably not more, but just about as much as I do like Elder. honorable mention here, Scott, for what is likely, I can't imagine there's anyone else out there.

The AL and NL MVP leaders at this point, Shohei Otani in a game where he struck out 10 batters, had a double dong. He went three for three with two more home runs, extends his league lead to 28 home runs this season. And Ronald Acuna, we all know what he's done this season. Same thing, goes two for four with a double dong, has four home runs,

past five games. He is betting 3.30 with 19 homers, 35 steals, 70 runs scored. He is on pace for 145 runs scored in a 162 game season. It's crazy. Yeah. It is crazy. I mean, like, if the performance that really should have made us say, oh my goodness gracious here, was that Otani? Like, Otani had one of the all-time great single game. performances, right? Two home runs as a hitter, 10 strikeouts as a pitcher. If you have Otani in a daily league, you probably started him as a pitcher just because you only have so many chances to do that. And so you're, I don't know if you're regretting missing out on the two home runs or not, because obviously on those days when he slotted him a pitcher, you don't get the hitting stats.

But yeah, it's been crazy lately. And I was actually looking at this earlier today in terms of head-to-head points per game for hitters. Akun is number one. Not surprisingly. Otani's now climbed to number two in points per game for hitters. With the kind of power surge he's been on lately, and the plate discipline's been good this year too. Not amazing, but good.

You know who's third, by the way, among hitters and points per game? I have a pretty good guess. Per game is doing a lot of the heavy lifting there. Well, I was going to say Corby and Carroll, but now I don't know. He is high up, but it's not Corbyn Carroll. Third is actually Corey Seeger. Wow. All right. Well deserved.

He's been everything we could hope for this season and then some. I can only imagine if Corey Seeger didn't get hurt earlier this year, what kind of season he'd be having and maybe what kind of pace he'd be on as well. But yeah. Oh, you know what? It's actually Aaron Judge. I thought about him too, but. Seeger's fourth.

Yeah. Great season for Corey Seeger. season for Shohei Otani and Ronald de Kuna all around as well. The Otani thing is just so crazy because you hear it often. It's like the old baseball cliche like there's no I in team. You know you need like a full team. You can't really just like win with one star player. But I mean in this game you won with just one star player. It's really like something we've never seen before. But you all know that already doesn't really change much for fantasy. Obviously. Let's talk about a few other double dongs.

We had five different players with two homers on Tuesday night. We just spoke about Otani and Ronald Lucuna. Brandon Nimmo went two for four with a double dong as well. He is up to 10 home runs on the season. Just kind of doing Brandon Nimmo things, batting 282 with an 820 OPS. He is hitting the ball harder than ever before. So it looks like he might actually set a career high in terms of home runs this season if he could manage to stay healthy.

J.D. Martinez visits Corse Field. and obviously enjoyed it on Tuesday, two for four with two home runs there. He's up to 18 homers on the season with 883 OPS, and that's with missing time on the IL. One other name is Brandon Marsh, two for three,

two homers for him, both well over 400 feet. You know, the overall batting lines got for Brandon Marsh looks really good. 283 batting average, 834 OPS. But it doesn't really feel like he does anything for fantasy.

It's just, I was surprised to see that's how good his stat line was, but it hasn't really translated much to fantasy production this year. I had the same reaction too, because he has, this two-homer game, those were his second and third home runs since April. Oh, wow. So he, like, he hasn't been getting hits outside of play. You know, all his hits have been coming in play, basically, since April. And he's still striking out a third of the time.

So I don't know how he manages to have. such a high batting average when he's not getting those free hits because they're carrying over the fence you know it's hard enough for somebody who hits a lot of home runs to deliver a respectable batting average with a strikeout rate

that high and for what it's worth his expected batting average brand of marsh coming into the day is 220 so stat cast doesn't really understand how he's doing it either outside of five outfielder leagues I don't think we have to worry about brandon march too much and whether or not he can sustain this batting average

because as you point out, he's not doing much else. But I'd be, you know, I wouldn't want to invest too much in him in a five outfielder league either. All right. Anything else you'd like to add on JD Martinez and Brandon Nimmo? Just kind of chugging along here. Yep, they are. These were, both of these home runs for JD Martinez were hit less than 98 miles per hour. So benefited from the Corps effect.

I don't know if you mentioned that, Frank. I did not. I noticed one. I think one of his home runs had an XBA of 100. So that definitely is the course field effect. But you know what? He has 18 home runs on the season. So like I'm not going to knock J.D. Martinez.

He's perfectly fine starter. And so is Brandon Nemo. All right. Well, let's get back into the rookie pitchers. We mentioned Andrew Abbott, what he did. Let's just kind of go down the line here. Gavin Williams, stellar in his second start at the Royal. Seven shutout endings.

just one hit, one walk, with six strikeouts and 11 swinging strikes on 92 pitches. Eight of those 11 swinging strikes coming on the fastball, which did the heavy lifting in this start. Completely ditched the changeup compared to his first starting through 13 of them. In his first start, Gavin Williams threw zero changeups in his second start. He is up to 76% rostered Scott. And I think after a start like this, if he's available anywhere, that probably should change. Yeah, he looked great.

And it was against the Royals in, you know, their very pitcher-friendly park worth noting. But he gave up soft contact. He had a 26% whiff rate on the fastball exactly the same as Andrew Abbott. So, you know, pretty good whiff rate on that pitch in particular. And that's what them throw on the fastball 62% of the time. Gavin Williams has two really good breaking balls. And I think once he gets comfortable throwing the slider and the curve more and can lean on the fastball less.

First of all, that'll just make the fastball all the more effective. And second of all, I think we could really see him take off. But I was encouraged that he was allowed to go seven innings, that he issued just one walk, and that he had a pretty good whiff rate unlike in his first start, his debut. So very much on board with Gavin Williams. And I think there's a lot of upside here. What about Brian Wu?

How much upside do we have there? He was up against the Nationals, five innings of two-run ball, one earned run, and seven strikeouts with 12 swinging strikes. The slider was up 1.6 miles per hour in the start for him. Continues this fastball-heavy approach for Brian Wu.

Lots of four-seemers. Kind of works in this sinker as well. But he now has seven or more strikeouts in three of five starts, and he's looked pretty good. He's much more widely available. 53% rostered. I had to imagine he's behind Gavin Williams, Scott,

but in deeper leagues where Gavin Williams was already picked up, I think that's obviously where you should be looking for Brian Wu. Well, look, if strikeouts are mainly your thing, all the rookie pitchers who've come up and disappointed with strikeouts, which even Gavin Williams has to an extent here, Wu hasn't. Wu has been a bat missing extraordinaire. and he has yet to go six innings in a start,

which is a problem, and that'll need to change, I think, before Brian Wu has picked up widely in fantasy leagues because it's hard to make much of an impact if you're not going six innings at least fairly often. But he's like the underlying numbers look great. The expected ERA is far lower than the actual ERA. And the actual ERA is mostly inflated by that terrible

debut he had. So things are definitely trending up for Wu. And, you know, if you already missed out on Gavin Williams, I would say he's a good target. All right, last but not least is Taj Bradley, who got hit hard at the Arizona Diamondbacks. Obviously worth mentioning that the Diamondbacks had been one of the best lineups in baseball in the month of June. He gave up seven runs, six of those earned over just four innings pitched, four homers allowed in this start for Taj Bradley. The whiffs were not there. Only had five swinging strikes. Gave up eight hard hits in this game. His velocity was actually up, but clearly it did not matter for Tage Bradley. And this is part of the issue, Scott, that I had.

Even after the past two starts that have looked promising for him is inconsistency. I know he's a rookie, and obviously he should be given that leash. But for all the people that are chiming in like, oh, you guys are too low on Tage Bradley, you got to move him up. It's like, this is part of the problem. He's still really, really inconsistent. There's a good pitcher somewhere in there, but we just haven't seen it. enough.

And this is just part of my concern with him. Yeah. Well, I struggle with where to rank him because of that. Because the flashes are brilliant. And his previous two starts, he had 19 strikeouts in 10 in a third innings. And then he comes back and gets two strikeouts in this one.

He gives up twice as many home runs as he has strikeouts. And like that's that's inconsistency. The velocity was up on everything. this start, it didn't matter. It was still one of his least effective starts. He is going to remain vulnerable to the long ball. We saw, you know, during that terrible stint when he got Sidback to AAA, Tosh Bradley gave up a lot of home runs then.

He entered this start with only 33.9% ground ball rate. So he is putting the ball in the air a lot. And that's going to keep him vulnerable to, I think, blowups like this. He needs to, he just needs to figure out to be more consistent. Like, as you said, we know it's there. We've seen it there. We've seen those flashes from Taj Bradley. But I have a hard time just planting them in my lineup and thinking everything's going to be okay.

All right. Let's take our first break. And when we return, we will talk about Sandy Alcantara, who got back on track. We'll do that right after this. Welcome back. And if you are interested in buying some fantasy baseball today merch, you can do exactly that at the Paramount Shop, which offers a mountain of merch from the Paramount shows and movies. that you love. Scan the QR code in the top right corner if you're watching on YouTube

or head on over to paramount shop.com, Paramount Shop, where products are Paramount. And of course, if you're watching us live on YouTube, see this handy-dandy cap that I'm wearing here. You get one exactly like this over at the Paramount Shop. Let's talk about Sandy Alcon for Scott, who bounced back with a nice start at the Boston Red Sox, seven innings of one-run ball, with five strikeouts and 16 swinging strikes on 95 pitches. What did he do differently in this start? Well, the slider velocity was up 1.2 miles per hour. He faded the fastballs.

He really leaned into the changeup, and the change up was on. It has been a problem pitch for him this year, but he had nine whiffs on the change up in this start, Scott. What did you see? And how confident are you that San Diego Concord can kind of get on a roll here? I mean, three starts ago, he gave up one run in seven innings. That's true.

That's the thing. It hasn't been an Alec Manoa situation. I could probably come up with a not-so-extreme example. But, you know, it hasn't been consistently bad results from Sandy Alcantra. He's had starts like this sprinkled in with the bad starts, which is why it's been hard to say just, oh, yeah, you should probably bench Sandy Al-Contra. I did that one time in one league this year, and I think that was the last good start.

He had the one-earned run in seven innings. So, you know, you're kind of just having to take with the good with the bad at this point, easier to do in a points league because at least even when he gives you a bad start, he's usually giving you a lot of innings, and it ends up being a positive score. But, you know, hopefully, this is the start of him getting back on track. Hopefully he doesn't follow it up with another five-earned run outing. I don't know what to predict happens next for Sandy Alconstra. I think eventually he's going to get it right,

and I feel confident it'll be before the year's over, but I figured it would have already happened by now, too. Doubably impressive because he goes it to Fenway, which is a tough place to pitch, and against the lineup that has been pretty damn good this season. So nice start there for Sandy, his next start at the Atlanta Braves. So that will be quite the test, but I mean, if he can come out of that one with a quality start,

then I think I'd feel pretty damn good about what he did this week. Yeah. So, like, if you say your line is weekly, as most people do, that's not a separate decision you have to make, fortunately. You just plug them in for the two starts. And so, yeah, he's in your lineup. So far, so good. Let's hope he avoids a Joe Ryan.

situation against that Braves lineup, which is ridiculous. Sure is. Let's move over to some Waverwire hitters. And much like Matt McLean before him, Marcel O'Suna, who we continue to tell people to add, same thing could be said for Ezekiel to Ron, who went two for four with his 10th home run. He has multiple hits in seven of his last nine games. He is now betting 319 with a 900 OPS on the dot. He's still only 73% rostered. He's got second, no, excuse me, shortstop, third base, and outfield eligibility.

Scott, if you can only add one, would it be Ezekiel Duran or Marcel Ozone? Those are the two names. I mean, Ozone has been a stud since the start of May, and it's kind of ridiculous that he's not universally rostered at this point. But Duran is under rostered too. He, like, he, like Ozuna, benefits from being in such a loaded lineup. I mean, the Rangers lineup, really even more than the Braves. You look up and down it and the kind of run an RBI pace that every hitter is on. I mean, it's the reason Jonah Heim is the number one catcher in Roto leagues this year.

It's the reason why, it's a big reason why Corey Seeger has as many points per game as he does. It's a reason why Adolice Garcia is a top five outfielder in every format. It's just because he's so many runs in RBI. So that's one advantage that Duran has. His totals are lower. I mean, obviously he wasn't an everyday player all year. But that's one advantage. It's just the lineup context.

Also, it's easy to look a guy who's hitting about 320 and say, oh, regression is coming here. Probably to some degree regression is coming. but his expected batting average is 91st percentile. So it's not all smoke and mirrors here for Duran. His expected slug is 89th percentile. He is legitimately impacting the ball a way a hitter would need to to put up the kinds of numbers he has.

And it's high time people took notice of that, especially since you could start him at three different positions. Again, that is Ezekiel Duran. Let's slide over to Hassan Kim, who you could also start. at three different positions. He went three for five with two RBI. I brought him up recently.

I feel like you and Chris just kind of brushed him off. Like, ah, you know, whatever. It's Hassan Kim. He's let off five straight. And since the start of May, this is now 48 games. He is batting 286 with six homers, eight steals, and a 13% walk rate. That, I think, is a pretty useful player.

He's 54% rostered, so he's probably more of like a middle infielder or you use them in a Categories league more than anything else, but I want to give him a little bit more respect, Scott. I moved Hassan Kim up to 23rd in my second base rankings ahead of Esauk Paratus, Orlando Arcia, and Geraldo Perdomo. I think he's similar to Perdomo. I would still prefer those other two to him, though,

Paredes and Arcia. He's useful, sure. He's useful. Kim is in sort of the same. I feel like I keep coming back to this comparison, but the same way that the Philly's second basement is. Price and Stott. That's the guy.

Price and Stott. Oh, my gosh. I've had such a foggy brain this year when it comes to names. I don't know what's happening to me. Sorry. I'm not even 40 yet. I don't know. This is a problem.

It's all right, Scott. By the way, for Hassan Kim, look, if this Padres lineup ever does get going and it just kind of clicks the way we think it could, if he's leading off, I mean, we could be looking at pretty massive counting stats for him, but I feel like we've been saying that all year, and frankly, I don't know if it's going to ever happen

for these Padres, at least this season. Nick Gonzalez, we spoke about earlier, he went two for four with his first career Homer, 106 exit velocity 442 feet to straightaway center field. And we mentioned how he has been a letdown in the minors this year at AAA. He was betting 257 with six homers and an 820 OPS. He's 10% rostered. And I think I mostly agree, Scott.

It's for deeper leagues as a middle infielder, you know, those 15 team leagues. So I don't know that he needs to be much more rostered than 10%. But a name that we should watch and see where I can. goes, Nickensals. Yeah. Just because he has a bit of a pedigree there being such a high draft pick, being like a consensus,

gosh, was he a top 30 prospect? Entering last year, basically. So not that long ago. It's just it was such a disappointing 2022 and then not such a great 2023 leading up to this promotion. It was a consensus top 50 prospect, let's say,

entering last year. Again, that is Nick Gonzalez. Two other names, I think mostly four deeper leagues. Will Brennan went three for four with two RBI. In the month of June, he's betting 347 with two homers, two seals, and an 892 OPS. And Garrett Cooper went three for five with a double two RBI. Also in the month of June betting 288 with four home runs and 15 RBI. I don't know that this Marlins lineup is ever going to be great,

but they just got jazz chisholitan back, so that's going to help. And Jorge Salar is obviously having a monster year. Brian Dela Cruz is playing really well. There could be some opportunities here for Garrett Cooper in terms of batting average and counting stats. More so for, again, deeper league Scott, but any enthusiasm for Cooper or Will Brennan? I mean a small amount of enthusiasm.

I doubt they're going to register in the sort of league that the average player, the average listener. plays in. So, you know, I don't want to talk them up too much, but Will Brennan, you know what? We've mentioned him a few times before, kind of a poor man, Stephen Kwan, makes a lot of contact. Steal's bases probably will steal at an even better rate than Stephen Kwan, actually. And I like that you can say Will Brennan's name to the Bay Menon jingle.

You call it a jingle? So you remember the Buy Minen jingle? uncle by men in will Brennan I used to do that too with Mike Glennon what is that Glennon what is at least Mike Glennon I know who Mike Lenin is I know who Mike Lenin is I don't what what is that first thing that you're saying is that like a product or a name or I'm in and I don't know they made like razors and I don't know exactly what they were but they'd say like at the end of a commercial this is probably like late 80s early 90s by menon

Buy Menon. What is Menon? I didn't know at the time. It was the weirdest thing. But I don't know. I'd have to look into it. Alone, somebody's saying, I don't know. After shave.

Bars of soap. Toilatries. All right. Men's grooming products. Something like that. Kind of like a, I don't know, like Irish spring or something like that. By Minut. I don't even know how to spell Minen.

Anywho. Let's move on from this and talk about Cody Bellinger. What to do with Cody Bellinger? We haven't talked about him in a while. He went two for four with a double and a run scored but has struggled since returning from the IL. It's a pretty small sample size. Only nine games played,

but he's betting 207 with zero homers and a 526 OPS, which will look eerily similar to the month of May. Before he got hurt, he played 13 games in May. Cody Bellinger hit 226 with zero homers and a 578 OPS. We know that April was great and it looked like Cody Bellinger was bouncing back. Maybe not to MVP form, but looked like he was getting back on track. Any concern here, Scott, that he's just kind of reverting back to his old ways, Cody Bellinger. So Menon was the U.S. market leader among deodorants and antiperspirants for men for many years.

Most known for Speedstick, the ultra-budget minded. Deodorant. Anyway, who are you asking about? Yeah, I'm trying to learn more about this too because I have, oh, I know what Speedstick is. I obviously have heard that. Right. It's like the starter deodorant.

Yeah. Figure out how to use this, kid. Cody Bellinger, Scott. I was asking about Cody. Cody. In nine games since returning, he hasn't played well. 13 games back in May. Didn't look great either.

So I'm just wondering if he's reverting back to his old ways. I worry about that. But more information is needed. Like, I'm not going to drop him yet because it's only nine games fresh off the IL. Even when he was succeeding earlier with the Cubs, the expected stats were questionable. So there was some reason for skepticism then. And then he got all that momentum interrupted by the injury. So it's just a wait and see thing, I think, with Bellinger right now.

I think most people probably agree with you because he's still 92% rostered, but only started in 39% of leagues. So sounds like he's just on the bench for a lot of people right now. That is Cody Bellinger. And frankly, that's probably how you should be handling him right now. Let's talk about some news and notes. And Ray's manager, Kevin Cash, said Shane McClanahan is expected to make his next start Friday in Seattle.

He last started on June 22nd and exited early due to midback tightness. All things considered, I think this is a pretty good news for Shane McClanahan. He got pushed back a little bit, but he's not. going to be back Friday against the Mariners. Salvador Perez underwent an eye procedure on Monday to help with his lingering vision issues. And apparently it's not as bad as it sounds and it's something that he's undergone in the past. And was, they said he was available to pinch hit on Tuesday. I didn't actually check to see if he did that.

But sounds like Salvador Perez is going to be okay. I know he's had a really rough June. So probably part of that vision issue. And that's why he got it done. Merrill Kelly was placed on the aisle with a blood clot in his right calf and is without a timetable. Hoping for the best, obviously it's a semi-serious situation. But it is a big loss.

Merrill Kelly has pitched very well this year, a 322 ERA, a 1.14 whip. And I know there was another example of a blood clot last year, Scott. And I think it was 18 games. Ian Kennedy. Yeah. Yeah, this one was cited by Merrill Kelly's own manager, Tori Lavello. You know, I hear blood clot and I think of like the worst case scenario,

which, you know, maybe it's a season ending thing. And in fact, that can be a pretty significant issue, but hopefully it's not that bad, and it ends up being close to a minimal IEL stint tier for Merrill Kelly, who's been one of the most reliable pitchers. this year. Would hate to lose him. Yeah, he really has. It's just a short-term thing.

Yep. Julio Arias is set to return Saturday against the Royals in Kansas City. Obviously a great matchup there. First time off the IL, so good for him. Brandon Woodruff threw another bullpen session on Tuesday, this time up to 25 pitches.

He's still scheduled to throw a few more bullpen sessions before beginning a rehab assignment. Jose Altuvae remained out of the lineup Tuesday due to lingering discomfort in his heat. U. Darvish was scratched from his start due to an illness. Hunter Green could be out until August due to a lingering right hip injury, which... I didn't think it was going to be that long. Yeah, same.

This timetable just kind of came out of nowhere. And it's kind of crazy. I was thinking more about it. The Reds are, they've gone on this crazy run. Obviously, the rookie hitters have come up and done really well. They're doing it without Hunter Green and without Nick Ladolo, who were regarded as their top two pitchers coming into the season, which is pretty crazy stuff for them.

Shout out to the Reds. I wonder if they could make a trade for like a high-end starter because they still have a lot of pros, for all the prospects they've graduated, they still have a lot more high-end ones in the minor league ranks, Noel V. Marte, for one. You know, maybe they could explore the trade market. Maybe there's like, I don't know,

a Luis Castillo type out there. I feel like the two big, names I've heard kind of mentioned are Shane Bieber and Lucas Giolito. It would be funny though if they traded for Luis Castillo, particularly if they traded Noel V. Marte as the centerpiece. That would be. Luis Castillo. Fantastic. Masataka Yoshita was out of the lineup due to forearm soreness.

Marcus Troman is expected to make his next start this weekend. He was pulled Sunday due to a blister on his right index finger. James Paxton remains lined up to make. his next start Friday in Toronto. He left his previous start early due to right knee soreness. Liam Hendricks is scheduled to play catch on Wednesday, his first time throwing since going on the IL earlier in June. Alec Manoa, the story just gets crazier.

He was making a rehab start, or I guess whatever, a get back on track start. In the Florida Complex League on Tuesday, he gave up 11 earned runs over two and two-thirds innings. This is the lowest level of the minor leagues, and he still got hammered. A bunch of teenagers who only see fastballs. Crazy. Eleven runs in two-and-two-thirds innings.

I don't know what I was expecting to use the Michael Bluth-Jiff, but it was better than that. Whatever I was expecting, I wasn't expecting that. and I would imagine nobody in the world was expecting that. Now, the Blue Jays did offer a lot of happy talk. That is laced with some truth.

So from John Schneider, their manager obviously saw the line score, but heard the things we were talking about in terms of strike throwing, delivery, tempo, velo was all positive. The rest of the stuff you can kind of take with a grain of salt. I don't think one day, one outing, one report will really change. what the Jace think of his rehab assignment. I think there's enough track record and confidence and belief in him. Okay.

So they're saying it's more about the process, basically. And that's true. But 11 earn runs in two and two-thirds innings against that level of competition. Like, you almost have to try to be that bad. I don't care what process you're going through. So I'm, you know, it could still all click into place. I remember there was a time when, McKenzie Gore was struggling before he made his debut and he got sent down to the lower

miners and had some really ugly starts at first. And like it's not like all hope is lost for Alec Manoa. But I'm losing hope that he's going to help much this year. I would imagine savvy dynasty managers are not giving up or selling low on Alec Manoa, but you can find one that's not so savvy. You might be able to get Alec Manoa for dirt cheap, for pennies. I can tell you, I offered in the Scott White. Dynasty League, R.J. White.

Savvy owner. No relation. But he is my managing editor. I offered him Lance Lynn and Jack Flaherty for Alec Minoa. And he seemed offended. Offended by this offer. He was looking for pitching. You know, Lance Lynn

was trending the right direction. I thought I didn't think it was an offensive offer. But yeah, he wasn't going to budge on Minoa. But he is savvy, as you said. Yeah, sure is. Brandon Lau began a rehab assignment Monday at the raise rookie level Florida Complex League affiliate. Jack Flaherty has been clear to start Saturday against the Yankees.

Tyler O'Neill said he's aiming to begin a minor league rehab assignment next week, and he's been out since early May with a back injury. Jose Orkidi threw a 25-pitch bullpen session Tuesday. He's been out since early May with right shoulder inflammation. Calquantral will return to the Guardian's rotation Friday against the Cub. which means the Guardians will either have to go to a six-man rotation or one of Gavin Williams or Logan Allen could get sent down. So I'm just gonna throw it out there.

I don't think it's gonna be Gavin Williams following this start, but we'll see what Logan Allen does. I think he faces the Royals on Wednesday. And last but not least, Matthew Boyd needs Tommy John surgery and we'll miss the remainder of the season. Let's take our final break and when we return, When we return, pitchers who did not pitch so well on Tuesday night. We'll talk about it here on Fantasy Baseball today.

Welcome back, and a big thanks to everyone watching us live. Nearly 500 people here. It's very late on the East Coast as it normally is, so we do appreciate you hanging out. Hit the like button and subscribe if you haven't already. Pitchers who did not have it on Tuesday night, and let's start with Joe Ryan in a warm, humid Atlanta, just set up for disaster.

fly ball pitcher in that environment against that lineup. We got all the regression that we could have possibly imagined. He gave up six runs over three innings pitched, five home runs in that start, and the fastball got absolutely crushed, which is very clearly his best pitch, a 98.2 average exit velocity against that fastball, and after this one, he's up to a 344 ERA. But it's got over the last six starts. this is coming with a start in there with a complete game shutout.

Yeah, his last time out was a complete game shutout. Against the Red Sox, a good lineup. Yeah, he followed up his best start of the season with his worst. His last six start, Joe Ryan, a 555 ERA, a 101 whip, so maybe he's been a little bit unlucky,

but I don't know. He is, I don't want to say he's hitting a wall, but he's hitting something right now. No. I think he just ran into a buzz saw. It was, you know, his vulnerability, because of that profile that he has, his vulnerability should be the long ball.

And he had allowed, prior to this five home run start, he had allowed just eight home runs all year. So he was due. And the Braves are the most powered-laden team in the majors. By far, if you consider, if you're measuring it by home-run distance, the Braves are by far the most power. latent team. They hit the longest home runs. They're like lapping the field in terms of home runs, home run distance. So yeah, they, they applied some regression here. They are also number one

in isolated power against right-handed pitching, which should come as no surprise, given that Atlanta Braves line. That's a more practical stat than home run distance. There you go. Three other other names that did not pitch well on Tuesday, Scott. Should we, or do we need to hold on to all three of these? Michael Kopeck lasted only four innings because he walked seven batters. He now has 16 walks over his last three starts. And on the season, 5.1 walks per nine. He's still 88% rostered.

Garrett Whitlock was hit hard up against the Marlins. He gave up six runs over four and two-thirds innings. And his ERA is now up to 5.15. and it was finally, it finally happened, Scott. We knew it was going to happen. Julio Tehran at the New York Mets. I think it's probably unfortunate because a lot of people had him in the lineup

for the two starts, but he gives up seven earned runs, including four homers, over five and two-thirds innings. Do we need to hold on to all of those names? Tehran, Garret Whitlock, Michael Kopeck. I think you for sure need to hold on to Michael Kopeck. The walks have been terrible lately,

as you pointed out. but let's not forget that in the five starts prior to these three starts where the control has been terrible. The five starts prior to that, a 172ERA 12.6K per 9. So we know what the upside is for Michael Copac. Maybe he's like a more extreme version of Dillon Cease. And I'm not saying you should trust him right now. We've got to see him get the control under control again.

but I think the upside is too high for you to dump him. And I would be reluctant to drop Garrett Whitlock. Depends how shallow your league is, I guess, whether or not you'd consider doing that. You mentioned the overall ERA is over five, but in the five starts prior to this one, it was 360. It was nearly a strikeout per inning. It was a very good whip.

The swinging strike rate was amazing. He has that due sweeper that he's been getting a lot of whiffs with. and, you know, I'll take one misfire in a span of six starts. If he struggles again next time out, it might be time to move on. But I'll give Garrett Whitlock a pass for this one. I guess if you're just going to apply the, okay, one miss is not enough to dump him rule to Whitlock. You could also make the case for Tehran. He's obviously the one I'd have the easiest time dropping.

And look, yeah, I was two-star week. came into it with a 157 ERA, right? Just going off memory. I can never find the stats when I need to. 153 area. So it came into this start with a 153 area, two start weeks, pretty good matchups. I was starting them in a bunch of leagues myself.

You live by the Tehran, you die by the Tehran. Unfortunately, I didn't get to experience any of the living by Tehran. I only know dying by him. And it sucks. the reason you could justify starting him wasn't just that he had a 153 ERA. He was giving up a lot of weak contact. His expected ERA was 329 coming into the start. That's still very good.

And so I don't know that I'm in a hurry to drop him necessarily. If I picked him up for the two-star week, let's see how the next start goes. But it's a volatile profile just because of the amount of contact he gives up. And I don't think you should count on him being a rest of season. for you by any stretch of the imagination. Would you drop either of Garrett Whitlock or Julio Turan for Gavin Williams or Brian Wu?

Yeah. I would drop either for Williams. I would drop Tehran for Wu. I think I'd keep Whitlock over Wu. All right. Do any of these Waver Wire pitchers matter? They were all in action on Tuesday.

Paul Blackburn, a solid start against the lowly Yankees lineup. Five and a third. One run allowed. with five strikeouts and 12 swinging strikes. His underlying numbers are actually pretty good too for Paul Blackburn. Alex Wood pitched well as the bulk reliever at the Blue Jays, five shutout with seven strikeouts. David Peterson pitched well in his return from the miners.

He threw six shutout innings with five strikeouts and 11 swinging strikes. And Matt Manning, he was okay at the Texas Rangers. His first time back on the mound here, five and two thirds, two runs allowed with four strikeouts. but his velocity was up a considerable amount across the board. Scott, do any of these pitchers matter? Matt Manning, David Peterson, Alex Wood, and Paul Blackburn. I don't think Matt Manning's going to matter. It's unlikely any of them really matter.

But I've long been intrigued by Alex Wood. For a decent amount of time, been intrigued by David Peterson. And then you got Paul Blackburn, who somehow has 10.2 strikeouts per nine innings this year. He has a 323 FIP. He has a 372 X FIP. I'm still skeptical all that's going to last, and he pitches for the A's, which is a major disadvantage. But he's doing interesting things. So I would at least keep an eye on those three, Blackburn, Alex Wood, and David Peterson. not sure it's worth adding them yet, though, even in like a 15 team league.

Let's wrap up with some leftovers, and we'll start with some pitching standouts. Kevin Gosman picked up his seventh double-digit strikeout effort of the season. He had 12 strikeouts over six innings up against the Giants. Clayton Kirschaw turned in his fifth straight quality start. He was in Corpus Field, six shutout innings with only one hit and one walk aloud. Bryce Elder, another quality start, just chugging along, six innings, two runs. four strikeouts up against the twins. Jordan Montgomery now has four quality starts in a row.

This one was up against the Astros. And Tyler Wells on the other side of that start with Andrew Abbott. A fun start. Just two young pitchers who are pitching well this season. Tyler Wells, he's really pitched well this year. Six innings of two-run ball with seven strikeouts there. Lots of names got. But Tyler Wells, Jordan Montgomery, Bryce Elder, Clayton Kirschaw, Kevin Gosman.

anything that stands out from that group? Well, you mentioned Kevin Gosman has seven double-digit strikeout games this year. About halfway through this year, he's already up to seven of those. The top two pitchers, the consensus top two pitchers coming into this year were Corbyn Burns and Garrett Cole. They each had only nine double-digit strikeout games last year, and Gosman is already out seven halfway through this year. that is impressive and it makes me wonder

if we're rating him highly enough. I have him as my number four starting pitcher rest of season so I think I'm rating him highly enough but I just don't feel like there has been I don't feel like he's been perceived on that level

for most of the year. He certainly wasn't coming into the year. Perceived as an ace, but not like one of the aces among aces, you know. Yeah. He's kind of looking. that way.

Yeah. I have them as my SP4 as well, Scott, so. Okay. So we just... Let's go.

Yeah. Credit where credit is due. So, Jordan Montgomery had a terrible May with an ERA over six. And here in July,

his ERA is one... I'm sorry, here in June, his ERA is 171. So he went from a 604 ERA in May to 171 in June. And I don't see what's changed.

for him. So perplexed by that one. But the longer track record suggests Jordan Montgomery is a pretty good pitcher, so I guess I'll go with that. All right. The hitting leftovers, a big welcome back to Jazz Chisholm, who went three for four with a double three RBI and two runs scored. Austin Riley went two for three with his 14th home run. And it has been a bit of a letdown season for him. Just a 787 OPS. Quality of contact has taken a little bit of a step back. So has the barrel rate for Austin Riley, mostly because he's hitting a few more ground balls this season. So if he can get back to lifting, obviously in the middle of that Bray's lineup, there's not really anything actionable with this. It's just, I don't know, maybe you could

buy low on Austin Riley. It probably not going to happen. Yeah, it's been, it's just been like a little underwhelming. You know, it's kind of like, it's kind of similar to Vladimir Guerrero where it doesn't really look like anything to worry about,

but you just keep waiting for him to take off. And I think that's eventually what's going to happen. Austin Riley's just going to get insanely hot for a month like he did last July when he hit 423 with 11 homers.

He's going to have, I don't know, maybe it'll be July. He has another July like that. I don't know. But I wouldn't be worried about Austin Riley per se. Well, it happens. for his teammate who did it once again on Tuesday. Michael Harris, one for four,

with his seventh home run, 110.3 exit velocity, 438 feet, and all of a sudden, he's up to a 260 batting average with a 742 OPS on the season. Corby and Carroll went two for four with his 17th home run, and I just want to show some appreciation. I know that we've talked about Catelle a little bit recently, but he went one for three with his 15th home run. He entered Tuesday as the third best second baseman in both Roto and heads head points leagues on the season. Not just the past month or whatever. It's on the season.

Cotell Marta has been. Five home runs and seven games. Yeah. Yeah, he's been great. And also wanted to show some love to Christian Walker. He hit his 16th home run. And very similarly, entered Tuesday as the fourth best, first baseman in Roto, the third best in head to head points.

Those guys have been great. Yeah. I have more faith than Catele-Marte remaining that high in the rankings. And in fact, my updated rest-of-season rankings reflect that. I've moved him ahead of Jose Al-Tuvae, for instance. Wow. That's a pretty big deal. Yeah, well, I mean, Al-Tufe is good, but so is Catele-Marte.

And it remains the most curious thing to me, why he was being drafted outside the top 200 prior to this. I mean, I pointed it out a few times during draft season, and I ended up with a lot of shares of him, thankfully. I don't know why everyone was so quick to write off Ketel Marte, a guy who, despite underachieving last year, still hit the ball plenty hard. It's just fatigue, Scott.

That's it. It's fatigue. I guess. Yeah. Because he's let us down twice, right? In 2020, following a monstrous 2019, he let us down. And then in 2022, following a very good 2021. It's been an odd year only thing here.

for Ketal Marja. And I'm not saying like that's programmed in and that's going to continue and fade him next year. I'm not saying that. But it was an overreaction to his disappointing 2021. I would say, especially since,

or his disappointment 2020, especially since he had succeeded twice before. It wasn't just a one hit wonder situation in 2019. Call to the bullpen. Some updates here for the Giants. Camillo DeValle recorded the final four outs, three via the strikeout for his 20s. third save for the Cardinals.

Jordan Hicks pitched a clean ninth, struck out one for his fifth save, and all five have come in the past eight games. He's 54% rostered. If you need saves or just a reliever in a points league, whatever it might be, he actually has starting pitcher eligibility too. He's one of these weird relievers

that you can use in an SP spot. I don't know why you would want to, but I'll just throw it out there that he has that eligibility. Yeah, last week I said Jordan Hicks, I think he could run away with this job for the Cardinals, and I'm doubling down. I'm sticking with it. For the Guardians, Emmanuel Class A picked up his league leading 24th save.

For the Dodgers, Evan Phillips, entered with two outs in the ninth inning, and the bases loaded. He got the final out for his 11th save. For the Reds, Alexis D.S. picked up his 22nd, and for the Oakland A's, Trevor May pitched in the eighth inning in a one-run game facing the top of the Yankees lineup. And then Sam Mole got the ninth of the ninth.

picked up his first save of the season. Let's wrap up with to stream or not to stream. And starting with Wednesday, there are some interesting names here. I think we said Dane Dunning versus the Tigers, Logan Allen at the Royals. Yeah, there's quite a few J.P. Sears versus the Yankees, Domingo Hermon at the A's,

Wade Miley at the Mets. Five names. I think they're all solid. Yeah, because there are so many choices, I think I'd shy away from. from Hermann at Oakland, just because he was roughed up so badly. His last couple starts. Mm-hmm.

That's fair. Let's move over to Thursday. And, ooh, tough. Emmett Sheehan has pitched well, but he's in Corse Field. Mm-hmm. Reese Olson has pitched well, but he's going against the Rangers. Yeah, don't. I'd rather not do that.

Don't love it. I think Kyle Hendrix against the Phillies. Might be my top choice. That's probably fine. I think Clark Schmidt at the A's. He's pitched pretty well over the past month. And Patrick Sandoval against the White Sox could go okay. I mean, he's his own worst enemy at times.

Yeah. But, no, he had a good start against the Royals recently. And I think the same could happen here. We are going to wrap there. For Scott, I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning in to fantasy baseball today. please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify, and we'll be back again tomorrow.

Bye-bye.