Fantasy Baseball Today - Steven Matz or Carlos Rodon? Are These Guys Good? (4/6 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: April 6, 2021

Right before we started recording Fernando Tatis went down with what appears to be a shoulder injury. We'll keep you updated once we know more. OH MY GOODNESS GRACIOUS (2:25)! Are Akil Baddoo and Steven Matz for real? J.D. Martinez is off to a nice start to the season. ... We have news and notes (16:54). Elieser Hernandez and Austin Hays landed on the IL while Trent Grisham and Sonny Gray could be back soon for their respective teams. ... Are these players good (23:12)? Rodon or Matz? Is Jordan Montgomery really good? ... Are any of these deep league starting pitchers good (31:23)? ... Let's recap the rest of Monday, including Jacob deGrom, Stanton, Nelson Cruz and more (37:08). ... What's the latest in the bullpen (44:27)? ... We update you on the West Coast games with a focus on Dustin May and Frankie Montas (49:14). ... MICHAEL CAINE pays special visit as an homage to Ty Buttrey, 'To Stream or Not To Stream' and Team Name Tuesday (56:30). ... Email us at [e-mail]. 'Fantasy Baseball Today' is available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Podcasts, Castbox and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank, @AdamAizer Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ 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. I drive, center field, and swing. This is magnificent. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy becomes reality. Now here's Frank Scott, Chris, and Adam.

What is up, everybody? Welcome into Fantasy Baseball today. Frank Stample joined by Scott White and Chris Towers. we have a jam-pack show for you today. I'm going to do a little segment. Are these players good? Some players that have been catching our attention early on in the season. Got a recap of hopefully everything to happen on Monday night.

We'll update you on the West Coast Games a little bit later on. Reminder for those listening on the podcast side that we do record these late the night before. And I have a scheduling note on the Rockies to talk about, some team name Tuesday. Do we have a new name for Sweet and Savory? I don't know. Let's find out.

but let's start with the big news right before we're getting started here. Fernando Tatis swings the bat very hard, swing and miss, goes down, looks like he's holding his wrist. It looked like he was holding his left wrist, but that could just be like trying to stabilize it. We know he had the shoulder issue in spring, but it looked bad, did not look good.

Yeah, the kids say you hate to see it. So if we get any update on Fernando Tatis throughout the course of the podcast, we will definitely fill you in on that. But just immediately walked off the field with trainers and went straight into the clubhouse. So we'll see what happens with Fernando Tatis. But obviously, consensus first round pick.

I mean, in Roto, he was a top five pick and obviously very pivotal to many fantasy teams out there. But we don't have information as of now. Once we do, we will let you know. What's going on, Scott? I'm doing fine, Frank. Doing fine. How about you?

I'm doing our first. All right? Your boy Ty Buttery, man. I don't know if you saw, but he retired from baseball. Hmm. You want to jump into this right now? No, no, no, no. I just, I wanted to make sure that you know.

Maybe, I don't know. Maybe we'll have a visit from a special guest later on in the podcast. I don't know. Maybe. We'll see. We'll see. I'm working on a little script here in between takes. We'll see how it goes.

All righty. We'll see what happens. Let's jump right into our, oh, my goodness gracious, player of the night from a Monday. Oh, my goodness. gracious. All right, Scotty, why don't you kick us off

with your player of the night or day? There was a lot of day games. Yeah, I'm actually going to go with one from the day. I'm going to go with the Kielbadu. I hope I'm pronouncing that right,

of the Tigers. We've talked about them before. We talked about the big spring he had as a Rule 5 pick from the Twins organization, showing power and speed and plate discipline. I hadn't really played

above the high miners. Of course, we don't know what kind of development took place for him in 2020. But he's, started for the second straight game for the Tigers. He homered for the second straight game for the Tigers, actually a grand slam.

Both of the home runs hit the opposite way. He also stole a base in the game, which, again, we saw him do his share of that in spring training. Obviously, the Tigers lineup is one where it doesn't make sense to hold back a player with genuine upside. It should have no problems breaking into that. Maybe it's already started playing back-to-back games. So I think certainly in five outfielder leagues,

Badoo is somebody you'll want to go ahead and pick up. I don't know, even in like, even in like shallow leagues, if you just want an upside play, you got some boring guy on your bench? I don't know. Like what's a good example of a boring guy who's probably universally rostered,

but you just know isn't going to be an impactful player in a shallow league? So I had, I had AJ Pollock written down, Scott. He's, AJ Pollock is 58% rostered. Yeah, not his rostered. as you think, right?

No, I think that's too much. I think I would want to drop someone like AJ Pollock to take a shot on Akeel Badoo. Yeah, certainly in a shallow league. And that's the way I was answering these questions on Twitter is like, in shot, the reason I make a distinction is because in shallow leagues,

you can burn through so many players in pursuit of upside, and it doesn't really hurt you because they're going to be comparable players always on waivers, you know? In a deep league, you know, AJ Pollack, that that standard of player doesn't come around nearly as often. You probably have somebody worse.

You can drop in a deep league for Badoo. But that's kind of what I was getting out with that deep league, shallow league distinction. One that we got a few times today, Scott, was Lioti Tavares with the Texas Rangers. Would you drop him for Akeel Badoo, even in a deep league? Yeah, I mean, I see him as a steel specialist at best. And, you know, if it's a five outfield league or Roto League, you probably need more steals, but the thing is, like, if Badoo makes good on this, he's going to contribute stolen bases as well. So. Yeah. And Tavares probably has a pretty short leash at this point. It wasn't clear he was

even going to make the team by the end of spring. So it's entirely possible he's out of the picture. If he, you know, I think he has eight strikeouts in his first like 10 play appearances or something like that. So, you know, it may not be long. You take a chance on the upside when it presents itself. I don't know where it goes from here, obviously. Maybe Badoo goes O for his next 12 and then sits four strike games and we drop them and never hear from him again. But I think there's a chance there's something here,

especially coming off the Big Spring. And he, I mean, he wasn't like a top 100 prospect, but he's a legit prospect, I think. Like, he was a third round pick in 2016. And like the minor league numbers don't jump off the page, 780 OPS, 249, batting average. But he was pretty young for every level. I mean, he's only 22 right now, making the majors,

having never played above high A. So, you know, he was one of like the 20 youngest players in the Florida State League in 2019. He only played 29 games. I assume there was some kind of injury there, but I'm not, I haven't seen that. 2018, he was, you know, again, one of the 26 youngest players. So, you know, there's the potential that there's something real here. And it's team name Tuesday. So you can always go with scuba-b-doo-but-do.

No reaction. Is that a Scooby-Doo thing? No, no, it's just, yeah, yeah. It's okay. Yeah, no, that's, yeah, you could do that. All right. They hate it. It's fine.

Akeel-Badu is 18% roster on CBS. I think that number should be a little bit higher. had an absolute monster spring to 13 for 40 with five home runs, four steals, a good amount of strikeouts, 14Ks, but he also walked 10 times. So balance it out a little bit there. Chris, oh my goodness, gracious from Monday. Can I do three different guys?

No. Wow. Okay, I'm not a low. Am I a goodness? They're all, well, I ask because they're all very similar, actually. And it's a trio of lefties who looked or are, as we are currently talking, are in the midst of looking very, very impressive. But if I have to

pick one, if you're going to call the police on me because I didn't pick one player, those are the rules, big fan of rules. Stephen Mets. He looked excellent today. 95.3 miles per hour with his fastball that was up about a mile per hour. He was consistently higher early on in the start. He couldn't quite hold on to it. But last year, we saw that was the highest velocity he'd ever had before. I think there was like a mile and a half hour, mile and a half per hour jump up in velocity for Matt's from 2019 to 2020. And he's up again. He had 15 whiffs on 91 pitches, you know,

32% changeups, 12% curveballs, 9% slider. So, you know, a legitimate four pitch mix. He got whiffs on all four of those pitches. Yes, it was the Rangers. They don't have a good lineup, although they, you know, hit pretty well in their first series. I guess Stephen Matt's is better. than anyone the royals have.

But I'm very impressed by what Stephen Mats did today. And if he's available, I will be looking at him. He is only 52% rostered on CBS right now. Again, Stephen Mats is the one that we're talking about. You'll get him. The two other lefties. I'm probably going to be more excited about the two other lefties for what it's worth. I think, so we're talking about Carlos Rodon and Trevor Rogers.

Rogers, the line doesn't look good. But he really had one bad inning. and I think there was some catching issues in that inning. But Rogers, who we talked about a lot in the spring, had a big velocity jump this spring. And he, I want to say he threw seven pitches in the first inning that were all harder thrown than any pitch he threw last season. Trevor Rogers, he averaged, let's see, 95.3.

With his fastball, 1.7 miles per hour up 17 whiffs on 77 pitches. And he was very good after that first inning. That's what I like to see. You know, it's the kind of, he hit 98. That's what's elite for a lefty. That's what jumps out to me. What also jumps out to me is, you know, last year, Trevor Rogers, he showed good strikeout potential,

but it was mostly playing the fastball and change up off each other. They both had high whiff rates. He actually threw his change up just 13% of the time in this game. He went to his slider more, which, you know, some of the reports out of spring training said he had more confidence. in it this time around. And he still got 17 whiffs on 77 pitch. It's still amazing swinging strike rate.

So, yeah, he looks like he could be a really, really big bat misser. And if I picked up Trevor Rogers for the two starts, there's no way. I'm dropping him after this start. Yeah. Do not drop Trevor Rogers. I know the final line doesn't look great, but a lot of that damage came in the first inning. And after that first inning, he allowed us.

just one base runner. Yeah, he had four walks in the first inning. Yeah, I think he might have been overthrowing because he dialed the velocity back. And that's the kind of thing. When you show you can throw 98, that kind of makes me think like, well, maybe he should throw 95, 96,

have a little better command, but still have 98 in the back pocket. So that might have been what happened as the start went on. So that's basically our, are these players good segment? Because I had Akiel Badu and I had Stephen Madsen there.

So I should have known that you guys were going to choose them anyway. but Scott, would you drop someone like David Price for Stephen Mats? David Price is still 64% roster on CBS. I don't have a problem dropping price. I don't. How about, I'm gonna give you three lefties in a row here.

Mad Bum, David Price, Andrew Heaney. They're all between 64 and 65% roster. Would you drop all three of them for Stephen Mats? Yeah, they all seem super replaceable to me. I'd be fine with that. But again, I would prioritize Rogers over Mats. I would prioritize, prioritize.

Let's see the update on his start, but I think you don't want to jinx it, but seven strikeouts and three and a third right now. Wow. He's consistently pumping 97, 98 into the fourth inning. He added a curveball. I don't know if he's used it yet, but he looks really good, like better than he has in a long time.

Yeah. Yeah, I guess the reason I'm kind of downplaying mats and, you know, you know how aggressive I am about roster moves this time of year. Anybody who shows an inkling of potential, I'll pretty much make a move for. But, you know, Matt's been around for a long time. He's faked us out a lot. And I don't really see what he did differently to get this result. He was throwing a little harder, but, you know, not such a big jump that I imagine it being completely transformational. He did throw his change up more than we're used to see in 33% of the time. Last year was the highest he ever threw

at 25% of the time. But last year, he was also awful. So, So I'll just point out he, um, his, like I said earlier, his velocity was up. He was throwing in 2019, he was 93.3 miles per hour. 2020, he was 94.5. And this one, he was 95.3. So he's throwing significantly harder than he has for pretty much his entire career, except for his rookie season, which was pretty brief. Okay.

So we're just compared to last year. It's not that much higher, but you're saying compared to the rest of the career. Compared to the baseline, yeah. Again, that is Stephen Matt. So I think we kind of agree that he's good. And a few names that, again, you could drop for him. David Price, Madison, Bob Garner, Andrew Heaney. Carlos Rodon is currently pitching against the Mariners.

We'll update you on his line later on in the show. Oh, my goodness gracious for me, I just wanted to highlight J.D. Martinez, along with a few other hitters, just because he, I feel like, is going to be under such a microscope this first month of the season, because last year just completely plummeted, off the face of the earth. 680 OPS, obviously a weird season for him, a weird season for everybody,

but specifically mentioned that not having in-game video was a big adjustment for J.D. Martinez, and other players have talked about it as well, Christian Gelich and Javier Baez, to name a few. But so far, Martinez has looked great on Monday, two for three with two walks, hit his second home run of the season. He had another ball off the wall in center field in Fenway.

That actually was only a single, so that's hilarious because he's so slow. But yeah, I just, I want to pay attention early on. I mean, just back in 2019, he was the 21st best hitter in both Roto and Head Dead points. So, I mean, if he comes anywhere near that based on where he was being drafted, usually rounds, I don't know, anywhere from like six to eight, then he's going to be a huge value. And the OPS for J.D. Martinez was up over 900 each season between 2016 and 2019. He's hitting the ball very hard so far for what's worth.

It's a super small sample size, so like you don't want to overvalue it. but I'm just going to continue to update people on these hitters that we're watching very closely from last year that struggled. And I want to mention that. With J.D. Martinez, as great as he's been, both Brewers, sluggers, I guess you can call them. But Kestin Hira, on the complete other end of the spectrum, he's 0 for 15 to start a season with eight strikeouts and zero walks.

And strikeouts were the big issue for Kestin Hira last year. Same with Christian Yelich, just three for 15 to open the season with nine strikeouts, only one walk. a 56% strikeout rate. It's, you know, he has 16 plate appearances. But the strikeouts were an issue for both Kesson Hira and Christian Yelich last season. Scott, any takeaways on any of these guys? J.D. Martinez, Hira, Yelich. It's still early.

Yeah, I mean, the one I worry about is Hira because it's been, you know, last season, this spring, now entering this season. And, you know, we don't have a lot of track record of success there like we do with the Yelich. So, yeah, it's not to the point I'm dropping Hira, but it then, I want to see more soon. I want to see better soon. And the thing with Hira is it was really, like as much as I like him, it was three months as a rookie. You know, he was not great when he first got called up. It was a ton of strikeouts.

He got sent back down. And then he was awesome for the, you know, last three months. But it was still a lot of strikeouts. So it's definitely concerning. I'm not panicking yet. down again. What's that? Maybe he needs to get sent back down again.

You know, sometimes that happens. Sometimes, you know, it takes a little while. Yeah, but yeah, it's, it's been concerning for Kestan Hira. The Brewer's lineup, I'm pretty sure they're just bad, too. I will talk about Trevor Williams a little bit later on. He was really good on Monday night, but it might just be that the brewers lineup is really bad. So we'll get into that.

But before we hit the news and notes, just want to remind everyone that, yes, it is is that time of the year again. Master's Week. The azaleas. Butter, Butler Cabin, the Green Jacket, the Pimento cheese sandwiches. Ooh, baby. CBS Sports is your home.

As always, to watch DJ, Brooks, Rory, and all the action unfold at Augusta. Whether you're looking to watch on the range featuring groups, Amen Corner, holds 15 and 16, all four rounds, and of course, the CBS broadcast over the weekend. It's all available on CBSSports.com,

the CBS Sports mobile app, and Paramount Plus, Pimento Cheese Sandwich, not included. But we're working on that for next year. I love that. That was great. Some news and notes, the Marlins placed Eliezer Hernandez on the IL with that right biceps injury that he suffered over the weekend. Garrett Cooper was placed on the COVID IL after he had a bad reaction to the COVID vaccine. Craig Mish reported that it should not be a long stay on the COVID IL for Garrett Cooper.

The Orioles placed Austin Hayes on the 10-day IL with a, hamstring injury. That should help shore up some playing time for one, Cedric Mullins, who is also a pretty nice start to the season, and he led off Monday against the lefty, Chorda Montgomery, so it was nice to see Cedric Mullen still in there. Danny Jansen left Monday's game after getting hit with a pitch on his knee. Maybe this opens up more playing time for Alejandro Kirk, so we'll be paying close attention to Danny Jansen. Some Padres updates outside of Fernando Tatis, of course. Tren Khrisham should be able to return from

his hamstring injury this weekend against the Rangers, and catcher Austinola is close to taking at bats at the alternate site. Sunny Gray, who is dealing with a mid-back strain, said he felt, quote, really, really, really good during his 60 pitch outing at the Reds alternate training site on Monday. He is targeting a mid-April return. Julian Meriwether, lots of fad bids this weekend that we were talking about. He may not pitch in back-to-back games early in the season.

Apparently, he almost... Go ahead. Yeah, Jordan Romano was once again, I think, used in the way a closer would be used today. He didn't actually come into the game, but he was warming up on two separate occasions in both the eighth and ninth inning when, what's his name, Miza? I don't know his first name. I'm sorry. And then Rafael Dolis struggled in the last two innings. So, you know, obviously Julian Meriwether, if he wasn't available, that's one thing.

but they were looking to bring Romano in to put out of fire if they needed to. Yeah, I mean, we're going to have to follow this because Blue Jays so far look like a pretty good team. And obviously, whoever their closer is is going to have a ton of value for fantasy purposes. Maryweather apparently has a very lengthy injury history. And he almost did not make the 26-man roster out of spring due to some tightness in his back. So, Maryweather, we're paying attention there. Kevin Kiermire was removed from Monday's game with quad tightness. Luis Arise of the Minnesota Twins left Monday's game.

After going one for one with a walk and two runs scored, the twins say he left with upper gastrointestinal discomfort, which is unrelated to the issue that caused Byron Buckson to leave Sunday's game. A few other lineup notes that I just wanted to highlight from Monday, Shohayatani was not in the lineup. He argued to play, but apparently the Angels wanted to be safe and cautious there. He should be back in the lineup. Tuesday they were saying. Tim Anderson dealing with that hamstring injury, he left Sunday night's

game. He was out for the White Sox, and it sounds like he will miss the entire series against the Seattle Mariners. Adam Eaton was also out of the lineup. Ramon Luriano with the A's and Michael Brantley with the Astros are both dealing with wrist injuries and we're both out of their respective lineups on Monday as well. We were just talking up Gavin Lux. He's played every game. He was out as well as AJ Pollock for the Dodgers on Monday. They just have a ton of depth. So I think They're just, you know, giving some guys some time off early in the season. Anthony Santander was out for the Orioles. Taylor Trammell out for the Mariners.

Brandon Belt sat against a lefty. Dominic Smith, opening day. He's got to be in the lineup, right? Wrong. He was out against the left-hand pitcher. Matt Moore, Kevin Pilar was in center field with Brandon Nimmo in left. That's the one. Nimmo in against a lefty.

Like Smith out against the lefty is not surprising. Nimmo in against the lefty, even though he was batting eighth and Pilar was batting lead off, which is hilarious, is like, that's, that's not great. You know, I think Smith's probably a better hitter against lefties than, than Nimmo is. At least he definitely has looked like it over the last two seasons. There really hasn't been any discernible split for Dom Smith. So, you know, you hope it's just kind of a talent will win out and he'll hit well enough to, to force the issue and it won't matter. But, you know, this is the kind of thing where,

if Smith just randomly starts out with a poor three weeks to the season, it could be tough for him to find playing time. I hope he doesn't. And like I believe he's a good hitter. But this is why I was starting to back off of him at the end of spring just because it really did not seem like they were going to use him as an everyday player.

At least, you know, like literally every day. I do want to mention just to give an example. example of how how this often goes. Kyle Tucker set out the first game for the Astros last year. He set out two of the first three games for the Astros last year. And everybody was flipping out. Should I drop Kyle Tucker? Yada yada.

And then, you know, he became a mainstay right after that. So I could see it playing out similarly for Smith. Not that the alternate scenario is impossible. I just don't, I just don't think you should overreact to one game. I think it's more likely that he's playing 80. of the time than not. I'd be pretty surprised if he was playing 95% of their games or starting 95%. But I would think he's going to play enough that you're not going to notice when he's out.

But just saying like if he does get off to a slow start, it could create an uphill battle. It's the kind of thing that could snowball, unfortunately. Mets are going to met, man. Tom Smith has been great against lefties the past two years to 876 OPS in 2019 against him, 900 OPS last year, against left-handed pitching. So I think he's awesome, and he would be playing for sure if there was a universal G.H., but unfortunately, that is not the case.

Travis Shaw and Lorenzo Kane were both out of the lineup for the Brewers on Monday. Shaw sat out back-to-back games after starting the first two. Lorenzo Kane working his way back from a quad injury, so I think they're just being safe there. Jock Peterson and Jason Hayward out against a lefty. Bobby Dalbeck was out for the Red Sox against Michael Waka. Dahlbeck has started the season 0 for 10

with five strikeouts. And Jesse Winker was out of the lineup with a non-COVID-related illness. Are these players good? Well, we already spoke about Akil Badoo. And Stephen Mance. And Carlos Rodana was going to give an update. He's four shutout, two hits, three walks.

Yeah, the control got away from him a little bit in that fourth inning, but stuff still looks really good. Eight strikeouts so far for Carlisward. On, 81 pitches through four? 17 whiffs. 17 whiffs on 81 pitches. I'm not sure that he's going to come back out for the fifth. Actually, I would be pretty surprised if he does.

But I just want to check in on the roster rate here for Carlos Rond. 63% on CBS. That's higher than I expected, yeah. Yeah, he was a two-star pitcher in. Highly recommended one by years truly. So I think that jumped up a lot because of that. But I would hope those people decide to hold on to him. It has been pretty much all fastball slider.

So hasn't really mixed in the change up as much as hoped. But velocity is back up after being way down last year. Coming back from Tommy John surgery. It's getting more spin on the fastball. Yeah, I mean, he hit 98 with his fastball. That's the first time he's done that since 2016. A while. Yeah.

Carlos Rodon, yeah, he's told him a couple of injuries the past couple of years. but he looked really good in the spring and outside of these walks he looks really good on Monday night as well. Chris, who would you rather have? Carl Srodon or Stephen Mats? I think I would actually go with Mats. I just, I think I trust him

more to stay healthy and pitch deep into games. Scott? Go for the upside, baby. I mean, maybe Chris, these Mats as the upside. But, you know, I was... I think they have similar upside. I think they both have upside too. I was liking Rodon. before today. So I don't see why that would change after today.

Yeah, I'm gonna side with Scott here by a hair, but I do like both. I'm interested. Stephen Matt's is still young-ish, and he's kind of had that upside. So I like both, but I'll take Carl's word on there. We spoke about Isaiah. Stephen Matt's, Stephen Matt's 29. Okay, he's not young-ish. Man, that is shocking. I'm the same he was like 24 when he made his debut. So I'm the same age of Stephen. Matt's. All of us, including Stephen Matt. Yeah.

I know we spoke about Isaiah Kine or Folefa yesterday. I want to talk about him again. Like, I really like Isaiah Kinear Foleva. He went two or four on Monday with a run scored. He's leading off for the Texas Rangers.

He makes a lot of contact. The plate appearances are going to be there. I think there's going to be volume. He's only 28% rostered, five hits over his last two games. Scott, I mean, should he be much higher rostered than 28%? Look, I have.

I had my flirtation with Isaiah Kinerfela, last year. We all go there at some point. But I think 28% is about what it should be. He's going to play a lot. He's going to have numbers because of that, but they're not going to be, they're not going to be any numbers that really set you ahead anywhere. Maybe above average and stolen bases, but that's it.

I will say I think he's a fine option if you lost Kibbrien Hayes. Maybe it's a deeper league, but Isaiah Kine of Flafea does have third base eligibility. He's not going to give you the same things as Kibrian Hayes, obviously, but I think he's a quality player. How about Evalongoria? I guess another third base replacement for Kibrian Hayes,

and he actually just hit his third home run here on Monday night. He is 37% rostered. Longoria has three home runs in four games to start the year. And last year, he was actually surprisingly, he was solid, but the underlying numbers were way better. He had 254, expected batting average 280 for Longoria, 425 slug, with a 521 expected slug. So, Chris, is Evan Longoria good? He's had a very nice career.

I was one of the best baseball players in the world for quite a while. I think he can be fine. I think he can be Brian Anderson-esque maybe, but I don't think, is he playing every day so far? Yeah, because I think the expectation was that he wouldn't play every day, but if he is, you know, that does change it. I think, you know, in a 15-team Roto League, like, you can you can add him to your to your bench. I think that's a one. The one who's not playing every day is Tommy Lestella. Yeah, Tommy Lestella.

That's very frustrating. Tanya Lestella has started one of their first four games. Yeah. Wow. And that's, and the opening series was in Seattle. They had the D.H spot. Yeah. That's frustrating because he was batting leadoff all sprang.

So I don't know what's going on there. That's disappointing. It's been bad for my team. It's three lefties that he's sat against and he bats left-handed. But he was batting lead off against lefties in spring too. Yeah. Maybe because Brandon Belt was sick. I don't know.

Belt's not in the lineup today either. Yeah, no, it's not what you want. That's a team that does have a lot of moving parts. So, you know, maybe that could be an issue all season long. Chris, who would you rather have as a Cabrion Hayes replacement? Longoria or Kinafelaela. I think I would go with

Kynar Folefa. Nice. Yeah, I think I would. All right, here's a bonus one. Is this guy really good? And no, it's not a Yankee thing. But Jordan Montgomery, up against the Orioles,

it wasn't their best lineup. Anthony Santander was not in the lineup. But six shot out on Monday, four hits, seven strikeouts to zero walks. 16 whiffs on 73 pitches from Montgomery. he threw five different pitches at least 10 times. So he has a bit of an arsenal,

and last year the service numbers were not great, but 5.11 ERA, 3.64 X-FIP with a 12.9% swinging strike rate that would have been tied for the same mark as Trevor Bauer. So Scott, 80% roster from Montgomery. I don't think he's really out there outside of shallow leagues at him if he's available in your league. But is there a chance that he's really good?

I think there's a chance. Yeah, he wasn't, he didn't get a lot of attention for me. He's a sleeper coming into the season, but you can see the argument. I mean, he was a hard luck case last year, as you already spelled out, the X, the expected stats looked a lot better than the actual ones. He's always shown good strikeout potential. And, I mean, he used his changeup, I think, more than any other pitch today. And it is a really good pitch. It's, you know, 16 whiffs on those 73 pitch.

He threw his change up a third of the time and got nine of the 16 whiffs on that. So the fact he went six innings on just 73 pitches, I know it was against the Orioles, but you do that against any team. Like that's really, it's really impressive. So yeah, I think, you know, he's not there yet. I can't commit to saying that yet. But I think there's a chance. I think there's a chance he takes a step forward this year,

another year removed from Tommy John surgery. Yeah, I mean, you mentioned that change of 39% whiff rate last season. 79.7 mile per hour average exit velocity, 245 expected Woba. It's a real good pitch. Yep. And I mentioned the Arsenal. Montgomery only used his sinker and four-seam fastball a combined 27% of the time on Monday.

Used a curb bowl, 19%, cutter 19%, and that change up 34% of the time. So I like the Arsenal. I like the repertoire for Jordan Montgomery. If you have them on your team, I think you should feel pretty damn good about that. And again, any 10-team, 8-team leagues that he's available. I'd go out and make sure that Jordan Montgomery is on your team.

I mean, Mercedes. What do you do? Another extra base hit just now. That's two for the day. He has, what did you say, three or four hard-hit balls already today? Three hard-hit. Presumably that one was a hard-hit ball. But yeah, he had two heading into that one.

Love him. Yeah, that had to have been a hard-hit ball. He hit it hard. Some deeper league names from Monday. Are any of these guys good? We're going to stretch the term good here. You know, it's a relative term at this point. But Danny Duffy at Cleveland, six shutout with 11 whiffs on 97 pitches.

Jose Dalyone was at home against the Pirates with No Kid Brian Hayes. He went five plus, two earned nine strikeouts. That was interesting. Trevor Williams up against the Brewers. Now he's with the Chicago Cubs no longer with the pirates. Trevor Williams, six plus innings there, two earned with six strikeouts. and Nick Povetta, old friend, at one point, thought maybe he's better than Shane Bieber.

It hasn't really worked out that way. Five shutout with the Red Sox, four walks, four strikeouts, meh. All of these pitchers are 22% rostered or less on CBS. Duffy, DeLeon, Williams, Pavetta. Chris, are any of these pitchers good? I don't know. Like, Trevor Williams has been interesting or has been decent in the past.

He was never interesting. I was going to say, interesting is not the right. right word. But the fact that you got that many whiffs is, yeah, never much of a bad mess or prior to the start.

17 moves. Yeah. Second most he's ever had. He's below mats. He's below Rodon. He's below Rogers. He's below Jose de Leon for me, who I think should be

in all head-to-head points leagues. He's expected to stay in the rotation for at least a little while longer, right? Yes. If if Gray comes back, it's not going to push him out necessarily. Well, yeah,

I mean, he's pitching in the rotation, before Wade Miley. Yeah. So we're talking about Jose de Leon now, right? Yes. Yeah,

he looked pretty good. And certainly, you know, he's a spark. So in a point league, he's worth adding. Yep. And I traded him to Nando

in the Scott White Dynasty League. So I don't know, maybe I'll end up regretting that one. I think I'm starting him against Scott in one league. Just so people know the backstory on Jose de Leon, because we're going, you know, it's dating back to 2015,

2016 when he was this really high end prospect, 2016 in the minors, a 261 ERA, 0.94 whip, 11.6K per 9. Got traded from the Dodgers to the raise. Had a lot of injury problems, lost velocity. Seems to have the velocity back now. And nine strikeout game here. So it's a chance he stays in the rotation.

I think it's, I think of the four, he's the, he is the most likely to be good. Povetta may be the second most, though. I would have liked to see more than what he showed today. It was interesting. He threw his slider 40% of the time. That's more than twice as. often as he normally throws it and it's his best pitch. It's usually a key to success.

But, you know, with all those walks, it kind of undermined to the performance for Pivotta. The one I'm least confident as good as Duffy. Yeah, I agree. Yeah. I pointed this out on Twitter today, and I don't know if you guys have had this experience, but I feel like any time I've ever tried to pick up Danny Duffy,

it's you see him perform well on your waiver wire, you pick him up, you put him in your lineup, and then he gives you like a 7.5 ERA and a 2.5, whip, you know, like three fantasy points on your team. You drop them. Danny has another really good start. You want to pick him up. And it's just like the same cycle over, over again for Danny Duffy. He does pitch in the American League Central. So you're like, you're going to have times to stream him against Cleveland and Detroit because those just look like two of the best teams to stream against. But I feel like we're pretty boring. We've kind of done this with Danny Duffy forever.

The only thing I'll point out with Jose Dalyone. He's only 8% rostered. So I'm sure that there are head to head points leagues where he is available. and he has SPARP eligibility. The sinker, he averaged 94 miles per hour with it on Monday. He used the pitch 73% of the time. So, yes, he had nine strikeouts, but I'm not overly excited about him. The changeup is supposed to be his best pitch.

And so, I mean, maybe he didn't need it in this one against Pittsburgh. That'll... Definitely possible. That'll happen. But no, I just... The SPARP eligibility is really what stands out for him. And a 12-team rode at league, I don't think you have to add Jose DeLay. If you were listening to this podcast, you should be listening to Fantasy Baseball Today in Five,

which is our five-minute podcast. Every weekday, Scott or Chris and myself hit on the biggest news, waiver-wire options, and pitchers to stream for the next day, some Bullpen updates as well, which is what we'll do on FBT and Five for Tuesday's podcast. So make sure to download and follow Fantasy Baseball Today and Five. Wherever you listen to this podcast, If you are watching on the video side, don't go anywhere. If you are listening on the audio side, we're going to take a quick break. But when we return,

we're going to check in on the Big Apple, the Bronx Bombers. Here on Fantasy Baseball today. I'm not actually going to talk about the Yankees. I wanted to start with Jacob de Grom. He's, you know, hashtag good. There's not really much to say about it. But just thought I'd let everyone know.

Six shutouts, innings, three hits, two walks, seven strikeouts against the Phillies, 16 whiffs on 77 pitches. what I thought was actually pretty interesting. This tweet from David Adler, Jacob de Grom, threw 24 straight fastballs to open the game.

He averaged 99.6 miles per hour, topping out at 102 miles per hour with that fastball before breaking off a 92-mile-per-hour slider for a swinging strike on his 25th pitch of the game. He had the hardest thrown pitch in the league so far this season today.

It's crazy. The 102-mile-an-hour pitch was the hardest, own pitch any player has had so far this season. Jacob de Grom did not throw his change up at all in this start. Exclusively fastball and slider. He used to change up 17% of the time last year. Frankly, I think he just probably didn't need it.

I don't think there's nothing to see here with Jacob de Grom. He did only throw 77 pitches and obviously the Mets blew the game for him because that's what they always do. So some people think he could have won another inning, which I guess he could have. But when asked about it after the game, he said, 10 days without facing hitters, didn't want to throw too many pitches with the hope of pitching Saturday later on in the week.

So whatever. Take up to grow. The Yankees, the Bash Bros. Aaron Judge and John Carlos Stan both hit their first home runs of the season on Monday. Stanton, 115 miles off the bat. That's pretty good, Chris. 471-foot Grand Slam for Stanton.

Not really much else to see there. Some other stuff that I noticed from Monday, Nelson Cruz, he's still good. He's still Nelson Cruz. He went three for six with a double. Sorry, God. He went three for six with a double dong and five RBI. I made the terrible mistake of benching him

in an 11-day week scoring period where he didn't play at all in the National League Park facing the Brewers early in the season. So that was just a terrible feeling to watch that. It was really fun. He hit that Grand Slam, the pitch before. He hit what appeared to be a home run,

and it hooked just found. He was arguing with the umpire. They didn't side with him. So he come back on the next pitch and 114 mile per hour home run. He still hasn't, doesn't appear to have gotten worse yet. Nelson Cruz.

I'm sorry I ever doubted you, Nellie. Which number is higher by the end of the season, Scott, regarding Nelson Cruz? His age or his home run total? He will be 41 years old by the end of the season. I think safe money is age. I'll take that under.

But it might be close. It really might. Yeah. I'll take the under whenever the over under is 40. Honestly, what I'm most worried about is they were talking about this in spring with both him and Josh Donaldson is just because of how old they are. Maybe sitting them more this year. We'll see. We'll see how that goes.

I asked that question. I put out a Twitter poll on Monday and 51.2% say Nelson Cruz is, his age will be higher than his home run total. But that's close. That is, uh, that, whenever you see the, the poll that close, that's a good poll. A few updates on some starting pitchers,

some, some, some fringy guys from Monday. Uh, the first leg of a two-star week for Matt Shoemaker, who was at the Tigers. Please just stream, stream your pitchers against the Tigers. Uh, six endings, one run, five strikeout, zero walks. 11 whiffs on 92 pitches. He is 49% rostered, and I'm guessing it's that high because he has a two-star week.

Logan Allen, who got some hype towards the end of spring training once we knew he was making the rotation for Cleveland up against the Royals five innings, two runs, three strikeouts, only seven whiffs on 72 pitches. His velocity was down a little bit from last year, but he was also

pitching out of the bullpen last season for Cleveland. Sky, did you notice anything here with Matt Schumager and Logan Allen that we need to highlight? No, not really. I mean, Schumaker threw 33% splitters, which is always a good sign for him. That's his best pitch. but got to stay healthy. And even if he stays healthy,

I don't think he'll be a big enough strikeout guy that'll have to be rostered in every league. He's somebody who'll probably see a lot in like the 10 sleeper pitchers for the upcoming scoring period, depending what the matchups are. Tristan McKenzie relieved Logan Allen, and apparently Cleveland does not need

a fifth starter until April 13th, so that is why they wanted to get Tristan McKenzie some work. He finished three and two thirds, one or run four walks, don't like that, but five strikeouts. 11 whiffs on 58 pitches, and I was watching that game. He looked pretty good. The stuff definitely plays up for Tristan McKenzie. So, you know, hopefully they don't baby him too much.

Once he gets in the rotation, they just let him pitch. But I like what I saw there. Chris, someone asked me today if I would drop Tristan McKenzie for Stephen Mats. And I actually said I would, but I didn't feel great about it. Yeah, I think it's fine. I'd rather stash McKenzie, but if he's not in the rotation to start the season, you know, it'll be, it might be hard to stash him. You know, I'm definitely facing a couple of situations in leagues where because I have guys like Wander Franco or Joe Adele or

Zach Allen, you know, I'm already starting to run into, I don't have anyone I can drop or anyone I want to drop. And so sometimes you have to make tough decisions. Yeah. And I think it's one of those scenarios where, you know, I'm just thinking about layman fantasy league, right? I'm not, I'm not thinking about a bunch of experts. If you drop McKenzie, a guy who isn't going to make his first start until when, you said, Frank? April 13th is about when they expect him to start. Yeah, I just don't know that that's going to send, send the sharks, send the piranhas swarming, you know, to pick them up. It's also about, you know, when you drop someone, will, like, get picked up. That's part of the equation as well. Yep.

Whitmeryfield already has three home runs for the Kansas City Royals. He has never hit more than 19 in the season. So a nice little power surge there to start the year for at Merrifield. And Chris, I know that you were paying close attention to Mike Fultenevich. He was going up against the Blue Jays on Monday. Four renings, four earned. Two to have seven strikeouts, the fastball velocity at 93.9 miles per hour, which is down a tick from 2019. And it's down about two and a half miles per hour from his breakout 2018. He's only 12% rostered, but I think if you need to clear a roster space in a deeper league, you could drop. You could drop Mike Fultenevich.

Yeah, I've got him in one league. It's the 2014 Dynasty League, and that's because I had to have someone at pitcher at the end of a draft. So the fact that he's giving in the rotation is a win for me at this point. Chris, I offered you Julio Arias and Aaron Sanchez for Joe Musgrove last week in a Dynasty league. That wouldn't help. I mean, Aaron Sanchez is a starter. I'm not saying he's good, but he's a stinger. That wouldn't help. All right, well, I'll get Joe Musgrove out of you one way or another, sooner or later.

Let's hit the bullpen, call to the pen. See, of course, there was a lot going on on Monday, as there always is, with the closer carousel. With the Tigers, Brian Garcia pitched in the seventh inning down. 13 to 1, he allowed three hits and two runs. Gregory Soto pitched in the 8th. He allowed one hit, one walk, and struck out two. So advantage Soto over Garcia on. Monday for the Royals.

Scott Barlow pitched in the seventh and the eighth inning. Jesse Hahn. Really, man? Jesse Han then came in in the ninth inning with the Royals up three zip. And Han was warming up in the eighth inning. So maybe it was just a thing where, okay, he was already loose because he was warming up for the eighth. But, I mean, if you have Greg Holland,

you don't feel great about that, Scott. Or not nor if you spent a bunch of fab on Wade Davis. Wade Davis, as I saw in a couple of my leagues this weekend. Mike Bethany did this at the beginning of last season two until it became apparent that Trevor Rosenthal deserved to be the Royals closer. He'd just throw any guy out there, you know? And I think we're seeing that with a lot of teams.

I do think most of them will eventually settle on someone, but they're just kind of, they're kind of letting it play out right now. In deeper leagues, would you take, would you throw a dart at Jesse Hanscott? I don't think so maybe a hell only okay for the Reds Lucas Sims

pitched in the eighth inning of three to two facing the nine one and two in the order Amir Garrett was used in a ninth inning they tacked on a few extra runs the Reds did

so they were up five to two at the time and Garrett was far from impressive he allowed two hits one being a home run he also gave up he also walked a batter so Amir Garrett is

the guy for now It looks like he is their course. Sims definitely looked better today. Yeah. But I will point, maybe the biggest development actually in that bullpen was Sean Doolittle, who struck out two in a perfect seventh, and his velocity was back.

Like he. Way up. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. He looked much better, which I guess it's possible he could enter into the closer mix at some point, but really more I'm thinking it's advanced.

It helps Garrett's case of sticking in the closer roll if they have another high leverage lefty there. No, that's fantastic point. I didn't, I didn't see that velocity on Sean Doolittle, so I appreciate you bringing that up there as well. For the Cardinals, Jordan Hicks pitched in the sixth. Giovanni Gallegos went in the seventh and the eighth, and Alex Reyes came in for the save. I believe the score was 4 to 1 at the time. He did allow one hit.

He didn't strike anyone out, but he converted the save, so you like to see that. Only 51% rostered for Alex Reyes. Chris, that number should be blank. 90, 95, 99. he's a very talented pitcher who's a closer. What should that person be? Is Julian Merriweather higher than him? He shouldn't be.

I'm not going to argue with you. At least whatever Julian Meriwether is. Two closers who weren't used on Monday because they've been used a lot recently. I think it was back-to-back days for both of these guys, but Hector Nerris was not used for the Phillies. Jose Alvarado picked up the save,

but he was pretty Rocky himself. Craig Kimball was not used for the Chicago Cucs. he pitched in back-to-back days. Alec Mills picked up the save for the Cubbies. And just Julian Merriweather is also enlisted in 51% of leaks.

So... Ray is that the name? At least 52. Oh, okay. Reyes. Yeah. Yeah. I mean,

Ray's should be like 85, 90%, I think. I do still think it's Jordan Hicks's job in the long run, but I mean, if you could only pick one Cardinals reliever to roster, I think it has to be Rayis,

right now. And I don't think they're going to remove him from the role unless he gives them a reason to do so. So if he performs, then they're just going to leave him there. I don't see why they'll change it. I think that's a big if. I just don't think teams want to change horses in the middle of the proverbial stream. So if Ray's is pitching well, I think it's his job. I mentioned I had a Rockies note at the top of the podcast.

And shout out to Bud Elliott, one of our other producers here at CBSports.com. just a bunch of awesome stuff with college football. But he pointed me out that for the Colorado Rockies, by July 4th, they will have played 48 home games and 37 road games. So I thought it was pretty interesting, and someone was trying to make a trade with him, so that's why he pointed it out. So, I mean, if anyone gets off to a slow start

and you're looking to buy low on Rockies early in the season, and then maybe sell them off in the second half of the year because they will play less home games in the second half of the season. I just thought that was an interesting, nugget there for the Colorado Rockies. Let's, uh, let's hit some of these West Coast games and give people a little update on what's going on. Uh, they actually did let Carlos Rodon go through the fifth inning final line for him.

Five shutout, two hits, three walks, nine strikeouts for Rodon. Yeah, the command wasn't there at the end. Uh, he actually has been throwing the curveball. Baseball, Savant just hasn't reclassified the slider as a curve or hasn't picked up on it yet, but they'll probably do that tomorrow. But he's got like a 72 to 75 mile per hour curve that he's thrown like four or five times. So Rodan is a four pitch pitcher, although he threw the change of in curveball about 11 times total on 95 pitches. So, you know, still.

I'm not hard on the locks. I mean, two hits in five innings with nine Ks. Other update from that is, you have me and Mercedes has three batted balls, 103.6 miles per hour, 104.2 miles per hour and 112.2. And he has two hits right now. Pretty good. A double two runs scored. He still, his

roster rate is not that high still. I mean, I don't know how high this number has to get to, but as long as he's hitting, he's going to play. He's 47% roster. He wasn't hitting the ball particularly hard before this game. For what it's worth. He only had a 33.3% hard hit rate. only two barrels, 85.5 mile per hour.

Ex velocity. So, you know, this is impressive. You know, the 112.4 or whatever max exit of ELO, that's pretty good. So, you know,

just still, still an interesting guy, not necessarily someone, I think it needs to be rostered in all leagues, but definitely anywhere where he's catcher eligible. Yes,

which is on ESPN. So if you play in an ESPN league, go add your me and Mercedes and more, more than, more than likely you will be starting him at catcher unless you have Salvador Perez or J.T. Real Muto or Wilson Contreras. Anything else in this game on the other side for the Mariners?

Justice Sheffield. Five innings, eight hit, six runs for those earned. Did have five strikeouts, two walks. He hit a batter. It's a pretty blast start here for Justice Sheffield. Blah. Yeah, I wouldn't like, I wouldn't say I'm dropping Justice Sheffield, but, you know, I have him in a handful.

leagues and if it comes to it if I have the opportunity to add Rodon or Rogers, I would probably rather have those guys than Sheffield. Anthony DiScoffani against the Padres. It's DeScoffani's Giants debut. Five innings, one run,

four strikeouts against the Padres there. Donovan Solano picked up another hit and stole a base. Hacian Kim. That's a name to pay attention to it. If there's anything serious with Fernando Tatsis, which just please cross your fingers that that is not the case.

But Kim could, you know, potentially walk into an everyday role here with the San Diego Padres. Adrian Mordejoin made his season debut in the rotation for the Padres. Four innings, two runs, one walk, two strikeouts there. Frankie Montas, man,

we should talk about him because he got just lit up by the Dodgers. And I get it, it's the Dodgers, which is fine. And the Vilo was way up for Montas, but like he was all over the place, had no command. Two and two-thirds, seven hits, seven earned, three walks, four strikeouts.

Coming off an inconsistent year, let's call it, in 2020. Scott, I'm not going to say make any rash decisions and drop Montas, but this is not what you want to see in his first start of the season, obviously. No, but if you're looking for a reason to be encouraged to through his splitter, 23% of the time, I believe, which is much more than we saw last year. and, you know, that's what we were crediting for his breakthrough in 2019. He acknowledged the spring he needed to get back to throwing it. And he did.

So that's, you know, that's good to see. We're going to need to see some results to go with that sooner than later. Yeah, he didn't really have a feel for the splitter in this game, especially early on. He bounced. I was looking at the, like, illustrator box score thing. And it looks like he bounced like 12 of the 21 splitters that he threw. So, you know, definitely needs to have more better command of that.

Yeah, the Vilo, I mentioned it was up. So the splitter was up almost two miles per hour. His slider, Frankie Montas's slider against the Dodgers was up almost five miles per hour. He was throwing his slider 90.8 miles per hour. So I think he was just like really amped up and potentially overthrowing here first start of the season for him. But I'm not dropping him yet, but he obviously needs to get better. The more interesting guy might be the other guy pitching in that game, starting in that game. Dustin A who has always had great stuff, but didn't get many strikeouts, didn't get many whiffs.

16 swinging strikes on 85 pitches today, eight strikeouts and six innings, no walks. Nine swinging strikes with his cutter. He threw 18 of them and got nine swinging strikes. I mean, that pitch is ludicrous. He's got a 93-mile-hour cutter. So, you know, it's still, like he was still mostly sinker fastball, sinker four seams. So, you know, 68% of his pitches were those. I think it's going to be hard for him to remain a high whiff pitcher if he remains so sinker and four seam are heavy.

But this was a good, it was a very good first start for Dustin May. Definitely a step in the right direction. And seeing those whiffs being there and using his breaking stuff a little bit more than he normally does, that's definitely an encouraging. for one, Dustin May. I do want to highlight a couple people that are talking in the YouTube chat right now. They're talking about potentially dropping

Andrew Vaugh for Nate Lowe. And Andrew Vaughn actually did start for the White Sox on Monday and pull up and see what he's doing right now. But he is 0 for 2 with a walk and two strikeouts. Scott, we're not there yet, right? RBI and two strikeouts not a walk. RBI.

Yeah, no, I'm not. I'm not doing that too much upside there, too much promise worth a longer look than four games, five games. And I'll just point out, AJ Puck pitched in this game, three and a third in relief, four strikeouts, velocity not anywhere near where it needs to be, 93.7 miles per hour. This is four seamer maxed out at 95.6. Needs to be much higher than that. But, you know, good first appearance for AJ Puck. Someone to keep an eye on if he, you know, when he gets a rotation spot, which should happen eventually. And that Astros Angels game, there's not a whole lot going on. Kentana, Jose Cantana, and Luis Garcia, the starting pitchers in this game were not great. Carlos Correa, Alex Breggman, and Jose Altuve, each have two hits on Monday night.

As of now, they might even add on to that. But Altuva and Bregman in particular are off to really, really great starts. This season, Mike Trout hit his first homer of the year, which is, Not surprising. He's Mike Trout. He'll do that. And he is awesome. Scott,

Ty Butchry, man. I don't know if you have any, if you have any feelings about Ty Butchery, it's pretty late in the podcast. If you have anything I'd like to say about him, you could do it today. If you want to save it for tomorrow, you could do that too,

but I'll leave it up to you, Scott. Frank. What do you got? I once knew a man named Lorenzo, last name, Kane, like mine, only spell differently. No E. So I went to the store for the first time in two, three years,

walked on over to the bakery counter and said to the young man, Hello, sir, I'd like a scone with blueberries. He said to me, yes, sir. And how would you like that, scone? I gave him a little sideways look because everybody knows by now how Michael Gain likes a scones. I said to him, I'll take it the same way I take my toast. But three.

He said to me, no, sir, I'm afraid that's impossible. I said to him, Well, then, I'll just take some toast, buttery. He said to me, no, sir, you misunderstand me. It's not to scone, that's the problem. It's the buttery. I said to him, now how can it be possible for a bakery, not to offer bread, that's buttery?

He said to me, well, sir, the young man we hired to butter our bread has taken an early retirement. I said to him, well, sir, do you have anything else? He said to me, I do have some rye to sell. So ends the travails of the young pitcher named Die Buttery. But die, didn't die.

He's living his best life. And I have this fantasy that one year, well on holiday in a cafe in Florence, I would look across the tables and see him there. He wouldn't say anything to me, nor me to him. But we'd both know that he'd made it. Bet he was happy. Fantastic job. Once again, the retirement of Ty Butchry.

Maybe. Nah, well, it'll happen at some point again. But maybe one of the last times you hear the old Scotty White Michael Cain impression. Should I read this poem from Nate in California to insinceree here? Yeah, sure. Okay. I'll read it in the Michael Cain voice. It was a crisp cold spring morning when Scott did arise to scan,

the previous day's box scores with his discerning of eyes, he looked at the angels and thoughts sprang with a flash. What if Michael Kane read the names that he saw on the dash? We heard up glorious tales of toast and of jam. Oh, what a name God had blessed on this man. But fast forward two years and he's gone like old tea. Please pour one out for the career of old Thai butchery. beautiful. Oh man, great job there. Again, shout out to Ty Butchrey. I never thought that any fantasy baseball podcast would highlight

Ty Butchery's retirement this much, but there you go. You deserve it. You give the people what you want. You got to give it to them. I'm not seeing any update. I really wanted to give the people something on Fernando Tatis, but there's just, there's nothing out here right now. We'll just wrap up with some to stream or not to stream for Tuesday.

This is for anyone who plays in a daily lineup, If you have bad pitchers, this segment is for you. If you have Garrett Cole and Jacob de Grom, probably don't have both of them. But if you have aces on your team, chances are you're not streaming pitchers. If you punted pitcher, maybe you want to stream some of these guys.

And we'll find out right now. J.Hap at the Detroit Tigers. To stream or not to stream? You just said stream your pitchers against the Tigers, but I'm going to say no to that one. Yeah, I mean, they made Matt Shoemaker look good, man. Oh, God. It's, they're so bad.

We are not streaming Jhab. How about Casey Mize on the other side against the twins? I'm not streaming him because he's on my bench in a bunch of leagues. I agree. I would not shoot him. Yeah, I want to see it first. I want to see it first. But no, not stream, but watch very, very intently.

I would agree with that. I don't know what his roster rate is, but he could be someone who we're talking about as just an absolute must add after tomorrow night. Yes, the velocity. He was up throughout the spring for Casey Mize, and he is 55% rostered in CBS leagues right now. Drew Smiley at the Nationals. We don't know who's not available for them.

I saw Josh Ball and Trey Turner weren't taking grounders today. I don't know if that... They haven't announced who's not on the roster, right? Only... They haven't. Kyle Schwerber and Josh Harrison, I know for sure are not going to be there.

Yeah, the only name that matters in terms of whether you use Smiley as Schwerber, but there's a chance there's more. But, you know, just regardless, you know he's not giving you a quality start. I would fall out of my chair if he went six innings. But, you know, he might give you a lot of strikeouts and a few innings. One of those four point two innings eight strikeout starts we've been seeing this first week. He could give you something like what Trevor Rogers and Carlos Rodon did.

So would you actually stream him? Depends if you need that. If you need strikeouts, then I think we're okay streaming true smile. He's more likely to help you than hurt you, I think. Following Drew Smiley, we have Wade Miley versus the pirates. No. No, not even against the pirates. Martine Perez versus the Tampa Bay Rays?

Nope, no. Advert Aaliy against the Brewers. Maybe. That's more of a watch for me, like with Mize. Yeah. I would agree with that. John Gant at the Marlins. No.

I mean, the Marlins are just another team where I'm ready to dream anyone. but yeah, probably not with John Gant. Dane Dunning against the Blue Jays, no. Tanner Roark at Texas? No. No, I'll watch Dunning, though. Aaron Sanchez at the Padres, no. Chase Anderson at the Mets, no.

Trevor Cahill at the Reds. So it looks like Drew Smiley, it might be the only one for you if you are looking for strikeouts. Some team name Tuesday as we wrap up here. This one's from Joshua. Gemini Mancini. That's pretty good.

From Kyle, Romano's Maca Roane-A-Rae. that's probably the best reaction I've ever heard from Scott. I like the food ones. That's the ones that make me laugh. This one's from Matt. You say what I means. Yep. From Thomas.

Brandon, Steele, meow. I don't understand what this is going for. I don't understand what the meow part of it is. I don't know what the steel part of it is. I don't know what the Brandon part of it is. This took about a minute for me to realize.

There's a golfer named Brandon Steele. Is that what it's referring to? No, give you guys a minute to think about it and see. This one's from Henry. Woodruff and Bernstein. Yep. Yep. From Doug. Robles oblige. Oblige. Roblese oblige. Oblige. Is that something that everyone's supposed to know and it's just one of those things that I don't know like everything else. I don't know. I know it because I like am interested in French history. Yes. So apparently thanks says it and Mary Poppin. So it makes me laugh.

No bless oblige. No bless a bleege. The absurd responsibility of privileged people to act with generosity and nobility toward those less privileged. Yep, that's exactly the definition I found when I looked it up earlier today. All right, so Brandon Steele Meow,

actually, once I figured out, I laughed pretty hard at this. Brandon Woodruff, Woodruff. That sounds like a heath team name. All right, that's a great way to end the podcast. For Scott and Chris, I am Frank. Thank you all for listening and watching Fantasy Baseball today.

We'll be back again tomorrow. Bye.