Fantasy Baseball Today - Week 8 Sleepers & Two-Start Pitchers! Coby Mayo Coming Soon? (5/10 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: May 10, 2024

Max Kepler has been turning up recently (3:26). ... Is it time to drop Reid Detmers (7:30)? ... Could we see Coby Mayo with the Orioles soon (11:05)? ... News (18:52): Luis Robert could start a rehab assignment soon. ... We got two regression starts from Sonny Gray and Logan Gilbert (26:36). ... Hunter Greene's velo was down almost three MPH (31:00). ... Michael Conforto continues to hit well (32:42). ... Erick Fedde turned in another quality start (41:30). ... Let's preview Week 8, starting with the schedule and two-start pitchers (46:08). ... Who are the top sleeper hitters for next week (52:15)? ... We wrap up with leftovers, bullpen updates and streamers (57:00). Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday Download and Follow Fantasy Baseball Today on Spotify: https://sptfy.com/QiKv Get awesome Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: http://bit.ly/3y8dUqi Follow FBT on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1 Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

to fantasy baseball today on May 10th. I am Frank Stamphill, joined by Scott White. Today on the show we have hitters that are going in opposite directions, another prospect spotlight. I have a new segment called Trade Matchmaker. Not sure if it's gonna work, but we'll try it out. Plus, we'll preview week eight, we've got two star pitchers, sleeper hitters, and much more.

Let's jump in. Oh my goodness gracious! All right, Scott. With the many options, options to choose from. Who is your player of the night? Yeah, save it seven games late today. So not many choices, but I'm going to go with Max Kepler here, who went two for four

with a home run. And Max Kepler, it turns out, has been doing a lot of good lately at the plate. Last six games, he's now 11 for 22. Quick math, that's a 500 batting average over that six game stretch. two home runs, six doubles, only three strikeouts. His 14.6% strikeout rate is the best he's ever had. He's never been a high strikeout guy, but this is the best he's ever had. And he has hit a ball this year 115.4 miles per hour,

which is his highest max exit velocity since 2016. So the version of Max Kepler we're seeing here by the under the hood data is maybe the best we've ever seen. And he's always been kind of a darling pick among certain fantasy analysts because he doesn't strike out much. He hits the ball pretty hard. He elevates pretty well. And it hasn't translated. He's had a couple good years, but for the most part, he's always been kind of underwhelming.

And maybe he will be again. But just given how thin outfield is, it's like the thinnest position by a long shot. And the fact that that low strikeout rate makes them well suited for points leagues especially, which are the shallower outfield leagues, I think Kepler deserves more attention than he's gotten so far. far. His roster rate is just a little, oh, it's right at 50%. So he's widely available at a

thin position and doing good things. And a lot of the underlying data looks good. So if you have an outfield need, it's worth a shot. It's worth a shot. And this is a little sneak peek for the sleeper hitters later on. But he is on that list, Scott. Would you take Max Kepler ahead of Brent Rooker and Brian Dela Cruz to other popular outfield ads right now. And points leagues for sure. Categories, I think, I just updated my outfield rankings today. I think they're all in the same range. I think Rooker is the highest for me in Categories leagues because he has a chance to be a category standout, obviously, in home runs.

But we're talking three players who are right around 50th for me in the outfield rankings. Let me see if I have Kepler higher than that in points, leaks because I feel like I probably should, given the advantages of that low strikeout rate in that format. Let me double check that. If this drop-down menu would work properly, I could give you an answer quicker. But I keep misclicking, choking under the pressure.

Cannot handle a mouse for the life of me. Yeah, I got them too low. I got Kepler too low. I want to move them up. I'm going to move them up. All right. I'm going to move them into the top 50 in points leagues. Look at that.

There you go. Live on the show, rankings updates, Max Kepler, moving on up, doing some interesting things. And it's a small sample size this year, but he's hitting lefties really well. And he hit lefties well last year too. So the twins are a team that likes to platoon a lot. I would say, you know,

in the top five in baseball in terms of how often they play. with Doom player. So I'm not sure he's going to play every single day, but he probably should, at least based on the past couple of years, splits against lefties. Yeah, he's been playing against lefties lately. Good.

Let's get him in there. Let's see what he could do. My player of the night is for all the wrong reasons. Reed Detmer's has really gone the opposite way recently. He got rocked by the Royals. He allowed six runs over five innings. He allowed two home runs in this. outing, still had 14 swinging strikes on 90 pitches, and oddly enough, he only allowed

four hard hits. The average exit velocity against was actually really good, but it doesn't really matter when, you know, the hard contact you do allow goes over the fence, right? So, Reed Dehmers, last four starts in 874 ERA, a 159 whip. He's a tough one to figure out, Scott. I feel like, you know, we kind of got duped again by what he was doing early on in the season. But when I look at the individual pitch data, I still think there's a lot to like here with Reid Dettmers. There's no way you could start him right now. I understand that. The next question becomes, do you drop Reed Dettmers? He's 86% rostered still. Are you okay dropping Red Dettmers following four rough outings in a row? Well, it's not an easy question to answer,

even though it sounds like it should be. It's really hard in baseball to resist. the idea that what we're seeing lately is what's always going to be. But we know that for Red Demmers, just within this season, his first four starts were amazing. He pitched to a 115 ERA or something like that, and then his last four starts have been horrible. So he have a microcosm of that just within this season for this particular pitcher. Maybe his next four starts will be amazing.

I think he's skilled enough to do that. He certainly misses enough bats. lately it seems like the biggest problem has been home runs, but it's not like his home run rate this year is out of character. So do I think he's going to finish with the 496 ERA he's up to? No, I think it's going to get better, and that means there are going to be some good starts moving ahead. The reason why I'm not going to say absolutely not to drafting redemmers

is because, as we've been talking about in recent weeks, there are a lot of interesting pitchers, and it's hard to roster them all. And in shallower leagues, that's especially true. I would still consider Reid Detmer's a top 60 pitcher for me. So I think somebody in your league should probably be rostering him. But if it comes down to do I drop Reed Detmer's or do I drop, do I drop Redembers or do I drop, I don't know,

Gare Crochet to use the name that we use all the time. I lean toward dropping Detmer's over crochet now if you're somebody who finds yourself in that situation. I've got four names on the most added pitchers list right now on CBS. Christian Scott. Would you drop Reed Detmer's for Scott? Yeah, I mean, if I had to do that, yeah. Would you do it for any of these three?

Reese Olson, Sandoval, Chris Paddock. No. Okay, so yeah, I agree. I lowered him down a little bit today after this rough outing. I think he's still inside of my top 60 starting pitchers, like you mentioned. For all the reasons that you mentioned, the swinging strike rate is still there. But I get it. I mean, people are kind of fed up with, you know, we've seen this happen many times before Reed Detmer's.

Again, I still think there's a talented pitcher there, but it certainly is not working out right now for Reed Detmer's. Let's get into another prospect spotlight. Well, it was only a matter of time, Scott, before we went back to the Baltimore Orioles and we mentioned this name here and there this season, but we have not done a prospect spotlight on him yet. That is Kobe Mayo, third baseman in the Orioles organization. He's 22 years old, fourth round pick back in 2020. He is having a monster season at AAA, where he's batting 295 with 11 home runs,

32 RBI, 3 steals, a 969 OPS. and the quality of contact certainly backs up that he is a legitimate power hitter. 93.6 average exit velocity, 114.9 max exit velocity. The biggest issue here is a 28.7% strikeout rate, though the swinging strike rate is just 11.6%. So I wonder if maybe the strikeout rate is a little bit too elevated.

I don't know if this is the first year that they're using the ABS system in AAA, They definitely do have it down there. And I've read and heard some things that might be causing some higher strikeout rates than it should. So I thought I would mention that. But Scott, what are your thoughts on Kobe Mayo? Is there a chance that he beats Jackson Holiday back to the Baltimore's? Well, first of all, Kobe Mayo sounds like a particular kind of mayo, doesn't it?

Like, I made this burger with Kobe beef and now I'm going to put on Kobe Mayo. Are you a big mayo guy, Scott? Not at all. In fact... I agree with you completely. We are in lockstep. I don't eat mayo ever. One of the things I was most known for in high school is we got a writing prompt in my junior year English class.

It's AP English class. And a writing prompt was if you could ban anything from the world, what would it be? And I wrote about mayonnaise. And my teacher loved it and had me share it. And it was like it kind of propelled me to a writing career, to be honest, because that was the first time. I got attention for anything I wrote. Do you still have that? Do you still have that article or essay?

It might be in my file somewhere. We've got to find that and publish it to the world. Oh, I mean, yeah. I'm sure the quality of the writing would, I'd find it embarrassing now. But, you know, it was like the first, like time I put my heart into something I wrote instead of just, you know, kind of going through the motions. Anyway, Kobe Mayo, back to the player.

Nobody wants to hear about my high school writings. Okay, tons of power. Tons of power. Transcendant power here. And he really took a step forward as a prospect last year. Like, he really broke through. The power was evident from the beginning. Big six-foot-five guy seemed like he was going to project as a power hitter.

but he broke through last year because the plate discipline was so improved, not just in terms of the strikeouts, but the walk rate was, he walked just in his time at AAA, 16% of the time. So that's like been almost cut in half this year, in addition to the strikeout rate going back up. You know, I don't know if it has anything to do with the ABS system, but it's not helping, it's not helping Kobe May.

get to the major sooner. Last time we talked about him on this podcast, I said, okay, it looks like the strikeouts are correcting. I think it was down to 26% at that point, but since then, he's just struck out a ton again. Now, when he hit the ball as hard as Kobe Mayo does, you can strike out that much and still be good. But the Orioles are obviously not going to want to rush him.

and I think he's kind of giving them an excuse to keep him down right now. They do have an infield opening Jorge Mateo and Ramona Reyes. They're not providing anything worthwhile. Obviously, Orioles first place team. They would like to get an actual hitter there. They tried it with Jackson Holiday. It didn't work out. It really becomes a question of who's going to fill that opening first between Jackson

Holiday and Kobe Mayo. and I think it's whoever who ever begins dismantling AAA in a way that can't be ignored that's who's going to be the one to come up first and claim that open infield spot and it may be that Mayo beats Holiday back

but maybe not I think we're going to have to keep an eye on how things progress with his strikeout rate because we know he's better than this do you worry about Kobe Mayo's power playing in Camden Yards because of the big cutout in left field. He is a right-handed batter. Or does the fact that he hits the ball as hard as he does,

he's just going to blast home runs and it doesn't really matter where he plays? I mean mostly the second answer. He's going to lose some home runs playing in Baltimore. But will it be, will he hit so many anyway that we won't even really think about it or wonder about it or be curious about it at all? I suspect that's the case. I expressed those concerns when Jordan Westberg was coming up about his home run potential being stifled by Camden Yards, and he's having a breakout year in spite of it.

And I think Kobe Mayo's raw power is significantly higher than Westbergs, which, I don't know, Westberg's has turned out to be pretty good. But Mayo is next level as far as that goes. All right. Kobe Mayo was one of Scott's five prospects on the verge of getting called up. Make sure to check out the latest prospect report, which is live on the site, CBSports.com slash fantasy slash baseball.

Quick reminder to download and follow FBT and 5. That's our five-minute podcast, wherever you listen to podcasts, and we have a bonus prospect episode coming out every Saturday of the season. Who knows, maybe we'll even mention Kobe Mayo again there. Let's take our first break when we return the news and notes right after this.

Welcome back in, the news and notes. Luis Robert has resumed hitting, manager Pedro Grifold said Robert has gotten past a slight setback and isn't far off from starting a minor league rehab assignment. Nolan Jones did light throwing prior to Thursday's game and will continue to ramp up activity on Friday and Saturday. Jackson Trio has now sat out back-to-back games both against right-handed pitching. He's batting 221 with a 610 OPS, a 29% strikeout rate. He's actually been much better against righties and he has against lefties so far this season. Scott, are you starting to get concerned about playing time here with Jackson Trio?

I'm concerned about a lot of things with Jackson Trio, to be honest. You know, the playing time will take care of itself if he's performing. He has not performed. And as I've mentioned every time we've brought him up this year, it's the contact quality that's most concerning for me. because usually when prospects are hyped like he was from the time he was 17, 18 years old and sped up the might sped through the minor league system, got a big contract on the opening day roster at age 20. You kind of take the contact quality for granted.

There may not be enough contact. He may swing in at too many pitches he shouldn't swing at. but you may not have a high average exit velocity just because you're swinging at too many bad balls and getting too much weak contact. But the max exit velocity is 108.6, which I've seen worse, but for this transcendent talent like Jackson Chorio is supposed to be,

that's discouraging. I don't think it's like an indictment on the rest of his career. he is only 20 after all, but I am not feeling good about him being a fantasy asset this year. Having said that, I think he's still in my top 40 outfielders just because that's the state of the

outfield right now, and I think Chorio is going to keep getting chances. Yeah. But I can't say I have a ton of confidence in him at this point. As bad as the batting average has been, the strikeouts, the OPS, obviously. Four home runs and six steals, you know, in the first

I don't know, five, six weeks of the season. He's on pace for to go over 2020 as a rookie, but maybe he's going to do it in like an Anthony Volpey way where, you know, the batting average really sinks you, but he is providing power and speed along the way. Tommy Edmund remains limited to T-work. He has been cleared to up the intensity of his workouts, but Edmonds' progress remains slow with no return date in sight.

He was placed on the 60-day IL earlier this week. Wilson Contreras underwent 6.5. successful surgery to repair a fractured left forearm and is likely to be sidelined 10 weeks. The timeline earlier in the week was six to eight weeks. So somehow it's gone up and that means we won't get Wilson Contraeus back until about late July. I started doing some preliminary waiver work for this weekend. My second catcher now in so many leagues is going to be so bad without Wilson Contraeus. Oh my gosh.

It is disheartening to say the last. least. Luis Renhifa was placed in the I.L. with an illness retroactive to May 6th. Kairn in Paris was recalled by the Angels. Brandon Jury was also placed in the IL with tightness in his hamstring. Christian Javier will return Saturday against the Tigers. He missed nearly a month with a neck problem. Eduardo Rodriguez is close to beginning a throwing program after an MRI on Wednesday showed healing in his left shoulder. Brian Wu is expected to be activated to start Friday against the A's. He's up to 77% rostered. should that be closer to 100% Brian Wu?

I moved him up to 65th. Would you drop Reed Detmer's to add Brian Wood? I probably wouldn't, but they're not going to be far apart once they move down Reed Demers. And Wu obviously has the upside to climb from there. But, you know, he's coming back from injury. He doesn't have much of a track record at the Major League level. I do think there's a lot of swing in this potential. He throws a lot of strikes.

for somebody who has his swing and miss potential. There's a lot to like here with Brian Wu, but how much will the Mariners coddle him? A lot of his starts last year, we're on the shorter side, and I kind of suspect that's going to be true again this year, certainly early on. But Wu has upside, for sure.

The Brewers are promoting one of their pitching prospects, Robert Gasser. Can't really get a much better name for that as a starting pitcher in Major League Baseball. To make his debut on Friday against the Cardinals, the Brewers were forced into a six-man rotation because of Freddie Peralta's suspension. Gasser could be sent down after the start. I guess it obviously depends how he looks in the start.

He's 24 years old, solid minor league career, 379, ERA 128 whip well over a strike upper inning. Scott, any interest in Robert Gasser in deeper leagues? I mean, since this is probably... going to be a short stay. I'm not that excited about him. The irony to him being named gasser

is that he doesn't actually throw that hard. He's more of a... What would be the best way to describe it? I don't know. His strikeout rates are good for not throwing particularly hard. And he has like a 14% swinging strike rate in his brief time, his three starts of AAA this year. But the control is...

suspect and just he's kind of an unconventional pitching prospect. He's been a difficult one for me to size up. I think it'll help to get a little sneak peek at him here, but I don't expect him to stick around for long this time. According to

MLB pipeline, Robert Gasser, left-handed pitcher throws 91 to 94-ish, really good slider, and looks like a pretty solid cutter as well. But we'll see how he fares in his debut on Friday. The Pirates were called Nick Gonzalez from AAA, 30 games there this year. He was batting 358 with four home runs, a 1039 OPS.

Just a 17.5% strikeout rate. Strikeouts have been a big problem for Nick Gonzalez and the miners. 90.9 mile per hour average exit velocity. He's still only 24 years old, seventh overall pick back in 2020. I'm not saying it's going to work out, Scott. But if it was going to work out, lowering the strikeout rate and hitting the fall a lot harder, seems like a way that it would. Yeah, and I have heard talk of some adjustments he's made because he obviously hadn't lived up

to the potential, the hype he got when the pirates originally drafted him and strikeouts were a big reason for it. So it does seem like Nick Gonzalez has kind of reinvented himself here and maybe could have, maybe it could end up being good after all, but reasonable to approach him with skepticism right now. Guardians prospect Chase DeLauder was diagnosed with a broken foot on Sunday, but won't require surgery. He remains without a timetable.

Had a huge spring, but it sounds like we won't be seeing Chase the Water anytime soon with the Guardians. Sound the alarms, regression alert for two pitchers here on Thursday. Sunny Gray got knocked around at the Brewers. He allowed six runs over five. innings, including three home runs in this start. He gave up 10 hard hits in this one, and the truth is he really just got hit hard. I didn't really see anything concerning under the hood when I looked at this start.

He also just faced the Brewers a couple of weeks ago, so they saw him recently. That is Sunny Gray. And Logan Gilbert got smacked around. At the Minnesota Twins, who are red hot, I think they won something like 15 of their past 17 games, and their offense has really come alive. four innings, eight runs allowed. Still had 18 swinging strikes on 91 pitches here for Logan Gilbert. Looks like he did not have the fastball or the cutter working at all.

He also got Babipped, 533 Babbip in this start against Logan Gilbert. Entered this one with a 169 ERA. So obviously that was not going to remain. It's just unfortunate. It all came in one start here, Scott. Anything actually concerning about Gilbert or Sunny Gray here? No, I think it's pure regression for both. both Sunny Gray's ERA was even more ridiculous.

I believe it was 0.89. And yeah, obviously those aren't going to last. For as ugly as these starts were, both pitchers still have a great ERA on the year better than we usually see from them. If these crooked stat lines revealed something scary, like reduced velocity, I might be more concerned, but that wasn't the case.

I think Sonny Gray just happened to give up three home runs. I think Logan Gilbert, as you pointed out, he had some bad batted ball luck here. And, you know, everything regresses to the mean, like I've been saying. It's going to happen for pitchers who seemed like they couldn't miss up to this point. Who did all that damage against Logan Gilbert? The twins scored 11 runs total on 11. hits including two home runs.

Ryan Jeffers went one for two with a walk and his eighth home run. He is on fire. As we mentioned yesterday, Scott and I both move Ryan Jeffers inside of our top 10 catchers rest of season. We spoke about Max Kepler who went two for four with his third home run. A name we have not mentioned, Jose

Miranda, went two for four with a double, three runs scored, he's batting 293, he's got two homers in 805 OPS, has started six of the past seven games for the twins. And You remember last year coming into the season, there was some hype around Jose Miranda. The ADP was right around 150.

He's getting a chance now, Scott. In deeper leagues, anything to see here with Jose Miranda? I mean, I have him in an AL-only league, and it's an AL-only Roto League. It's a big lineup. I've been starting him. That's what you have to do in an AL-only league. I've been pleased with what I've gotten from him. It's more than I expected.

Of course, last year was derailed by a shoulder impingement that eventually required surgery. I don't remember the whole history of that if it had some impact on his disappointing production it's reasonable to think it did, but I don't remember the exact timeline there. I will say, though, the exit velocity data looks worse for Miranda this year than it did last year.

It's bad. And the strikeout rate, it was exactly 15.8 both years, maybe a little lower than that this year, but basically the exact same, very good strikeout rate, but not any different. I don't see a lot of change here under the hood for Miranda,

even though the results have been much better. And it's a difficult fit for him in this twins lineup. He's not a great defensive third baseman. They've kind of been transitioning him to first base. third base is the way to get him in the lineup now, but Royce Lewis is going to be back sooner than later. And I think that's going to leave with Jose Miranda without a spot to play.

I don't think it's far-fetched to say his numbers will have regressed to a point that the twins won't mind losing him when that happens. Any concern regarding Hunter Green, who struggled with control against the debacks here, five innings, three runs, five walks, six strikeouts still had 18 swinging strikes on 84 pitches. His fastball velocity was down 2.6 miles per hour.

He averaged 95.4. The usual is 98 for Hunter Green. And here was a quote that I saw from him after this start. Quote, it was a sluggish day from when I got to the field. I was just grinding from the first pitch, trying to make the most of it, and still go out there and compete and give the team a chance. it wasn't early start time too so maybe that's part of it

but Scott any lasting concern here about Hunter Green's Velo being down? You don't like to see it he says he was feeling sluggish as you point out so

I don't know exactly what that means like he was feeling sluggish like his shoulder didn't have its usual strength or he was just feeling tired I don't know exactly what he means by sluggish you don't hear too often about pitchers velocity dropping like this just because they're tired or whatever.

But, you know, it's not going to be a concern, I think, unless next start we see the same thing from Hunter Greens. So I wouldn't panic yet. He's been pretty good so far. I don't think we should expect him to turn into an ace this year. but yeah, I think we'll just have to keep an eye on this velocity situation. I presume right now it's a, it's, it's just an aberration. We'll see.

Let's slide into the waiver wire and we'll first talk about hitters. Michael Conforto could be available in some shallower leagues. He is up to 77% rostered. He's quietly been really solid. Two for three with a walk and his seventh home run. He's homered in back-to-back games. He's batting 275 with an 822 OPS. He's hitting lefties well.

the expected stats look pretty good for Conforto 263XBA 487 X-SL Scott would you have Conforto ahead of the names we mentioned earlier the Max Kepler's and Brent Rookers of the world no I prefer Kepler and Rooker to Conforto I've not had a lot of confidence in Cofordo he hit those four home runs right away and then did nothing and now he's kind of having a second power binge here I did notice his fly ball rate is up. It's closing in on 45%, which is high. It's higher than we're used to seeing from him.

His home run to fly ball rate is normal. It's what it's been the previous couple years. It was higher like in 2019 when we thought of Michael Confordo as this 30 homer guy because home runs were so easy to come by. But in recent years, his home run to fly ball rate, this year looks like it has then. So I guess if he can sustain the higher fly ball rate, maybe he can continue to exceed expectations like this. But I would bet on that normalizing rather than becoming just the new normal for Conforto right now.

So hot hand play at a weak position, I get it. I'd consider him a cell high candidate though and leagues deep enough that you could even consider. that you could find a buyer for him. Okay. Jamer Candelario is slowly coming around. He went two for four with his fourth home run. And over his last eight games, he's batting 3.79 with two homers,

hitting the ball really hard, tons of line drives during that time. Candelario is 66% rostered. If he was dropped, would you be looking to re-ad Candelario? Somebody I think we universally liked as a sleeper this season. Yeah, so I actually hadn't.

noticed that he was beginning to pick things up at the plate. I guess it's not terribly surprising. Everything regresses to the mean, right? He's not a young guy, and I was most concerned about how inflated his strikeout rate was. It was insanely high. And let's see, has it gotten much better? It was in the mid-30s before.

Now it is down two for Jamer Candelario. it's down in the low 30, so it's getting better. Yeah, we did like him as a sleeper coming in. It seems like a career high in home runs is to be expected, given the park he's playing in now in Cincinnati. And his playing times should be pretty secure with Noel V. Marte still out and Christian Encarnacion Strand down now for six weeks. So, I don't know, in quarter infield league. obviously but considering Candelaria is already 49% on maybe he never got dropped in those leagues He's 66% actually yeah okay so even more likely I was looking at the wrong player there

Would I so I'm trying to remember who were he talking about yesterday is the first base like we were talking to can you drop Spencer Torkelson and we were like no I'm not gonna drop Torkelson for Candelario I agree can you drop Who was another struggling when we Michael Bush Yan Diades, Yandy Diaz and... I'm not going to drop Yandy Diaz. Michael Bush, yeah. Yeah, I mean, I could...

In the sort of league where you could even consider dropping Michael Bush because it's shallow enough, I could see swapping him out for the hotter hand. But I don't know that you're... I don't know that in the long run you're gaining much there. Okay. Don't drop Joey Loprafito just yet

if you picked him up in five outfielder leagues. He had his best game yet. We went two for three with a walk and his first career steal. He's six for 19, so far. with 2 RBI. Did not start the previous two games. Both were against Ritey, so didn't love that.

But having a strong game here, hopefully that builds some confidence, both on him and his manager to continue playing Joey Lopofito. Yeah. It is just one game. And I believe only one of his batted balls had a high expected batting average.

So one of those singles was pretty weak. I don't know. The Astros have the most favorable hitter matchups, and it's five righties versus two lefties. So I consider Joey Lopifito for the top 10 sleeper hitters next week. I just don't feel like I've seen enough to want to get him in my lineup, even at a sleeper context like that, you know? Yeah.

Maybe a big weekend will change my mind, but there hasn't been enough yet. How would you rank these three outfielders, probably for five outfielder leagues? Brenton Doyle had a bounceback game when two for four with his fourth, home run. His previous 10 games before this, he was betting 128 with a 33% strikeout rate. Jock Peterson continues to hit. He went three for five with a sock and a shoe. And Tommy Pham continues to hit as well. He's off to a great start. Two for four with a double,

a run, and an RBI. He's betting 313 with two homers and an 840 OPS. Scott, how do you rank Fam, Jock, and Doyle? I rank them differently, depending on the format we're talking about. I think fam would be number one in a points league Doyle would be

number one in a category's league obviously the difference there is strikeouts Peterson

would be second regardless of format and I think he could be a pretty handy player if you're if it's like

a daily league or if you're just very dedicated to playing matchups in weekly leagues if there are enough righties

on the schedule I think Jack Peterson could come in handy shallow leagues probably have no use for him. I just checked his roster rate. Jack Peterson on Yahoo, it's 5%.

But those are typically 12-team leagues with only three outfield spots, but a lot of them are daily. I agree. I think that's probably Jack Peterson's best format, but I'm not sure he's enough of a difference maker in a league that shallow to roster him. So just thought I would check. Two names in deeper leagues.

John Singleton hit a mammoth home run. When I say, I watch a lot of Yankee games, you don't see home runs land where John Singleton hit this home run. It was a huge shot. It was 115.4 exit velocity, 442 feet. And he has started all nine games since Jose Abraeu was sent down. And he's betting 241 with four homers and a 90.5 average exit velocity during that time. A gentleman named Diron Blanco with the Royals had a huge game, went three for three with a sock and two shoes. He's a part-time player, pinch runner type.

He has 10 steals on the season. The problem for him, he's only started two of the past 10 games. Anything to add here, Scott? John Singleton and Diron Blanco. Hard to have anything to say about Blanco because he starts like once a week. Yeah. So good on him having a big game. He's 31 years old too, so he's clearly not a part of the,

a big part of the Royal's Future or anything. He's just a role player. who played his role as well as he possibly could today. But John Singleton, on the other hand, still liking this guy. Me too. I'm liking this guy. I mean, Astro is obviously like this guy

because they've made him their everyday first basement. And certainly the quality, the contact quality is there. That home run he hit 115.4 miles per hour. That's his hardest hit ball. He had already hit one, 114. So he was already setting new highs and reaching elite levels in terms of peak exit velocity. And that's to go along with great plate discipline. I'm not sure why his expected stats are so low on stat cast. But I think the tools are there for him to potentially take off. I'm not saying like you got to add

Singleton in the shallow leagues. I wouldn't add him over Jamer Candelario. But I do have him as one of the top 10 sleeper hitters for this week. He is the representative for the Astros with them having the best hitter matchups. All right. Let's talk about one waiver wire pitcher. And Scott, don't lower Eric Fetty in those rankings just yet. Don't do it. Because when you do it, he goes out.

It has a pretty good start. Against the Guardian. Six shot out innings. Six hits, zero walks, three strikeouts. Only seven swinging strikes on 88 pitches. And it kind of just feels like Fetty is tinkering from start to start. I'm trying to find consistency among the pitch mix and what he's doing in the games that he's successful

and the ones that he's not. And I can't find much, but he's now allowed to earn runs or fewer in six of eight starts. He's got a three ERA on the nose, a 116 whip, right around a strike upper inning, getting a good amount of ground balls. I think he's just solid. And he's 62% rostered.

He's home against the nationals next week. Yeah. Do you regret it, Scott? Do you regret it? Here's the problem. Is solid good enough when you're pitching for the white socks? I don't think it is. And that's why I don't really regret it.

We can't roster all the pitchers in the world. And I don't think Eric Fetty is high impact enough to overcome the supporting cast issue. I don't think he's going to be consistent enough. The one thing his good starts have had in common is zero walks. So three of his last four starts, zero walks. the other one, he walked five. And the zero-walk starts were all great. But in this one, he had only seven whiffs, if you point out.

Five came on the cutter, one each on the splitter and sweeper, which are supposed to be his best pitches. Those were supposed to be the pitches that allowed him to take off in South Korea last year. and they just look so blah, you know, he's obviously not going to have pristine control all the time. I'm not sure it's always going to be to his benefit when he does, since he doesn't have a lot of whiff potential there, and it's not like his ground ball rate is through the roof.

I don't know. He's, I think going to, I think the, like, distribution of his starts is going to end up looking sort of like Dean Kramer, but Dean Kramer's got a great offense backing him up, and Fetty has a terrible one. So how excited are we about Dean Kramer? I do have Fetty ranked ahead of Dean Kramer,

but so I don't know. I'm kind of presenting a bit of a downside case there, I guess. Ultimately, though, I just don't think the impact potential is going to be very high. He's around 75th in my starting pitcher rank. rankings. And I think I have him in a very similar spot. So, yeah, I think that's fine. I wouldn't drop Reddembers for him. And I think I would take Not at all. Yeah, I would take Christian Scott ahead of him.

I have Fetty one spot ahead of Sandoval. That one's a lot closer. Like, Sandoval has more strikeout upside, but probably has a lower floor too. So, all right. Let's take our final break. When we return, we will get into our week eight preview. We'll do that right after this. Welcome back in. Let's get into our week eight preview and we will start things off with the schedule.

20 teams have six games next week. Ten teams have seven games including the rays, pirates, Phillies, A's, Mets, Dodgers, Astros, Reds, Cubs, and Red Sox. What about the Rockies for next week? They have six games and all of them are on the road.

Starters sit these fringy two-star pitchers, the aforementioned Hunter Green, velocity was down. He's at the D-backs and at the Dodgers next week. Yeah, I have him as a probable start. You're probably going to want to start him. Tanner Bybee has struggled a lot recently. He is going up against the Rangers and the Twins. As I mentioned, the twins are red hot, and Tanner Bybee is not. Yeah, it's still probably started. Nick Povetta threw only 58 pitches in his return. He's going up against the raise and at the Cardinals.

Yeah. Good matchups. Obviously, he didn't get good results in his first start back. It was against the Braves. Mostly, Marcel Lozuna is the one who got to him. But those are two really good matchups for Povetta. Okay. Jordan Hicks is home against the Dodgers, but also gets the Rockies on the road in San Francisco. I feel pretty good about starting him as well. None of them I would consider must starts, but probable starts. Do you disagree on any of them, Frank? Hunter Green, Tanner Bybee, Nick Povetta, Jordan Hicks. Tanner Bybee, just has someone who has them in multiple leagues, it's been a mess right now, and I don't like those matchups. I think if you play in a shallower categories league and you have some options on the bench,

I know we usually say, oh, if you can't start a pitcher in a two-star week, should you have this player on your team? Tanner Bybee has enough upside. I think we know that. But if you can get away from in a categories league, the way the ratios have been recently, I wouldn't mind doing that. In a points league, I think I'm fine using Tanner Bybee. Yeah, Povetta in a points league as a SPARP. Another one wearing categories.

I might kind of play it safe with Povetta. Jordan Hicks, I feel good starting. I think I'm right with that one. The last two names on this list, Sean Minaya, is up against the Phillies and at the Marlins. I lean no on that. I could see doing it as a spark at a points league. But Eileen, no. He just hasn't had a good start,

like a really good start in a while. Ken Tamayda just got rocked, but he is facing the Marlins and at the D-backs next week. The debacks are good, but not as good against right-handed pitching. What do you think about Maida? I'm going to pass. I think that is the prudent move here with Ken Tamayada.

What about the two-star pitchers to add and stream? These names are rostered in less than 80% of CBS. leagues, who you got. So these are pretty much all just points league recommendations. If you want to chase counting stats in a categories league, I'm not going to tell you you can't. But mostly I'd just be looking to start all these guys in points leagues with one exception. Christopher Sanchez.

I think you start him everywhere at the Mets against the Nationals. He barely makes the cutoff here. He's 79% rostered. But after him, the points league guys, Gavin Stone. at San Francisco versus Cincinnati. The strikeouts have been underwhelming, especially lately, but the matchups are good enough. And he's got the Dodgers offense backing him.

Obviously, Aaron Savale has been pretty shaky. I think he'll rebound. I'm not confident it's going to be right now, but with the two-star week in a points league, look at a maximize volume, probably end up starting them at Boston at Toronto. Those are decent matchups. Paddock coming off

a really good four-start stretch versus the Yankees at the Guardians, so the matchups could be better, but he's got two of them. Jose Budo versus the Phillies at the Marlins, one bad matchup, one good matchup, hopefully I get a win out of that.

Graham Ashcraft at the Diamondbacks, at the Dodgers, not the greatest matchups, but he's been steady enough. to, I think, earn points league consideration anytime he's making two starts at this Graham Ashcraft.

And if you want a really highly available option, Jose Soriano, we'll go to that well again. His first matchup is great against the Cardinals. Second matchup at the Rangers, not so great. The stuff still looks tremendous. He's just struggling. He's kind of doing the Edward Cabrera thing

is Jose Soriano, but doesn't have such a long history of it that we're we need to be as dismissive of him. And again, only 13% rostered is Jose Soriano. If you miss out on the two-star pitchers, who are some single-star streamers for next week? Not a lot.

Not a lot of good ones here. I think we've kind of entered a rut with both the pitchers and hitters for this segment. Like, everybody's kind of picked through everything already and what's left is generally not that appetizing. But three decent ones this week at least, John Means against the Mariners. I think that's pretty attractive. I'd start him over all those two-star guys, again,

except for Christopher Sanchez. That's John Means. Reese Olson gets the Marlins. He doesn't have a win yet, but he's a winner in my book. And Eric Fetty, he gets the nationals. Yeah, I kind of like that group. of the single-star streamers. So, yeah, I don't really mind them.

I was about to say that I would start all three over Tanner Bybee next week, but that's probably a little bit too reckless. So I will retract my thought there. What about the hitters for next week? The best matchups include the Astros, the Angels, the Pirates, the Phillies, and the Tigers, and the worst hitter matchups,

Orioles, Blue Jays, Nationals, and the A's. who are the sleeper hitters for week eight? I do want to say, I came up with five good hitter matchups, five teams with good hitter matchups, because that's what's required of me. But it was a stretch to get there. They're only, with all the pitchers who are pitching well right now,

it was a stretch to get to five. I feel like only the first four of those teams really have hitter matchups that are that good. And so that really limited my selection of sleeper hitters here because there weren't a lot of matchup related choices. So a lot of them are just hot hand plays, which I don't really prefer from a process standpoint. I feel like when I lean on a guy just because he's hot, heading into the weekend, you know, him just sustaining that hotness throughout the following week. It doesn't always work out. But anyway, that's why Max Kepler's at the top of the list, because obviously he's hot, as we already talked about.

Brent Rooker, he's hot. I actually have the athletics as the fifth worst hitter matchup, and yet here I am recommending Brent Rooker, which shows you how limited my choices were, because I also hate to ever choose sleeper hitters who are on teams with bad matchups. Brian de la Cruz, the Marlins matchups are on the better end

for a week where not, many teams have good hitter matchups, and De La Cruz has been hot, of course. Mark Kana, the Tigers, had the fifth best hitter matchups to whatever degree that means anything. Three of the pitchers on top are lefties in Kana. Certainly this year has been

mashing lefties. John Singleton, who I mentioned with Astros having the best hitter matchups and only two lefties in their seven games. I think he's a fine play. Might roll the dice on Joe Adele with the Angels having the second best

matchups. Might roll the dice on Spencer Torkelson. You know, worked out Anthony Rizzo. I predicted the week he'd come back to life. Torkelson's been getting some hits here and there lately. And the Tigers, you know, fifth-best hitter matchups. So maybe this is the week. But boy, I'm reaching here, clearly.

Willie Castro, you know, he's been performing well lately. The twins matchups aren't so bad. Brandon Marsh, Phillies have the fourth best hitter matchups for righties on the schedule. I don't know if that's reason enough to start Marsh. I'm rounding out the list here with Kyle Manzardo, who has one major league hit so far. But no lefties on the schedule for the Guardian, so I think that would benefit Minzardo. Do I really want to start him? No, I really don't.

But you may be desperate enough to try. All right. Well, I had this trade matchmaker I wanted to do. I'm sitting here. thinking what did we talk about for an hour's kind of like there's no time my paper on mayonnaise in the 11th grade i was just i was just thinking yeah maybe we spoke about mayonnaise for too long but here we are i just i was just long-winded probably no give me a space of time to fill and i will fill it baby that is your job that is your job for saying uh i'll just quickly mention the names and if we get a short

slate coming up soon we can dive into this a little bit more but the six by-low hitters i was going to present. We're Matt Olson, Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Mani Machado, Brian Reynolds, Alex Breggman, and Vinnie Pass Quantino, who had a big game on Thursday. He went two for five. With his fifth home run, it was a blast. 110.6 exit velocity, 442 feet. With the exception of Breggman, all of those names I just mentioned, their expected stats are much better than their actual numbers so far this season. And the thought on Breggman is that he just gets off to the slow starts. He got off to a slow start last year as well. Bregman's first 38 games last season. This went through May 12th, so basically where we are right now.

He hit 201 with four homers and a 650 OPS. He still finished hitting 262, 25 home runs, and an 804 OPS. He's also in a contract year. So, yes, I was going to bring up Bregman and the rest of those names. And I had a bunch of potential sell high candidates. It might have been a good segment. I don't know. We'll break it out someday soon. I want to wrap up with some other leftovers. Mention some hitters that are going in opposite directions right now, Scott. Two names that are slowing down that I hadn't really realized, but Lord is Gareal, his first 23 games, he hit 300 with a 852 OPS.

His last 11 games, he's batting 087 with one extra base hit, not hitting the ball hard at all during that spin. And Spencer Stier, his first 20 games hit 324, Three homers, four steals. His last 17 games, batting 133, but he's still running. He has six steals during that time, and it looks like he's just hitting way too many fly balls. Any actual concern with either Steer or Lordus Guerriel? Not really for steer.

He has a great park to hit in, obviously, the best. The kind of park that's going to make his not-so... not so stellar power, it's going to make it stand up. And he steals plenty of bases. It's a diverse skill set. Obviously, plenty of job security. In terms of how many points he scored, it's still really high for the season, even though he's slumped recently.

If you go rank in a points league, at least, sortable stats at first base, third base, steer is going to be very high up there. So I wouldn't sweat it up so much with him. Lorda Scuriel, though, he was one of those players I wrote about earlier this week, 24 who you could, it would be okay to drop in shallower leagues. I was kind of floored to see Lordus Gurriel. Well, now he's rostered in 96% of leagues. And I just don't think he deserves that.

That feels like a guy who had a really strong first week. And it kind of stuck with him in terms of people's perception when he's done basically nothing since then. And he's been around long enough that we know who he is. he might hit 260 with 25 homers and with, you know, low on base percentage, which is good enough that he probably needs to be started in all five outfielder leagues, but in three outfielder points leagues, pretty fringy. Do you want to dump Lordescariel for the high hand there?

I think that's totally fine. All right. And then three hitters who are picking things up. Aaron Judge looks like he's back, one for four with his ninth home run. It was a blast. 11.7 exit velocity, 4773 feet for Aaron Judge. Over his last 12 games, he's betting 372 with five home runs, 12 RBI, 98.3, average exit velocity. Tyro Estrada is picking things up.

He went two for three with a walk, and over his last 16 games, he's betting 293 with two home runs, 10 RBI, and one steel. I would like to see Estrada run more. He's still 75th percentile in sprint speed. I wonder if this is maybe a Bob Melvin thing because the Giants are currently 29th in stolen bases as a team so far this season. That could impact Tyro Estrada long term. And Michael Garcia, who continues to pick things back up,

three for five with two doubles, two runs, and two RBI. Over his last 19 games, he is batting 329 with one homer, seven doubles, 12 runs, 12 RBI, and four steals. So it was a hot start for Michael Garcia. cold, middle, and then he is very hot once again. Anything else to add on Garcia, Estrada, and Aaron Judge? I think you basically summed it up.

If I could add a comment on Alex Bregman who you want from the segment that never was, pretty much everybody you mentioned there, I think is going to regress to the mean in a very good way. And I think Alex Bregman, same thing. You mentioned the expected stats didn't look great for him. they never look great for him. He's kind of weird like his teammate Jose Altuvae in that way, but the strikeout rate is normal, which is to say very low. The max exit velocity is normal.

I don't see a diminishment and skill there for Alex Bragman, which means he's probably going to be fine. But I wanted to mention that there was that curious story from this spring about how he spent a lot of time swinging weighted bats this offseason and had improved his, the velocity on his swing by like four miles per hour and he was trying to get back to being the 40-homer guy he was in 2019. Somebody needs to tell Alex Bregman, it's not 2019 anymore.

And I just wonder if that might be contributing to the slow start because he did kind of, like he kind of meddled with his mechanics there, you know. Given his history, given that the, again, all that data still looks normal for him. It's probably not a big deal. It is in the back of my mind, and I thought it was worth bringing up. All right, some leftovers. We will quickly run through.

Pablo Lopez pitched a gem against the Mariners, six and a third innings, one run, 10 strikeouts to zero walks. He had 15 swinging strikes on 100 pitches. He has eight plus strikeouts in three straight. Renel Blanco was solid at the Yankees, five and two-thirds innings. Two runs allowed five walks to, excuse me, four walks to five strikeouts, allowed a ton of hard contact in this start. And I know Chris brought him up on Monday's podcast as a sell high.

I agree with Renel Blanco. I mean, he's just walking too many batters for like the amount of strikeouts that he gets. And at some point, those walks are going to hurt Renel Blanco in a big way. So if you could turn him into, I don't know, a viable starter at an offensive position anywhere, I think I'd be looking to do something like that, Scott. Yeah, I mean, to that point. FIP and X-FIP for him are both around 420, even though his ERA is as low as this.

For what it's worth, XERA is much, much lower. So the quality of contact, like, Ronel Blanco does not give up hits. He threw a no-hitter, but like he is built not to give up hits. And so maybe he can overcome a 4.1 walk per 9 rate better than most pitchers can. But there is some amount of regression coming, I would agree. Some of the hitting leftovers, Ellie De La Cruz, just continues to run.

Two for three with a walk and two more steals. He is batting 264 with eight homers, 28 runs, and 23 steals. His 150 game pace, 32 homers, 93 steals for Ellie De La Cruz. Yorda de la Cruz. Yorne Alvarez needed to get back on track and he went two for five with his eighth home run. Previous 14 games entering this game.

154 batting average with two homers. and way too many fly balls for Yorda Alvarez. Jose Ramirez and Josh Neller, they went back to back here on Thursday. Ramirez's eighth homer and Josh Nellar's 10th. Some bullpen updates for the D-backs. Paul Seawald got the ninth with a one-run lead. He struck out two for his first save of the season.

For the Astros, Josh Hader got the final four outs for his fourth save. And for the White Sox, Michael Kopeck got the final four outs with just a one-run lead. he picked up his fourth save of the season as well. To stream or not to stream? And I just realized that I did not write down the match us beforehand, Scott. So we've got to go.

We've got to go the old way. Important detail, Frank. Yes, for your favorite segment that has ever existed, to stream or not to stream. So I will just run through some names and you tell me if you like them or not. On Friday, we have Javier Assad at the Pirates.

That's probably going to be among the better ones. Casey Maynes at home against the Astros? Nah. No. Clark Schmidt at the raise? I'd rather not. Tage Bradley's season debut against the Yankees. I like him more than Schmidt, but less than Assad. I do want to mention it because I wrote about Tosh Bradley for Waverwire today.

That or yesterday, I should say. New Splitter is throwing 20% of the time. He was untouchable at AAA with that and getting. a lot more strikeouts than we ever saw him get at that level of the miners. So definitely worth picking up if he's available, but it's scary to start him out against the Yankees straight off the I-O. Brendan fought at the Orioles. Nah.

Robert Gasser in his debut against the Cardinals. No, no, no. Griffin Canning against the Royals. Nah. Paul Blackburn at the Mariners. I mean, if you're really, if you're really desperate to get another start in there, it sounds like one of the better ones. Andrew Abbott at the Giants. That's okay.

Yeah. So it sounds like Abbott, Assad, and was there anyone else that we really liked? Maybe Tage Bradley? Yeah. Assad's the only one that I firmly support. On Saturday, we have Simeon Woods Richardson in a revenge game at the Blue Jays. I don't think so. Not a lot of faith in him.

John Means against the D-backs. They are so good against lefties. I don't know. He's in Camden Yards. I like this better than most of what we're going to talk about as streaming options. So I understand your point about the Diamondbacks beating up on lefties, but Means is the best pitcher I think we've mentioned so far. Christian Scott is home against the Braves.

Yeah, I'd do that over a lot of these. Taiwan Walker at the Marlins? No, I don't think so. Scrolling through to see if there's anybody else that is interesting on Saturday. Nope, that's in Coorsfield. We don't want to do that. Tyler Anderson against the Royals. Okay.

Yeah, that's probably on the same level as Javier Assad. Okay. And then we get to Sunday where we have Dean Kramer against the D-backs. You could do worse, but it's dangerous. Braxton Garrett in his season debut against the Phillies. Man, he was killing it on his rehab assignment, but this is the Phillies, so probably not. Logan Allen at the White Sox. We've tried this with him a couple times this year, and it hasn't gone well, so I'm leaning no.

No, don't do it. Frankie Montas at the Giants. Yeah, yeah, I like that one. That might be my favorite one of the entire weekend. Patrick Sandoval, Home Against the Royals. That might be my second favorite one of the entire weekend. And I think that's probably it. Maybe Bryce Elder at the Mets, Sunday Night Baseball?

I don't think so. All right. Well, we're going to wrap there for Scott. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning into fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify, and we will be back again next week. Bye-bye.