Fantasy Baseball Today - 🚨Yu Darvish Traded to the San Diego Padres - Emergency Podcast (12/28 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: December 29, 2020

Yu Darvish and Victor Caratini were just traded to the San Diego Padres in exchange for Zach Davies and four young prospects: OF Owen Caissie (18), SS Reggie Preciado (17), OF Ismael Mena (18), SS Yeison Santana (20). What does this mean for Darvish's Fantasy value? Is he still worth drafting in the second round? ... With Davies traded, the Padres have an opening in their rotation (7:28). Whom do we expect between Morejon, Gore, and Weathers? ... What's the latest on Dinelson Lamet (9:56)? Could this trade mean the Padres know something we don't? ... What about the Cubs return (13:05)? Any love for Zach Davies moving over to Chicago? Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday '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, @AdamAizer, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank 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/ 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.

This is starting to become a nightly occurrence. We have another massive trade in Major League Baseball. Welcome to Fantasy Baseball today. The emergency. edition, Frank Stanfel, joined by Chris Towers again. Two nights in a row. The San Diego Padres making massive moves. This time they acquire U. Darvish and catcher Victor Caratini in exchange for Zach Davies and four young prospects. Outfielder Owen Casey, shortstop, Reggie Priziano,

outfieler Ismael Mena, and shortstop Yason Santana. All these prospects are under 20 years old and haven't played at any level above rookie ball. In fact, only one of these players has appeared in the minors. to this point, but obviously, Chris, the big story here is U. Darvish moving over to the San Diego Padres, and we know how great he's been. His last 35 starts. He got up to the slow start in 2019. Last 35 starts, 306 ERA, 0.94 whip. The current price, ADP, is at 18.2. He's being drafted as the sixth, the fifth starting pitcher off the board just behind Trevor Bauer. Chris, what do you think about this move for U. Darvish? And his fantasy value, now that he's on.

the West Coast. I think it helps him a little bit. It's, you know, I think it's probably more of a boost for him than it is for Blake Snow because Blake Snow was moving from a, you know, one of the better pitcher parks in baseball, you Darvish moving from a bit of a more neutral environment. Although I will say, it's worth pointing out that the, the NL Central teams in particular had by far the easiest schedules in baseball, especially a team like the Cubs or the Reds,

you know, the rare good teams in the AL or NL Central because they were able to feast on the really, really bad teams that made up the rest of those two divisions. And so, you know, with, you know, it's true of Bauer wherever he lands. It's true of Darvish. It's true pretty much all of them. They have to face the rest of the major leagues now.

And so he's not going to have a 201 ERA again, but you don't need me to tell you that. He's probably moving to a better lineup, moving to a better park, probably a better defense behind him, although I'm not sure on that one. So what I saw with defense, Chris, was that in 2020, short sample,

the Cubs were sixth in defensive runs saved and sixth in UZR. The Padres were 15th in defensive run saved and fourth in UZR. So it might be a slight downgrade, if anything, based on those stats. Could be a slight downgrade, but probably a pretty moderate one. But all in all, yeah, I think it's a better situation for you, Darvish.

But your expectations for him shouldn't change much. If he's the sixth pitcher on your board or the fifth pitcher on your board, he should still be that today. I think if anything, I might downgrade him slightly. I do agree that he gets better run support, obviously, with the Padres here. But I do really think that moving over to the National League, West where now he has to face the Dodgers consistently. He will have to face the Rockies.

The Giants were in the top eight in run scored this past season in a short season. That ain't happening again, buddy. That ain't happened again. Look, man, not to be mean, they've got some guys, but that was a bit of a fluke. All right. Well, either way, he had great teams to face off against. I mean, the competition level in the National League Central. and just the AL Central.

It was great this past season, but you pointed that out. So because of that, and the fact that, I mean, he is changing scenery. It's just whenever you have to draft a pitcher that early in the second round, we spoke about Blake Snell yesterday. You know, he's going like the fourth, fifth round. You have to use a second round pick on Darvish. I think him changing scenery is enough for me to just knock him down a little bit. That's just a really, really big price tag.

So in my personal rankings, I will drop him behind Aranola. I'll drop him behind Luis Castillo. assuming Castillo doesn't get traded. But after those guys, yeah, I'm probably looking at you Darvish. Yeah, and it's worth remembering Udarvish is probably older than you probably think. He's 34 years old. He'll turn 35 in the middle of the season in August. Because he missed two seasons with Tommy John surgery,

or I guess it was just the one season. No, he missed two seasons with Tommy John surgery, basically. He basically didn't play in 2018. I think he is a little older than probably most people think. He's 34 and like we've seen with Corey Klober, like we've seen with Max Scherzer, like we've seen with Justin Verlander over the last two seasons, guys can go at that age from a model of consistency in health, which Darvish has been over the last two seasons, at least.

He was not that in 2018, so that adds a little bit of risk there. but that turn can happen really quickly and you can start to see that decline happen really quickly and in the case of, you know, potentially Corey Kluber, maybe we saw the decline and the injuries start to hit and the body breaking down.

So he's definitely in that. He's going to be, you know, I think one of the riskier picks in that range even just aside from the fact that he's a pitcher. And for people, wondering why they acquired Victor Caratini as well. No, he isn't going to take playing time away from Alcinola, just one time a week, whenever U.

Darvish is on the mound, because Caratini has basically been the personal catcher for U.Darvish over the past two seasons. If you look at his splits by catcher, Darvis's splits in 2019. I mean, I guess it was really when he really started to take off that season. He had a 3.29 ERA, and 19 starts with Caratini as his catcher. He had an ERA over six in eight starts with Wilson Contreras as a catcher. And Keratini also caught all of U. Darvish's starts in 2020 as well.

So that's the reason why he was acquired as well. Personal catcher there for U.S. Last question, Chris. I mean, you're on the board in the middle of the second round. Would you pull the trigger on U.Darvish? No, I think I would probably wait. But, you know, in that range, if you're looking for a starting pitcher right now, ADP, it's kind of a.

you Darvish, Trevor Bauer, Max Scherzer, I guess is probably that range. And then maybe Lucas Gialito and a couple of guys after that. So I don't necessarily love any of those guys at that price. So yeah, I think that might be a little tier that I might skip. But if he falls to like the late, you know, the mid third round, maybe it's a little easier to justify. Yeah, I mentioned I'll take Aaronnola.

Luis Castillo ahead of him, but I think once those guys are off the board, I would be looking at you, Darvish, myself. So part of this trade was Zach Davies goes over to the Chicago Cubs, which now opens up the fifth starter spot in the Padres rotation because they do still have Blake Snell. They have Chris Paddock. They have Darvish. And they have to Nelson Lamet. We'll talk about him in a second. But that fifth starting pitcher spot is open. It's up for grabs. And we could see one of the young guys come in and grab it here, Chris, between Adrian Morehoun, McKenzie Gore, obviously, one of the top prospects in baseball, the top pitching prospect, and Ryan Weathers, who started games in the minors, and then we saw him in the postseason, in a relief role for the

Padres. So if you had to guess now, who do you think winds up being the fifth starting pitcher for the Padres in this rotation? I guess probably Adrian Monaghan. He pitched a little more than the other guys did last season. It's really hard to say with, you know, we're coming off a season where we, we personally did not get to see any of these guys play. And the prospect writers who we trust, very few of them got to see these guys play. You know, we didn't get an Arizona fall league. We didn't get the minor league season. And so it's, we don't, a lot can change in a year for a prospect, especially for a 19 to 21-year-old pitching prospect. And the fact that McKenzie Gore never got the call-up last season after, we thought,

hey, maybe he might be on the opening day roster. Maybe he's not where they want him to be yet. Ryan Weathers is a guy who last time he pitched in the minors was an A-ball in 2019. He didn't pitch a whole ton of innings either. So are they going to make the jump from A-ball to the major league rotation with him? it's going to be really interesting, not just with these guys, but with a lot of them.

And I think, yeah, it's probably, it's probably Motohen just because he got to pitch, you know, somewhat extensively in the majors last season. Yeah, I think that makes sense as of now.

We have seen them be aggressive with some of their top prospects in the past in the past couple of seasons. Actually, we saw Fernando Tatis on the opening day roster. We saw Chris Paddock make the opening day roster as well. So if Gore is performing well, One spring training fires up, then he could get that opportunity.

So pay attention. And obviously, again, Gore, one of the top pitching prospects in all of baseball. But we're leaning with Mordejone. As of now, to Nelson Lemette. Now, I'm going to put my Inspector Gadget hat on here, Chris. And I'm going to speculate a little bit because I don't know that the patres go out and make two trades of this magnitude back to back. Snell Monday, Darvish Tuesday,

if everything looks and seems okay with Lamet, I think that we might be dealing with a ticking time bomb here. Obviously, was shut down late in the season, dealing with that bicep injury, which usually is a precursor for worse things to come. Hopefully, that's not the case, but Nelson Lamett has had Tommy John surgery before. So I'm just speculating,

but I think that the Padres might know something we don't about Lament. Well, they definitely know something we don't about Lament because, you know, they talk to him and they have MRIs and such. I have not seen Denelson Lemaat's MRIs. Me neither. It's, yeah, it's not what you want, I think, is fair to say. If all other things being equal, if you asked me, you know, whether I wanted a pitcher who was coming off of an injury and has had, you know, what was it, a quarter? Orison injection, PRP? Yeah, he had PRP.

Yeah, I would prefer. I would not want that, all other things being equal. So it's definitely a concern. And I think there are, this might get me, you know, kicked out of the fantasy baseball Twitter groups. But, you know, there are reasons to be concerned about his performance as well. I know he was awesome last season, but, you know, we're still talking about. 69 innings, which is almost exactly the same number he threw in 2019 when he was good, but not great. And so how many of the, how much of those improvements in terms of keeping the ball in the yard and limiting free passes?

How much of that was real? So I think there are reasons to be concerned about Lamette. And frankly, he's probably going at a place right now where I wouldn't feel super comfortable taking him. Yeah, I'm pretty worried as well. well. I did get an update in mid-December. We spoke about it on fantasy baseball today as well. But the update that I saw was according to the San Diego Union Tribune, and they reported he's so far avoided surgery this time around, and his platelet-rich plasma treatment appears to be having the desired effect. But his injury history means the Padres will have to continue to manage his recovery carefully. Yeah, and we were listening to a J. Tingler interview where he was talking about,

you know, very vaguely, well, everything looks good. We're getting good reports. You know, he's talking to the trainers. He's playing catch. But, you know, right now it's still, it's still definitely something to keep an eye on as we move forward. And he seems like one of the higher risk pitchers you can draft in the first, really five or six rounds right now where he's going.

Yes, very, very risky. Cubs fans, you might want to cover your eyes and plug your ears because Buster only had this to say right before we hopped on. Quote, this is what a salary dump in a pandemic looks like the Cubs aimed to transfer debt. Obviously, I mean, we have to give these prospects to benefit of the doubt and see what works out here. The Cubs needed to replenish their farm system.

I thought it was surprising that they didn't wind up with at least one of Luis Campusano or even a Ryan Weather, somebody like that, one of these top prospects. Guys were a little closer at least. Yeah. But Zach Davies, they do get a very, veteran arm and they get those four prospects. So what do you think about the return in general here, Chris?

And Zach Davies, he was very good this past season. He made some tangible changes to his pitch mix, 273 ERA, 107 whip. He was top 13 in both head-to-head points and Roto among starting pitchers. So anything to see there? Yeah, I mean, look, he can, they can, you know, have him room with Kyle Hendricks in training camp. I just realized they're like the same pitch. They're the same guy. I mean, Kyle Hendricks is a much better version of what Zach Davies is because, you know,

Zach Davies, the thing that he doesn't do or has not done that Kyle Hendricks really is elite with is one issue issuing locks. He's a little, a little worse than Kyle Hendricks there, although he's still very good. He gets hit a little harder than Kyle Hendricks. Kyle Hendricks is one of the few pitchers who you can confidently say has a legitimate skill when it comes to limiting hard contact. And that's how he gets away with being a low strikeout, you know, pitch to contact guy. The guy that nobody's ever excited to draft in fantasy and who just consistently performs. Davies needs work to get there.

And he's moving to a worst ballpark. and that can be an issue for someone who gets hit hard because he could have some issues with home runs. But if the improvements in swinging strike rate and strikeout rate sustained from last season and they were largely driven by a reduction in his fastball usage, his sinker usage, then I think he can be a kind of useful, you know, poor man's Kyle Hendricks,

probably someone who's just like your eighth starter, seventh or eighth starter, or maybe a streamer. But, you know, there is a little bit of room for a little bit more there. Hey, well, we spoke about the competition for Darvish. So now Davies is going to be facing that competition. He's going to face the pirates without Josh Bell. The Cardinals lineup is not great. As of now, we'll see if they make any other moves.

So, you know, it is a nice change of scenery in terms of competition for Zach Davies. So at least we can hang our hats on that. Just to recap, Chris, you think slight upgrade for Darvish in this move? I think you talked to me into it being, you know, maybe a slight negative, but probably mostly holding steady. Yeah, and if you're a Padres fan, look, it doesn't mean, I don't... It's a great deal. Like, you guys have an awesome rotation.

But just from a fantasy perspective, I think, you know, some of the pros, he has a better offense behind him. Yeah, the ballpark might be a little bit better to pitch in. I think it's a better part. Yeah, it's a better park to pitch in. But, you know, obviously some of the cons. he's moving to a new place and he has to settle in there. And you do have to spend quite a bit on him.

And the defense is a slight downgrade as well as the competition that he'll be facing. Although remains to be seen with the San Francisco Giants. We'll wrap up there. Slight downgrade for you, Darvish's fantasy value for Chris Towers. I'm Frank Stanful. Thank you all for listening and watching. Maybe we'll be back again tomorrow when there's another trade. If not, well, we'll see something.

There's someone else for the Padres to trade for, I'm sure. It'll happen. It'll happen. See you guys.