Rates & Barrels - Brandon Woodruff's Impressive Return & Big Changes in Washington

Episode Date: July 7, 2025

Eno and DVR discuss the return of Brandon Woodruff, Corbin Carroll's surprisingly quick activation from the IL, likely Tommy John surgery for Clarke Schmidt, a midseason rollback of Drew Rasmussen's workload, the arrival of Colson Montgomery, the Nats' decision to part ways with Mike Rizzo and Davey Martinez, and where the money went during the weekend.Rundown2:46 Brandon Woodruff's Return to the Brewers' Rotation11:14 Corbin Carroll is Back14:48 Clarke Schmidt Likely to Undergo Tommy John Surgery21:38 Colson Montgomery Promoted by White Sox28:57 Drew Rasmussen's Mid-Summer Role Tweak for Innings Management33:20 Nats Fire Mike Rizzo & Davey Martinez47:23 Mailbag: Team Quality & Save Opportunities52:45 Where the Money Went: This Weekend's Waiver Wire PickupsFollow Eno on Bluesky: @enosarris.bsky.socialFollow DVR on Bluesky: @dvr.bsky.sociale-mail: [e-mail] our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFeSubscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrelsHosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno SarrisProducer: Brian SmithExecutive Producer: Derek VanRiper Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

What matters most to you? Is it unforgettable adventures? Connections with lifelong friends? Peaceful moments of reflection? Feelings of joy and freedom you can't wait to experience again and again? Or is it the vehicles that help you make all those special moments possible? Whatever your answer is, Toyota is here to bring you closer to the things that matter to you. Because they matter to you.

Because they matter to us too. Toyota. For what matters most. When does fast grocery delivery through Instacart matter most? When your famous grainy mustard potato salad isn't so famous without the grainy mustard. When the barbecue's lit but there's nothing to grill. When the in-laws decide that actually they will stay for dinner. Instacart has all your groceries covered this summer.

So download the app and get delivery in as fast as 60 minutes. Plus enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. Slip into a deep restful sleep on a luxurious feeling mattress you can afford. Logan & Cove is named Canada's best luxury hybrid mattress.

Designed and handcrafted in Canada, it starts at just $7.99. Melt into its plush top cover. Stay comfortable with cooling gel foam. And let supportive coils cradle you to sleep. Try Logan & Cove at home risk-free for 365 nights. And if you're a listener in Canada, we have an exclusive offer for you. Get a free bedding bundle when you buy now at loganandcove.ca slash podcast. Welcome to Rates and Barrels presented by E-Trade from Morgan Stanley, Derek VanRyper Inosaris here with you.

On this episode we have a lot of ground to cover, a busy, busy weekend with the holiday weekend here in the States. Brendan Woodruff got back for the Brewers. I thought he looked pretty good in his first start back after anterior shoulder capsule repair. We'll dig into what might be next for him. We got a quick return from the IL from Corbin Carroll. Maybe a little too quick. Some bad news on Clark Schmidt. An interesting usage of Drew Rasmussen, temporarily at least least in that raise rotation mix. We had big changes with the Nats talked a lot about them on last Tuesday's episode. Mike Rizzo and Davey Martinez both out with a week before the 2025 MLB draft.

So the Nats making some big changes had a great mailbag question come in about save opportunities. And we'll dig into where the money went during the holiday weekend. Eno, how is it going for you on this Monday? It's going pretty good. It's a little crazy here in the household. We are trying to pack. Our cousins visited last minute from Hawaii and our plane to Germany leaves tomorrow early afternoon so a lot of stuff going on. That is a lot. It's actually imagining your house right now is like the scenes from Home Alone, the beginning of the movie when all the kids and cousins are like running around trying to pack and it's just utter chaos and no one knows what's going on. The cleaners are here too so there's

just like extra random people looking around like, why are there so many more people here right now? At least the Hawaii contingent can't bring their dogs. The rest of our family visits, they bring their dogs even though our dogs are not great with other dogs. So then the entire time that there are people running around, there are dogs barking at each other. Adds some chaos. That's how it goes with other families. These guys couldn't bring their dogs. At least they don't have a ton of barking.

It's gonna be a good trip for you. I'm excited that you're getting to go on that. And we got some great shows lined up while you're away. You can join our Discord at the link in the show description. Give us ideas along the way. Any questions, mailbag questions can go there. If you're watching us on YouTube, be sure to like this video. If you're not watching us on YouTube, subscribe to our YouTube channel. We'd love to have you there, even if you're listening as a podcast listener. We've got plenty of people that do both, so

be part of that crew. Let's get into some of the baseball news you should know. The guy wearing the Brewer's hat came away pretty excited about the return of Brandon Woodruff on Sunday. It was actually, I think, of regular season games, maybe the most uninterrupted game I've watched all season. I was pretty laser focused on this. The stars aligned. The sleep schedule magically worked in a way where my son napped a little early because he slept like garbage the night before. So, you know, I was on like a giant Americano

as my third coffee watching Brandon Woodruff. So I was a little delirious. Maybe I was seeing pitch movements that weren't actually happening. And that's why I thought it was so good. But I was watching it and had the brewers feed on because it's in market and I liked that crew anyway. And Vinnie Rotino, who does a lot of the games

as an analyst for the Brewers, was talking about the command of Brandon Woodruff and how good it looked. And I thought it looked really good too. It seemed like the two seamer in particular, he had a lot of movement on it, but he was also putting that pitch wherever he wanted. He worked in a new sweeper.

It kind of looks like Brandon Woodruff has turned into a three fast balls, two breaking balls and a change up guy. And he didn't have the cruising velocity that we're used to, but he did reach back for 95 and 96 on the occasions in which he really needed it. So I came away feeling good about what they got after a really long layoff for Woodruff. And then there was sort of like the human element of, hey, this guy worked through a ton of rehab, had a bunch of setbacks along the way, like the fluky kinds of setbacks that make you think the sky is falling and everything's going wrong. And I think there's at least a shot that this is better than we expected when he got hurt as far as the outcome.

I think this is a pretty successful Return given how few pitchers we see come back from that procedure One thing I should have known looking backwards is that for my conversations with Brandon Woodroof and my knowledge of the Brewers pitching department I should have realized that he wouldn't just come back as the same guy with Les Vilo and just sort of bang his head against the wall. He absolutely changed his entire arsenal. He separated his four seam and two seam more. So when he came into the league, he kind of had a two plane four seam.

And so he didn't really have like a four seam in sinker. He had one pitch that was kind of both, you know? And, you know, since he had all that time off, he really separated the four seam and sinker. If you look at the 2023 plot and the 2025 plot, they're very different. He also added a cutter, you know, that he didn't have before. So now he has that three fastball look.

And he's kind of leaning into more of the sinker pitcher you know base package where he changed the slider into a sweeper. Didn't really throw the curve that much but you know he's got a little bit of a sideways thing going on with the sweeper and the change up so he can go sideways with those and then he can have three different separate kinds of movement on the fastball. I mean, kudos to him. Like I don't think he can be who he was before and so I think he saw that and was like let's do this. You know, there are the guys that survive at 93 with command three fastballs and twoaries. So he is among the tough ranks for me this week because I had been pessimistic based on the stuff. You know, 104 stuff plus after that start, you know, some of it is floated by a good

slider stuff plus, but hey, 107 stuff plus on the fastball, 108 on the sinker. Your actual mix of fastballs is part of your stuff plus now. So basically what stuff plus said is, hey, he lost stuff on his actual pitches individually, but made up for it by now having three fastballs. And so the one thing is stuff plus says that he threw the cutter too much and he did fall in love with that pitch.

So that's the next thing we have to watch for. What is baseball going to do once they know he has this new mix and once they've seen him and what kind of success will he have then? So he's been moving up, big up arrow in my ranks as I work to file those before I leave. I just came really excited to the Brandon Woodruff page this morning on FanGraphs looking for that

location plus number to kind of validate. It was ridiculous. 132? I thought like, okay, 110, 115. Like it's going to be good, like above average for sure based on how sharp it was in the first outing. I saw that 132 was like what 132 location plus like okay yeah he's always been a sneaky really good guy I mean like for his career 108 he's a guy who's always had good command so maybe I should have known like he was a guy who has in the past had five pitches with above average stuff plus and command of all those pitches that you know in a lesser form he would just find different ways it's almost like a fight.

Like we talk about this, how five toolers age on the hitting side. You want to have a five to learn because when one of the tools goes, they might still have the other four. Yeah. You lose some speed, but you're above average as a hitter and like, you're going to be fine, like you're still going to hit two 80 and get on base at a three 50 clip later, even if you're not stealing 30 bases anymore. The big one for me was Curtis Grams.

He signed a deal with the Mets that some people didn't like and I just thought, hey, this guy, he was a center fielder at the time with five tools. Maybe he struck out a little bit too much, but I was like, hey, he's gonna be still a good corner out fielder, even if he's not a good center fielder and so on and so forth. Yeah, the corresponding move, by the way, to make room for Woodruff was something you suggested.

I think it was actually during an episode, Chad Patrick got bumped. And this is just the state of the Brewers rotation depth right now. To have a guy like Patrick and just have him kind of waiting in the wings at Nashville. I mean, Logan Henderson's been down there for several weeks. And Logan Henderson, for a lot of teams, would be in the rotation, getting an opportunity, probably as a number three or number four starter. So a good situation sort of developing as far as getting a lot of guys help. I mean, Tomias Myers is pitching all right down there.

Yeah, he's posting good numbers, too. And they don't need a trade for depth. They've got depth. I don't think they have enough depth where you say trade away that depth to get a bat, but Maybe if it takes one of them and it might make sense for them I think it depends on the impact of that bat. I don't know if you're trading anyone for a rental I think you might be looking for a longer term boost even though they have a couple of prospects that are in the upper levels that might solve a problem at third base.

I just don't get the sense that solving that with a band-aid is necessarily the direction they're going to go. It just depends on who is actually available. Other moves from the Brewers real quick from a news perspective. Reese Hoskins sprained his thumb over the weekend so Andrew Vaughn coming up on Monday probably going to platoon. It'll be the small side guy with Jake Bowers being the big side at first base. So more of a wait and see with Vaughn, even in deeper leagues.

I think it's more like a starter two per week until Hoskins comes back and then maybe right back down to AAA for Andrew Vaughn if everything goes to script. Big ol' poll number with Milwaukee for Vaughn and the Miners. So I wonder if they were like, hey, can we try going getting that ball? It's something I've been calling for, but with the bat tracking technology, I've realized that there may just be an aspect of his swing that doesn't lead it to a lot of pole air because he's pulling the ball with Milwaukee, but he hit 58% on the ground.

So I don't know. I guess that's good. It was okay for his outcomes. Takes time just to get the adjustment to work consistently too if you really are trying to change something up like that on the fly. Some other baseball news you should know. Corbin Carroll made a quick return from the IL. Got back on Saturday, started again on Sunday, went 0-9 with five strikeouts. I didn't think we'd see Corbin Carroll made a quick return from the IL. He got back on Saturday, started again on Sunday, went 0-4-9 with five strikeouts. I didn't think we'd see Corbin Carroll until after the All-Star break, so I don't know if this is maybe kind of a, feels good enough to play, let's just get him out there

because we feel better about Carroll than we do about the backup options, and we're trying to stay in the wild card hunt, but I'm glad he's playing, but I'm also kind of guarded in my expectations for what he's going to do given how quickly he came off that injury. Yeah and Jake McCarthy's chance just vanished into thin air again. I'm starting to get the feeling that his best chance is gonna come with a

different organization. That might be a guy that is a post-trade deadline winner. You could see Jake McCarthy ending up on a non contending team and getting a full run for two months and maybe actually being a difference maker in fantasy because he has several categories in which he can contribute. But yeah, that small fracture that Carol was dealing with in his wrist apparently is healed enough or healed up a little faster than we initially expected. You Darvish is coming back, you know? Does he fall into that top ranks category you were talking about before? I mean, it's interesting. He's coming back after throwing a 64 pitch simulated game

last week, Tuesday. So he's gonna go from simulated game right into a real lineup facing the Diamondbacks on Monday. I know, and he's got a two start this week. But how many pitches he got to pitch? How good has he looked? I can tell you that his stuff plus in the minors is 102.

For you Darvish, you made enough pitches in front of the machines to know that. The command was there. He's a tough one for me. I have him too high right now. He's going to move down. I think I'm going to have him in the 60s somewhere. I could see him slotting in around Merrill Kelly, wide Arsenal command. He's not the big stuff guy anymore and he

does give up homers. So, and we don't know about his length in the game. And then what we also don't know is will he finish the season healthy because we've had the starts and stops with him where he was rehabbing and then had to step up off of it. It could be totally possible he comes in, pitches that first game and he's like, nope, that wasn't good. Because there's something seemingly wrong that I don't know that we know all the details. You know what I mean?

Like we just hear he's like been stopped on rehab. That's not, you know, that's not good. And then they're just like, yeah, we're just trying to see what feels good. Maybe nothing feels good. Oh, and he's gonna come up and start in the big leagues and throw harder because now he's in the big leagues. And how's that gonna feel? Against a good lineup.

Even with Corbin Carroll banged up, it's still a really tough lineup to navigate. So yeah, for as excited as I'd ordinarily be about a you Darvish two-step, I am cautious with this one in particular. I don't think I have him anywhere this season. I didn't wait it out injury-wise with him. I got a fair amount of him in draft and hold

because he fell so far that I, and I was a little bit more conservative early on with my guys. It actually worked okay. Like, what happened in the meantime was all of my other guys got hurt. And I was just pitching everybody who was healthy. And basically, Hugh Darvish is replacing Clark Schmidt in a couple weeks. It's just like, okay.

Yeah, the disappointing thing we learned over the weekend is Clark Schmidt will likely have Tommy John surgery. And doing a little digging pre-show, I was reminded. He had Tommy John surgery back in 2017. He's had some other arm injuries in the time in between. So we may get a confirmation the next day or so that he will officially have that. But that was where things sat, I think as of Saturday when Aaron Boone was addressing the media.

That's too bad, because he said like early on, like, oh, just a little tightness. We're just going to check it out. day when Aaron Boone was addressing the media. The thing here is everyone's asking, oh do the Yankees have to get a starter now? And my gut feeling is not necessarily because they've got a really interesting prospect, Kam Schlitler, he could get the call this week against Seattle. I think Tuesday is the day they need to go ahead and make a decision. Eventually, Luis Heal and Ryan Yarbrough are both back after the All-Star break.

Eventually, it's not that far off. It says here, Heal may be ready to start a minor league rehab stint this week. Yeah, so next week's an All-Star week. Kind of stretch them out a couple of turns. Like end of the month, probably a possibility for Luis Heal. Cam has great numbers in the minors. It is a little bit of that kind of two or three good breaking balls,

not great fastballs, sinker package. Not super different than and then Clark Schmidt necessarily. But he has a 115 stuff plus and a 104 location plus in the miners so far on a decent amount of samples. So I've got Cam Schlitler right now at the very back end of the top 100, just an interesting name right next to somebody like Joey Cantillo, who seems to be the benefit of the Luis L. Ortiz investigation. Yeah. of the Luis Ortiz investigation. Yeah, and real quick, there's a little more information

about that. So there were two pitches that were flagged, Luis Ortiz did in different games. They were first pitches in and at bat that were bad misses. In an inning, too. Yeah, first pitches of the inning, which on a betting slate is actually available to think people bet on on outcome of individual pitches.

And there was there were amounts of wagered that were flagged by betting integrity firms on those pitches. So that's the detail that has been revealed since we first talked about that story. Don't really like where this is headed, but we'll wait and see what else MLB can turn up with that probe. The pitches themselves, you know, among all of his pitches were basically among the 10 worst pitches he threw in this season. So you could be and he doesn't have good command, so you could say, ah, there's nothing there. However, if you limit the sample to zero, zero pitches or pitches where he's ahead, they're the worst, like two pitches of the season for him. Because if you think about it, a zero-zero slider,

you're doing different things. You're not normally yanking like that. One of them, it looks like he just throws right into the ground. Now, that wouldn't be enough. You don't flag crazy pitches, because it's baseball, it happens all the time. If your feet slip, the ball slips out of your hand.

There's only a number of things that could cause you to do that, but it's the activity bet on those pitches compared with how bad they are that has raised the suspicion. The only thing that's a little bit icky is that, I mean, there's a lot of parts of this are icky, but one thing that is low key icky is that, I mean, basically the way those things are flagged is AI as judge in this case. AI, you know, they basically AI wash all the drafts and be like spot anything weird. So that is definitely something that is coming for all of us in terms of how we are evaluated

at work and how we are evaluated in the public, is AI is going to do judge us. And in related news, apparently the open AI, when it was told that it was going to get shut down, tried to copy itself to external servers, and then lied about it. So that's good. Well, that sounds like something that was made by people,

doesn't it? Yeah, that's great, really. These things in tandem are really good. Well, that sounds like something that was made by people, doesn't it? Yeah, that's great. Really? These things in cotton to tan them are really good. And also as much as, you know, I don't love prop bets because I think that's a real prop bets are like just a real way. First of all, I think that they end up being predatory a lot of times. And then second of all, we would even talking about on this show all this time

about the ball is different. You know, the strike zone is different, you know, and prop gets get disproportionately affected by a lot of those things, you know, because they're micro bets basically. And then on top of that, you're not really allowed to like bet $2 million on the first pitch of a thing.

So it couldn't have been somebody dropping a huge amount. What must have just, what must have happened is a bunch of people, like the betting activity across the board was up, you know, and so I don't know, this will be really interesting. The proof can't, nothing that has come so far out into the public can be considered proof.

I wanna say that. Nothing that we know can be considered proof. The proof, if something happens, will be communications between him and other people. There will be some they'll get his... they'll be looking at his phone, they'll be looking at his interactions, they'll be looking at his money. Did he get some sort of money put into one of his accounts weirdly? So that'll be the proof. What we just know from the outside is this is how this whole thing started.

It's a strange story and as everyone keeps saying and writing, it's not the last time we're gonna have a story like this. This is just part of sports now. We're seeing it beyond baseball. We've seen it with umpires. We've seen it with players. We've seen it with the interpreter. Prop We've seen it with players. We've seen it with interpreter props is where we saw it in basketball

John T Porter there was props about you know How many how many minutes he'd play and he mucked around by saying he was injured and took himself off the court? And how many three-pointers you take or something he took a bunch of wild-ass three-pointers That's the easiest way for a player to to Like, you know, that's the easiest way for a player to, to, and vetting and like to have a bad interaction that's bad for all of us. Right, and that might be the area where if there are going to be some restrictions and changes,

like that might be the first thing that they try and change to reduce the likelihood of things like this happening. We'll see where it goes from here. I'm curious for sure. Did you know that socks are one of the most requested clothing items by organizations addressing homelessness? It's true, and it's also why we started Bombas.

Every time you buy, well, anything from Bombas, an essential item is donated to someone facing homelessness. That's Bombas's one-purchased, one-donated promise. Bombas makes socks, underwear, slippers, slides, and t-shirts all designed to feel good and do good. Since we're new in Canada, all new customers enjoy 20% off your first purchase. Just visit bombas.ca. That's B-O-M-B-A-S dot C-A.

And use code MUSIC to start doing good and feeling even better. The Holt Renfrew beauty refresh offer starts soon. Enjoy up to 20% off select beauty and grooming so that you can shop brands you love and ones you've always wanted to try. July 10 to 13 in store and online. Terms and conditions apply. Don't miss it. Shop with Rakuten and you'll get it. What's it? It's the best deal, the highest cashback, the most savings on your shopping. So join Rakuten and start getting cash back at Uniqlo, So, other stuff though from the other section, K-U-T-E-N, Rakuten.ca. Some other stuff though from the other section. We have Colson Montgomery getting promoted. There was a time not that long ago where Colson Montgomery getting promoted by the White Sox might

have been the first topic on the rundown for this show. I did notice that after a little reset down in the the ACL, Colson Montgomery was playing better at AAA, albeit still with a lot of strikeouts. So his season looked like it maybe had been fixed in some ways, like mechanical adjustments, whatever it was that he was making. I'm curious, like, what type of player you think Colson Montgomery is going to be based on this sort of meandering path he has taken through the final level of the minor leagues in particular.

So the bat speed is good and not much else. Like he doesn't run well. You know, I think there were some questions about his defense from the beginning. They gave him a 30 slash 40 future fielding at Fangraphs. And obviously you mentioned the strikeouts and the swing strikes, but the swing strikes are not crazy. We've seen bigger numbers. He had 13s and 14s in terms of swinging strike rates close to Montgomery did.

And we've seen 16s and 17s and 18s from legitimate prospects. Right. So I actually think he'll fall into a bucket that's that oopsie is kind of pointing us towards oopsie is the one that has bad speed the most prominently within it. It says 220 average 300 OBP. I'm going to muck around with that slugging a little bit and give him a 400 slugging. That's not what he's projected for. Three's 378.

But you know, 220, 300, 300 400 if he can play third base for them that works if you can play second base for them if he can play better shortstop than my droth right now they're playing him at shortstop it'll be a weird combination of skills it is kind of like the three true outcome slugger at first base but at short yeah that is a pretty strange combination and I think the other complicating factor in Colson Montgomery's development first base, but at short. Yeah, that is a pretty strange combination. And I think the other complicating factor in Colson Montgomery's development

has been a lot of injuries, significant injuries that have cost him time at various levels along the way. You could spin that in a hopeful direction, too. Just be like, hey, maybe this is the first time he's actually going to play for a full season and actually start to make all the adjustments. And you start with good bat speed, it's not nothing. Yeah, you look down at AAA this year,

I mentioned the demotion to the complex, then coming back. It was an 83 WRC plus across both parts of the season put together, 11 homers in 55 games. That 33.9% K rate at AAA is weirdly high. He's shown elevated strikeout rates before, but even the jump we saw at the AAA level could be somewhat the result of ABS. There's just, it's a lot of different factors

that you have to account for. So I think he's more of a deep league fantasy player for now. I don't think there's anything guaranteed as far as immediate results, especially. I think Eric Long and Higgins right up over a fan graphs even points to a long adjustment period. Any player that strikes out that much a triple A is probably going to go through a lengthy adjustment period, and that likely means a low batting average, a low spot in the batting order until they start to figure it out.

But I don't know, it might be one of those guys where the shine is gone and there's still reasons to like him. That's kind of the vibe I have right now when I look at Colson, Montgomery. So I kind of want to see what happens after a month or so. Is he hitting the ball hard? Is he doing some of the things that we thought he would do a couple of years ago? Is he actually doing those things, even if the top line results aren't there? Seventy six and a half mile an hour bats.

We do a lot of bats be legit. It is legit. So I know that in my 12 team dynasty somebody tried to pick him up and I was like, that's the only prospect I've got it which is not a I don't have good prospects. I've been selling them pretty hard, but I was like they don't touch my one prospect. I was surprised.

This is a little bit of a call ahead to the way the money went, because obviously people were picking him up. He went for 50 something dollars in one of my leagues where I got Zach Gelof for 11. Similar kind of profile with Gelof. He's already at least kind of started down the path of having to make the adjustments at the big league level. But I think statistically, that's a good slash line sort of comp. I guess the main difference for me is I don't steals.

Yeah, I don't think Montgomery is more than like a 10 steals guy in the long run, like at like a higher end. And Galov could do a lot more in that category. But yeah, I do think the the lower average, maybe lower OVP sort of grind for a while. The Galov has been on, I think that's a path Montgomery might follow. Yeah, bad news for James and Tyon came up with a calf strain. These things don't seem like a big deal, but they can cost you three weeks or a month,

you know, just in terms of slowing it down, starting the rehab and getting back. And so for a player also like Tyon who may be borderline keep in most situations, borderline keeper, borderline on your roster, I think you just move on and try to find some value in the meantime. I don't think you want to nurse this one along. Although you know, Tyon is a respectable veteran pitcher with a nice arsenal who knows how to get out. So, I mean, it's it's he's I'm not he's not at all a bad pitcher. It's just the top end upside is not there anymore, really.

It's a tough hold, though, for the the timetable. It's just long enough where you might be better off dropping him and then trying to get him back later, as opposed to waiting it out in case this takes until the earlier middle of August for him to actually get back into that Cubs rotation. We might get a look at Chris Flexon as a starter. He's been really effective in a relief world

even though it's 17 strikeouts in 32 and two thirds innings but a.83 ERA and a.86 whip. I don't know how he's doing it. I am not gonna take part in that. No, I'm a little more interested in Jordan Wicks if they go that route. Oh, yes, that's why Wicks is up. And Wicks is a little bit interesting.

He pitched like two innings in his last outing. So I wonder if they're going to just sort of Wicks and flex them like sort of bullpen game ish Yeah, yeah, July 6th. So Sunday three and a third 41 pitches after yes. What was that game like that was? Boyd he just came on to save the bullpen, I guess Yeah, it was a blowout was 11 nothing. I would rather see Wicks in that role than Flex. I think I've seen enough Chris Flex in back ends of rotations to just know it's not going to work even though it's worked really well for him in the way they've used him on the panel.

I think Wicks has to make my top win 50 just in case he gets it. Yeah, I got to move him in somehow. Well, you got a lot of tough ranks on your plate right now and the one that's actually tough right now is probably Drew Rasmussen because we don't know what the actual plan is going to be with his workload right now. They're using him as an opener in front of Joe Boyle and they're going to do that for at least a couple more turns because they're trying to keep from overworking Rasmussen. He's had three major elbow surgeries, so it makes sense to not overload him.

And maybe the thought is, hey, if we can take some innings off his arm now and we're a playoff team, we can actually use him in the postseason, because there's probably a world in which Rasmussen is one of their three best starters if they're in October. Yeah, my math is that they've mentioned that 150 is kind of a hard cap for them for Drew Rasmussen. He's at 87 so obviously he couldn't just keep going what

he's doing. He would get past that 150 number. What I think you do is, I did this math on the Discord trying to explain, I think you get through all of July with another eight innings. So you basically do this two-start thing through July. What you're doing is you take the all-star break off, you get three or four starts where it's two innings like this. And then you're at around 90, your 90 something pitch is 95, then you have 30 ish, 25 to 30 innings of regular usage for two months. So I think you're thinking about nursing, you'd have to nurse him along until August. I think it's worth it. I think it's worth it. He's a really good pitcher. I would hang on. And you're still looking at like four and five inning starts probably a lot,

even after you get to that August window. You're not pushing him six and seven really ever. Right, so in quality start leagues, there are definitely leagues where he's just not a great option. But he can get wins in four and fives, I think. Maybe they switch it in terms of who's in front of whom at some point. But he's also just so good per inning

that in draft and holds, there are gonna be times where you just play him because he's got two starts, even yeah that they're if you you know in draft and holds They're gonna be times where you just play him because he's got two starts even yeah, it might be four or five innings But it'd be great, you know, and so I I think I think he's worth holding I've got him still in my top 25 but back the very back end so you get him back to the top 25 I get it because the skills are there but they but the shorter term outlook is just a little bit cloudy because of what they're trying to do in the best interest of trying to keep him healthy. Joe Boyle, though, has been picking up the opportunity in bulk and he's pitched really

well at AAA this year. A 10.6% walk rate from Joe Boyle at AAA, striking out nearly a third of the batters he's facing. That's everything you'd always hoped for from Joe Boyle at AAA, striking out nearly a third of the batters he's facing. That's everything you'd always hope for from Joe Boyle. And now if he's working in the bulk role, it's kind of like we talked about with Ben Kasparis a couple of weeks ago, this should work and actually be an optimized role for fantasy purposes where you have the high probability of being in the game long enough to get a win. Ratios end up being good because you're not getting overexposed to the lineup a third

time and he doesn't have to face the meat of the order three times. Exactly. Yeah, I've got Joe Boyle firmly in my top 100. Right now he's in mid 80s. I've got him ahead of kind of the boring veterans like Jose Barrios. And right now I have him behind some of the injury turners. Maybe that'll change. Luis Heal, Grayson Rodriguez,

just sort of right ahead of him. It's funny because it's just the shape of the season, right? I'd rather have Luis Heal and Grayson Rodriguez for the rest of the season because I actually do think they'll have more innings. But for the next three weeks, I'd probably rather have Joe Boyle. Yeah, I mean, you got to play. You got to play what's in front of you. If you're desperate for the innings, especially, you're probably ranking Boyle ahead of those guys. You know, if you already

have injuries on your roster, you can't stash more than what you already have. But interesting usage from the Rays, not surprised to see things playing out that way. The Nationals making big changes, Mike Rizzo and Davy Martinez out. Rizzo was heading up baseball operations for what, 17 years? I mean, one of the longest tenured executives in the game. So surprising to see both let go simultaneously. I mean, Davy Martinez was their manager when they won the World Series in 2019. We talked about how much they have struggled since that World Series being second in losses to only the Rockies during that span

I mean, it's been a brutal rebuild even though so many things it went right with the Juan Soto trade in particular So it's Mike D Bartolo taking over as the interim GM with the Nats having the first pick in the draft, which begins on Sunday. So it's not like they brought in someone from the outside. You really couldn't do that with the draft within a week. Plus, they've prepped it. Their board is ready. Yeah, like they they have been at one. They know what they want to do already. And their plans with the picks around that are also probably in place anyway.

You think about all of this though, and the question I come to is, is leading the nationals baseball operations a good job in the scope of similar jobs in baseball? They're all good jobs in the sense we'd all love to run a baseball team. It's a high paying job where you run a baseball team. It's not a bad job. It's a baseball team. It's a high paying job where you run a baseball team. It's not a bad job, it's a great job. But thinking about it in the context of the NL East, the spending and how different that is now

versus when they were competitive. And even thinking about how when the Nationals peaked, it followed back to back one-one picks of Strasburg and Harper that were more of the consensus no brainer variety. Any team in that spot would have taken those players with those picks and then hitting on Anthony Rendon in the early first rounder and getting early career very good results from Rendon too.

Like a lot of things kind of fell into place all at once. If you don't have ownership willing to spend, you know, top 10 the way they did seven out of eight seasons from 2014 to 2021, how are you going to be consistently competitive in a division that features Steve Cohen, who will seemingly go to the upper bounds of baseball spending to build a competitive team? You have the Phillies ownership group clearly spending in a win now phase right now and maybe unlikely to go through lengthy rebuilds. And of course you have Atlanta,

generally well run organization that has a strong core, even though they're in the midst of a down year. How tough is this job, I guess, is the better way to say it? I'm gonna flip the script a little bit though and point to those years where they did have good spending and say it's in there, right? That you know, this is the team that if they were performing better this year Rizzo could have maybe even kept his job and signed a big free agent, you know, just how things have worked out I would say that there are some really low-hanging pieces of fruit that that they're the Nationals aren't doing that

Most teams are doing that you could come in and probably implement and maybe see some small improvements right away. It's definitely, it's got to be an easier job than running the Pirates, right? I think you'll have more resources than you will there. And then if you look at a place like Anaheim, where you get big league payroll, but you don't get organizational cohesiveness, you have a very hands-on owner, it's probably better than that situation as it's currently built. Plus you have some good young players, like you don't want James Wood and CJ Abrams. You're showing up with a roster that's not a full rebuild the way, like what Peter Bendix and the Marlins are doing.

And that's not to say, like, I mean, Kim Aang had a good roster that got to the postseason. Like that was, it was not a hopeless organization there either. It's not the White Sox situation that Chris Goetz ended up getting promoted into. And he helped build that, of course, as their scouting director. Seems like he has a bit of a meddling owner, plus some real deeply entrenched institutional kind of retrograde thinking that he has to kind of uproot. There is some of that in Washington, I believe, but I think they've been shipping away at it over time. And I think that another thing is, and this is maybe just an opinion of mine,

but I think there's some backing to it. I think it's easier to turn a pitching program around than a hitting program. I just think it's easier because if you think about how pitching is being developed these days, the benchmarks for success in terms of development, the sort of developmental things that we, hoops that we go through,

the things that we do across baseball, they're more established, you know? Like everybody has a stuff plus and everybody looks at pitch movements and looks at seam shifted wake and says, oh, can we get more movement out of this pitch doing this? Or like, it can't be that hard. What you're saying is we're not up to speed in pitching where everybody's up to speed to a certain degree. to speed in pitching where everybody's up to speed to a certain degree. And there's lots of extra coaches that you can hire. There's great, there's pretty good pitching coaches and this program needs help. And so you can come in and be like, okay, I'm going to really pay attention to pitching because we've got some good hitting in place.

And I think you could, I think you could do things. I think you could make change in this organization pretty quickly. I did want to address something like I do think that the person that comes in is going to have to make some change. It's going to have to change personnel. Maybe in the past, I've been a little bit gung-ho about that. We talk about turning the tanker know, you have to fire people. Maybe I maybe I express that in too gung ho a manner and I and I understand these people, everybody in these organizations knows there are people first of all, and they know a lot

about baseball. But I also just feel like if you're the GM in that seat, and you want to make the team in your image, like it's something you got to make the team in your image, like that's something you gotta do. So I do think that somebody would have to come in and kind of give it a year to figure out, you know, who thinks about baseball the same way that they do.

But that'll be part of the process in Washington as well, because when you hear these things like they're the only one that doesn't have a trajectory system, you know, you're just like, okay, so they don't necessarily value the things that most organizations value right now. Right, and I mean, we talk about the Rockies all the time in that light too, it's like, they're just behind and it seems like a miserable combination

of you're far behind, you have some longer term folks who are just not on board with modernizing the approach. I don't want to dismiss that there's a lot of value in different approaches to the game. I think what you need is you need a willingness to learn, but you also need people who can buy into the bigger vision. I can still imagine you have people that don't necessarily agree with every aspect of a modern organization who could still be very helpful to you if they were respectful of the idea

of doing things differently, right? I'm with you. It's not just, hey, let's just fire a bunch of people. It does matter. These are humans. These are people whose livelihoods are built in the game and maybe it's their last opportunity. You know, being old school and having a growth mindset, you know, to some extent, you know, Brent Strom was kind of an old school pitching coach, but he really partnered well with the

Astros who were super progressive forward thinking data based thing because he was like, yeah, teach me, tell me more. I want to learn more. So you know, that kind of person needs to stay. So I'm not just saying everybody who has old school thinking, you're gone, you know, it's like old school thinking, but a growth mindset that is super helpful. You want that on your team because they will have a mental Rolodex of all sorts of different situations.

You know, they'll have they're probably pretty good at like interacting with people because they're they're an old school baseball person. Everybody in baseball like knows that sort of that sort of vibe. And then if they are willing to learn, then you can bring some new information to them and maybe that'll make them even better coaches. Yeah. So I'm curious to see what direction they go and I brought it up in the framing of hey is this a good job because I was trying to hone in on what type of interest there

might be. I just remember thinking about like the Orioles maybe 10, 12 years ago they had their head of baseball ops position whatever they were calling it GM at the time and there were people that were just turning it down before even talking about it. That's right. Like not interested, don't want it. And it's like, okay, that's not good for your organization. That's similar factors, willingness to spend

and maybe divisional factors. It's kind of similar. Right, but I think there are some things to like here. Like very similar, same market. There is a little bit of a Baltimore versus Washington thing that I don't want to speak out of turn because I don't know every piece of detail. This is like an Evandrelic thing.

But you know, the whole arguing about, and maybe Britt has more to say about this too, but the whole arguing about the local TV contract and they had the shared contract and all that, they are locked in battle. They're competing for some of the same seats, people, butts in seats, I think. And maybe, hey, look, maybe the relative expectations of ownership because of all the factors of the Mets, the Phillies, the Braves, maybe they're slightly lower.

I'm not saying that is necessarily making the job easy because beating those teams will still be difficult, but maybe you're not going in there and getting fired in three years if you don't advance to the NLCS. Yeah. But what sucks a little bit is that this is in the sort of this would be the part where the rebuild is coming together. So if you were taking it over as a GM, you're like, how many years are you actually

giving me? Because I don't really want to start a rebuild over. Like, you don't want to take over this team and trade Mackenzie Gore and tear it down to the nuts and start over. Because it seems to be a team that's more coalescing. So this is the kind of thing where they want some pretty immediate results. So that's a little bit part of the stress too. This isn't like, you know it's going to be deep rebuild,

it's going to be hard. No, they're like, we want you to, this wants to be competitive in the next two years. Yeah, so that I think that will change their pool of applicants if they're not gonna keep Dibertolo in as their interim. They're not gonna remove the interim tag from him, then they're gonna choose someone

that's probably won before. I wonder the ideal hire, at least based on what I know, and the success guys have had, people have had at different organizations, would be someone like James Click. Like James Click just got pushed out in Houston. I don't know, I think like a Dave Dombrowski might be all right.

A Dombrowski could work there too. Somebody who's like take two over the fishing line. You know, he's like, okay, you got some good pieces. I think Rizzo's liking Dombrowski and his approach. I think it's a very like trade the prospects, you know, build around veteran core, like sign spending free agency. Like I felt like the Rizzo strengths were more

on that Dombrowski part of the plot. So I think you might need someone who's a little bit more modern to pull it all together. The Discord is talking about whether, how much of the sort of good scout flowers should Mike Rizzo get. And I don't know, I think just pulling off that Soto trade and basically nailing almost every single, like the only one he'd missed on was Hassle, you know? That gets you a lot of credit. You know to say that like oh well his lot of hits have been like one like top of draft one ones are you know first round picks is.

It's not always easy to to nail those either so I do think that if he had more of an analytics forward a GM that was in charge of player development. That maybe he could be having slightly better outcomes with the houses and ten years and you knowyle's and we'll see some of those who might still work out. But, you know, those are the types where player development might be able to get them that half grade that turns them from a fourth outfielder into a third outfielder, you know, that sort of thing. There may be some evidence that they're not great at that, but I'd look at this lineup and say, give me this team. I want it.

You know what I did? Like I would take this job. I would take this job because I'm like, give me this team. I want it. You know what I'd like? I would take this job. I would take this job because I'm like, I like that lineup. I don't think it's hopeless at all. Give me some money to buy some pitchers. You know, like, if we could change the pitching program a little bit. What's our budget? What can I do to spend? Can I get the trajectory machine here like yesterday?

Can I sign Dylan Seese next year? Because I would. I mean, and I think expanded playoffs are great if you're taking this job because you feel like you actually have a good chance. The divisional stuff can kind of can kind of be a wash sometimes. If it doesn't matter, you don't have to win the division to win at all, you know. We'll see where they go from here. Interesting times, though, in D.C. Let's take a look at this mailbag question here.

This one came in from Lou and it's a question about the relationship between team quality and save opportunities. And at the time it was asked, I thought, yeah, I think I've seen a little blurb at the beginning of the forecaster for sure about that. I was trying to find some stuff that Greg Jewett wrote at one point, and maybe I'm just

misremembering what I've read. It's possible. My brain's a little fried, a little soggy. Lou's question was, has anyone ever seen research on projecting team save opportunities? I feel like there is some sort of sweet spot where the team has a strong starting rotation and an average offense. If the offense is too good, there are too many blowouts and what I remembered vaguely was that it's still generally good if you are targeting closers on a better team

and that is exactly what the forecaster said. Patrick Davitt has an essay in this year's forecaster I think it's been in some previous years once too and it says more wins leads to more saves is generally correct over five studied seasons the percentage of wins that were saved was about 50% and half of all team seasons fell in the 48 to 56% range as far as the percentage of wins that were saved. Many outliers though, looking at the team individual seasons

because higher win teams do get more blowout wins. 73% close games wins by three runs or less for poor teams compared to 56% of teams, better ones. So, but the gap still like because of those other, because those teams that have more blocks win more, they still end up getting you more saves typically. What's better than a well marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue? A well marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue that was carefully selected by an Instacart shopper and delivered to your door.

A well marbled ribeye you ordered without even leaving the kiddie pool. Whatever groceries your summer calls for, Instacart has you covered. Download the Instacart app and enjoy zero dollar delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions, and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. The Holt Renfrew beauty refresh offer starts soon. Enjoy up to 20% off select beauty and grooming so that you can shop brands you love

and ones you've always wanted to try. July 10 to 13, in-store and online. Terms and conditions apply. Don't miss it. What matters most to you? Is it unforgettable adventures? Connections with lifelong friends? Peaceful moments of reflection?

Feelings of joy and freedom you can't wait to experience again and again? Or is it the vehicles that help you make all those special moments possible? Whatever your answer is, Toyota is here to bring you closer to the things that matter to you, because they matter to us too.

Toyota, for what matters most. You touched on a little bit of like, that analysis is great because it's a sort of a top level like team is good. But you also sort of alluded to the fact that there are different ways to be good and there are like different structures to goodness. And one, I don't have the study in front of me, but I do remember that this one study said that team bullpen strength was meaningful in predicting saves. You have to have someone hand it to you. That was where I thought maybe some of the noise comes in

from the range. Okay, some of those teams are elite offensive teams that maybe do win even more, a larger percentage of those games by blowout. That could be one differentiating factor, but you're right. You need everything in that bridge to still be consistently good to save games.

Like think about Boston, you know, as a team, Boston is 46 and 45. So you think, oh, well, they're just, you know, they're an even team. And yet if you think about it, Chapman with 15 saves is a is a huge win For anybody who invested in him and also it also makes sense to say well Boston may be a 500 team overall But they had the fourth best bullpen in the big leagues So you have you have some of that then I guess as a foil to that Texas by war by pit Fang grass pitching war is the seventh best bullpen and they have not produced a single closer. So there is this relationship between the quality of the single pitcher you have and

the bullpen around them. A good team that maybe has struggled to give their closer more wins or more saves, you know, because of the overall quality of the bullpen might be the angels who have the worst bullpen in the big leagues and yet Kenley Jansen still has 15 saves. So I think that right there kind of gives you this like feeling that I tend to focus on the individual quality of the reliever in question because I think a lot of those things can go out the door. And like, what will be the difference in the end between Kenley Jantz and Aroldis Chapman? Maybe five saves?

And the cost difference was pretty big. So you have all these different factors where you're like, what is this pitcher, the reliever gonna cost me? And what do I think? How much should I think about all the team factors around them? I prefer to say, is this clearly the best pitcher in this bullpen?

And it maybe, and is this bullpen okay? But I don't actually think about that much. I don't think about team factors that much when I draft relievers, other than to say, is this clearly the best reliever in this bullpen? Yeah, I think the only consistent thing I've been doing is just lopping off the absolute horrendous teams at the bottom.

I'm much less interested in Rocky's relievers and White Sox relievers. Even Grant Taylor's a really interesting pitcher to me, but that team is so bad that you might be waiting forever for those opportunities. And that's kind of where I'm like, team quality's so low low not worth the squeeze. You know sometimes you can just you can wait wait it out and not invest on the front end and be like

Oh, I'll take Ronnie Rodriguez now, you know for not too much money But I'd rather stay out of the especially in draft and hold season and before you know anything Like I drafted a bunch of Anthony vendors and it's like, okay, congratulations. You got the setup guy on the Miami Marlins. Good job. Yeah, and there were some other interesting essays in the beginning of the forecaster, you know, looking at just like number of saves the previous year

and like stickiness to the job the following year. And there are other factors like that. You'll see some patterns that develop. And I think the Marlins to me would be one of those teams where they just did not have a guy going into the year. That makes it extremely difficult. That's an easy way to avoid it. Yeah.

Yeah, because you could take three different shots and be wrong. It could be the fourth option in a situation like that. The hierarchy is just not established in terms of like how they're going to anoint a closer. So it's a lot more random, even if it's not necessarily a committee. They just don't know yet. They're still trying to identify the high leverage relievers they like the most. And then eventually you get to this point in the year and maybe like by this point, I might be more

inclined to pick up a reliever on a team like the Marlins because they might settle on someone now and sort of audition them over two or three months. You have some in-season tools where you're like, okay, I can see his stuff. I can see his VELO. I can see the usage patterns. In February, you're like, what's the usage patterns? Don't got any. So Ronnie Rodriguez was part of where the money went this weekend. I saw some $50 numbers on him. That's 50 out of 1000 where he was available. I didn't need him and where I needed him, he wasn't available. So I went with a $2 Randy Rodriguez by where, you know, I wish I'd wish Ronnie Rodriguez had been available to me in that week.

Yeah, I went. I went Jordan Hicks, where I was looking for saves on the relative cheap a few places. I did spend a little more in the listener league in which I am in 15th place out of 15. Good job. Really, really well constructed team. I was in like top three for so long and I'm bottom of the fold right now. There's two things that went wrong. One, I didn't lean enough into adjusting my plan for the format because Jeff Good,

Low Guppy cooked up a different kind of Roto format with more categories and I thought I can gut feel my way through this one. Nope, didn't do that really well. And then the actual players I took, just almost all underperformers. I mean, I missed on a whole bunch of players in that team. So I have a woefully bad team in that league. Early in the year, I was underbidding in fab, getting beat on nearly everyone.

I wasn't making long enough bid trees. I've just played that league as poorly as you can play a league. It's unreal. Well, one thing that was really tough in that league is strikeouts by the batter is a category, I have tough in that league is strikeouts by the batter is a category. I have another league like this. Strikeouts by the batter is a category and power is still a category. X-Bray hits. And those things are co-related, like negatively co-correlated.

So it's really kind of hard to build a good offense that has power and doesn't strike out. I've kind of nailed it in the other league where I've done it. But I've also it's a keeper league where I get to start with show Hottani every year. So it's like there's a bit of a cheat code there. This league, I tried to cut the strikeouts and at the beginning of the season, I got power and didn't have strikeouts. And now I have no power.

I thought I could punt multiple categories in my initial build. That doesn't work. Like never, never do that in your initial build. That's an in season tactical adjustment because things went wrong. It's not a starting point because you build a team like that and then stuff goes wrong and you have nothing. And that's exactly what I've turned into. My team does nothing well and it's my own fault.

The interest in Hicks for me, and there were people in the main event that picked him up, I think in 31 leagues, only a range of one to $31, so a very inexpensive ad. I think there's a good chance the Red Sox could flip a role to Chapman. The long-term interest, especially in Hicks, if you're in a keeper or dynasty league and he's available, I think he's a smart pickup because he's on contract

for a couple more years. He's probably not a starter anymore. We always liked the stuff from him as a high leverage reliever. So there's little reason to think that if Chapman gets traded or if Chapman just leaves at the end of the season, that Hicks isn't the favorite to just be the guy

in the ninth inning for the Red Sox. Yeah, my reasoning for Randy Rodriguez is just Deval's fastball is under 100 stuff plus. He's throwing more sliders than fastballs and he looks shaky. Like, I don't know. I've, I've seen enough of him out here on the West coast that Randy Rodriguez makes the all-star game over his closer kind of gets, you know, kind of, kind of tells you something, doesn't it?

And the team, the team comments are all just like, Oh, yeah, we love Randy. Randy's the best. Like, oh, so I'm just reading between the lines and hoping to be a couple of weeks ahead. I dropped Luke Weaver on the other end of that. I think it might be time. I don't know when they're just struggling like that. And this is where the team stuff comes in, right?

And Devin Williams exists. It's funny though, that for as bad as it's been recently for Luke Weaver, it still looks a lot on paper like last season. It's a 319 ERA instead of a 289. It's a 0.90 whip instead of a 0.93. Lighter workload. I think he, did he have an IL stint this year?

I think Luke Weaver may have missed some time. Or they're just wisely not using him as heavily. I thought he had an IL stint this year. I think Luke Weaver may have missed some time or they're just wisely not using him as heavily. I thought he had an IL stint though too. All that's to say like yeah you have a guy that you traded for that has shown better skills historically and probably makes more sense. So I understand they had the decision to to cut Weaver despite the worst ratios from Williams of the two overall so far this season. A bunch of guys came back from the IL. I was going to the online championship in particular.

Tyler O'Neill got scooped up. Tyler O'Neill got a lot of money, yeah. Yeah, and actually like for 12 team leagues it wasn't that bad. The range was one to 51. Actually ended up being a little lighter than I expected. I actually thought so. The projections are starting to move

the wrong direction on him. I noticed this in Rasball where like I was to put him at the top of a bat tree that I had and I looked at the Razzball weekly projections and for this coming week, Tyler O'Neil was like a 250. And I was like, wow, that is really low. And I don't know if it's like a matchup thing or if it's just, or they're dinging him plate appearances or something. But I was just like, uh, okay, I'll go somewhere else with this this week. So but,

you know, I saw some tens and elevens and maybe a 30 on him. So thirty one. Yeah. And main event. That's OK. I mean, I'm hoping that he helps power my my League the team that were that we were just talking about the the listeners league I need I need him to come back and hopefully he's he's he's healthy I went with a couple of two starters Brandon Young and Aaron Savali, so pray for me you went Brandon Young why yes Explain yourself starts. He's got two starts. He's got two starts and he cost me a dollar. That's about it.

But this is also the thinking that got me, Hammerson Hancock last week. And guess what? I didn't even get the two starts because he was so bad in the first start that they just turf the second start. So yes, let's hope they don't do that to me. Brandon Young at home against the Mets and home against the Marlins right before the break I mean Marlins are a little plucky I think you're attempting fate Young's got a wide arsenal with good command it's not terrible I don't know like I said pray for me that's what terrible. I don't know. Like I said, pray for me. That's what I said.

I got Andre Pellante for the same idea. So, yeah, I saw some Pellante, Eric Lauer getting picked up in some 12s. Lauer, I think I'm a little more on board with the more I look. I think he's getting a little underrated right now. I don't know if he's 10 team league stick on your roster. Good. But 25 percent K

rate so far this year to 364 Sierra. So yeah, a 265 ERA is you bank that if you've been using them and you're getting lucky. But if he pitches to a high 3s ERA on that team, he'll probably get some wins. That's actually good enough to at least be- Why aren't we burying the lead? Back at the top 75? The number one pitching pick up this weekend Barry and I'm a she in dude well yeah I'm a she in he got some real money yeah

what would you what did you see on she and I thought I think I saw a $200 bid on him there were some leagues where he was available but I didn't I didn't see him available at most of my legs he was already stashed from last week yeah people were ahead on that one let Let me see where it is. This must be my TG. They had a cost if you waited, though, like 200. Like I get it. But 108 to my 46 runner up in TGFBI. But I didn't want to go.

I was like with 46, I was like very obviously just decided not to go to 100. Right. I was like, I'm not going to 100 on this. And here's why. So here are, this is Emmett Sheehan, like there's no minimums here. This is supposed to be starting pitchers. I guess Devensky and Brad Keller were openers. That's why they're on here.

But this is just sorted by the change up stuff plus. And yes, Emmett Sheehan, lovely, loves you change up at the top. But then you start to look at the other pitches and you're like, oh, this is, this is like a Michael Wacha situation. That's the closest comp I've got. Tobias Myers with more Velo, those are not super helpful comps.

I think there's also the workload questions. They're going to get guys back. Tyler Glass now should pitch at least once before the All-Star break based on what they're saying right now. So there's one more guy back in the equation. She ends lined up to go, I think, the last game before the break at San Francisco. So it could turn into a stream and then who knows? But they do like to use six starters.

So there might be a window here for a couple more weeks until they get a few more guys back into the equation. But I think that would be the other thing kind of keeping that bid number closer to where you had it. I don't think I would have gone to three figures, especially at this point in the season. Yeah, I would hate to pay $100 for one start against the Giants. And, oh, look, everyone's healthy. We got two guys healthy after the All-Star break. And, you know, sorry. There you go, Emmett. Back down to the miners.

Anything else of interest, though, for you go, Emmett. Back down to the miners. Anything else of interest though for you from the weekend? No, I'm hoping that that Gelof for seven bucks was smart. I also did a little bit of buying and we've talked about this enough, but I bought Luis Heal for a buck. Whenever you have a dropper and you don't have an immediate need, I think that that's when you go and you just go through the IEL guys and you just pick one of them and you put a dollar on them. What ends up happening a lot is that you end up having to drop them when you have a need. So I think in one of my leagues I've already spent like four dollars on

Grayson Rodriguez like picking him up and dropping him, picking him up because it's like, oh no, I need to start it this week, gotta drop them again. So at some point, hopefully they'll just make it to health on my roster. But yeah, I spent two one dollar bids on Luis Heal and Grayson Rodriguez in different leagues this weekend. And you know, whenever you feel like you're doing well, that's I think something you can do to push the push the gas pedal down a little bit further. Yeah. So 25 pitches in a bullpen session on Friday is the most recent update on Grayson Rodriguez. So we ought to be getting close to some kind of rehab assignment. And that's going to be a lengthy process, I think, for Rodriguez, probably three or four starts, given how long he's been down.

But maybe August. Like, that's a possibility. I have a little Bieber heel and Grayson Rodriguez grouping. I put Bryce Miller down in there for now Bryce Miller might be closer to getting back, but he also has had worse results on the field there's this like weird combination where you're like how good are they and you know that made you Darvish a little bit of a tough rank, you know because The projections are only okay, you know, but he's closer than a lot of the other guys. Yeah. So I just ended up taking all the injured guys and like putting them in groups. I don't know what to do. Like, please on the discord, help me make these

rankings better because what I end up doing is just having like two or three pockets of injured guys to being like, this is roughly, but injuries in every league have different settings and you have different IL settings, you have different ways to deal with them. And I know Nick Pollack just takes them off. Should I just take all the guys who are currently injured and not pitching and make a second ranking?

Where it's like, here's a ranking of the injured pitchers. I don't know if even ranking them against each other is necessarily the move. What if you what if you had them separate? But well, what if you indicated where they'd be ranked if they were completely healthy? Like maybe that's more helpful. Like how valuable Tyler Glass now, Tyler Glass knows completely healthy. And you have that ranking in May versus June. Your rankings probably going gonna be pretty consistent

You're gonna say well when he comes back. I think he's a top 25 starter and If you just have that you're at least comparing because I think what you're doing is you're comparing potential stashes in a lot of instances and You have a limited number of stashes, but you just want to know like am I stashing the best possible? Guy and then if you have an indicator of when they're expected back, then you can decide, I'm looking for the best guy who's going to be backed by this date. And then they can choose based on their format.

And that might be about as well as you can do with a list. And then you're not jamming guys that are three or four weeks away from returning up on the list in places where you're like, I wouldn't take this right now. Where do I put Spencer Schwellenbach? Yeah. Some people are cutting him because, you know, like what are you gonna do? You don't have enough IL spots

or maybe you have no IL spots. Like that's a tough call you have to make. Okay, I'm gonna suggest something and on the Discord you guys can tell me if this is good. I take them out, I put next to them maybe a fully healthy rank and a possible return date and Then I tier them and I tier them in don't drop Until you have to don't drop unless you have to sure start time to stash and

Probably drop. Yeah, like wait if you wait drop if you have to yeah like something like that Then they can move around in those based on when they, like if their return date is getting closer, then it's like time to stash. You know, they move from, you know, weight or drop if you have to, to time to stash. That's where Grayson Rodriguez and Luis Heal are for me right now.

They're moving into time to stash. So I could have like three or four tiers. Then I could take those out and then I could actually have a ranking of 150 healthy starting pitchers and so people could be looking at actual options, I guess. Right, because you probably have some loose rules where you say, I'm usually not waiting more than three weeks if I don't have IL spots.

And like the exception would be if we're talking about top five or a top 10 pitcher, maybe I would still wait it out in that instance. Right now in my rankings, I or a top 10 pitcher, maybe I would still wait it out in that instance. But then- Right now in my rankings, I have a grouping around 55, which is these guys are so good that you have to hold them. Shane McClanahan, Michael King, Blake Snell, Chris Selle, Cole Regans.

You gotta hold these guys. I've actually, doing what I said I would do in the rankings. So if you go to 50, you're like, oh, this is the too good to drop group of injured players. You know, but if I just make it more obvious that these injured players are sort of over here and another ranking, I think that might I think that might serve them well. That might be the best you can do given the constraints of how lists work. But yeah, feedback in the Discord, always welcome. Be sure to drop us a note there.

You can join the Discord if you haven't done so already with a link in the show description. We need to go. Eno's got a pack for his trip, so a lot of a lot of ground to cover for Eno outside of the pod. Got a full run of episodes this week. We'll have a slightly shorter cadence next week, taking a couple days off, I think, at the beginning of the week and then Wednesday, Thursday, Friday, I pod next week.

So we'll still have a lot here while Eno is away. Thanks to our producer, Brian Smith, putting this episode together. That's going to do it for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We're back with you on Tuesday. Thanks for listening. always wanted to try. July 10 to 13 in-store and online. Terms and conditions apply. Don't miss it. What's better than a well-marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue? A well-marbled ribeye sizzling on the barbecue that was carefully selected by an Instacart shopper and delivered to your door. A well-marbled ribeye you ordered without even leaving the kiddie pool. Whatever

groceries your summer calls for, Instacart has you covered. Download the Instacart app and enjoy $0 delivery fees on your first three orders. Service fees, exclusions, and terms apply. Instacart, groceries that over-deliver. Shop with Rakuten and you'll get it. What's it? It's the best deal, the highest cash back, the most savings on your shopping.

So join Rakuten and start getting cash back at Uniqlo, Best Buy, Expedia, and other stores you love. You can even stack sales on top of cash back. Just start your shopping with Rakuten to save money at over 750 stores. Join for free at rakuten.ca or download the Rakuten app. That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N. Rakuten.ca