Rates & Barrels - Dynasty Hitter Stock Watch

Episode Date: April 29, 2025

Chris Welsh joins and Eno and DVR to discuss several long-term risers and fallers as the first month of the season winds down. Is an uptick in production just around the corner for Jordan Walker as he continues to show elite bat speed? Is this the last chance to make a deal for Dylan Crews and Jordan Lawlar before everything clicks? Should you lower the ceiling expectations for Anthony Volpe? And, has Victor Scott shown enough to have an extended window as the Cardinals' primary center fielder? Rundown1:40 Can Jordan Walker Turn Elite Bat Speed Into More Production?10:26 Is Dylan Crews Ready to Click?16:59 Will Luis García Jr. Rebound Toward His 2024 Levels?22:59 Making Sense of Kyren Paris' Uneven Start32:39 Why Isn't Colt Keith Hitting (Yet)?40:42 Will Jordan Lawlar Break Through in Arizona This Season?48:17 Dialing Back on Anthony Volpe's Ceiling?53:16 Victor Scott's Step Forward57:27 Better Long-Term Outlook: Scott v. Chandler Simpson Follow Eno on Bluesky: @enosarris.bsky.socialFollow DVR on Bluesky: @dvr.bsky.socialFollow Welsh on Bluesky: @isitthewelsh.bsky.social e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno Sarris With: Chris Welsh Producer: Brian Smith Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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The all-new, all-electric Can-Am Origin motorcycle takes you everywhere. Sleek power for the streets and deep adventure routes for the trails. Discover your origin today. Learn more at CanAmMotorcycles.com. Welcome to Rates and Barrels, it's Tuesday, April 29th. Derek and Robert Inosaris and our old friend is back. Chris Welsh. Is it the Welsh? Yes, it is the Welsh.

Welsh is here. Welsh, how you doing, man? I'm doing great. I'm so happy to be here. I miss these faces so much. I miss that open. I miss talking baseball with you guys. But we can, I can hear you at any time I want on the podcast feed, but I'm glad to be here with both of you. We can hear you as well. You're on the Fantasy Pros Pods.

They've got Prospect One in this league. You're all over the place, man. Like, it's still, still great. Still too place, man. Like, it's still great. Still too much of me. That's the big key here. Still too much. And you do a lot. You were just telling about your weekend. You had the Little League weekend that Eno usually has in the dance world. So I can empathize, man. It's a lot to keep it all in the air.

But today, the focus of our episode is a Dynasty Stock Watch. We want to check in a month into the season, talk about some players that are moving up, players that are falling in rankings, try to find some buy low opportunities and even if you're not playing Keeper in dynasty right now these are probably engaging conversations to listen to anyway because we're talking about players that are overperforming and underperforming and that is always a good time. Be sure to join the Discord using the link in the show description.

If you haven't done that already, you can drop us some mailbag questions for a future episode. I think we should start today with some buy low hitters, or at least some potential buy low hitters. Jordan Walker was the subject of a post in our Discord a day or so ago, and this came from Nova. Jordan Walker

totally got to come around eventually even if it's not this year right. We're so post hype on him but he's still only 22 and he has 99 percentile bat speed so that's always been there with Jordan Walker right. The raw power potential kind of at the top end of what we're looking for. We talked about the EV 50 a couple years ago when he debuted being among the league leaders There's a lot to look at and say okay It's going to work eventually now to begin this season guys 26 games in it's a 208 269 281 line two homers two steals

But better defense at least which might matter in the long run as Jordan Walker continues to jockey for his position on the Cardinals depth chart so you know would you like to make the case for Jordan Walker as an actual by low bat right now on the heels of a pretty quiet start at the plate for the cards? I'm losing faith no that's not the answer I was looking for I'm losing faith. No, that's not the answer I was looking for. I'm losing faith. And the thing that I'm worried about is Bat Path. What we're seeing now is we have a 747 plate appearance. And maybe more importantly than the plate appearances,

we have 500 batted ball events. And what we've got is a launch angle that changes a little bit. The barrel rate does, has never been gotten to plus and the maxi V has been elite and so what I see is a guy who has elite bat speed, but maybe a really poor bat path and it reminds me a little bit too much of Cabrion Hayes. Oh goodness, you went all the way to the Cabrion Hayes level of disappointing us. How long have we waited for Cabrion Hayes

to tap into the raw power that he's got? I just, I don't see it from Walker. When he pulls the ball as he did in 2024, and maybe gets the ball out in front, he's got the good barrel rate, but the bad strikeout rate, there's maybe he can Frankenstein two or three different approaches he's had into one. And so there's maybe a little bit of potential, but I would only ask for Jordan Walker as the third piece in a deal. I would not be going out and

pounding the table and trying to acquire him for my dynasty team. Well, that's not at all what I expected. Welsh, do you have a more optimistic long-term outlook for Jordan Walker? A little bit. I kind of agree that I don't think he should be like the centerpiece of some bigger deal or whatever. If you can get him thrown in, I really like that. Or if you're interested in deeper league and a super by low. He was a big bounce back guy for me this year, because like, you know, said the thing that stands out, unfortunately, in a very

Ke'Brien Hayes type of way is it's like, you know, it was almost 10% barrel last year, hard hit looked like it could be on the rise, big EV numbers, like all of that looks really solid. But the big thing in this offseason, we, and there's been a lot about many players working with like Aaron Judge's hitting coach and trying to change, was he specifically went in working on shortening his swing path. He wanted to be able to get the bat to the zone so he could make better contact and he reworked his swing. And you actually see that if you're on baseball savant and you look at the batting the batting stance data you can see that he closed in his stance he had a 42 degree open stance last year and it's down to 19 so he really closed in his stance and also it looks like the Aaron judge coach has been telling and just seems to be a thing is guys are moving back in the box a little bit more the downside

he's not growing as a hitter right now. His barrel percentage looks a lot worse this year. He's still striking out, like so we don't have something to pull from. And he's very heavy fastball hitter. I mean, if you look at the pitch types he's hitting against, you would be surprised. He's hitting 368 against sinkers. You're like, whoa, that's the number one pitch he's seeing.

He's hitting really well against that this year. But everything else is like 227 sliders. He's hitting under a hundred against. So there seems to be a batter's eye issue that's still going on with him. I don't think we've had enough time for the swing changes to kind of completely take place because you've got really good hard hit numbers.

You've got a fast bat. You've got a guy that brings his hands in more, closed his stance. We've seen what that has even done with Corbin Carroll. And you're just like, okay, where are the results? It seems to still be an eye situation. So all of that to be said, I'm still intrigued with Jordan Walker. I think he's a really good deeper league, just absolute by low, because I don't think he comes at really any acquisitional price, because he could have been the post hype guy, but I think people are done with it. But he's 22 years old.

So I think there's a lot that's still going on there. I am worried that we could look back on this in two years and be like, oh, he was keep Ryan Hayes. But I would be actively in some capacity trying to get him in some bigger keeper leagues. Yeah, I think the deeper the league, the better Jordan Walker is as a target because the short term ceiling might not be high enough in a keep five or keep seven sort of league. We were getting that long term value and you may have to wait until late this year for these adjustments to start to pay off too.

I think that's the other part of it. Maybe these changes will bear some fruit. It doesn't happen quickly. He's just got to play well enough to keep the job. And I think that's a question in St. Louis. And that's what I'm hopeful for, because the one thing you could look at him over the last couple of years,

this is the first year of noticeable change. You'll see a noticeable stance change, a noticeable approach change, but the results aren't there. Let's have more of a sample size, because we can look at four or 500 at bats, and we can see what's going on, but like, let's see what, you know, two and a half months looks like on this year.

They've also said they're committed to Jordan Walker, but if he's still hitting 209 at the end of May, he'll be gone. They won't be able to be committed, but I'm cautiously optimistic it's going to turn around. Here's just a list of guys that have elite bat speed that haven't worked out. And I don't think I don't know if he belongs on this list here. I mean, at the very top, you've got Giancarlo Stanton, O'Neal Cruz, Junior Caminero.

They've worked out, you know, but the ones the list of players that haven't worked out that are in this group are Pedro Leon, John Kensky-Noel, Alexander Canario, Matt Gorski, who just got called up, Jair Camargo with the twins, Gerard Encarnacion with the giants. These are guys that I've hyped. I guess Joe Adele. Joe Adele's the only one with a real sample size

of those guys though, like if you really, like that's a good one to talk about, but all those other guys, sample sizes, maybe Noel is pushing in it, but those are pretty low sample sizes to say that any. Oh, for sure. Yeah. But there is a little bit of a shared problem here, which is contact. But you know, Walker's contact rates aren't great, but he's managed to keep a 28 percent strikeout rate and is worse.

And that's not as bad as some of these guys. Noel's worse than that. And I think Canario is worse than that. So he does share some of the attributes of the guys who just haven't been able to put enough wood on the ball. Like Miguel Sano still has elite bat speed. You know? And Miguel Sano has the same bat speed as Jordan Alvarez,

but they're not the same player. Wonder what he's doing right now. I wonder what snow's doing right now. Just thinking about him. So, you know, I tend to like these players because, you know, if they, if they figure it out, they turn into O'Neill Cruz or, or John Carlos Stanton, you know, Carl Schwab is up here. A lot of elite players are up here.

Aaron judges 13th and bat speed, you know, Ron Well, C up here. A lot of elite players are up here. Aaron Judge is 13th in bat speed. You know, Ron LaCunha Jr. is still 15th in bat speed. So I tend to believe in these guys and I tend to give him chances, but he's inching closer and closer to that group where he said, mm, maybe it's just not enough contact, not enough lift, just too much into the ground. All right.

So we're kind of like okay with Walker long-term if he's not the centerpiece of a deal that seems to be the consensus on the show still reasons to like him but we're starting to see a few of the bigger picture red flags that could slow him down. How about Dylan Cruz? We still haven't seen the Dylan Cruz that I thought we were going to get when he was a prospect at LSU. And this one might even be more of a premature sort of judgment if only because it's only been 57 games in the big leagues for Dylan Cruz. We don't even have a full big league season yet.

He's still just finding his footing against top-level pitching. Early on this year, the K-rate is up at 26%. Walk rate has dipped to 3%. Still stealing bases, 6 for 7. That's the part of his game. I just didn't expect to get that much from Dylan Cruz as a base stealer. I knew he would run as a big leaguer, but didn't think he'd be the kind of guy that would pace out for 30 plus steals.

What do we make so far? There's not a ton of chase, there's a good bit of hard contact, there's too many ground balls for him to unlock the power we saw from him at LSU. Is this a window right now, Welsch, where you want to get in and try to get Dylan Cruz onto your long-term teams before he starts to put all the pieces together? By the way, Dylan Cruz older than Jordan Walker.

That's like one of those things that blows you away when you look at that and the service time. Yeah, this is a, to me, this is like an absolute by-law right now. Am I worried about the strikeouts? Yeah, I am. He showed a lot of like breaking pitch slider worries that was like, man,

he is going to get taken advantage of in the majors. And he has, so it's about a 39% K percentage against sliders right now. That's not super good. But like a lot of young hitters, breaking pitches are a little bit of their struggle. But right now, one thing you can poke at as well is fastball percentage.

Something I noticed in the off season, if you ever find extremes, whether it's extremes on the high or low of fastball struggles or doing really great, it's not really sticky, as you would say. So here's an example. He's hitting 174 against four seam fastballs right now. That's not really sticky as like, you know, you would say like, so here's the example. He's hitting 174 against four seam fastballs right now. That's not gonna continue.

Year over year struggles against fastballs for players that stay in the majors. You just don't see that. His expected batting average against four seam fastballs is 317 right now. So almost 150 batting point difference. And he did well against the fastballs last year. And if you get him back, bouncing back,

expected around 300, even if you get him into that 250 range, you're gonna see a nice increase on the batting average. He's done all this while still hitting four homers and six stolen bases, big plus. Expected batting average is around 280. He's barreling 15% right now, which is triple what he was last year. And he's not pulling the ball in the air.

And that's abnormal. 7% pulled air ball percentage. And he was around 13% last year. So you start kicking back on fast balls, start getting the pulling the ball a little bit more, maybe walk a little bit. I think he's still lining up to look like a 20, 30 type of guy.

Like it could go in any direction. Maybe the power kind of ticks down and he's right under 20, but he steals over 30. He's been aggressive against left-handed hitters. I think you can, or pitchers, you can probably put him back in the lead off spot if he starts to bounce back, which they did. I think it's a great opportunity because I think a lot

of people are burned by some of these rookies. Dominguez is kind of tailing down. Jackson Holliday hasn't quite found the stride, though I think there's some positive signs. And Dillon Cruz for half of the season so far, I think has been talked about being cut by a lot of redraft people. So I think there's a really negative connotation

with him right now, but from a dynasty perspective, I still think he's legitimately like a top 50 dynasty prospect. And people that are moving out from him, I would be, now this is a guy that I think you can have like a centerpiece of a trade for. You can go out and be like, hey, I'm gonna, maybe I'm rebuilding and I'm trading.

I don't know if you'd wanna do this, but you could trade off like maybe a Casey Meis. Maybe someone who's playing right now and they're like, hey, I need pitching help, Casey Meis has bounced back. You could trade a Casey Meis and get like a Dylan Cruz for a team. But you can, however you end up looking at it, this would be a guy who would be trying to buy right now.

I think I agree. Yeah, I agree. The max TV's up and it's closer to where it was in triple a So you look at his bat speed it is above average and when you look at his Plate discipline stats they were better last year And I think this year he's just decided to be a little more aggressive and pictures are filling up the zone on and the zone percentages up. And I guess I could be worried that, you know, the sliders in the zone is the way to get Dylan Cruz out. And you know, what happens if he never figures that out? But you know, my story for that one is that sliders in the zone has been the way to get

Jorge Soler out his whole career. And he's made a career out of it anyway. You know, because it's not that easy to just, oh, just drop a slider in the zone and don't hang it, you know what I mean? Like, and don't throw it for a ball, you know, with a guy who does have a good sense of the zone. So he can spit on those and sometimes get a called strike three

and maybe have a slightly higher strikeout rate than you think you should have given his contact rates. But his contact rates are good, his plate discipline is good, his bat speed is above average, his foot speed is good and he makes the most of it. So I would say, you know, above average to plus plus, you know, like if you're talking about speed, the raw power is there and he's tapping into it more. He does seem to have these sort of changes in approach.

The pull rates go in and out, the chase rates go in and out. He's just trying to figure out his right approach, I think. And I think it could really click. There's a lot of the pieces here. And it's not as much of an unsurmountable thing. You know, he hits too many ground balls. Well, he didn't do that in the minors. You know, this isn't like a long-term problem for him

So I think he's just trying to figure out how he can fend off enough sliders to get more fastballs And then he'll eventually feast on those fastballs And I think you know I don't know where the OBP is gonna slot in But I think he will end up being like a 260 270 hitter that could have a 2030 season a 20 he could have maybe 30, 30 season at his peak. I think those pieces are there. All right, so it's a definite acquire grade on Dylan Cruz right now as he continues to make adjustments.

It seems like he might have two different approaches he could utilize, right? If you can pull effectively, but you can also go the other way, it just becomes more of a learning process. How are you going to be pitched? What are you going to do in each situation? Marry those two approaches appropriately,

and then maybe you get up closer to the ceiling that you both described. I think there's a player we disagree about in this group, Luis Garcia. You know, you like Luis Garcia. You think he's a good buy low target right now. No, I just put him on the list. I, in fact, was going to talk about how I don't want to. What do you mean? What kind of sabotage are you running on our rundown right now? I just thought he'd be worth talking about as a possible bylow.

Okay well the reason I'm out is that he's got too much chase in the profile he always has and I don't know if I trust it's kind of like a little bit like a Luis Renjifo sort of profile where I don't know if I trust him to do it consistently even though I think there are tools there. I think he's a weirdly high variance player for someone who doesn't strike out a lot and I think it's because of the pitches he chooses to swing at. That's my main takeaway with Garcia. I did not like him in redraft coming into the season.

I'm not buying a dip if there is one. Keeper League, Dynasty League, Redraft League, I'm just out on Garcia. And he's always had a problem lifting the ball. Even last year, 47.4%, that was the best ground ball rate of his career. He's gone right back closer to his old career numbers. 54% here through 26 games. So he's gone right back closer to his old career numbers, 54% here through

26 games. So he's such an easy avoid for me. For me, it's really simple. I just don't believe the power. If you don't believe the power that changes the ceiling for a player, changes their usability, and it puts so much pressure on their legs, and this is not a guy who is going to Xavier Edwards you to a championship. You know what I mean?

It's just a guy who next year may hit 10 homers and steal 10 bases and hit 240. You know, it's like, no thanks, I don't think. 45th percentile sprint speed with the bags that he had last year, that's already dipped to 37th percentile this year. It just, he's young, he's always been young for the level. It's already dipped to 37 percentile this year. It just is young. He's always been young for the level.

It's always felt like it's been a house of cards for me with Luis Garcia. Do you have any any reason to like him? Welsh? Well, I mean, last year would be the reason to like him. But I think there's a twofold thing in here. Dynasty is a whole like I do ranks and I've posted ranks. I at least do it yearly on the athletic for dynasty and stuff. And assuredly, what you're always going to get is you're going to get like, why isn't dot dot dot higher? You know, why don't you like this? And a prime example is like what

you're seeing with Luis Garcia. This was a one year pop. And it's really hard to kind of decipher because when you looked at last year, you're like, wow, batting average is up. He was almost a 20, 20 guy. And then look at these changes. All of a sudden, he's an 8% barrel guy, a career high hard hit percentage. And you're like, all right, well, K percentage went up. So he's selling out for a little bit more power. He's making more quality of contact. This is all looking good. Maybe he's not a cheap version of Luis Arais. But that's also the reason why you don't take the abnormal, the abnormalness of that season and then just go all in and be like, OK,

well, now everything is going to change. Now he's going to barrel more. Now he's going to hit the ball harder. He makes tons of contact. Look at the world. It's our Easter. No. And it's like he came back down to earth. He came back down to earth and he stopped barreling. And he looked a lot more like the guy that's going to run,

you know, slow bat, low barrel, not great hard hit percentages, doesn't strike out. It's kind of like Jacob Wilson, but like Jacob Wilson has the extra advantage of like he's got this really great ballpark and he's starting to lift the ball in the air a tiny bit, but all of these guys share those similar traits where it's like, that's great that they don't strike out.

It's great that they can get on base, but am I gonna buy into a one-year power projection? I remember Luis Garcia was one of like three players on the dynasty ranks where it was like, but we all like him in redraft this year. Why isn't he higher in dynasty? Cause he's younger. And it's like, you guys kind of laid a lot of that out.

Also as a guy that is supposed to be some version of like a Luis Arais type of a clone, all he's doing is hitting fastballs. He's hitting 353 against four seam fastballs right now. The second two pitches he sees the most are sliders and curve balls. He's hitting under a buck 70 against both right now. So it's great that he's not striking out,

but he's still struggling with quality of contact. And the supporting data behind it is not like, oh, look, he's 15% barrel guy, or, oh, look, he like Mikell Garcia, we were like, man, look, he's 50% hard hit rate, but some of the other stuff isn't there. Luis Garcia doesn't have a lot of those. So he might float kind of backing around and he's an 88% zone contact guy. So I think there's some nice things there. I give you one little argument. There's the potential to buy solo right now that people are out and we're kind of talking negatively about based off of what happened last year

that, you know, his high contact rate and low strikeouts work a lot better in points leagues and maybe as a middle infield option, if people are looking to get out from under him. But in a vacuum, like a body situation like, yeah, give me, give me an above replacement middle infielder in a 15 team league. And what if things click back? What if we do see him get the ball in there? That's the other thing. They're a little bit different, but guys like like Hassan Kim and CJ, CJ Abrams is now moved away from that. But those are some guys that had there are some poor traits, but what was one

like low barrels. But then all of a sudden, what would they do? 90% launch angle, you know, and they're starting to pull their maximizing pulled fly balls and stuff like that. Well, Luis Garcia backtracked his launch angles under five degrees right now with an under five percent barrel rate. Like those don't work well unless you're Chandler, Chandler Simpson, and you're going to, you know, beat out grounders and stuff like that. I'm not super into all that to say I'm not super into Luis Garcia with you guys. All right. So not a by low necessarily, even though, you know, Deek this with Luis Garcia Jr. on this. It All right. So not a by low necessarily, even though, you know, Deekedus with Luis Garcia Jr. on this run down. That's worth talking about.

Oh, definitely worth talking about because I think the age and what he did last year is going to make him sort of pop for people as someone they should try and target right now. The following was recorded from inside an ice plunge. Okay. All right. from inside an ice plunge. Ah! Woo! Okay. Alright.

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Hey, it's Noah Chestnut from The Athletic. If you're into games and sports, pay attention. I'm going to give you four sports terms. You tell me the common thread. Ready? Axle. Loop. Lutz. Saukow. That's Axle. Loop. Lutz. Saukow. That's Axle, Loop, Lutz, Salcal. This one's like medium hard. The answer is figure skating jumps. Now, what if I gave you 16 different terms and you figure out how they come together into four different groups? If you're up for the challenge, you'll want to check out Connections Sports Edition.

It's a new daily game for sports fans. There'll be some that are going to stump you, some that make you laugh, and some that remind you when you were a kid watching sports for the first time. Connection Sports Edition. To play today's puzzle, go to theathletic.com slash connections. I got a few names here for you guys, just the tougher calls, I think. What direction are these players actually going? I mean, let's start with Kyren Paris. He is frequently being dropped in 12-team

redraft leagues right now because he's been ice cold after the torrid start to the season. 1 for 30 with 17 strikeouts in his last 11 games. That is the kind of slump that can cost you being in the lineup every day. That's the kind of slump that can send you back to triple A depending on how your team feels about the alternatives. But if we had this conversation two weeks ago, we would have talked about Kyren Paris as some kind of dynasty league riser just because he was going off, playing every day, showing power, showing speed.

Where are we at right now? What's the broader direction for Kyron Paris-Welsh knowing that the hot streak to begin the season and the slump that had followed it, neither of those are really his true talent. Like what do you think of Paris at this point? I was really optimistic because he's the one, he's like, worked with Aaron Judge's hitting coach

and we saw significant changes and then something we'd always point to is like, not only did it like with Jordan Walker, oh cool, you did all these things. You have this idea, you wanna shorten your path. Where's the results? Kyron Parris, results. He was a nothing.

And then all of a sudden he came in and you're like, oh my gosh, he's barreling the ball. He's still, even in these struggles, he still has a career high pulled air percentage of like 18%. He was 8% last year. So those things are good, but he's on a bad downward track right now. His K percentage is like 18%. He was 8% last year. So those things are good. But he's on a bad downward track right now. His K percentage is over 35%.

And it's like if maybe he wasn't a big strikeout guy and he was struggling, we can make some excuses because he if you just look at the savant as a whole, you're like, wow, 17% barrel, 50% hard hit rate. That's Michael Tolia, you know, in a small middle infielder from last year. But also, unfortunately, like Michael Tolia, there's a 35% K percentage, doesn't walk a whole bunch. Here's my biggest worry with Kyron Parris. Like, should we all, as quick as we jumped on the train, should we jump off immediately because of the struggles? Probably not. And in like deeper dynasties where, you know, you can move around players, I'd want to hold,

but here's the problem. Carter Keyboom is in the minors and he's hitting well. And you've also got a guy like Christian Moore who's not having a good minor league season. But my point is, is there are options that it's not like, we're like, okay, hey, cool. We're gonna give Kyron Parris the entire season to figure this out.

No, they probably are not going to. He's starting to sit more games. You've got a guy like Keyboom who you're probably gonna wanna see soon. And if Christian Moore picks it back up, he almost made the opening day roster. So, you know, from a buy low perspective, I don't know if I'm in a buy as I am,

like if I own him a whole, just to see what the next two weeks hold out because, you know, the changes created some really, really interesting production that's not holding right now. So why is that not holding? Is he just an unproductive, not great player or is he going through an adjustment period? Like with Jordan Walker, are we on the bad side of the adjustment period and we just haven't seen the good? With Kyron Parris, did we just see the good and now we're only focusing on the bad and will it turn?

We don't have enough sample size to know, but you dynasty leagues, you got to figure out what's worth figuring it out. You know what I'm saying? Like you got to jump early. Like I got a dynasty, I had a league that I was able to pick up Tyler Soderstrom at the beginning of the year. That looks silly now. So it's like, you got to make your moves. Are you also going to be pissed if you spent equity on Kyron Paris, you dump him for nothing. And then two weeks later, things start to click back. You guys get this all the time. People always ask these like vacuum questions.

Should I drop bop bop bop? And it always needs context because it's like, I'm probably going to say no, like, no, you just shouldn't just drop a guy. Like, give me a reason why you're going to drop a guy. Especially. Yeah. What's the what's the move? What's your league look like? People will be like, should I drop this guy?

And I'm like, absolutely not. And then they're like, well, it's a 10 team and here are the players out there. And it's like, oh, okay, yeah, then maybe you could. Like, here would be a good one. If someone was like, should I drop Austin Wells? I really struggle with Austin Wells right now because I still really like him, but he's had a poor run.

I would in a vacuum in a dynasty or even redraft at this point. I'd probably tell you no. But then if you're like, but- I'd be more likely to be like, go buy him, yeah. Yeah, yeah, I agree, I agree with you. Even in a redraft, you just say, cut Austin Wells. And I'm like, no.

But then you go, okay, it's a 10 team league. And on the wire right now is- Augustin Ramirez. Augustin Ramirez, Sean Murphy, you know, Wilson Contreras just got cut. And I'd be like, oh yeah, dump him now. So I just want to throw that out there, that the context of what else is out there before you say, hey,reras just got cut. And I'd be like, oh yeah, dump him now. So I just want to throw that out there that the context of what else is out there before you say, hey, should I cut these players?

I think you should have a reason. And Kyron is, I think a good example of, just have a reason before you cut it, but things are not looking good. The interesting thing about Kyron, I just went down a rabbit hole in his pitch types. And in the hot streak, he was seeing four seamers and what's weird is even last year when he was bad across the board had a 28 wrc plus he was a positive against four

seamers after the home run spree he stopped seeing four seamers as much and they were replaced by sinkers so you could just take sort of 15 percentage points of four seamers and switch them over to sinkers since that hot streak and he's gone cold since. He has a zero batting average against sinkers by the way. Yeah currently. So I think that you're just anybody who has a good sinker is going to throw it to him and so there's a new book on him and it's really kind of similar to the old book. Maybe he just kind of got better at his strengths and didn't cover any of his weaknesses. And now people are like, oh, we actually care about this guy, Karen Paris in the lineup. We got to do a little

prep work and think about how we're going to pitch him as opposed to just ignoring that spot. And so I, I like, you know, the fact that his barrel rate is up, but it's not in a sample that is really super meaningful. The hard hit rate, you are talking about 40 balls in play, and that's pretty low, but there's maybe some signal there. I'm willing to give him, when you look at the Bat-X and Oopsie, they give him the best ISOs, the best slugging percentages of the group.

And so I'm willing to give him maybe a league average slugging percentage. The problem is, so league average slugging percentage plus wheels is usable in a lot of leagues. It's going to be a terrible OVP, I think. And it's gonna come with lots of strikeouts. So I don't think 10 and 12s I'm not holding, I'm not sticking around. 15s, Dynasty, maybe, especially if it's not OBP, if it is OBP, I don't know if I'm sticking around. So you're saying the use cases, you know, are getting smaller and smaller.

One thing I wanna add, this is the mic dropped to being like, oh, you know what, I think I am gonna just dump him. I feel like I would have loved to see what this looked like during the hot streak. League average on contact percentage is 82%. Kyron Paris last year was 78%. This year he's 61%. Yeah, that's almost not tenable.

That's worrisome. It makes you wonder if the adjustments he made to his swing actually added raw power or bat speed, but also hurt his ability to make contact on pitches he needs to make contact on so much that the trade-off's not worth it. And then the next question would be okay well does he have good pitch recognition does he have good strike zone judgment he's 22nd percentile in Seeger. Not everybody in that range is bad but I don't think Seeger. Not everybody in that range is bad, but I don't think that pitch selection approach works with that swing.

There's a lot of those guys that are in that area who aren't bad are guys who have great head tools. Right. Steven Kwan's in that range, right? Sal Freelix in that range. Pam Smith's in that range. At the other end, like, you know, a high ceiling guy figuring it out. Like some of it could be figuring out big league pitching because he hasn't seen a lot of it too

And I feel like that's part of what's making this a little more challenging as you could say he's 23 and he has 179 major league plate appearances 179 major league plate appearances made a wholesale change does have more power now has always had speed and has Been a phenomenal base dealer and has put up some pretty gaudy walk rates along the way too which when you see big walk rates next to big strikeout rates you start to think is he just working the count a lot? Like is he getting himself into situations where he's more vulnerable to striking out than he needs to be? There is still stuff here to like. I think it's got to be a very deep league so I would actually try and scoop up Kyron

Paris in a really deep keeper league, a keep everyone sort of scenario. Autonou, probably a good example, right? 12 team league, deep rosters, you don't have to play him when he's not playing well. I actually want Kyron Paris in Autonou right now because I'm curious enough to see what happens in the next few weeks.

The pressure, you mentioned Christian Moore as one possible major piece they could bring in. Yohan Mankata comes back from the IL, maybe if at that point Kyron Paris is still struggling, they could bump him off the roster for a little while, but I think they'd rather see what Paris can do this year and figure out if he's a part of their future or not, as opposed to play the awful up and down game.

If they think he's good enough to contribute, they're to keep giving him a chance to contribute. So I remain intrigued but yeah in redraft leagues I understand why people are not waiting around right now because it could get pretty messy. How about Colt Keith? One of my most rostered players this year starting to lose a little bit of playing time and probably the guy that becomes most vulnerable as a result of Spencer Torkelson looking good again thinking about where they're gonna move Keith over to first base and a lot of his playing time for a second this year because Gleyber Torres missed some time on the IL to begin the year but Colt

Keith is hitting 176 with a 325 LBP and a 206 slug. This is not the step forward I was hoping for. This is not the party hangout I was hoping it would be. I thought Colt Keith showed some gradual improvement over the course of last season. I know Detroit, especially the first month of the season, is a difficult place to hit. What direction are we going long term on Colt Keith, Welsch? I think he might still be a buy. I'm just taking a look here. I mean, one of the mirages for last year, and this is where I don't know which direction this is gonna end up going,

is how he performed against lefties. Last year he hit 300 against lefties. This year he's hitting 100. He's just struggling, and then you're getting into like a platoon range. But when you're taking a look at the profile, 160 or 176, not good, but there's about a 50 point increase

in his expected batting average. That's probably supported by some similar-ish traits. Like his barrel is down, his launch angle's down, but they're kind of the same. Hard hit is down, it's kind of the same. He's striking out a tiny bit more, walking a bunch. So blah, blah, blah, all that type of stuff. But he's got a better zone contact percentage this year.

It's at 87%, it was around 86 last year. Having a lot of those traits sit around with a lower BABIP and a struggle against lefties where, as maybe unbelievable as we should have thought that he could hit 300 against lefties last year, should be that we think he's only gonna get 100 against lefties this year. You bring up a really interesting point about like, you know, with Torkelson bouncing back,

you got some minor leaguers that are, you know, kind of looming around, like, what does that end up doing for, I mean, they even experiment to like Justin Henry Malloy is a guy that they might want to see more of. I guess I would worry that what does the, what does the clock look like for him? You know, like how long are they gonna let this struggle happen? The batting profile, like as a whole, if you are a slider looker at baseball's Devon, if you just wanna pay attention to sliders, it's blue.

It's under 50% kind of across the board, outside of he doesn't chase and he's walking a whole bunch. But I don't know, I've always thought he's like a really good hitter. I just think he's mediocre-ish as a fantasy player. He might end up being one of those guys that's just a better real life player than he is fantasy as a whole. I think I might have a tiny bit longer of a leash for a guy like Colt Keith than I would Kyren Parris right now. I mean, you kind of created a step ladder.

The guy we're going to talk about next, I'm much longer leash and really in Kyren. This is like the middle house of the porridge, you know, but it's not just right Unfortunately, but I'm gonna give a little bit more of a leeway because I don't see the decreases being anything that is insane and There is a babbip story that's telling us he's underperforming as well Yeah, I mean there's an interesting thing here with him where he's, I think, in inside in his core, he's the opposite field hitter. And you know, I've talked to him about this in the minor leagues.

I think he was at the futures game, the AFL, he was at the AFL, cool, Keith went to the AFL. And I talked to him then he said, Yeah, I'm learning to selectively pull, because, you know, that's where pulling in the air, I understand pulling there, but I'm learning to selectively pull because you know, that's where pulling in the air I understand pulling there, but I'm learning to selectively pull but I do have this opposite field swing I see him in the major leagues and I'm like, hey remember we were talking about Selectively pulling and you're pulling the ball a lot and he goes no man. I'm domed up right now Like I I it was like halfway through his rookie season. He's like I I can't even talk to you Like I don't even know what's going on

He literally said I'm don't don't say anything else like I don't even know what's going on. Like he literally said, I'm dumbed out. Don't say anything else. Like I'm not going to. He's like, get out of my face. I can't do this. No, it wasn't like negative. It was just like, I don't, I can't. I just, I'm like, he was,

it felt like it was in over his head. And then if you look at his rolling charts, you'll see that he started to go opera a little bit more in the second half last year. And his Wobba like went along with it. So he kind of found himself again and like was better in the second half. But the problem is that he is a like a guy

that goes to the opposite field, but doesn't have great power. And you're throwing in the home park and so like you've got, it's just a weird combination. So like I'm gonna take Max CV and I'm gonna take, you know, what his batted balls, I'm gonna take a, I'm gonna take pull percentage and I'm gonna, I'm just gonna look at,

I'm gonna take pull percentage, go backwards with pull percentage last year and then look at guys who had max EVs like him. You know, you have Yandy Diaz, right? But he has maximum power, right? So when Yandy Diaz goes Oppo, it goes out, you know? I want to ask you this because I want to see if this name is on here. And I mean, they're up to you, but because what you're the conversation you're having and specifically the thing you said where he was like, I'm domed up, I can't talk, reminded me so much of a conversation I had at the AFL with Alec Bohm,

where I'd asked him about making changes and does he pay attention to stuff in season? He's like, he doesn't look at anything. He's like, I don't wanna talk about it. He just was like, not into in season changes. This conversation reminds me of it. And then as you've been talking, I'm thinking, Colt Keith is sounding a lot like how Alec Bohm can be. I wonder is Alec Bohm on that list at all?

Um Bryson Stott is. Oh similar-ish. Bohm's pretty close to Keith. Okay there you go I just the conversation made me think. Max EV for Bohm 110.8. Max EV for Colt Keith last year 1094. Now I don't I want to make that like oh 1.4 but it's a little bit different so like 1094 who has a pull rate like Colt Keith and a Max EV like Colt Keith? Mookie Betts but this is Mookie Betts not the 30 homer hitting Mookie Bats, right? Who's another guy? Taylor Ward, who's another guy? Bryson Stott, who's another guy? Luis Arias, who's another guy?

Anthony Volpe, you know, who's another guy? Bryce Terang, some of those guys are a bit lower. And a lot of those guys have different skills in that, like Terang and Stott run a lot. Colt Keith's gonna run a little, he's not gonna run a lot. But also you got defensive value, you know what I'm talking about, yeah. Right.

There's a lot of pressure on him to hit, because he doesn't bring a lot of defensive value. I mean, I think the combination of the Torres signing in free agency and Torkelson turning things around puts more pressure on Colt Keith than we would've thought he would've had on him going into the off season. He's right there with Mikel Garcia, but Mikel Garcia is a pretty elite defender

at multiple positions. And Colt Keith is suddenly a first baseman. So what I didn't say, what I didn't list any people were first baseman. You know, the closest he has to somebody who has similar walk, strikeout, and defensive value is Jesse Winker. Oh, and it took a while for Winker to even still, like it just- You don't want to be Jesse Winker. And it took a while for Winker to even still like it.

You don't want to. It's never been like it's like you know, a young player to be like, he could be Jesse Winker. Right. A healthier Jesse Winker would be fine for deeper leagues if you kind of go back through his career and like add volume. But it also wasn't like such a difference maker that you were excited in most leagues to have a player like that. Am I right for believing that Jordan Lawler is one of the best position players you can try and get right now

as a centerpiece in a keeper or dynasty league because we talked about it when they brought Tim Tawa up as the injury replacement for Ketel Marte instead of Lawler, there is so much ceiling here and there have been injuries and setbacks but all Jordan Lawler has done around the injuries has put up pretty nice numbers that we as fantasy players are extremely excited about because there's power, there's speed, I think he hits the ball hard enough where if they're still swinging missed long term the average is not going to be a liability. I think Jordan Lawler is still going to be a very good five category player,

and because he was drafted out of high school, and because we've been talking about him for a few years, I think we lose sight of the fact that he's still 22. It's just, what's gonna hold him back, Welsh? Is it just having a spot to call his own in Arizona this year? I mean, I think if not, by the end of this season, Jordan Lawler is going to be a regular and a high level contributor. My question is similar is just

what is his true talent power? Is that the thing? So I mean the first thing that's holding back has been his medicals. I think that has set him back just literally from day one. I was at his pro debut and the next day he got hurt and he missed the season. It's just been consistent injuries that have kept him back. It's been here. Oh, the 2021 Complex League. He had six plate appearances. I was at Brewers and he was all happy, hey,

and then boom, hurt, done. It's been consistent injuries. So unfortunately, when your most consistent thing is being hurt, that's gonna set you back for quite a time. With that, he made his major league debut in 2023. And he is still in the minors. The thing that's made me a little cautious is Mike Hazen said this during spring. He said, when Lawler shows us he's ready, he's up regardless of what's going on around him. Well, he looks, I mean, it looks pretty

ready. I mean, that's why that's not true. That's why it's not true. That's an untrue statement because they said, whenever he's ready and he shows us he's ready, he'll be up. Okay, then why are we seeing Jorge Barrosa and all respect to Tim Tawa and him being a super-utile guy? I think Jordan Lawler could have been a super-utile guy

because he can play third, he can play short, he's playing second. They were even playing it, right? They've played him at different positions. They're playing them all around. This is very Royce Lewis-esque to me. Learn to play the outfield so you can get him out there. So you get back to the question of like,

who is he gonna be truly as a player? The power looks like it's setting in to be average. Even in the, you have to remember the PCL ball flies more and stuff like that. Even though the numbers are stacked, like five homers, he's stealing a bunch of bases and stuff like that. He's getting the ball in more and stuff like that. Even though the numbers are stacked, like five homers, he's stealing a bunch of bases and stuff like that. He's getting the ball in the air more. I think the profile is gonna look similar

to like a CJ Abrams in that he's somewhere between 15 and 20 homers because he's getting the ball in the air a ton. So career high between AAA and the majors, he's around almost 15% launch angle right now. So, or 15 degree, I'm sorry, 15 degrees. So he's really getting the ball in the air. He's hitting the ball harder than he's ever done

at AAA or the majors at 40%. That's still not great though. Max EV, average EVs, they're kind of average-ish. So what that's telling you is it's like, all right, there's a hit tool in there. He's optimizing getting the ball in the air. And you also see that by a massive increase in zone contact percentage.

He's been in the seventies, it's at 87% this year. So he's seeing the ball better. He's optimizing the swing better. And what are we also seeing in the minors? He's stealing bases aggressively. So then now you put that up to the majors. What does that look like? Top 10 hitter friendly environment in Arizona.

One of the most aggressive base stealing teams out there. I think there's a lot of things that line up really well for him when he's in the majors. Do I think he'll be a 25 plus home run hitter? I don't. I would have said this last year, if you said, do I think he can be a 280 hitter? I'd have said no,

but now I think he's re-transforming the game a little bit where he is gonna get the ball in the air. He's making a ton more contact. He's not trying to over swing. I think he could be a smaller-ish version of what we saw, like I said, out of Abrams. Steals 30, hits between 15 and 20, can hit somewhere between 240 and 270,

and maybe he's still transforming as a hitter, but he's healthy right now. And opportunity, so if help held him back the first time, now it is opportunity. The Diamondbacks, here's what I wanted to do and I'll shut up about it. I wanted him to play in the outfield because Cattell's our second baseman.

I saw him yesterday. He's going to be back next week. Or he's gonna be back on Friday, it looks like. And they're not moving him to the outfield. So where do you play him? I just thought he would always just take over for Perdomo, but Perdomo is really performing at the top ends of I thought the outcome.

Second highest, I believe war or WRC play. I think it's war among all short stops right now in baseball. Perdomo's not going anywhere. Lavello loves him. So, okay, what do you gotta do? Get him in the outfield. Let him take some reps in the outfield. That's what I would love to see.

He hasn't done that yet. He has right handed hitters here. And they haven't done that yet. He's a right-handed hitter, and they haven't done that yet. So I don't know how they work it out. Hazen is kind of lied about that because Lawler looks great, and he's checking off all the boxes of what you would want.

You want him to not strike out. It's 23%. You want him to walk. It's 13%. Zone contact is up. Staffs are inflated. All of that is creating this weird mixture of what are you do in dynasty,

you go buy him right now because everything is looking and placing in really well. If he's a regular in the Diamondbacks lineup, he's going to be a dude. Alec Thomas and Jake McCarthy, the ringer, like if they decide like, and it will be almost too late if he gets two appearances in center field in the minor leagues, people will notice that immediately. Yeah. What I would love for them to do, unfortunately, is get Gritchick out of there. Let Lawler play the short side of the platoon for DH and let him be a super-utile guy that gets a game or two for Johanio. He spells Perdomo one day. Maybe he gets in the after- I think it could be a Jackson Merrill situation where you put him in center and suddenly you're like, wait, this works. That's what I wanted them to do in the spring that he did.

But I think you can make it work. But the cool thing is you can buy him right now when he's not in the majors and it doesn't seem like there's a spot. That's why the opportunity is super interesting to, to buy him because he was until Nick Kurtz and him tied in hits. But when he got called up, like he was as hot of a hitter as Nick Kurtz is. So I tend to focus on like max to be a fair amount because I want to know what their bat speed is. I don't want to. I don't want them to be legging out doubles. You know, that

doesn't work as well in the majors. But I think looking at that, I think he could like worst case be like a Bryson Stott guy where he's hitting 10 homers and stealing 30 bases. And that'll play too. So he might be a better sort of hit toolie hitter guy than Bryson Stott. So if he kind of gets the most out of his power and hits 15 or 18 or 20, then you'll be really happy. So I think worst case scenario, maybe like a Volpi last year too.

You know? Yeah, the good version. Right, yeah, so. Not this one. Right, so I think he's all right. I have a great idea We're only gonna talk about hitters in this episode. We'll talk about pitchers on a future episode Had a feeling I over scripted it yeah Well, let's just mention Volpe and I know for a long time

You were an Anthony Volpe guy and I was an Anthony Volpe guy and he knows an Anthony Volpe and I know for a long time you were an Anthony Volpe guy and I was an Anthony Volpe guy and he knows an Anthony Volpe guy and we've wondered like can he take the best parts of his approach and taking you Frankenstein all the good Anthony Volpe's we've seen and cut out all the bad and make super Volpe and now we're another month into his career and I get the sense that maybe you're starting to lose some patience, that he might actually be a faller in terms of his long-term value on your dynasty ranks and just how you're valuing him if you're trying to look to the future. Yeah. Two years ago, we were with our Volpys combined.

We were going to create that Super Volpi. But yeah, it's not. It's just, it's continued weirdness with him. And I'm still kind of surprised by it because 2020, 21, 24, Homer stolen bases and 23 stolen bases went up, power down ticked a little bit last year. The most shocking to me is the average has just continued to be a big, massive problem. He's not pulling the ball in the air anymore.

His own contact percentage is absolutely tanking. Does he have the raw skills? Yeah, he does. He's still hitting the ball in the air anymore. His own contact percentage is absolutely tanking. Does he have the raw skills? Yeah, he does. He's still hitting the ball hard. He's actually barreling this year, but he can't consistently get the ball in the air. He can't make consistent contact. And this is an example of a guy where it's like,

all right, well, how long do we do this game? Like, how long are you gonna hit under 250 and not ever piece anything together? I struggle with him on my dynasty list, even into this year, I had him right around like the hundred range because it's like, hey man, you know, the ballpark is so great.

And you know, he was almost a 1530 guy last year. And if we can, we're just not seeing improvements. I mean, technically he is barely hitting the ball harder this year, but he's also striking out more and his expected batting average is still 230. And it's just like, I'm off of that train. And what it is is like, could you buy him for absolutely nothing?

That's kind of interesting, but I'm off the train where he's the top 150 dynasty guy. And that's tough for a under 25 Yankees shortstop who had all the potential in the world. I'm kind of out. I'm a glutton for punishment. Sign me up. So you still have your Volpi ring. You still have it. Sign me up, I'm still aton for punishment Sign me you still have your Volpi ring you still had me up

I'm still a vulpinator one thing that I like is That his bat speed is up two point three miles per hour this year And that's what you're seeing in the increase in max TV. That's what you're seeing in the barrel rate That's who's seeing the hard hit rate so I think instead of you know putting together these two pieces and becoming the of putting together these two pieces and becoming the superstar that honestly is still slightly possible to have a really, really great season for him. Because he's a guy with power and speed who's starting shortstop for the New York game, he's 24 years old. That's still possible. The thing is there. I think what has happened is he's just decided to be the powerful version of himself

and he's going to eschew the contact that he was making last year and we're going to settle in at sort of 26 to 28 percent strikeout rate with a good walk rate a good chase rate and just like more batted ball juice with the better bat speed. So I think he's settled into a guy who's going hit 240, but still manage a 320 OBP and a 450 slugging. So I think that there's a lot of these where that's really useful. I'm not sure the batting average will ever be. I think we've seen enough on the batting average.

It's 1,400 played appearances with a 228. I'm hoping for a 230 or 240 along with, I think, maybe 25 homers and 25 steals this year. And you look up and that's going to end up being a top 10 shortstop. I think it's just realizing it's going to come with that lower average. That's where I'm at. I'm still in. I think Welsh might be right to lower them a little bit because the ceiling might not be as high as we thought. but the power adjustment looks legit to me. And I'm not worried about the speed at all. I know it's been a slow start on the base pass.

He's like three for six as a base dealer, but that part of his game looks as solid as anything. Like that looks like the category where I would have the most faith. So I'm quietly still happy to have him in long-term leagues. Maybe he's not the main guy. Maybe he's not the headliner of a blockbuster and keeper in dynasty, but I'm still in on Anthony. Who would you rather have, Anthony Volpe or Matt McClain?

32%, I think K% is Matt McClain. Volpe is my kind of snap judgment, but that's a great toss up. I think I would go Matt McClain, but it wasn't like that preseason. You have to break it. Matt McLean or Volpe? Matt McLean. The other reason I'm a little scared of McLean long term, the major injury, right?

It was a huge shoulder injury. That's just a little extra risk that I feel like I want to avoid in this instance. I think Victor Scott has shown us something as a rising bat so far. All of this is like relative, like the whole conversation today. We're talking about generally young players and guys that are struggling that might not be as good as we thought at their peaks, but they're still good players for the foreseeable future and useful in many many cases. I think Victor Scott has done just enough in this early part of the season to convince me that it's going to work. And when I say it's going to work, I mean it's like six to eight homers in a

typical season, doesn't have a lot of power, probably 35 to 40 steals and a batting average that's going to come in a bit higher than the projections are at right now the averages across the board are like 225 to 236 I think that's oopsie to steamer from pessimistic to optimistic But the reason I'm excited is we're seeing a little more patience at the plate not a surprise given how Limited exposure was the big leagues last year k-rates down a little bit. It's accompanied by less chase. I think this is going to work for that type of player. I think this is a solid piece for

the Cardinals. I think Victor Scott has shown us he's clearly better than Michael Ciani. That was the bar he had to pass to be the primary center fielder. He's done that and that gives him a nice window to continue improving as a hitter at the big league level. I would just throw out to Eno that this is our this is our baby, Victor Scott. Eno and I did a dual interview with Victor Scott and then proceeded after to go hang out at the German place with the boots. But Victor Scott was our that was our guy that we both fell in love with talking. It's just such a great hitter in baseball. I'll let you talk about him.

But outside of even just like what a smart baseball player he is, you're starting to see a lot of those things click, not in an aggressive way. And he's probably a better real life player maybe than fantasy. But, you know, if he's a two, he's a 270 hitter. He steals 50 bases at them in the major leagues. I believe Right, I think you may have a season like that, but you know my true talent You know Spidey sense is kind of like a 240 300 guy 240 average 300 OBP so yeah, I don't think he'll ever be a star that kind of

powers your team along but the one thing I do know that I've dealt with with slightly older teams in Dynasty, because I'm willing to acquire older guys on the cheap and I don't really have the taste for a lot of the prospect hunting that a lot of my league mates will do. I found it hard to have stolen bases. So, one thing that you can do is if you're having a hard time acquiring prospects that might steal bases for you because the

prospect cost is too high in your dynasty league and that'll happen. There are leagues where everyone's a prospect hugger. Then somebody like a Victor Scott could be more attainable because someone says, well, I've seen his power and it's not enough. He's not going to be a star. He's just going to be a guy who steals bases for me. I'll take your, like zero hope for him, right? Zero hope is still really young and he's really exciting, but getting Victor Scott for him, it might be the right deal for the right team was that doesn't have any stolen

bases. I mean, your hopes not not gonna steal those bases for you. Right, I agree. I think he's just a really interesting buy. There was a small period of time where it did look like he was gonna hit for more power. He kinda talked to Eno and I about the approach change and how he was attempting to hit for more power. I think he just needs to hit for just enough.

It's not zero. It's not Edwards territory. I think his ISO will start with a one and that that's meaningful. And you can see it in like, you know, it's get the ball in the air. Like that's what they want him to do. 12 degree launch angle last year. 14 this year. He's not pulling it quite enough. But even though his XBA is telling a different story, the batting average, I think he can go in the positive direction and getting him in the leadoff spot for more at bats.

Like I think he's just got to adjust. But, brings up a really interesting debate I had thrown to you with take a guy like Chandler Simpson, who he talked to us about, by the way, where Chandler Simpson is a absolute zero projection power guy. He's not going to even try. He's not going to try to get the ball in the air. He's going to be a negative launch angle guy. He's just going to hit gonna even try. He's not gonna try to get the ball in the air. He's gonna be like a negative launch angle guy. He's just gonna hit across his body. He's gonna literally get hits by beating out throws from a shortstop that, you know, would you rather a Victor Scott, five to 10 homers,

40 stolen bases and a 250 average, or a Chandler Simpson who will give you a zero on the power department, but I legitimately think he can hit $293,000. And I wouldn't be surprised if he steals 60 bases in a full given season. And I think I would lean Chandler Simpson in fantasy a little bit more because he's also not going to be a high strikeout guy. I think he will still work in points leagues.

And I think he's just going to be less volatile because Victor Scott is still maybe changing as a hitter. I don't know if you guys feel any different about that, but I would take Chandler Simpson in dynasty over Victor Scott right now. Yeah, I think it's a safer floor for Chandler Simpson because the ability to put back the ball is so good. If they had the same strikeout rate, I would trust Victor Scott more because he has a little more power. Yeah, because he has that little bit extra power. But I think that extra bit of hit tool is significant. And Simpson, yes, I think you're setting a fair expectation

talking about 60 bags. There's a chance that he's a league leader by a wide margin if it all goes well. That's in the range of outcomes too. But when we did talk to Victor Scott, he was trying to steal 100 bases that year. That was when you just got one to steal 100 bases that year. That was a steal 100. Yeah, 100% and it was very funny too, because like I was

like, you led the league in the minors and he kind of begrudgingly was like, he's like, well, Chandler had like one or two more. If you count the AFL, you got to over 100 but good competitive, they're best friends too, if people didn't know that. It's a cool story. Yeah, I mean, Victor Scott had 94 steals in 2023 between high A and double A. It was 94 for 108 on the base pass across those two levels.

So the stolen base ceiling might be closer than you think, but I do think a K rate that might flirt with 10% as a big leaguer for Chandler Simpson goes a long way towards protecting that average. His BABIP is going to be weirdly high because of his top end speed. We've already seen that on display and it's only been what eight games in the big leagues for Chandler Simpson. Just that it yeah feels like he's been up for anymore. Yeah I know but no he's been up for a little over a week. Let's take some theory talk here real quick. If you had a theoretically zero strikeout rate, then your batting average would be your

Bavip. Yes. That is correct. Especially if you're not hitting homers. I don't know if it works that way. Because you would be such a limp stick too, right? Wouldn't everybody just fill up the middle of the zone? Does Bavip work that way?

That's a question for you and not me I'm just genuinely curious to see the different approaches pitchers will use against Chandler Simpson and how he adjust to them because I mean just from a development standpoint I would I would I would take Victor Scott's development the way that I think the Cardinals did which is Let's see how far we can push the power, you know Yeah with Chandler Simpson. I don't think you do that that I think the Cardinals did, which is, let's see how far we can push the power. You know? Yeah. With Chandler Simpson, I don't think you do that. I think you say, this is unique.

Right. That's the question I'm interested in right there. It's like, do you say, no, no, don't go for power at all. And then you totally limit your ceiling. It's like the gold, like Juan Pierre. It's just like, just do what you do. Do what you do. Don't change anything and let you succeed and do it at the top of the lineup.

And I think that's the path for Chambers-Simpson. Very few regulars that have an ISO that start with slot five. Especially nowadays. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. It's like the teams are just kind of want to have only guys that have power to reposition. In terms of qualified hitters last year, ISO begins with a zero.

Jacob Young who I guess he still has his job this year. He's like the fourth outfielder. Yeah, fourth outfielder. He's not the center fielder anymore. Sal Frelick is a regular Lisa Reyes, Andres Jimenez who's adding power back Bryce Turang who I think tried to add more power comes up on every one of these searches. Yeah. And then then Nico Horner and Michael Garcia just basically passed it, and then Stott, who I brought up twice in this one. So you have to have the elite defense.

Both these guys have the elite defense, so they can be on that list, but it's hard to be on that list year after year after year, too. As you can see with Jacob Young, who has the lead defense, had the Ice Hoop Star with zero and no longer has a job, like a starting job. Well, we had a whole bunch of pitchers

we were gonna talk about. We'll talk about them on a future episode because three of us, we get together, we're a little long-winded. We're supposed to be long-winded. That's our job. Welsh, before we let you go, let our listeners know where they can find all your work

and where they can follow you on socials. Sure, social at isitthewelch. If you guys were dying to see Cattelmarte hit homers against 17 year old Complex League guys, I'm your man. If you wanted to see Jackson Merrill de-aging, I went and saw him last night out here in Arizona. I tweeted out some videos of that. Did he run?

He did not run. He got, it was a little rough yesterday by the way, struck out a couple of fly balls. I'll be honest with you, if you read body language, probably the way. Struck out, couple fly balls. I'll be honest with you, if you read body language, probably the worst body language I've ever seen of Jackson Mero. He looked very frustrated,

but it might not have been baseball things because then he walked off and he was fine, but it was a bit odd. He did get a base hit, but in the video, you can see base hit kind of takes a step and immediately walks back. So he doesn't look like he's cleared for running. Brandon Lockridge was.

He played in the field. He stole a base when he was out't look like he's cleared for running. Brandon Lockridge was, he played in the field. He stole a base when he was out there. So he could be gone soon. As far as I know, Merrill's gonna be out here a week. To be honest with you, I heard that there might be some medical people that are coming today, which were just to check him out and they might clear him to run.

So there's a chance we could see Merrill running in the next day or two. And my prediction is Monday. You will see Jackson. Maybe the frustration is like he wants to go and they're telling him not to. Yeah, a hundred percent could be. There was something off about that.

He was a little behind on some pitches, but again, you just, you know, you're not in the majors. You just left, you came out here, blah, blah, blah. I've seen major league pitchers skulking around the clubhouse because they think they can throw, but the medical team told them to stop. I've definitely seen that. The complex isn't the place for happy major leaguers. If you know what I mean. Happy major leaguers aren't in the complex usually. Yeah.

I talked to Colton long one time when he was down here, that was two years ago and I said, Colton, it's really nice to see you. And he's like, it's not nice to see you. We laughed about it. We knew what it meant, but it's not nice. But you can follow me on Twitter, is it the Welsh? That's all my stuff. I got the show Prospect One in this league. I'm on Monday through Friday on Fantasy Pros

12 p.m. Eastern on our YouTube and Twitch. So I got the daily shows, I got the Prospect shows and I've got the Patreon in this league.com where you can check out my dynasty of Prospect list which I updated today. There's a brand new update, my top 500 prospects and top 400 dynasty. Thank you gentlemen. I miss you so much. I miss doing all the podcasts with you. I miss all the, all the talking and having fun. No, we miss you as well. We'll do it again soon at some point. Maybe before the season's

over, we'll get you on again. Oh, you're busy. That's a lot, man. You're busy. You're like I said, you're everywhere all the time Always time for you and for Jackson Merrill at the complex Well, we are always happy to see you okay, so no no that you'll never get the Colton Wong at the complex from Thanks to our producer Brian Smith putting this together. Thanks again to the Welsh for joining us That's gonna do it for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We're back with you on Wednesday. Thanks for listening.

I'm a glutton for punishment.