Rates & Barrels - News Roundup and Position Battles

Episode Date: March 17, 2023

Eno and Al discuss the latest news items, including some positive developments for Kyle Wright and Byron Buxton, and they look at several position battles that are still looming with opening day less than two weeks away. Eno also identifies several pitchers who are Stuff+ laggards. Rundown 1:08 News updates: Edwin Díaz, Kyle Wright, Byron Buxton, Mitch Haniger, David Villar, Eric Haase, Jackson Jobe 20:12 Position battles - hitters: NYM 3B, LAD CF, MIA OF, CHC OF/DH, KC OF, OAK CF 37:03 Position battles - rotations: OAK, ATL, ARI, TB, CIN 49:06 Stuff+ laggards Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow Al on Twitter: @almelchiorBB e-mail: [e-mail] Subscribe to The Athletic at $2/month for the first year: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Subscribe to the Rates & Barrels YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/RatesBarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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And a good time as any for us to check in on some spring training position battles. We'll be looking at a bunch of those. We'll catch you up on some of the latest news from the last 24 hours or so. And time permitting, we'll get into some of the Stuff Plus standouts. If we don't get to that today, I'm sure we will get to that sooner rather than later. So before we get to all that, just a reminder that now is as good a time as any to subscribe to The Athletic. If you haven't done so already, it's just $2 a month for your first year. That rate gets you in the door to check out everything

that's in the draft kit, everything that's still to come in the draft kit. And of course, everything that is on the athletic, just go to the athletic dot com slash rates and barrels. So let's pick up sort of where we left off yesterday. You know, Edwin Diaz at the time that we recorded on thursday we didn't know specifically what the injury was we didn't know as a result of that didn't know how long he'd be he would be out uh he has had surgery uh to repair a right patellar tendon tear and is expected to miss the entire season and just one other wrinkle uh that i like to raise, you know, is that Zach Britton has been named as a potential replacement.

He's been doing showcases. Does that change anything from Thursday's analysis where it seemed like you were pretty big on David Robertson to pick up saves? Yeah, I don't think it changed as much. Now we have a diagnosis, but even then uh everyone is different uh zach eflin came back within a sort of a six month time frame from a similar injury but others missed full seasons um even when they i think matt strom had uh had it in like the sort of the winter before a season and missed the whole season after that so So it's kind of touch and go, person to person. There's some chance that Diaz comes back for a few weeks in September maybe

or the postseason given a six-month time frame. But I think from the way his general manager was talking and just most of his comps I would say he's out for the season. Britain, I just don't know I'm not there at the showcase. I don't know the VLO readings. We can be comfortable saying that if the VLO is back then maybe the stuff is back because he's had such interesting stuff in the past. So if you do hear of some velo readings out of those workouts,

then maybe you can move him up your boards. But even then, I think it would be kind of surprising if he returned all the way to his old dominant ways. So I would, I would kind of still bet on David Robertson. Yeah. Now that,

that seems, seems pretty sound. Some good news to report. Kyle Wright is scheduled to make his spring training debut next week and should be ready to start, not by opening day, but by the time the second series rolls around for Atlanta when they play the Cardinals, that according to Mark Bowman of MLB.com. So I think that Wright is being underdrafted. And again, maybe that's just a result of the uncertainty of his timetable. Previously, he's 50th among pitchers in NFBC ADP, right around the 130th pick on average. Pretty much every projection system has him with a four ERA, you know, plus or minus 20 points. Do you think that he can come close to repeating what he did last year when he broke out?

He's interesting. I think him and Mitch Keller were the biggest stuff plus movers from 2021 to 2022 among starting pitchers. And so I believe in his stuff. His command is a little bit below average and um i think the park is a little bit tougher than than people uh realize because once we added park in we got a 391 era so in our projections even using this this revamped stuff this you know this uh some proof stuff that he's got so he's a little better without the park taking into context, more like a 3-7 guy, I think, 3-8. So the park booms him up a little bit. Gives up homers. It actually is a little bit more elevated than people know.

Atlanta sits atop a little bit of a mesa there. And so it used to be, you know about the old Atlanta-Fulton County Stadium? Yeah, it used to be you know about the old the old uh Atlanta yeah it used to be called the launching pad right exactly yeah so uh you know there's a little bit of that going on they it has nice dimensions but just generally 23 strikeout rate 3.91 ERA I can see why uh where he's being drafted but with a guy who has like a new arsenal and has really revamped his stuff, like maybe another year in person's command, you know, with these new shapes that he's throwing.

So definitely somebody who has a little bit more upside than some of the other guys that have similar projections. All right. And Byron Buxton, good news for him. He is back, not playing with the Major League squad just yet, but on Thursday played in a minor league game as the DH. That was his first game activity since undergoing knee surgery last fall. Does this change anything for you?

I mean, I'm glad to hear. It's a little bit like an injured pitcher. I'm glad to hear he's no longer injured, right? Right. I'd hate to draft Byron Buxton knowing he was injured. But, I mean, where would you set the over-under? I'm going to set the over-under at 301 plate appearances. What are you taking?

I'll take the over. Probably foolishly, but. He's done that one, two, three times out of eight. That's actually more than I would have guessed. So I feel better about taking the over now. I don't know. I don't remember exactly how his rookie year came up. So it could be three times out of seven, you know, it'd be unfair to say he didn't do in his rookie year. He just got called up and then, you know, at the end or something. Right. Yeah. I, you know i you know for me it doesn't i guess maybe changes a little like you say because if he goes into the season injured that's just a another level of risk but obviously buxton carries a lot of risk regardless

uh for the giants couple of updates here mitch hanager is still at least a week away from baseball activities after sustaining an oblique strain earlier this week. Do you think that this opens the possibility of Blake Sable not only making the team as a Rule 5 player, making the Major League squad, and of course they have to carry him all year or return him, but maybe getting some playing time? Yeah, it is possible. He has very interesting minor league stats,

and he was part of a devastating Rule 5 draft for the Pirates where they lost more players than any other organization in baseball. But his Fangraphs prospects report still has him as a 35 future value with a 59th team rank on his team, basically saying that it's all raw power. But hey, I mean, if it's all raw power and he has 250 ISOs in the minor leagues, maybe it's actually some game power too. His strikeout rate has really fluctuated up and down.

power too. His strikeout rate has really fluctuated up and down. He could either strike out 30% of the time or even as low as maybe 25% of the time. And that would change what I thought about him tremendously. I'm going to guess he's a patience, power, and no hit tool kind of guy. A typical sort of catcher. And that they will want to try and play games with him in terms of rosters. And the reason I say that is, that is exactly what Farhan Zayed does all the time. And so, if you're looking for something out of Sable, I think the most likely scenario is he makes the opening day roster, he plays until Mitch Hanegar comes back,

and he is DFA'd when Mitch Hanegar comes back. And, you know, to be fair, we don't have a specific timetable. He has to return to his other, you know, so maybe he's fantomiled. I don't know. Yeah, that's kind of where I thought you were going with that. Yeah, he has to return. So he can't be – there's a lot of DFAing in San Francisco where they try to DFA a guy

when everybody else's roster is set so nobody else wants to drop a guy. But with the Rule 5, the roster sought is... I suppose by that time, Roberto Perez could be hurt or they could decide that at 34, Perez doesn't have anything left in the tank if he's not hitting well. I mean, in 2021, Roberto Perez had a 56 WRC plus,

and that probably does not carry even the best framing and blocking. So if he comes out of the gate, if they keep Sable and Perez comes out of the gate that bad and Henniger comes back, they could possibly just release Roberto Perez. You know, the part of this that makes this interesting to me and I think makes it relevant for this show is that, as you mentioned, Sable catches. He also can play some outfield. He can obviously DH.

So being on the Giants, there's kind of the double-edged sword here of that they're always manipulating the roster and the lineup. Nobody's really a regular. Very few people are regular. So he could be a part of that mix and give them maybe a third catcher if Perez sticks around. And at the same time, give them some flexibility. And that could provide enough playing time to make Sable relevant in some deeper leagues.

It's an interesting depth chart. Yeah, with the catcher eligibility. I mean, that actually could give him a little bit of value. It's an interesting depth chart right now because with Hanegar out, I think Conforto is like one of the few people that I think will play every day. And in fact, as bad as Mike Jastrzębski has been against lefties, I think

you kind of almost have to play him every day. You cannot platoon more. The math says you can't platoon more than three spots on the roster. You can only have four guys on the bench and one has to be a backup catcher. Even with Sable in there, you can count him as one of the platoon guys, you can't platoon every spot on the roster. So I think Conforto, Yastrzemski, Crawford are everyday players. David Villar is hurt currently, but we's the next update on him. Yeah.

So let's get right to that then. Uh, so yeah, VR is dealing with the left hip flexor strain, but he is expected to be back in a few days. Uh, of course, you know, there being an expectation that doesn't always translate into, uh, you know, something that, that is actually going to happen. So that's a situation that we have to watch, But I think VR could be on that short list of players that plays pretty close to every day. And he's barely inside the top 600 in ADP and NFBC leagues. So that to me seems pretty low for somebody who put up some monster power numbers in the minors.

I think acquitted himself pretty well when coming up with the Giants last year. So assuming that he does come back pretty quickly, where do you see him fitting in fantasy-wise? I don't know. He's a weird player because he hits the ball in the air a lot. And not so much that I'd be worried about his BABIP. But enough that you think, okay, he had a.224 ISO last year.

I believe it. He had a 9% barrel rate. That's I'm like, Ooh, okay. 220 ISO and a 9% barrel rate. And then you see the max EV 106 max EV raw power 55 grade from fan graphs. It's it's a weird package cause it doesn't come with a hit tool either. So it's a sluggers package, but a sluggers package without the kind of raw exit velocities you'd expect. Yeah, no, it's really reliant on that fly ball rate. Yeah. And it, it just makes me nervous.

You put in tandem with that park, uh, I'm not in on him longterm. Short term, you know, it looks like there's runway for him. And like you said, like I was saying, I think you have to play guys every day. In fact, now that I said Jastrzemski, I think maybe Jastrzemski is still in a platoon with Slater because they've really avoided playing him against lefties and they've really avoided playing Lamont Wade against lefties. So, you know, if we're going strict platoon stuff here, we're talking about a platoon of Jastrzemski and Slater and Wade and Davis. That's bad for J.D. Davis because he's a righty.

However, J.D. Davis hits the ball really hard, and I like him. So I think J.D. Davis is a little bit of a threat to David Villar's playing time over at third. So, you know, I'd try to keep Peterson out of the field, but you can't put Davis in the outfield. So maybe Peterson plays the field some, Davis gets some burn as the everyday DH or, you know, shares it with a lot Wade. That's, that's sort of how I see things playing out is Davis gets a little bit more playing time with his injury at the beginning. Sable makes the roster as a backup outfielder and catcher.

He doesn't play that much. The name that I'm circling that's coming up that might matter this year, we talked about Isan Diaz because Derek liked him. I don't think he's already been optioned. Derek liked him. I don't think he's already been optioned. Blake Wisely is in camp as, I think, a Rule 5 pick from the Rays, or maybe just a pickup from the Rays.

I don't know if he's making the roster either. Casey Schmidt is a name I think you need to store in your memory banks. Casey Schmidt was only 8% better than league average in AAA last year, but it was 16 plate appearances. If you look at his AA, he was 44% better than league average, made contact, had power, and most importantly, is a whiz defensively. And I think in this league, in this time of shift rules, regulation changes, a little bit more emphasis on defense,

and Brandon Crawford being near the end of his career, Tyra Estrada being, I think, a borderline shortstop. They've been playing Casey Schmidt at shortstop. Casey Schmidt replaced Marco Luciano at shortstop at the end of the season, and people by most reports said it was okay. So there's a couple ways there for Casey Schmidt to make the roster. And if I don't love VR's profile, that means that that's one of the weakest places, one of the easiest points of entry, I think. So that's why I like J.D. Davis.

And in keeper leagues, Casey Schmidt is a bit of a stash. That's a deep keeper league probably because he's not like a top 100 prospect, but it is someone I'm circling. Okay. Well, I need to take a second here and take David VR out of my score sheet queue. My pick's not for a while, so I can revisit that later. But let's take a look at a couple of notes from the Tigers. And kind of in the same category we were talking before with Sable and the catcher eligibility, Eric Haas. Of course, we know he's been logging time behind the plate for the Tigers for a couple of seasons now. And a report from MLB.com that he's going to play a little bit more in left field over the remainder of spring training with the intention of getting him in left field over the remainder of spring training with the intention of getting him in left field more during the regular season. So again, with him

already having the catcher eligibility, certainly catching a good deal during the regular season as well. That's, you know, somebody who's, who's got some proven power can already can, you know, you can pencil them in as your, your second catcher in most formats. And now maybe with the promise of a little bit more playing time. Yeah, Badu's not having a great time of it this spring. He's got about 32 plate appearances with 200 batting average and one homer. I don't know. He was a Rule 5 pick to begin with

and had a little bit of a bump in his first outing, his first Major League experience, but since then has really struggled. I circled Matt Vierling as a name I like because he hits the ball hard and just waiting for him to kind of lift it a little better but Vierling got hurt and you know so now I think that has something to do with what Haas is doing as well as he's having an amazing spring really and then there's the fact that he's probably not the greatest defensive catcher. But maybe he's

enough to have in there. It's going to be interesting if Sands makes this team. Donnie Sands, if he's going to have to make this team if Haas is playing the outfield. Because almost every manager wants to have a catcher on the bench. So if you have Haas in left and Rodgers behind the plate, you might need Sands. So really that's why these sort of catcher slash OFs or catcher slash whatevers are awkward and usually short-term situations

because you have to know whether or not he counts as a catcher and you have to have a catcher on the bench. You know? Yep. And if Sands makes this team, so I think maybe it's a nod to the fact that maybe Vierling isn't going to be ready for opening day with his knee sprain. Because otherwise, you'd want to have a bench spot for Vierling,

a bench spot for backup short, so that's either Matan or Kreidler, and a bench spot for catcher, so that's three bench spots. And then if you had Haas there as a starting catcher, you'd have to have another catcher. Am I doing this right? I think so. Again, then you'd have Sands

filling that role. You'd have Sands. And Kerry Carpenter I think has to make this team, and I think we've run out of bench spots. All right. Well, you know, we can see, first of all, how this trial in left field goes, see what the other dominoes, what happens with those. Yeah. The other thing is, Boudou doesn't even make the major league team and that creates a roster opening and you can have Vierling, Haas and Kerry Carpenter out there.

Another possibility for sure. And then just one more note here. This is not going to be anything that is at all relevant for redraft this year, but something that fans just in general and those playing dynasty formats will want to be aware of Jackson. Job is going to be out for three to six months with lumbar spine inflammation. So unfortunate news for one of the tigers. Rough dude. Top prospects there. Yeah.

Very, very rough. So three to six months. And like they didn't even say surgery is imminent did they not yet no maybe too early to know wow but uh yeah obviously if you've got them like i do in uh dynasty leagues then that's a situation you need to track track closely it's very disappointing whoa what are you listening to this for wait who's talking you know you're driving

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Available hot or iced, only at Tim's. All right, well, let's move on to talking about some position battles. We'll lump the hitters together first and got some kind of juicy ones with back of the rotation battles as well. But the first, okay, it's a little bit of false advertising maybe because I want to start with Brett Beatty. And I don't know if there is technically a position battle going on. I have not seen anything that he's in competition with Eduardo Escobar. And yet you look at the spring that Beatty's having, you look at the upside. So I don't know. Is there a battle? Should there be a battle? Do you see a path for Brent Beatty to be a starter on opening day? I think it does matter how much they're focused on him

lifting the ball because right now he has even increased what used to be a poor ground ball rate even further. He now has four and a half ground outs to every air out. As an example to compare him on the other extreme, Pete Alonzo has.8 ground outs for every air out. And Lindor even has 0.6. You know, even McNeil, 0.8. Escobar, 0.5.

So everybody else is lifting it. He's banging it into the ground. I think that has been the only sort of question mark that people have had about him. And he said to me in the past, like, I just hit the ball hard. So, you know, we could build a bench for these Mets. I think you've got to have, you know, you've got to have a backup center fielder, backup catcher, backup shortstop. Backup center fielder, you can probably get by with Marte, but Nimmo Marte is a really old

center fielder. Let's say you've got Marte who starts and right as your backup center fielder. That affords you an extra bench spot. You've got to have Luis Guillerme on the team. You've got to have Thomas Nito on the team. That's two. So we have two more spots for the bench. And Tommy Pham has one of them. Right. So that leaves, without just straight up cutting somebody, that leaves one roster spot left.

You could start Beatty at third, Escobar at second, and push Nick Neal to the outfield, except you have four really credible Major League outfielders. You could push Escobar to DH. That would cause you to drop. You'd have to cut Ruff or Vogelbach. Right. So it is a little bit of Beatty versus Ruff. That would cause you to drop. You'd have to cut rough or full Vogelbach. Right.

So it is a little bit of Beatty versus rough, which actually makes it a little bit more palatable, given that rough has half as many plate appearances as Beatty and has a 143 average. So he might actually make this team. And then the question is just then what happens with him vis-a-vis Escobar does Escobar you know get get a super utility role or how does that play out so but at least there's you have to have the path to the opening day roster first so the opening day roster spot like yes you could put him on this team over rough however in terms

of everyday playing time, which seems to be an important thing for a young prospect, I don't see it, you know? So I almost see them just taking Ruff because it's easier for them to just have – he just comes and hits against lefties, you know? He's basically like a pinch hitter. Can go to AAA and work on lifting the ball and work on his defense. Yeah, that's how I see it.

I think that's what I'm thinking. All right. Well, the Dodgers center field situation I think is pretty interesting. Of course, there's Jason Hayward in that mix. And I was kind of surprised. I think this came up two, three weeks ago talking about whether or not Hayward could play center. And he played 20 some odd games there last season.

I didn't realize it was that many. James Altman's having a really good spring. He can play center. Trace Thompson, that's actually who Fangraphs has on their roster resource chart. But this, to me, looks pretty wide open. Hayward acquitted himself pretty well by outs above average. He's a plus one in the outfield and near some centerfielders

such as Adolis Garcia, Riley Green, even Kevin Kiermaier last year, although that comes with a big asterisk because that was an injured Kevin Kiermaier. He would usually have much better numbers than that, but better than Roman Quinn, better than Mickey Moniak. These are guys who are playing center field. So I guess he can play there. His hitting this spring has not been good. He has two homers, but 379 slugging despite a 273 OBP. Altman has been the one who's been hitting the ball the best, but if I remember correctly, Altman is a righty. I think that comes against him a little bit.

They do like to platoon. Nope, Outman is a lefty. That's good. So, I don't know. Trace Thompson is the righty, and he has half the plate appearances of the other two guys and the worst line. he has half the plate appearances of the other two guys and the worst line so uh if outman makes the team maybe trace still makes the team as the righty component of a platoon out there

um do they have enough room to have to have all three guys on the roster i kind of doubt it yeah i was going to say that seems kind of unlikely. Seems very outfield heavy when you consider that Chris Taylor can play out there too. Well, they don't have that much invested in Jason Hayward, honestly. And so I think it looks a little bit like Altman versus Hayward. Because you don't really want Altman and Hayward on the team in a platoon version. Even as bad as Trace Thompson has been, it'd be more useful to have a righty, especially since David Peralta is a lefty that sometimes you want to platoon. So do you platoon

with Chris Taylor and Peralta? You can't platoon Chris Taylor with both Peralta and James Outman. It doesn't work. Yeah, that doesn't work. It's against physics. So there is a bit of a thing there. With Taylor's versatility, you do buy yourself a roster spot in terms of bench,

but you still need to have some bodies that can play center. This is a tough one. I'm just going to say, I think Altman still has a real chance to carve out a two-thirds playing time center field versus righties role here. He's the one playing the best. They have most of the years of control with him. They're the most invested in him. Hayward is just a guy in camp. Hayward's not going to hit better than... I don't think that... Oh, look at this. Hayward is a safe bet to be on the Dodgers opening day roster.

Dave Roberts tilled Fabian on Wednesday. Way to complicate things. But that was uh on that was 10 days ago i think a lot can change um i would say okay so let's handicap this i would say outman is my favorite for the center field role all well, we have to save our odd man out. They could maybe have Hayward backing him up, and Trace Thompson doesn't make this team, but that is awkward from a handedness standpoint.

Yeah. There are a few other outfields here. I mean, I think that one's really the most interesting, potentially the most impactful, but also the Marlins. It looks like it's come down to a battle for the last starting outfield spot, Jesus Sanchez and Brylin De La Cruz. It does seem like De La Cruz is more the favorite in fantasy. I think Sanchez has got more upside.

I think he put up one of those lines last year that wasn't reflective of the skills and particularly the power that he has. So I'm sort of rooting for Sanchez, but I think this could go either way. And the plate appearances say you are correct because 28 plate appearances to Jesus Sanchez and 27 to Brian De La Cruz, this is a real platoon, but this is a real battle. This is what a position battle looks like. When you have the exact same amount of plate appearances. I hate to say that results might matter in this case because it's it's it's kind of sad to like make a decision based on 35

plate appearances or whatever it's going to be in the end but Sanchez hasn't hit a homer yet and has four extra base hits Brian Lillicruz has five extra base hits including a homer and so his slugging percentage is higher but sanchez has struck out just a scooch less and has actually walked and has shown more speed on the base pass so this i don't really know how you figure this one out i know that brian de la cruz was one of the biggest improvers in barrel rate in the end of the season. And so if you think that is going to stick, you could project him for better even than the league average-ish power that he's projected for. But he's going to probably strike out a quarter of the time.

And Sanchez came with a better baseline of barrel rate over his career has had better max EVs is projected for better power the same kind of strikeout rate what about defense though you you're about to put your second baseman in center, and he's been hurt a fair amount. I think Brian De La Cruz is closer to being a center fielder than Jesus Sanchez. Well, I'll throw one more factor out there, which is that Sanchez doesn't have options.

Oh, no, that's it. Dude, that is so important in these things. Yeah, and I'm looking at the ADP. I want to make sure what I said before was right. Yeah, Dela Cruz is far more popular. He's basically 12-team relevant. He's getting drafted 238 ADP in NFBC. The options thing is so big.

Yeah. I mean, I don't know that the Marlins will run like the Rays, but, like, for example, right now the Rays are running out. What is his name? Luke Raley. Oh, yeah. Every day in spring training, just trying to see if there's something there

because they don't have any more options on them if they dfa and then lose him and you anybody who's like sort of yelling to their blue in the face about curtis mead or jonathan aranda or any of their uh their prospects coming up like uh even cal monzardo you know how the rays work lu Luke Raley is much more likely to make the opening day roster than somebody who has options. So if Kim Eng is running her team, anything like the Rays, it will be Jesus Sanchez. And that was an amazing, that was off the top rope. I love it. That's enough of a tiebreaker for me that Jesus makes his team. That improves Jesus. I have Jesus in a couple of places just because I like his barrel rate. I like his max TV. I like his power potential.

This is a team that does not have much power potential. Um, you know, and so they went real heavy on the contact, but they're going to need power from somewhere. And all they've got right now is Solaire and the corpse of Abbas, I'll Garcia. So they need a little bit more oomph, and Jesus Sanchez could give that to them.

All right. So there are three other situations that I wanted to talk about, but I'm not sure any of them is necessarily worth that much discussion. So I'm just going to toss these out and tell me if there's one or none that matter. The Cubs and the outfield DH mix, you've got Mike Tauchman, and I saw some,

and I wish I could remember who it was from, but some sort of report saying that he's getting an increasingly good chance of making the roster. So Mike Tauchman, Edward Rios, and Christopher Murrell. And then with the Royals,

you've got basically the Drew Waters replacement, Edward Olivares, or Nate Eaton. Eaton at least brings a little bit of steals potential. And then the Oakland center fielder I think was a couple weeks back presumed to be Astoria Ruiz, but Christian Pache is still in that mix. So which one of these, if any, do you think matters? I think the Cubs one matters, but Morell is fairly safe because he can also play third.

And Patrick Wisdom has some killer platoon splits and may need a caddy at third base. Morell has even played some shortstop for them, so I don't think there's any way he doesn't make that team. But Tauchman could make this team over Edwin Rios just because of defensive value. Edwin Rios is a corner infield outfield DH type that has been able to hit the ball hard in the past. He's not even listed when I look at outfielders on the Cubs on MLB. I have to look at all positions for him to show up as a third baseman. He's hitting the ball hard again, but that's about all he's doing.

If Tauchman makes this team, it is over Edwin Rios. And there's a possibility of that. They have enough first base DH types, and Mervis is on the way behind them. So I don't think they even necessarily need a ton of depth there. Maybe they try to sneak him onto the opening day roster with a Suzuki injury and then DFA him at a time where other teams' rosters are set and keep him in the organization. So that's about the best I can do for Rios. You had on there, who else?

You had the... Oh, the center field battle for Oakland and also then the third outfielder for the Royals. Yeah. I don't love either player. They both have options. I'm just guessing that Ruiz as the as the centerpiece of that the the newest trade makes the opening day roster um maybe they just maybe they go with both and uh

my guy connor capel who is playing well in the uh and even jj bluledet is playing well in the spring. So they've got a bit of a glut there. I think Bledet got sent down, not to say that he couldn't be up fast. Did he? Let's check. That would open it up a little bit for Pache. Yep. Okay. So if he's sent down, I think maybe both can make it. Pache is a really good defensive defender and uh i know you know how many times can you send him down tell him to work on his bat you know maybe he

just needs to do it in the major leagues um the royals one uh you did you didn't even mention isbel did you uh no i think he's from everything i've read he's a lock okay he's the lock so it's it's who's behind isbell you're talking about. Waters is hurt. And so it's Bradley, Eaton, or Oliveras. Right. I didn't even include Bradley, but I guess we toss him in there as well. It's a bit of just a mess overall because I don't know if it's just center field.

So Waters starts on the IL. Isbell is a starter somewhere. Does that make Melendez a starter somewhere else? Probably mostly DH. Little outfield. Obviously catching. Yeah. This is a really interesting roster. I would just guess that Olivares makes it because I think he's a decent player.

And I think that even Eaton can make it with the Waters injury. he's a decent player. And I think that even Eaton can make it with the Waters injuries. So you'd start with Isbel, Oliveras, Eaton, and Melendez as a sometimes outfielder. I think they all make it. Alright, well let's move on to pitching then. And we kind of gave a little bit of short shrift to that Oakland outfield situation but I think that the fifth starter

battle there is a really really interesting one. Adam Oller if I recall I think he's a guy hasn't he scored well with Stuff Plus I seem to recall you liking him Kyle Muller was somebody I really liked last year in the Braves system

Ken Waldachuk coming over from the Yankees. They're all battling for that spot. Yeah, I believe Aller is a guy. He's a one-pitch guy in Stuff Plus. Oh, his sinker is actually above average. His four-seam is around average. He's actually a no-pitch guy, in fact, in terms of his secondaries aren't very good. Well, maybe I'm misremembering that.

Yeah. I'm not that big on Ahler. Muller has a good curveball, I believe, uh, none of his other pitches, uh, really scale that well. Waldo Chuck is my guy and I know, uh, that he's been struggling this spring, but his last outing was much better. And, uh, he is still, uh, he is still my favorite among these people. I don't have Kyle Muller's. I have one start of his, 89 stuff plus, and I have no Uller, and I have no Walda Chuck. So I'm going on last year's numbers, and by last year's numbers, it's

easily Walda Chuck. I think in terms of options, they all have options too. So I'm sticking with Waldo Chuck. I think in terms of options, they all have options too. So I'm sticking with Waldo Chuck. All right. The, the Braves one's really interesting. Ian Anderson sent down. So you've got Dylan Dodd and Jared Schuster both competing for that spot. Not something I think many of us foresaw going into spring training, but both have put up some, some good minor league numbers. And Dodd's having a really nice spring. Yeah, Dodd and Schuster have really poor stuff plus numbers

in my model. Dodd has been locating the ball really well, but that's not something you can believe in small samples. I'll put Dodd ahead of Schuster based on that location numbers. But, uh, you know, in terms of location, you, you want like 300 pitches. I got 44 in here. Um,

but 44 is enough to say that maybe he's not, doesn't have great stuff. Um, especially wouldn't be surprising for someone you hadn't heard of until just night. You know what I mean? Who's doesn't even have uh uh fan graphs scouting grades on his pitches and uh had a you know some spots with good strikeout rates in the

minors um but not uh anything that you'd be really uh impressed looking at projections for mid-fours ERA. I don't really know why they did this. They could have kept Ian Anderson up. There's an injury, right? What's the injury in the rotation? Because otherwise, it would just be Soroka as the five. Yeah. I mean, not anybody that you would think would really be in this mix.

Colby Allard and Waskar Yanoa. We've got Freed, Wright, Morton, Strider. None of those guys are hurt. Yeah, see if I'm looking. Morton just did a start. Yeah, I don't think I'm missing anybody. Wright. Bryce Elder got sent down.

Oh, Wright's shoulder through two innings went down to backfield. Wright, which we, yeah, we talked about that a little bit earlier. So he's got a, so that, okay. That's how I see it. Dodd makes this rotation if Wright doesn't make opening day.

Otherwise, Soroka is number five. That's how I see it. Okay, okay. And again, as of right now,oka is the number five that's that's how i see it okay okay and again uh as of right now right is slated to start in that uh early april series has a hamstring but he's throwing live bat in practice so yeah okay all right dot is dot is the sixth starter the guy who steps in if there's an injury otherwise soroka is the fifth because ian anderson was already sent down right so soroka is the fifth and Ian Anderson was already sent down. Right. So Soroka is the fifth and then Dodd is the injury replacement. All righty.

Let's move on to Arizona. We've got at least four in contention here. And I think the one that a lot of us are rooting for is Brandon Fott having a really good spring. But there are three others who have already made their debuts. I don't know what the pecking order is here. Tommy Henry, Dre Jameson, Ryan Nelson. I would think that Fott would just be the one to target because even if he's not their opening day, maybe it's not long.

And I would expect he'd perform the best out of the four. Fott has the best stuff plus. Second is Nelson. Third is Jameson. second is Nelson third is Jameson that might be surprising because Jameson has gained more velo than almost any other pitcher I think he's in the top three in velo gain this spring but the models never really loved his shapes and if I remember correctly, it's because the slider is okay, the foreseam is okay, the curveball and the change are poorly rated. So it's kind of a reliever package for me.

I think Fott has the biggest upside. I think you're right to say that. Nelson is really struggling in terms of results on the field. It could go either way. Fahd is the guy I want to own the most in Dynasty Leagues. I think Nelson is the guy, but obviously this one's turning on me. Nelson's been a guy that I've called and liked, and I'm going to stick with him here as the most likely fifth starter there

in the short term. But honestly, you can hear the doubt creeping into my voice here. Yeah, you're talking yourself out of it. Yeah. All right. We've got two more. The Rays, Luis Patino in that mix, Yanni Chirinos coming back and in that mix. And Josh Fleming, you know, he's been in that kind of up and down

sixth starter role for a while. So Patino, Chirinos, Fleming, anybody that you like there or anybody that you see with a clear leg up. Yeah, the innings pitched battle, the flip side of the plate appearance battle, the innings pitch battle might go to patino uh he's got five and a third um who is he battling against yanni chirinos has four and has really struggled in terms of results and fleming did have a good

outing recently and oh no fleming's got 11 innings pitched, but he also six earned runs. So it could really be Fleming. If he's got twice as many innings as Patino, even if Patino goes out and throws three next time out, he's a turn behind Fleming. And that is what the team usage says. I just want to say real quickly, though, and pimp my piece, I've got a piece up today about biggest stuff plus gainers this spring, and it's Patino.

Patino is on that list. And right now his forese seam fastball and slider doing really really well um and the the shape on that four seam has improved um that still makes him a two pitch pitcher but you know the rays they're okay with two pitch pitchers especially for five innings so uh patino is the guy i want to own. Unfortunately, Fleming seems like the guy that's going to slot in as the number five for now. Now, what's interesting to me, maybe apropos of nothing, is that Patino and Chirinos, both of them are barely in the top 700 in NFBC ADP. top 700 in nfbc adp uh there are 22 raised pitchers listed in adp and the very last one the lowest one at 750 is josh fleming nobody wants to see josh fleming win this apparently yeah not even me give it to my stuff is dude it's patino's time there you go i mean uh fleming has a 493 career

era 643 last year i mean he's probably a little better than that let me see what uh my model has in store for him mr fleming come on down not william josh 405RA, 1670 strikeout rate. So my model does like him a little better than the public projections, but that's damning with fate and praise. I think Fleming is a week one play in AL only leagues. All right. Well, let's finish with sort of a free for all in Cincinnati. I think we've got three spots locked up there.

Of course, Hunter green and Nicola Dolo at the top Graham Ashcraft who left, I think it was his last start left early, but I think it was just a cramp. So he's online to, to make another start, I think in the next few days. And then that leaves the rest of the rotation totally up for grabs.

Connor Overton has struggled, but had a good outing his last time out. You've got Luis Sessa, Luke Weaver, Chase Anderson, all familiar names. And then the prospect, Brandon Williamson, also competing. Do you like anybody out of that group? And again, two spots open. And again, two spots open. I have no stuff plus numbers for these players. I'm flying blind.

Brandon Williamson has seven innings pitched to Luke Weaver's five and two-thirds. Brandon Williamson has a nine ERA. Luke Weaver has an 11 ERA. Connor Overton has six and two-thirds and he has a 14.9 era so uh be careful out there folks i would say the thing that makes this really rough is that um that park is so terrible that park i think i think I had Nicola Dolo as like a 3-6 or something like that, a 3-6 context-neutral ERA projection. And then once we put the context in, it went to like 4-1, 4-2.

So it's a tough park. And so I think I'm going to take the pass. I'm going to hit the pass button on all of these guys. But it is worth mentioning that Brandon Williamson has the best strikeout rate out of all of them. And if you were going to look at something in this smallest sample, that's as good as any. All right. Well, and I'll just, yeah. And I'll just put it, put in my word for Graham Ashcraft, uh, because we talked about Ranger

Suarez on the Thursday show and in the context of him having a forearm issue, which is, which is scary, but, uh, to me, it's kind of similar appeal, like somebody who can get a lot of ground balls in a tough, tough home park, and right now, he's got a little bit of a health issue, but better health than Suarez, so just something maybe to keep in mind is, you know, in that context that you raised, you know, like the

Kyle Gibson, you know, type late safety pick. Well, before we wind up here, I know you'd wanted to talk about some stuff plus standouts. I don't know if we've left enough time for you to really dig in, but anybody worth tossing out before we wind up? Yeah, I've got that piece up about stuff plus surgers,

so I'll leave the surgers there. If we want to look at the laggards uh as you know standout can go in either direction that's true the laggards adam wainwright has the largest drop in stuff plus among any starting pitcher this spring that's pitching from the machines he has a 77 stuff plus which is believable because his fastball is topping out at 86. Adam Wainwright may have the biggest down arrow on any of my non-injured pitchers in my rankings. And every time I open up my rankings, I push them down a couple more. So that's a name I'm looking to avoid right now. Yanni Chirinos, with the bad results, also has an 82 stuff plus to back that up.

So I think Yanni is not going to end up being the option there in Tampa. Chris Bassett's down to 82. This includes his last stat, so it's 130 pitches. That is not good news although his velocity keeps creeping up he said that his velocity is down on purpose I don't know if I believe anybody who says something like that but his velocity was creeping up I saw some 93s when I saw him in Florida last week and so if we can see some 94s, maybe that stuff number will jump up. Ryan Nelson down from 115 to 101 is on this list.

Alec Manoa didn't have a good stuff plus and is now down to 87 on this list with 149 pitches. Possible we're missing something there, but it's still something to monitor, especially when given his poor projections everywhere else. Yusei Kikuchi's stuff pluses down, and he never had good command. And who else do I have on this list? I have Jared Schuster showing up as someone whose stuff pluses down. Rich Hill's stuff pluses down, and 129 pitches to 87. He is just going to be someone they use

to keep Luis Ortiz's numbers down because I'm not going to tell you about Luis Ortiz because he's in my piece, but the numbers are bonkers. Mackenzie Gore's stuff pluses down to 93 this spring. That's not great. And so that is, we're going to define stand out in the negative way because why not i did the positive way on the piece today all right well we're choosing here to

end the week on a downer ah well it's friday at least that'll that'll balance things out and here at least the weather is turning so i hope you are, there's at least a little glimmer of hope on the weather scene. There is, yeah. East Coast here, weather improving as well. So I guess it's a good week, a good way as any to end up the week. So I will just finish up here with the usual reminder that if you have questions for us, things that we haven't talked about or follow-ups to things we have talked about, you can reach us by email at ratesandbarrels at gmail.com. And

that's ratesandbarrels all spelled out. You can reach us on Twitter. Eno is at Eno Saris. I'm at almelkeorbb. You can also ask questions in the comments of this here YouTube video, if that's what you happen to be watching right now. So anyways, thank you so much for tuning in. Hope you all have a great weekend and we will be back here on Monday. Thank you.