Rates & Barrels - Pitcher Week, Part 2!

Episode Date: February 6, 2020

Rundown1:16 Assessing the Pending Mookie Betts Deal14:09 Adjusting Expectations for David Price in LA?27:07 Back Surgery for James Paxton37:54 'Sleeper' Starters47:23 Choosing the Astros' No. 5 Starter55:52 Will MacKenzie Gore Make the Opening Day Roster?60:59 Digging Deep Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarrisFollow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRipere-mail: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels, episode number 67. It is February 6th. Derek Van Ryper here with Eno Saris. On this episode, Pitcher Week rolls on. We will discuss discounted starting pitchers we like, also known as sleepers in some circles, and take a crack at breaking down this year's closer pool. But of course, we'd be remiss not to discuss the still pending, at the time of this recording at least, the potential blockbuster trade that should send Mookie Betts to the Dodgers along with David Price. We'll talk about that deal on this episode as well. Housekeeping first, we are available on iTunes, Spotify, Stitcher, pretty much anywhere you want to listen to podcasts. If you're enjoying this

show on a platform that allows you to rate and review it, we really appreciate that. And tell your friends if you think they would like the show as well. If you're not already a subscriber to The Athletic, you can get a subscription 40% off at theathletic.com slash ratesandbarrels. Check out everything we just launched in our new draft kit and all the great coverage across all major sports. You know, I hope this deal doesn't get reversed or basically never processed

as a result of some lingering concerns, but Ken Rosenthal reporting kind of overnight Wednesday into Thursday, there's a hangup in the medicals with Brewster Gratterall, the prospect going from the twins to the Red Sox as part of what would be a three team deal. I think everyone knows by now everything that's involved, but Mookie Betts and David Price, the Dodgers,

Alex Verdugo and Gratterall to Boston and Kenta Maeda to Minnesota are the principles of that trade. And then there's a second trade with the Dodgers and Angels that we'll get to in just a minute that sort of hinges on all this falling into place as well. But just your overall reactions, now that you've had a couple days to let this proposed trade really sink in, how do you feel about this for each of the three teams involved? I hated it for Boston. I mostly hate it because they paid down half of the deal

for David Price. I think if you pay down half of David Price's deal, it no longer becomes as much of an underwater contract. I don't think anybody really wants to pay three years and $93 million for David Price. If you're saying, would to pay three years and $93 million for David Price. But if you're saying, would someone pay three years and $45 million for David Price, the same offseason that Dallas Keiko got $55? I think so. I think somebody would do that. And if they wouldn't, they wouldn't do it by $5 million or something. We're talking about making that deal almost palatable. So if that deal is almost palatable,

now you're talking about trading an at-price, pun intended, I guess, at-price price with an underpriced superstar basically projected to be the second best player in the game. And what you're getting back is i think he's slightly above league average uh for as a corner outfielder alex verdugo but he has character issues he has injury issues he doesn't have much patience and he's projected to be not to be an asset in in the outfield so you're betting a lot on that plus hit tool that he's got.

Maybe elite hit tool, but that's about all you're getting for that. And then Bruce Dargradarol, who I like as a reliever, but in order to depend on a lot of production out of a reliever, you need them to be sort of a top 10, top 15 reliever over a three-year span. Those are the only relievers that put up four wins of value. There's only 10 to 15 players in any three-year span, any 10 to 15 relievers in a three-year span that give you like four wins. If you get more like three wins from him, which is why I think this deal has fallen apart, is they say, okay, we've now seen the medicals. We now know exactly how injury prone he is. He also doesn't have great

command and doesn't have a good changeup. But we thought maybe we could alter those given that he throws so hard and he has a really good slider. We thought we could make him, but these medicals say he's a reliever. Now we're getting two or three wins out of a reliever and a league average corner outfielder for the second best player in baseball and a well-priced starting pitcher. So I think that's why the deal has been scuttled. I don't know who has to give up more. I think the Dodgers have to give up more. So I think they're going to have to find an extra piece.

And honestly, that's how most of these deals go. There's usually another piece, like an A-ball guy. There's a person you can dream on that's in the piece, in the trade. And that wasn't in this trade, which is kind of remarkable. So I don't think that they're going to give up any of their top five guys. They're not giving up Kybert Ruiz or Dustin May or any of those guys. But down ballot on their thing, their ninth or tenth best prospect, another arm to give the Red Sox a chance at getting a starter out of this,

yeah, I think that's what's going to have to happen to make this deal more even. And once that happens, i guess i could see why everybody's doing it um but i got a lot of pushback for saying negative things about gratterall but you know i think this this the way this has turned out uh you can see that um i was right well i think with gratterall like there the idea that he can't be a starter, it's a question of whether or not he develops that changeup or some other third pitch. He could. It's true. I mean, he's young enough.

But you kind of need the volume of the reps to get there, and he hasn't really shown that he can do that yet. Right, and my assessment as I thought more about the trade was that maybe the Twins saw a path for that to happen, but they thought it was going to take a couple of years before he'd be ready to contribute to a playoff caliber rotation. And they said, you know what? Yeah, he could help us as a reliever right now. We actually have a pretty good bullpen. Let's go ahead and let someone else try and develop him as a starter. And if he turns into an elite closer, oh, well, we're getting Kenta Maeda.

And they needed another starting pitcher. And they got one who's very affordable. And they're in a situation where because the Twins don't have the loaded pitching depth within the organization that the Dodgers have had for several years, I think Kenta Maeda's workload holds up all the way through September. Like the move to the bullpen to limit the innings and keep them from hitting incentive clauses. I'm not sure about that. I don't think that's going to happen. I don't think they have a choice. I don't think they can afford that

luxury. I think they can pay them. Think about all the other people that they've signed. I mean, I know that they're not exciting names, but in particular, think about Rich Hill. They could actually pull the same shenanigans, the exact same shenanigans that the Dodgers pulled when Rich Hill comes healthy and they say,

you know what, we'll keep your salary down, you're flagging anyway, and welcome to the bullpen, Quinta Maeda. I think if he's pitching well, they're not going to do that. If he gives them a reason to, sure, they have a path to continue getting value out of him in a different role, but they're relying on Michael Pineda, who's suspended to begin the season,

has had some pretty nasty arm injuries, Homer Bailey, who could be near the end of his career, Yolis Chassin, who probably won't be on the roster after May 1st, and then a lot of soft tossers like Dobnik and Smeltzer. We've talked about Louis Thorpe as a guy that I kind of like as a deep sleeper, and Rich Hill is lingering there as well. We know with Rich Hill, it's complicated. It's good innings when he's healthy,

but you just don't know really how many you're going to get. So there are a lot of questions about their depth that I think will prevent them from automatically doing that same thing with May. I think there's a chance we see him get to 180 innings this year. Fair, fair. And that has been holding him back. He's been 150 in the guy at most. I just, I don't see much upside in terms.

Oops, sorry. I said it. I don't see, I don't see much left in the projection in terms of, oh, they're going to tweak a pitch and this is going to happen. You know what I mean? Like at his age and with his history, I don't think they're going to find a mile per hour, you know? So I think that he's a more established, useful piece and that the everything that we could

get out of the innings that's good, we're also going to give back with having to face the DH and having to face some superior lineups in the AL. Now, we're not talking a lot about the Mookie Betts aspect of this trade because he's a superstar and he's going to put up big numbers with the Dodgers the same way he was going to put up big numbers with the Red Sox. There's not a whole lot to break down with that. But David Price going to the Dodgers is very interesting. I keep looking at that and saying, you know what? I probably wasn't going to have a lot of David

Price if he stayed in Boston just because of health concerns. He's probably still a significant risk, of course, going to the Dodgers in that regard but we've seen them manage their IL we've seen them leverage their depth to give guys brief intermissions during the season as needed and I just think David Price has quietly won himself a few more very productive years with the move to Los Angeles yeah and I you know uh Rasbaugh came out and said he dropped from about fourth to 15th in their in their metrics due to small changes in lineup effects the Dodgers scored I don't know something like 15 fewer runs last year than the Red Sox but that's something um I guess uh leadoff hitters in the NL score less often than the AL.

Probably has to do with the pitcher hitting ninth. And a slight par factor change. I can't imagine that the drop-off is that far. And given the way the Boston Red Sox might run this year and who else they might trade off, I can't imagine that the runs in RBI totals are that different from team to team. Now, home runs is interesting. I did look at Mookie Betts' spray chart, and he did hit most of his home runs down the line. And Fenway has this weird thing.

He kind of pulled most of his home runs, and Fenway has this weird thing where you'd think the big monster, the big monster. My God. What country am I from? What planet am I from? The German has shown up again. Jeez. The green monster. The big green monster.

You'd think that it would, what is it called, depress home runs, but once you hit a high drive, I have Boston as above average in terms of turning high drives into home runs. in terms of turning high drives into home runs and i actually have la as just you know one or two rungs below them so maybe there's a little bit that however center field in la is hugely friendly and mookie does hit a fair amount to center. I have, you know, like five to seven last year home runs to center. And so I think that Mookie, who has also shown the ability in the past to change his spray chart and has changed his spray chart to add more pull when he used to be more of a push and spray guy, I think that he could take advantage of LA. So to me, no change.

That's how I see it. That's how I've seen it the whole time. I don't think we're going to have to worry about him seeing fewer green lights. I mean, we saw kind of a lower end outcome with steals last year. He was 16 for 19 with the red socks i still think there's room for probably 25 bags at this point still runs really well it's on base like we talk about

all the time about how poorly stolen bases age though i mean i a guy like that i i wouldn't project for much more than 20 it is kind of wild though when you look at his batting average fluctuations over the last four years i mean as low as low as 264 in 2017, as high as 346 in 2018. And then you got a 318 back in 2016 and a 295 last year. And he puts a ton of balls in play, under 15% strikeout rate in all six big league seasons so far. Yeah. Refreshing this chart here to look at the batted ball sprays, the differences. And in fact, one of the big differences between 2017 and 2019, which should be

a good sign for him going to LA, is that he used to be more sort of strictly pull in 2017 and in 2019 he added this whole grouping of fly balls to center field so I think that's got to be seen as a good sign fly balls to center field are often outs but you have a couple more feet in their home runs so I think this is a good sign that he's been more balanced in 2019 than he was in the past. You know, 2017 being, you know, such a pull season, that means to me, like, he got more predictable, easier to defend, and easier to pitch to in some ways. Yeah, that's funny that it's just been such a, for an elite player especially, it's been such a series of adjustments to the approach underneath for Mookie Betts. As far as price goes, though, do you buy the assessment that I put out there that he's in a much better place now and is a lot more interesting from a fantasy perspective with this trade?

Yeah. I mean, to me, probably the two biggest winners in this whole trade thing are David Price and Ross Stripling. That's who I see as the big winners. David Price just gets, you know, just give him an out a game. You know, I think that'll be huge. Give him a couple Giants starts. As bad as the Orioles are, if you have to pitch to the Orioles in Baltimore, it sucks. The Giants are going to be otherworldly bad this year.

I mean, they are just going to be putrid. And he's going to get, what, three, four starts against them? Yeah. It's going to be lovely. So I would say that he's going to move up big time in my next ranks. And then Stripling, it is a wrong way move in terms of the DH, but a right way move in terms of innings pitched. And I see him as a baby Ryu because he told me himself

that he's patterned his game after 100 Ryu and that he just wants to have four or five pitches that he throws that he can command and he can throw at any count. And in a sort of increasingly guess-hitter game, I think that has been shown to be useful. There's not a lot of people like it. That's why we like Lewis Thorpe. We thought he had the potential to command multiple pitches that were good and throw at any time. But Stripling

has demonstrated that ability and has demonstrated skills in terms of strikeout percentage and strikeout against walks. I wouldn't say he's necessarily elite, but Mike Patriolo had a tweet about how he's top 10 in ex-WOLBA allowed in the last two or three years. So I think Stripling wins big time in this trade i think it's unfortunate that the dodgers had to do that part i mean it really reads as a salary dump to

to accommodate mookie and i think it's unfortunate they had to do that part i don't i think they can i think they can recover on jock peterson i think matt matt baity plus obviously mookie betts you know matt baity brings up the replacement level the internal replacement level and mookie betts is a superior player you're fitting six six and a half wins into one roster spot you know that's that's superior to having a jock peterson but ross stripling was a bit of the glue so they're gonna have to depend on guys like tony gonsolin a little bit more. I'm not sure how much more I'm going to push Tony Gonsolin because just innings pitch projections in L.A. are terrible,

but I think we're going to see more of Tony Gonsolin this year. Yeah, definitely a guy that I'm more interested in now for NL-only leagues as kind of a bottom-of-the-rot rotation, two to $3 dart in the end game, because as a reliever, he'll be useful when he starts, he may have some spots where you're pretty comfortable with him, but if everybody's healthy, it's Kershaw,

Bueller, Price, Julio Urias, Dustin May, and they could use Alex Wood a lot. Like they've used Alex Wood in the past and Ross Stripling in the more recent past where he's that guy that really swings the most between back of the rotation and long man out of the bullpen. Alex Wood? Yeah,

as long as he's healthy too. That's the qualifier there, of course. He's also the guy without an option. So, you know, he's going to be up all year. And in fact, in some ways that makes him riskier in certain leagues. In certain leagues, you can put a guy on the bench if he's been demoted, but you can't otherwise. In those leagues, Alex Wood is a little bit more risky because he just may be a reliever for long stretches of the year. Whereas Tony Gonsolin and Dustin May are either up and starting or down. Gonsolin and Dustin May are either up and starting or down.

Gonsolin's a little bit hard to figure out. He could actually be up and relieving too. Yeah, I think with May they want to keep him stretched out and they want him to start. I think with Gonsolin they're going to tinker more with how they use him. He's also found money. I mean, this guy was nobody until they went to pitch design on him. And I have a long conversation with him about that that I haven't used yet. They basically found every pitch.

He was a reliever in A-ball, and then they made him. It's a weird way to think of it because obviously the player had to do the work, It's a weird way to think of it because obviously the player had to do the work. But they brought together a new breaking pitch and introduced a split finger and changed his arm slot a little bit. And boom. I wish the principles that major league teams now use to develop pitchers in pitching labs were applied to writers and podcasters. I want somebody else to bring out some previously untapped potential in me, even if it doesn't exist.

Someone should be able to do that. I'm hoping The Athletic has actually been like that for me because different outlets do demand different things of their writers and have different overarching themes and overarching values. And the one thing that The Athletic has always been about is, you know, don't worry too much about getting a piece out, you know, make it bigger, you know, think bigger bigger talk to more people put it together in a bigger way collaborate with somebody you know and um i don't know i think it i think it's been good for me i i could have i could have been cranking out fangrass pieces my whole life but i can take chances here for sure yeah things

have changed a little bit here so that's that been a positive. So my arm angle is slightly different. Still got a hip problem though according to every test you've been given so far, right? Oh, dude. I just went back to get some muscle activation technique yesterday. The thing that Boyder does, Matt Boyd. And I feel so good. I really do. I feel so good.

My Achilles stopped hurting. I can almost touch my toes like the first time in my life. And apparently, I retained all of the range of motion that we got in the last session. So I've got 90 degree range of motion in both of my hips. And there's still some ankle and hip stuff to keep working on, I think, maybe, but I feel really good. And I busted out my max six-mile run on a 9-10 pace. And I can do my three-and-a-half-mile run on an 8-15 pace. So I'm going to run this half marathon. Yeah, you're crushing right now. Yeah. Yeah, I'm feeling pretty good. Although it is funny to think that the 8.15 pace, I'm like, I'm running about as fast as I can. If I ran one mile

as fast as I could, I think it might be like seven minutes or something. Those people who do like two hour marathons are running like four and a half minute miles for a marathon. It's really amazing when you start to get into distance running to realize how much faster elite competitors are than you are. I could sprint and they'd beat me. Yeah, there was an advertisement. I think it was a couple of years ago now in New York on one of the subway platforms. And it was an Olympic marathon runner on a digital LED board running down the platform,

and people were trying to just run and keep up, and he's just dusting them. I mean, it's not like it's Usain Bolt running the 100. It's a guy running his marathon. This is mile 24. Just holding people, just crushing them, running down the platform. So, yeah, and you kind of touched on this. We'll kind of close the book on the Angels-Dodgers stuff real quick. You mentioned stripling on the move.

It's stripling and Jock Peterson and potentially Andy Pagas. I'm pretty sure it's Andy Pagas. That's where I'm at. It'd be weird if it was pages. It'll be very weird sure it's Andy Pagas. That's where I'm at. It'd be weird if it was pages. It'll be very weird if it's pages in this case. We'll have some backstory we haven't heard about. Yeah, exactly. And then the Dodgers side, Luis Ranjifo is going to the Dodgers and maybe other prospects. That's kind of hung up right now on Jock Peterson's arbitration hearing. I think there could be something going on with the other trade

also. That has to be finalized before this one can be finalized. But you mentioned Stripling as a big winner. Jock Peterson, maybe a slight downgrade, but not a massive one. In the AL, the lineup's going to turn over more. You talked about the effects of being a leadoff hitter in the AL versus the NL. So he'll get the same kind of little bump that mookie might be getting bounced down for so i don't know like this is a pretty interesting sub trade because we don't know the full scope of what the dodgers are getting back beyond ren hefo yeah but by my stack has park factors it is a downgrade to right field however those were implemented before last year the research was before last year and last year the anaheim dropped the wall in right field yeah they lowered it for uh for cole calhoun and shohei

otani yeah so i would actually uh and and like literally if you look at jock peterson's spray chart he like literally hits all his home i would say he hit 70 of his home runs last year in the place where they dropped the wall so he fits the park well yeah i think so he's i mean he's he's kind of a boring hitter in terms of just the things i was saying earlier it's like he's a little bit easier to pitch to you know what he wants to do he wants to yank it and he wants to yank it hard. However, he has decent play discipline, and he only swings at the pitches that he can drive for the most part. He has a pretty good hit tool, too. So, you know, I think maybe 36 was his peak in terms of home runs,

especially with his playing time, and especially with the fact that the ball was different and the fact that the Angels have Joe Adele waiting. So there's always the chance that something funky happens with playing time. But I also could see him playing first base after they finally buy out Albert Pujols. My God. Yeah, he's still there, still kicking.

Still there. I mean, I think with the amount of time that justin upton missed last season too this is a short-term problem for joe adele it hurts his 2020 redraft value yeah if upton you know is going to miss a lot of time or any of the regulars the outfield go down with a significant injury i think there's a really good chance that adele gets promoted then as opposed to playing you know brian goodwin every day like that's definitely an option the angels are still going to consider but it is the kind of thing that makes me less excited about taking a flyer on adele in the late rounds good good one's a good fourth outfielder and he may sneak himself into some time um here or there uh to be relevant in short stretches but i think you're right right that if it was a major injury,

I mean, look at what Goodwin did last year. In 458 plate appearances, he had 17 homers, seven stolen bases, and hit 262. That's definitely relevant in AL only. And I could see spending a reserve pick on him just in case. I mean, there's also the chance that Upton, that two people are hurt, and Adele has to come up and Goodwin has to play. So, you know, he's on the cusp of being interesting,

and it's nice that he has a little bit of speed. And I think last year was an eye-opener for some people. But he's also 29, and it's probably going to be his best year. And they obviously just got jock peterson so i think we've uh i think we've discussed this one to depth just all the way does it hurt anybody in the anaheim rotation patrick sandoval i think is now the seventh starter but when you're having a six a six-, the seven-starter is going to be pretty relevant. So he's still semi-interesting. I don't know.

The Angels probably would be a lot better with this. Yeah, it gives them that length they need to execute a six-man rotation. It's going to take far more than six starters for them to make it through the season. Yeah, exactly. The particular six they're going to try and begin the year with. Let's move on to James Paxton. He's going to miss a lot of time to begin the season due to a microscopic lumbar discectomy to remove a paradiscal cyst or back surgery, if you're just like a normal person and want to just call it that.

Interestingly enough, they do have some depth, of course, with the Yankees. I think Jordan Montgomery is the guy that's going to get the first crack at filling that rotation spot. But that also assumes that, you know, he's healthy and effective this spring. I think he has to compete to earn the job. Domingo German, of course, is suspended. Jonathan Loaiziga is kind of interesting. And maybe a few weeks into the season, I wonder if someone like Davey Garcia could actually emerge to be an option if they don't get what they're looking for from Montgomery. I bet you it becomes a sort of de facto bullpen situation. I bet you they want to start Montgomery in the minor leagues. And so for the beginning part of the season, Montgomery is down

and maybe David Garcia makes the team or maybe Loizaga makes the team, but he's not considered a five inning guy. We're going to start games with him. Maybe it's one inning, maybe it's three innings because he's just so injury prone. I don't think that they're going to be like, hey, five innings from you today. And they have the bullpen to be able to handle kind of an opener strategy situation. Maybe they actually have the opener, Chad Green, and then maybe Lovaisica pitches three innings,

and then they go back to the bullpen. But they can do that for a while. And then if Montgomery is dealing in the the minors then he comes up so i still don't think that montgomery is a is you know i'd say probably like 30 or 40 likely to to open the camp which is more than open the open uh camp with the team or uh what is it open from camp break camp with the team that's it uh if if he's i think he's about 30 40 which is higher than what's before but it before, but it's lower than maybe some people would consider. I think what's most interesting here is what you do with Paxton because three to four months, that's all of spring.

At least it's beginning of February. So that's February, March, April, May. So let's push it out. So he's going to come out June. That's still four months. Yeah, it's four months if it's early June. I think you have to wonder, okay, is he going to give you regular starts because he was able to get through a rehab assignment

and get fully stretched out? Or are you going to get a couple of weeks where he's throwing 45 pitches, then he's throwing 60, then he's throwing 60 and he's throwing 75 like you know if your first two weeks back are stretching out and he's going you know two three four innings basically being an opener and it's going to chip away at his chances to get wins that's going to make him a little more frustrating to use he's to me a guy that he was not on some sort of like don't draft list i've seen some people pop that out there on twitter like oh yeah this is this is why like don't draft list. I've seen some people pop that out there on Twitter. Like, oh yeah, this is why I don't draft James Paxton.

I'm not on that. I think there's obviously a lot of injury concerns, a lot of stuff with the forearms too. I talked about this at First Pitch Arizona maybe two years ago now. Like he had one, he got hurt doing PFP drills and like fell down and hurt his forearm and just dumb, dumb injuries like on top of these like chronic weird things. He got hurt doing PFP drills and fell down and hurt his forearm.

Just dumb, dumb injuries on top of these chronic weird things. He didn't strike me as super athletic. Right. There was a clumsy quality to some of the injuries on there, which he's pitching in the big leagues, and I'm sitting in a chair talking about baseball. I'm below James Paxton on the clumsiness ladder, which is probably the safest place for me to be.

Let's do some would-you-rathers. I'm looking in the late 60s on my rankings. Masahiro Tanaka. I'd rather have Tanaka. Okay, I got a little lower. Adrian Hauser. That's probably a good place to put the line. I do tend to lean towards the injuries are going to find me,

so don't buy into injuries, especially when it comes to a pitcher. Don't buy an injured player. Yeah, I mean, a position player would be generally where I would take that shot. And so many of my leagues don't even have IL spots. If I had IL spots, Paxton in leagues where I don't, I'd rather just take the healthy guy and go Hauser. And just take a shot. Like maybe three inning,

three months in, you don't even have Hauser anymore, but you had that roster slot that you could play with. And Paxton was just sitting there. Yeah. I mean, I love the settings. I think settings are pretty big.

But I think right around there, I have got Hauser, Arrieta, Aaron Saval, Kyle Gibson. They're good players, and I don't want to slag on any of them. But when Paxton comes back and pitches four months of Paxton, you'd rather have that than sort of like okay guys all year. But if it just sogs up a roster spot and then you just – I played a lot of leagues actually that have unlimited deal. So I'm a little bit more pro-Paxton as a stash. But if I have the choice of – like someone like Mitch Keller I think is interesting

because it's like I might not have Mitch Keller by the time Paxton comes back. However, I might have ditched Mitch Keller for another player. That's interesting. However, if I have unlimited DL, I draft Paxton, I miss out on Keller, but I pick up whoever I would have dropped Keller for

when I decided I don't want Keller, I want this other flavor of the month. Yeah, that's what I was thinking about this morning. Tout Wars is a league I play in that has the unlimited IL spots. And I play in the 15-team mixed auction. So I was thinking, okay, what would I throw at Paxton bid-wise if the auction were today? At least four or five bucks. I mean, because I can IL him, and then in a 15-team league, I feel good enough about the waiver wire pitchers

relative to a guy like Hauser, who I would take if I didn't have unlimited IL spots. I feel like I could find something kind of like a Hauser on the wire in a league like that, and then have that chance on Paxton later, where it's really not costing me that much. And if things do take a turn for the worst, I have the opportunity in that league to actually redeem Paxton for 10 times his FAB value. So we have a $1,000 FAB budget. If I paid $5 for him in

the auction, he has a setback or something, and I get $50 in FAB. Whoa, you get 10 times it. Yeah, I get $50 in FAB back for it. Oh, because it's 1,000. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it just scales it up. It's basically the same. Yeah, in labor, you get your money back. That's interesting. Yeah, you get 50 bucks in fab back for it. Oh, because it's 1,000. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it just scales it up. It's basically the same. Yeah, in labor, you get your money back. That's interesting. Yeah, you get your money back if he just misses the year. And I think it's interesting in labor to think of it this way. Like, let's say I was going to take a $1 reliever in – let's say I was going to take three relievers.

And I hate this because I know people that play labor are listening but i'll run through it i'm not saying i'm gonna do it but it would be interesting it's like okay i was planning on taking like maybe three relievers and one of the relievers is probably going to be a dollar reliever and dollar relievers are not super exciting it's just kind of a holding spot a player that could be a closer. And there's probably going to be some relievers on the wire that are just about the same as my dollar reliever. So instead of the dollar reliever, I throw $3, $4, some X money at Paxton in that reliever slot. I DL him and wait on him for the second half and go get that dollar reliever that's just about the

same as the dollar reliever I would have drafted in the draft. Right, you draft a reliever in the reserve rounds instead who you can take in and out of your lineup. So if that reliever happens. And I got a lot of value out of Cam Bedrosian last year as a reserve reliever where he just came in and I actually did some sort of streaming like that

where I would start Dylan Cease some weeks when he had good matchups and then not start him because he was in my reserve and put Bedrosian in instead. So there's some ways to finagle your particular settings. So I would say that Paxton doesn't belong, exactly like you said, does not belong on a no draft list.

There are ways to look at your settings and figure out if he's actually useful but if you have like two dl slots and you're going to come out of the draft putting a guy in that dl slot like i'm thinking about my pitchfork league with the pitchfork music guys we have like four or five bench slots and like two dl slots ouch yeah it's a little's going to be hard to hold on to Paxton all year. If you think about them in leagues like the NFBC where you have

seven reserves and no IL spots, this is a lesson that some people have to learn firsthand. You get crushed waiting on injured players in that league. So bad. More injuries are going to find you after the draft anyway. Right. hand like you get crushed waiting on injured players in that league and again bad in more

injuries are going to find you after the draft anyway right paxton is right on that borderline like talent wise where you have a difficult time cutting him if this injury happens right before opening day and it's a four to six week injury which is kind of roughly or four to eight week injury then which is kind of like what we're talking about right now, the injury optimism, once you already have him, gets even stronger because you think, oh, I committed. I used the sixth-round pick to get him. I really don't want to just cut my sixth-round pick. It's one of the hardest things about playing in leagues without IL spots,

especially the NFPC, but any league with no IL spots forces those tough decisions. Ultimately, though, I think that is a more fun and challenging way to play fantasy baseball. I know some people out there are going to say, no, you're punishing me because I'm having injury bad luck. It's like, no, everyone has to deal with this when it comes around to them. It's a tough decision. I'm not saying it's easy. It's the major point of chaos in real life baseball and in fantasy baseball. No matter what, you know, like I could have won labor last year if Severino was healthy.

I'm not whining about it. I am. But it's just how things work. You know, injury is the biggest deal. And I don't believe anybody who says they can predict injury. I don't even believe anybody who can really project innings uh so that that whole that whole bit has been difficult for me from the beginning and also what's the over under on me switching from dl to io like how many years is it going to take five and a half oh man all right let's get to some sleepers huh

yeah it's minus 110 on both sides, by the way. So you will pay a vig if you want to bet on that with me. You're screwed either way. The house always wins. Yeah, I'm winning this as the person taking these bets. But yeah, sleeper starters. I kind of thought about this a little bit after we signed off on Tuesday. You mentioned Spencer Turnbull as a guy that you had quite a bit higher than I did.

And he's just great because he's cheap, right? Guys like that you can throw a late dart at, kind of wait and see what happens for a few starts, and potentially get $10, maybe $15 in value, maybe more in some cases, if everything falls into place. So let's start with Turnbull. What is it that you like about him as a cheap flyer? start with Turnbull like what is it that you like about him as a cheap flyer since I started with stuff and and and command he just basically had the almost exact same stuff in command numbers as German Marquez that's a little bit complicated by the fact that German Marquez has different movement numbers on his breaking balls home and away so there is a possibility that Rocky's

pitchers get dinged on the stuff number. I may have to look into that one. But just overall, seemed very similar to German Marquez, except that he has a really nice home part for the most part. And then on top of that, one of the reasons I like Spencer Turnbull

is he has a lot of pitches. And the reason I like having a lot of pitches is A, you can fall into that Ryu, Grinke, you know, we've been saying Thor, Stripling. You can fall into that grouping where you have a lot of pitches, you command them, you throw them, nobody knows what's coming. That's good. The other thing is, it also gives you more lottery tickets in terms of, oh, this spring he tweaked his X and now he's great. You know?

So, you know, what's it going to be? Does he make his change up better? Does he make his this better? Does he make his that better? Who knows what it's going to be, but he has basically more chances to improve than someone who throws a fastball and slider. So that's sort of where, yeah, if you have those weapons already, you're not buying blind and just bring it back to like Brewster Gratterall for a moment.

Brewster Gratterall developing a third pitch is kind of like Frankie Montes starting to throw a splitter. Like it actually, I thought that's, that's the best case scenario, but how many other people have you said, Oh, if only had a a change up there's like the thousands of pitchers that that are relievers now that never developed that change up that you just don't think of and you're like but frankie montas did it yes frankie montas did it yeah most good relievers with another pitch would be good starters that's why they're relievers like it yeah kind of a man we're really slagging on relievers i'm sorry i'm I'm sorry, relievers. I love you. You talk to me so much. You're really nice people.

No, you guys are great. You just have funky deliveries and you don't usually have a third pitch. That's not your fault. Let me look at also his granular stuff numbers here real quick to get to on Turnbull. The slider is his second best pitch, which I like. The sinker is his best pitch. And the changeup is good. And the curveball is also above by stuff.

So yes, his four-seam fastball is not his best pitch. But he has a slider, sinker, curveball, and changeup are all above average by stuff. And so that's four pitches that he can play with. If he turns the four-seamer, which he threw a lot, and that was actually what sort of reduced his upside

potential as results. Probably. What made his results a little bit less exciting was that his four-seam fastball is not great, and he used it a lot. What if he tweaks that so that the four-seeing fastball is not great and he used a lot what if he tweaks that so that the foreseeing fastball is more a pitch he throws high in the zone for strikes and he uses the sinker to establish strikes more often that could be or the slider which he commands well and has good stuff maybe uses that to establish strikes more often this

that is a story that is being told all around baseball that's that's why half the reds were better last year, you know, just throwing the fastball high in the zone for whiffs. So, you know, I think the tweaks are there. You know, people in Detroit tell me that the coaching staff, in terms of the pitching coaching staff, is good, even though from the outside it looks like Detroit doesn't know what they're doing. I think Turnbull could take a leap forward. And, you know, I have him in the group where, like, Mitch Keller, Josh James, Dylan Seas, Sandy Alcantara. You know, I have him in the group of, like, hey, these are fun players that could break out. He's probably going to cost less than all those other ones.

Yeah, that's definitely going to be the case. I would be stunned if he was inside the top 300 overall of any drafts i just think he's kind of a an afterthought in most mixed leagues at this point uh there's a guy that comes up in a lot of your pieces if you kind of go back over the last two years or so sandy alcantara i'm curious to know are you still in on him as a guy that has that potential payoff still to come. Here's an interesting comp just based on, on stuff and command. Sandy Alcantara has a 109 stuff number 99 command. AJ puck has a 109 stuff number 98 command.

I just, I find that interesting. Josh James, command uh i just i find that interesting um josh james who i have ranked near him has 119 stuff and 88 command and we talked about whether or not 90 represents the sort of minimum level of command dylan sees who's right there 112 command 90 command 112 stuff 90 command so a lot of those guys that are around there have bigger flaws like alcantara i think has a high floor and late last season when he ditched the four seam and went back to the sinker which is kind of reverse of what other people are doing he had a really good end of the year and as much as his secondary stuff is not the most exciting stuff around, starting with velocity is huge. And if you want to see something interesting,

go to Jeff Zimmerman's page today and look at all the pictures and how they do when their fastball drops below 94. He's got these graphs where he graphs basically one person's fastball between 90 and 98, like how many swinging strikes they get based on the velocity of their fastball. And every story is almost the same. They're okay, they're okay, and anything above 94 is great. And that's a piece of research that's been around for a while. And so the fact that Alcantara starts with so much velocity

just makes everything better and just makes him a better bet. And this is part of why I'm nervous about Lance Lynn. He averaged 94.2 last year. Before that averaged 92 and 93 he had his best year averaging 94.2 which means he hit through the most fastballs over 94 that he ever had in his life these things are linked now if you age him at all and he averages 93.8 next year there's your regression yeah he's also been able to put up decent numbers in the past, though, without that increased fastball velocity. Like he's he survived without that weapon before. Yeah, it's true. He survived, but some of the ranks need him to thrive.

Interesting. Interesting. And then the granular stuff numbers on Alcantara are also interesting because he had this breakout when he went from the four seam to the sinker, and his stuff number on the sinker is 128. His stuff number on the four seam is 93. So he basically took his worst pitch and stopped throwing it and went to his best pitch and started throwing more. Boom.

Smart adjustment. Yeah. throwing it and went to his best pitch and started throwing more boom smart adjustment yeah so a little bit of that max freed situation where maybe he's underrated by his overall stuff number because he you know made some changes on the hood that's i think going to be the source of my piece for tomorrow i'm going to try and find more max freeds by looking at late pitching mix changes let's try to stay outside the top 300 in terms of adp who else is kind of catching your eye late right now yeah well there's you know when i when i get when i'm looking for late sleepers i'm just looking for stand standouts in any direction either a standout stuff number or a standout command number. So, you know, just kind of scanning through, Nick Pavetta still has the same stuff number as Dylan Cease,

and his command number was not as bad as I thought it would be. I don't know what it is, if it's sequencing, body language, you know, head case situation, defense behind him. I don't know what it is, but there's still potential in Nick Pavetta. And it's so funny because I was in on him and he had an okay year, and then I was like, I'm not sure he's any better than that. And I was out on him and he had the bad year. And now I'm back in on him, which proves that every pitcher has their price.

Cal Quantrill is actually interesting because he's average at both stuff and command. Dustin May has otherworldly stuff and just above 90 command, but I think he's going to be on a lot of people's lists. But Brad Peacock showed up, and I wonder who do you think is going to be the fifth starter in Houston? I've been putting chips on Josh James. He was the guy I was going to bring to the conversation. He's going just out to the top 400 right now.

It's Verlander, Grinke, McCullers. Urquidy looks pretty safe as the four, and then you're right, the fifth spot, Frambois Valdez, Christian Javier, Peacock, Austin Pruitt on the depth chart, and then Josh James. I'm using the depth chart over at Rotowire. I mean, the difference between five and nine on that list is nothing. And in terms of stuff, Josh James versus Brad Peacock would probably be the debate for who has the best stuff of those five.

James by far, at least by the stuff metric, but James also has that command issue, which was pretty easy to see. At that price point, though, we're talking one of your last pitchers or even a bench pitcher in a lot of circumstances. I'm fine taking on that risk. If it clicks, I think there's a ton of strikeouts that are coming down the pike. I mean, we're seeing that already. Even with the poor command, Josh James misses a ton of bats.

And if you get him up to 160 innings, that might be enough for him to strike 200 guys out. It's absurd. I mean, he's close to—I mean, he's not glass now again, but he could be that kind of pitcher where he just, no, he doesn't have great command, but he just throws stuff past everybody. Yeah, that's within the range of outcomes that I see with him anyway.

And Pruitt just seems like boring glue guy. Yeah, and if they see him as a boring glue guy, then that probably makes me think twice whereas if some other team had tried to stash him away then i probably wouldn't care at all yeah yeah i mean he could he could be like a ryan yarborough type where he's he's useful because he comes in after lance mccullers throws three super high-stress innings

and Pruitt gets a win with three boring innings. That could definitely happen. Speaking of McCullers, he's not as cheap as some of the other guys we're talking about. He's got an ADP right inside the top 200 right now. I want him to be healthy and productive, but what do you expect from him? Do you trust him enough to draft him in that spot? I don't really like drafting returners from Tommy John, usually, because there seems to be just so much getting the dust off.

I drafted Pineda coming off his surgery, and he just never came back like what you're talking about it's like drafting an injured person almost like they're they're not technically injured but like how's their recovery gonna go what's gonna happen when they actually step to the mound every five days and try to do it the regular way are they gonna have the command he doesn't you know the college doesn't have great command to begin with so like if there is a problem with command like what's it going to look like? So I would normally be kind of out on him, but he missed all of 2019 and some of 2018.

So I don't know. Somehow that kind of, I do know there's some research that says the longer that you, you take off, the longer that you kind off, the longer that you kind of – like if you push time and job recovery to 14 months rather than 11 or 12 months, that you have better outcomes. So there is some research behind what I'm saying, but there's something about the fact that he's had so long that I'm like, hey, maybe he's just ready to go. He's just ready to go. Yeah.

I mean, they're still going to be very careful with his workload, but I think the Brewers have been doing that 13, 14 months instead of trying to max it out and hustle someone back at 12. Indians did that too, yeah. I mean, you might as well do what's best for long-term health and performance. It's kind of a no-brainer. But I think you mentioned Michael Kopech on the either Tuesday episode or at the end of last week. And he's another guy like he made it back.

Well, he didn't make it back. He didn't pitch in 2019 because he didn't make it back. He's had that long layoff as well. I know you like him a lot based on stuff. I've always kind of seen just like a Noah Sindergaard sort of similarity in just physical appearance, but also just in demeanor and velocity and some of the things he does on the mound. Is he all going to come together for COPEC this year? Is he a guy that you will have a lot of places?

I think that was something you maybe hinted at on a previous episode, but is he definitely one of your guys this year? Yeah. It's interesting the thing about him versus Dylan Cease. Dylan Cease is healthy. Dylan Cease needs a little bit of a tweak to his fastball. Obviously, he always needs command, but Dylan Cease also is going to have Grundahl behind the plate

helping him out. Whereas Kopech, are they going to start him with the big league squad? Are they going to start him in the minors? Kopech, are there adjustments in Kopech's future? Dylan sees pitch last year, so he knows, I was cutting my fastball too much. I know that he knows it. And he'd probably been working on that during the offseason.

Kopech hasn't really done that thing where he's hit the big leagues. The big league shows him he needs to make an adjustment, and and he makes it. So I guess it's a technical way of saying there are adjustments in Kopech's future, and we just don't know if he can make them. So I think I would have Cease a little bit ahead, but both of them to me are just fascinating, sky's the limit arms. And I can't think of a better way to use your last draft slot on a pitcher like that that may break camp with their team

and just has all that upside. Mackenzie Gord, Nate Pearson, Dustin May, Michael Kopech, Dylan Cease. Those guys are the type of players that can win you a league because you drafted them last and they came in.

You just have to not fall into the thing of what we're talking about with Paxton. It's like, how long are you going to hold on to them if they're not with the big league squad? Right. You can only take so many chances like that in those limited roster spot situations we were describing earlier. Nate Pearson's

probably the cheapest of all the young starters that you mentioned, and I think he's got a pretty limited number of highly talented obstacles blocking him in Toronto, and I just wonder if he's going to get moved through AAA pretty quickly. I think he got a handful of starts there at the end of last season.

Is he an early first half call-up, maybe even a late April call-up for this Toronto team? Yeah, I mean, he's a guy who throws 100, driveline guy, has been working on his secondary stuff, a little bit of an injury situation in the past but they've they've tried to uh increase his innings i mean i i think um i think he's really interesting and for me like matt schumacher wasn't even on my rankings um ryan bo rookie was going to be a lefty reliever until he added a bunch of velocity and then immediately

got hurt after adding the velocity. So I don't think that those are much of an obstacle. Anthony Kaye, to me, is like a not super exciting, just sort of up and down guy, you know um and so to me right now it goes rourke or ryu rourke anderson thornton bull rookie i guess maybe shoemaker's in there nominally but you know shoemaker thornton bull rookie so and then k is obviously the next one up but really it's Pearson and who does he have to overcome he has to overcome Shoemaker and Bill Rickey and Thornton and as much as I like Thornton I think there's the other two or I'm not that into so yeah Pearson's interesting he's probably not going to break camp with the team so it's a little bit harder it's a little bit more of a stash and and wait kind of situation.

But it may not take that long. It could be on the same sort of schedule as somebody like Luis Patino, who's probably the guy after Mackenzie Gore. I think Mackenzie Gore might actually break camp with the team because you have to think about this. AJ Preller's job is on the line pretty soon. Patience in

the ownership group is probably starting to run out. Even though he's doing a great job piling up young talent, eventually... They have to win. Yeah, you got to win games and get results. He's only signed through 2022, so he needs to at least go 500 this year. All right, so let's think about Gore this way for a second. He was right around 100 innings between high A and double A last year. I think it was 101 to be exact. How many innings can they reasonably have him throw in 2020? an old school one. In fact, someone asked Alex Anthopoulos at some point why it seems that teams just increase

innings by about 20% and he said nobody knows. That's not a good answer, but it's an honest answer. I think it's about 20-25%. I think they could go to 120- 130 innings. I'd like to

see... Let's look at Paddock. Paddock had I think they could go to 120, 130 innings. I'd like to see. Let's look at Paddock. Paddock had 140 after a 2018 that had 90. He's probably on the pushing it end. A little bit complicated by the fact that maybe he would have had more than 90 if he wasn't coming off a surgery. Right. But I think he could maybe get to that level, 120, 130 to 140, somewhere 125.

I'd put the over-under 125 for Gore. Okay, so 125 is the number if he breaks camp with the team and all those innings come in San Diego. It's Gore plus someone else on your roster filling in around his inevitable absences. Yes. You'll miss weeks. He'll maybe even be demoted around

the all-star break to mess with his service time and whatever. Have him miss a couple starts or whatever. But I think he could break camp with the team. He seems pretty polished. One thing I worry is that the changeup is his best secondary pitch,

but Paddock has obviously shown that there's still, if you can throw the changeup to both sides of the plate and to both handedness, you can still kind of, Luis Castillo, I would say that there are fewer and fewer people with a changeup as their out pitch, as their best pitch. That is becoming a dying breed. Yeah, but Gore seems to kind of have good enough breaking balls to make it all work, and everyone's really excited about him.

I'm really excited about Luis Patino because he's more of today's game where high spin, high velocity, crazy breaking balls, ready to go but i do admit that patino could have a bit of lamette around about him in terms of downside but you know hey people have lamette in their top 50 so yeah lamette you know what came up this week after we talked about him on tuesday is i was looking at the baseball savant player page and the way pitches are broken down by stat cast is pretty different like the stat cast system has them throwing five different pitches although one of them is a change up and he threw it 1.5 percent of the time which it's like a rounding error so but interestingly stat cast says he has a curveball and a slider

right yeah and they've got kind of like the new little spin thing they've got they look different yeah i'm just not sure with that he has that 89 command i'm just not sure that he's very good at at producing those regularly do you think it's like a byproduct of him not really like especially the differences in the fastballs too is there anything going on with him that you think is not by design in terms of how those pitches kind of are inconsistent that's that's what i'm talking about i think that shows up in the command number the 89 commander i was watching some games where i was like you know oh that looked like a curveball and then oh that looked like a slider and then i was like you know oh that looked like a curveball and then oh that looked like a

slider and then i was like did he want to throw that curveball like he's doing these things and the ball's spinning a different way and it's kind of like yeah that didn't seem like what he was trying to do in that instance yeah um like you would normally think oh he'll throw more sort of back foot curveballs to lefties and i remember seeing things that look like curveballs to righties and i'm like well do you mean to do that or so anyway i'm gonna move lamette down a little bit honestly i have a note there down the command is just way lower than everybody around him so i may move him more into the 50s. The people's sleeper, but not our sleeper here on this show. Not necessarily. And again, sleeper being a relative term, he's shooting up the

draft board and I think has that shot at cracking the top 100 by the time we get to March. Anybody else on your radar late or even in the mid rounds there's pitchers that you clearly like more than most other people at this point. Oh, well, just late. I love late sleepers. Austin Voth just showed up as having a near elite command number and basically an average stuff number. And so, you know, in in the nationals world it's like joe ross is the fifth starter but my lord joe ross

yeah there's there are a few ways that can not work out yeah uh and then obviously corbin burns man uh he has the best stuff number you know south of 100 on my list. And the command number is 95. So we've talked to Corbin Burrows to death, and I don't want to give him too much helium because there's obvious flaws in the fastball and blah, blah, blah. But, I mean, they're going to give him another shot, don't you think? They kind of have to. And whether they keep him stretched out as a starter,

if he doesn't end up in the rotation to begin the season, or if they want to use him in relief, that might be the kind of thing that really hurts his fantasy value for this season. I can see the case for him being a multi-inning reliever and just crushing people out of a pen. It'd be pretty amazing to start a game with Brett Anderson and go one or two times through the order, and then Corbin Burns comes out of the pen.

I couldn't think of two people who are more different. Yeah, I mean, you've got the opposing team kind of on their back foot playing their lineup against a lefty. Lefty sinker baller. Lefty sinker baller. Lefty sinker baller and you come in with Burns with high velocity, high spin breaking stuff. And it

could be true behind Eric Lauer too. So you've actually got two situations where he'd be an interesting guy to come in off the bench. So that's why I don't want to get too excited about him because they do have five without him. We have a demonstrated

there's got to be flawed. You don't have a season that bad without. There's got to be something flawed about his fastball. Tipping in a big way could be part of what's going on with him too. I don't know. I was surprised, like everybody else,

that things unraveled on him as much as they did last year. And then there's always Freddy Peralta too, not to go all Brewers at the end of this segment, but they're relying on a mix of young guys like Burns and Peralta, Josh Lindblom coming back over from the KBO, Brett Anderson to chew up some innings, maybe in the Miley role from a couple of years ago. They're kind of trying to run it back the same way.

But if they get unexpected growth, or maybe internally it's expected growth, but if they get steps forward from one of Burns or Peralta, that changes the look of the rotation very quickly. With Peralta, I mean, there's your true two-pitch guy. At least that's what he's been so far in the big leagues. Apparently, a third pitch was coming along in winter ball. We have to see him throw it and throw it a lot with confidence before we can really trust he's going to use it in games, though, right?

Yeah. Yeah, and to me, he just seemed to have a lot of success coming out of the bullpen i mean i'm not looking at splits right now but is that am i a crazy person on that one no he was one of those guys that the first inning was just a debacle so many times that it got to a point where i think the brewers were messing with his pre-game routine and trying to figure out something that would get him to have more success just coming right out of the gate as a reliever he had a 401 era and uh you know 13 strikeouts per nine uh regular home run rate i think i think he might be a reliever dude i think i think we need to stop

talking about him. You're obviously going to throw your dart. If you're throwing a dart at one of the two young brewers, you're throwing it at Corbin Burns instead of Freddy Peralta. It's so hard to do coming off the season that Burns just had. They both had nutty seasons. Yes, I am.

Okay. That's understandable. I'm doing that. Let me see who else is interesting. Low on my list. I guess I can't quit Jorge Peralta. It's very upsetting. No? No, I can't quit him.

Not Jorge Peralta. Jorge Lopez. Jorge Lopez setting no no i can't quit him um not jorge peralta jorge lopez jorge lopez yeah yeah jorge lopez has an above average stuff number and above average command number if you break his pitches into pieces they all look good i think he could very least be their closer of the future i'm not gonna spend any money on him but a reserve pick in my very deepest leagues he might show up again um tony gonsolin's gonna have to move up but he had average stuff and below average command but um you know that i think that in in in la and with more opportunity that could be good it's's kind of hard, actually. Near the bottom, there's a reason.

Okay, here's a weird one. Let me just give you a weird one. Alex Cobb. Whoa, that is weird. I don't understand it, but both his command and stuff numbers just pop off the page where he is. 107 stuff, 112 command.

One thing I do know is he got the split finger back. The thing is back. That is the biggest dart throw of all time. I don't want to really associate my name with him. I do have an edit button on this thing. No, I know, I know. But I just wanted to say, I have him at 160 because of that. There's no other reason.

That's the only reason I have him there. Well, there's two reasons. The thing is back and the numbers are okay. I don't think we should forget that he was really good at one point. He was. There's proof that it can be done. And there's obviously opportunity there.

The opportunity is what makes Jorge Lopez, at least in draft and hold, why not? Take your shot after the 40th round. He could put some pieces together. And if the fallback is the bullpen, Ian Kennedy seems like the kind of guy the Royals would pretty happily trade at some point this season just to open up that spot and save some money

even if they can't get someone to take the entire contract. And other than Kyle Zimmer, there's almost nobody in that pen. Is Greg Holland back with the Royals? My God. Always. Greg Holland had one of the best closer seasons of all time

yep in 2013 he had 47 saves with a 1-2-1 ERA a.87 whip and 14 strikeouts per night pretty amazing we were talking about Fernando Rodney the other day too and just how ridiculous his season

with the Rays was. Those can come out of nowhere. I think this year my closer strategy is I'm a little bit off of the top closers in the game. I'm going to go back to my old closer strategy of, you know, here are some big arms that I like and have an opportunity. So I think we should extend Pitcher Week into Tuesday and then focus a lot on closers on the Tuesday episode since we

ended up talking a lot about that trade and Paxton and sleeper starters and everything that we like. One other name I want to throw at you. We talked about it a few weeks ago with the Braves situation and I think you said something about Kyle Wright's stuff and command numbers being kind of mediocre.

Bryce Wilson is still the young starter in Atlanta that I like. I mean, Ian Anderson probably has the brighter future if you had to go off the reports right now, but I think Bryce Wilson is the guy that pops up to have the most value of the young Atlanta starters outside of the Max Freed range, of course. We're talking about the cheap ones. outside of the max freed range. Of course, we're talking about the cheap ones. He's the guy that I want. Bryce Wilson is the guy that I want to take that chance on.

Yeah. Yeah. Um, so Bryce Wilson has 94, uh, command stuff, 105 command and right has, uh,

100 stuff, 91 command so it becomes a question of like what you want out of a guy you know neither one has anything that's really stand out except for wilson's command in this situation and the interesting thing is if we are setting 90 as sort of a bottom for command for starters, that might have something to do with Wildcat Wright has struggled so far. And I think with Wilson's being so young that I'm willing to take the chance

that the stuff could still come along a little bit further and catch up. The command's a good foundation. If the stuff gets better, he picks up some velocity, know refines a breaking pitch that could be the thing that kind of pushes him up to that level where he starts to get big league hitters out consistently enough to lock down that fifth starter spot yeah for sure yeah i mean what you said earlier too about that astros rotation and urquidy looking safe in the fourth spot, he has equal above average stuff in command. And that's why he's 50th on my rankings. And I'm pretty excited about him. I'm surprised that he hasn't showed up when people do, you know, people were someone people on the piece were doing like, you know, minus ADP and stuff. And I'm surprised he hasn't showed up as one of my favorites, but he is one of my favorites. so I know that's not a deep sleeper like we're talking about but that's that's the kind of player

I'm looking for yeah or kitty's definitely a guy that I'm gonna have on a few rosters this year I like that setup for him and the skills we talked about him as a prospect of the week I think last season skills have been there pretty consistently as he's moved through the Astros system. As always, you can reach out to us via email, ratesinbarrelsattheathletic.com. If you'd like to hit us up with the mailbag, just be sure to spell out the word and if you do that. We have two other fantasy baseball podcasts running this season, Fantasy Baseball in 15. Every weekday morning, Al Melk here, Michael Beller, and myself are getting you all the news you need to know in a quicker format. And then, of course, the Athletic Fantasy Baseball podcast.

New episodes of that drop Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays. That is going to wrap things up for this episode of Rates and Barrels. Pitcher Week continues with Closer Talk on Tuesday. Have a great weekend. Thanks for listening.