Rates & Barrels - Prospect Watch with Geoff Pontes & Weekend Waivers

Episode Date: May 30, 2025

Eno is joined by Geoff Pontes of Baseball America to talk about some of the upcoming prospects to look for soon in the big leagues and some names that are making a push to get into the upcoming Top 100 list. Also, Eno breaks down some of the big news of the day and talks about some Weekend Waiver picks to click.Rundown1:20- Rays Option Chandler Simpson2:20- Marlins designate Ronny Simon & Matt Mervis4:20- Marlins call up Heriberto Hernandez4:59- AJ Smith Shawver goes on the 60 day IL5:22- Mike Trout is Back6:46- Dodgers trade for Alexis Diaz9:50- Yankees change positions for a few players12:22- Royals release Hunter Renfroe12:40- Jordan Lawlar sent down by the D-backs14:08- Geoff Pontes of Baseball America joins us15:48- Prospects to look out for soon in the big leagues41:20- Potential Top 100 additions50:55- Weekend WaiversFollow Eno on Bluesky: @enosarris.bsky.socialFollow DVR on Bluesky: @dvr.bsky.sociale-mail: [e-mail] our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFeSubscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrelsHosts: Eno SarrisWith: Geoff PontesExecutive Producer: Brian Smith Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome everybody to Rates and Barrels and yes, it's just me. But not for the whole show. We've got Jeff Ponce from Baseball America coming on later and he will give us a little quick tour around the minor leagues get us some minor league prospects behind Jack Caglione behind Roman Anthony that might be on their way up as well as some names that might be on the move on to top 100 lists things of such nature again thank you so much for anybody who's left a review for us please like the video and subscribe if you can join the discord we're all talking over there about the things that we put on here. I

try to put the visuals that we put on these that show up on discord and plenty of channels there to find leagues or discuss pickups and drops. I'm sorry that I don't have someone to throw it to. I'm sorry I don't have DVR and I'm sorry I sound like this. This is day 14 of a sinus infection. We are going to bang this out with the doctor later and I will be ready to go on Monday I believe. I hope. This has been way too long. But we have some news to get to first. You know, one of the biggest pieces of news that came across the desk was that the Raise option, Chandler, Simpson, the speedster had been providing stolen bases.

So for fantasy owners that might've been a surprise. But if you were tracking real life work, it wasn't really that exciting. Not much power. We knew they didn't have much power, but he didn't even have really doubles power. What we also saw was the, you know, small sample but still existent Major League poor results in with the glove. And the odds above average is below average. I think the eye test was also that not as great a center fielder as you might expect given the tools. So it ended up being kind of a one-note option. There are other players on

this roster that could have gone down over Chandler Simpson, but this was the decision they made in the short term. I'd expect them to be up, but they're just going to have to go elsewhere for your stolen bases. The other news was that the Marlins designated Ronnie Simon and Matt Mervis, they've been kind of going through different options, basically AAA quad A options that project all right, that are close to big leagues. A lot of them strike out too much. That just proved to be the case with Matt Mervis who had a 208 ISO backed by OK barrel numbers, but a 37% strikeout rate is just not going to make it work and that's 35% for his career in the major leagues for Matt Murbus. I bet you he gets

another shot, but it's hard to see where it'll be right now because the Marlins are kind of the last chance saloon for these types of players. Ronnie Simon, this is just a sad story because Ronnie Simon made three errors in a game against the Padres and was crying on the field and he must have felt like, you know, a lot of pressure to make good of this chance because he's been with the Cubs, the Diamondbacks, the Rays. With the Rays, he was regarded as one of their top 20 prospects. Not, you know, not a top 100 overall, not maybe a difference maker, but someone who could make contact, take walks, help in different facets of the game. If he's not helping with the glove though, that kind of profile does not move

the needle for major league clubs. At this point, we're talking about a 25-year-old who's slightly above average in AAA and doesn't help with the glove. So I don't know. I think he'll be a depth acquisition for somebody that might want to play him as a utility player. There, you kind of emphasize that he can play some places okay and he swings the bat from both sides of the plate so I actually I'm a little bit more upbeat on Ronnie Simon's chances to get another to get another shot at the big leagues than Matt Mervis just because of that versatility. Do we have some good news in here? Heriberto Hernandez is up I mean does that count as good news? Heriberto Hernandez is up as part of those moves for the Marlins.

He's 25. Guess what? He strikes out too much and he projects pretty well and he's a triple A guy. You know, so they're just going to give him a shot in the kind of Matt Mervis role. I don't know if it's necessarily going to be first base, but it's another guy where you're going to watch the swing strike rate early and try to see the bat speed numbers, I think, and the hard hit numbers and see if the hard hit numbers can outpace his strikeout concerns. That's only a deep league thing.

We do have some bad news, good news combo here. AJ Smith-Schaver got hurt between our last show and this show, and he felt a pop in the elbow and just by the pop in the elbow and just by the end of the day he was on the 60-man IL. So not good news. Nobody is, nobody, everyone's saying that it doesn't look good. We haven't gotten the final news on what exactly it is other than an elbow strain that can be anywhere from Tommy John to some time off. But the good news is that Mike Trout is back and the league is better for having Mike Trout

in it. He did complete a bit of a rehab assignment. Maybe it was in the Complex League or something because it's not registering in Fangrabs as minor league stuff. But you know what he was doing before I think he can do again is hit for power, you know, steal a couple bases. You know, I think there's a real question starting to bubble up about what his true talent batting average is going to be in the decline phase of his career.

His strikeout rates, not so bad in some years that you'd expect the batting average to be bad. Last year, Mike Trout had a 21% strikeout rate and still only a 220 batting average. To some extent, he's been fine with just launching fly balls looking for homers and that's going to eat up his average. So I know that there are projections as high as 262 for his batting average going forward from the bat X. I just don't know if I believe it with a 50% fly ball rate. I'd expect Mike Trout to be more like a 230, 240 hitter with great power and a couple of steals, but he may not any longer be an asset when it comes to batting average.

So I think that's just something to think about when you're preparing your bid in the short in the in the leagues or if you're trying to buy him maybe, you know, ahead of a push for the postseason in your league. Just don't count on him for batting average. We also had some news in the reliever front. Alexis Diaz was sent to the Dodgers and I thought this graph would be interesting. Alexis Diaz, when he came into the league, had five inches less armside run on his fourseamer. I think that's important because with relatively the same arm angle, he is now throwing a pitch that looks much more like the arm angle projects

him to throw it. So basically he has a 17 degree arm angle. And so people expect when they see that to see a lot of arm side run because it's kind of the sinker ish arm level arm legible and that's been part of why stuff numbers have been low and I think that's part of why he's been hit around obviously another part of this is that he does not have good command but if he can be more like AJ not AJ Smith Schalmer Spencer Schwalbach Spencer Schwalbach has a low arm angle and he cuts his fore seam so that doesn't have this arm side run. If Alexis Diaz can do that and despite having that low arm angle throw something that's

a little bit more unique, he can get back to the higher stuff numbers that he had in his first year in the league. You know, I don't think that this is necessarily going to turn into, you know, the Dodgers next great closer, but they've also used more relievers, more relief innings than anybody else in the big leagues. And if you could get Alexis Diaz back to a 30% strikeout rate, then you can handle a 12% walk rate and you can handle the bad command. I think that's what Alexis Diaz needs to do is basically cut the foreseam a little bit like he used to. I don't think that they

need to add a whole new pitch or rediscover gold with him. I think it's more just, you know, I guess also he used to throw 95-7, he's throwing 93 now. So if there's something they can find mechanically to regain that Velo, that'll be part of it. But they don't have to play him in the major leagues right away. And this could just be depth for them. Like I said, they've been using so many starting pitchers and so many relievers that they need this. Michael Kopek, just as an update that's related to this, is making several more rehab appearances. That's what he said on 519. So that's a little bit weird that we've had to wait this long. I mean a minor league rehab stint that's how many appearances deep now? Eight appearances deep for Michael Kopek. He has a

29% walk rate. Yeah I know you expected me to say strikeout rate. 29% walk rate. 27% strikeout rate. But there's something going on with Michael Kopek. I wouldn't be surprised if they decide that he's still injured. That there's something that they need to fix in that arm because there's not, you know, no news is not good news for Michael Koopak. He should be up in the big leagues by now. Relievers don't have long stretches like this in rehab usually so I don't know what's going on there. It's not good news and the acquiring of Alexis Diaz sort of points to that direction. We've stretches like this in rehab usually. So I don't know what's going on there. It's not good news. And the acquiring of Alexis Diaz sort of points to that direction. We've got some news about position changes, I guess. I mean, neither one of these is playing a new position that they've

never played before, but they are playing in a new place maybe going forward. Jazz Chisholm, on his rehab stand, has only played third base and it seems like that's likely where he's going to play when he gets to the big leagues. Now he's played enough all over I think in most leagues that he'll still be eligible in different positions next year. But you know this is something to think about long term if he settles in there I think he's slightly less valuable as a third baseman. That's up for debate but with 29 games started at second base that's not anything to worry about until 2027 really. So that's eons in fantasy. So you can still consider him a second base slash third baseman for fantasy

purposes. A guy who gets injured all the time, but shows amazing flashes of promise when he's in. So he's still going to have us at the trough every year. Xavier Edwards is making a somewhat predictable switch over to second base and that'll help him in the short term by adding an eligibility in leagues, but it will hurt him because I think that some people thought that Xavier Edwards would just be, you know, in a dynasty situation somewhere they could plug in at shortstop for steals and steals alone, maybe a deep league shortstop for a while that wouldn't be great, but wouldn't be terrible. He's a lot less exciting I think at

second base, you know, and it just points to some of the flaws in his game. With zero power and zero glove, not zero glove, but you know not great glove and not enough glove for shortstop, the margins for him being a Major Leaguer are extremely thin. If you just look at his projections, you know, something like the bad X gives him an 88 WRC plus going forward. If he's not a shortstop any longer, this is going to be a player that puts up like one win above replacement, one and a half maybe in a full season. And that is not a starting level player in on most teams. I know that most of us don't play in War Leagues but that doesn't matter when your major league teams you know as we saw with Chandler Simpson make decisions based on things like war, based on things like defense and so that can affect you in your leagues. Just a couple

more pieces here Royals release Renfro the release went through We'll come back to the guys who were short-term replacing him, but this is a of course a Jack Caglione update And so we're just gonna keep Breathlessly updating these things Jordan Lawler was sent down the corresponding move was for a Utility player that's gonna be a better fit for what ended up being Jordan Lawler's role. He was up for a while, but he didn't play much. He played at second some, at third some, he had two or three game stretches where he didn't play at all. And so the news is that a more utility prone player will come up.

That doesn't really affect anybody, anything other than Jordan Lollis' future, which seems to be that he's going to come up next time if there's a major injury on that infield or to play for good next season. I don't think what he did in that short sample should really turn you away from him long term. He's not unassailable. That might make him gettable in dynasty leagues. Maybe you go and try to buy him now because his owner is a little frustrated.

But just know that for me, he's not necessarily an unassailable top prospect. It's not like I traded George Kirby at a reasonable price for Jack Kagler just because I'm totally enamored with how hard he hits the ball. And just like I said yesterday on the with how hard he hits the ball and just like I said yesterday on the show, his quads of steel. I think there are things you can say about Jordan Lawler which are like how much of the power is real, what's his true talent strikeout rate going to be in the major leagues, what is his position going to be in the major leagues.

I think those are enough questions that I would be a little careful with making a huge spend when it comes to Jordan Lawler in the future. Hey, it's Lauren Dragon from Wirecutter, the product recommendation service from the New York Times, and I test headphones. Sweat is actually conductive because of the saline content in it, so we basically make our own fake sweat

and spray it over and over on these headphones to see what happens to them over time. This is 85 dB of airplane noise. We're going to put on some noise-canceling headphones and see how well they actually block out the sounds. Put them on the ground and kick them over there. Okay. Go. Are they broken? No.

I have 3,136 entries in my database. Kids, workout, running. Does it have a connector that's lightning or USB-C? What version of Bluetooth is it? Does it have FDX HD? We have ones that track your- At Wirecutter, we do the work so you don't have to. For independent product reviews and

recommendations for the real world, come visit us at nyTimes.com slash Wirecutter. We even have one that's solar powered. It looks like we have our first guest. Hello, Jeff. How's it going? Pretty good. Eno, how are you, man? I'm doing great. Thank you for coming on the show. I am two weeks into a sinus infection and Derek Van Riper is moving. So you are a sight for sore eyes. Thank you so much. What was your old handle? Is it Prospect Jesus?

Many moons ago, it was Prospect Jesus. And at that point, before I went full time as a baseball writer, I had a professional job. So I didn't use my my real name until about six months before I got hired by BA. And that was obviously intentional because I wanted to kind of make the switch from, you know, business sort of, you know, customer facing kind of jobs to that. So once I didn't have to worry about customers any longer, I went with my real name and not Ralph.

We are at a game somewhere where someone just yelled out Prospect Jesus. And I was like, what? And I forgot that was your name, your own handle. That's great. But now you're a muckety muck. You're a man among many here at the Baseball America. It's a great role for you.

I know that I'm super happy for you that you've been thriving in that role. And you're coming on today to tell us a little bit about Prospects. I think we've been salivating, waiting a Jack Caglio and there's the, the pass an article and Roman Anthony obviously is in that mix. But I think when we do stuff like that, we forget sometimes about the other guys that that are on the way up.

So just wanted to give you a chance to highlight some guys who are not named Jack or Roman that may make an impact this year for our listeners. You don't even have to dig too far. There's other sort of top of the top 100 prospect list, you know, not just ours. Obviously, there's a lot out there in the industry. But I do think there's typically a general consensus on, you know, top 50 to like 70 players. And, you know, I think there's a couple of pitchers in AAA right now, as well as a handful of pitchers that, you know, potentially can come up and have impact and it could even be, you know, within the next few weeks. Two guys that stand out for me right off the top are Bubba Chandler and then Jacob Miziurowski of the Brewers.

Chandler, I think, was, you know, kind of one of the more notable names, whether you're playing fantasy and redraft or just a fan of the game. One of the more known prospects and I think the dream, at least for Pirates fans at this point, is that with the Jones News will sort of come up and ascend in that number two role. I don't know how soon it happens. Obviously, Braxton Ashcraft was the last one who got the call up. But I do think that it's probably within a matter of weeks, if not days until he does make his first start in Pittsburgh. It's big stuff, huge fastball velocity. There's good ride on it. It's like maybe 17 to 18 inches of induced vertical break, kind of depending upon where he's pitching.

It's kind of a two-planer, right? Like it has some run on it too, right? Yeah. It's, you know, more of like that, that I'll say typical, like Garrett Cole kind of fastball where it's like 17, nine, 18, nine, 18, 10, you know, in terms of the vert and horizontal, it's not more, it's not really like a cut ride fastball that you're seeing with a guy like Chase Burns or somebody like that. But it's also like a low release height, like low VAA high like foreseen like spin efficiency type of a fastball as well that just plays at the top of the zone, but can kind of play all over the place.

I think the development of the secondary stuff, there were some questions on the slider. He's always had feel for the change up, but you know, especially as a right-hander having a quality breaking ball that can generate swings and misses is obviously a big part of it. So he's shown way more command. It's had better snap and sort of feel generally. His movement has been good. He throws it really hard.

I think it's, you know, more of like a cut gyro sort of high eighties, low nineties sort of slider. But I think Chandler's one in particular that's really interesting. Well, I just on Mizorowski, like I'm surprised our model has him with above average locations on the fastball and around average on the slider.

It really says he struggles to locate the curve ball. You know, I remember when Hunter Brown came up, the scouting grades were terrible on his command, but the location plus numbers were okay. And he's kind of born that out. There's been, you know, some of that with other players, and then there were other players who you know, you don't think have a command problem and have come up and been worse. But and I'm not saying this is necessarily predictive. But what have you seen on the command front? Because that's the biggest thing with Mizorowski. Yeah, I think, you know, one of the

things that we've kind of dug into in recent weeks, and I know my colleague, J.J. Cooper, I think actually wrote a little bit about it, but the strike rate just in general is usually pretty indicative, particularly in the minors of how decent your command is, not necessarily control and all that, but how are you using your chase pitches and all that sort of stuff to actually generate strikes, right? Cause it's more than just getting the ball into the zone. It's a, command is really like hitting spots and locating, et cetera. You know, I think with Mizierowski, it's just the delivery has gotten cleaner.

He's just more direct to the plate more consistently. The release heights are closer and more clustered than they had been in previous years. And I think, you know, everything's now sort of playing off of that fastball because he's commanding that pitch. Looking back last year, I think the zone rates and the strike rates in the slider actually weren't bad when I kind of color coordinate all of my spreadsheets. Like they were above average, they were green, you know, but it was always like

the 59% sort of strike rate on the four scene that was an issue and it's a great pitch. You know, it's another guy. He gets tremendous extension 7374 sometimes depending upon the pitch on that four scene, which obviously lowers the release height pretty high efficiency. So he's a guy where like, you know, it's maybe 15 or 16 inches of induced vertical, but it's from a lower release height. So it plays up a little bit. And, you know, that pitch, just being able to locate it consistently and hit spots just kind of allows all of his secondary stuff to cascade off of it. He uses the curve ball really like as his off speed. It's, you know, what he's using to, you know, off-handed batters. It's one of those sort of setups. So be interesting. But I think when we look at the Brewer's track record of developing pitching,

they do a really good job of these guys that have these relief risk questions attached to them. You know, recently it was Freddie Peralta before that it was Corbin Burns who, you know, was in a relief role initially, and even like Brandon Woodruff. So I think like they consistently sort of take in guys like this that have these questions and figure something out in terms of the command and execution, So I think like they consistently sort of take in guys like this that have these questions and figure something out in terms of the command and execution because it has been almost night

and day this year and it's allowed him to go deeper into starts. He's not one of these like four or five and dive guys any longer is getting into the sixth inning more consistently. And I think, you know, innings are indicative of being able to start in the major leagues. I think that they have something in common with the Rays and Tobias Myers told me that, you know, when he was with the Rays, it was a little bit, you know, they have one target until AAA. And then he went to the Guardians. He said the Guardians had a much more detailed game plan about throwing to this zone

and throwing to this zone and throwing to this zone. So we got to the Ruer's is a little bit more like the Rays was like, just throw good stuff in the zone, you know, mostly not necessarily just one target, but just, you know, simplifying things. So I bet you they went on that. So what do you have on on bats that might come up? I mean, there's something weird about the current environment, which is that there is this like the very best bats, I think, are more likely to play in the big leagues from the beginning of the season because they if they can win them hardware that can they can bring

Back something there's incentive there for the teams and then that leaves the sort of middle We're not really other than Roman and Jack were left with I don't know Are there are there exciting bats that that are you know a top 50 even or top 70? Yeah, and I think you know the other part of it too is You know years ago before AAA started messing around with this, the challenge system now last year, it was full ABS for three days, and then it was a challenge system for another three days. And the full ABS like really benefited hitters, especially if you were a little bit passive, because the zone honestly was tighter than what we're used to in the major leagues. And the zones, historically, you know, going back to, you know, 2018, I think there were studies on this. They typically get smaller as you move up the chain or the ladder or the minor league systems.

But you get to the major leagues and obviously that was usually the best zone, the tightest zone. You were going to have the least amount of leeway as a pitcher. And I think what happened with the auto zone is like if you're a quarter of an inch off and you're in that like gray zone, the tightest zone, you were going to have the least amount of leeway as a pitcher. And I think what happened with the auto zone is like, if you're a quarter of an inch off and you're in that like gray zone, that's historically a strike your entire life. And then all of a sudden it isn't. So that was frustrating, I think, for pitchers. But what it did is it masked a lot of inconsistencies in terms of swing decisions with a lot of hitters. And so what I noticed last year in particular is the guys that were coming up to AAA as hitters

seemed to have a harder adjustment to the major leagues in the zone because they weren't getting the same calls because it wasn't like this clustered ABS system. And there was, you know, obviously some nuance to it with an actual human being behind there calling balls and strikes. So I think with a lot of hitters, that's a big hurdle to overcome. And it's kind of the opposite for pitchers

where at least a lot of guys that I talked to that pitched in AAA early in the season. It's easier up here. It was actually easier. Like I'm getting more calls here, stuff that I was not getting in AAA and you know, my walk rates plummeted or whatever it might be. So I think it's a little balance of that. Now that said, I do think there's kind of a trio of bats that I'm looking at here where I think there could be potentially some opportunity. We'll see how Baltimore sort of plays the next month or two,

but they're certainly not in a great spot to make the playoffs or to compete or even be considered a contender or a buyer, you know, at the trade deadline, does that mean that somebody like Ryan Mountcastle is maybe moved, et cetera, um, you know, to a contending team, it might be the right time to do that for them. At some point in the next couple of months, that could open up opportunities. I think for same a Visio, um, they're big catching prospect bat to play at first base. He's a bat first player, you know, predominantly the throwing.

He's got a big arm, but it is a big body behind the plate. The blocking and receiving isn't great. He's not going to supplant Adley Rushman as an everyday option back there. But I do think the bat just in terms of the marriage of contact quality and bats, a ball ability is there. Oh my God. 116 mile power, max exit velocity, 54% hard hit. It's Jack level sort of power. I don't know if it's quite like the same top end. Like he might be like, if Jackson 80, he's a 75, you know, on the 20 80s scale,

but there's a lot of bat to ball ability. And I would say that especially based on his age, because he's younger, it's a more advanced approach. He's not a guy that is overly passive. So really high zone swing rates, which is something that I really look forward. I'm trying to like a context of, you know, of actual true plate approach and plate disciplines skills in the minor. We used to be love chase right here. And then we found that if you marry it with zone swing,

you get more productive. Yeah. And I think like there's some nuance too, in terms of like swing rate and the chase rate and like what's the delta between those two numbers, where you start to get like a 20% or higher sort of, or I guess like a 20 point or whatever delta between those two numbers. And then you have a high zone swing rate. It's like, all right, that's really good approach. This guy's actually recognizing balls and strikes as opposed to being super passive and not, you know, not swinging, you know, maybe only swing the bat 30% of the time or 34% of the time. We do see that with a lot of guys. That was like Nolan Jones's

issue where he put up these huge walk rates and great numbers. And really when he made that adjustment and had some success, at least for a season with the Rockies, it was because like Cleveland really made it a point to be like, we need you to swing more. We need you to attack more. So when that's kind of not present with like with a guy like the SIO, I'm confident that he's going to attack strikes. He's going to hit pitches in the zone. When he sees fast balls, he's going to do damage. He's got adjustability in the barrel too.

He's a guy that can't adjust on spin, stuff that's low or high in the zone. The hands are pretty gifted. They're not stiff or anything like that. I think he's a guy that could come up and, you know, potentially give them some instant offense and could factor into that Baltimore lineup, you know, over the next couple of years. Projections are never like super excited about prospects, but they almost as a unit say he'll be an above average hitter,

which already catches my eye. Yeah, and I just think like when you start to look at historical data, cause like that's what like we do with our fantasy model that we have at baseball America through, you know, my colleague Dylan White, the Robo Scout model, it's really looking at like historical perspective and, and how that sort of lines up with production, you know, for age and level based stuff. And he's always been one of the youngest players wherever he's played and been really productive. That's a big part of why the next thing you the next guy, Cole Young, you're, you're,

you had on this list and he's 21 and a triple A and doing great. One thing that I worry about sometimes, and I think maybe his, you know, maybe it doesn't matter so much. Maybe he's so good at, you know, a lot of different things that this won't matter. But like when you have these like 180 ISOs in the minors and you also have legs, then I'm a little bit worried that you're getting to doubles with your legs and you're not necessarily maybe hitting the ball that hard. We got some data this year with a 44% hard hit rate from him at AAA, but a 109 max CV

still leaves me a little bit cold. What do you think his true talent power level is? Do you think it doesn't matter because his defense will float him and his OBP will float him? You know, there is a relationship between power and OBP too. So it's, you know, is he gonna get the bat knocked out of his hands basically?

Yeah, I think, you know, I was not a big coal young guy coming into the year. He's been on a real burner in May, probably one of the top, you know, 15 or so hitters in the minor leagues over the last month. What he's showing though, is significantly more power than he had in AA previously. So just looking like year over year, 90th percentile EV,

it's been a four mile per hour climb. It was like a hundred mile per hour 90th last year, and it's more like 103.9, 104 now we're seeing more. He's hitting what's like a major league average on 90th. It's like 104.2 I think was what I looked at for last year. So you know, it's it's somewhere in that neighborhood. He's got a ton of bats a ball skills in addition to adding more power and the angles aren't great. Like he's not a guy that's putting the ball in the air consistently to the pole side, which for a smaller guy like him, I think is really important if he's going to be a 20 homer guy.

But I think he kind of went from like a seven homer guy and empty batting average to like maybe this guy can sneak 12 or 13. Certainly Seattle isn't the comfiest confines for a guy like that either. So that kind of knocks it down a little bit, but I do think confines for a guy like that either. So that kind of, you know, knocks it down a little bit, but I do think he could be a batting average play. We've seen how sort of Jacob Wilson has played out. I don't think the contact is quite that good. He is a little bit younger. I do think that the angles are probably a little bit more consistently better and he's hitting the ball harder than than Jacob Wilson did at the same age by a pretty wide margin.

So he's trending in the right direction. There's probably a need. I mean, the bottom of that lineup is not very good. Maybe there's opportunity there. If there's an injury, whether it's short or second base, you can fill in there. It's really solid defense. So the glove's gonna keep him in the lineup

where all these guys have early struggles. But I do think that the trends are going in the right direction at least, and the opportunities there. He's hot, he's productive, it's a playoff team that isn't gonna care about 40 man roster stuff or losing a year of control and that sort of thing if it's the best lineup that they can put out there.

With Seattle, it's also probably gonna be one of the more cost controlled lineups, even if they do lose that year, they're not going out and having to shop and free agency, et cetera. So not a huge upside guy, but if he comes up and does provide good batting average, maybe hits his way into the top of the lineup where he's getting enough at bats, there's maybe a possibility there that the runs and the counting stats are kind of valuable. But you know, I don't think this guy's going to come up and hit, you know, 15 home runs or anything like that. It's not going to be like a Reese Hoskins the first month he got called up and hit like 15 home runs and you know,

a month or whatever. Just as a side, how do you say your last name? Ponce. Ponce. Okay. Because it's, it's not Yeah, it's one. Because it's not. Yeah, it's one syllable. It's Portuguese. So we just, we kind of, kind of mumble everything out there.

I just was thinking about it because you're in Devil's Rejects with us. I think you won a couple of years ago. This next name, there was kind of like, like I honestly, you know, I partner with James Anderson so that James Anderson can kind of tell me about the prospects a little bit more. I'm the model guy. I'm like, you know, I'm like the veteran guy. This name didn't just I hadn't heard it before. We had this big trade, like where someone gave up Major League talent for C.J.

Cafas in that league. I forget. I forget what the trade was. Tell me a little bit more about C.J. Cafas, because he's kind of come on this year, I feel like. I think it's been building, you know, last year he was one of the big pop-up guys, just sort of among college bats from the previous draft. I have a decent background with him because I'm out here in Massachusetts and obviously doing what I do. I have access to the Cape Cod League and you know, I shoot out there a lot. So I see a lot of these college

hitters previously and saw a lot of Cafas, sort of an undersized first baseman corner outfield type. It's not a big body. It's kind of slender and athletic, but I think the left-handed part of it obviously stops him from being able to play third base. He's not twitchy enough to be like a shortstop or a center fielder or something like that. But it's not like he's like this big body, bad bodied first base only type. There is, you know, maybe some ability for him to play a corner outfield spot. It's not huge underlying power. I'd say it's like fringe average exit data.

The thing that he does really well. And I don't think it's all that different from Kyle Manzardo. I was about to say, I see a little bit of a Kyle Manzardo thing here. It's great angles, like consistently just, he's a guy that is just making flush barrel contact with sort of everything. So he's like probably like a good VBA guy.

Huge babbips, yeah. And like, I think it's indicative of what he's doing. He's just really clean backspin. And I think this is one of the things that we haven't totally conquered. And I know that there's a lot of information out there, but like the idea that there are guys who hit the ball more efficiently off the barrel than others, almost like a four seam fastball, right? Like they're spin on batted balls, you know, there's certain guys or they hit the heck out of it, but you know, they're cutting it a little bit more. So it doesn't, it doesn't

sort of spin or carry as true. I think this is one of those guys, almost like Bregman, where he always outperforms the underlying predictive data with his power because he has so much barrel control. It's pretty good bats of ball skills, but not incredible or outlier. It's really good swing decisions, and he's patient, and he does attack a lot of stuff in the zone. I think what it is, is it's sort of just that batted ball magic that he just knows how to backspin stuff off the barrel. So it's not probably super loud. I think he's most valuable from a fantasy perspective. If he comes up, can hit for a decent average, get on base, you know, give

you, you know, I'll say over the course of the season, maybe it's like low 20s, like 18 to like 24 sort of homers, racks up some counting stats in that lineup, and then maybe plays a little corner outfield. He's played a lot of first base, but I think honestly, once he gets up to the big leagues, if it is with the Guardians, it's probably going to be more left field, right field, first base, DH on certain days and they'd move them around. But it's just an interesting profile and guys like this kind of fascinate me that sort of like have this hidden element of like the hit tool. Like it's not just bat to ball. It's not just swing decisions. It's like, how do you hit the ball? Brian Reynolds a little bit. Probably Vato, I think was like that.

I think certainly Mookie Betts is like that to an extent. You know, I think a lot of these smaller guys that can really spin it true to their pull side and, and, you know, I've talked to Travis Bazzana and written a bunch of articles and, you know, over the course of a couple of years of a decent relationship with him, but I sat down with him last year in Lake County right after the draft and we were kind of talking some hitting concepts and that was his big thing is like,

I wanna be able to get to pull side power cause I'm a smaller guy. I'm not gonna power it out to the middle of the yard, and I wanna be able to spin it true consistently to my pull side. And I think there is an element there of like those guys that kind of outperform their you know, their body or their power because of how clean they catch barrels.

The deal in case anybody was worried, we do update a little bit about Devil's Regis. It's a good league because it's, it just, it's a stand in for like the deepest prospect oriented league. You know what I mean? Like 20 teams, you know, like open universe. So CJ Caffas was traded to Savannah Pizanis for... Savannah Pizanis got Trevor Story, Ryan O'Hearn and Kenley Jansen for CJ Caffas. So I think that actually kind of put it in the context a little bit.

Like he's not going to get you an elite major league guy. All these guys have questions. Trevor Story, is he near the end? Ryan O'Hern, is this just a pop-up year? Kenley Jansen, is this near the end? He didn't get a crazy haul, but those are all major leaguers. And so if you've got CAFUS or if you want CAFUS, that at least gives you a little bit of context. I think we had one more name on the major leaguers that might help in the major leagues

this year. Yeah, I had thrown a couple names out there. One was Nolan McLean. It's just a matter of how the Mets sort of handle his innings. He's really interesting because he was a two way guy sort of coming up, I think was a football recruit at Oklahoma State as well. Stopped hitting because he had like an insane amount of whiff. He was one of these guys that like could hit the ball a million miles an hour, you know, would hit a,

hit a ball for 50 to dead center, but also probably with 40% of the time. So he hit a little bit as he came in a pro ball, they stopped all that. This off season was his first full off season as a pitcher only it's a crazy slider. It's like a hard, like mid to high eighties, like sweeper. It is filthy.

Oh man, the model loves it. 125 stuff plus, yeah. Yeah, I was gonna say it's probably gonna pop like crazy on stuff models now that it's on Hawkeye. But they like both as fastballs. Yeah, they're not bad. It's not, you know, maybe like the traditional sort of shape that blows those models away. But both of them are hard. Both of them move a lot. And you know,

I think the two seamer in particular is really sort of almost all four seamer prior to this. Now, you know, having that two seamer in the back pocket, I think, you know, really has gone a long way. And I think there's even starts where he's thrown it more than the four seamer now. The four seamers almost become like, you know, an off speed a long way. And I think there's even starts where he's, he's thrown up more than the four seamer now. The four seamers almost become like, you know, an off-speed pitch, almost like how the Red Sox initially did with like Tanner Hauk when he was actually productive and not giving up eight, nine runs every time.

Is he a lower slot? I mean, is he a sinker sweeper guy at a heart? Yeah, I think he's a sinker sweeper guy. And he's added other pitches, right? Like he's got this. Yeah. And there's like other shapes that you could add as bridge pitches or situational stuff that he can added other pitches, right? Like he's got this. Yeah. And there's like other shapes that you could add as bridge pitches or situational stuff that he can throw in to, to sort of keep you, keep you off balance.

But I think, you know, what, what the Mets have done, you know, with their pitching development over the last two or three years, Like they're just all popping. It really is. I mean, there's, there's all these like late round college guys with interesting traits that like they brought into the development system. They have an undrafted free agent that's popping. Oh my God, they've got all sorts of guys. Yeah, Jonah Tong added a new change up and it's like completely unlocked his his arsenal because

he had a great, you know, high ride foreseen, you know, ride cut fastball, but really like it was a kind of a bad slider. And then the change up like came and went just started. I wrote an article about it, but started using a, uh, uh, a Vulcan grip, which he had used, but he had used it like, you know, like a typical Vulcan grip. They put it over like the horseshoe and it just started to move differently. And it was like, it almost moves like a splitter off of his foreseam or now. So there's like this huge vertical difference between like the VAA on the foreseam and now the VAA on the chain job. So you're a Tong believer.

Yeah. You know, it's pretty good. And the slider is still kind of iffy, but it's something he's cognizant of and working on and I have every, uh, confidence they'll do that. Philosophically. That's a tough one for me to overcome. Sometimes I definitely have a bias for for do you have a slider? Yeah, you do.

Especially if you're a righty. Yeah, right? Yeah, as a righty, you know, it's part of why, you know, I was actually a little bit down on Roki Sasaki coming into the season because I was just like, there is no slider there. And it's something that I worry about sometimes with prospects. If you're change up first, like, Wisenhunt, does there a good slider there? Is that just all that change up? He's at least a lefty. But like, yeah, that's certainly what anybody who's changed up first.

It's not awful if you're a reliever because I think like their situational stuff, we've seen a lot of relievers that just have these filthy change ups that we kind of make it work in one of these things. Yeah. Or even like, you know, Koji Uehara, like, or whatever his name was, like the Red Sox, like that guy through nothing but like change. Yeah. Tommy Conley. Right. Yeah. Yeah. You know, but, but I think the issue is, is when you're a starter, you've got to be able to turn the line up over twice. Like nowadays, I'm not asking you to go seven, eight innings

every time, but you gotta, you gotta consistently be able to like, you've additively give me five innings. And when guys don't have a breaking ball or sort of a bridge pitch or something in between, it's just, it's hard to believe in it, especially like if it's a two pitch guy with like chase burns, you know, whatever, 80 90% of his usage is a four seamer and that slider, but the slider and the four seamer are so good that it kind of eliminates like 70% of a bats anyway. So the 10% of those other two pitches, it's fine. But yeah, I think it is a concern. Like I even, you know, was engaging in talks of for Logan Henderson in our league and, you know, was a notoriously difficult person to

trade with Tom Trudeau. Oh, man. I just threw my hands up at some point. I was like, let's move on. Seven trades and a dissertation. Exactly. Yeah. So he was telling me all about how his model loves Logan Henderson. And I believe it because the Miley numbers are great, but I couldn't get to that point where I'm like, okay, I'll just give you everything for Logan Henderson.

Cause I was like, I don't think there's a slider there. So I don't know. We're running out of time. I do do want to hit these guys real quick. Should we skip over maybe to the potential top 100? Let's go a little bit deeper. So these are guys that may jump onto a top 100 list and we'll finish with these these three guys just so that people who are looking for prospects to add right now who are building maybe these guys will make a big move on next year's list or the next time the list come out. We're going to be updating the top 30s early next week. So we should have a new top 100 I would imagine probably mid to late next week. We did a big rerank after the first month of the

season and sort of you, moved on some guys. There's still a few players left that I think have continued to perform and maybe answer some questions. A big one for me is the athletics gauge jump and talk about organizations right now that seem to be hot in the minor leagues. It's the athletics. And obviously, I'm obsessed with,

there's more pitching in that system right now than I had seen in a while. And it's even guys that like, I think a lot of us had written off like Gunnar Hogwin had a decent season last year, but has looked a little bit better even than he did last year. Louis Morales who pitched in AAA last night against Bobby Miller, huge stuff, Cuban signee they got a couple years ago. Our internal stuff model with some of the data that we get, he's always like, you know, jumped off the charts with two or three, like, you know,

plus to plus plus pitches, big velocity, really good slider, etc. He's had a really good year. He's still really young. He's in triple A and has actually performed fairly well considering it's the PCL in Las Vegas and you know, all you have to deal with with the elevation and the parks and everything. But Gage Jump has been the one that's been most impressive. He was a big high school recruit, Southern California, CIF guy that like stood out in those tournaments, kind of ballyhooed, went to UCLA. Things didn't work so well.

He ended up getting injured. He ends up transferring out, gets one season at LSU last year is kind of their defacto ace and has to jump into that role Obviously after Paul skeins pitched well not incredible, but well Everything he's been this year has been like dominant doesn't pitch after the draft Which is what's happening with a lot of these college arms. Obviously they get some volume Goes to high a dominates the Midwest league gets a call up to double a a couple of weeks ago and since then he's allowed one run every two starts he's

not walking anybody it's something crazy like a 65% zone fastball rate and if you look at the clusters on synergy with the fastball locations it's all like high and like in spots that guys really aren't going to hit. He's not jamming middle middle fastballs, but even if he does, it's 94 to 96 touching 97, 98 from the left side, low release height, flatter VAA guys, a little bit shorter, not a ton of extension. It's maybe like six feet, six one of extension, but it is a, you know, it's a, it's a lower slot and it's a lot of efficiency. So it's kind of weird because, you know, he's generating like 17 to 18 inches of vert. It's a pretty flat, like four, four, four, five VAA, and

it's got velocity. He's got a couple of breaking ball shapes. He's got a curve ball. That's really like a two plane banger in the low eighties and then like a baby sweeper in the mid eighties really throw mostly those will show up, throw a change up every so often, but it's not, not a great pitch for him, but he's in the Texas league now and he's handling that. And that is one of the, you know, tougher run environments, uh, in the minor leagues and he looks great. And uh, I think the stuff is there and he already starts with zero.

He's got 35% strikeout rate. I'm interested. Yeah. And I'll send you the data over on the pitches after the pod, but like it's pretty crazy. Like his fastball command is, is it might be a seven, like just in terms of what he's producing right now. You don't see guys with zone rates like that that aren't like just hammering middle, middle fastballs, you know. I've seen this other name, Sarota.

Where have I seen him? Is he, is he an angels prospect? No, he's a Dodgers prospect. And they tried for a long time to get him into the system. So he was drafted out of high school. He was a New York, Connecticut area, you know, around the city high school guy, fairly high, highly touted prospect ended up committed to Northeastern of all places, which is very strange because it's a mid-major, good mid-major, but still a mid-major. And the Dodgers took him in the

19th or 20th round in 21. He didn't sign, he gets to campus. First two years he was on campus, he was like, you know, a you know seeing you know college national team guy like you know tryponvite you know highly touted ranked as a first rounder comes out his draft season and tanks it was bad for the first month or so against not great competition kind of picked it up late the reds end up drafting him i believe in the third round last year. Doesn't debut for the Reds. And the Gavin Lux trade happens. That's where I knew the name from. They get Sarota thrown in.

Sarota gets into the system and lo and behold, his one problem that he had was pulling the ball in the air. All of a sudden, Sarota has like a 10 degree pull side launch angle. He's got like a 27% air pull and he's, you know, got like a 94 mile per hour average exit velocity. The 90th is like 107 or 108. He's hitting the ball harder. He's hitting the ball in the air more. He's hitting the ball in the air through his pull side more.

Always had outrageous swing decisions. A little bit passive, but he's one of these guys that he's kind of passive in the way that he's going to walk 11, 12% of the time, even when he gets up to the big leagues and we'll put up outrageous, you know, K to BB numbers now. So kind of interesting because, you know, gets on base, he's athletic, he's a center fielder, he can run a little bit. There's maybe some sort of five tool, five category and fantasy upside with a guy like this in the defense will keep him there and like right now the Dodgers have like five outfielders that might be top 100 prospects. I would say to Paula's your hope.

Yeah. And then I think Eduardo Quintero, who we just added to our top 100, he's a guy who's in Rancho Cucamonga that probably could be in high A, but the outfield in high A is Hope, DePaula, and George, and then Sarota. So like they even have like four good outfield prospects just on that Great Lakes team. It's an embarrassment of riches. And you know, I'm sure they'll find another two outfielders that will, you know, backfill these guys as soon as these guys either get traded or graduate. Oh my God, they're gonna, yeah, they're gonna trade it. I wonder which one. I love that they probably had that adjustment ready for him in high school and they just held on to that adjustment until they got

them from the Reds. It's a story of dedication and not giving up. The Dodgers just kept going back to the well. I bet you they had them queued up in like the next pick that they had after the Reds. Oh yeah, that too. Yeah. Well, not to be outdone, the Reds do have a prospect that you've got that might jump onto the hundred here. Yeah. And I think he's a tough sell because it is sort of a bad body cornering field kind of

prospect. I'm surprised because he's ceiling bases. Yeah. He's moving a little bit better than people think. But I think that's one of these things. We didn't say it's Dave yet. Sal Stewart, third baseman with a double A Chattanooga. So he's not too far away. He's 21 still a couple of years away from like the 40 man roster.

So I don't know if he's up this year, but maybe if he hits enough and there's there's an opportunity there, but it's just really good bat to ball skills with a bigger body. So, you know, like mass moves mass and sort of is able to... But the demonstrated power hasn't quite been there yet. I mean, it's okay. It's not huge power, but he's also one of these guys

that doesn't really sell out for it either. It's really like, so it's not one of the profiles that I go crazy about, but it's also getting to a point where he keeps performing at every single level. You know, he's young for the level, no matter where he's been. And it's hit tool with like, you can sort of project the power to come and for him to be able to get to it because the EVs are pretty good. They're certainly there. He's just a tough sell because it's like, if he ends up at first base and he doesn't hit for enough power, you know,

the bar to clear there is pretty high. But you know, you look at who have been the most productive hitters over the last two years in the minor leagues and, and Sal Stewart is, is right there in the conversation. So I think sometimes with guys like this, it just gets to a point where it's like, are we kind of ignoring the obvious too much even if it doesn't fit into the box of, you know, up the middle athletic twitchy players that have a bunch of tools? This has been a pleasure. I hope to see you again, maybe in Arizona this fall. And it's always a pleasure when I do see you.

And thank you so much for helping me out today and coming on and helping our readers out with all this gold, this prospect gold. And yes, I bow down to the prospect Jesus. I appreciate it. Have a good one. All right. Thank you to Jeff Ponce for coming on. Baseball America Scout, just really great knowledge there.

I don't know how to do the fancy thing that DVR did where he's got the CBS rostered rates So what I did was I went and looked at the most viewed and the most added on CBS That's an easy little click one, two, three click And I just thought these would be players you would be looking at because other people are looking at them for your weekend waiver Lance McCullers has a nice to start at Pittsburgh at Cleveland. I do think that he's more one of these players that I want to know what the matchups are. This stuff will tell you that it's above average, but it is really the slider on the curve. And we saw this before the injury even where he was pushing. Remember that one time in

the postseason where he just like only threw sliders and so he's pushing 33% on the slider plus 15% on the curve he's only throwing 20% sinkers and that's in 9% force aimers so he's really not throwing many hard pitches I don't know there's just not a lot of models for success for somebody like this I have to think that this is going to blow up in his face sometimes, whether it be why walks or homers or people sitting slider, people reacting to this mix. But all that said, Pittsburgh, Cleveland, I'm taking him for this to start. I would put him as a one of the, probably the best to starter in the upcoming week.

So if you're in a weekly league, I could even going past you know for me streaming is sort of seven to eleven dollars out of a thousand. I could see pushing that up into 13, 14, 15 if you think you might keep them around for the next two-star week or for certain matchups going forward. Chris Paddock is another name that I even added to my league leading auto new team It's a head-to-head and I just wanted another option I don't think that he's as good as the recent results have been because the strikeout rate for Chris Paddock is not great The stuff plus is not great

But there is something that the twins seem to be pretty good at getting the most out of these guys with great command I could see him, a 4-1, 4-2 going forward and just being careful with the types of starts that you give him in terms of what he's got coming up. He's got Seattle on Sunday and then Toronto the next week. I would like him for that Seattle start. I don't know if I want him for that Toronto start. Ryan Yarbrough is Somebody that everyone's looking at he's finishing up to start with the Dodgers on Sunday his next start is Boston

Those are not great matchups, but I would like to say that the Yankees did find something I wrote a piece today about the Yankees and all the things they've done for Max Frieden Carlos Rodone and different guys over the past couple of years. They gave Carlos Rodone a better change up. They gave Ryan Yarbrough a better change up. So now he's got a slider that's plus, a change up that's plus. And despite the poor velocity, he's got 96s and 97 stuff pluses on his fastballs. So you know 88-4 is always going to make you nervous and I don't really like him for those next two starts but I do like him in deep leagues. I do like him as a stash. I do like him like as a circle for when he gets better matchups and he's a better situation. Slay Chikoni is another guy that a lot of people are looking at. I think that they did tweak his change up in Cleveland and he's

always had a good breaking ball. He's a similar where the fastballs aren't great. And so I don't think he has the greatest upside. I don't know if I believe this 31% strikeout rate in a short sample, but again, another sort of fourish ERA guy that can hang around. He gets the angels on Saturday and then next week Slade Tacona gets Houston on Friday. That's an iffy one for me. I might take a chance on some of these two starters I'm about to list that are owned

in fewer leagues over that Slade start. Dickie Fitz is back. Richard Fitz has a two starter Angels at New York. I love that at New York, but maybe he'll be motivated. That's his old team. The Angels start is a decent one. Here's my favorite two starter next week. And this is a guy that maybe you just keep around on your roster for these two starts because they're going to happen every once in a while. Jonathan Cannon gets Detroit and Kansas City this week at home. I'm into that. And then Mike Burroughs gets Houston and Philadelphia at home. I'm okay with that. These are deep league

options. Also wanted to mention Robert Stevenson all the way back. 132 Stuff Plus was throwing heat. You know, he's now my new favorite for saves when Kenley Jansen gets traded. He's in Anaheim and the stuff looks all the way back. He is a great stash for the future. On the hitter side, a lot of people, a lot of yous out there's looking up Colt Keith. I dropped him a while back and yes, the splits have improved. In the last month, we've seen him hit for a 282, 325, 535 line. Colt Keith has 141 WRC plus, and that's backed by a slightly different batted ball mix. But the real difference has been a lot more line drives. And I feel like that comes and goes.

And he also though has been pulling the ball more and going up the middle of the field. And that is something that is really important for Colt Keith is mixing that ability to go the other way with the pull power. At this point, I think the ceiling is so is low. And I think that, you know, he's basically in the Jake Cronenworth territory where, yeah, he's a decent player.

He's going to hit some bombs, not that many. He's going to hit for an okay average, but not that great. He's going to steal some bases, but not that many. If you wanted to switch from Cronenworth to him, you know, they're really just a Spider-Man meme. I don't really know that there's a real difference between the two. I don't think the ceiling is great on him. He's not an acquire for me in fantasy leagues. Even if you look at the most rosy projection firm, it's 260 with a 326 average

and something that would equate to 15 homers and two steals over the course of the year. and something that would equate to 15 homers and two steals over the course of the year. It's okay. It's just, you know, not my bag in terms of, you know, acquiring him as if I'm rebuilding. It's just more like, oh, he's on the wire. And what I have is worse than that, I guess. Ernie Clement is 29 years old. He also, I don't think is necessarily, you know, a building thing. What he does is he will give you batting average if you need batting average. And I guess the question is, where does he play when they're fully healthy? He's been playing short, second, third, first. He plays everywhere. If they're fully healthy, does he have a place to play? Because I know that Beau Bache has been a little banged up. He missed

a game with injury at third base. You've got a mix of sort of barger going to the outfield, but I think barger is going to take third base and then second base. Andres Jimenez is, you know, on rehab right now. So I think Jimenez will come back. I think Clement's a true utility player that's just playing a little bit more than usual. I don't think that you need to go get him. Jake Myers was another guy that people were looking at. He's a little bit like Colt Keith

where I'm like, it's fine, you know, but I think over the full season, he's somebody that would normally hit 260 with 15 homers and 15 steals. It's like, it's okay if you need whatever, an outfielder, fifth outfielder, it's fine. His best strikeout rate of his career, best swing strike rate of his career for Jake Myers. So I do believe that the batting average can stay north of 250, but it's not great bat at ball stuff. You know, he just, he doesn't pull the ball much, sort of sprays it around with not great power, you know, and he's also at this point 28 years old. So he's not somebody I'm looking to build with. But if you just need a fifth outfielder right now, he can be your guy. I'm very happy to have many shares of

him in draft and hold. I've been using him and not using him it's you know based on the schedule it's been fine. Kato Norbi was involved in a very scary incident where Jason Adam hit him with a change-up in the head in the San Diego game. I don't know why people are necessarily looking at him I guess he's he's playing, he's back. He got up from that and argued his way back into the game. His barrel rate 10% for Norby is good. His max EV is not. This is something he's done a lot of though, is have okay barrel rates and bad max EVs. So maybe he's just a guy who gets to his

power well, but he's doing it with a 17% whiff rate so I don't even believe the 276 batting average. I think he could be a 230 hitter that hits you like 25 homers and steals you 10 bags over the course of a season. That will be a building block for certain leagues but it's mostly deeper leagues. I don't think 10 to 12 teamers need to do anything other than maybe have him at the end of the bench to see if he can work on that strikeout rate a little bit. But remember, he's a little bit older, 24 years old, he's a Marlin. That's what these things happen. All right.

And then on the deeper end of things, we've got Gavin Sheets. People are looking at him. He is now passing the 50% own list level and that's because he's hitting for power, hitting for batting average. And a lot of it looks sustainable nice the best barrel rate of his career you know the best max one max max TV of five years you know and he's doing it with you know he's straight he's being a little bit more aggressive he was going getting the ball a bit more swinging missing a little bit more but it's really working for his game and he seems to be a guy that they need in the

lineup right now in San Diego. I think this will continue but if you look at his last it's a lot of DH. I think this will continue even if they acquire some money because you know he doesn't look good out in the outfield in left field. So a poor you know Bricks for Hands Gavin Sheets in left field or Tyler Wade who has no bat in left field or Jason Hayward who's currently injured but didn't look that good even if they acquire somebody I think Gavin Sheets could be their DH So I could see picking up Gavin Sheets and and playing him in most leagues You know, I think he's gonna end the season with something like, you know, a 260 average and 25 to 30 homers.

So that could be useful on most teams. Parker Meadows is on his way back. So people are looking to get ahead of that. He's a beginning. He's in the middle of a rehab assignment. I guess they're making a little bit of a longer one because he's already 40 played appearances into it, but he's been playing well on that rehab stint. And I think there's a job, there's just a job waiting for him. Dan Myers is coming back. He's older. We've talked about him a fair amount, but at 29 years old, I don't think he's a building block, but I think that they don't have enough, you know, great players to play every day

in Miami. So he's going to play every day and he's going to, the type of talent that should put up 260, 12 homers and 20 steals in a given season. A little bit like a Luis Garcia of the outfield maybe. I think that's definitely useful. We talked about Jesus Sanchez last week. Angel Martinez is probably, Angel Martinez is probably the guy who's a little bit like Jesus Sanchez that I think he's underrated

power speed, not great amounts of any of them, but comes with good contact and he's playing almost every day in Cleveland. So I also don't think that Lane Thomas is necessarily, Lane Thomas is back and I guess he got injured, but Lane know, Lane Thomas' metrics defensively are not great in center field. So I could see Martinez still having a great role even when, when Lane Thomas is back. For example, there were days where Lane Thomas DH'd and Martinez was center field when Lane Thomas is back. Martinez also played second one of those games. So there's enough defensive versatility there that I would buy on him. Just to finish things off, over in Kansas City they've got a rave going on.

They've been using a 27 year old outfielder named John Rave every day in right field since they let Hunter Renfro go. I know that the numbers look really good for Rave in the minor leagues. He's 27 years old. You have to basically minus away almost all of that and assume that he's basically below league average player AAA. That's what we found when we talked about age adjustments. Maybe he made an adjustment to get to more power, but in the major league level, so far, he hasn't hit a ball that super hard.

He's striking out. I don't know how I think they'll basically give him, you know, seven to 10 days to make his case before Jack Caglin comes up. Nick Lofton, I think has a little bit more defensive versatility. He was walking like the mad in the minor leagues, 21% walk rate in the minor leagues, and he could play the infield. He could play the outfield I think he has more staying power on that roster. So I love raves, but I don't love the rave

I think I would take weight for Jack Caglione or take Lofton over him and that's the best I can do On one leg. Thanks so much to Jeff Ponce for coming in and uh, and giving me a breather and talking because this has been difficult. And we're going to have Derek back early next week and I will be very happy about that. So please again, join our discord, like the video, subscribe and thank you so much for listening. It's been a marathon today and I'm going to go back to bed I think. Thanks for listening. DVR, please come back.

I can't quit you.