Rates & Barrels - The 2024 Second-Half Rebound Draft, Jacob Wilson Comps & Weekly Waiver Targets

Episode Date: July 19, 2024

Eno and DVR host their first second-half rebound draft looking for players who have accrued negative value to this point (12-team, 5x5 leagues) with the best chances of turning things around in the second half. Plus, they consider comps for the recently promoted Jacob Wilson, Brooks Baldwin's opportunity with the White Sox, River Ryan's model-breaking arsenal, and a few names to consider on the waiver wire this weekend. Rundown 1:31 Second-Half Rebound Draft: Luis Robert Jr. v. Gerrit Cole 4:50 Xander Bogaerts & Dansby Swanson 7:50 Blake Snell & Kevin Gausman 11:56 Josh Lowe & Bo Bichette 15:44 Lars Nootbaar & Hunter Brown 17:51 A Waffle to Yusei Kikuchi, the Case for Closers & Sean Murphy 23:01 Camilo Doval & Edwin Díaz 27:52 Project Prospect: Jacob Wilson Gets the Call 34:25 Brooks Baldwin's Opportunity in Chicago 39:30 River Ryan's Model-Breaking Stuff Numbers 47:14 Other Pitching Prospects to Consider Stashing 53:09 Injured Pitchers Nearing Return 58:12 The 12-Team Mixed League Outfield Puzzle 1:04:55 Future Saves: Time to Stash Ben Joyce & A.J. Puk? Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Join our Discord: https://discord.gg/FyBa9f3wFe Join us on Thursdays at 1p ET/10a PT for our livestream episodes! Subscribe to The Athletic: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Hosts: Derek VanRiper & Eno Sarris Producer: Brian Smith Executive Producer: Derek VanRiper Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Derek and I are here Eno Saris here with you on this episode we have our 2024 second half rebound draft. We're looking for players who had negative value through the first half of the season, drafting them hoping to do better in the second half. So it's a head to head me versus Eno scenario in this one. We got Project Prospect with a few players coming up, including Jacob Wilson for the A's, Brooks Baldwin for the White Sox, and River Ryan soon to join the Dodgers.

Of course, we'll have our weekend waiver wire preview, so a lot to cover in there. Eno, how's it going for you on this Friday? It's going great. I'm about to leave for Seattle tomorrow, so I won't see you guys next week, but it'll be some much needed rest.

Full house, four shows still coming anyway, even with Eno enjoying some time off. If you'd like to join us in the Discord, you can do that using the link in the show description. There's actually stuff in there like free tickets to a Pirates game, thanks to Eno. So you never know what you'll find in the Discord, so be sure to join if you haven't done so already. Let's get things started with this rebound draft. The main point of the exercise is for us to discuss some of the players that have underperformed to this point and explain why we think they're going to be better going forward.

As I mentioned up top, the rules are pretty simple. We're looking at the fan graphs, player raider, 12 team, 5x5, looking for players who had negative value and played at least one game in the big leagues prior to the all-star break. I think we're going to try to make this a 7 round effort and the rule is going to be you can't have more than 4 hitters or 4 pitchers. So it'll be 3 and 4 in some combination. No specific positional requirements because it doesn't quite work out to do it that way.

And if we remember to do this, I'll try to put on the Google calendar, I'll tally it up at the end. We'll see looking at the same auction calculator when it puts the second half 2024 option up there, we'll see who accrued the most second half value. And since you're going on vacation and since I made this up and didn't tell you other than just putting it on the rundown, I will let you have the first selection in our first second half rebound draft. And since I'm I'm just doing this on the fly with very little preparation,

I'm going to take the name at the very top of the list is just staring at me. I'm going to take Luis Robert Jr. Seems fair. I just feel like, you know, some part of it is lower Babbitt than usual, 290 Babbitt, 330 career. He gets that batting average up to 250, 260, like he should be able to, then the power and speed are there and he's healthy for now. I feel like a 260, you know, 12, 10 second half

will get me what I need in this draft. Yeah, I'm pretty sure of the players that are in the red that qualify for this draft. Luis Rappert by far earned the most last season. So I think that makes him a great, great general target if you're looking to trade for a player that can make a big impact, even with the low, low quality of the supporting

cast. He's done this before with similar talent around him. Maybe the White Sox bring up more prospects. I mentioned Brooks Baldwin up top. Maybe we see Colson Montgomery at some point in the second half. Maybe they make a couple of trades. They end up getting a position player back that actually bolsters that group should they trade some pitching.

There's a few different ways the lineup could actually be a little better. A healthy Eloy, I know people are laughing as I say that. Maybe that helps boost things compared to where they were in the first half as well. So I think Luis Robert makes a lot of sense as the first pick for this. I'm gonna take a pitcher first. I'm gonna take Garrett Cole.

We talked about him recently. Seems like the stuff is slowly coming back. Our main concern really is the lack of slider usage right but similar to Luis Robert the thinking here is maybe I could sneak a 20 or 25 dollar half out of Garrett Cole if everything is clicking for him now that he gets a few starts under his belt and he looks something like 80% of typical Garrett Cole it will pay off nicely we talked about him as a trade target before and he might be somewhat gettable if only because he was likely held. The people that had him had to figure out how to keep the pitching together without him and perhaps they did a good enough job

to where Cole himself is still expendable in leagues that allow trading. So I'm hoping we get that $20 second hat from Garrett Cole. I'm one of the people that tried to stash him in a league where I actually need him. So I'm living this one. I'm riding this one out in a place where it actually matters too. Nice. I had a tough decision between a favorite outfielder of mine, a couple of them that I like here, but I'm going to go with some name value here.

Xander Bogarts as my second hitter. I know he's coming off a shoulder injury but for the year his max EV, his barrel rate, his contact rates, they all line up pretty well. He did steal four bases in 200 plate appearances so I think there's gonna be power and steals. It may only end up being 280 with, you know, I don't know, five or six homers and four or five steals. But, you know, it's one of those things where I think the lineup around him has gotten better with them while he's gone. You know, now, and if he is going to get hits, then that's what he's done since he's gotten back, which I know it's like tiny sample poor analysis, but he is a guy who's gotten hits in the past.

So I'm seeing like good runs in RBI out of him on that Padres team. So after a season, a full draft season of Xander Slander, I love that he ends up on your roster for our second half rebound draft. But we'd like that he went to driveline. He put in that extra work. He's trying to find ways to continue producing at a high level. And I liked him a lot as an early-ish round oatmeal pick back during draft season. So I think he ends up being a nice impactful piece for the Padres in the second half of the season.

Nothing against that pick whatsoever. I'm going to take Dansby Swanson as my first hitter. I think when I look at Danzbe Swanson, I look across the board, the slash line's disgusting. It's like as bad as it's ever been for him in the big leagues. The K-rate's up a little bit compared to last season, but he's not chasing more than he was a year ago. The barrel rate is still very good, 9.3%.

I think he's been four consecutive seasons in the double-digit range, that 10 to 11% marker. Mostly the difference is hitting the ball on the ground. I think he's a key player for the Cubs, of course, being part of an offense that needs to take a step forward, whether they add at the trade deadline or not. Dainsby Swanson is still going to be there. If they're going to make a run, he has to be a part of it. Little bit of, kind of does everything in a typically good year, even if he's a slight

drag on the batting average. But going into this season, I felt like Dan's be Swanson versus Willie Adamis was sort of a Coin flip where they were going in drafts. I usually took Adamis because he was going later But now you're sort of getting that discount on Dan's be Swanson because the first half of the season has been Underwhelming just nine homers five steals so far I think if you could just keep playing every day, the second half ends up being just as good as the first half, even though there's a smaller number of games on the slate. This one's going to be interesting. I'm going to delete, I'm going to risk leaving that bat out there. I'm going to go with Blake Snell. My rankings are coming out early next week. Sorry, I had said that they might come out Friday, but it's just the snazzy kind of fun bits with my

rankings this year as you've noticed the way that they format and all that just requires more people to get them out if you know what I mean, just sort of in terms of structure and you know what's going on behind the scenes. So you know, and it's also vacation season. So we just a couple of vacations didn't line up. And so you should get them next week. Anyway, just a sneak peek into where Snell is. I have been struggling with him.

It's been up and down a little bit. But one thing I noticed is that he's one of the few people with a positive stuff trend. Like his stuff is up. He has a 3.5 ERA projection if you use his stuff. He has a 29% strikeout rate projection if you use stuff plus. And I think a big part of the story has just been getting comfortable with his catcher, getting comfortable with his environments. The tone has changed a little bit. There was a little bit at one point when he was saying,

oh, the Giants are just trying to get me back. It's blah, blah, this, this, this, this, this, this. It's getting me back, getting me back. Most recently, I don't know if he's trying to rehab those quotes or whatever, but he has been much more positive about the organization and how he feels in it. So maybe they backed off of the rehab. Maybe they, you know, clarified some things with each other. Either way, I think he's primed for a he's, you know, he's a great pitcher in a great park, you know, or at least a very above average pitcher in a great park. You know or at least a very above average pitcher in a gray park. Yeah and capable of I think just going

red hot for a stretch we've seen them. He's been with the full seasons before as a two-time Cy Young winner so I think if he's finally healthy the the shape of his season has been so unusual you know the late signing a couple of injuries I could see Blake Snell settling in pitching really well and ending up being a big part of a Giants team that hangs around and at least causes some problems for other teams in the playoff race over the course of the second half. I've got a torn here looking at some of the pitchers that are available. We talked about Kevin Gossman on an episode recently and it doesn't look like a lot has changed but at the same time, if you say, okay he's more of an SP2, 2 SP 3 now that's still pretty good in the pool of players that we're looking at I think you're generally gonna get high volume of innings you're gonna get

above average ratios because he throws so many innings you're gonna get a good number of K's and that stuff all tends to pop in a player raider so I'm gonna somewhat reluctantly take Kevin Gosman I don't think he brings the Blake Snell ceiling but I think he also the Blake Snell ceiling, but I think he also brings a lot more floor, and I think it feels kind of right after getting Garrett Cole for ceiling to go ahead and find the other guy

that could finish the $20 pitcher in the second half, but sort of does it a slightly different way. I don't really wanna take a currently injured guy, but there's one that's looking at me, staring at me. That's the tricky part of this too, is timing the injuries, because missed time in a partial season has a massive negative impact on value.

Yeah, I'm gonna pass on that, I guess. And we've talked about this before, like injury optimism as the season goes on starts to fade, whereas like in March and April, you might hold a player for four to six weeks because the bulk of the season is still there once they come back Now we're at the point having passed the all-star break where if you say someone's down four to six weeks They become much more cuttable or in a situation like this. They almost become someone you would avoid

This is a gut play here. This is a gut play Josh Lowe. I'm gonna take Josh Lowe There's not really a reason I can give you other than I Think he's you know kind of an everyday guy on a team that doesn't always do that. I think There's more power in there and he's stealing bases and hitting for power So I'm making my multi category play against you where I'm hoping to beat you in a multi category play against you where I'm hoping to beat you in. Did we establish how the scoring goes?

This is dollars. So it doesn't matter if you have balance between the categories. Oh, boo. I was going to beat you in the categories. No, but, you know, it just generally it's good. It's a good way to earn money is to have somebody who does everything. I mean, one thing that really surprised me, I guess this is this is my argument. Matt Chapman is my argument. this is why. I was looking, I did a story today about All-Stars that weren't All-Stars in the first half and Matt Chapman's name came up. He doesn't qualify for this, you know why? Because he's been the seventh best third baseman in baseball, in fantasy baseball. Doesn't that surprise you? He's hit 230 but he's hit, he's stolen seven bases and he's hit a bunch of homers,

he's hit like nine homers or whatever it is, 10, 11, 12, whatever it is. Because he's done everything in all the categories, the batting average will fool you. And so in this case, Josh Lowe has only hit five homers, but he hasn't played a full season and the barrel rate looks great. The maxi beat doesn't, but it's not a full season yet. I'm into Josh Lowe. I like him as a player. We'll see what the true talent strikeout rate is. My pick depends a little bit on if he strikes out 28%

or 33% going forward. Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, we've wondered about that with Lowe. Where does that number settle in? But I think as the Rays Potentially thin out the position player group a little bit Low is someone they're gonna probably rely on a lot regardless But the chances of him being a max volume player start to go up if they move a position player or two and get a little bit younger after the trade deadline

So I think that's a pretty good call not much has changed for him He's been gone a lot because of injuries so far this season. I'm starting to look at some of the injured guys. Still doesn't feel quite right. I'll take a guy who's a little bit dinged up and probably be disappointed in myself later, but I liked Beau Bichette a lot during draft season. Even if we were gonna say his 20, 25 ADP

or second half ADP would be in the 150 range, he's at least healthy, which is something we can't fully say about a lot of the guys we're thinking about right now. I don't know why the barrel rates basically been cut in half this year. He still hits the ball hard. We know the approach being one that gets, where he sprays the ball over the place is not the ideal approach to consistently get to power. But I look at this and say, okay, maybe it's gonna be different than what I expected. Maybe it ends up being a good average in the second half.

Projections have in the 270, even the low 280 range. Maybe it's that with the equivalent of 15 homer power and 10 to 12 steals, kind of in a weird Matt Chapman sort of way where it's average and then a little bit everything else. I think Beau Bichette might be sneaky, useful in a format like this. Maybe he can give me something similar to what you're expecting from Bogart's.

The kind of healthy thing I was talking about, it's that calf injury he was dealing with before the break. If that's actually behind him, then I think I'll come out okay with Beau Bichette for these final two and a half months. All right, it's getting thinner Definitely getting thinner. I'm still leaving my injured guy out there. It is time for law New bar Come on down. He should spell it with extra O's and extra A's even on top of the ones He's got he's got two of both already in the last name. So.

I'm going with him because the strikeout rate is good. The walk rate is good. The barrel rate is good. The max EV is good. He steals bases. It's all there for him. I do think he's struggling to find a way to pull the ball in the air with authority and not put everything on the ground. But he's a bit of a tinkerer that's aware of this that I think will maybe make that one adjustment to to get past this. All right. I like that. All right. So Lars Newt Barr got another guy that's missed a ton of time that just could stay healthy and maybe be the player you thought he was going to be back during draft season. Definitely makes a lot of sense. I'm going to take advantage of the format here I'm going to take one more pitcher, maybe I'll end up taking two, but I'm going to take Hunter Brown

It's funny because if you run the player raider for a 15 team league, he's a slight positive if you run it for a 12 team league, he's a slight negative which makes him eligible for our purposes but this is basically just buying into the adjustments that the sinker has become a really important pitch for him, just having that as a way to keep hitters more honest against the rest of his arsenal. So I think you're going to get lots of Ks, probably better ratios than we've seen for the season so far, something more in line with what he's done for the last six or so weeks. Hunter Brown just makes sense to me as someone that is healthier than some of the other players

I've taken so far too. I think as we kind of go through these last couple of picks that's where a lot of the gambles are gonna be. It's gonna be on guys getting back sooner than expected or coming back and just being themselves for the final six or seven weeks that they're available. Yes and two spots ahead of my rankings is Mackenzie Gore who is actually protected for a little bit worse ERA but more strikeouts. I was looking to the strength of schedule to make a decision here. I hate to talk about a pitcher that's still on the board. This is a faux pas in most drafts but you say Kikuchi is a guy that I like.

Have him ranked... where do I have him ranked? Where is Mr. Kikuchi? Wow I have him ranked. Where do I have him ranked? And where is Mr. Kikuchi? Wow, I have him ranked way higher. Okay, can I change it? I'm taking you say Kikuchi. All right. You want you say Kikuchi instead of Gore, that's fine. I mean, he's projected for an ERA that's 20 points better than McKenzie Gore's. His stuff is there.

And I was gonna say something about strengths of schedule. The Blue Jays have a poor strength of schedule. They have a bad one. They have a 506 regular strength of schedule on Fangraphs. That's a 506 winning percentage against the facing and the Nationals is 502. But I don't think Kikuchi will be a Blue J. And so I'm going to take a bet that he ends up somewhere better than the American League East because I just don't think the blue jays will trade him within their division and almost every other division makes for easier competitors than the American League East.

So you say Kikuchi come on down. Solid pick for sure I think we've talked about him as a good trade candidate for a few episodes now it's probably going to happen unless the Jays nudge their way back into the buyer's group and it makes all the sense in the world. But he may be the best starting pitcher moved at the deadline this year. All right, so you've got two pitchers now

with six players taken, so your last pick will end up being another pitcher to see a four and three. I need to know somebody I like, so. I know, I could snipe you here, and I don't think that's the direction I want to go. So it looks like you're going to kind of get what you wanted here. I'm torn on the closers. A closer for a partial season could reel off.

No, there's no really good closers here. I was looking at all these closers. I mean, how do you even pick? Let me just list them. So before you pick, we've got Clay Holmes as a minus and 12 closers. I mean, how do you even pick? Let me just list them. So before you pick, we've got Clay Holmes as a minus and 12 teamers, Camilo Deval, Edwin Diaz. I mean, if I were to rank closers for the rest of the season, I think I'd rank all of them in the top five. I think I still like Diaz the most of the bunches, even though this has been just a disaster

year for him. We've seen stretches like this before and we've seen worse than this from him before. But what makes me nervous is they're not they haven't all been bad and yet they've all had negative value the way that this was calculated. So I'm just never nervous that you could get a fine season a fine half season from Doval or Diaz and still not rate that well. Right. I think the exercise here would be of those teams, well especially of the Giants and Mets, which one's more likely to stay in the mix and be a buyer because you wanna max out those saves, that's gonna be the thing that drives the value

in the player-rater and then with the Yankees, does Clay Holmes make it through the trade deadline keeping the job or they upgrade that spot and make him a setup guy? That's the kind of lingering question as you look at those guys. But I'm gonna pass on all of them for now and see if it moves you off of your McKenzie Gore pick.

Now we're just playing mind games. I wanna take Royce Lewis, but I don't know when he's coming back. So I'm not gonna do it. The guy I've been referencing is Tristan Casas too. Yeah, I keep looking at Casas. I feel like he must be close. With Royce, he's just like, I don't know.

I don't know where he is. That's a complete unknown. Casas is like, they said maybe back by the end of the month. Right. Casas and Michael Harris are both on similar timetables. Harris will be probably early August if he gets back. By ADP, he was the best player eligible for this draft. I just as much as I like him long term, I don't think I want to squeeze him onto the roster here and put too much of an expectation on him for the second half

of the season. So, yes, I'm stalling a little bit. I want to do something really unconventional. I'm going to take Sean Murphy. I'm going to take a catcher, a guy who's healthy that I really liked. I think catchers can pop a little bit in the player raiders and in those formulas because of their scarcity. But even without that, I was looking at last year what he did. He was about a $12 player and that was with a bad second half.

I think this is a bet on Murphy being more the player he was in the first half of 2023 than the player he was in the second half of that season because he's been hurt for most of this year. We don't really know which of those is true. But last year, the first season with Atlanta, Sean Murphy had a career high 15.8% barrel rate, kept the K rate down like he usually does. It's a great lineup, even without Acuna as far as run production goes. It's kind of a bet on more of the good things we've seen from Austin Riley lately, a possible bounce back from Matt Olson.

It's kind of all of those things rolled into one, but also some belief that Sean Murphy is more of like a $15 player over a full season. So just hoping to get that over a half now that he's finally healthy again. I'm going to switch switch doors. Switch doors, Moti Hall. Yes, I know. I know. I got it wrong earlier. I'm switching doors to Camilo Doval. The thinking here is that even if the Giants sell, they're not gonna sell Doval, I'm pretty sure. So they could sell some relievers around him that make the relief core so good, but I kind of bet that with the the flames that are under the GM's but perhaps that they

Buy or just sort of tepidly buy I can't imagine Spending all that money and knowing that your time as the leader of this team is limited and not and not going for it on some level so the other part of this is team is limited and not going forward on some level. So the other part of this is, yes, Accumulative Balls Locational Plus isn't good, and yes, he's had some bad walk rates in the past, but there's been very few stops where his walk rate has been as bad as it is right now. And I could see that as just an easy thing for him to iron out going forward. The stuff is dominant. The things that we've found about save opportunities have been that team quality matters

and team bullpen quality matters. And I think that's a sneaky, really good bullpen. The reason team bullpen quality matters is because they have to hand you the save opportunity. They have to keep the lead, you know? And I trust Ryan Walker. I trust Tyler Rogers. I trust that bullpen.

Completely fair, yeah. I think you're. I trust that bullpen. Completely fair. Yeah, I think you're right about Farhan having that extra nudge to try and make this roster better rather than try to play for the future given the state of things in San Francisco right now. I am gonna go ahead and take a closer. I'm gonna take Edwin Diaz. I was hoping he'd make it there.

I felt like the difference between the closers was so small that there was no reason to take one with that six pick. But I think the Mets hang around. I think they're just good enough. I think they can be a team that spends more on payroll the rest of the way and it makes player acquisition at the deadline affordable in terms of not giving up long term value. And I think that ultimately drives some value for guys like Diaz.

And they're going to create tons of save chances in the second half and I think we'll see something more typical from him. He's still missing a lot of bats, 33.6% K rate. Yeah, it's not the 50% we got a year ago, but it's still very good, right? Among closers, that's still gonna be top end. That would still probably nudge him closer. That top five, we were re-ranking the position

for the rest of the season. They are really set up for maybe a rental starter acquisition because the bullpen's fine. Butoh has been been pretty good out of the bullpen. And Deduel Nunez is actually a kind of a stuff plus hero. So you're kind of putting together the pieces in the bullpen. The lineup, I think, looks strong and long. I mean, who's the big hole in this lineup?

At this point, you know, it's Jeff McNeil, and at least he's going to put the ball in play for you, you know? Even Harrison Bader has been playing above average. So the lineup looks long. It looks good. I think, you know, maybe Senga can come back and be a playoff starter for you. He's at least a top five guy. They've got, you know, Manaya and Severino

look like top five guys. Peterson could be, I think I'd want to be upgrading on the Quintana spot. And I think you could do that in a trade environment. Or you kind of push Quintana and Peterson into, you know, sort of sixth, seventh areas or fifth, sixth, seventh. So I think acquiring a rental starter, even like a Jack Flaherty, I think would make sense for them Yeah, and I just I don't think it's going to hurt them long term if they go after some players like that either

So I wouldn't be surprised at all the Mets are fourth in team WRC plus this season Who had that on the on the prediction? Yeah, it's been a revelation for them and Alvarez is good. And so both those guys hit the ball super hard. And then Nemo is just an underrated player. I think people just don't understand. I think Nemo and Lindor are maybe some of the most underrated players in baseball. It's weird, but it's true as far as how people look at those two guys in particular.

So recapping our draft, you got Luis Robert Xander Bogart's Blake Snell Josh Lowe Lars Newt Barr you say Kikuchi and Camilo Deval with your seven picks I took Garrett Cole Dan's be Swanson Kevin Gossman Bo Bichette Hunter Brown Sean Murphy and Edwin Diaz the bowl, but I thought it was me a little bit. I don't think I don't think I saw his name The boba shed bothers me a little bit. I don't think I saw his name. We're using the same spreadsheet. I know, I know. I just didn't see his name on there. But of course it's on there. I mean, he's been bad. He's been real bad.

I'm not sure that it's rock solid, but I think it was a good pick. Well, we'll see how it plays out. Should be fun. If you're shopping while working, eating, or even listening to this podcast, then you know and love the thrill of the hunt. But are you getting the thrill of the best deals? Rakuten shoppers do. They get the brands they love with the most savings and cash back. And you can get it too.

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or go to rakuten.ca to start getting the most bang for your buck. That's R-A-K-U-T-E-N. Let's move on to Project Prospect. We've got a new shortstop coming up for the A's, Jacob Wilson. And Jacob Wilson is a bit of a polarizing player because he's got questionable power but seems to have a phenomenal hit tool. How good?

We're talking about a 3.3% strikeout rate during his brief time at AAA, 10.8% during his time at AA, and that samples only 41 games combined between just this season. He played it a little bit at high A last year to being drafted. So the simple question is, what are the reasonable comps for Jacob Wilson as a hitter, as a tons of contact, questionable power sort of bat? I hate this, you know, oh, nice, exciting player. And now here comes, you know, to poo poo it. He doesn't hit the ball hard.

So if you look at his max CV and you look at his hard hit rates, I found comps in the major leagues sort of plus or minus two, plus or minus three in terms of max.cv and hard hit. So just around him. And the comps are up on the on the TV screen right now. It's Jose Altube, who's an outlier. I don't know that you want to comp to Altube in terms of batting balls, you know, stuff. He's done a lot of things that made himself unique over the years. Bryce Turing, I think is actually the best comp for Jacob Wilson, which is, I know, I know, some people are gonna get very angry about that comp,

but I think it is a really good comp because they're, you know, defensive guys, make a lot of contact, don't hit the ball super hard. Justin Turner's on here, he's not a good comp because he's old. Cedric Mullins, probably ditto. Jeff McNeil is like a low end comp, is like probably like a, you know,

what could happen in a bad way comp. And Max Schumann is, that would be a terrible outcome for Jacob Wilson. But these are, and I, and Max Schumann is above league averages here, so I'm not, I'm not, I'm'm really I know I'm rude, but I'm not trying to be rude and Max human also strikes out more. So if you bring contact rake batting, I think to rank is the best comp for him. All right. So then to be like to ring as a fantasy player, you have to run. I mean so far this season Bryce Trang's been a $16 player by the player raider, 12 team, five by five.

What happens if you take the dollars for Stonebase out? Oh, I'm sure it's bad. It's not terrible because he plays every day. He leads off a lot against righties. Like the average has been good. I just think a lot of pressure is put on that particular category with this profile. And the other way to get there, of course, is to be like a 300 plus hitter, which is hard to project for anybody because it's very hard to hit in the big leagues right now, too.

It doesn't line up super well because Stephen Kwan hits the ball even softer than Jacob Wilson. But Stephen Kwan is, you know, in the range of outcomes for Jacob Wilson as well, although Stephen Kwan has stolen 20 bases in both his professional seasons. And I'm I don't know what Jacob Wilson will do in that category. Yeah. So far as a pro and again, this is scattered over a bunch of different levels, including the complex. Jacob Wilson is six for eight as a base dealer in what is about a half seasons work It's like a meteoric rise. Yeah, and he's Dom he's on base all the time

So there there are chances because he creates them Fangraves is a 55 grade on his speed. So from that standpoint, it seems like he could do it It's really much a lot of an unknown. So if you kind of think about redraft leagues, 15 teams, is that the cutoff right now for Wilson until we get more? I mean. No, I mean, it's so intriguing.

I think you can pick him up anywhere. I just, I just, I don't, I wouldn't pick him up in like 10 and 12 team leagues where you have to play him or you're like, you play your bench a lot But if you have that one spot on your bench where you you're nursing along You know, where's that line? Who's who's somebody like? Jeremy Pena like they throw is the yeah, hey you line. Are you taking Jacob Wilson? Yeah

Yeah, just because I can those shallow leagues up there. Yeah, just try something new. Yeah. All right That's that's probably a pretty good spot to just say. All right, let's Neto like Neto versus Wilson. Are you holding Neto? I Mean he's he's better than Pena because he you know double-digit homers and stolen bases Like there's some decents upside there still it's almost like just reaching for the newest version you know upside there still it's almost like just reaching for the newest version. You know, there is somebody here later that I'm reaching for the newest version right after, you know, it's that meme where he's looking at the other girl walking the other way, holding hands, looking back. Yep.

I'm keeping that up, keeping Neto. Oh, this would be a harsh cut, but maybe something you would do at this point in the year. Nico Horner versus Jacob Wilson. That's another comp for me, for Jacob Wilson. So that's Spider-Man meme. It is. I think with the slightly lower rate of stealing bases,

or I mean, actually pretty significantly lower rate of stealing bases for Horner, I could go for it. They're very similar, so what's the worst case scenario? You just get another Nico Horner. That's sort of could go for it. Hmm. Okay. They're very similar. So what's the worst case scenario? You just get another Nico Horner. That's sort of how I see it. Maybe you lose a few stolen bases. I think the worst case scenario would be Wilson moved so fast to the

minors that he's overmatched in the big leagues and they send them back down. And he's unusable. And he becomes unusable. But if the goal is shooting for some ceiling and you just think Nico Horner showing us that he's more of a floor guy anyway, then yeah you take Take the new guy and see if you get something more. Jeremy Payne is probably out there for you if you messed up You can go back to Payne at the end. Yeah, so alright that gives us an idea of some guys you'd be thinking about Dropping to upgrade

to Jacob Wilson in those more shallow formats. Let's move on to another call up, Brooks Baldwin. Baldwin kind of looks like an underrated player, right? I haven't really heard a lot about him. He's in the White Sox system and I was reading some of the profiles and I thought it was interesting when I found the White Sox 2024 report over at Fangraphs, Eric Langenhagen and Tess Druskin had him in the bat to ball sleepers category. So he wasn't even in like the actual ranked group,

but they listed him as a versatile switch hitter with a sweet swing, right? I was like, okay, that's kind of good. That's kind of what we're looking for. And someone that can play all over, if he's not actually a shortstop, or if they do bring up Coleson Montgomery at some point, Baldwin can play one of the other vacant spots and stick around and maybe actually do something.

We're talking about a guy who's been at least 20% better than league average at each stop since the start of last season. There's a little bit of power and there's pretty good efficiency as far as what he's done as a base stealer so far as well. It's more of a question of how does he, how quickly does Brooks Baldwin adjust making that big leap that everyone has to make facing big league pitching now? I do like this, and this is important for Wilson as well,

that I do like the contact guys. I feel like there's a base level when they get up that at least they won't strike out 40% of the time and just go back down. You know what I feel like there's a base level when they get up that at least they won't strike out 40% of the time Just go back down And it is interesting that they love they they love his bat to ball skills because there are some higher swinging strike rates in lower minors for Baldwin But he looks yeah

This is like that's a little bit more scout versus and stats, you know And then he comes to AAA and it's just 35 plate appearances doesn't strike out at all. But that's I don't think that's useful for for this enterprise. So I think he's likely to strike out around 20% of the time the average 21 22. I have no idea what you give you power and steel wise. So this is a deep league play for me for sure. This is a deep league play for me for sure. All right, so you're thinking more ale only league Maybe 15 team league if you're really kind of just looking for something to hit in the mid lane feel like like if you're talking NFC like put him on your tree, but not not at the top All right similar to maybe like Angel Martinez came up for the Guardians recently that sort of the Expectation on hell would probably be ahead if I was thinking about picking up players. OK, that gives us a sense of where Baldwin sort of fits.

One thing that's cool about Baldwin is he mentioned this, but he's played everywhere. In twenty twenty four, we've got eleven games in fifteen games in the minors at second. So that's probably his primary position. But he also had six games at third, 57 games at short. I guess maybe that's his primary position, but he also played in the outfield 10 games and even DH'd once.

So I hesitate to give him shortstop, but I think he might play all over. Yeah, I mean, I think it's a question of what they want to do. If they think there's a chance that he's their long-term shortstop They'll play him there see how it looks and then decide later because they can move Montgomery Paul de Young's not part of the long-term plan. They can move him to third

They added Nick Senzal by the way after the Nats let him go so Senzal is gonna play some second base So the the Nick Senzal tour of the big leagues continues, but why? Why I don't know why why why I just why why I I he's 29 years old he hasn't ever been above league average the bat he hasn't ever been an asset defensively to be fair the Reds played him out of his natural position most of the time he was there. What's his natural position? It's supposed to be third.

They're gonna play him as second. I thought he played third. He played third for the Nats a lot. Yeah, oh you're saying the Reds playing him out of position. Yeah, the Reds, the Reds begging him an outfielder was. I don't know. This is a little bit more eye test, but the defensive stats somewhat agree with me.

Like I thought he was a tailboard third baseman. Yeah, well it's, you just can't know. This is a little more eye test, but the defensive stats somewhat agree with me. Like I thought he was a tailboard third baseman. Yeah. Well, it's uh, you just can't hit. It's got a 78 WRC plus and 1600 career plate appearances. I realized some of those have been coming off of injuries. He's dealt with vertigo. It hasn't been an easy path for Nick Sensel, but what are we clinging to at this point? I have no idea. Not even, it's not even like, oh, he projects well. He projects to be worse than the average. The bad ex does spit out a 93 WRC plus. So maybe that's a slight upgrade.

But yeah, it kind of feels like they're stuck on some old, old, old prospect reports at this point, trying to get the block. The ball is just going to make me angry. Let's let's try to make you happy. Let's talk about River Ryan for a second. It is. Yeah, that does make me angry. Let's try to make you happy. Let's talk about River Ryan for a second. Yay, that does make me happy! Yeah, see as we suggested there's a path for him and Fabian Ardai just reported a couple days ago They're gonna bring River Ryan up. It's not gonna be for this first series at least based on how the probable starters are listed

It sounds like they're gonna go Gavin Stone, Justin Robleski and James Paxton for their first three out of the break. Paxton is hanging on for dear life. By a thread. So you've got Kershaw making progress, and now River Ryan entering the mix. And I think Ryan kind of fits into this other question we'll get to in a minute, like of the pitchers that haven't debuted yet that are prospects

that should come up this year. He's number one. He's number one for you. And this would be a group that includes Jackson Job, Kate Horton, Miss Arouski. Like career wise, Job might be ahead of him because Job is also really nasty. But I just I don't know exactly what what reason the Tigers would necessarily have to push Job's timeline. You know? Yeah, I think for Job, it's more the Tigers get hot for a few weeks and then he becomes an upgrade that they need to try and chase down a wild card.

Or he comes up to replace Flaherty, but. I guess that could be a solution too, because you want him to problem solve bigly hitters a bit, because you have designs on being good next year. But do you want to keep him in case he gets rookie of the year? So you want to keep him under 50 innings, which actually is doable.

It's doable. Plus he missed some time this year with an injury. So you could just shut him down early. He's got room. I think Jackson Job could probably just pitch every fifth day for the rest of the season without really being. Would he get over 50 innings? If he came up today, yeah, he would. But if he comes out August 1, or if he comes up after they trade Jack Flaherty, you'll be talking about sort of like nine-ish starts. And you can just shut him down early. Right. Because you just be like, you made your innings.

So you could just get 40 innings out of him. So what is 40 innings worth versus, you know, it's a little bit like, who's up now is my deal. You know, and I think River Ryan is closer to being up now. You know, they're talking about it. They're talking about bringing him up. That's like, that's the decider for me. The other part of this is I have seen stuff plus numbers on Job and they're

really exciting and scouts all love him. And he looks, there's, there's a whiff of de Grom about him. So that's, that's how exciting he should be about Jackson Job. But River Ryan looks almost like a model breaker. I've got triple A stuff plus numbers for him. The pitches he throws the most are the four-scene fastball, 122 stuff plus. So this is a nasty, nasty fastball. 117 on a cutter, 132 on a slider.

So even if that's a sweeper, he's got the cutter. So you know, he'll be fine. Sometimes I mention that because I don't always trust sweeper stuff pluses all the way. I feel like the league is getting better at sweepers and stuff. Plus, you know, every time we updated sweepers, we'll get, we get knocked down a little bit, but it doesn't stop there. Sinker 104. That's really high for a sinker curve. 138 stuff plus change change up 117. It's a big mix.

I think he'll come up and be like four seam cutter slider, but the fact that the Sinker curve and change all rate well gives him like that ability to be like, oh, I need to do more. You know what I mean? Like there's other tricks he has in his bag. It looks really good. This is supposed to be scaled to the major leagues.

So this isn't like he's just got stuff that would dominate the minors. That's the whole point of stuff is supposed to be scaled to the big leagues. And he looks nasty. If they get Bueller back along with Kershaw and we'll assume Yamamoto is still on the shelf like, yeah, who are their best five starters? And they often go six they may go six to keep everybody fresh they quietly do it and they talked about that

before so glass now Kershaw Bueller stone Ryan and knack and then you bump Paxton and Robleski and then once Yamamoto comes back then you know Ryan or knack tighter bumped out if everyone stays healthy. If you're in redrafts just treat this like who's up now, who's pitching now. Because of this scenario that you just put out where it's like where does Ryan fit when everyone's healthy and because of the kind of what we went through with Jobe is like what are they thinking about timeline and how many innings they wanted to pitch? I don't know that stashing pitchers is a great idea in redraft leagues.

Because you could just wait forever and they could be like, and he's shut down. You're like, God dang it. Yeah, it's hard to get way out in front of these. I mean, I think I ran the poll in the Prospects channel on the Discord and overwhelmingly Jackson Job is the preferred stash of the group.

River Ryan was not in the poll. I think it's because I look at Ryan as someone who's already getting that bump. So it's kind of like who's next. A couple other names I would want to add to that list is just maybe Braxton Ashcraft and Bubba Chandler. Bubba Chandler probably a little step ahead. Those are both pirates guys. I think in what's going to happen in Pittsburgh is if they buy or make a trade, it'll be for somebody like a bat that has multiple years of control like Taylor

Ward. Then on the pitching side, they will just DFA some guys. So they'll just be like, thank you, Marco Gonzalez or Martin Perez, or maybe even trade them away. Just send them to the angels to just to fill a seat. Yeah. Or maybe maybe some other contender just wants a spot starter. It's like we need a guy for two weeks. Can you can we have Marco and they're like, yeah, give them some cash considerations or whatever it is. You know, so I think that that could be a place that Pittsburgh would be like, well, we'll just upgrade from within when it comes to,

because it wouldn't make sense for them to, you know, trade for a rental starter or something. That doesn't make any sense. Yeah, I think my quick argument against Kate Horton right now is that he's still coming back from a lat injury. So if he comes back from that and starts pitching well, then maybe stash him try to get a week or two ahead of the call up before it costs you a lot but I think if I were

choosing from the group in the poll I like Mizorowski quite a bit because when we talked about the Brewers a bit in passing on the show with Trevor on Thursday yeah like they have to do something in that rotation they're probably not going to go out and make another trade they already added Aaron Sivali. DL Hall's coming back as a starter, but Mizorowski has done a great job cutting down on his walks. You go back to his first start in June, it's a span of seven outings now. Jacob Mizorowski has only walked 10 hitters during that span, and he's doing it with the electric bat missing stuff that we're accustomed to. It's a 44 to 10 strikeout to walk ratio in 33 and a third innings. I don't know if they have to necessarily let him see Nashville.

Like, couldn't they just jump him up from double A if they think he's got big league ready stuff? I think you wouldn't want him to see ABF. Given some of the issues he's had with control. You want to get him in front of a really good framer. One thing that David Forrest said recently about calling up Lawrence Butler again, that was interesting was just, you know, we do a fair amount of our player development

at the big league level. I don't know if that's a good sign to hear that. I think it, you know, he's coming from the A's who we know don't maybe invest as much as they should in minor league coaches. And, you know, some, to some extent they're like, well, our best coaches are in the major leagues, let's get them up there.

But I wonder, even if you do invest in the minor leagues, it's probably still true that your best coach is in the major leagues. So maybe Mizorowski is like, this is how far he's gonna get, let's get him in front of our major league pitching coach and our Our best framer in our organization is probably gonna be the starting catcher in the big leagues. Well, I think the other Reason I believe this is they were pretty quick to just move

Abner Uribe out of triple-a and that was a little different because he's reliever but he's wild and he's a little wild But yeah, I mean, I would not be surprised if Mizorowski ends up being the next Brewers prospect to get a look and ends up having a really important role for them. He's kind of at where he was innings-wise last year. He had about 70 innings last year. He's at 72 now. But we're seeing some pitchers kind of blast through any sort of numbers we had in mind for them. And I think there could be a world, too, where they're a little bit careful with some of the usage once they bring him up, the three or six man rotation.

Yeah, I think they could find a way to make that work. And you go back and look at some of his previous totals. I mean, college. Yeah, he was another another guy from Crowder College. I think Aaron Ashby was the other guy they got from that program. Seventy six innings is final year in college with another one and two thirds in Carolina that year. So, yeah, triple digits will be kind of uncharted territory for Mizorowski once he gets there.

I probably one twenty five one thirty is the number they're looking for. They can get a lot of what's left from him in the big leagues I think pounce pounce if they If they tell you they're calling him up and who he's facing and then just wait Otherwise in most redraft situations and I'll only probably different you can afford to stash a guy like this and get nothing if it doesn't End up happening, but I think it's going to happen. He seems kind of important to them I mean mentioned not necessarily wanting to stash pitchers. Junior Caminero time has to be just around the corner, right?

He's 43% rostered in the Rotowire Online Championship, so if not now, it's going to cost you a fortune if you go to pick him up. I just saw a note on Rotowire this morning that he's back from the Minor League IL. So give Caminero these next 10, 14 days, maybe to get his legs back under him, coming off that quad injury. Think about the Rays, maybe trading a position player at the deadline,

and I think there's a very good chance we'll see Kamen Arrow for these final two months. If the Rays aren't going to pick up Brandon Lau's options, and the acquiring team is not either, these $10 million, 11 million dollar options. Brandon Lau could be a small trade that someone makes. You know, let me just help you from the left side on the infield. Hey, that's pretty good.

You know, here's a guy who can hit for some power. Maybe we'll give him a shot and like maybe he works with our coaching staff and we do consider picking up the 10 million dollar option. You know, like would you rather Brandon Lau or Gavin Lux, you know, in a big at bat in September? You know, we're not going to allow I think I, I don't think the guy that is more likely to do some damage by a healthy margin.

Want some homers here. Gavin's not really given much of anything. So, you know, if Brandon Lau's on the move, that would be, that wouldn't,'t know nobody would bat an eye if Brandon Lau was traded at this point. We've made the case that Randy Arreza-Rena would be a little bit more surprising one because they've got him for two more years after this. But also given the raise, it wouldn't even be that that surprising. And then I thought Yandy Diaz would be a really interesting acquisition for somebody. So those are three guys. I'm not saying all three. And then I thought Yandy Diaz would be a really interesting acquisition for somebody. So those are three guys. I'm not saying all three. And then Ahmed Rosario is super cheap.

Like, what if you're dealing with a super cheap team that doesn't have any money but wants to upgrade somewhere? You know, there's got to be a contender that fits that bill. It was a super cheap. Like the Guardians or something. Get Ahmed Rosario back. Whatever. You know what I mean? Like, well, he'd be a good bench player for a lot of teams. Yeah, and he wouldn't cost any money He's his contract is super cheap So I'm not saying that all four of those guys are gonna be on the move But I feel like the odds are one of them will be and as soon as that one person is gone

There's that there's an opening I mean those are fairly regular players for these Rays. And so you just need one of them to be gone for Junior Kamenera to have an easy slot to come up into. Yeah, yeah, I mean, he's clearly a big part of their future, but I think he's going to be a big part of their present. And they might do the thing where they give some players away in trades, look to the future

without trying to completely punt. That's where I think the Rays like to live like, yeah, maybe this isn't our year, but we're not giving up completely. Kamenero helps them do that, gives them some credibility. You trade Yandy Diaz internally, you could say, well, we think Kamenero can hit as well as Yandy Diaz, because they actually have some similarities in terms of bat speed and contact rates and stuff like that.

But Kamenero has more defensive value and is is gonna be $10 million cheaper next year. So you kind of pat yourself on the back and say, we just saved $10 million and our current team stayed the same. Totally a raise move. Absolutely. Well, let's talk about some players we might be looking at on the waiver wire this weekend.

There are some not universally available pitchers that are available in some places, all returning from injuries in the near future so I'm gonna roll through these just as like hey these guys could be available even though they're likely rostered Kodai Senga the least likely available of the bunch scheduled for one more rehab start this weekend for the Mets before he comes back from that shoulder triceps issue almost 90% rostered on CBS so we're really talking about just a handful of leagues where he might be able to get him,

but everybody else a little more available, including Devin Williams. He struck out the side on Sunday in a rehab appearance at high-a Wisconsin. It's not clear if he's gonna make another rehab appearance at Nashville or anywhere else this weekend, or if they're just gonna activate him.

But I get the sense Devin Williams gets activated and he's the closer again, and Trevor McGill slides right back into a setup role. That works, that works for everybody. I think that makes sense. Yeah, so even if you don't see him this weekend necessarily, I think he's gonna be an add now or you're not gonna get him sort of player.

Clayton Kershaw, we discussed a lot lately, three scoreless last Saturday at AAA, ended up with 50 pitches because he threw extras in the bullpen. So he's getting closer, probably still another rehab start or two away from possibly rejoining that Dodgers rotation mix that we talked about earlier. Seventy seven percent roster and CBS seven percent rostered in the Rotawire online championship because unless for injured players, unless they were drafted,

they're not available to be picked up until they're back in the pool. So very few teams stashed him, given that we didn't even know if Kershaw was going to make it back to pitch this year. So that's kind of interesting that Kershaw will be a fab target in a couple of weeks in those leagues and could be openly available elsewhere. Jeffrey Springs, making good progress to 77 pitches at triple A on Sunday, not lined up as one of their probables for the weekend They're gonna go Eflin Bradley and Boz for those first three starts at Yankee Stadium The Rays are in Toronto to begin next week

So it's possible Springs gets activated for start next week as he's nearing the end of his rehab assignment And if you're looking further down the road Tyler Mallee He's only 7% rostered on CBS and not rostered at all in the Road to Wire Online Championship. He went two and a third in a rehab start. This was the Arizona Complex League. He's moved around to three different levels.

They're probably just doing that thing where it's like, keep them as close to the facilities, keep them as close to where we want them as possible, but a couple more turns for Malley and he probably rejoins that Rangers rotation maybe by the start of August. You're going to have to help me a little bit on the 12 team bats because I'm only in one or two 12 team, I mean three 12 team leagues but two are odd and new so like the waiver

wire is very different, it's very deep, it plays very deep and then the other one is also a dynasty so half the players that are on the waiver wire are protected in our minor leagues. So it's not useful for me to look at that. But I have lots of 15 team leagues. And I would tell you that Matt Wallner is somebody I'm circling. He's got the second best bat speed in the big leagues and playing time is a little bit unsure. But the longer Royce Lewis is out, the more he's going to play. And I could see him kind of swim moving past Trevor Larnack and maybe taking Trevor's job once Royce Lewis is back. So something to bet on there is real power. I know the strikeout rate is bad. He told me a little bit about the adjustments that he made in the minor leagues to kind of regain some of that contact ability this year.

And then another name that I'm kind of circling other than, you know, Lawrence Butler and Justin Henry Malloy are just two guys that Lawrence Butler has had longer had good peripherals and you know, has a three homer game that kind of got on everyone's, got him into everyone's cue, but he steals bases, he has good bat of ball stats. In some cases, some of the flaws that Malloy has, he shares, but they both kind of strike out too much. But one thing I've noticed with Malloy is that he is mashing against lefties. So if you have a daily lineup situation,

you could just make it easy on yourself and just play Malloy against lefties. But the other thing is in the last month, Malloy has struck out less. He's gone from a 38% strikeout rate to a 27% strikeout rate, you know, between June and July. And then the barrel rate is coming up for Malloy. So just

those two guys or three guys I wanted to put on your radar if you if you hadn't been. I think they're mostly 15 team league guys but of the three probably Butler has the chance to jump into 12 team league status. Yeah so I was looking at a bunch of outfielders kind of grouping them to say okay here's a handful of guys that are already on a lot, okay, here's a handful of guys that are already on a lot of rosters, here's a handful of guys that are trending onto rosters, and who do you like most out of this group?

Pick, give me three that you like out of the group, and we'll put Matt Walners in this group, Colton Couser, Andy Pahes, Lawrence Butler, who you just mentioned, Reese Hines, who's been taking off lately, Jake Myers, Alex Verdugo and Hey Sue Sanchez because I feel like that group it ranges up to maybe 80 to 90% rostered in a typical 12-team league but those are guys you have to start

thinking about dropping if you're gonna add the shiny new toys the Hines Butler Walner types so does anyone stand out to you as clearly like, yeah, I want that guy or I want those guys out of that group? Yeah, I was gonna say Verdugo, but he's minus projection in a 12 team league for the batter, but this is a three outfielder 12 team league.

That's a little bit small. Yeah, that default though is frustrating. Verdugo now on projections, 74th outfielder actually just around replacement. That is surprising me. I was gonna I was gonna pick him as just my safe veteran that I'll keep around. Jake Myers has the same projection. Oh that is very interesting. In 12 team leagues with five outfielders Jake Myers and Alex Verdugo are below replacement. With five outfielders, Jake Myers and Alex Verdugo are below replacement. That opens me up to say whatever I want.

Who do you have? Do you have Butler, Wallner, who else? Waller, Kauser, Pahes, Butler, Hines, Myers, Verdugo, and Sanchez. Let me go off script here a little bit. Jesus Sanchez is projected to have the same kind of minus one dollar value as those other guys, but as I uncovered in a piece today,

he has actually been working very diligently on his biggest flaw, which is his ground ball rate. It has been improving with every week. The rolling ground ball rate is really eye opening. If he can lift the ball at all, he has a swing that has the same bat speed and swing length as Bobby Wood Jr. I'm not saying he's Bobby Wood Jr. Don't put that in the paper.

But what I am saying is that the biggest deal was he used to have a 65% ground ball rate. It's down to 47. And we're seeing some of the power come back with it. You know, I could just see like a really good second half, you know, which would be, you know, like 260 homers, a 260 batting average with 10, 11 homers, you know, I could just see like a really good second half, you know, which would be, you know, like 260 homers, a 260 batting average with 10, 11 homers, you know, with a little bit of speed. So if he's projected by more sober projections to be in this group, I'm going to take him. He's going to have the best batting average of anybody in here, not named for Dugo too. Yeah, I think the two that stand out to me are Sanchez and Myers. And it's been recently Sanchez is giving that power as you mentioned he's been a top 40 outfielder in the last 30 days that plays in a ton of leagues so like Myers kind of nice balanced production

thumbs up probably the first for me out of this group Sanchez that made the surprising number two everybody else is where it's like wide open Colton Couser and Alex Verdugo have been brutal lately I think both could be in danger of wide open. Colton Couser and Alex Verdugo have been brutal lately. I think both could be in danger of losing. Career wise, I love Couser still. I think this is part of his finding adjustments. He's obviously has some swing and miss in his game. So he needs to figure out how pitchers are pitching him.

But I still really like him long-term because it's such a great eye, power, speed. The glove is good enough for him to still play in center. So Couser is a good, I would say a buy in dynasty leagues. If you can use this bad stretch to buy him, I would buy it. Yeah, actually, I think I've previously suggested that Kouser might not have as much defensive value as Cedric Mullins and as someone on our Discord pointed out,

it's not necessarily the case. I mean, he's improved defensively. Yeah, he's been playing there a little bit this year. It's more of of I don't know It's more of yeah, can he cut down that swing and miss? Can you actually get rid of that because the the production's been light really going back to May as we talked about I think earlier In this week, so I think that that's where it's like, what do you need right now? And maybe you're playing the schedule on a 12-team league with the others

I mean Reese Hines is probably the most tempting of the alternatives because the start has just been ridiculous, but there's probably the highest ceiling and the lowest floor if we're trying to estimate that for a player out of this bunch. Yeah, and totally somebody that maybe you can ride the wave now, but career wise, I would be much more negative on. That kind of strikeout rate, I just get the vibes, Aristides Aquino vibes. Lawrence Butler, let me just give a little case for him as having best or second best ceiling on this group, is just that his strikeout rate has oscillated hardcore around a swing strike rate that's been much more steady for Lawrence Butler.

So what that tells me is just, and there's an eye test here too because I see a fair amount of them, is just he gets wrapped up. Like pitchers just play with him. And I think the more he sees pitchers doing it, major league pitchers doing that, the more he's going to be like, Oh, no, no, I know what you're doing. You're doing this or you're doing this. I've seen this before. You know, I know what's going on here. You know, so, you know, the true talent ability to make contact is not that bad. You know, 12.8% swing strike rate for his career with 11s and the minors,

that could produce anywhere from a 24 to 30% strikeout rate. And what I'm saying is if he figures something out in terms of how people are approaching him, you start getting closer to that 25, 24% strikeout rate that might be attainable for him. Now you got a guy with power and speed, you know, hits the ball hard. There's a chance, like a 10 percent chance that he could be like a 25, 25 guy with a 250 average. Yeah, I like Butler, especially in long term leagues where you're just kind of, hey, what could go right? What could I do here that might actually help me in the second half of the season,

but also could help me in 2025? I think he profiles really well there. Maybe Jesus Sanchez still does, given some of the things you mentioned that he's improving upon here in recent weeks. One more part of the weekend waiver preview. I think this is kind of your window. If you are trying to find future saves coming out of the trade deadline, this would be the weekend to do it. It'll be less expensive now than it will be the next couple of weekends. Ben Joyce looking good really since coming, looking at the numbers for him. 15 to five strikeout to walk in 14 and a third innings.

No earned runs allowed since June 14th, only 10% rostered in CBS League's 25% roster in the Rotowire Online Championship. Big stuff numbers to on the fastball and the slider and that sinker that he added has been solid to. So you got three pitches now. Decent command for a reliever with a 97 location plus Carlos Estevez. Seems like one of the absolute most likely relievers to be moved. This one, it just jumps off the page, but it's kind of now if you want to discount

and later if you want to pay a premium for Ben Joyce. Yeah. And I don't know. I've already added him in both of my leagues. Just got him, snuck him in for a dollar, just looking ahead at the schedule. I like the new sinker-splinker situation that Joyce is throwing,

and he just seems like the really obvious solution for them once they trade Carlos as Deves, and there's no reason for them to keep him around as a rental. I got a question in a chat today about that that and so I just wanted to list out the names that I put in the chat. Joyce was number one, Puck was number two. I don't know that these next three have rankings, but John Brebia, Nate Pearson, and Robert

Garcia were some names I wanted to throw on there. Feel Like Finnegan's gone. Garcia's got three holds in recent play and the best stuff numbers in that pen. Nate Pearson just looks like a closer man. He's got the stuff of it, he's the big guy, he throws real hard. I feel like Jimmy Garcia and Jordan Romano

and Chad Green could all be traded or hurt. So that puts Nate Pearson in the mix on some level. And then John Brebbia is not exciting. I like Jordan Leisure's stuff better, but they've been up and down with Jordan Leisure. He hasn't really been used in any sort of high leverage. The results haven't been great.

That pen might be a sort of no thanks if they trade Michael Kopek. Yeah, I tend to think that's where I'm going with the White Sox in the second half. They're so bad. They're not creating that many opportunities. I think the Nats sort of jumped out as that third team I was looking at. I'm glad you called out Robert Garcia. I think he's the only lefty they've got in their pen right now.

But guess what? Sean Doolittle is a big part of their coaching staff. Sean Doolittle is a lefty that closed. I don't think they care in the second half of the season. How much are they like, oh, what if we don't have a second lefty? How many games are we going to win? It's going to be more like now we just sold for we're we're building for next year. We can get a lefty in the offseason if we need one. Right. Super deep watch list sort of name, though, that just came up in Washington.

Amos Willingham, want to see what he brings to the table with a little more time. He's got one inning just pitched, I think, in the last game before the break against the Brewers, but maybe there's your long, long term. Ninety seven, seven. Yeah, throws hard. in the last game before the break against the Brewers but maybe there's your long long term guy. 97-7. Yeah throws hard so we'll see if they can find something there with Amos Willingham not an endorsement to pick him up just the name to put on the radar for the long term. Absolutely. We're gonna go if you want to check out Eno's updated rankings and they dropped next week you're gonna want to get a subscription to do that. Theethelic.com slash rates and barrels

will give you the best possible deal on that. You can find Eno on Twitter at EnoSaris. You can find me at Derek and Ryan for Found the Pod at rates and barrels. That's gonna do it for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We'll be back with you on Monday. Thanks for listening.