Rates & Barrels - Tons of weekend news & Where the Money Went with Eric Samulski

Episode Date: June 3, 2025

Eno is joined by Eric Samulski of Rotoworld to talk about a busyyyy weekend of news. A lot of call-ups, injuries and moves this weekend. Also, they talk about where the money went in some of the moves of the weekend.Rundown4:57- Jac Caglianone called up by KC9:40- Corbin Burnes is hurt14:57- Mookie Betts fractures toe20:54- Varsho & Santander on the IL for Toronto24:27- Mick Abel is back for Philly28:15- Eovaldi heads to the IL35:20- Yordan Álvarez return delayed43:45- Coby Mayo gets called back up47:10- Cole Young called up by Seattle56:05- Possible moves for the Giants?57:15- Rockies make a move at 1B58:12- Jobe heads to the IL1:00:14- Where the Money WentFollow 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: Eric SamulksiExecutive Producer: Brian Smith Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Welcome to another episode of Rates and Barrels and yes I am still hosting Derek Needs one more day to figure it out and so we are so blessed today We get Eric Simolski in and I'm so happy Eric Simolski is over at Road to World, a place that I used to to work. I love that place and Love Eric Simolski's work there. He also does On the Corner with Nick Pollock. We both have podcasts with Nick. That's fun. You guys go through all the pictures on his rankings on a weekly basis, all the risers and followers and all their interesting things. So that's a great episode for people if they want to listen to that. Does chats over at World of World. Eric, thank you so much for coming in and helping me do this show today. I need all the help I can get without Derek.

I'm thrilled to be here. As you know, this know, the this space is filled with with podcasts, you and Derek are one of the ones I try to listen to literally every episode. So I'm thrilled to be here. And yeah, one time it was cool to have a podcast with Nick Pollock. But now there's like what nine of them. It's no longer so special. He's a special dude. It's all right. It's fine. All of the collaborations that he does. Oh my God. He's one of the busier men in the business. But yeah, thanks for coming on.

I hope you had a good weekend. I am in the throes of, I know everybody wants to hear about my sinus infection. I got the antibiotics. Finally. Geez. So I'm kind of turning the corner. Summer has started. What is summer starting in the Summerskye household mean? I met up with a bunch of my college teammates. We went to Cleveland, Ohio this weekend for the D3 College World Series to see our old

coach and our old team. So I was in Cleveland for the D3 College World Series and then went to the Guardians game on Saturday. That was the first time I'd been to progressive field. I really liked that field. The vibes are awesome. The new construction is great. It was a lot of fun. And so that was, uh, that was a full weekend of baseball was what summer is like for me. And then I came home, my, my wife and my three year old child.

And we're running around like crazy on Sunday and now we're back to work. Nice. And you were a pitcher? I was a catcher. I was a catcher for most of high school and early in college. And then I six foot three and in college I was maybe generously like 220 pounds. It was probably larger than that. So I made the move to first base after like maybe my like halfway through my sophomore year of college. How was the game you saw? The Guardians game was great. The college baseball game not so much.

Our ace was a little too nibbly. What way could you give your alma mater some love? Who was it? So I went to Trinity University, San Antonio, Texas. We are college World Series champions 2016. They made the World Series in 2022 and we made the World Series now again this year. Unfortunately, 0-2 this year in the College World Series, so they will not be taking home the trophy. But, you know, always fun to be there and it's fun to see those guys and, you know,

they're playing at a minor league park outside of Cleveland and it's a fun experience. And it is wild to like watch a college game and then go right to a pro game and you're just kind of like, oh, right. Yeah, what's the level of play record scratch on that? It's good. I mean, the arm that we were facing was like 92 from Wisconsin Whitewater, you know, but when you're throwing 92 in D3, your list of secondaries is not super long. So it was like 92 with an inconsistent change in slider.

Our guy was like a mid upper eighties lefty with like a deep pitch mix, but he was just, you know, missing some spots, trying to be a little too cute with two strikes and then a one, two count, but it became a three, two count. And then there was a bloop and a whatever. But yeah, listen, I will always defend D three sports. There's a lot of really good players there. We had a guy drafted basically every year that I was in school. Multiple guys, you know, got up as high as like AAA and a lot of guys are still working in baseball now. So there's a, there's a lot of talent out there that

sometimes slips through the cracks. Yeah. We had a weekend full of birthday parties, got to drive everybody around to birthday parties, different, different sort of end of year celebrations with the kids, a little bit of baseball practice, working on throwing the curveball hard in the zone with the elder kid. And the younger one opened up a pack and picked out a nice color matched chrome Jack Caglione, one of 175. This one paid for the two boxes I got them. As an investment, I feel better about the whole thing.

Plus it's a good transition to our news. The biggest news of the weekend, I think, is that Jack Caglione is up. And I guess the funny thing is I don't think they play today, do they? Actually, no, they're not. They start tomorrow in St. Louis. So he's off today. Yeah. So we got to wait a day and see what he does.

I mean, do you expect him to hit the ground running? I mean, there's always like, you know, I have the inner Derek Cardy in my head who's always like, you know, rookies are not a good bet. On the other hand, his exit velocities in the minors are just amazing. I mean, he's hitting the ball like 118 and stuff. And I know that we have a reported 113.6, but there was some other stuff that I saw that was even harder than that. And then I guess there's some issues with Chase.

So what did you think about Jack Aglione, you know, day one? I think it's not unfair to expect a similar transition to what we saw from Nick Kurtz. And I know Nick Kurtz has a little bit more swing and miss in his game than Caglione does, but you've got these guys who are power first prospects with very limited minor league experience, but a lot of college experience. Caglione 12.3% swinging strike rate so far in the minor leagues. You figure that probably jumps up above 13% in the big league level. There's going to be a little bit of a book on him. He's going to have to adjust.

It would not surprise me if he doesn't come out like a house on fire. There's a little bit of more swing and miss in his first games than we're used to seeing from him in the minor leagues. I know some people like panic dropped Nick Kurtz when he started and struggled. And so I would just say don't be surprised if you see that learning curve again, with Cagliari. He's up to play he's going to play. Kauffman Stadium is not exactly the launching pad that Sacramento is in terms of like where the ball will leave the yard.

And so, you know, we'll see how that power translates there right away. But I, you know, I'm putting him in lineups. I think the exit velocities are going to be strong. I think he's going to barrel the ball. I think there's going to be some home runs early on, but it wouldn't surprise me if maybe he has like two homers in his first like, you know, 10 games, but is hitting, you know, or his first week, you know, 10 games but is hitting, you know, or his first week but is hitting like 200 something, 220, you know. There's striking similarity between the two. You know, the hard hit rate is almost down to the, like it's 57.4 for Nick Kurtz and

57.5 for, you know, going to decimal points for them. And then they're both lefties. They're both 22. You know, so I think there's a, I think that's a really good comp to make. And, you know, Kurtz came around and- Yeah, and then he got hurt unfortunately. Yeah, before the injury, I think he probably was showing the promise of, you know,

all those big bids that people put in as long as they held onto him. So I think he's probably worth one of those big bids. We call him fabopalooza every time these guys come up. And if you're an NFC, I think you're going to be preparing a $200, $300, at least a $200, maybe a $300 bid for Jack Kaggle. And what's going to be interesting though is that with this one, we're going to see five days. And remember, he's going to be out in field only right away, but we know they're going to play him in the outfield. So eventually you're getting dual position

eligibility for a guy who's going to be in the lineup all the time. And you know, if you swung and missed in a few places, and especially if you need power, which is me in a few spots, like I am preparing myself to put some big bids on him. And I'm not going to be put off by a rough first week. Maybe you lower the bid a little bit. In fact, I might be excited if he has a little bit of a bet. I would want it. Yes, you want it. Yeah, you like root for him to have an 0 for 4 in there

because you still want to get your bid in without having to pay too much. One thing I don't want to see though is like just outlandish strikeout rate. If it's just 45%, 50%, I just don't know where that'll land. That would be a rough beginning for me. Because there is this question about Chase and stuff. What if he just gets massively exploited and now we're talking about a 180 or 190 average or something? I don't want to say long term. I'm just saying,

I think there could be bumps in the road. If the bump is really bad, maybe I'm down to more 150, 200. But if he hits a homer in his first week, I think it starts with a three. So just keep that in mind. You get a good start Thursday against Matthew Libretor, who's a lefty. So you get to see what their plans are for him against a lefty. Are they going to keep him in the lineup? Are they going to arrest him? That gives us a little bit of a sense of is if he's a true everyday guy or if they're going to platoon him early on when he's come up. Yeah, that's a good point. The other big news the weekend was sad news. Corbin Burns did not look happy as he walked off the field. There was a lot of lip

reading going on, people talking about my elbow. I saw some lip reading that said, it's dead. It is one of the things where the pitch itself was not so remarkable. The game itself, he was doing all right. He had a decent amount of strikeouts. The VELO has been up a little bit this year, so it's not like we had a VELO down portion that made us aware of the problem. If he goes, I guess the first main question is what happens? And I think what happens is Ryan Nelson had just been told he was going to the bullpen and I think he just stays in the rotation. That's probably the easiest thing. He was going to the bullpen because Eduardo Rodriguez is coming back, but I think it'll just fold Eduardo in back and keep Ryan Nelson in there. Nelson has

been okay, but it's a weird mix for a starter because it's a good fastball. It's almost like Bailey Falter-esque where it's a good fastball. It's like a, almost like Bailey Falter-esque, where it's like a good fastball and not really any good secondaries. Nick has been banging the table for a cutter for Ryan Nelson or more cutter for the longest time. I will say that I was looking for this exact quote, but Corbin Burns was interviewed at his locker after the game and said, obviously,

he's having an MRI today, Monday. But he said, quote, just got to the point where the tightness was just too much. Hopefully we caught it early. Hopefully it's not bad, but we'll see. So he's describing the injury as tightness. And so it might be a little better than my elbows done. It's dead.

But who knows what the cause of that tightness is. But I was initially, I think an IELTS didn't feels very realistic regardless. Oh yeah. I mean, I think I'm almost at like 90% sure that's an IELTS then the question is. I took him out of lineups everywhere. Like I think he's going on the IL,

but tightness feels better than like he didn't, there was no, like when AJ Smith Shaw, AJ Smith Shaw said, I heard a pop. Yeah. And that's it was gone. That's a very different outlook. And so we'll get the MRI results probably at some point later today, and we'll see what happens, but maybe, you know, maybe it's a few weeks without burns or a month.

And that still means Ryan Nelson. Listen, Ryan Nelson was set to start that game and they bumped Corbin burns up a day so they could have Eduardo Rodriguez in the rotation on Monday or Tuesday. Sorry. I don't know. It felt questionable. Why they do that. It felt questionable to do that. Like for a guy who had a 70 RA to make sure he gets in the rotation on his day or whatever. So yeah. and then you've got a $200 million guy on the other hand. Yeah. Well, the other thing that I, this is, we're not going to solve this here, but you know,

I think that I'm doing my, my ranks right now. There's supposed to, they're going to come out tomorrow. I didn't, I'm only saying supposed to, but it's God, it's, I do it once in their preseason and then I update it once like halfway through the year. It's so tough to go through. Marvelous. I've got him, you know, using Jeff Zimmerman has this, you know, these injury markers that he uses their fastball velocity, number of arm injuries, career number of arm injuries

the last few years, number of IL stints. And then he actually got a lot of use out of switching from last year in his pitch to last year's second half in his pitch. So he could catch people that were going away and coming back, you know? And so he's put this together and it has a reasonable amount of signal. He uses them to great success. He's a really good NFC player. I've been trying to incorporate them. So, Corbyn Byrnes had a 92nd percentile health rating going into the season. One of the best. If he goes down, I'm more just frustrated

than just being like, can we, if he goes down, anybody can go down. That's my reaction. It's sort of like, they're pitching, man. Anybody can go down. That's why we're reaction is sort of like any pitching man, like anybody can go down. I think it then becomes like I remember when we were at first pitch Arizona, you know, Jason Collette said, Corbin Burns has shown so many innings over the last three years that Jason was thinking of fading Corbin Burns because it felt like inevitable that his arm would break at some point because he put so much strain on it for three years. And so I think it just, it comes down to like which way you look at it, right? Yeah. But if you don't have the innings,

then you're a, then you're an injury risk. You can't stay healthy. If you do have the innings, well, he's about to go. There seems to be no perfect answer. And it's like trying to thread an impossible needle. Yeah. I think it all just comes down to your comfort level and your tolerance. And maybe you are somebody who says, I need to see success and I would have taken Corbin Burns or maybe you're somebody that is a, you know, maybe a glass half empty person. And you're like, well, all pitchers are going to get hurt eventually. And so the ones who have the most innings over the last few years are bound to get hurt. I don't know.

I really don't think that there's a right answer. I think we do the best we can in trying to predict injuries and then, you know, cross our fingers and hope for the best. Yeah, it's really, it's tough out there. This is a real small one. I think we, well, hopefully it's a real small one. Mookie Betts fractured his toe, stubbed his toe at home. He hit a piece of furniture while walking through his house, which I've done a bunch of times, so I get it. I get it. Oh no, I get it.

I love that there are some ones that we've been like, oh, well, that's obviously like a sex injury. I remember it was like the Carlos Correa rib one, you know, just like, oh, you did what? You got a massage and now your ribs broken. Like, yeah, sure. Yeah. But with the toe one, we're all like, you haven't done that. We don't have to like question his story. Yes, it's not the like who was the one who like I think it was like Glenn Allen Hill back in the day, like had a dream, a nightmare about spiders and fell through a glass

table. And you're like, yeah, I guess. Sure. You weren't in the middle of like a drunken poker game in the middle of the night. Yeah, sure. But he was supposed to come back today. So he's out today as well. And it's just one of those things that linger. I guess we could use this just as an opportunity to be, you know, talk about Mookie season

because it's not been the greatest. He seems now suddenly at 32 to be in decline. He is making as much contact as ever, but the bat speed has been down a couple of years over years. The max EVs are down, the barrel rates are down. The nice thing about having him, if you do have him in a keeper league, is that I think he can provide this sort of like 290-2020, 290-2015, you know, kind of really like excellent production. He probably can do this level for another three, four, maybe three years. So especially with the new stealing rules as we're helping him like keep the steals up. But I do sort of question if he's ever gonna hit more than, he's projected right now to hit by some of them,

26, 27 homers this year. And I'm like, and I don't know if the toe injury factors in that much, but it's part of it. Maybe the steals won't be there for a little bit when he's coming back and the bat speed's not there. So what's your end of season line for Mookie Betts? I like looking at the swing decisions too, to see this. It's like he's becoming way more passive in the zone. The zone swing rate is down like 5%. Zone contact is up though. And

the contact, right? So it's like he's's not chasing he's a little more passive in the zone his contact rate is down a little but the swinging strike rate is basically the same it's up like point four percent so to me there's not any meaningful changes and like he's making worse swing decisions he's getting beat more like he's not swinging and missing that much more. Then I'm looking at like, okay, he's pulling the ball a little bit more on the ground. Like if you really dug into that,

like is he maybe a little bit out in front and rolling over, things like that. But I also look at, we know that he battled the sickness early in spring training where he lost, like what was it, like 15, 20 pounds. And then I look at like the defensive metrics and Mookie bats went from a negative four outs above average. It's short to a positive three outs above average.

It's short. He seems to have worked incredibly hard to turn himself into a much better shortstop than he was last year. And then you just wonder like, is a guy at 32, 33 years old, did he spend the vast majority of the off season really working on his defense to make himself a good defensive shortstop for the team? And then expected to like use spring training to get the timing and the rhythm and all that back and then was out for weeks with, you know, an illness where he lost 15 to 20 pounds and it just kind of threw everything off a little

bit. I've got him as a cornerstone in my 12 teamer. What you're describing to me is maybe something he could get back. He's done weighted bat training and increased his bat speed. They did that before the 2023 season, I think. If he has the season this year where he only hits 20 homers again, I feel like the thing he'll do all offseason next offseason might be wait about training and get the power back.

If you think like he's at eight homers right now, let's assume this doesn't linger and let's assume that he comes back and is back sometime this week. It wouldn't shock me to see him get to you know 22 23 24 something like that. You know he's hitting 254 right now the expected batting average is that I expect to go up which is 272. Let's say he hits 275 280 the rest of the way you know winds up hitting something like in the low 270s on the year with 20 to 25 homers and 10 steals. He's at five now. So again, I'm saying 10 steals because if the toe is something he has to play through, I don't really know that he runs as much the rest of the

way. That's not a line you're looking for from your first round pick. I think we would acknowledge that. But was he a first round pick even this year? I think it depends if you drafted him pre or post illness. I think he was going ninth or tenth overall in a lot of drafts and then people got worried and then they pushed him in the second. It's not one that kills your season. It's still going to have positive value on the season. It's probably even going to be Right. You know, it's not it's still going to have positive value on the season. It's probably even going to be, you know, like a top 20 outfielder. Yeah. Just not a top five.

And does he still get to 100 runs like he's at 42 runs right now? If he doesn't miss that many games, like it would still be feasible for him to push 90 or 100 runs scored, which again, is an underrated fantasy category and one that was something you were counting on him for when you drafted him. It's not the 120 plus from a couple years ago, but it would still be really useful. Hey, I'm Robert Vinlo and I'm from New York Times Games and I'm here talking to people about Wordle and the Wordle Archive. Do you all play Wordle?

I play it every day. All right. I have something exciting to show you. This is new. It's the Wordle Archive. What? I play it every day. Alright, I have something exciting to show you. This is new. It's the Wordle Archive. What? Okay, that's awesome. So now you can play every Wordle that has ever existed. There's like a thousand puzzles.

What day would you pick? Let's go back to my birthday. My first guess is going to be birth because it's my birthday. What made you guys do an archive? It's one of our most requested features. A bunch of our other games have archives. Like the crossword puzzle. Yeah, exactly like the crossword.

You know, you can catch up if you missed one, which is pretty cool. Wordle Archive. Oh, cool! Now you can do yesterday's Wordle if you missed it. Thanks so much for coming by and talking to us and playing. New York Times game subscribers can now access the entire Wordle Archive. Find out more at nytimes.com slash games. My default word is always bread.

Why? I like bread. Okay. Over in Toronto, there are a lot of comings and goings. It's kind of crazy. So Dalton Varshoer is the newest injury, but also over the weekend Anthony Santander went on the IL Varsho is a hamstring they think maybe grade one so not too long Santander I believe is shoulder Fatigue or something. He was battling a hip and shoulder injuries and then they put him on the IL for the shoulder and

both may be You know two-week varieties, you know, but with both of them out, it's pretty barren there. And the corresponding moves were Alan Rodin and Davis Schneider, but neither has really played since they've been up and they've gone with Jonathan Klase and Miles Straw. And Andres Jimenez is supposed to come back today, I think, from the IL. Schneider may not play at all. I mean, Schneider might be a short side platoon guy

with Classe. Or, I was looking at this because I know how you love to build a bench and look at options. Oh, that's right. The easy guy to send down on the Blue Jays bench is Michael Stefanik, but he has no options. So if they're bringing up Jimenez, they either needays bench is Michael Stefanik, but he has no options. So if they're bringing up

him and as they either need to DFA Michael Stefanik, which feels feasible, that's not like a non starter, or you send Davis Schneider back down, which is another thing that we could do. Yeah, he I think he had like a pinch hit. He had a pinch hit at bat yesterday, I believe. To me that says, okay, Jimenez is back playing second base, Ernie Clement moves to third base, Addison Barger then... Barger plays the outfield. ...DHs or plays the outfield, right? So Barger becomes like kind of left field DH. You have Springer out there and then you have this like combination of Nathan Luke's and Alan Rodin. And then it seems like against lefties, they like straw and class A is a switch hitter.

So maybe there's a lot of Luke's and Rodin against righties and straw and class A against lefties. It's interesting to see how that's going to play out. I feel like we can maybe move past this pretty quickly because I don't know. The only thing that I say is that I've loved Barger. We've been talking about Barger for a while. If he's out there still anywhere. I can't see them sitting him. I think he's still going to be out there.

Yeah. And I think he's usable in all leagues. And in fact, I think this latest raster injury just makes his playing time safer once Jimenez comes back. Like, you know, He's going to be the DHer in the outfield. That's the most actionable thing here is that if you were waiting to see what would happen to Barger after Jimenez comes back now, I think he's safer. Otherwise, all those other guys, I think that's going to be too mix and match.

Soterios Johnson I agree. If one of them emerges, it's a different story, but you need to look at the lineups this week to see if one of those guys is going to get regular playing time. And it seems just like a hodgepodge of matchup based play. Yeah. And with Varsho being such an excellent defender in center, I could see them just putting straw in there while he's out and just being like, we always have just an excellent defender there. And then if that's the case, then it really becomes Luke's road and in class a all fighting for one roster, one position basically. Yeah, I was curious if if class a was a good enough center fielder, but it seems that they've been playing him at left, like very frequently and in AAA, I guess he had 14 starts, but they haven't wanted to play him in center field at the big leagues, which tells me he's

probably not a great big league center fielder. Yeah. So I think the biggest thing there is just a bargers safe. Mick Abel is back. I was very happy in main event last week. We got him for like seven blocks and we just sat on him. Our reasoning was, well, he seems like he's a head of painter now, and his small sample numbers were great. And I get a little vindication here now, Taiwan Walker's going to the pen. And I love how they were like high leverage. It's probably how they sold it to him. You know, like, sure. Oh, you're going to be a setup guy, Taiwan. Sure. Maybe. I mean, he's always had like, when he has more Velo, his everything works

better. So maybe he'd be a good reliever. There's been plenty of like Graham Ashcraft is a decent reliever. There's been plenty of worst starters that have been good relievers. But Aaron Nola comes back in mid-June. And I guess there would be a question of what happens then. My reasoning is, Mick Abel will make a case for himself over the next few years, few weeks. He does have two weeks, I think, probably before Nola's back. So he gets to make the case for himself. Even if he makes the case for himself and he goes back down, how long is it till somebody else is hurt? Lizardo doesn't have a great health record. Ranger Suarez doesn't have a great health record. So there's a chance that somebody else is hurt

by the time that Nola's back and Abel just stays. And then if Abel does go back down, how long is it till the next injury happens anyway? Beyond that, people were sitting on Zemi Matthews for weeks. So I just see this as- Or a trade. Yeah, or a trade even, yeah.

But Mick Abel is the, oh, Mick Abel out of town or in a big trade or- Maybe there's, I don't know the contract stuff Yeah, or trade even. Yeah. But Mick Abel is the, oh, Mick Abel out of town or, you know, for in a big trade or maybe there's, I don't know the contract stuff for like a Ranger Suarez, but like, could you use Ranger Suarez to upgrade somewhere in your bullpen? If you think Mick Abel is ready, you know, things like that where it's back up and the painter's still there. And you know, the Noah through a bullpen before Wednesday's game. And after that the team said he's gonna do live batting practice this week. So it's not even rehab. And then he's gonna go on a rehab assignment. So he

won't start a rehab assignment until the week of June 9th. And given how he was struggling before, you don't really, there's not a lock that they say, hey, we need to rush him back. Like if Mick Abel has some good starts and they could have Aaron Noah just like working on whatever he needed to work on. Cause the command was not what we've seen before from him is the walk rate was way up. So maybe there are some mechanical issues they could pinpoint that they have him working on. Maybe he makes two, maybe three minor league starts. And then all of a sudden, Aaron Noah is back at the end of June

or the first week of July or whatever it is. And that gives, and that's if Mick Abel is pitching well, if Mick Abel gets hit hard, then sure they could fast track Noah. And listen, Abel, like it's at Toronto and then it's against the Cubs. That's a tough two-start stretch. I would use him against the Blue Jays, you know, especially with Santander out of the lineup. I think it takes a little bit of juice out of that lineup even though he wasn't hitting. He wasn't tearing the cover off the ball. The Cubs matchup is a tough one, but it gives McCable a chance to say, Hey, like take your time with Aaron Noah, like don't rush him back. And then who knows what's happening by the end of June. And if he proves himself over these two, then he's even more of a lock in the sixth starter role,

you know? Like if he does well in this next two starts, even if they send him down, like I would try to hold him on a lot of teams because I'd be like, he's the next guy, you know? And he's pretty exciting. Like if you're holding any prospects in any of your leagues, then he'd be one of them I mean, that's how nice his I thought his his debut was in terms of just the shapes and the VLAs on his pitches Like it was good. It was a good debut So, you know, I think he's he's worth holding through a lot of that There's another piece of news with Nathan Yavaldi being hurt nothing structural But you know, the one thing about Nate Yavalddi is that he always has these second half swoons.

And I wonder if they're just trying to get out in front of that and be like, no, we're going to clean this up before it gets there. They're saying he could have pitched, but whatever. They don't really have great options. So I feel like, and I know that their, their season hangs in the balance. The next two weeks depends on, will decide if they're sellers or buyers. They just fired their hitting coach, you know?

A lot of it is offensive, right? Like the, their pitching numbers have been pretty good. Their offensive numbers have really struggled. But yeah, I mean, they said it was triceps fatigue. They thought that he might miss a start. Then they put them on the IL, but have said, Hey, listen, it's, it's precaution. You know, the Padres also said Michael King slept on his shoulder wrong. And now he's getting quote unquote incrementally better. And he's still a light catch. It's hard to know for sure. We know that Kumar Rocker is taking his spot in the rotation, but Kumar Rocker's last start

in AAA was 53 pitches. He was battling a shoulder impingement and now he was at 53 pitches. When Rocker pitches on Wednesday, what's he at? 65 pitches? Right? He's not fully stretched out. That's why I brought up Cody Hoyer, who's done some bullpen work. He's probably the long guy.

Hoyer is up now. Rocker is going to start Wednesday and it's not like, oh, well, you know, and Rocker has struggled in his MLB start. So like, they don't really know what to expect from him. It's a decent landing spot against the Rays and Rocker is in the situation where like, I, you know, I mentioned this when Nick Pollack and Rocker is in the situation where like I you know I mentioned this when Nick Pollack and I were chatting in spring about Jack Leiter where I think Rocker is in the same situation where I don't see any reason for them to keep Rocker in triple-a like they they know he could get

out triple-a hitters they need to know if he can get out MLB hitters because they need to know what his role is gonna be and that was why like why like they, you know, they called up Cole Reagan's the year they traded him. They didn't have a rotation spot for Cole Reagan's, but they were just like, this guy doesn't need to be at AAA anymore. We know what he could do at AAA. So we're going to call him up to the big leagues and see if he can get out big league hitters. And then is he in the rotation? Is he a trade candidate? Is he whatever?

I think it's kind of shaping up like that for rocker where rocker's going to get a look right now to get a couple starts And then maybe he just shifts to the bullpen as their long relief guy if e of aldi comes back or you know, whatever I guess it makes jack lighters Yeah, I don't know. Yeah, I don't know if he pitches he has your exactly how many how deep he's gonna go into these games And and like honestly, I don't know how he pitches he has. Exactly. How deep is he going to go into these games? Honestly, I don't know how he's getting lefties out yet. The shapes on his pitches are not good against lefties, or at least the fastball. Without a cutter, and I talked to him in the spring and he was like, I don't have the feel

on the cutter yet. Maybe he's been working on the cutter. Nick loves to yell about people adding cutters. I think Kumar Rockoker of all people probably needs the cutter the most. I mean, you can be cutter sort of death ball against lefties and then cutter and then sinker death ball against righties and then just be still kind of a small arsenal guy, but be dominant small arsenal guy if he has the right fastball for each handedness.

Jack Leiter on the other hand seems to be safer now because of this and he has his top level results are good but you know his Sierra is a 494 his K-BB is 7% whereas league average is 14%. The only thing that really speaks well for Jack Leiter right now is his stuff plus which is amazing but also his location plus is terrible and I have him. We liked him using the Sinker but but the sinker is allegedly what helped him, what gave him the blister. Um, and so now you're like, okay, he started throwing a sinker. We got the blister pop up, you know, it's rumored that the sinker is connected to the blister.

He hasn't come out and set it. So we're just trying to connect dots here, but that is one of the rumors. But he's throwing it like the last two starts he's been throwing it. And maybe he has found a grip or found an adjustment, but that was a huge thing for him was getting the sinker because the command of the force teamer is questionable. So if he still gets the sinker, then yeah, there's a little bit more safety there than not. And then I think also like you you got I think John Gray is starting a rehab assignment soon, or you know, is getting closer. So maybe that's an option, but that's still weeks away. And by then, as you mentioned, like by then, there are two games under 500

right now, maybe it's too late. They're trading Yvolde. It's a weird couple of weeks in Texas and from what I gather, it's pretty stressed out there. So we have him in the main event. We were about to drop Jack Leiter in our main event and then he had that decent start. So we decided not to drop him this last week, but he's not like a guy that we're rushing to start. He's basically the worst pitcher on our bench. And somebody asked me, should I drop Casey Meyers for Jack Leiter today? I'm saying no. As much as Meyers doesn't strike guys out, Jack Leiter doesn't either really right now.

Leiter is this interesting thing I talked to Nick about too, where it's like you buy in on these upside guys in the spring. If they don't pan out in the first few starts, it's easy to say, okay, I thought it was something, it's not something. It's tougher when they really pan out in the first few starts, and then there's the dip, and you're like, okay, so am I believing what they did early, or was that also part of the mirage?

And Max Meyer has come back from that, right? Max Meyer did that, and he sort of bounced back. I think he's come back and been like, you're good, but Jack Leiter, I feel like you're just like, I don't know, I don't know. And the reason I've held in a few places is the next two starts are Tampa Bay, Minnesota. And even though those aren't bad teams, those aren't offenses that I'm like, whoa, I can't start anybody against Tampa Bay and Minnesota. And now Minnesota is healthy again. Buxton's back. Lewis is back even though he's not hitting. Walners

back. So maybe Minnesota isn't as friendly. But I think if you can't trust Jack Leiter against the Rays and the Twins offenses, it's hard to keep him on your roster in a lot of formats. So make or break season for Jack Leiter a little bit. Right now he's settling in the low 100s in my rankings and I don't feel like I need to have him higher than that. But yeah, the Stuff Plus is great. But at some point, there is a moment when the sample goes to K minus BB is more important. We're past that for Jack Leiter. Yeah, the Stuff Plus is great, but the K minus BB is bad. So why is he not striking out more guys? It's the command,

but also we can believe the command numbers by now. So Houston is actually having a situation that's a little bit like Toronto where everything is bad. At least in the lineup, they are having some problems. So Jordan Alvarezarez who thought just had wrist inflammation. It sounds like you're kind of reading between the lines. But Rome Chandler had a great article about this where it basically sounds like he and his agent decided to go get their own, you know, like imaging. And there was like in the Rome Chandler article about how this reminds us a lot of the the Kyle Tucker situation where they were like, oh, no, it's not a fracture.

It's not a fracture. Okay, sorry. It's a small fracture. You know, it's like, well, you know, what they seem not to do is like there's there's the original imaging. And this is a problem for for Corbin Burns to is the original imaging sometimes just says, oh, just a lot of information, man, I can't see much in here, you know, And so some of these guys have to wait, you know, for the inflammation to go down and then take another one. And then it's like, oh, Tommy John, right? So in this case, your Alvarez had the original imaging, they said inflammation, and then they sat them, and then they never really did another imaging. That's my question. And also why then why if, if your initial imaging was, hey, there's too much inflammation to know for sure. Why is he not,

he's not even just swinging. He's facing high velocity. Like he was, he's in high velocity off a machine. Like if you're not sure, if there's a fracture or not, because the imaging, there was too much inflammation to see the image and he's still saying he should be doing very kind of like low stress stuff. So you reduce the inflammation, then get another image. Why? So this guy's been hitting high velocity with a small fracture in his wrist for what? Two weeks now? Like that's not helping the healing. And one

of the things I read said that he's about 60, the fracture is about 60% healed. So now what he's shut down until the fracture heals. And then he's got to get his timing and his rhythm back again, which is going to be a lot of batting practice and live BP and then a lengthier rehab assignment now than it would have been a couple weeks ago. So like I can't imagine seeing Jordan Alvarez in Astro's uniform before July. Yeah, I was gonna guesstimate about a month because the nice thing is non-displaced factors, you can, and it's 60% healed, a non-displaced factor you can actually heal in like three weeks or something. And so you can say, all right, he's done half of that.

So he has like a week and a half, maybe two weeks of healing. But you're right, after the two weeks of healing, he has to start the process over, get his timing back and all that stuff. So yeah, I think this is at least a four week injury now. So if it's a four week injury, that's enough to be like, hey, what's happening behind him? Well, what's happening behind him

is other guys are getting hurt. Chas McCormick's on the IL. Zach DeCenzo is on the IL. Zach DeCenzo's might be short, but it's hand inflammation. Oh God. Exactly. Let's wait until we get two images from this one. Yeah, right. So there's this wide gap. And the other thing that's been happening is that Brendan Rodgers has just not been playing. They're just tired of it. So the news is Jacob Melton and Shay Wickham are the guys who were up as the. So the news is Jacob Melton and Shay Wickham are

the guys who were up, you know, as the corresponding moves. I think Jacob Melton could play because they don't have any lefties with your on out. Karatini is their only lefty. And Karatini has been DHing basically every day that he's not catching right now. He's been there to which is a little embarrassing. It is he is I will say he is hitting well right now and we've seen Karatini do this before where he has two weeks where you're like, that's pretty good production and then He can't be your everyday DH Yeah, see, you know, so I think there's probably a road here for

There's probably a road here for Whitcomb and Melton to play a lot. Altube can DH. If Melton becomes an everyday outfielder, you can go Melton, Myers, Smith. That's a pretty good defensive outfield. It's a fairly bad offensive outfield, but you could just prioritize defense. Altube plays a DH, and Whitcomb and Dubon handle second. I'd love to see Whitcomb and Whitcomb you assume as a righty will be in the lineup against lefties. 18 homers, six steals this year at AAA. He was hitting 275. I get that there's some swing and miss. He was an advanced. He's 26 at AAA so it's not like he's a young guy carving up AAA.

But I'd love to see that power in the lineup a little bit to see if they can get some juice out of it. That Chandler Rome article that you're citing, they had quotes from Dana Brown, the Astros GM, about Jacob Melton, where they said they were playing Melton four days a week in AAA because he had been battling a groin injury at the beginning of the season. And so they expect that to continue at the big league level. So their plan right now is for Melton to not be an everyday player, but play about four games a week. But like you're saying, there is a path where if he produces, there's a path for him to say, okay, I'm not playing four games a week. I'm playing five games a week.

I'm playing six games a week. Like He can hit himself into a bigger role. Can't baby this groin all year. And if he's the only left-hander that's producing and Karatini starts going in the tank, then it just becomes pretty obvious. And the other thing I just want to mention about Melton is, before the days of exit velocities, you could look at his line and be like, oh, this is a legs-based power situation where he strikes out a little bit too much. And so it might be like a 240 batting average in the major leagues with not much power because he, you know, kind of a limp stick, you know, like a 170 ISO with 20, 30 stolen bases could all just be legs, you know?

could all just be legs. But we do have exit velocities and he's hit 113 miles an hour last year and this year and this year he's got a 57% hard hit rate. So this is a guy who can hit for power. Now he hits the ball on the ground a decent amount and he may not hit for a lot of game power, but he has raw power. There's a lot to like, the stuff you worry about is what is the true talent strikeout rate? What is his game power going to look like? But there's still actually a fair amount to like here. I think he will supplant Myers eventually as the center fielder. He has more offensive upside for me.

And the question really is just how quickly does it manifest in games in the Magic level? Yeah, I will say, I wonder if that, I mean, as long as the Astros are playing well, like I really the new the swing change for Jacob Myers this year has really helped him. I mean, I think he has earned a lot of that 292 batting average even if you think it goes down a little bit back some of it is just getting healthy you know like he was he was hurt when they were bringing it back I mean I think all the numbers kind of suggest that he had more power than he came when he first came back. He's cut that strike, the swinging strike rate to sub 9%.

The zone contact rate is up to 91. The overall contact rate is pushing 82% for Myers with a, with a new swing behind that. And then you add, you know, he's a, it's a lead defense. His outs above average in center field is five. It was 14 last year. Like he's an elite defensive center fielder. If he's going to hit 270 and steal 15 bases for you on the, on the season, like that,

that's a guy who's going to force himself into the lineup most times. Yeah. The only thing I concern is I do think that Melton has more true talent power like at some point. So that may change the picture because if Myers returns to kind of an ISO that starts with a zero, they may just look at that position and say, that's a position we can maybe get more offense out of. The Kamsmith thing is interesting too because the batting average has skyrocketed while

the ground ball rate has also skyrocketed. There's been like no power in May at all. And so you have to wonder where that adapts from. They're obviously happy he's getting on base and hitting for a solid average. Can they get a little bit more thump from the bat? I don't think they were expecting to call him up to be a 300-0 homer hitter in right field for them. I think his long-term upside is greater than his short-term. I do like Cam Smith. I think he's worth, if you're selling this year, I think he's worth actually targeting. Give me Cam Smith.

He doesn't look like, if you're a competitor, Cam Smith looks like somebody you might be able to give up. You're like, ah, he's not that good. But I would go get him. Another guy's up that has a big name, but the game hasn't really played to the name is Kobe Mayo's backup. Mountcastle strained his hamstring after stealing home. Now I didn't see the play, but maybe he shouldn't have. But I guess they're pretty desperate for winning games over there. So

yeah. So he stole home and came up lame afterwards. Mayo has played both games since he came up. One at first, one at DH. I guess the question is, how deep does your league have to be to care? Because I think his line of minor leagues wasn't that great. You know, it was 5% above the average for a 23 year old. It's, you know, it's, it's okay. But I added him in, in my, in my online championships, a 12 team NFBC format. I added him for $15 because this is my, my Alex Bregman league. So I've been kind of churning at third base. And again, a $15 bid for me is not all that expensive. And my thought is if he's not playing every day right now for the next, like

two weeks while Mountcastle is out, it's, it's never going to happen. He's a DH in first base now, like that spot is wide open. He could just take them out. Castle at bats. When Westberg comes back, theoretically Westberg plays third base and Ramon Urias shifts to your utility infielder again. If you're, if you're DH in like Westberg or Ramon Urias over Kobe Mayo, that says all you need to know about what their thoughts are on Kobe Mayo. And I just keep coming back to like, there was an interview this past month with Kyle Stowers, where

they basically talked about his success this year in Miami. And he basically just said, all that up and down, up and down, has you really pressing and doubting yourself and you get into a headspace where you don't really kind of believe that you can put your shirt like they read that yeah right and so i i kind of think it's the same that we're seeing that with mayo this year like mayo has never been this bad of a player at the triple a level and i think they read that they're like this time we just need to if may i was up he needs to play every day or they looked at their starting rotation and they said we have to play this guy every day because either it's going to be him or Mountcastle starting for the rest of the year

and the other one is being traded for pitching because it makes no sense to have both of them only play one of them and have our starting rotation be run out the way it is. I think it has to be now for Mayo, at least for two weeks. I don't know. You could you can play these. You can play games like Ross. You'll be like, oh, Hearn's gone after next year and then we'll just have Mayo and Mount Castle and that'll be better than not having them. They obviously have just decided not to prioritize pitching in terms of free agency or trades

in terms of top end. They think that they can develop it. Kramer and I have been looking, Kramer and Povic have been pitching a little bit better recently and partially because they both added or emphasized their sinkers more. So maybe they think they've figured something out there with those guys. But also they're tough ranks for me because they just don't have any stuff in that rotation and they you know, they don't really have strikeouts, you know, so it's kind of like, how many kind of boring stuff guys, how much can a sinker help them?

I do love that they got a really great spot start from Trevor Rogers, who was their ace pick up at the deadline last year. And then they were like, all right, you're going back to AAA. That's the Orioles way. So don't get too comfortable with Mayo. Here's a guy who's up and he's nothing like Kobe Mayo. So that's different already. But Cole Young is up with the Mariners and he's up, it seems like just to be the second baseman. And he's played both games a second. Like Mastastrobone is a backup. Dylan Moore is, you know, can play against lefties.

He's their utility guy. They haven't been emphasizing and reusing very much anyway. And DH is not really open because Calralli is like DH-ing every day that he doesn't. And that'll be Polanco when Calralli's catching, you know? Yeah, so, and so Moore in Mastromonia can help. And third, this is not a bench that's gonna be used a lot.

And I think that they're just looking, they've been looking since, you know, they gave the job to Bliss in the spring. I think they've been looking to, you know, like they've been doing with Brandon Williamson, like just hand it to them. It seems like a very different approach in Seattle than in Baltimore, where it's a little bit more like,

you're not up until we really do think we can it's a little bit more like you're not up until we really do think we can give you a job. And then we're just going to give it to you. And then we're just going to give it to you. And we're going to let you battle through some stuff. Bliss was not great, you know, and was struggling. And then really it was the injury that made the decision for them. So now I think it's just Cole Young's turn.

Jeff Ponce from Baseball America was on Friday and he said, you know, I think Cole Young is going to come up soon. He thinks he can maybe hit for a good average. Now, the one thing that I worry about with guys who like, oh, they made good contact the minor leagues. They didn't show the batted ball power is that without that batted ball power, you just have to be so good, I think, to be a good batting average guy. You have to kind of jump into that Kwon, Raya's, Jacob Wilson territory, and he's not quite there. So it could, like the protections are all 230 batting average.

It could still be, even if you like him better than that, a 250 average with no power and some steals. Yeah. May not be a great fantasy asset. I agree with you. I think he's going to be a better real life asset than fantasy asset. I do love, 31 walks, 28 strikeouts in his 54 games at AAA. Anytime you're walking more than you're striking out as a young hitter, it does speak to your eye at the plate, your plate discipline, your contact skills, stuff like that. So I do think that that points to maybe the batting average, you know, being a tick up from the projections at the big league level, but you know, I'm not projecting him to come up and hit 280 right off the bat. And, you know, I think that he's maybe like, right now, his

power is maybe like a full season 1012 Homer guy at the big league level, and maybe full season, he's like 15 ish steals at the big league level. And so, you know, what do you get out of him from the rest of the year, maybe like five homers, eight steals, five homers, 10 steals, if he runs a little bit more, you know, and if he can hit 250, 260, you know, you're hitting at the bottom of the lineup for Seattle. He's going to be second and short eligible. So in your 15 team leagues, that could be useful.

Sort of like a bench player in 15 team leagues or like a utility. If you're in a bind, you're middle infield in a 15-team league, you know, if you need a little bit of a batting average boost and you hope that that carries over a little bit. And then we'll see how if the Mariners run more than he was running a triple A, maybe they send him a little bit because his speed is fine. Like he could steal more if he's more aggressive, if they run more. It's sort of borderline in terms of interest. There's a couple ones I'm going to fly by here. Stop me if you hear something interesting. David Fry is up and I'd stashed him in some drafting holes as like a fourth catcher because I thought he might hit enough to be up. He's been up and he hasn't played in two days and it looks like he's probably the short side

platoon partner for Menzardo at DH. That's my thought. Short side DH, I don't know about that. Gavin Sheets has been an adventure in the outfield. We have the Padres on a ton in this household and over the last few days, he's just been bobbling balls in the outfield. And then yesterday, he was trying to catch a ball that he... If it had been Merrill, Merrill would have stolen the homer. You know, we talk about these stolen homers like sometimes like they're amazing and they look great and they're big plays but some of them probably are like 60, 70 percent catch probability, you know, and that's kind of the ball that she's just going after. It was like he didn't have to jump

and he would have quote unquote stolen a homer you know, he just face planted into the wall instead of getting the ball. And the ball just like went right over his glove and he's on the ground and it's like possible concussion. And I was just like, he's just not a good outfielder. So like the thought I had was just, you know, in the meantime, maybe Tours Ornelas comes up, there's a chance that Ornelas actually plays his way into a role here because they need an outfielder. But I'm not that big on Tours. And I think that the eventual solution for them is some sort of trade.

But I also don't know what they have to trade anymore because I don't think they're trading De Vries, their big shortstopstop or Salas, their catcher. So. Dennis Lin of The Athletic wrote that article about them being interested in Jaren Duran. And the Red Sox, it fits. The Red Sox could move Duran and call up Roman Anthony to play left field if they get a sizable enough package from the Padres. It's like Michael King or something. Well would the Red Sox be open to actually taking Luis

Arias because they need a first baseman and a contact oriented hitter at first could benefit the Red Sox. Would the Red Sox, the Red Sox, Red Sox need help in their bullpen? Would the Padres trade Jason Adam? Would they trade Jeremiah Estrada? Because those guys would immediately be in the late innings in Boston. If Preller is really desperate, the Red Sox traded away Kyle Teal. Could Ethan Salas go back to the Red Sox? Right? I mean, Jaren Duran is pre-arb under team control through 2028. That's a lot of team control at a cost controlled amount for an All-Star.

Like you have to give up a lot. Man, you just made up the weirdest trade. It's like Jaren Duran and just Jaren Duran and it's for Luis Arias. There are pieces that could fit depending on if the Red Sox want to say, hey, give us Arias and give us bullpen help and we want to contend now. And Salas. Give us arius and give us bullpen help and like we want to contend now. Or if the Red Sox say, you know what, we feel pretty good about Anthony just moving in for Duran.

So give us, you know, Jeremiah Estrada and give us, you know, Salas and we'll give you Duran and maybe like some lower level prospects also. And so the Red Sox make a quote unquote future looking trade, but they just bring in Anthony into the starting lineup. I mean, I just think there are some iterations there where if both teams are motivated enough, it could work. I don't want to count out. I mean, I don't want to count out probably. He's kind of got the took the rabbit out of the hat in the past. Ornelas is 25 and if you look at his AAA line, you say, oh, he's been above average of AAA, but the time you're 25 in AAA, you're not adjusting that number.

So you're basically saying he's an average AAA player, which doesn't usually equate to an above average Major League player. There's some skills there where the contact looks okay, the power is mediocre. I mean, it's like everything's like a 45 to 50. You know, like he looks like he could be, I would say like a second division starter. You made me say that about what Jason Hayward was doing for the Padres anyway. So it's not a, it's not a net negative move for them if that's what they went. We have to speed it up a little bit. Here we go. Michael King has a pinched nerve. It's not structural. That's good. It's bad. It's like you just have to wait, I guess. Tyler Glass now to the 60 day DL. So that just means we now know

he has another 30 days. It's not, I mean, even though he's throwing bullpens, I was like, oh, he might be back. Nope. It's another 30 days. Miguel Andujar, oblique injury. He caught some flack on a drive by from us a second ago. We're not on strikeouts. He is still striking out 60% of the time. He had a really good time in Toronto where he's from. He had a good series there where he hit a homer and stole a base. That catch was awesome too.

The catch was awesome, but he's a good centerfielder. I don't think you want to play him too much in fantasy. The Giants, there's a rumor they might be making a change of first base. Yes, Lamont Way Jr. is a 60 WRC plus. He isn't the best first baseman. Also, if you need power, he's not going to give that to you. And Wilmer Flores kind of receding from his early power outburst. Jarr and Canacion is coming. He has, you know, 80 bat speed. Marco Luciano playing first base in the minors. What if he gets the shot before Bryce Eldridge?

That would be interesting. I think Bryce Eldridge is still the pick to click, but I've seen from some scouting reports that he still actually struggles a little bit with velocity. Incarnacion is interesting if he's the first baseman when he gets activated. He had a little setback so now he's like kicked it back up again at AAA so who knows how much longer he needs. That intrigues me a little bit. He destroys AAA pitching and comes up to the majors and gives you like kind of like a solar light in the majors. But you know solar light

if it starts getting closer to solar at first base that would be I think an improvement for the Giants. The Rockies did make a change. Michael Toglias was option. He wasn't hitting the ball hard and he never makes contact. That's a bad combo. Keston Hira is up, sat the first game to Cal Farmer at first, but Hira played the second game and could take the role. He's only 28 quote unquote only. Yeah. Keston Hira, Scott Kingery both called up the same weekend in the year 2025. Just wild. Nice. Where's Kingery called up? Angels. Yeah. Yeah.

Because you're a deep league, you know, Colorado hitter maybe. Jordan Walker to the IL. I'm done. I'm done. I'm done. I'm chasing the bad speed. Yeah. I mean like change something. He's been trying to change his batting stance You can see it is openness and his closeness the angle of his batting stance a lot of stuff changing But it's just not none of its working Ursaig to the IL he thinks it'll be short-term hurt his back lifting Jackson job to the IL with a flexor strain. I hate flexor strains Gibson long I guess is gonna take his his his job and moves up in the rankings.

Joe moves down the rankings. Flexor strains are often precursors to Tommy John, but I figure Joe will be back in six weeks or something. Joe was such an interesting conundrum too, because you knew what the talent was there, but the strikeouts weren't carrying over. And so it was like, okay, the fastball is maybe not producing at the major league level like we thought. And so it was like, okay, the fastball is maybe not producing at the major league level like we thought. So we have to go super slider heavy to kind of make up for that.

And so I do think he was improving and adjusting in ways where kind of like you talked about with Max Meyer before, it was nice to see that he was acknowledging flaws at the big league level and trying to adapt to them. But he hadn't hit the ground running like we thought. And now this is obviously going to interrupt the adjustment period. And you also have to wonder, and the Tigers weren't going to be able to pitch him all year in the rotation

anyway, just innings wise. So you have to wonder if they also see this as an opportunity to hit the pause button, let him fully heal, let him fully heal more than maybe they would have normally do the slow ramp up, have him work on some things in the minors come back for the rotation for the most important games and like August September. It's that's tough in a redraft like in an NFB C format where you have no IL spots I could see moving on. Yeah, I don't know if I can hang around like if he'd been killing it too before maybe but like Grayson Rodriguez is still on a lot of those waiver wires, you know. So, you know, if you're in that position, I'd almost make this, make this hop over to, you know, if you need a stash spot. Yeah, if you just, if you, if you're going to be a stash spot, like I'd rather stash Shamanaya or Grayson Rodriguez.

So somebody's coming closer, you know, so I would make that jump. Where the money went, just real quick, the final bit here, Andrew Benatendi was a $33 guy in the main event. I got him for $11 in bar. I think he's actually going to be traded. If the Padres just want somebody who's a major leaguer that's slightly better than what they've got and they don't want to spend much, I think Andrew Benatendi is one of those guys that they can go get. I mean, there's a question of you know salary

He is overpaid, but it's not too much salary I mean it's still it's it's like 15 million dollars a year until 20s 27 and he's an above average Major League player I think if you give him the whole season so for now he's playing White Sox hitting homers, you know, not striking out. I don't know why he stopped stealing bases, but you know, he's a body and he plays. I got McGable a couple of times for around 30 bucks. I figured that's like, you know, streamer plus. Streamers around 11. I'm hoping to streamers, you know, maybe play him this week, maybe not play him next week, but not play him next week,

but stash him, see what happens after that. I think it was worth that. So that's like, I'm paying to see what's going on. You know, I did buy Luis Avarino for 40 bucks. It's a two starter Cole Young went for 66 out of 1000 and TGFBI just to so you know where these things fit in. I did a couple Parker Meadows buys around 20 bucks because you buy him ahead of the news that he's back. I did that last week with Colton Couser where I

bought Colton Couser before the news. Parker Meadow this week felt like that exact thing and he actually might be back this week. Yeah, so it was 20 bucks instead of maybe I could have gotten him last week for five, but 20 bucks still feels like a decent price. So just real quick, anything you saw off your off the wires that you wanted to highlight? I mean, I guess I should ask you the most added player in NFB, NFBC formats was Lance McCullers. Obviously that comes off of the huge strikeout game. I didn't get I didn't spend enough.

I had him in all of my like, you know, I guess waterfalls if we're referring to it as that, but like in turf, he went for 60 and my bid was in the thirties. I know it's a two start week this week. I think it's like Minnesota and Cleveland. The ERA in those starts with the strikeouts was still like a 450 ERA. He's still getting hit around a little bit. He's just not throwing the fastball at all. Like I just don't know if 20% fastballs is really doable in the major leagues.

Yeah, I was interested, but not enough to spend like a lot of money to get Lance McCullers. I will say my most added starting pitcher, cause I came in around $19 in a lot of leagues was, was Ryan Yarbrough. I thought he looked, change up. I thought he looked pretty good. One of my friends who's in my home league is a Yankee fan said I didn't know the Yankees signed Prime Jamie Moyer. It is slow, slow or slowest. But it's working. And I think they've used the approach in a way where I kind of trust what he's doing right now to an extent.

He's not a huge breakout. I needed a starter now. I went with Ryan Yarbrough. I don't love what the Red Sox offense is doing and Yarborough gets the Red Sox this week and you know, they might sit will your brain because it's a lefty and Duran is a little bit worse against lefties. And so that's not a spot I wanted to avoid. Speaking of Red Sox, I got Richard Fitz in a few places. He kind of like made a rehab starter. I think he is. He made like a rehab start in the big leagues last week. Like he only was through three innings because they rushed him back. So I don't really know how deep he goes this week. He may be like a four or five inning guy, but I think he's in that rotation. I don't know why they would rush Tanner Hauck back. Hauck is on the IL. There's no indication that he's coming back anytime soon. He has real problems with his pitch mix and has been an asset in the bullpen in the past.

Fitz has supplanted Hunter Dobbins. So I think Fitz has a run in the Red Sox rotation for a while. So I was happy to get him in a few places and I picked up Edward Cabrera in a few places where he was out. Edward Cabrera. I know. Every year I do this. Every Wednesday I write a starting pitcher news column over on Roto World and I covered his pitch mix change. His arm angle dropped six degrees this year, which over Alex Chamberlain's pitch leaderboard, you can see the year by year results. That's a pretty sizable

drop. It added more movement to the sinker and then he started using the sinker as his primary fastball rather than the foreseam fastball. It also added more movement to the curve and he has leaned into the curve against lefties. And so what he's kind of doing right now is curve for whiffs against lefties slider for whiffs against righties and a sinker as the primary fastball with more run on it than it had last year. And it's kind of working. And so, you know, one of those starts against was

against the Cubs. It wasn't just like this run has been bad offenses. So I was happy to just kind of see what it is. I mean, he's 27. So it might just be a young player figuring it out. And let's say he does figure it out for the next three weeks. The Marlins were hoping to trade Sandy Alcantara. I don't know that there's much trade value there, but could they flip Edward Cabrera to somebody? If Cabrera, you know, by the end of June is looking decent, would a contender take a flyer on Edward Cabrera?

And then all of a sudden he has a new pitch mix and is pitching on a better team, and that becomes a little pitch mix and is pitching on a better team and that becomes a little bit more interesting than pitching for the Marlins. So that made some sense to me. And then in a two catcher format, I finally gave up on Bo Naylor and I went with Henry Davis, who is back up, Joey Bart, you know, on the concussion IL again. That's like the second time in two years for Joey Bart. So I don't really know what his return is like. So I take some gambles on Henry Davis. And then last actually, I had a share of Ryan Walker with Doval being named the closer in

San Francisco. I pivoted and added Robert Garcia in a 12 team OC. If they win some games, I think he's going to be the closer. Yeah. It's like, I don't know if he's going to get all of the shares. I needed a closer and I had Robert Garcia at the top of my list. I had Kirby Yates as a backup because I think he's back this week and, you know, could get the righty share of that bullpen for the Dodgers. But yeah, Garcia seems like the guy right now for Texas and we'll see what they do in the weeks ahead.

Location plus for Edward Cabrera since May 4th, 108. 100 for the year. This would be amazing. I, when you were talking, I was like, whatever he can throw in the zone. And it is finally maybe doing that. So that's always been the thing is can he throw strikes and clearly it was not with the four seam fastball. And so he ditched it. And like, I don't love a righty throwing a primary fastball

as a sinker to lefties, but you know, I know you, you know, you've talked about this with Nick on the craft a lot where it's like, if he's doing his job against righties and he's just kind of like meh against lefties, then maybe that works enough. You know what I mean? Maybe he's old Edward Cabrera against lefties

and he's more dominant against righties. Like, that might actually even out to like a pretty good pitcher. We did it. We made it. We made it. There was a lot of, why is there so much news this week? It was a super interesting waiver period because there weren't, I mean, we're, you know,

Jack Caglione didn't happen, but there was so much that happened over the weekend that made small moves kind of interesting. And it depended where you wanted to go with like the Blue Jays News and the Alan Rodin and whatever. Did you want to go for Shay Whitcomb? Did you want to, you know, like, I don't know pivot to I was super boring. Andrew Benatendi. Benatendi Mike Tauchman even for the White Sox, like playing all the time.

I mean, I don't, I think me going Yarborough is pretty boring and that's pretty good. Maybe delusional buying back in on Kobe Mayo in some places, but you know, what are you going to do? But it was all like sort of 20, $30 buys this week. It was kind of, everything was small this week. And this is, I think sometimes these are the more fun fantasy weeks is like, where do I want to put my $27 bid? Because if it pays, if I made the right one, it could be a really nice return on value. And so it's like, it's those fun kind of like a low risk

gambles that I think this week was. Thank you so much for coming in, Eric Sumolsky. Thanks for having me. This was a blast. It was a blast and enjoy your pods with Nick as I do. And thanks again to Brian Smith for producing this. Thank you for listening and for liking this video and subscribing and for joining our discord. The link is in the show description. Thanks for listening. DVR, please come back.