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[email protected]. Get ready to win your lead. [MUSIC PLAYING] Now here's Frank Scott and Chris. Hey there. Welcome in to Fantasy Baseball Today on Wednesday, August 12. I am Frank Samful. Join by Chris Towers. Today on the show Blake Snow is back. Paul Schienz is cooked. The Rockies promoted Zach Vienn. And much more. Who's just an annoying night, Chris? I hate starting the podcast like this, but we were talking about it beforehand. And I just want to warn everybody in advance. I'm annoyed. I'm annoyed by Tuesday night's action of baseball. I want answers, and there are no answers. But we will try to find them together. Let's start with something a little bit more positive. And that is Zach Vienn being promoted by the Rockies. And we spoke about I'm just yesterday on the podcast. And I'm happy this happened with the timing. And just he was completely destroying the miners. Over the weekend, he had a game, five hits, three homers, a double, a triple, his last 12 games, a triple A. He was hitting 462, eight homers, 20 runs, 24 RBI, three steals, a 1649 OPS, video game numbers. Just legit stuff that you would do. And it'll be the show if your guy is rated 99 and you are playing road to the show. You were just absolutely demolishing the miners. That is what Zach Vienn was doing. So he has earned this opportunity. He is 17% rostered. Just wondering if there's enough playing time here to go around. Chris, what are your thoughts on what Zach Vienn has done this year? Complete transformation. Good for him. He's got his life back on track. And whether or not you, where you would add him in fantasy right now? I would add him, I think in any five outfielder league. And I mean, first to start off, like you said, the turnaround for Zach Vienn, if you don't remember in the off season or in spring training, there's a story about how he had been dealing with substance abuse issues and spent the end of last season. And then this off season, going treatment and staying sober. And he put on a bunch of weight and just generally seemed a lot healthier both physically and mentally. And it's great to see him back after all that. And I still think despite how bad his stint in the majors was last season, there's a lot to be excited about with Zach Vienn. Like you said, the playing time is a concern. You look at the Rockies. And I think we've reached the point where like Trijonston doesn't really need to be in line. And so that gives them three outfield spots and the DH spot most days in which to use their right now I would say four viable outfielders. And so that might just be it, right? Like Jordan Beck probably doesn't need to play. And Connor Norby, I know Kyle Carro left this game. So maybe Connor Norby slides in at third base. That's actually like in your deep leagues. That's kind of a name to keep an eye on when they're at course field at least. But there might just be enough playing time right there between the three outfield spots and the DH spot. But I think we should also consider the possibility of Cole Carrick continuing to play shortstop, at least a little bit as another path to playing time for all these outfielders because I believe he started at shortstop on Monday. And he has played there, I think it's only three or four times. But they have been more recent, I think three in the last 10 days, two of them as a defensive replacement late in games. But if they are comfortable with Cole Carrick in the shortstop spot a couple times a week, makes it a lot easier to get everyone in the lineup too. And it's not like a Zikiel Tov are needs to be in the lineup for any reason other than frankly at this point, the contract they're paying him. I mean, the defense is still very good. But that contract is a thing, man. Like he signed through 2030 and he has a 2031 team option. So yeah. And he's still, I believe a good defensive player. I guess I will confess to not having actually looked at a Zikiel Tov, as defensive numbers. But yes, he still rates out very well. Defensively he's just the worst hitter in baseball right now. And so that tradeoff may be worth it. And I, yeah, I have the concerns about Zach Vien's playing time, especially if they call up Charlie Condon as we hope and maybe expect them to at some point. But one, that's not a guarantee on its own. And I don't think that's a reason to not add. A player with Zach Vien's potential. And two, we should focus on Zach Vien's potential because he has improved his plate discipline across the board. He's chasing less. He's striking out less. He's walking more. His average ex of velocity is still 90 miles per hour. His barrel rate is nearly double what it was last year at Triple A. The numbers are inflated by playing in Albuquerque in the Pacific Coast League, which is, I don't know, maybe the best offensive environment in all of professional baseball, at least in the United States. And so, no, he's not a thousand OPS guy, but 24 homers, 18 steals still has good numbers on the road. I think there's a lot to like about this kid. And they're serious upside here. So any road-o-league, any five-out-free-daleague, I'm adding Zach Vien and we'll just hope the playing time works out. I'll worry about that when the cost is more than a little bit of fat, you know? Yeah. I agree. And ultimately, I think it comes down to if Zach Vien hits, they're going to play him, right? Like, what else are the Rockies playing for the rest of the season other than evaluating their young talent and seeing what they have for future years? Like, Zach Vien has done everything he can do at Triple A. There is nothing left for him to do there. Now the Rockies need to figure out if he is a major league player. And so, he should have a pretty long leash. Do they view it that way? I'm not entirely sure. I think he'll play at least every day against right-handed pitching to start. And once they call up Charlie Condon, if they call up Charlie Condon, I think they will, although he has slowed down a little bit over the past month, his numbers in the minors this year are still very good. And they should see what they have in Charlie Condon as well. Obviously, like, they invest a lot in him. He was a top pick, a top five pick in the MLB draft. And so once that happens, that will raise another question. But for the time being, they call Zach Vien up for a reason. I think he will play against right-handed pitching. He is 17% rostered. He is widely available. And I was getting a lot of tough questions today, admittedly, mad. So let's go through some of these. The one I probably got the most is, would you drop as Merlin Valdez for Zach Vien? And it's, for me, it's tough because Valdez has not been the same since getting hit by a pitch on his hand. And to you and Scott's credit, you guys were expecting him to slow down. Like, obviously he wasn't going to keep up that pace. He was striking out way too much. So it's part of, all right, is he playing with like a hand injury right now? Is this just like normal regression? Because he was always going to slow down. But I still kind of worry about him getting hot again, just because we saw a massive stretch from as Merlin Valdez looking really good. So what do you think about that one? Would you drop Valdez for Zach Vien? I think so. It's not a slam dunk. It's not like Vien is a camp miss prospect. Neither Vien nor Valdez were top 100 guys before they made their debut. So they are interesting prospects with real skills, but also real downsides. And I guess part of the thing is we've seen both the upside-and-down side for Valdez now. Actually, if you play in an OBP league, he's been pretty good in OBP. Over the last 15 games. He still has like, say, a 20% walk rate or something during this slump, but he's literally doing nothing else. And so I think it would be OK to drop Valdez for Vien. I think it would also be OK to hold on to Valdez for Vien. I can't say definitively one way or the other, but I do lean towards saying yes, drop Valdez for Vien. So in the second half for Valdez, 157, for her.
still has a 368 on base percentage as you pointed out a 739 OPS. If you look at just August, which is nine games, he has two hits in 24 at bats, 12 walks to 16 strikeouts and a 472 OPS. So I get why it's a question. The people who I answered, I said that I would hold on to Valdez, but I think it's a really close call. If you need to win now, if you need the production now, not that we know Vien is going to do anything, but Valdez is doing nothing. So I think they're both super high volatile, highly volatile players. Paul Wow. Okay. Sorry, I woke up early today. Frank and I hung out today. We saw Adam Azur. That's right. We did a show. We had lunch. We had to go into the big city to get photos taken. You'll be seeing our new faces sometimes soon somewhere. But yeah, I got up at like 930 today. It has been a very long day. It's been a little bit long day, but anyway. The other question that I was getting regarding Vien is him versus other prospects right now. So, which is also tough because those guys could get called up as soon as this week. We just don't know yet. And they are, they're much more highly ranked prospects than Zach Vien. So someone like Joshua Baez, who has picked things up again and his strikeout rate is down over the past couple of weeks. And Walker Jenkins, who's picked things up. And the twins are playing for a wildcard spot. And maybe they just think Walker Jenkins could help them win a wildcard spot. So, would you, if you're, I guess, how would you rank those three? Just right now knowing that Vien is up and the other two are not yet. Well, which bird is worth more? The one in your hand or the one in the bush? That's a saying, right? Yeah. Vien is here and the other guys aren't. And they might get called up tomorrow, but they might not get called up at all. I don't think that's the likeliest outcome, but it's possible. And so I'll take the guy who's already been called up and just hope that Baez and Walker Jenkins aren't far behind him and don't make me look dumb. You know? Yeah. All right, let's move on from Zach Vien and we will get into the players of the night. In a year that has been so improbable, the impossible has happened. Blake Snell is back. Yeah. That's your cue, Chris. Yeah, he pitched today. He was back. Came off the IL and pitched for the dawn. Now, it was I, I believe on Sunday's podcast, I think I said I'd lean towards sitting, Snell, and I did it. And at least one league. I have so many leagues. It's hard to remember if I did it in every league that I have him in, but I definitely did it in one league. It was my tower's league. And yeah, he made me regret that immediately. Like literally first inning, he pitched. He struck out the side and he finished with 10 strikeouts and six innings. The Dodgers did say that we're planning on limiting him to 75 pitches or five innings. I guess when you're cruising the way he was, you can bend the rules a little bit. And he ended up with 10 strikeouts, one walk, three hits, one on run, over six innings, 15 whiffs on 84 pitches. He was dominant. He looked like the good version of Blake Snell. I will say I'm not beating myself up for sitting him because yes, I think as a general rule, you should just start a pitcher like Blake Snell. And a pitcher like Blake Snell, I mean, a guy who goes through outrageously frustrating peaks and valleys throughout the season. And you're probably better off just riding it than trying to figure out when you can start him and when not to. We said the same thing about Gavin Williams all the time. Yeah. But given the circumstances, given that he was coming back from elbow surgery, given that, you know, there was some concern about how deep you would pitch into the game. I feel okay about sitting him. I think that's okay process. I think you're definitely starting him the next time he pitches. And I don't think you take him out of your line up the rest of the way. I think we see Blake Snell get absurdly hot hotter than maybe any pitcher in baseball for stretches. He has won two Saiyans basically because he got crazy hot for like two months, both years. And I don't think you can miss out on that kind of upside. It's not a guarantee that he's going to be good. There's lots of stretches and Blake Snell's career where he follows up a great start with the terrible one. But I think you have to give him the benefit of the doubt here. And if you did start him, congrats. It worked out great. And even looking at what he did last year in a very small sample 11 starts to 35 ERA 126 whip. I think it is very likely that he's going to run a higher whip. But the ERA should be very good, especially with that defense behind him. You know, he's going to give you a lot of strikeouts. He will be inconsistent at times and with his command and walks could be issue in issue. And let me pull up again, what he did in the post season. So that was 34 innings of a 318 ERA, a one whip 10.9 K, 393.4 walks prior. Like, yeah, there's no voting even though he's getting a little bit older when he pitches. He still mostly looks like Blake Snell. So great start for him. I think if you waited this long, I wouldn't have blamed you for using him this week. Obviously, we're riding it out the rest of the season. Now that he's, I guess we have to see how he bounces back because he made one star earlier this year. And then immediately went back on the I L, but assuming he's healthy, where do you think you'll, you'll rank Blake Snell rest of season 30 ish for now and maybe higher. That's just off the top of the dome. Yeah, I was thinking top 30, but I got to look through it like there's a real chance that he's just like right back in the top 24. Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. Again, that is Blake Snell. I did just want to mention with his velocity because he's coming back from a year worth of arm injuries. He averaged 96.2 miles per hour in his fastball and last year 95.1. So I think a very good sign there for Blake Snell. And yes, he was going up against the royals who generally have a bad offense, but they are middle of the pack against lefties this year. And they have been middle of the pack in the second half in terms of woebo. So, uh, Turkish group will just had a pretty mediocre start against the yesterday. Yeah. Yeah. How about Cags, by the way, Cags hit lefties. He's wrecking up the hits. He's lefties. He's a love to see that. Let's move on to Paul Schienz, who we talk about all the time. And maybe some people are annoyed by it, but he is one of the faces of baseball and he is going through the roughest stretch of his career. And we are trying to figure out why. And of course, we have no definitive answers, but the velocity being down once again. So at the Marlins five innings, five hits, two runs, one of those earned four strikeouts to one walk. Just four swinging strikes on 65 pitches. Velocity down once again, fastball was down 1.2 miles per hour. He averaged 95.7. He topped out at 96.5 miles per hour on his fastball. Last year, he averaged 98.2. The year before that, he averaged 98.8. All of his other pitches were down as well. He gave up eight hard hits in this game. And he was helped out by Brian Reynolds who robbed a run as well. So I watched a six minutes from after this game trying to get some kind of answers with Paul Schienz. You sent me an interesting quote here. He was asked if he was surprised on being pulled after the 65 pitches. Quote, not really if I were the manager, I'd probably do it too, which I could have gone more, but it is what it is. That's the one that really raised the eyebrow for me. Because I am having trouble making sense of what we're seeing from Paul Schienz. If the answer isn't some version of, he just isn't healthy. But the problem is there's not healthy enough to pitch. There's not healthy enough to pitch well. And then there's just normal wear and tear. Like if you gave every single pitcher and baseball truth serum, I think every single one of them would say, "Yeah, I'm not 100% healthy. It's mid-August." At least the ones who have been pitching the whole season. So where he falls on the spectrum of healthy to not healthy, I don't know. But a couple of things stand out. 195.7 miles per hour is the lowest average fastball velocity of his career. About a half mile per hour down from his previous low, which was about a month ago. The 95.7 average versus 96.5 max also really stands out. That is an unusually low spread between average and max velocity. And it suggests that Schienz is having to go all out to get to 95.7 miles per hour. And I have always viewed Schienz as a guy who, the velocity came so easily that he didn't have to max out. He's always felt like one of those guys who, if he wanted to, he could average 101 on his fastball. And now I clearly don't think he can. And that's what's especially concerning is that he doesn't have that extra gear now. And there are still good things in the profile. Generally speaking, he's still been missing a lot of bats that was not the case today, though. And that quote, yeah, asked if he was surprised to be pulled so early, not really. If I were the manager, I'd probably do it too. Well, he wasn't like pitching terribly, you know, two runs, one earned in five innings. It wasn't like the worst start we've ever seen from Paul Schienz. And so for him to concede that after 65 pitches, yeah, he probably should have been pulled from the game. I mean, what's going on here? I don't have an answer. I mean, I think you have to, I think you have to lean.
towards he's not 100% healthy. But that is not the same as his arm is falling off. And so I the way I play fantasy baseball, I would probably keep starting Paul schemes. And I definitely wouldn't drop him. That should go without saying, but I definitely would not drop Paul schemes. I can't start him confidently. And I can't say you're making a mistake if you're sitting him. I'm just telling you what I would do is probably keep starting Paul schemes. But I don't have a good explanation for why I want to do that, except that it's Paul schemes. Last point and it will move on. Part of the reason why I was frustrated tonight is that I watched a six minute video of reporters talking to Paul schemes. And I don't know if there's just an unwritten rule or you just can't ask tough questions, but not one of them asked him about his velocity or his recent, just directly, Hey man, you have been crap over the last nine starts, not in those exact words. What's going on? And no one asked in that question. I just, I don't know why. And it's frustrating to me. So that is Paul schemes. I know we just talked about it for a lot. And we didn't really give you a definitive answer. But there's no definitive answer. If you're looking for a definitive answer, if someone is offering you a definitive answer about Paul schemes, you should not trust that person's opinion about it because there are just too many unknowns here. We until we find something out that explains why he's struggling, there is no definitive answer. I wish there was, unless it meant they was hurt. I don't wish that. My answer is, if you have a loaded pitching staff, Benchem. Yeah, that's it. Absolutely. I wouldn't drop in because there is, it might be a sub 10% chance that Paul schemes figures things out and turns back into Paul schemes over his final eight starts. I don't want to take that 10% chance on someone else's team. There is that happens. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Before we hit our first break, make sure to sign up for the FBT newsletter. If you haven't already, you can scan that QR code in the top right corner. That will bring you right to the website CBSports.com/newsletters where you can sign up for free. Let's take that break. We'll be back right after this. Welcome back, fantasy baseball today. And let's hit the news and notes James Wood, who is on the aisle with an oblique injury is not expected back when first eligible later this week. And oblique injuries could take a long time, especially for big human beings. And so we just wait and see what James would bad news for Nick Kurtz. He is set to spend three more weeks in a brace after receiving a PRP injection in his right thumb. Manager Mark Cazze said Kurtz is unlikely to return this season. So if you play in leagues with no isle spots, I know it hurts. I think it's safe to drop Nick Kurtz. If you really need the IEL spot, I also think it's safe. The one saving grace here, although you will not replace Nick Kurtz, is that there are still a lot of first basement that are available. Ty France and another home run on Monday night. And he's been really good for a long time now. And he's only like 50% rostered. So someone like him. And even if you go a little bit deeper, you know, I spoke up Nate Low recently, there's the ever reliable Josh Bell, who's just boring, but keeps getting it done. So you should be able to find decent first base for placements. Obviously not Nick Kurtz Joe Ryan threw on flat ground Monday and he went on the IEL last Friday with a left glute train. So hopefully back sooner rather than later, Byron Bucksson went through a full workout on Monday. He is working his way back from a right hip impingement. Roman Anthony is getting closer to a minor league rehab assignment. He's progressed to hitting off a traject machine and his final step before rehab will be live batting practice. So we'll see how his wrist and then it was a finger. I think the finger has been the primer. The finger. Yeah. Yeah. It's like one of the ligaments in the knuckle. I think has been, which is apparently the problem here is that blood flow matters for the healing of various injuries. And that is a spot where there is very little blood flow. I was reading about this in the last week. And so that's the explanation for why it's been so tough for him. Kyle Stowers was placed in the IEL with a left hamstring strain. He missed the first three weeks of the season with a right hamstring strain. So both hamstrings given Stowers issues this year. Griffith Konae started at first base here on Tuesday. Heriberto Hernandez Jacob Marcy and Estérie Ruiz in the outfield Owen Casey at DH. And if Ruiz becomes an everyday player. I think he's must roster in five outfielder roado leagues, which might sound crazy, but he has made such an impact this year in a limited sample. He went one for two with a sock and a shoe. The home run came off of Paul schemes. And in 76 games, he is hitting 266 with a 387 on base six homers 11 RBI, which is just hilarious. How does that even happen? 28 steals in 887 OPS. He is pulling the ball in the air this year 40% of the time. I don't know. He is one of these players, Chris, where it could be like, there's a point of diminishing returns where hey, he's probably really good in a small sample in like your spots and use him here or there. And he probably will just get a lot worse if he's being an everyday player. But on the off chance that he can maintain at least some of this power and just a ton of speed. I mean, he can maybe give you 15 or 20 steals the rest of the season. Like he's that fast to do that. So I think in five outfielder leagues, I am very interested in Estérie Ruiz. Yes. I think certainly and I mean, Lee, where you're looking for speed, you should be very interested as well. I'm not sure the Marlins are going to fully trust him, but he's mostly, I think, been starting Antelope D's when he's in the starting lineup and they started against Paul Schienz. So that could tell you something. He's striking out 30% of the time. For all the pulled air that he has, it's a 40% pulled air rate. It's still only 85 miles per hour average, X of velocity. It's better than it's been, but it's gone from worst and baseball to just plain bad. And so there are so many ways for this to go wrong, but he has 28 stolen bases in 157 played appearances. They're letting him run wild. I think you can absolutely look as way in a five out for the league if you need steals. And his splits this season, Estérie Ruiz, who we're talking about 947 OPS against lefties, 831 against righties. So he's been good against both handedness. Would you rather add Ruiz or Zach Vine? Vine for sure. All right. Tyler Glass, that will make another rehab start at AAA on Friday. The plan is for him to go four innings and or 60 pitches. Trey Savage is weak to weak after undergoing surgery to repair the tournament iskis in his knee. I did have some people asking if they could drop Trey Savage Chris. What do you think about that? My understanding two things here. One, this is almost certainly not a repair of the meniscus. I know that's how it's been reported, but just from everything I understand about meniscus injuries, if you fully repair a meniscus, which is I think the more rare way of approaching them, you're out like six months. So it's almost certainly a they replaced it right or something. No, it would be called a menisctomy, which is a debridement of the meniscus. So they cut off the injured portion and that can have a four to six week timetable for return to play. That's pretty iffy. I guess the way it's reported, if you don't have to drop him, I wouldn't, but from my understanding of how meniscus injuries work, it's unlikely he's going to pitch again this season. And if he does, he'll have to rush back for a team that I guess they're only two and a half games back because of wild cards by right now. So they do have something to play for, but I think it's a long shot year and get much out of Trey Savage the rest of the way. Shane McClellan, through three perfect innings in a rehab start at AAA on Tuesday. His velocity looked great. He got up to 30 pitches. So good news for him. Riley Green left early with right hamstring tightness. Cosima Okamoto was originally in the lineup, but then was scratched for a second day in a row due to that left knee contusion. Harolo Perdomo was out of the lineup after leaving Monday with left knee soreness. Josh Neller was out due to right wrist soreness. Andy Rodriguez has missed four straight with left hip discomfort. Joe Musgrove said he currently feels the best he's felt in two years. And he got up to around 50 pitches in his latest rehab start. We talked about his velocity being up. I think he's a an interesting stash right now for sure. I think he I would bet on him being back before the end of August. They'll probably give him like two more rehab starts, but even with that, it could be a late August return there for Musgrove. Corbin Burns and Zach Allen both completed 30 pitch bullpen sessions on Tuesday. James and Tyrone was placing the aisle with right forearm tendonitis. And the angels fired pitching coach Mike Maddox, bullpen coach Dom Chiti, and assistant pitching coach Darrell Scott. I saw something. I didn't really fact check it or check to see if it was real. But there was some kind of quote from John Mozellac that like they were given pitching like statistics or some type of I don't know pitching numbers or things to help with like whatever pitching plans and and they just weren't really using them. So I do.
I don't know. Yeah, I mean, it's a weird situation because I think all these guys were only on one year contract anyway. And so is Kurt Suzuki, which was so weird. Yeah, the angels had a weird offseason. Surprise. I don't know. I Mike Max is a really good reputation as a pitching coach. Yeah, I don't think he's gonna be unemployed long. Yeah, it was because they weren't sufficiently using the technology available. Okay. I mean, look, I if you want to be bullish on the on the angels moving forward, the fact that they want them their their coaches using more technology and more data isn't a bad sign. Yeah, I don't know. I'm sure it has nothing to do with the personnel that the angels are throwing. Right. I know. I don't think that's his fault. Yeah. You know. All right, let's do a little buy or sell and what in God's name happened to Kyle Harrison at the Padres. Four and two thirds innings 10 hits eight runs three walks, three strikeouts, three homers allowed. And his fastball velocity was down nearly two miles per hour. He averaged 93.3. Everything was down in this outing for Kyle Harrison coming off the star. We had 10 strikeouts in his return. Maybe the calves were still in issue here. Another one that was just I watched like a two minute video of him being interviewed and like they just didn't ask him about his velocity being down. It's like I don't know. That seems like a pretty interesting thing to ask a question about. I'm not sure why they didn't. But buy or sell Chris. Kyle Harrison is not right. Strong lean towards buy. Obviously, I I would hate to come to a strong conclusion without evidence, but velocity down 1.7 miles per hour for a guy who needs his fastball to be dominant. His fastball got destroyed. Yeah. He got two whiffs on 16 swings. He gave up 12 bad balls with an average exit velocity of 92 miles per hour. That's really bad sign for Kyle Harrison. Like it's hard to imagine Kyle Harrison is going to be good if he's not averaging 95 with his fastball. That doesn't mean he'll average 93.3 the next time out though. But you know, left his previous start with calf injuries or calf cramping. Okay, I don't have too much concern about that. But obviously he had just come back from an elbow issue before that. So I yeah, I definitely have a strong lean towards Kyle Harrison is not right right now. Yeah. Kyle Harrison, by the way, let me look up his start percentage this week. It was 69% not nice for Kyle. Not rough. Nick Martinez with one of the weirdest starts of the year, a complete game at the athletics. Eight hits. Four runs allowed. Five strikeouts to zero walks. Eight whiffs on 101 pitches. His velocity was down. He gave up 11 hard hits in this game and he threw a complete game. It's last eight starts for Nick Martinez. 276 ERA 0.96 whip. 23 strikeouts over 49 innings. All of his ERA estimators are over 4.3 O during that stretch. I couldn't even think of a buyer, Celcris. Why is this happening? Because he's got really, really good command. And when you have really, really good command, you can keep the ball from getting hit to dangerous parts of the field. The problem is not can you succeed without striking a lot of people out? The question is, is that sustainable moving forward? Is that something you should bet on? And the answer is almost always no. But in Nick Martinez's case, he did have three straight seasons with a sub 350 ERA. Now his strikeout rate has dropped a lot since then. He was never a big strikeout pitcher, but he had one season with an above average strikeout rate and was closer to average two of the other ones. He's not a 14%. That's like 7 percentage points below average. So I think in the end, this is going to go the way I expected where the Rodriguez to go. And the way Bryce Elder has gone and the way, there's not that much difference between Nick Martinez and Zach Latel. It's just, I think we're seeing the high end of the outcome on one. And we Latel got cut recently, right? We saw the very low end for him. He joined the debacks and he pitched in long relief yesterday. There you go. Eventually it's going to stop working, but it might not be until next year. So I think it's fine to just keep riding Martinez. As for the, you know, the weirdness of this start, giving up four runs in a complete game, he had eight innings, two earned runs heading into the ninth inning. And then he gave up two in the ninth. His pitch count was low. They were blowing the a's out. So, you know, we saw a start from Justin Robleski, I think right before the all-star break where he went like eight innings, gave up like six runs. And it was just one of those like, it's your turn. You're going to wear one for the team. That happens sometimes when the games out of reach are ready. Yeah, I agree. I mean, there's nothing in the underlying numbers that say this is sustainable for Nick Martinez, but he's been so good all season that look, I have him in a few spots. I don't trust it, but I keep starting him because he's doing things like this. So, yeah, just keep riding with Nick Martinez, but don't be surprised if at some point we get a couple of blow-up starts. I don't think he'll give it all back because you would probably have to start him, I don't know, five starts in a row where he gives up six runs in each of those. And I don't think that is going to happen, but yeah, just keep riding with Nick Martinez. You just look at Davis Martin, who was actually getting a ton of strikeouts early in the season. His performance were great. Bryce Elders given it all back. That happens. Yeah, it can happen. You need to have a short enough leash with these kind of pitchers that they can't give it all back. Like, if you're going to ride it right the hot hand, that's fine, but you need to know, okay, that was a bad start. One more and we're out. All right, next up, we have Yuri Perez, who was awesome against the Pirates, seven shout out innings with seven strikeouts. He had 15 whiffs on 100 pitches. All of his secondary stuff was awesome in this start. Four whiffs on each of the slider and the sweeper. His fastballs didn't get hit a little bit hard, but overall, his updated numbers and nine starts since returning from the aisle. A two ERA, a point nine three whip, 56 strikeouts over 54 innings and doing a good job avoiding hard context. So by or sell, Yuri Perez is entering stardom. Bye. Yeah, this was always going to happen at some point. It was just a question of when. It's like the opposite of the Nick Martinez thing. A guy with the pure stuff Yuri Perez has some of the best stuff in baseball, who debuted at 20, like a month after he turned 20. He was always a good bet to figure it out at some point. And it looks like, yes, that doesn't mean he will carry this over forever, but I've called out that stat of the, it's the, the pitchers who threw at least 90 innings as a 20-year-old since 2001. And it's like Jose Fernandez, Felix Fernandez, CCC Zabathe, Zach Ranky, Clinton Kershaw, Oliver Perez, Madison Bumgarner, Rick Porcelo, won a Sai Young, the only two pitchers in that group of pitchers who debuted at 20 and through at least 90 innings, who weren't at least stars. I think we can quibble about Porcelo and Oliver Perez, but this goes really good at their peaks during Bonderman and Jordan Laos were bad. It's like an 85% hit rate. That's pretty good. You should always bet on players this talented and this young figuring out eventually. All right, next up we have Dylan Seese, who was not great against the Red Sox five innings, three runs, four walks in this one, seven strikeouts, two homers allowed. He's still got a ton of whiffs, 17 whiffs on 104 pitches. His velocity was down again. And we've talked about this recently. We haven't really made it too much of a thing because even with the velocity down, he has been amazingly so Scott mentioned this last time out where Seese has been starting with his velocity lower in starts and then it kind of builds up and that same thing happened here. It was 94 miles per hour in the first and then it was around 96 miles per hour for the rest of this outing and his previous six starts point eight four ERA point six seven whip. But this one was obviously not very good for for Dylan Seese. So by our cell, we should be a little bit more worried about this velocity thing. So I agree on unlike schemes where I think it was the average almost identical right 95.8 for C 95.7 for schemes. Scheme's max was 96.5 you said yeah. Seese was 97.5 and then you have like you said, averaging 94 in the first inning 96.2 in the fifth. I think this is a case of a guy pacing himself and learning how to pitch and I think we've seen all kinds of growth from from Dylan Seese on on multiple axes this season and I think this was just a fairly standard Dylan Seese didn't quite have it today kind of start and that's fine that'll happen.
Yeah, I still think he's gonna be awesome. I think forward. It feels more like he just didn't have command rather than his velocity just completely ruining his start here. So four walks, only 61% of his pitches for strikes. And again, that's within the range of outcomes for Dylan. So I only more that way than anything. Next up, we have Sean Burke, who had another great outing. This one against the red. Seven innings, one run, eight strikeouts to zero walks. 20 whips on 94 pitches, nine on the slider, five on the fastball, five on the curve. And the curve, the breaking pitches were a little bit different. The velocity down on both, he had much more drop on both the curve and the slider. Those pitches were great. And over his last 10 games now, nine of those starts, 160 ERA, 0.87 whip, and 79 strikeouts over 62 innings. So by or sell, Sean Burke, a top 36 starting pitch arrest of season. It would be a lot easier to buy this one if, that velocity jump that we saw from Sean Burke in late June, early July, head stuck. That being said, I'm buying it. I know you expected me to say I wasn't, but I, I don't know. So the reason I bring up the velocity jump is the things that tend to be stickier. And this has been, you know, I think it's intuitive, but also it's been studied. I've seen Kyle Body of Drive Line baseball has talked about it. You know, Sarah has talked about it. Very, very smart people have talked about the fact that stuff is a lot stickier than command. And so I wish Sean Burke's breakout was being fueled by something a little more concrete than what's actually happening, which is just that he's pitching really, really well right now. He is locating his fastball up in the zone consistently. He's bearing the curve ball really well. Like he's just pitching. This is the best version of what Sean Burke can be. And the fact that when you look at the stuff metrics, when you look at the velocity, whatever it is, it hasn't really fluctuated all that much outside of those three starts. That's where it's like, okay, I wish there was something a little meatier to grab onto here. But I think he's good. You know, he's not a top sub two ERA petri like he's been for the last month or whatever, you know, whatever it actually is to 160. Yeah. Last 10 games. He's not that he's probably not the sub three ERA. His ERA sits at now. But I look at all everything and it's probably like a 350 ERA mid three ZRA with a 10k for nine. Yeah, that's probably a top 36 starting pitcher. So I feel very good about Sean Burke, the rest of the season. I'm feeling very good about him for next season. There's a lot to like. Remember, he was a, you know, not a top prospect, but he wasn't a nothing prospect and he was an opening day starter last year and this year, I believe. So yeah, I think there's definitely something here. And I'm buying him as a top 36 starting pitcher. I buy it as well. I had him already ranked inside my top 36 even before this start. I moved them all the way up to SP 31 last week. So yeah, we are in on Sean Burke. Let's take our final break. What are your turn? I have two more buyer cells to ask about two hitters. Gunner Henderson and Alex Breggman will do that right after this. Welcome back fantasy baseball today. Two more buyer cells to ask about and Gunner Henderson is next up. He went three for five with his 19th home run. He had two runs to our bi. What has happened to Gunner Henderson 33 starts since the beginning of July? 184 batting average three homeers three seals is OPS right around 600. Just a unfathomable down season for a 25 year old hitter right in the middle of his career. Now he dealt with a lot of injuries last year and maybe some of those things have lingered or, you know, maybe they have contributed to him. Maybe they've just, you know, it adds up over time. So I buy or sell Gunner Henderson is droppable. Oh, yes, sell. You're not going to, you're not going to get get that answer from me. There might be another fantasy analyst who will tell you to drop him and I've had people asking me if they could drop. And that's, I'm not even saying that as a way to criticize people. I'm just saying for me, I'm not going to be able to drop a player like Gunner Henderson with his kind of track record at his age. I'm just, I'm not going to be able to do it. And look, that, that is hurting me in multiple leagues where I have Gunner Henderson, but I'm just not going to be able to do it. But I will say something that I've mentioned a few times over the last year or or so, let's say about Gunner Henderson is we have this one three month stretch at the start of 2024 when he was an absolute superstar. He had a 957 OPS in the first half of 2024. He hit 28 homers outside of that one stretch. He hasn't been that kind of hitter. And I do think maybe we are at the point where we have to consider that Gunner Henderson isn't a superstar caliber hitter. And whatever the explanation for that is, I think the Orioles probably have some blame. I think maybe he just wasn't as good as he looked in that one half of 2024. But when you look through his splits, basically every half season split that you want to look at is around an 800 OPS, except for the first half of 2024. And then all of this season, he has just been terrible, almost exclusively. And so yeah, I do think there's something to we've just been overriding Gunner Henderson. And we overreacted to that one great half season. But I can't bring myself to drop him like even if he's never going to get back to what he was in 2024. What he was last year was still very good. He finished the season even in what we thought was a down year of a 17 homers, 30 stolen bases, 274 average. That's a very viable starting player. It's not a superstar. It's a huge disappointment for a first rounder. But if he's that moving forward, you're fine with him. You're lying. Yeah. And I still expect something like that. But I do think we have to start. Seriously considering that maybe he's just not that elite player anymore or never was. All right. And the last name up here I have is Alex Bregman, who went to for four with a walk, his 13th homer and three runs scored over his last 35 games. He's hitting 278 with seven homers, 27 runs, 27 RBI and OPS around 850. During that stretch by or sell Alex Bregman is back. Yeah. Yeah. That's a good question. I lean sell. The underlying numbers are a little better. And he's always been someone who outperformed his underlying metrics. But his ex-wovo over the past 100 played appearances, even during this hot streak is 305. His ex-wovo for the season is 308. Okay, even if you give him the credit for outperforming his ex-wovo, but he's usually 15 to 20 points better, that's still not a very good hitter. It can work in fantasy at third base, especially in a points league. But no, I don't think we're getting Alex Bregman, you know, top 100 pick, top 75 pick back. I don't expect that. No. Yeah. I do expect him to be better than what he was. Or most of the first half of the season. But I agree that I don't think he's back to, you know, for example, last year, he was an 820 OPS bat. And before he got hurt, he was actually like much better than that. He was like a 5,900 OPS bat. So I don't think where, like, yes, he has an 850 OPS over his last 35 games, but I wouldn't expect that the rest of the way. I'd probably expect like a 750, 775. I think he could be an okay kind of like high floor hitter. But I don't expect him to maintain this like, and I think a 50 OPS. I think the hot street kind of tells that story, right? Like if your hottest stretch of the season is like an 850 OPS, I think you're kind of, you're kind of learning that that's not a huge impact player anymore. Like to name one player who I don't think is as good a hitter as Alex Bregman. As Marlene Valdez is best stretch of the season was quite a bit better than that. So like, yeah, I think like that doesn't mean that's the best Alex Bregman is possibly capable of hitting anymore, but yeah, I don't think this is a difference making player anymore. All right. We've got about 20 minutes left. Let's see how fast we can move through the rest of this. Waiver Wire hitters from Tuesday's action. A.U. Hanyo Suarez looks like he is picking the power back up. Hit his 17th home run. He has homeworked in three of his last four and has eight home runs in his last 22 games. He's down to 70% rostered, so he was dropped in the most shallow leagues. I think that's probably still fine. If you held onto him in a deeper league, he probably pops him home rest of the way, but he was dropped in like a head to head league. I don't know that I would go out and try to add Suarez. He's got to be really locked in to matter and a head to head point sleek with how much he strikes out. I would rather have, I think Royce Lewis is probably still less roster than him. I'd rather have Royce Lewis. That's a lot.
way up. It's it's up to 85 or 90. Okay. So finally good. Good. Yeah. Um, but then yeah, you mean you just start to look at the rankings and it's like, okay, yeah, you'd rather have killed Durbin with how hot he's been for for such a long time. Austin Riley versus a Hany Suarez. I mean, that's a, that's a, that's a real, I don't know, Sophie's bad choice there. I know this is gross, but I would rather use Nolan Aradato right now. He's actually over his last, I yesterday I said, I think last 40 games, he's back to like an 850 OPS. Yeah. I think that's okay. Yeah. I don't really buy it, but like Tommy Edmond, I think I'd rather use Tommy Edmond in a point like the name of any Suarez. So, um, yeah, I'm not, I'm not super excited about any Suarez at the point. Any interest in these two Lawrence Butler in the second half, he is hitting 240 with four homers, three steals a 750 OPS. So, he's looked a little bit better. He's 45% rostered and jock Peterson, one for one with three walks and his 22nd Homer in the second half for him, three 17 seven homers, a 10 96 OPS. He will not play against lefties. So he strict platoon against right handed pitching, 27% rostered and he's actually first base eligible. I didn't realize he gained that eligibility, but Chris, can I interest you in Lawrence Butler or jock Peterson? Just looking at their roster rates, it's hard to get too much higher than they are, I think, because I don't think Lawrence Butler is going to matter at all in a point league. And even a road league, I mean, this, this post-alster break stretch is like 24 homers and 18 steals, which, okay, that's not nothing. But again, when that's the best stretch of your season, it's, it's not particularly exciting. And then Peterson's kind of the opposite problem where he's just, it's really hard to make that profile matter in a point league when volume is so key that unless he's hitting, okay, yeah, if he keeps hitting 320 with an 1100 OPS, that's going to work in any format no matter how often he sits. But jock Peterson is not a 320 hitter with an 1100 OPS. So when he returns to being an 840 OPS hitter who plays who starts 67% of the games or whatever it is, that's a pretty fringy player. That doesn't matter in a point league. jock Peterson is very niche, you know, if you're playing a deeper daily lineup league, I think he matters in a league like that, but it's how many people actually play in those leagues. So, in Lawrence Butler, I would just keep an eye on it because I think a reasonable explanation for why he's been so bad this year is, you know, he was coming back from knee surgery. Yeah, I think it was a surgery on both knees, surgery on both knees. So I think that's a pretty reasonable explanation for his very slow start. But we know he is capable and we think he's like a decently talented hitter, you know, the A-stoughts, so they give him a pretty big contract extension. So I would just keep an eye on Lawrence Butler, like maybe he can, you know, take off here down the stretch for those who play in five alphular leagues. One deeper name, Christian and Karnasio and Tran 3 for 4 with a sock into shoe, his fourth homer, his first steal, and he has only started two of the past five games. Very small sample, but his underlying data is really interesting. Deep league CES thoughts. Yeah, I mean, both him and Kobe May are kind of playing well right now. And so that's kind of cannibalizing both of them and I'm not sure Christian and Karnasio and Tran needs to play against most varieties. So I think there's pretty limited upside here despite he's doing some things well, but it's just, yeah, I don't really, I don't really see a ton to get excited about unfortunately. Yeah, I think it's AL only for now. I could see him working into like 15 team roto leagues, but the playing time is going to have to be a little bit more consistent and he's just going to have to be better against varieties like he is destroying lefties. He's been awful against varieties so far. Guys that can bounce around your lineup. So have, you know, three or more position eligibility's Luis Renjito has actually been solid with the Padres. He hit a grand slam here, revenge game against the Brewers who dropped him earlier this season. 24 games with San Diego 321, 3 homers, 3 seals, 872 opus. He has started 17 straight. He has second third in outfield eligibility and Tim Tawa, two for four with two more steals. Last 28 games, 291, 5 homers, 5 steals, 92.3 average EV and he is eligible everywhere except for shortstop and catcher. So if you're in a deeper league, Chris and you're just looking for a name that you can kind of bounce around. Who do you like more between Luis Renjito and Tim Tawa? Tawa, I think is a little more interesting. I think we've seen bad speed and exit velocity gains for him. He's playing very regularly right now. Renjito as well, but there's a one thing with Renjito and I mentioned this before the show to you. The Padres just getting these like random best month of their lives from like Luis Renjito and Luis Camposano and Freddie for me, Freddie for me and Luis Camposano have been like superstar since the All Star Break. I have no idea what's going on there. The Padres lineup, I think they're first in Wobba in the second half. That one month where Samad Taylor was really good for them and Miguel Andu Har was good early in the season. It's just like they're having a good season and it's really weird because they're just getting these random blow up months out of replacement level players. Ty Francis having the best season of his career. This is so weird. They didn't especially too. Gavin Sheets and Miguel Andu Har, you know. And the Roman L'Oriano. Yeah. Yeah. But it's just so weird because then you had the two months where Fernando Totsi's man and Machado and Jackson Merrill all couldn't hit at the same time. So it's like what's happening here? I don't understand the Padres. They're weird. That's baseball, Susan. Wave or wire pictures. I have, let's see, one, two, hmm. I will throw these first four at you. And that includes Andre Palante who turned in another quality star. He's just high floor pitcher. Gets a lot of ground balls. He's been doing his thing. Looks like he lines up for two at the reds at the Phillies next week. Brandon Young, solid outing here. Quality start as well. He had 14 whiffs on 104 pitches. His last two starts were rough. His three before that were very good. And it looks like he lines up for two both against the raise next week. So kind of weird the way that works out. I think one of those is a makeup game. Martin Perez shut down the met six shut out innings three walks to two strike out. So he's kind of doing the Martin Perez thing. Looks like he lines up for at the twins and at the brewers next week. And Cody Bradford a quality start. But only one strike out only four swinging strikes on 75 pitches. His first two starts have been okay. Three yarn runs over 11 and a third. And he gets the angels again next week. So can I they all feel like streamer types Chris. Can I interest you in any of these pitchers or matchups? Cody Bradford, Martin Perez, Brandon Young and Andre Palante Bradford, he's 38% roster already. I don't really think that needs to be much higher. He's his fastballs 88 miles per hour. Yeah. And I think he can be pretty good. Like we have we have seen him be a useful pitcher, but it's pretty low end to begin with. And I don't think there's a ton of upside there. Martin Perez, no, I'm not interested. Brandon Young and Andre Palante are both moderately interesting. I think Palante to start week at Cincinnati at Philadelphia. Tough places to pitch, but for a ground ball or with a good defense behind him, I think it's okay. And then Brandon Young, that's going to be that's an interesting one because if you look at I was looking at ESPN's projected starters and they have him projected to pitch on Sunday of this week against the raise. And that would make a big difference because if I have to add him next week for a one-start week against the raise, well, I think that could be okay. Like I'm not saying I expect him to be terrible, but he's a lot more interesting if it's a two-start week. And so I think that's going to matter a lot. And unfortunately, I don't know if we're going to have an answer to that. Yeah. So fan graphs, probable pitchers, grade has Chris Bassett returning on Friday. So that would that would push Brandon Young back to Monday of next week. Yeah. And then at Tampa Bay versus Tampa Bay, I mean, it's always if he want a middling pitcher faces the same team to start in a row, but it would be two good matchups and two-start weeks. So I'm pretty interested in that. But if it's not two-starts, then it's I think it does get a lot less interesting because I just think he's a guy. Yeah, I think both are good to use in points leagues if you're chasing volume. I also think at this point in the season, there should be a day where we kind of like flesh this out a little bit more. But if you play in a road o league, you need to figure out what categories you can realistically move up in at this point in the season. And let's say your ratios are just kind of shot. And but you can move up and strikeouts or wins. I mean, I'm at that point in my couple leagues. Yeah. You should just be chasing pitchers like this where you could just like, hey, let me go after all you and chase that as much as humanly possible. And yeah, they might blow it up, but for this specific team, it doesn't really matter. So I think these are the types of pitchers you should be looking at for for teams like that. Brennan Young and obviously Andre Palante, who we mentioned. A couple deeper names here. Walker Bueller, strong outing. He was strong.
like Miley before this, his first quality starts in June 3rd. And Mitch Bratt had a quality start against the Rockies, Six innings, two runs, four strike outs for him. I don't really see it. I don't know if you feel differently with Mitch Bratt. I mean, the ERA is okay, but the whip and like the K-to-Walk stuff has been terrible. And Carson Wiesenhunt, a solid outing here, former top prospect with the Giants, five and two thirds, one run, but three walks to two strike outs, three very deeply. Deep league names. Did you see anything here with Wiesenhunt, Bratt and Walker Bueller? Bueller, no. I'm, no. No. No. Mitch Bratt, probably not. I don't really think there's much here. He's got a, an okay minor league track record. I think he was really bad this season, but had been better before. But not someone I'm especially excited to chase. And then Wiesenhunt, it would have to be the right matchups as a single start streamer. He's at Cleveland at Boston next week. I don't think I'd want to trust him with a start against Boston in a point in a red o'league. So like that's, he just has, he's got to change up and nothing. Carson Wiesenhunt. I think his slider is decent, at least based on the numbers on the season. Yeah, it's getting decent results this season, but. And it was very different in the start. The velocity was way down and it had six more inches of drop. So he might have two good off speed pitches, but his forcing just gets demolished. So I, I would like to see, I would like to see him try maybe with like a sinker or a cutter. Yeah. Just to like get away from the forcing fastball. I don't know if he has that. He has a sinker that he's throwing like 2% of the time. So he can try it. But, uh, yeah, as, as long as that fastball gets hit as hard as it does, I, I don't know that we can find success here with Carson Wiesenhunt. Uh, next name up here. I have Nicoladolo who made his return. It was a rough return. There's no way around it. Like four runs over four innings. He gave up three homers in this one. Some of the underlying stuff, 13 whiffs on 70 pitches. You pointed out to Scott and I that, um, he threw like a modified curveball because he, he has a new grip because of the blister issue. So it was like more like a slider. Um, the stuff was good, but three homers is three homers. So it kind of is what it is. 75% rostered and, uh, in leagues where I had him, I kind of used this as like a freebie. He left him on the aisle just to see how he would look. If you have to make a decision, I, I think it's probably okay to drop Nicoladolo. Yeah. A couple of things on this one. One, it just discovered something weird today while researching that, baseball's a vant almost always. I think their like policy is to default to what a pitcher calls their pitch rather than how it moves or whatever. And apparently Nicoladolo calls his curveball slider. So I think it's weird that they, they refer to it as a curveball, but he calls it a slider. And it looked especially sliterie today. Um, he's always been a weird pitcher and his curveball has always been a weird pitch. I was doing some research just trying to find some like physical cops for it based on his release point and the movement profile and all that. And um, it's like Brendan Bernadino is the only curveball that's even close. Like there's just nobody that really. And then today he, he starts throwing the curve ball or slider, whatever you want to call it with 1.1 mile per hour more of velocity while the rest of his arsenal was down about a half mile and four less inches of glove side break. So rather than looking like maybe a slow curveball sweeper combo like it did before, it now kind of looks like a gyro slider. But from a funky arm angle and he got seven whiffs, our eight whiffs on it. And I, I think there could be something here. Um, but I don't think we saw enough in this start to overlook the fact that he's been pretty frustrating this season. Hasn't shown the ability to stay healthy and hasn't been all that good. So I'm, I, I'm okay with dropping Lidolo. I don't know if any of the guys we've mentioned so far, you know, I guess in a point's league. Does Lidolo have two starts next week? I did not look up as matchups. Yeah. Um, because that if it's like Lidolo versus Palante, I think he lined up for two this week actually. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Cause if it was like Lidolo versus Palante and Palante is a two star pitcher and Lidolo is not. He starts again on Sunday and then. Yeah. And then next week is at Arizona. Yeah. Then I, I think going with Palante or Brandon Young instead of him is fine, but not I wouldn't drop him for like Mitch Brad or anything like that. But I would drop him for a lot of the other names who've talked about Lili Sean Monaya and Jackson Job and Jacob Lopez who's coming off another great start. So, uh, yeah, I'd rather just write it out with, with those guys in Nicolodolo. Let's get into the leftovers on the pitching side of things. The good. But good starts from Christopher Sanchez, Brian Wu who actually did not get bombed on the road. So congratulations to Brian Wu. Uh, weird start for him is velocity was up quite a bit, but he also gave up a lot of hard contact in that one. And Ryan, whether it's pitch well once again, uh, over his last four starts, 0.74 ERA 0.95 whip. And it's interesting because Carlos Rdon is getting close and Ryan, whether it's his outperformed Will Warren. So I just think based on merit, he deserves to stay in the rotation. Yeah. But he's also like way exceeded his career high in innings. So, yeah, in the major. I don't really know which way the Yankees are going to go, but if it's just based on performance, he deserves to be in there. Yeah, he does. And given that Rdon's velocity was way down, a match of Rodons can be better than Ryan Wethers or Will Warren at this point. So one thing that I would imagine is part of the Yankees calculation is the innings, obviously Warren, I think just has a little more room to go there. But also, I think Ryan, whether it just seems like he'll play up in the bullpen more than Will Warren. Okay, I don't know if Will Warren has another level that he can reach in shorter bursts. Whereas I think Ryan, whether it could potentially be a really devastating bullpen hour. And so that is the one thing I've thought all season is when everyone's healthy and as we've seen, that doesn't actually happen. But if it was my decision, I would probably go with Weathers in the bullpen just because I think he can be a better weapon there. Anything on Sanchez or Brian Wu? Sanchez, I don't really know. I don't have anything to say. He's awesome. I know it's been a little bumpy lately, but he's really good. Brian Wu, getting hit hard against the Yankees, that's just kind of what the Yankees do even without Aaron Judd. They got a lot of guys who can hit the ball hard. Given how shaky things have been for him this season, especially on the road, not really going to look a start like this, a scant. I'll take it. All right. We had two other meh starts and then two bad ones, Nolan McLean, solid outing. The line was okay, but he had just five whiffs on 85 pitches. Michael Waka was cruising and then he ran into trouble in the seventh inning at the Dodgers. Final line, six and two thirds, seven hits, three runs, zero walks, five strikeouts. But overall, you'll take a quality start against the Dodgers. And then the bad, we had Choate Emanaga, a rough one, four and two thirds, four runs, two homers loud and that one at the Nationals and Hunter Brown. Not great at the Giants, five innings, three runs, three walks, four strikeouts. He had just six whiffs on 89 pitches. He threw 63% of his pitches for strikes. He looked like he was coming around. His last three starts before this were great. He was limiting the walks. It's really frustrating, especially against this Giants lineup because it's a rundown Giants lineup. It should have been better. A team that should not walk very much. Yeah. Clearly they had, like going in, they had an idea to just, hey, let's just be patient against this guy. But I think given how good he had been previously, I'm willing to give Hunter Brown the benefit of the doubt here. It's kind of less so for Choate Emanaga just because, well, I guess for the most part, I just think this, you can file this under this as who Choate Emanaga is and this happens sometimes for him. Yeah. And so, you know, when you take the season in hole, 374-ERA, very good whip, that's probably who he is. And he goes through stretches where he looks better and he goes through stretches where he gives up a ton of home runs. I think that's probably just who he is though. All right. The hitting side of things hitting leftovers, chased the lottery three for five with his 13th home run and updated numbers since returning from the IL 36 games, 313 with six homers and five steals. Willier Abrayu, a sock and a shoe, his 21st home run, his eighth stone base. He has 10 home runs in the second half. They down Raffaella hit his 16th home run and added to RBI, mentioned his name recently, but basically since the start of June, middle of June, he has 10 homers and 10 steals in his last 52 games while hitting 293. Nice little bounce back season here for Ozzy Albees. We haven't talked much about it, but 20th home run of the year, he only has two steals so you don't love that. But everything else looks very good year Ozzy Albees' esk. Matt Olson is on a heater. He hit his 35th home run and in August, he has six home runs on 12 19 OPS. Junior Caminaro. Caminaro. Ah! Ah! Caminaro. Hit his 35th home run and his last 11 games. And this last one does not matter at all for fantasy. I just think that's the best thing about it.
thought it was funny. Taylor Walls, two home runs at a game, double dong. He entered this game first 96 games, zero homers, a doughnut, and then hits two home runs, the power of Sacramento, anything on these names, Chris. Um, I mean, Olson and Kamenero both getting to 35 homers just highlights what a, what an awesome home run chase. This is going to be their ass of the way because you've got Schwerber, Alvarez, Olson, Kamenero tied at 35 homers now and Hunter Goodman sitting at 34. And it's, it's easy to forget that it's, it's only August 12, right? We, we still have like six weeks left in the season, right? So any of those guys could get to 50 homers. Yeah. I mean, we could have, you know, a handful of guys that are in the like 45 to 50 range this year. Also, if you, um, I believe the overrunner for home runs before the season for junior Kamenero was 34 and a half. So, boom, that was, uh, that was one of the easiest caches, I think of the, of the season. And we've said it many times that there was a lot of, I, I think, not great analysis going on with junior Kamenero's home road splits last season. And it's a reminder that just seeing a large OPS split from home versus away, you got to look a little deeper than that because that was really the only thing with Kamenero was his road OPS was like 200 points lower than his home OPS. It was entirely bad. Driven, driven. He actually had, I think more homers on the road last season than that hole. He's an awesome hitter. He's really, really, really good. Yes. Sure is. Call to the bullpen for the Tigers. Kenley Janssen picked up his 14th save and he is 10 away from 500, which I don't think he's going to do this season. So I'm hoping Kenley Janssen could latch on one more time and get to that 500 number next year, assuming they're a baseball for the Marlins Pete Fairbanks picked up his 18th save. He has seven scoreless appearances in a row for the college Jacob Webb picked up his eighth save for the Yankees David Bednar picked up his 27th for the blue J's Louis Varlin was unavailable Spencer miles picked up his first save for the Orioles a three run lead. It was a year can know in the eighth and then Andrew Kitchwich who picked up his sixth save in the ninth inning. And so they've been mixing and matching, but I would lean towards Kitchwich. It's just it's played, it's played out more in his favor so far for the red semi-alpagon picked up his 14th save for the Cardinals. He picked up his, he being Riley O'Brien picked up his 30th save and just wanted to highlight man, like what a year this guy was a very late round pick. We weren't even sure he was the closer. I mean, he wasn't on opening day, right? They remember Ryan Stannick had a couple of saves in the first part of the season. We're just like what's going on? But a 314 year a 113 with 30 saves for Riley O'Brien. Great year for him. For the Angels, a one run lead, Sammy Natera, junior got the ninth. He struck out two for his third save. He looks really good. His numbers on the season are great. Ben Joyce did pitch on Monday. I don't think that they will use him on in back to back outings, but he also hasn't gotten a save yet. Yeah, I don't even got a save opportunity. The only other save opportunity went to for me, I think. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. So yeah, I think it's Natera. He's 8% rostered. So there have been a few of these very deeply names that have emerged. And I think Natera is one of, if not the most interesting one of that group. I will say he's been dominant this season. You watch him pitch and it's, it is kind of hard to understand why because he throws 80% fastballs and they're like 94, 95. But he's got a massive whiff rate with it. And then you watch him pitch and there is like a, there's some funkiness to it. Like he's got a short step on a crossfire delivery from the left side and hitters just seem to struggle to pick him up. But it is weird to see a guy without elite velocity dominating, dominating with an 80% fastball usage. Yeah, it is very over the top from the left hand side. I haven't actually actually seen him pitch before this, but yeah. I was watching him earlier and it's I would want to look more into like the pitcherless metrics and stuff like that on on San Eterra Jr. For the Rockies, Jordan Romano picked up his 11th save. He is just the guy in Colorado for now, 16% rostered. And for the Giants, JT Brew Baker got the ninth and he picked up his second save Dylan Smith had worked two games in a row. He also blew a save on Monday night. So we'll see who gets the Nick, the next save opportunity. I still think it will be Dylan Smith. But hey, JT Brew Baker, clean save here on Tuesday to stream or not to stream on Wednesday. We have Shane Baws at the twins. Debbie Matthews against the Orioles Kyle Leahy against the Phillies. Merrill Kelly gets the Rockies in Arizona. They're Zach Thorin at the Braves Tyler Malley against the Metz, Red Louder at the White Sox and Luis Castillo home against the Reds. Shane Baws. Merrill Kelly, I think would be my second choice. I think there are actually some pretty decent options here though. I don't mind Kyle Leahy versus the Phillies. I don't hate David Peterson at Washington. Zach Thorin at Atlanta. Yeah. I think there are some okay options. Even Eric Lauer versus Kansas City. I know his last star and maybe his last two have been bad, but it's a good matchup. My top three would be I'm trying to remember who I said yesterday. I think it was Baws Malley and Merrill Kelly, but I would be okay with Leahy. I think I would be okay with Castillo. I know his first star with the White Sox was bad, but this Reds lineup has been not great. It's a revenge game for Luis Castillo. So you've got a factor that in. Can it be a revenge game if it was like six years ago? Chris, it's always a revenge game. On Thursday, K-Dare Monterey against the Guardians, Tyler Phillips against the pirates, Andrew Abbott at the White Sox. Max Scherzer against the Red Sox. Aaron Nola at the twins. Walbert, Arania at home against the Rangers. Lots of TBDs has of now for Thursday. So I don't have a full slate of names, but I think Arania and Abbott are okay. Arania is good. Abbott is okay. If you really pressure me into it, Kater Monterey is getting really good results. I don't really buy it, but he's been awesome all season basically. Is Shane drawing to rostered to count for this? I. He's got the Dodgers. I don't know if I want to do that anyway. So I know I think he's good, but that's that's just asking a lot. He's coming off a bad start too. Now he's available. He's 59% rostered. Yeah, I'd add that one, you know, probably ahead of Monterey. So he'd probably be second or third on the list, even with the matchup against the Dodgers. All right, we're going to ride there for Chris. I am Frank. Thanks to Zoys for tuning into Fantasy Baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five star rating on Apple or Spotify. And we will be back again tomorrow. Bye! Kater Mont podcasts. on Pluto TV. Stream now, pay never.
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