Rankings Risers & Yankees Promote Spencer Jones! (5/8 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

[MUSIC] Happy Cuckoo Mote Friday and welcome in. >> It's up fantasy baseball today on May 8th. I am Frank Stamford, joined by Scott White and Chris Towers. Today on the show, we have Phil in the blank rankings edition. We have three pictures you might be able to drop. Another picture I believe is a prime sell high candidate. So you guys think the Yankees are promoting Spencer Jones, very polarizing player that should be fun. And much more, let's jump in. >> Holy cow, how about that? >> How about those Cubs? By the way, nine game winning streak, they have one 15 straight and it really feels they are rolling. Well, we're not talking about the Cubs right now. We are talking about one of those pictures you could probably drop. Chris, your player of the night. >> Yeah, Andrew Painters feeling a lot like Jackson Joe, but this time last year. >> I can't for Joe. >> Presumably Andrew Painter will not get hurt again, because Jackson Joe did last year. Painter is coming back from Tommy John's surgery, but he just doesn't have it. It's weird because on paper, it's one of those situations where it looks like he should be at least decent. Like there's, yeah, the fastball is not great because it doesn't have great shape. >> But it's 97. >> It's terrible. >> 97 is nothing. >> It should 97. >> Your daddy's 92. >> You look at the stuff plus metrics and the stuff is like average, below average fastball, but everything else should be better. Even the location metrics aren't terrible. It's just, I don't know, for some reason, he just cannot make it work. This is another data point in what I suggested a few weeks ago, that when guys come back with diminished stuff, they perform worse than even the new diminished stuff would make you think. Because they just don't have the feel for pitching that way. Maybe Andrew Painter will find it, but you went a whole year last year pitching pretty terribly. We just, to a large extent, gave him the benefit of the vow that it was the first year back from Tommy John's surgery, that there was a mechanical flaw that the Phillies identified and could fix. And no, he's just been as bad against major leagueers as you would expect someone who was as bad against minor leagueers as he was last year to be. He have up eight iron runs and three and two thirds innings today, three walks, two strikeouts. He's down to 8.3 K per nine. He's up to a 689 ERA. The underlying numbers are better, but nobody's excited about a 488 fit and a 437X fit. That's not really a guy you need to hang on to. So if you're hanging on to Andrew Painter, it is entirely blind faith that he can figure something out. And I don't have a lot of faith in it at this point, given that it's been, frankly, four years since Andrew Painter has been a good pitcher. I think there will likely come a day when he is at least good enough to have an erotation. I don't know what the extent of how good he, you look at his arsenal, he's got a ton of pitches, some of which play. Should be able to make it work. If you're going to lead with your worst pitch, that's probably not a good approach. And that's what he's been doing, I think, at some point, somebody, maybe himself, needs to get through to him and say, you have to be one of those pitchers who just uses his fastball as a secondary offering. Then maybe it'll lock into place. But I'm with you there right now. It's like there's no signs of him coming around to that idea. And even if he did, we don't exactly know how it's going to play. It's just a theory of mine. So I think it's fine to move on. And deep leagues, you might not have anybody good enough to move on to. But that would be the only scenario where I wouldn't be dropping painter at this point. We're going to talk about JT again. I would not drop painter for Ginn specifically. I, again, think it's fine to drop painter, but I don't think Ginn is good enough to make that move. Probably selling, I think, is probably still about 60% rostered. If you are in one of the leagues where Andrew Painter is on your team and Robbie Snelling is available, you should definitely do that. But I would guess most of the leagues where Robbie Snelling is available, just don't have waivers that run until Sunday. So you can't rate that move. But it's not drop for anybody, but it's probably drop. Yeah, I think drop for anybody who has upside right, like, Snelling, Logan Henderson, Max Meyer, hadn't okay start here on Thursday. And obviously has a sweeper and slider, which look very good there. I agree with everything you guys have said. I mean, there are some individual pitch characteristics here that look pretty good. The slider, the curve, the splitter, all looks pretty good for Andrew Painter, but his fastballs are just are not his. His four-seam were entered today with a 7% with rate. I mean, that is that's usually what you see on a sinker, a pitch to contact type pitch. It also had a 360 batting average against and 480 slug. And that probably got worse after today too. So yeah, I think you go ahead and move on from Painter for now. Maybe he matters a little bit later on in the season. Scott, over to you for your player of the night. Ryan Jeffers had a huge game. He went three for four with a home run. His fifth, he hit two doubles, which also brings him to five in that category. He had a walk. He has been walking more in general this year. Rate of, no, what is it? 14%? 14% walk rate. He's been striking out less than general. Less than he adds normally. It's 17% strikeout rate. So walking more, striking out less, barreling more, hitting the ball a little bit harder on average. The expected stats are better than usual. Everything looks good. And in a typical year for catchers, I think it would be genuine reason for excitement. But I am struggling to find a scenario where I think Jeffers is somebody who I'm just willing to stick with outside of a two catcher league. I mean, one catcher scenario where I'm willing to lock in Jeffers and say, this is my guy moving forward for a couple of reasons. One, he is overachieving. I mean, that's worth pointing that out. Yeah, he's having a very good season. The slash line looks great. His expected stats are better than ever. But batting average is like 50 points better than the expected batting average. The slugging percentage is about 80 points better than the expected slug. So like, there's likely to be some regression here. And the second is the problem that's always been there for Ryan, Jeffers, even with a managerial change. He just doesn't play that much. He started 26 of the twins 38 games, so about two thirds. And at a time when so many catchers are playing close to every day, because every team has a DH spot and a few of them have dedicated DHs. And the catcher is just such a good hitter. You want to keep them in all the time. That makes it harder for Jeffers to keep pace, I think, in the long run. So the numbers will normalize the playing time. I'm not sure I was going to get them. Maybe a well, maybe the twins will decide he's one of their better hitters and they have to keep them in more. But this has been a long standing issue for Jeffers. Jeffers is the playing time. So obviously if you have them in two catcher leagues, you're thrilled. If you just want a hot hand playing a one catcher league, I think he's fine. But I am not ranking him even inside my top 15 at the position rest of season. He's 16 for me. So it's not far, but that top 15 is really good and it's guys who, Dylan Dingler is having a really good season with comparable underlying stats, arguably even better. Kebra Moreno, I don't think he's really done much, but he missed some time. I think we all still like him quite a bit. Same with Francis Galvarez. Kind of same with Carter Jensen actually, who slowed down a lot. I could see Ryan Jeffers being one of the 12 best catchers to use right now. And if you just lost Augustine Ramirez and like you're looking at the guys on the wire and Ryan Jeffers is out there and 25% of leagues, I can see just running with him as my number one catcher and a one catcher league. I just think in the long run, Carter Jensen and Francisco Alvarez, Gabrielle Moreno will be better even if you might prefer starting Ryan Jeffers right now. Sample Bessiah at the top of Jeffers. Although Bessiah has turned it on enough, he's like close to an 800 OPS now I think. He's had some playing time issues too, but I don't think it's severe even as Jeffers. Yeah, no. The playing time is a little wonky there for Bessio too. So I moved Jeffers up to catch her 13 today. And this was the first rankings update where I was like pretty aggressive in some of the moves that I made. So 11, 12, 13, I have Dingler, Liam Hicks, and Ryan Jeffers. They're all performing well and all the underlying numbers look really, really good. Although, as you pointed out, Ryan Jeffers is over achieving right now. He has played a little bit more recently, nine of the last 12 games for the twins. So I hope they just realized like, hey, this guy's one of our best hitters on the team. Like, let's just continue to roll them out there. I think like long term years from now, like Bessio and Jensen will be better players than any of the three I just talked about. But I just still kind of worry about a little bit about playing time and just, you know, Jensen to get against lefties. And he has slowed down a little bit too. So maybe it's too aggressive, but I think in a one catch or league, I would, I would just roll with the hot hand for now. Like you said, and go with Ryan Jensen ahead of some of those other names, but-- Ryan Jeffers. Ryan, man, I keep doing that. Past couple of days have been rough. Ryan Jeffers, ride the hot hand. And in a one catch or league, I think you can, like if you play the back in a catcher, like you could just do that. You could just play whoever's hot at the position. So don't have an issue with that. There was a Ryan Jensen, a pitcher for the Giants. Yeah, right. In the early 2000s. What's he-- What's the name of the guy? Did he get saves? Did I just make that up? He did not get a single save in his career. He had 30 starts one, year 113 games, that was pretty much the only year where he mattered at all. All right, Ryan Jensen. You played for the year I graduated high school. Ryan Jensen. Ooh, what a guy. All right. He's 50 years old now. Player. I'm 42. Time flies. Player of the night for me here is JTG in the aforementioned at the Phillies. He shut them down. Eight innings, one run. H-Trike out to one walk here. He had 10 whiffs on 96 pitches. He used more sliders and cutters in this one, less forcing fastballs. It was the sinker that was actually his best pitch. He had five whiffs on that pitch, 36% whiff rate. The slider and changeup performed very well. He got some whiffs on each of those pitches as well. It's got to know you and I have kind of always been intrigued by JTG in. This is his first quality start of the season, for the first time, even completing six innings. So it's like-- Yeah. --you should not expect anything like this from JTG in, probably ever again. But he's always just kind of had some characteristics. Like he gets ground balls in like-- What am I missing? Some of the secretaries are pretty good. I don't see anything here, really. Well, what I like-- I like-- --448 minor league career, R.A. 474th, the major league level. No, velocity's up like-- His sinker Velo was up 1.5 miles per hour from where it was last year. So I've noticed this. And I thought about it the other day when who was that pitcher for the Giants that came up for one start? And Trevor McDonald's-- Trevor McDonald's. Trevor McDonald, yeah. I feel like I've noticed-- and this is just me observing things. This is not me crunching a bunch of numbers. But like, minor league defenses are so much worse than major league defenses that a lot of times the ground ball guys end up looking a lot worse than the minors than they end up being. And so what I like about JTG is he gets a lot of ground balls weak contact. And for somebody who gets a lot of ground balls, he's actually a respectable bat misser, which is a combination that you don't see very often, except with really good pitchers. His swinging strike rate is over 10%. That's not an impressive swinging strike rate on its own, but for a guy who gets ground balls as well as Genn does, it's better than you'd expect. And you know, he had a game here with eight strikeouts. So that kind of backs it up. But, you know, 26 years old, this is his third year getting occasional chances. I'm not saying, Genn is somebody need to pick up outside of an A L only league. I'm just saying there are some things about him that I like. And if you were ever to go on a stretch of four or five starts where he's consistently producing, then I could see talking about him as a potential ad. Yeah, I think in deeper rhodolies, like 15 teamers, the waiver wire's just so bad. And there are so many injuries that I could see just taking a shot and seeing where this goes. But obviously it's a bad pitching environment in Sacramento. I get that. But, you know, his sinker, change up slider, have always gotten decent whips and obviously gets a lot of ground balls too. So, a really great start for Genn just a deep league name for now. Before we hit our first break reminder that we will help you set your week eight lineups. This weekend, FBT Express will be out on Saturday. Scott and I will talk to star pitchers and sleeper hitters. You could also find Scott's articles. We'll be out on the website Friday, cbsports.com/fantasy/baseball. So make sure to check all that out. Let's take a break and we'll be back right after this. Welcome back in fantasy baseball today. Let's talk news and notes. Terrick's Google had his surgery and apparently could return in as little as four to six weeks. The doctor removed just one relatively small loose body from his elbow. That was according to John Heyman. I'm not sure that it actually works that way, but no, no. That was according to Scott Boris. Let's be clear about the four to six week time table. It might come true, but that is according to Scott Boris. Like this is like this is ridiculous. It might happen. I'm not saying it's impossible, but I have done a lot of research. I have looked through baseball perspectives is recovery dashboard archive. I've looked through my own research on IEL Stints. I have not been able to find a single picture who has returned from loose body surgery in their elbow in anything less than 57 days. The closest I found Blake's now in 2020, 2019 came back in 57 days. And then Manuel Margot came back in 33 or 34 days back in 2019. He's an outfielder and you need your arm. But like, so like I'm not saying it's impossible. I'm calling BS on this one. Well, it seems so unlikely that like, Terrick Scoobel is going to be back in four weeks. That there's just there as far as I can tell, I have not been able to find a single example that's anything close to this time table. What about six weeks? Because it's four to six weeks. I mean, six weeks would be two weeks shorter than the shortest time table I've been able to find. That's not to say that there is not a shorter time. 57 weeks. That's not to say that there isn't like, it's not every person who goes on the IL is listed as loose bodies. I did try to go through every elbow surgery and try to identify. But like, well, I have not found an example. I have asked people, for example, the median for this type of surgery is 110 days. We're talking about 30 to 40% of the median return to time, return to play for this. So I guess, I'm not disagreeing with you. That sounds like an unrealistic time table to me as well. But when I get-- I feel like this is worth bringing up in a conspiratorial age on the internet. I've found when people raised the idea that, oh, this is a facade somebody's putting on so that X is accomplished. Well, what is the X that's accomplished? Because if I can't come up with a good thing that it's accomplishing, why would anyone be putting on the facade? And it's like, OK, well, Tarek Schuubel's a free agent that's off season, yes. But whether he comes back in four to six weeks or eight to 10 weeks, that's not-- nobody's offering him contracts yet. Like he'll come back when he comes back and the contract offers will come after that. I agree. I will also point out some additional context here that John Heyman was the first one to report that Tarek Schuubel was dealing with this injury. And he initially reported it as he's just a precaution that he's not going to start today. And then like 15 minutes later, someone else reported he was having albose surgery. So John Heyman's a good reporter as far as that goes. But I am very skeptical that like four weeks, I like to keep my mind open to the possibilities of various things. Four weeks sounds impossible. I think two months is much more likely than four weeks. And even six weeks feels really unlikely. I am not expecting to see Tarek Schuubel again the first half personally. I would say early July could be, you know, but early June just seems impossible to me. So maybe I'll be wrong. But six weeks from today is June 19th. If Tarek Schuubel is back by or before June 19th, Chris, you have to eat your hat. This isn't my hat. I don't want to do that. I just remember that time. What was your obsession with eating hats? That time I said if Fernando Tate says back in the minimum amount of time that I would eat my hat. And then he was back in the minimum amount of time. And you didn't need your hat for what it's worth. No, I think I started the podcast with like my hat in my mouth. But I actually was trying to like find somewhere that would bake a cake in the shape of a hat and then eat it on air. But I couldn't find any reward. What are you doing? I don't know. I was trying to continue the bit somehow. A piece of tofu shaped as a hat. >> Yeah, maybe. >> Ooh, no, no, no. (laughing) Not that. Cole Reagan's was diagnosed with pitcher's elbow. They're going to let him rest for a few days to see how he feels before determining the next steps. The actual navel of his injury is something that's much harder to say, and I didn't really wanna try to figure out how to say that thing. Chris, did you at all look into the database on a pitcher's elbow? >> You know, I love to nerd out about injuries. >> I was not able to find specific other examples of valgus torsion. What's the, I don't know. >> It was something crazy. >> But basically, it's pitcher's elbow, right? >> Yeah, it's called the colloquial term. >> Yeah. >> I mean, in theory he has two. >> Not. >> Pitcher's elbow is his two elbow. >> I mean, he's a pitcher, he has two elbows. They're both pitchers elbows. They both belong to the pitcher. Sorry, anyway. This sounds like just kind of a very vague catch-all thing that's just your elbow had too much stress on it. It's basically my read, and it can manifest in different ways. It can manifest in bone spurs or ligament damage, or what's the other thing, nerve damage. >> I guess stress fractures too, right? >> The elbow is in that. So it's just sort of elbow soreness, it sounds like and what the actual, from what I was reading, I was reading a study that the recommended approach to handling this for athletes is the first time you do it. You rest for a couple of weeks, treatment, and then you try throwing again. And then if it remains an issue, then you have to identify what the underlying issue is. But for right now, my assumption would be, he's just gonna rest and rehab for a couple of weeks and then try throwing, and maybe it goes well, and he's fine, but things often go wrong when it comes to pitchers, especially pitchers who are currently not healthy. So I'm pretty pessimistic about Coleragons moving forward, which is a bummer, because I was pretty optimistic about Coleragons coming into the season. >> Yeah, it seems very vague, and it's someone who's dealt with multiple arm injuries throughout his career. Last year, the shoulder, you worry about compensating and things like that, and now he's got the elbow. So just kind of a wait and see approach here with Coleragons. Roman Anthony was officially placed in the aisle with that sprained right wrist. The hope is that he will return when first eligible, that should mean more playing time for Masataka Yoshita for those in deeper leagues. Moogibets will begin a rehab assignment at Triple A on Friday, he could return to the Dodgers as soon as Monday. Jason Dominguez left in the first inning after crashing into the outfield wall, on a really outstanding catch for someone who has been a really bad defender so far in his career. He was later placed in the aisle with a sprained AC joint in his shoulder. As a result, the Yankees are calling up the big man, Spencer Jones. He is a massive human, six foot seven, six seven AO. For former first round pick back in 2022, and we've heard his name for years, it's massive power, solid speed, tons of strikeouts, 32% strikeout rate at Triple A this year. That's an improvement. Makes you really scared about what it will look like at the Major League level. My guess is that he gets to play against right handed pitching. Scott is Spencer Jones worth an ad in fantasy. He's 34% roster. Man, it would be awesome if Spencer Jones worked out. Not like worked out like exercise, but if he can't out. Yeah, he works out a lot actually. Yeah, because he's got the weirdest looking swing I've ever seen. He does, and he's always changing it, and it always looks weird. And he's just trying, it seems like he is just trying to figure out a way to not get eaten live by strikeouts, because surely he knows the knock on him. And if he could do that, if he could just be an okay, not even okay, if he could just be a bad strikeout guy. If it's 34%, it probably works. Yeah, and that's what it's been in the minors, but of course, majors is different stories. So he swings and misses a lot on pitches in the zone. And the thing is, like, it's not just the power. He's a great base dealer too. So for first big as he is, he had 29 steals in the minors last year. He already has seven this year. So like the upside for Jones is astounding. I just think it's like a 2080 proposition that he meets that upside and I lean toward the 20. And I think that's closer to the consensus than not. Now, having said that, I mean, a comp you're gonna hear for Spencer Jones a lot is Joey Gallo and who else have you been hearing that comp for a lot lately, Moonitakamer Murakami, who has a lot of the same warts that Jones has. Real big one though. One real big difference. What's the big difference? Well, one Murakami has a 65% in zone contact right against major leagueers. And Spencer Jones has a 65% in zone contact right against triple A pitchers. But more specifically, it wasn't Murakami. Bad at that in Japan too. Okay. But the bigger one is Murakami has a 22% chase rate. Joey Gallo had a 24% chase rate for his career, had a few seasons in the 19 to 20% range. Spencer Jones is at like 33%. So like the way it's, he gives away too many struts. The way it's working with Murakami is he is being super selective. He swings it only the pitch as he can do damage it. He still misses a lot because that's just his swing. Yeah, but he's not picking up bad pitches. And that's where Spencer Jones has the same whiff issues as Murakami and he has worse swing decisions. Now it's possible better coaching, better scouting, traject machines at the major league level can all get him to a place where he improves on that. But he has not had Murakami's eye at the minor league level. And that's where it really seems like it's just, like Murakami's on a knife's edge as it is. And it just feels like Spencer Jones is not going to be able to make that dance work, but it's not impossible. And you're not even sure how to get the same as many chances. And I'm sure, obviously the White Sox committed millions and a roster spot to Murakami. So like they were going to ride or die with him and Jones isn't in the same position. So again, I think the odds are very much against this working out. In five outfielder leagues, you'd probably try to pick him up just in case. I mean, we often refer to minor league callups as lottery tickets. And maybe this is a lottery ticket in a more precise sense that it's very unlikely to pay off. This is like the mega millions right here. Yeah. But if you don't have the ticket, you can't win the prize. And it's not impossible that it could work out for Jones. I would just-- I'm not optimistic. It's not optimistic. I'm not the lightest. It's not the lightest outcome. And just if you haven't seen his swing, he's trying to be Shohei Otoni. This was a big deal on the off in the spring training. There were a lot of like, oh, look at Spencer Jones. Has the same swing as Shohei Otoni. But the setup before it is like Chuck Noblock. And then he goes into a show. It looks very uncomfortable. There are like three distinct phases with a lot of moving parts. And I don't know, dude. It does not look like it's going to work against Major League pitching. But he's a crazy athlete with a ton of bat speed. And it's not a 0% chance. That's for sure. I would just caution people because there are a lot of things going around right now, comparing his minor league numbers to Aaron Judges. And the fact that they are both 6'7" and they're massive. And they both hit the ball extremely hard. Dude, you're comparing him to a future first ballad hall of Hammer, and it's not fair. So just keep your expectations in check. Judges, I don't know. Top five right handed hitter ever. Look, he was in a great prospect. Like he was a prospect. But he was a good guy who was going to bring up. If he struck out much less often than Spencer Jones, that's the whole one. It was like a 27% strikeout for Judging the Miners. And this is why I say it's probably still worth buying the lottery ticket. If you don't have to pay much for it, lottery tickets usually don't cost much. This is why also a lot of times people get frustrated because I don't take a firmer stance on something that hasn't happened yet. And that's just because I've seen a lot of crap over the years that I would not have imagined. And one of those things was Aaron Judge. I mean, that was like a 99.9th percentile outcome for the kind of prospect Aaron Judge was. So the year before he debuted, I think baseball America had a 90th overall among prospects. And his strikeout rate was crazy high. He didn't hit that many home runs in the Miners. I didn't think he was going to be a big deal. And Spencer Jones is not even a top 100 prospect anymore either. No, because he's also like 25 already. And I actually, but I actually bought that lottery ticket in Towers. I got him very late in the draft. It was almost over. I just figured what the heck? And he hits how many home runs? runs was it is rookie 54. Yeah, I think that's how we're like 52. Yeah, like sometimes the lottery ticket pays off. It's still very unlikely for Spencer Jones just because it didn't Aaron Jones is in Aaron Judges case, but like that's that's why you you don't completely rule anything out when there is an upside side to it. Also I love that. Hey, welcome to the Biggs. The first picture you have to face is Jacob Mizierowski, like that's here you go 102 miles per hour. That's really fun. He's going to go deep tomorrow. I plan the flag just just connect on one fastball, right? And it's just going to fly just give me a name in a vacuum. Would you rather add Spencer Jones or Bryce Eldridge? Eldridge. I guess. Yeah. Yeah, I think so too. With Bryce Miller, Bryce Miller, nearing activation a few things are being considered by the Mariners. Apparently one of Emerson Hancock or Luis Castillo getting bumped to the bullpen. I mean, look Castillo is a veteran. He's been there. He's done that. He's got a long very good career, but like Emerson Hancock the way he's pitching. I don't really see how they could do that, but that is what's being considered right now. Bryce Miller made another start on Wednesday. Five shut out innings two hits three walks two strikeouts. 59% rostered and another lottery ticket. Everyone we've actually seen perform very well at the major level in the past. So if you need some pitching help, sure, why not? Bryce Miller. Ben Rice has missed four straight with that hand injury. I am getting a little nervous. We'll see if he plays this weekend. Matthew Boyd underwent meniscus surgery. Apparently it was minor and the hope is that he's back in about six weeks, like four to six weeks is what I've seen as a tentative timetable. Mick Abel was given a Cortezone injection after feeling soreness in his right tricep following a simulated game in leagues where you don't have IEL spots. For example, our beat FBT league. We have a lot of hurt players. Would you, I mean, I'd love to hold onto Abel, but it's like at some point, if the injury is pile up, you just, you got to drop him right. I say he's droppable and then lead without IEL spots. Isn't it? Never mind. Never mind. Never mind. You were just saying there was a setback for Abel. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I think that seems low. I'm not like totally enamored of Addison Barger, but I think he's a bit more than I thought. I think that's what I'm saying. I'm not sure if he's going to be able to do that. do you have any interest in Ben Brown the starter 19% roster? I'm not going to say zero interest, but I. I think this is a mistake, actually. Like he's looks really good. It's a reliever. Yeah. They finally found something that works for him and it makes sense given the profile that he has. He does not have a. A bright, uh, an off speed pitch. So getting through the order three times, two times is going to be tough for him, but he's got a pretty good fastball and an amazing curveball. So I think he's going to be a very good reliever and I'm not surprised he's thriving in that role and it just seems. I don't know if the juice is worth the squeeze. Have you ever saw it as decent enough that I just don't. I don't I don't like this move for the Cubs personally. He did add a sinker. Yeah. And he had to look good in spring training when he was being stretched out to start in Brown with. You know, so he's got the four seamer now and the sinker that he throws about a quarter of the time and then a great. Curve ball. Um, open to it. I mean, I'd much rather pick up in Brown than JT again. I'm sure Chris wanted to disagree with that, but I could probably come up with ones that at this point. I think I'd rather take a fly around been Brown then. I had an even mind, but then I changed my mind and it's sentence that I'd rather have been brown over him. What's a good one? What's a good one? How about another converted reliever, Griffin Jax? I actually honestly have a little more faith in Griffin Jax figure. Yeah. I don't know. It's probably it's probably about equal. Okay, so I can't come over the good one. Yeah, I want to look into my head. I'm sorry. What I wanted to look into, Ben Brown for his career, 6.53 OPS against right handed batters, 7.73 against lefties. Sinkers are typically better used to same-handed hitters, right to right, four-seamer right to left. I think that was the incentive thinking back on it. Right, but that would still be the new pitch shouldn't help him in that regard. So I guess the idea is he, it makes the four-seamer play up against lefties. I think his fundamental problem is lefties are going to crush him and I don't think his arsenal is suited to overcome that. So I think it's just, I'm open to the idea. He's talented. He's got a live arm. The curveball's great, but I just, I really, I just for the Cubs sake, I think this is a mistake personally. Would you drop Cade Cavali for Ben Brown? Sure. Yeah. But I don't think so. That's not to say Ben Brown's better. Ben Brown's starting pitcher about a hundredth in my starting pitcher rankings. Yeah, I mean, that's not to say I think Ben Brown will be better. It's just, I'm pretty convinced Cade Cavali's not very good. So why not swap in a guy that I also don't think is very good? Exactly. And that's, I think that's the decision a lot of people are facing right now. I just don't have enough pitchers that give me any hope at all. And so Ben Brown, I think, represents one I'm not saying it's likely. It's probably more likely than Spencer Jones, but but yeah, it's, it's not like he's immediately somebody you're going to want to start. I just think there's enough upside here to take a shot if you need, if you need another pitcher on your bench. The Padres transferred Joe Musker to the 60 day IL. Honestly, we haven't heard a single update about this. I have no idea what's going on. The Padres also placed Luis Campusano on the IL with a left toe fracture. Cade Povitch left his start early with left forearm discomfort. Let's say our final break when we return fill in the blank rankings edition. We'll do that right after this. Fill in the blank rankings edition. Let's talk about show to Imanaga who looks very good against the red six innings one run 10 strikeouts to three walks. He had 22 whips on 99 pitches 14 on the splitter. That splitter has 12 or more swinging strikes in back to back starts and show to Imanaga just kind of looks like he is back to 2024 form. So fill in the blank top blank starting pitcher rest of season. Imanaga. I have him. I'm gonna, you know what? How many times am I going to start this sentence before I actually say it? I am going to say top 24. Chris, I've got him 28, which is close enough to 24 than I'm not gonna argue with it. It's fine. I moved to 18. So I would say top 20. Yeah, I was tempted to go that high past George Kirby past Joe Ryan. And so I guess the reason I'm not is because he's older and I think there's probably a little more chance of missed time there at some point. But start for start, I probably have more confidence in Imanaga than I though doing those two. I mean, Joe Ryan might not even be completely healthy right now. The splitter you mentioned with the splitter. He has thrown that pitch over 45% of the time in his last two starts. So he's turning it into his number one pitch it looks like. And that doesn't seem like such a bad idea. Yeah, I agree, man. Like the velocity is up. I think that hamstring probably really just affected him last year. And I think he's back to being like a SP two for fantasy. That is Imanaga. Let's talk about Michael King. He was great against the Cardinals six innings one hit one run six strikeouts. He had 18 whiffs on 86 pitches here to earn runs or fewer in six of eight starts. He's got at least six innings in five of his last six starts. So giving you some length, he's looked pretty good. He's healthy for now. Knock on wood. Chris, top blank starting pitch arrest of season Michael King. That's a good question. I love updating my rankings and not having the answer ready. I have him at 40. But that feels low. I have him at 31, but I think my answer would be like top 36 starting picture rest of season. That's what I was going to say. I have him 33rd. So once again, Chris is low. I'm middle. Frank is high. That makes sense. Yeah. Yeah. Makes sense because we're talking about players who have increased their value since the start of the season. It's much slower to move guys up than I think in that order, you guys. So that makes sense. I typically am slower than Scott to make moves. Are you? I like, there's just been so many injuries right now. Partially, it's just like a lot of guys dropping down and then honestly, once you get outside the top 25 or 26, I kind of feel like it's just wide open. Like I can make an argument for Michael King to be like 26 or 27th. Yeah. You know, I was debating moving like Yuri Perez behind King and I don't know if you have Hunter Brown behind King or not. I have him ahead. I have Hunter Brown and scuba like around SP 50, just kind of part of an injury. Hunter Brown is going to come back a lot sooner than scuba unless June 19th. I have it circles right here. I mean, it could be June 5th. My hesitation with King is he's walking a lot of guys. That's the one thing where it's like, hmm, how sustainable is this? Walking a lot of guys, I feel like probably has had some good home run luck here. I think he's a good pitcher. I think he's a good pitcher, but I do think he might either he's pitching over his head or there are some warts that need to be dealt with for him to continue doing this. Go me on, we have Brandon Lau who continues to rake. He went three for five with his 10th home run. He has a 941 OPS so far this season. His walk rate is way up from where it was last year. So that's a good sign for him. Scott, top blank second baseman rest of season. Brandon Lau. When are we asking on Friday or Saturday or Friday? Thursday or Friday? Hmm. Where are you going with this? What are we doing? South Stewart just got. Oh, yes. But he's not going to be in the rankings until Friday. I guess considering South Stewart in there as well. Yeah. I mean, South Stewart has second base eligibility now. So he has to count. I'm only going to go top 10 here for Brandon Lau. And I think that's a credit to how well the good second baseman have performed so far with the notable exceptions of jazz chism and katalmarte who were at the tip top. So they're not dropping out of the top 10, obviously, first low start. But you know, Terang's been awesome, Horner's been awesome, all these have been awesome, Weatherholz been awesome. And Brandon Lau has and who do I think has the least upside of that group? I think it's Brandon Lau. So he drops to 10th. And then you got Al 2v11. That's the one. Okay. I was wondering where you've had Al 2v because I. Yeah. I've stuck with him so far, but it's getting harder to justify, I think. Well, and then you have Xavier Edwards and Otto Lopez, 12th and 13th. And I think most people would consider the mustard. I'm less confident they'll remain so, but they're mustar right now. And so that suddenly second base is looking 13 deep in players. You can't really bench. I'm including Keishel and that group still maybe someone it, but I am. It gets really ugly after the 13. But yeah, it's, it's, there's enough at least for a league without middle infields, but. I would say Brennan Donovan once he's, is he, he's not back yet, but once he is, I think he'll be back on Friday. Okay. That's what I thought. I think he's right there with Edwards and Lopez. So yeah, I think you can go 14-ish and feel pretty good about your second baseman. I'm pretty intrigued by what Travis Bazon is doing. We'll get to him in a little bit as well. Shay Bangaliers with the new dad strength back from the paternity list, 2 for 5 with his 11th home run. This one, I mean, look, it's, he's very high at the top of the list. So top blank catch arrest of season, Shay Bangaliers. Five. Yeah, definitely five. Four. I think it's four. Three. I, yeah, I mean, look, it's who you leave it out. I got, I got Raleigh. It's not Cal Raleigh. I got Raleigh. I got Drake Baldwin. I got Ben Rice ahead of him. Same. I moved Cal Raleigh to four. I think that's an overreaction. It might be, it might be, but the fact that he's dealing with this kind of oblique injury, and I understand he got up to a slow start last year, but the underlying numbers when he got up to that slow start, so like said that he was going to be better. The underlying numbers this year do not support that he is like all of a sudden going to be better. And look, he was in the MVP race last year, but this was always a real possibility that he would go back to closer to the hitter that he was all the years prior last year, right? I think that's a whole history of Cal Raleigh, and I still think it could be really good. I just don't think six weeks is enough for me to. You might be right. You might be. It's a war of season like that. I, it is possible. I'm just saying like I'm not willing to commit to yes, that's what's happening. I am willing to trade Cal Raleigh for your Drake Baldwin or your Shay Langulears. I'm not willing to go. If I had Drake Baldwin, Ben Rice or Shay Langulears and someone sent me Cal Raleigh in a trade, I would not accept that right now. I'll just say a little bit different, but then the other scenario I'm trading Cal Raleigh for one of those guys. I don't know why it's different. It's just emotionally. It's different. So I'll put it a different way. It's kind of the same way, but I don't think you have to get into how historic last season was, although it's a nice feather in Cal Raleigh's cap to have argued with the best catcher season ever. These most recent six weeks are the first time Shay Langulears has been better than Cal Raleigh ever, right? No, he was better than the second half last year. Yeah, sure, but we're talking like a full season. Langulears was better than the second half last year than Cal Raleigh. Okay. Look, I mean, Raleigh doesn't really count for anything for me, but I get it. That's fair, but I'm talking full season. 2024 Langulears was good, but Raleigh was better. 2025, obviously, Raleigh was much better. And so, okay, maybe it's the second half of last season in the most recent six weeks. Maybe you can make a case that he's building and is better than Cal Raleigh. That's not how I'm ever going to rank it personally, but that's just different approaches. And I don't think it's necessarily wrong. It's just that's not that's not how I'm going to do it. And I get that. Yeah, like I could be kind of jumping the gun here. I just think the most likely outcome right now is that Carole hits two. He gets to like a two 30 to 40 batting average and gets like 35 to 40 home runs. And that's still a really good season. But I think what these guys are doing collectively with like really good batting averages and just chipping in across the board. I find that more valuable moving forward. Alec Burleson, someone we haven't really talked about. He is mashing one for three with a walk in his sixth home run. He has 30, no, seventh home run, seventh home run. I think it's seventh. 30 RBI. So that looks great. He's walking more this year. The expected stats love him. There's two different positions here. So I guess take it whichever way you want to go with it. But it's got top blank first base or alphular rest of season Alec Burleson. I'm going to say first base. He will be top 20, which I know doesn't sound very impressive. But we were talking about it before we went on the air. And that 12 to 20 range at first base is so crowded, so crowded. And it's hard to determine what order everybody goes. And you have the underachievers like Michael Bush and Tyler Soderstrom. You have Murakami who I think is still very likely to take a tumble here at some point. You have Salvador Perez with the catcher eligibility not off to a good start, but great track record and catcher eligibility helps. Esauk Perez with third base eligibility. How low do you move him? I don't even have Burleson in my top 20. I think it's just what the Ferreris is off to a great start. I don't think I could even commit to top 20. I think I could only say top 24. I'd say definitely top 24. It's between him and Andrew Vaughan at 22. I would lean Vaughan. I just think there's a little more juice overall. But Burleson is going to hit for a better batting average. I would take Burleson over Vaughan. Sure. If only for playing time concerns in Vaughan's case. Yeah. I would listen up to 14, but it's tough, man. That is a loaded position. I feel like honestly 12 through 20. Again, like you said, it's got like, you can put those guys on. I was short because Miguel Vargas is there. Ryan Burns there. He's playing against lefties again. It's pretty subjective, but I like Burleson a lot coming into the year. I love what he's doing in terms of the hard contact, the barrel rate being up and everything. The fact that he's walking more, so it all looks like a really, really good profile. He's very like the RBI rate is ridiculous. For Burleson. So, like, I'm not down on Burleson. It's just, it's hard to be down on any of those first baseman. Either I liked them a lot coming in and I'm not ready to back off or like Burleson, there have been a lot of players who have just delivered their best case outcome at first base. All right. Let's get into the rest of Thursday's action rapid fire. Here we go. We talked about Ryan Jeffers, we were wire hitters here. Travis Pesana, he has been running a lot so far. He went one for three with a walk, a run, two steals. He has started eight of nine games. He's only hitting one ninety two, but he's got a three eighty on base so far, four steals in eight games. 70. He's hitting the ball really hard. It's just a lot of ground balls. I am pretty impressed by what we've seen from Bazonis so far. I think he's close to like, must roster. He's, I've encouraged. I'm not ready to go beyond that yet because, you know, he doesn't even have an extra base yet. But he's running a bunch, which helps a lot that raises the floor quite a bit. And he's hitting the ball hard and the plate discipline has been as advertised. So I, I think if he's still available on your league, I'm not sure what his roster rate is 70% on CBS. I was just talking about how second base is 13 deep in mustar players right now. 14. So he's not must start yet. But 14 on that rank list for me is Bazonia. So if you're underwhelmed by your second baseman, or if it's a middle infield league, I doubt he's available in the middle infield league still. But like, yeah, there's enough here early on to say this might turn out well. Let's talk about Trent Grisham who's coming around three for five with a double or a three RBI, his second stolen base. He has multiple hits in three of his last six games. And the batting average is a bit as much 182. But plates discipline is actually improved from last year. The average EV, the barrel rate up from last year, the expected stats basically in line with where they were. So Chris, we had a lot of questions about Christian. If he maintains this bad a ball profile and plate discipline, like, I think better days are coming for him. I don't really see any reason to think he won't be good moving forward. And I was pretty skeptical of Trent Grisham coming into the season because he had never done anything like last year before. And if you only look at the surface level numbers, you'll say, okay, last year was a fluke, but the skills based indicators this year are as good or better than they've ever been. The plate discipline, like you mentioned, incredible 92 mile an hour average, exoflossy. His batting average is always going to be bad. His batting, his bat bit, his batting average on balls and play is always going to be bad. I think it's like 180 right now. It's like 60 points lower than his 60 or 70 points lower than his career average, which is really low. He has one of the lowest career babbups, I think, in Major League history. Brenna March, by the way, has like the second highest bat bit in Major League history, which is weird. I for a career, I believe so, yes. But I don't see any reason why Trent Grisham's not going to be at least very good moving forward. It'll be with the low batting average, but I think it's, if it's not another 30 home or season, it'll be a lot of home runs. Who would you guys rather have in a, I guess, shallower league, Grisham or Spencer Stier, who's doing some interesting things himself, hitting the ball hard this season? Grisham, I think. Yeah, I think Grisham as well. Stier has the first base eligibility, which is nice, but yeah, I think Grisham's skill set looks a little better. A middle infield option. Brian Roqueo has actually been solid two for four with his fourth stolen base. He's hitting 260, three homers, four steals, 7, 12 OPS. He's striking out a lot less. It's got to have any interest in Brian Roqueo as a middle infield option? Not a lot of interest, but I have noticed the improvement and I guess I'm not totally convinced it's durable. And like there are so many Andres Jimenez, Bryson Stott types that we have to go through before I consider Brian Roqueo, but you know, he was a pretty good prospect. Top 100 guy consistently. I don't think it's crazy to say he could break out this year. It's not just not quite sure a breakout will be enough to make him relevant and most fantasy leagues. All right, just real quick. Top five babbips of all time, Major League history, number one tie cop, number two Brandon Marsh, number three, Jorge Alfarro, whoa. Number four Rogers hornsby, number five, Rod Carru. So three first ballot hall famers, two of the best hitters of all time. That crew was like a what, three 30 career hitter in an era where nobody did that. And then Brandon Marsh and Jorge Alfarro, you ever seen that meme that's like what the hexapolar bear doing in Arlington, Texas? That's Brandon Marsh at the top of the all time babbip leader board. Yeah, I have never seen that meme. It's a good meme. It's also it's like the meme of like the soldiers behind the wall, but there's a clown in the middle of it. It's like, what are you doing? What movie is that from Frank? I honestly. It's one that I think would appeal to you. Is it Lord of the Rings? Hot shots part. Dude. Okay. Nope. Haven't seen it. Some hitters and deeper leagues. Ryan McMahon, last 13 games, he's hit in 311, two homers and a steal. Jake McCarthy has homered in back to back games. He had a grand slam and five RBI here on Thursday. Capert Ruiz had himself a massive game three for four with two doubles. His second home run for RBI. Ezekiel DeRan had a great series against the Yankees five hits, one homer, one steal, five RBI and Zach Gelloff back from the dead. Two for five with his third home run, three RBI. And I do just want to highlight DeRan and Gelloff are kind of doing some interesting things here. So in some of those like 15 teamers this weekend, I will be interested in seeing if DeRan and Gelloff are available. What are you guys saying? Man. I can't say I'm super interested. Are any Rockies, Outfielders playing every day? I guess Mickey Moniac kind of, but. Doesn't feel like it. Like Jordan Beck only has 76 played appearances this season. He's not playing much at all. He's not playing at all. Like nobody's playing regularly for the Rockies right now. It's very frustrating. Troy Johnson might be playing the second most. I got to tell you, I got to, I watched a little bit of Troy Johnson, I don't know, a week or so ago. I know the dad is not very good on him and he's maintained a three-hander bet. Like he's hit well between the majors and minors, the little bit of we've seen if I'm hitting over 300. Like he just manipulates the barrels so well. Like he directs the ball past Infielders. It's kind of fun to watch. He is, he is a more interesting player than the data would suggest. So I will just quickly touch on Ezekiel Doran and Gelloff and the reasons why they have peaked my interest. Doran, his K-rate is way down this year. His average EV is up like six miles per hour. He's up to like 91.4. And he has 90 second percentile sprint speed. And he is eligible at every position except for catcher. It's kind of intriguing. And then Zach Gelloff, he has started 13 of the past 16 games. He's hitting the ball hard. He has a career high 28% pulled air rate. And he's 89th percentile sprint speed. So I think both are good athletes and they're going to chance to play. So we'll see. Riverwire pitchers Max Meyer was solid against the Orioles five innings two runs with five strikeouts here. He is at the twins next week. Griffin Jacks continues to be stretched out as a starter. He was at the Red Sox four innings two earned runs three strikeouts. He got up to 59 pitches. So my guess is like 70 to 75 next time out. Matthew Liberator a quality start at the Padre six innings one run six strikeouts for him. He is at the athletics next week. Christian Scott pitched well in course field. Just fell short of the five innings, but four and two thirds one run six strikeouts. He is 21% rostered gets the Tigers next week. Chris, can I interest you? I look, I think Max Meyer is in like a different stratosphere than these other guys. But any thoughts on Scott Liberator Jacks and Max Meyer? I think interest is the right word for Griffin Jacks. I am interested in this experiment. I don't have a lot of faith in it. Switching from starting pitcher to relief pitcher in the middle or relief pitcher to starting pitcher in the middle of a season when you haven't really started in like three years is seems like it would be rough tough to pull off. His velocity was down significantly as the start went on. I think his sinker went from like 96.5 in the first inning to 93.9 in the fourth. That will be something to keep an eye on because his velocity hasn't dropped much in his couple of starts. But how is that going to work out when he's starting 80 to 90 pitches? I think it's a long shock. Griffin Jacks is going to be good. He wasn't a particularly good starter when they used him in that role back when he was with the twins. But I'm interested in seeing how this goes and I'm keeping an eye on it. It's hard to roster him, I think, because mostly I'd be interested in a point's league for that spark eligibility. It's hard to roster a guy that you probably aren't going to start at minimum for another couple of weeks just because he's not going to get the workload. If you think he can get to 70 to 75 pitches, he might give you like five or six. Yeah, maybe five, but he'd have to be really efficient with it and remember it's the race. So they are unusually quick with their with the hook with their pitchers. So I think he's interesting. I think he's the most interesting of the three non max Meyer pitchers here. I don't think Matthew Leverator is particularly interesting at all despite, hey, good start. Christian Scott's not totally uninteresting. His last two starts, it's nine and two thirds, three runs, 14 strikeouts to two walks. He walked everyone in his debut. But the last couple of starts have been better. I'm monitoring. Not all that they just outside of 15 15 team leagues. Christian Sky really needs to be on your radar. It's one of those cores field. starts that you can't really make anything off because the characteristics on his pitches were so different. Like the fastball worked great. It had four less inches of a least vertical break because it was in Koresfield. Yeah. So I think I agree. Max Myers, way ahead of these guys, Max Myers is closer to Robbie Snelling and Logan Henderson and those guys. But just ranking this group from a deep league perspective, I would probably go jacks, Christian Scott, JT Gain Liberator. I agree with that. Are we good to drop these three pitchers? We spoke about Andrew Painter, the other two, Zach Galen, who allowed four runs over six innings. He did have 15 whiffs on 100 pitches and his slider was really good. It had six more inches of drop. So I don't know. Yeah. Like wasn't a good start, but I'm like kind of intrigued by what he did there. And then Mackenzie Gore is the other one. I don't know. I think maybe I got duped into buying Mackenzie Gore once again because it kind of looks like Mackenzie Gore. Five in a third, five runs, three walks, three strike outs. Scott, what do you think about potentially dropping Zach Galen and or Mackenzie Gore? Yeah. I think we can, and I was pretty much already there at the start coming into the year. But I think we can move past the idea that Mackenzie Gore is ever going to overcome the walk issue. And that doesn't mean he's worthless, but it means he's going to be frustrating and not especially high end. And I think that's where he remains. As for the other, who was the other one? Zach Galen. Zach Galen. Yeah. Yeah. That was interesting with the slider, the extra drop, one less mile per hour, which is, you know, helps with the drop there. So it seemed like he was throwing it differently intentionally and it's served to make his curveball better too. Got a lot of whist with that pitch. So, you know, we've seen this from multiple pitchers this year. How they'll have a game where one pitch dominates with different characteristics. And it's like, ah, that continues. This might mean something. And then it doesn't. It just reverts the next start. So we'll, you know, let's see if it happens again for Galen next time, but it could be a game changer for him if it does continue. It's just, it is hard to make that case in a start where you have a five-round runs. Four. You know, like, I agree with everything you said. And I was like, well, that might be a reason to not drop him if you were going to, but then it's like four on run. Sorry. But then it's like, yeah, but he was bad still. So it's like, I don't really, I still kind of lean, just drop him in shallow leagues, at least. Sure. In a shallow league, like, if you could drop him for snelling or Logan Henderson or Max Meyer, I would do that. How rostered is the ice-empty's already been 70% of the leagues. 70%. Yeah. Could be less. I would say Gore. I'm probably not dropping, but the theory that he just needed a new, no, new voice in his ear and a change of scenery doesn't look like it's worked out. I teased this earlier, but I think Mitch Keller is a prime sell high candidate. I don't know what you can get for Mitch Keller, but he's pitching really well right now. I don't really see anything that he's doing too different. Maybe you guys disagree or you see something else. I might wait until after his next start because he gets the Rockies in Pittsburgh. So use him for that one. But like, we have a pretty substantial amount of innings here in Mitch Keller's career. And I would bet on regression after that start against the Rockies, but like he's serviceable in a points league. But if you can flip him for a top 40 or top 50 starting pitcher as upside, I would be looking to do that. Okay. Yeah. There was something he was doing different early in the season. I can't remember what it was. He's stirring his cutter a little more. There might be a different movement profile on the cutter as well, but the sinker. He's getting it's a different. He's getting more run on the sinker. That's what it was. Which isn't nothing. I noticed Nick Pollock was talking about that earlier in the season, but look, it's 6.7 K. Prenine. It's probably going to be a high threes. The rest of the way. Yeah, I think if anybody's buying Mitch Keller, he's a fairly easy sell. Some leftovers here. Cody Belinger is on fire. Last seven games. He's sitting 538 with two homers, 13 RBI and a stolen base. Bobby with junior huge game. He reached base five times, four hits a walk and his fourth home run. Vinnie P. Baby. He's slowly coming around last seven games, 2 92 homers, a stolen base and an 806 OPS. Sal Stewart looking to snap out of the slump. He hit his 10th home run that one came off of show to Imanaga. PCA continues to make things happen last 16 games, 298 three homers, 10 runs, 11 RBI, four steals, OPS over 900. His bad at ball day during that 16 game stretch, 93.2 average EV 16% barrel rate. That is awesome there for a P. Cray Armstrong Brent Rooker. He listened to yesterday's podcast and he responded by going to for four with his fourth home run, three RBI. So a very good sign for him. Junior Caminar. He destroyed a baseball in Fenway. His 10th home run, 115.8 ex of velocity, 449 feet to straightaway center. You do not see a lot of baseball as land, like 10 rows deep in center field in Fenway. It was just absolutely ridiculous stuff. Anything on anything. Jim Tomay hit your member that one. He has the fastest bat speed and baseball now. I believe. Yeah. Junior Caminar was really good. Yeah. Anything else stand out here? Lots of names. Oh, I'm watching it. It was a laser and the sound off the bat was just ridiculous. Yeah. I think the guys who haven't been very good so far among this group. I guess you could kind of include Bobby with junior. I know it's been a little underwhelming, but he's still been very good. But if any P. C. A. Brent Rooker, I think they'll all be good moving forward. P. C. A. slightly less certain of that. But if Rooker's healthy man, just please please. I mean, Rooker's the one I'm least confident in, but it sounds like you guys talked about him a lot. Sure. It mostly comes down to whether he's healthy. Yeah. Just kind of worried about that oblique. I miss one here. Liam Hicks, another homer, his ninth home run, and he holds on to his NLB RBI lead 34 RBI on the season. That's why Liam Hicks is going to be an all star this year. This is wild. The call to the bullpen for the nationals Gus Varland got the final. This is going to be on all star for the Marlins. Well, that doesn't always pan out that a team with no all stars gets their best player on the all star team. Both of the ones at all star both of their middle infielders are really good. Yeah. Well, peasant. Who I'm trying to think because I know I have a lot of catchers ranked ahead of Hicks. Yeah, but aren't they? A lot of them in the A. L. Yeah, Drake Baldwin is one that stands out. Immediately. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, look, it's still a while till the all star game. William Contreras could go off of on her air could go off. Will Smith could go off, but he's not getting as much playing time as usual. Yeah. Yeah. It's not a sure thing. But if the all star game was today, sure, Hicks would make the all star team for the nationals. Gus Farlin picked up his fourth save. He's only 19% rostered. So deeper category leagues, he kind of looks like the guy for now, but they do play matchups quite a bit as well. For the Guardians, Kate Smith, truck out to for his 10th save for the Cubs. Daniel Polencia came on with two outs in the ninth. The bases loaded a five run lead. He struck out Nate low for his second save for the pirates. Dennis antenna entered the seventh inning with a runner on first. No outs to run lead facing six seven and eight in the D backs line it lineup. He walked one. He got out of it. Gregory Soto later got the ninth. He struck out one for his third save and all the sudden Gregory Soto has saved on back to back days. Is there any rhyme or reason to the pirates? Well, I mean, part of the rhyme or reason is Dennis antenna had been bad recently. Yeah. I think. Yeah. I mean, it had been a long time since they had a chance for a save even. Yep. But in the meantime, so do kept doing his thing in Santana had a couple of big blowups. And so I think the scales are tipping back in Soto's favor. It's gone back and forth. And maybe it will again. But right now I you got to lean Soto as the guy for the pirates. Would you straight up just drop Santana for Soto? I mean, if it came down to it, yeah, I'd rather invest in a reliever who I think has a firmer grip on the role, which are the only leagues where I think you'd consider dropping Santana yet. But yeah. For the Marlins Calvin Foshe pitch a scoreless ninth with the game tied. He wound up with the win. And for the Cardinals, Riley O'Brien, a clean ninth inning for his 11th save of the year. To stream or not to stream on Friday, Mike Burrows at the Reds, Chase Dolelander at the Phillies, Reed Deppmer's at the Blue Jays, Foster Griffin at the Marlins, Robbie Snelling in his debut against the Nets, Connor Prelyp at the Guardians, Sean Burke against the Mariners, Michael McGreevy at the Padres, Griffin Canning against the Cardinals, Carmen Majinsky at the Giants. This might be the best streaming day of the year. It's a good day. I mean, Dolelander at Philly, it's a must. I like Reed Deppmer's at Toronto. Yep. I like. -Go, smelling. -Berk. -I like Sean Burke against the Mariners. -I like that one too. -Snelling feels like a coin flip. -The nationals crush lefties too. -We're doing it. -Ride to Valhalla, shiny and chrome. I looked up the quote this time. -I like how they're gonna strike out nine or walk six. -Yeah. -I like how they're pre-elephant at Cleveland. -It's time. -I don't think McGreevy at San Diego is terrible. It obviously doesn't compare to some of those other ones. -Even canning in Maginsky, I don't think you're good. -I think canning in Maginsky if they had good starts, I would not be shocked. -It's a really good day for streamers. But yeah, I would put Dolanter and Berk up at the top of that list. -It might be record for home runs allowed coming in tomorrow. -On Saturday, we have Janssen Junk against the nationals. Merrill Kelly against the meds. I don't think you could play him right now. Dustin May at the Padres, Randy Vasquez against the Cardinals. Aaron Savali at the Orioles. Jack Cahana wins at the Blue Jays. Junk Vasquez May. -I agree. -Yep. And then on Sunday, Logan Henderson against the Yankees, Kate Cavali at the Marlins, Luis Severino at the Orioles, Andrew Abbott against the Astros, Tyone at the Rangers, at Wartow Rodriguez home against the meds. -Well, Logan Henderson against the Yankees seems like so scary. He really hasn't had a miss as a starter yet. I guess you could say his earlier spot start this year was kind of a miss, but he's been so reliable in the few chances he's gotten. I think Henderson has to be number one on the list, even with that Yankees matchup. -I'd just say for a year or a second. -I think Tyone and E-Rotter, okay. -Yeah, I was kind of thinking Edward or Rodriguez against the meds. Just, I mean, he's coming off. -He's a great Rodriguez. -I don't either, but he's coming off a good start, and the meds lineup has been terrible. -Yes, I think there's a second to last at Runscore. I think it'll change at some point, but. -I could see Cavali getting strikeouts, but I mean, he's just. I think he's so hit or miss, man. Like, his control is terrible. We just saw his last start. You could get a blow-up. You could get five innings, two runs, 10 strikeouts. -I mean, he's at Bows' Volodol as they come, I think, especially given the matchup. I would not be surprised by nine strikeouts. I would not be surprised by nine-ernd runs. -Yeah. I would rank Henderson Tyone E-Rotter for Sunday there. -We are going to wrap there. For Scott and Chris, I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning into fantasy baseball today. Please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple's Spotify, and we will be back again next week. Bye-bye. [music playing]