July 26, 2025 • 19 mins
Join Ryan Wormeli (@RyanWarmly) and Mike Maher (@mikeMaher) for Part Two of this week’s edition of The Cycle!
In this episode, Worm and Maher highlight their favorite buy low and sell high targets before going through the best pick-ups that you can make off the waiver wire this weekend!
Timestamps: (May be off due to ads)
Intro - 0:00:00
Favorite Buys - 0:00:39
Edward Cabrera - 0:01:04
Dylan Cease - 0:02:57
Favorite Sells - 0:06:14
Brandon Woodruff - 0:06:19
Paul Skenes - 0:08:06
FantasyPros Lineup Assistant - 0:11:45
Waiver Wire Central - 0:12:04
Matt Shaw - 0:12:17
Royce Lewis - 0:15:29
Quinn Priester - 0:17:08
Deep League Targets - 0:18:15
Outro - 0:19:04
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Hello, everybody, Welcome into the cycle. Part two of the week.
This is our buys and sells and it's kind of
a special buys of cells because it's buys and sells
ahead of the real life trade deadline and also the
trade deadline in a lot of fantasy leagues is coming
up as well, so we're kind of, you know, taking
the approach of like this can be a by low
or a buye high, sello and a sell high. It's
really that's kind of what we always do. But it's
(00:26):
really just like trade targets right in general, because we
are up against it. This is the stretch run coming
up here very shortly mayor for fantasy leagues, whether it's
a roto league or you know, a head to head league.
So these are just some of our favorite targets that
we're looking to trade four or trade away. You can
go first, who's your favorite buye? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
So normally on fantaspros dot com, we do the weekly
Featured Pros article where we you know, we ask the
experts or who's your bylow, who's your so high? And
you know, I participate that in every week in that
every week, and so this week, since we are approaching
the real like you said, the real life MLB deadline
and the fantasy trade deadline, we did more. We did
more of like a trade deadline addition, but it's still
the same thing, like who you're looking to buy, who
(01:06):
you're looking to sell. The player I said that I
was looking to buy is Edward Cabrera, and it's obviously
in leagues where I need pitching. He's one of my
top targets. He's been, he's been quietly excellent, sense a
rough start this season, and his name is also now
popping popping up in real life trade rumors. And so
going from the Marlins to you know, a better team,
(01:27):
you know, no offense to the Marlins, but a team
with maybe better defense or a better offense to support
him and get some more wins, he could be really valuable.
And so, you know, I don't want to go on
and on, but he had a he had a really
rough start to the season, and he's been, like I said,
really good recently, and I think there's even more upside there,
especially if he can go to a better, better situation.
(01:48):
And just to throw a couple of names out there
that I thought might be in the price range for him.
I listed Austin Hayes, Marcella Meyer, although he just got hurt,
so put a pin in him. Rhyan O'Hearn, your boy,
Spencer Steeer, Addison Barger or Yandy Diz. What do you
think about those?
Speaker 1 (02:06):
I think i'd keep you. I didn't catch every name
you said, honestly, but I think Yandy Diaz I'd rather
have him than Cabrera. But I like Cabrera as a
target in general. I think you made a good point.
We just talked on part one of the cycles Luke
with George Bistol of roode World, and we talked a
little bit about Cabrera as a real life trade target
and a guy who could really benefit from moving, Like
you say, no offense to the Marlins, you know, offence
(02:27):
to the Marlins, Like it'd be great to see him
move somewhere else. So I think I think it's a
good Who are some of the other names you threw
out besides Yandy you said Ryan O'Hearn, I would do that.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Washton Hayes, Spencer Steere.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
I think I would move Hayes if I had outfield depth,
because he's a guy that gets banged up a lot
and tends to be run hot and cold. So I'd
be willing to move him if I had. You know,
if I wasn't like desperate at the position, like I said,
I wouldn't move Yandy. I would move O'Hearn. So yeah,
I think those are something like kind of the right
names to be thinking about.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Though, awesome about you.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
My favorite target is Dylan sees as somebody that actually
am trying to trade four in a league and have
not successfully done it yet. But he's one of those
guys that has been disappointing this year and disappointing two
of the last three years, but very consistently does seem
to have these underlying metrics that would suggest he is
(03:23):
better than what the actual production and results have been.
You know, you're getting the strike cuts right like that
that hasn't changed at all. Eighty eight percent island strike
cup percent is just under thirty percent strike out rate.
That's obviously excellent. If you look at the walk rate,
it's actually just a hair off his career low. Not
that it's a low number, but it's lower than it
has been in some of these other seasons. Combining that
(03:46):
with the really high strike cut rate is appealing to me,
the expected RA, and again this has been the case
in other years, is over a full run lower than
his actually is. ERA is four five nine. His expected
ERA is three four eight, and that's in line with
like his ex FIP is three point thirty, his actual
FIP is three forty nine. Like these numbers all are
(04:06):
kind of uniformly suggesting that this should be lower. It's
the highest home run to fly ball rate since twenty
twenty for him. It's not like insanely high, but it
is higher, which isn't you know, helping a lot of
this case. The backup against him is pretty high this
year compared to last year at least, so again this
(04:27):
is one where it almost feels weird to make the
case for it based on the underlying numbers, because that's
been a consistent theme for him in his career. But
it's really hard for me to look away a guy
who right now is on a good team that's going
to win games and could also get traded as somebody
that applies to who strikes out so many batters, whose
numbers say that he should be having more success than
he does. And it's one of those things where I
(04:49):
didn't draft him a lot this year, and yet I
still feel like I have to say I can't quit
Dylan cease. And I know you are in the position
of trading him away in a lot of places because
you did draft him this year.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Yeah, And as you were talking talk, and I was
thinking back to some of our preseason shows, and I
kind of I remember bringing up Delancey's more than once
and my main talking point was, I pretty much know
what I'm going to get out of Dellancy's mid threes
ZR and two inch strikeouts, and that's what I want.
And I'm getting the two un of strikeouts, but I'm
getting a mid four ZRA, which is not what I wanted.
I wanted to mid threes ZR. But like you said, uh,
(05:22):
it's interesting that, like like you said, fip X, FIPZIERRA,
and x CRA, they're all like within a few points
of each other. And it's it's, you know, those metrics
use different formulas to to generate their numbers, and so
it's interesting that despite using those, you know, different formulas,
they're all very close to each other and all, you know,
pointing to significantly better outcomes than what its actual era
(05:44):
is showing.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Yeah, and even aside from the ratio numbers, like you're
going to get two hundred strikeouts by the end of
the season for him, So like I, if that's you
could just straight up the eat strikeouts and say, I'm
hoping the era gets better. But if I'm in a
points leg where the strikeouts really matter, or if I
really need them to catch up in the category, and
(06:07):
rote it like, I think it's worth it even for that,
let alone building in the you know, statistically probable improvement
of the era, but you, of course, you never know.
It's no guarantee. All right, let's go to the guys
that we're looking to get rid of. I'll let you
go first again. Who do you have?
Speaker 2 (06:23):
So the player that I wrote up for the player
I'm looking to sell is Brandon Woodruff, And like Edward Carberra,
it's a pretty simple, simple formula. For me, it's he
started the year I'm you know, injured. He's been on
the longest rehab assignment of all time, and a consistent
theme throughout his rehab assignment is that his velocity was
way down and he's back now. Velocity is still down,
(06:44):
but the results have been excellent, And so I kind
of don't don't know what to make of him. My
theory is that another shoe is going to drop soon
because we were only as you know, as of this recording,
we've only gotten three appearances at him, and they've all
been really good. But the concern is the diff in
vel velocity. In twenty twenty three is four symer averaged
(07:05):
nearly ninety six miles an hour. Now it's a hair
under ninety three. And in nineteen ninety five, a ninety
three mile an hour fastball is great. In twenty twenty
five is actually below average. And so while he's he's
mixing a new cutter, which is I think in some
ways helping him because he's he's leading with his fastball
but mixing in the cutter. The problem is the cutter
is getting hit pretty hard. It's got like a six
(07:26):
sixty seven batting average against when I looked at it,
and the velocity of that is even lower. It's hovering
around eighty nine miles an hour. And so while I'm
a Brandon Woodriff fan and he's been really good since
he's returning, I think we're dealing we might be dealing
with a small sample size situation and that the future
results are going to be much much worse, and so
(07:46):
I'm looking to sell high. If I have Brandon Woodriff
and see, you know who I can acquire.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
The velocity is definitely concerning. I'm glad you brought up
up because he has been better than I expected in
these first few starts. So I think he's somebody that
you can convince a manager in your league to say, look,
Brandon Woodriff was back, this is great, and try and
trade them away. I think it's a great call. I
really struggled to come up with a good sell target
(08:14):
on my own, so I did something that I used
to do a lot last year, which is I pulled
up that article that you referenced that we had on
the site, and I picked out my favorite one that
somebody had selected in the article. And I want to
kind of put a shine on the site and tell
everybody that she could read the whole article and see
kind of all the breakdowns of these guys. I also considered,
since I got to the sheet before you putting Edward
(08:36):
Cabrera and Brandon Woodruff, since those who you picked, and
just taking him from you. I did not do that,
but Brandon Meyers from Rasball was one of the contributors
to this article this week on fantasypros dot com, and
he picked Paul Skeins, and I thought it was a
really great case. If you look at the last thirty days,
he's sp thirty eight, even with his great era and
whip strikeout and all that. Because he plays with the Pirates,
(09:00):
he's not going to win games. And it's not just
the fact that you're not going to get a lot
of wins with the Pirates, it's that they have also
announced they are going to put a limit on his workload,
which makes sense given that they're not competing for anything.
They said he's not gonna misstarts, but they're going to
manage each start. I don't like the sound of that
in terms of trying to get more quality starts out
of him, just general innings to rack up the you know,
(09:22):
ratio help or the you know, just getting more strikeouts.
And the key thing is he's Paul Skeens, so you
can get something really valuable for him. I would think
it's not like you're saying, hey, this is a guy
that everything I just described applies to, and he doesn't
also have a ton of name value, So like, what
(09:43):
are you what are you going to get for him?
People will say, oh, Paul Skiens the best picture in
baseball or second best pind Schooble, Like, yes, of course,
I'd love to have that on my team. He's bound
to regress to start getting more wins, right, he has
won wins since May. Like, this is not gonna go
well in terms of fantasy for a as good as
he is in real life. He hasn't thrown ninety pitches
in a game since June nineteenth. I mean, like, again,
(10:05):
I want to give credit to Brandon who wrote the
stuff in the article. This was his case, and I
just think it's a really compelling one that I strongly
agree with. So I wanted to kind of sell that
He lists, you know, some other options if you don't
want to move Skans. I think moving Skeins is a
great call. Like I, he puts it, well, it's a
smart move that's hard to make, but at the end
(10:26):
of the day, it is a smart move. So like, I,
what do you think about moving a guy as kind
of big time as Skeens? Because I love the idea.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Yeah, I liked the idea and we talked about it
a little bit last year because the Pirates did the
same thing last year. They slow played him in the
second half, and they you know, they pulled him from
starts early. They they they said, you know, he's going
to have an innings limit, and we're basically going to
shut him down. And last year is because he was
coming in without a ton of innings under his belt,
and he ended up throwing one hundred and thirty three
(10:54):
innings at the major league level, plus twenty seven more
in the minors. This year, he's already out one twenty
seven and you know, three weeks into July, and so
I don't know how much, like how many more innings
they're going to let him go. So we're gonna start
like we're probably gonna start seeing him get pulled in
the fourth inning of games or you know, like five
innings max. We're not going to see him pitch deep
into games because the Pirates are nothing to play for.
(11:16):
He's their most valuable player by a lot, and they're gonna,
you know, in their mind, protect him and try to
limit the innings. And so not only is he not
going to get winsdasy on the Pirates, he might not
even throw five innings and at that point, like you're
not getting as many strikeouts, and then he really becomes
a less valuable piece. And so if you are going
to trade him, you probably need to do it now,
(11:36):
not only because the like the trade deadlines are coming
up in leagues, but also if he comes out and
then the next two starts and only throws four four innings,
his value is going to go down and you're not
going to get as much in return for him. So
I think if you are going to trade him, you
have to do it soon.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
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My Playbook to set your winning lineup today. Let's go
to Waivers Central here. I'll go first on this one.
(12:12):
We're gonna do a hitter and picture each My favorite
hitter is somebody that has been mentioned in this section
of the show repeatedly this year, but I wanted to
highlight him again because he continues to be under rostered
Matt Shaw of the Chicago Cubs, you know, second third
and short eligible, depending on the site you're on. He is.
This has actually gone up a little since I wrote
(12:32):
down in the sheets. I'm looking at the updated one.
He's now twenty two percent rostered on Yahoo, fifteen percent
roster on ESPN. I had written down forty seven percent
on CBS. I didn't look at the updated on that one,
but under fifty percent there as of last night. So
a guy who continues to be pretty available. He's on
a bit of a power search. He has three home
runs in his last five games. He's somebody who has
(12:54):
given you sole on bases during the season. He has
two of those in his last six games as well,
So that's continued, you know, getting hotter with the batting average.
He's a good hitter that a lot of us really
liked before the season and had higher expectations for that
did not live up to them early. And he has
gone on slumps. I mean, his batting average for the
season is due twenty one, but again it's been better lately,
(13:15):
and it just seems like he is a jut we
talked about this with George in rounding the bases this week,
how the gap between the minor leagues and the major
leagues is as wide as it's ever been. We've talked
about it, you and I in previous episodes. So he
has played sixty nine games this season. I think it's
totally reasonable to expect that adjustments are being made. And
three of the five homers he's hit this season have
(13:35):
come in the last week. So I'm kind of viewing
that as something that I think is going to He's
not gonna keep hitnying three homers every five days, but
I think it's going to continue to just see that
he has progressed a bit. And I'm not saying he's
a league winner. I feel like I say this every
week with this section, but I'm not saying he's a
league winner. But he is way too under rostered right now.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
I don't know if I can get in on it.
I don't know if I can. I can be hurt
by Matt Shaw again. He's certainly so many times already
this year. You know, we talked about him in the preseason.
I know Kelly was very high on Mattshalk going in
the season. I know other smart fantasy analysts like George,
like Mattshaw, but it's just been so inconsistent. And I
get the point that you know, we're talking about these hitters,
(14:16):
they've never seen pitching like this before. They struggle, and
the good ones kind of turned around. I just don't
know if he's going to turn around enough. Is it
is exciting that he's hit the three home runs, still
batting two seventeen in July after batting one ninety three
in June, And so I still have concerns that you know,
he's just going to go cold again, and.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
You know he's going to be do you think don't
you think twenty two percent rostered is just too low?
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Maybe? I don't know.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
I think it is. I think a roster for me,
I think it's too low, and third base is a
tough spot to fill. I think he should I think
he should be. Just the upside and the possibility that
he is kind of taking a step forward and having
adjusted is enough for me to say that never should
be closer to fifty percent. I think's two percent is
(15:04):
way too low. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
The other bummer there is that he's batting ninth in
the lineup. He's still burned and bottom in the lineup,
and he had he did just face three lefties in
a row, and so I worry when he gets back
to a more righty heavy schedule. Still betting ninth. You know,
I worry about what we're going to see there, But
I hope you're right. I like Matt Shaw.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Well, listen, let's go to your player. You can't sit
here and talk about like I'm tired of getting burned
by players and then throw out the name you're throwing out.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Oh man, let's skip mine. I forgot about who I pick.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Well, we could go quickly on it because we don't
have a ton of time speaking.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
Good players who have burned you many times? How about
Royce Lewis? Can I interest you in any Royce Lewis.
He's he's more roster than Matt Shaw. He's under fifty
percent in most leagues, so in YAHOO under fifty percent,
slightly over in CBS. But he's he's a player that
we've seen the immense talent, but he's just never on
the field. He's always hurt and he's also writing or
(15:59):
writing heater right now, I forget I wrote a stat down.
If I can pull it up, we can go quick.
I hate three home runs in four games, so he's
also heating same amount of home runs in one less
game than one fewer game, one less game, one fewer game.
It is one, but I'm comparing it to match SHOs.
I think it is one. I think it's fewer. It's right,
You're right, it's fewer.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
It's fewer if you can count it individually, it's less
if it's like water or air, like some of you
can't count individually.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Okay, So I always une.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Little grammar lesson for you.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Yeah, well, I always use the grammar lesson. I'm like,
if you if you're like directly comparing, then it's less.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
At trivia last night, one of the rounds of reference
to jarend and I was like, that's a that's a
deep cut for grammar. If you remember from like high
school English, is it? I did remember, but like the
first time I was sitting with that Trivia was like,
what on earth is a Jerrand.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
We'll get into that next, But yeah, it's really we
don't have to spend a lot of time.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
You know.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Royce Lewis he can be really good. When he's really good.
If he's on the field, he's been really hurt a lot,
and even when he came back he was not very good.
But he's also heating up. So even if you pick
him up and stash him, I think he's someone you
should pick up. And again, like you said, third base
very shallow.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Position, so s wrap us up quickly with your pitcher.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
Sure, So, Quinn Priester is a He's been pitching really well.
He actually does have a little bit more strikeout upside.
He's been really good since June. One ninety eight ERA
in June, three point zero four ERA in July, and
a one point three eight ERA to start the second half.
Only thirteen innings, so small sample size, but he's been
really good and since June more than a strikeout reinnning,
(17:34):
which is big for him because you know, not necessarily
the biggest strikeout guy only has if I'm looking at
the right page here, only has eighty six strikeouts in
one hundred and one innings. But a lot of that's
probam his kind of slow start, and like I said,
sent June more than a strike up reinning and he
I don't think he's a two star pitcher this week,
but oh you know what, I think he actually has
(17:56):
a matchup against the Cubs this week. I think that
was going to be the one down I wanted to
bring up. Let me just double check that that is correct. Yeah,
he has the matchup against the Cup, So that's the
one caveat is that he has a tough matchup this week.
But I still think he's worth rostering.
Speaker 1 (18:10):
I picked him up not not planning to start him
this upcoming week, but just because I wanted to kind
of take the swing on him for the stretch run.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
So yeah, I think I do it all right.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
You want to read through these deeply targets quickly. By
the way, I know people don't like when I talk
about quickly. I just have a heart out because I
have to go tape something else. So that's why we're
kind of moving a little quicker here. It's not because
we don't want to keep talking more baseball, but quickly
give us your deep league targets.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah, they really don't like when you say that. So yeah, yeah,
so deep league targets. And I did want to mention
like at this part of the year with like waivers,
like I kind of mentioned before we were chatting, like
it can be just a crapshoot. Out there, and so
a lot of these targets are almost, you know, deeply
targets by default. But Colson Montgomery is one. He's younger prospect,
he's been playing well. Slade CHACONI I think his name CHACONI.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
I'll have to check that I'm not the pronunciation guy.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
Yeah, and Chris Paddock. So they're pretty deep name guys.
But Montgomery and Teal are pretty highly talented prospects, especially
in two catcher leaks. For Kyle Teale, he just hit
his first home run the other day.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
All right, we'll wrap things up there. Be sure to
check out our conversation with George Bissel from Rotal World
that was in part one for rounding the bases this week,
and also be sure to stick around for Part three,
where we talk about some pitching streamers and our two
start pitcher competition for Mayor. I'm Ryan Warman. Thanks for
tuning in. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening
to the Fantasy Pros Fantasy Baseball Podcast. If you love
the show, the best freeway to support us is by
(19:30):
leaving a positive review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Follow
us on x, Instagram, and TikTok at Fantasy Pros and
subscribe to our YouTube channel at YouTube dot com Slash
Fantasy Pros MLB
Hello, everybody, Welcome into the cycle. Part two of the week.
This is our buys and sells and it's kind of
a special buys of cells because it's buys and sells
ahead of the real life trade deadline and also the
trade deadline in a lot of fantasy leagues is coming
up as well, so we're kind of, you know, taking
the approach of like this can be a by low
or a buye high, sello and a sell high. It's
really that's kind of what we always do. But it's
(00:26):
really just like trade targets right in general, because we
are up against it. This is the stretch run coming
up here very shortly mayor for fantasy leagues, whether it's
a roto league or you know, a head to head league.
So these are just some of our favorite targets that
we're looking to trade four or trade away. You can
go first, who's your favorite buye? Yeah.
Speaker 2 (00:46):
So normally on fantaspros dot com, we do the weekly
Featured Pros article where we you know, we ask the
experts or who's your bylow, who's your so high? And
you know, I participate that in every week in that
every week, and so this week, since we are approaching
the real like you said, the real life MLB deadline
and the fantasy trade deadline, we did more. We did
more of like a trade deadline addition, but it's still
the same thing, like who you're looking to buy, who
(01:06):
you're looking to sell. The player I said that I
was looking to buy is Edward Cabrera, and it's obviously
in leagues where I need pitching. He's one of my
top targets. He's been, he's been quietly excellent, sense a
rough start this season, and his name is also now
popping popping up in real life trade rumors. And so
going from the Marlins to you know, a better team,
(01:27):
you know, no offense to the Marlins, but a team
with maybe better defense or a better offense to support
him and get some more wins, he could be really valuable.
And so, you know, I don't want to go on
and on, but he had a he had a really
rough start to the season, and he's been, like I said,
really good recently, and I think there's even more upside there,
especially if he can go to a better, better situation.
(01:48):
And just to throw a couple of names out there
that I thought might be in the price range for him.
I listed Austin Hayes, Marcella Meyer, although he just got hurt,
so put a pin in him. Rhyan O'Hearn, your boy,
Spencer Steeer, Addison Barger or Yandy Diz. What do you
think about those?
Speaker 1 (02:06):
I think i'd keep you. I didn't catch every name
you said, honestly, but I think Yandy Diaz I'd rather
have him than Cabrera. But I like Cabrera as a
target in general. I think you made a good point.
We just talked on part one of the cycles Luke
with George Bistol of roode World, and we talked a
little bit about Cabrera as a real life trade target
and a guy who could really benefit from moving, Like
you say, no offense to the Marlins, you know, offence
(02:27):
to the Marlins, Like it'd be great to see him
move somewhere else. So I think I think it's a
good Who are some of the other names you threw
out besides Yandy you said Ryan O'Hearn, I would do that.
Speaker 2 (02:37):
Washton Hayes, Spencer Steere.
Speaker 1 (02:41):
I think I would move Hayes if I had outfield depth,
because he's a guy that gets banged up a lot
and tends to be run hot and cold. So I'd
be willing to move him if I had. You know,
if I wasn't like desperate at the position, like I said,
I wouldn't move Yandy. I would move O'Hearn. So yeah,
I think those are something like kind of the right
names to be thinking about.
Speaker 2 (02:58):
Though, awesome about you.
Speaker 1 (03:02):
My favorite target is Dylan sees as somebody that actually
am trying to trade four in a league and have
not successfully done it yet. But he's one of those
guys that has been disappointing this year and disappointing two
of the last three years, but very consistently does seem
to have these underlying metrics that would suggest he is
(03:23):
better than what the actual production and results have been.
You know, you're getting the strike cuts right like that
that hasn't changed at all. Eighty eight percent island strike
cup percent is just under thirty percent strike out rate.
That's obviously excellent. If you look at the walk rate,
it's actually just a hair off his career low. Not
that it's a low number, but it's lower than it
has been in some of these other seasons. Combining that
(03:46):
with the really high strike cut rate is appealing to me,
the expected RA, and again this has been the case
in other years, is over a full run lower than
his actually is. ERA is four five nine. His expected
ERA is three four eight, and that's in line with
like his ex FIP is three point thirty, his actual
FIP is three forty nine. Like these numbers all are
(04:06):
kind of uniformly suggesting that this should be lower. It's
the highest home run to fly ball rate since twenty
twenty for him. It's not like insanely high, but it
is higher, which isn't you know, helping a lot of
this case. The backup against him is pretty high this
year compared to last year at least, so again this
(04:27):
is one where it almost feels weird to make the
case for it based on the underlying numbers, because that's
been a consistent theme for him in his career. But
it's really hard for me to look away a guy
who right now is on a good team that's going
to win games and could also get traded as somebody
that applies to who strikes out so many batters, whose
numbers say that he should be having more success than
he does. And it's one of those things where I
(04:49):
didn't draft him a lot this year, and yet I
still feel like I have to say I can't quit
Dylan cease. And I know you are in the position
of trading him away in a lot of places because
you did draft him this year.
Speaker 2 (04:59):
Yeah, And as you were talking talk, and I was
thinking back to some of our preseason shows, and I
kind of I remember bringing up Delancey's more than once
and my main talking point was, I pretty much know
what I'm going to get out of Dellancy's mid threes
ZR and two inch strikeouts, and that's what I want.
And I'm getting the two un of strikeouts, but I'm
getting a mid four ZRA, which is not what I wanted.
I wanted to mid threes ZR. But like you said, uh,
(05:22):
it's interesting that, like like you said, fip X, FIPZIERRA,
and x CRA, they're all like within a few points
of each other. And it's it's, you know, those metrics
use different formulas to to generate their numbers, and so
it's interesting that despite using those, you know, different formulas,
they're all very close to each other and all, you know,
pointing to significantly better outcomes than what its actual era
(05:44):
is showing.
Speaker 1 (05:47):
Yeah, and even aside from the ratio numbers, like you're
going to get two hundred strikeouts by the end of
the season for him, So like I, if that's you
could just straight up the eat strikeouts and say, I'm
hoping the era gets better. But if I'm in a
points leg where the strikeouts really matter, or if I
really need them to catch up in the category, and
(06:07):
rote it like, I think it's worth it even for that,
let alone building in the you know, statistically probable improvement
of the era, but you, of course, you never know.
It's no guarantee. All right, let's go to the guys
that we're looking to get rid of. I'll let you
go first again. Who do you have?
Speaker 2 (06:23):
So the player that I wrote up for the player
I'm looking to sell is Brandon Woodruff, And like Edward Carberra,
it's a pretty simple, simple formula. For me, it's he
started the year I'm you know, injured. He's been on
the longest rehab assignment of all time, and a consistent
theme throughout his rehab assignment is that his velocity was
way down and he's back now. Velocity is still down,
(06:44):
but the results have been excellent, And so I kind
of don't don't know what to make of him. My
theory is that another shoe is going to drop soon
because we were only as you know, as of this recording,
we've only gotten three appearances at him, and they've all
been really good. But the concern is the diff in
vel velocity. In twenty twenty three is four symer averaged
(07:05):
nearly ninety six miles an hour. Now it's a hair
under ninety three. And in nineteen ninety five, a ninety
three mile an hour fastball is great. In twenty twenty
five is actually below average. And so while he's he's
mixing a new cutter, which is I think in some
ways helping him because he's he's leading with his fastball
but mixing in the cutter. The problem is the cutter
is getting hit pretty hard. It's got like a six
(07:26):
sixty seven batting average against when I looked at it,
and the velocity of that is even lower. It's hovering
around eighty nine miles an hour. And so while I'm
a Brandon Woodriff fan and he's been really good since
he's returning, I think we're dealing we might be dealing
with a small sample size situation and that the future
results are going to be much much worse, and so
(07:46):
I'm looking to sell high. If I have Brandon Woodriff
and see, you know who I can acquire.
Speaker 1 (07:53):
The velocity is definitely concerning. I'm glad you brought up
up because he has been better than I expected in
these first few starts. So I think he's somebody that
you can convince a manager in your league to say, look,
Brandon Woodriff was back, this is great, and try and
trade them away. I think it's a great call. I
really struggled to come up with a good sell target
(08:14):
on my own, so I did something that I used
to do a lot last year, which is I pulled
up that article that you referenced that we had on
the site, and I picked out my favorite one that
somebody had selected in the article. And I want to
kind of put a shine on the site and tell
everybody that she could read the whole article and see
kind of all the breakdowns of these guys. I also considered,
since I got to the sheet before you putting Edward
(08:36):
Cabrera and Brandon Woodruff, since those who you picked, and
just taking him from you. I did not do that,
but Brandon Meyers from Rasball was one of the contributors
to this article this week on fantasypros dot com, and
he picked Paul Skeins, and I thought it was a
really great case. If you look at the last thirty days,
he's sp thirty eight, even with his great era and
whip strikeout and all that. Because he plays with the Pirates,
(09:00):
he's not going to win games. And it's not just
the fact that you're not going to get a lot
of wins with the Pirates, it's that they have also
announced they are going to put a limit on his workload,
which makes sense given that they're not competing for anything.
They said he's not gonna misstarts, but they're going to
manage each start. I don't like the sound of that
in terms of trying to get more quality starts out
of him, just general innings to rack up the you know,
(09:22):
ratio help or the you know, just getting more strikeouts.
And the key thing is he's Paul Skeens, so you
can get something really valuable for him. I would think
it's not like you're saying, hey, this is a guy
that everything I just described applies to, and he doesn't
also have a ton of name value, So like, what
(09:43):
are you what are you going to get for him?
People will say, oh, Paul Skiens the best picture in
baseball or second best pind Schooble, Like, yes, of course,
I'd love to have that on my team. He's bound
to regress to start getting more wins, right, he has
won wins since May. Like, this is not gonna go
well in terms of fantasy for a as good as
he is in real life. He hasn't thrown ninety pitches
in a game since June nineteenth. I mean, like, again,
(10:05):
I want to give credit to Brandon who wrote the
stuff in the article. This was his case, and I
just think it's a really compelling one that I strongly
agree with. So I wanted to kind of sell that
He lists, you know, some other options if you don't
want to move Skans. I think moving Skeins is a
great call. Like I, he puts it, well, it's a
smart move that's hard to make, but at the end
(10:26):
of the day, it is a smart move. So like, I,
what do you think about moving a guy as kind
of big time as Skeens? Because I love the idea.
Speaker 2 (10:32):
Yeah, I liked the idea and we talked about it
a little bit last year because the Pirates did the
same thing last year. They slow played him in the
second half, and they you know, they pulled him from
starts early. They they they said, you know, he's going
to have an innings limit, and we're basically going to
shut him down. And last year is because he was
coming in without a ton of innings under his belt,
and he ended up throwing one hundred and thirty three
(10:54):
innings at the major league level, plus twenty seven more
in the minors. This year, he's already out one twenty
seven and you know, three weeks into July, and so
I don't know how much, like how many more innings
they're going to let him go. So we're gonna start
like we're probably gonna start seeing him get pulled in
the fourth inning of games or you know, like five
innings max. We're not going to see him pitch deep
into games because the Pirates are nothing to play for.
(11:16):
He's their most valuable player by a lot, and they're gonna,
you know, in their mind, protect him and try to
limit the innings. And so not only is he not
going to get winsdasy on the Pirates, he might not
even throw five innings and at that point, like you're
not getting as many strikeouts, and then he really becomes
a less valuable piece. And so if you are going
to trade him, you probably need to do it now,
(11:36):
not only because the like the trade deadlines are coming
up in leagues, but also if he comes out and
then the next two starts and only throws four four innings,
his value is going to go down and you're not
going to get as much in return for him. So
I think if you are going to trade him, you
have to do it soon.
Speaker 1 (11:50):
If you're struggling with lineup decisions, our lineup assistant recommends
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My Playbook to set your winning lineup today. Let's go
to Waivers Central here. I'll go first on this one.
(12:12):
We're gonna do a hitter and picture each My favorite
hitter is somebody that has been mentioned in this section
of the show repeatedly this year, but I wanted to
highlight him again because he continues to be under rostered
Matt Shaw of the Chicago Cubs, you know, second third
and short eligible, depending on the site you're on. He is.
This has actually gone up a little since I wrote
(12:32):
down in the sheets. I'm looking at the updated one.
He's now twenty two percent rostered on Yahoo, fifteen percent
roster on ESPN. I had written down forty seven percent
on CBS. I didn't look at the updated on that one,
but under fifty percent there as of last night. So
a guy who continues to be pretty available. He's on
a bit of a power search. He has three home
runs in his last five games. He's somebody who has
(12:54):
given you sole on bases during the season. He has
two of those in his last six games as well,
So that's continued, you know, getting hotter with the batting average.
He's a good hitter that a lot of us really
liked before the season and had higher expectations for that
did not live up to them early. And he has
gone on slumps. I mean, his batting average for the
season is due twenty one, but again it's been better lately,
(13:15):
and it just seems like he is a jut we
talked about this with George in rounding the bases this week,
how the gap between the minor leagues and the major
leagues is as wide as it's ever been. We've talked
about it, you and I in previous episodes. So he
has played sixty nine games this season. I think it's
totally reasonable to expect that adjustments are being made. And
three of the five homers he's hit this season have
(13:35):
come in the last week. So I'm kind of viewing
that as something that I think is going to He's
not gonna keep hitnying three homers every five days, but
I think it's going to continue to just see that
he has progressed a bit. And I'm not saying he's
a league winner. I feel like I say this every
week with this section, but I'm not saying he's a
league winner. But he is way too under rostered right now.
Speaker 2 (13:54):
I don't know if I can get in on it.
I don't know if I can. I can be hurt
by Matt Shaw again. He's certainly so many times already
this year. You know, we talked about him in the preseason.
I know Kelly was very high on Mattshalk going in
the season. I know other smart fantasy analysts like George,
like Mattshaw, but it's just been so inconsistent. And I
get the point that you know, we're talking about these hitters,
(14:16):
they've never seen pitching like this before. They struggle, and
the good ones kind of turned around. I just don't
know if he's going to turn around enough. Is it
is exciting that he's hit the three home runs, still
batting two seventeen in July after batting one ninety three
in June, And so I still have concerns that you know,
he's just going to go cold again, and.
Speaker 1 (14:33):
You know he's going to be do you think don't
you think twenty two percent rostered is just too low?
Speaker 2 (14:41):
Maybe? I don't know.
Speaker 1 (14:43):
I think it is. I think a roster for me,
I think it's too low, and third base is a
tough spot to fill. I think he should I think
he should be. Just the upside and the possibility that
he is kind of taking a step forward and having
adjusted is enough for me to say that never should
be closer to fifty percent. I think's two percent is
(15:04):
way too low. Yeah.
Speaker 2 (15:05):
The other bummer there is that he's batting ninth in
the lineup. He's still burned and bottom in the lineup,
and he had he did just face three lefties in
a row, and so I worry when he gets back
to a more righty heavy schedule. Still betting ninth. You know,
I worry about what we're going to see there, But
I hope you're right. I like Matt Shaw.
Speaker 1 (15:20):
Well, listen, let's go to your player. You can't sit
here and talk about like I'm tired of getting burned
by players and then throw out the name you're throwing out.
Speaker 2 (15:28):
Oh man, let's skip mine. I forgot about who I pick.
Speaker 1 (15:32):
Well, we could go quickly on it because we don't
have a ton of time speaking.
Speaker 2 (15:34):
Good players who have burned you many times? How about
Royce Lewis? Can I interest you in any Royce Lewis.
He's he's more roster than Matt Shaw. He's under fifty
percent in most leagues, so in YAHOO under fifty percent,
slightly over in CBS. But he's he's a player that
we've seen the immense talent, but he's just never on
the field. He's always hurt and he's also writing or
(15:59):
writing heater right now, I forget I wrote a stat down.
If I can pull it up, we can go quick.
I hate three home runs in four games, so he's
also heating same amount of home runs in one less
game than one fewer game, one less game, one fewer game.
It is one, but I'm comparing it to match SHOs.
I think it is one. I think it's fewer. It's right,
You're right, it's fewer.
Speaker 1 (16:19):
It's fewer if you can count it individually, it's less
if it's like water or air, like some of you
can't count individually.
Speaker 2 (16:27):
Okay, So I always une.
Speaker 1 (16:28):
Little grammar lesson for you.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
Yeah, well, I always use the grammar lesson. I'm like,
if you if you're like directly comparing, then it's less.
Speaker 1 (16:34):
At trivia last night, one of the rounds of reference
to jarend and I was like, that's a that's a
deep cut for grammar. If you remember from like high
school English, is it? I did remember, but like the
first time I was sitting with that Trivia was like,
what on earth is a Jerrand.
Speaker 2 (16:49):
We'll get into that next, But yeah, it's really we
don't have to spend a lot of time.
Speaker 1 (16:53):
You know.
Speaker 2 (16:53):
Royce Lewis he can be really good. When he's really good.
If he's on the field, he's been really hurt a lot,
and even when he came back he was not very good.
But he's also heating up. So even if you pick
him up and stash him, I think he's someone you
should pick up. And again, like you said, third base
very shallow.
Speaker 1 (17:09):
Position, so s wrap us up quickly with your pitcher.
Speaker 2 (17:13):
Sure, So, Quinn Priester is a He's been pitching really well.
He actually does have a little bit more strikeout upside.
He's been really good since June. One ninety eight ERA
in June, three point zero four ERA in July, and
a one point three eight ERA to start the second half.
Only thirteen innings, so small sample size, but he's been
really good and since June more than a strikeout reinnning,
(17:34):
which is big for him because you know, not necessarily
the biggest strikeout guy only has if I'm looking at
the right page here, only has eighty six strikeouts in
one hundred and one innings. But a lot of that's
probam his kind of slow start, and like I said,
sent June more than a strike up reinning and he
I don't think he's a two star pitcher this week,
but oh you know what, I think he actually has
(17:56):
a matchup against the Cubs this week. I think that
was going to be the one down I wanted to
bring up. Let me just double check that that is correct. Yeah,
he has the matchup against the Cup, So that's the
one caveat is that he has a tough matchup this week.
But I still think he's worth rostering.
Speaker 1 (18:10):
I picked him up not not planning to start him
this upcoming week, but just because I wanted to kind
of take the swing on him for the stretch run.
Speaker 2 (18:16):
So yeah, I think I do it all right.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
You want to read through these deeply targets quickly. By
the way, I know people don't like when I talk
about quickly. I just have a heart out because I
have to go tape something else. So that's why we're
kind of moving a little quicker here. It's not because
we don't want to keep talking more baseball, but quickly
give us your deep league targets.
Speaker 2 (18:32):
Yeah, they really don't like when you say that. So yeah, yeah,
so deep league targets. And I did want to mention
like at this part of the year with like waivers,
like I kind of mentioned before we were chatting, like
it can be just a crapshoot. Out there, and so
a lot of these targets are almost, you know, deeply
targets by default. But Colson Montgomery is one. He's younger prospect,
he's been playing well. Slade CHACONI I think his name CHACONI.
Speaker 1 (18:55):
I'll have to check that I'm not the pronunciation guy.
Speaker 2 (18:58):
Yeah, and Chris Paddock. So they're pretty deep name guys.
But Montgomery and Teal are pretty highly talented prospects, especially
in two catcher leaks. For Kyle Teale, he just hit
his first home run the other day.
Speaker 1 (19:09):
All right, we'll wrap things up there. Be sure to
check out our conversation with George Bissel from Rotal World
that was in part one for rounding the bases this week,
and also be sure to stick around for Part three,
where we talk about some pitching streamers and our two
start pitcher competition for Mayor. I'm Ryan Warman. Thanks for
tuning in. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening
to the Fantasy Pros Fantasy Baseball Podcast. If you love
the show, the best freeway to support us is by
(19:30):
leaving a positive review on Apple Podcasts or Spotify. Follow
us on x, Instagram, and TikTok at Fantasy Pros and
subscribe to our YouTube channel at YouTube dot com Slash
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