Episode 33: Viva La Renaissance

Nate capitalizes on what may be his only chance to talk about the Rockies, aka the hottest team in baseball, which turns into a conversation on player development. The duo then discuss prospects they may be rekindling some interest in before covering prospects whose roster% is trending up and the usual look ahead to this week's MiLB action. Some players discussed include: Yohendrick Pinango, George Valera, Leandro Pineda, Drew Romo, Andres Chaparro, Andre Lipcius, Jeremy Rivas, Noah Miller, Aaron Davenport, Deyvison De Los Santos, Niko Kavadas, Juan Daniel Encarnacion, Will Johnston, and Zebby Matthews.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Not five miles an hour. Ridingto his head. He hopped down first
with the lumpbonius face, and onthe very next pitch he up and stole
second face with gradest speed. Hewasn't born. He had the yes uniform.

(00:28):
All right, Welcome to episode thirtythree of the Prospect B Sides Podcast.
I am Nate Handy, he isrook me back. We're back to
muddy B siding. Let's go.Yes. I think that will fit somewhat
of our theme this evening, Matt. But how you doing man? Plan
that a little bit. I'm good, man, I'm good. You know.

(00:48):
I just off of a wonderful Mother'sDay weekend and got to the weather
has turned really nice here. Wegot up into the upper eighties this weekend.
It was beautiful and I don't knowif you got to see this down
in the mountains, but we getto see the northern lights Aurora borealis last
weekend. Yeah, it was supercool. Yeah nice, nice, Yeah,

(01:11):
we were. It was a littletoo overcast for us. I believe,
like I was telling you earlier beforewe came on, I woke up
to like three inches of snow onthe ground this morning. That's a lot
of fun. But yeah, different, Yeah, I think good to see
them though. Were they how werethey? Were they? Was it like
full sky part sky? It wasfull sky, I mean it was it
was pretty This was Friday night kindof came and went. Then when I

(01:34):
first checked, it was really faint, and you know, we live in
the city, so there's quite abit of light pollution anyway, so it
was a little bit fainter. Buta little bit later on the storm really
kicked up the solar storm and easilyvisible. You could see some shimmering,
definitely see the gradiation in the colors. And then you look at it on
your phone and it popped, youknow, you could see it a lot

(01:56):
more easily. So it was cool. It was really cool, just a
fun little thing that I had neverseen it this far south. I'd only
seen it in Alaska actually, andyeah, yeah, it was really cool.
I remember the first time I sawthem. I was in college and
I was like working overnight shifts,but this was like a night off and
I was just up right. SoI decided to just go grocery shopping at
like two in the morning, andI remember getting back to my place,

(02:17):
getting the groceries out, of thecar. It was wintertime, so there's
a snow bank like right there whereI'm putting the groceries down on the ground
getting them out of my car,and I just remember looking at the snow
bank and it was changing colors,and I was just like, oh cool,
yeah, and I'm like what isthat about? And I looked up
in the sky and that this waslike full on whole sky, just at

(02:38):
every inch of the sky changing colorsexcept for one like really dark spot,
round circle in like the middle ofthe sky. For whatever reason, I
didn't know what was going on.I like seriously started like panic. I
thought it was like aliens coming,Like I ran inside, told my roommate,
I like woke up like I do. I don't know what the hell's

(02:59):
going on, but out here,like it was to be corny, like
a spiritual weird like you understood howsmall you are in the universe by looking
at that, Like it was justyeah, it was a wild phenomenon.
I mean you just don't see anythinglike it. And I mean that's why
it was so cool seeing it downhere just in my backyard. I mean
that is I had seen it ina similar had sort of a similar experience

(03:23):
when we were up in Alaska fishingone year and seeing it at night on
the beach where we were camping out, and on top of just having an
incredible day fishing, it was aspiritual experience. I mean seeing all of
that in the middle of nowhere offthe Key nine Peninsula, like it was
incredible to see that and no lightpollution and like you said, you know,

(03:44):
dancing changing colors, Like it wasabsolutely amazing. And it definitely wasn't
that cool last last weekend, butit was still very cool just to see
it. Yeah, I've never seenlike that full sky doing that thing before.
I've seen like some streaks and stufflike that, but I couldn't even
like go back out and like watchit. Man, it was that like
that terrifying to me. It wasinsane. AnyWho, this is the baseball

(04:08):
podcast, not a I don't knowwhatever we were talking about, but now
I figured, you know, wehaven't been talking a lot of major leads
the last month or so. Idon't think or at all happen. I
mean that's because we're prospect. It'sin the name of the podcast, Nate
like a prospect. That's true,that's true. But I thought maybe we
should start like a little mini segmentof like hottest team in baseball? I

(04:30):
see where is going. That's alittle tough to quantify, right, but
uh huh, maybe having the longestwinning streak in baseball just sweeping the defending
chap champs probably qualifies you, right, does it? So that would be
the Colorado Rockies, my friend,that would be the Colorado road who there's
a lot of game left, butare up five to one against the Padres
right now. It might make itfive in a row. But I think

(04:51):
we should spend a little time talkingabout the rockiest and a motivation. It's
like we talk about like development,right. I think we try to talk
about development a lot on this show, at least little bits and pieces that
we might be, you know,either numbers pointing us in a direction or
eyeballs. You know. The Rockiescatch a lot of strays, I think,
and I get that they're not verygood at the moment. This is

(05:15):
the twelve and twenty eight Colorado Rockies. That those guys, and it was
much worse five days ago. Myfriend Brenton Doyle, Brenton Doyle, dude
so much of a better offensive playerthan I ever would have imagined, even
if this is just a little whipon the radar, never thought he would
be this good at the plate.Watch a lot of him in Double A
and Hartford. Never I didn't eventhink he could make the big leagues.

(05:39):
And another thing that's interesting about thatto me, Matt, it's like he's,
you know, arguably the best defensivecenter fielder in baseball. Right.
I watched a lot of a tonof Hartford, Religiously, I didn't even
realize that he was that good ofa center fielder. I definitely didn't know
that he would have had the hardestthrow from the outfield last year in the
majors like he did. So mh. I guess my point being there,

(05:59):
like defense stuff, even if youwatch every day or semi every day
amount, like I was like,you could still not know. Or maybe
that's just me being being dumb,or maybe me just not really focusing on
that aspect of what I'm watching,But I don't know no way, man,
It's it is really hard to actuallyhave a good eye test for defense.

(06:24):
The way that the metrics work now, it takes a long time to
stabilize, and one bad play ora couple of really good plays can swing
your defensive metrics kind of wildly,and they're still really noisy even at this
point in the season. Like toyour point, Brenton Doyle was incredible defensively
last year, rightfully so, incrediblearm and covers a ton of ground in

(06:46):
that incredibly large outfield that Colorado has. But Doyle thus far this year is
negative in his defensive metrics per Fangraftsup to this point. Only slightly so,
but still for someone with both thereputation and the skills that he showed
last year, you'd probably look atthat defensive rating and say it's probably just

(07:06):
hasn't caught up to his true talentyet. And even with that, he's
still been basically the Rockies best playerup to this point, so that's arguably,
but yeah, maybe there's to betterthings coming. I do think that
he has been moving quite as well, maybe the first month of the season,
but he's swiping bags now, eyeballs. Would not say that he's a

(07:28):
negative whatever you said right now,Like, he is not a negative defensive
player. No, Like I wassaying, they catch a lot of strays
on not being able to develop andall that stuff, Like, Man,
I don't think there's an organization thatdoesn't have good developmental stories, that isn't
doing good things with some players orcoaching them well, or players that are
making improvements and coaching themselves if theyhave to, and what have you.

(07:50):
I wanted to bring up Montero.Well, let me back up. I
wanted to bring up kind of theirwhole infield right now. I don't know
if you saw yesterday, Matt,but Tovar and rad had back to back
just fantastic web gems. They've beenplaying great defense. I saw it to
Tobar the highest and you know itis what it is. Fielding percentage isn't
like the greatest defensive metric in theworld in my opinion, I don't know

(08:13):
what is. But for a shortstop two hundred games, first two hundred
games, he's got the highest fieldingpercentage ever, which is kind of interesting
because I feel like he's gotten overthe last couple of years a couple of
airs charged to him that I don'tthink we're that deserving. Man, It's
been great per usual. Montero,who we talked about in the preseason,
he is like a good first basemannow man, he picks it. He's

(08:35):
caught some screamers like he bailed outTobar a few times, all of those
guys a few times. But uh, in his bat I know the numbers
are not there. I know ifyou look at his stack cast page,
nothing is red. I don't thinkthe red's the good color on stack cast,
right, red is the good color? Yeah, which makes no sense
to me. It should be blueor green, right, it shouldn't be

(08:56):
like red. Red is like stop, no, not good? Right?
Right? It's hot, I don'tknow, Okay, blues hotter than red?
Right? Yeah, he is unequivocallya better hitter than he was a
year ago. His approach is somuch better. I don't know what his
hard hit is, what have you. He's had some loud outs, hard

(09:16):
contact that hasn't paid off. Butif you're desperate like I am in some
leads for a corner infielder, maybetake a look in Montero because his strikeout
percentage I think is way down.And I see tonight he's what three for
three with four RBIs three RBIs He'sa guy that I kind of got my
eye on that his numbers might notbe telling the story of his development right

(09:37):
now. I don't think. Yeah, and one one though on Montero that
we had touched on earlier this seasonis that he had been hitting the ball
harder in VLO or His max exitVillo got up to one fourteen over over
one fourteen, which is up there. Combine that with the strikeout rate improvements
that he showed over a fairly significantsample last year in Triple A. I

(10:01):
think that's something that we had talkedabout in the discord a bit last year.
Seeing Montero improve his strikeout rate andstill slugging the ball really well,
that tends to say something good abouthis future performance. And he's got the
strikeout rate down to twenty percent,which is really good for someone with the
power potential that he has. Yeah, but all of his numbers, his

(10:22):
production is down right, And that'skind of a bit of a theme that
I've noticed with some Rockies early inthis season before he went on the shelf.
Jones, Dude, he hit likeclose to like five hundred or something
on first pitches last year, right, and then this first month of the
season he wasn't swinging at first pitches, trying the more your approach patient,

(10:45):
perhaps take some more walks right,tone down the aggressiveness and he was not
producing. Right, Montero, Ithink there's some of the same stuff.
He's been trying to be more selective. Surface numbers aren't there yet. Tovar,
I think too, even though he'sstill probably like the most aggressive,
you're one of in the major majors, I see him try to be more
selective and struggle while doing it,at least, you know, struggling to

(11:07):
produce. I think that is partof a process, and part of what
I think I've tried to talk toyou about in the past too, is
like, no, if you TimAnderson wasn't so aggressive, he wouldn't be
good or when he was good,right. I think there's good things happening
with some of these hitters, asmy point, but you're just not seeing
it yet in the short term,perhaps well, at least for Montero and

(11:30):
Jones, I think both of themare victims of just a bit of bad
luck both on the back up front, and that both of their expected weighted
on bases are higher than they're actualweighted on basis, which means that even
the contact that they've had up tothis point is under represented by their overall
stat line. Right, Like they'veeven what they've done up to this point,

(11:50):
they've still gotten a bit unlucky.People love to use the stat cast
to say this is going to tellyou something about the hitter going forward,
and I think that especially the expectsdid stats, that's not what they're built
for, and they aren't really verygood at that, especially over small samples
of like even a month, itdoesn't really tell you that much about what
you expect from them going forward.And so for a guy like Jones,

(12:13):
that's somebody that I expect him tolook kind of like he did last year,
which means he's going to strike outa bit less than he has in
the early going. Once he's backfrom the IL, I think he's going
to walk a bit more. Ithink the babbep's going to rise because he
hits the ball really hard at goodangles, gonna run and hit home runs
and all that said, like areally good player flawed, you know,
he strikes out too much. Outsideof that flaw, like he looks pretty

(12:37):
good, like a positive contributor,you know, one fifteen one to one
twenty WRC plus over the next fewyears with some steals thrown in, Like
that's a really really good baseball player. Just to me, looked like a
victim of Maybe it's some approach changes, maybe it's trying to change who he
is a little bit. And youknow, it's hard to know that without

(12:58):
seeing some reporting on it, orthe guy's talking about it themselves. I
just think that a lot of thisis statistical noise in Tarot, Jones,
Tovar. There's better things coming.So I'm with you on that. You
know, I'm not ready to describesome sort of master plan behind behind all
of this to the Rockies as acollective unit yet, but there are certainly

(13:20):
some Rockies that I'm on board with. I think that they're very good players.
Obviously, I'm a Rockies fan,and I'm that point here isn't to
like the Rockies are good now andthey're all going to be Hall of Famer.
My point is like, like,look at back right now, just
coming up. He's made a lotof improvements, I think since last year
on the strikeout, on the chase, on the swing and miss side at
they at least in Triple A.Now you see him up in the majors,

(13:43):
not lighting the world on fire atall, but like they talk about
a lot on the broadcast, Spilboorgis really good at this, and we'll
break it down and show you asiding like. His timing is awful.
He's laid on fastballs all the timebecause he's got like that step right.
But one thing that I've seen theRockies introduced done near alder hitters through all
the levels is when they get likethat and their timing is off, they
set up real wide, they takeaway the step and they start to get

(14:05):
their timing back. And Beck isdoing that from time to time right now
in the Majors, the last coupleof days, the last series you see
ving, I feel like v I'vebeen watching some ven long story short.
I think that we've talked about thisa little bit. I think he was
taking a lot of their coaching inthe lowers. When he hit double A,
he started reverting back to some ofhis old ways, and that's that's

(14:26):
his words. And there were somestruggles and there was some injury too,
And now I feel like he's kindof found a happy medium with all that
pulling the ball well, hitting somehome runs, he's hitting opposite field.
He's still I still think he's probablyswinging and missing and striking out a little
bit there's development all over the place, even in the worst even in the

(14:46):
worst developmental organization in base I guessis my ultimate points. Yeah, and
definitely agree with that. And theseguys are trying to get better. I
mean, that's that's what they arepaid to do. That's there. Competitive
by nature, and a lot ofthem, even the most stubborn of them,
are still trying to improve constantly,and especially with these young guys.

(15:09):
I think that's something that in theDynasty world, players can overrate they view
top prospects or you know, ZachVine's a great example of this, who
showcase loud tools and then they expectthem to just keep linearly getting better they
as they go up the levels,and that doesn't happen very often, and
even when it does, al aJackson Holliday or a White Langford, you

(15:31):
still should expect a long period ofadjustment once they make it to the show.
I mean, I've heard some announcersrecently talk about the fact that they
think the jump to the major leaguesis actually the hardest that it's ever been,
and now I'm not sure that that'strue, but it remains a big
jump between the upper miners and whatyou face in the major leagues on both

(15:56):
sides of the ball. And sothis time last year, everybody was saying,
Brandon fat is the worst picture thatthey've ever seen, and he's giving
up home runs all the time.He's terrible. I can't believe we bought
in to what he did in twentytwenty two. And I was like,
look, this happens. Same thingwith Gavin Stone getting lit up. Gavin
Stone has turned in, like hislast five starts in the major leagues have

(16:18):
been awesome. He's like, afterYamamoto maybe been the Dodgers' best pitcher in
the last month. That's kind ofthe guy that he showed in twenty twenty
two. And he had a roughone year adjustment to the major leagues and
there will be more adjustments to come. All of that to say that these
guys are constantly adjusting. In goodorganizations quote unquote, or organizations that seem

(16:40):
a little behind the times, youstill see that development and those adjustments happen
constantly, and it's one of thereasons why we watched this and especially as
dynasty players like you can constantly lookfor the little changes that might portend something
interesting. It's why I read fangraphs, Right, These guys are really good
at spotting changes and contextualizing them ina way that helps pull out those nuggets

(17:03):
of utility. And sometimes it's nothingright. Sometimes these changes are statistical noise
or like you said, you findyou watch a few games and you're like,
oh, he's swinging more first pitches, and you know, maybe that's
a thing that is going to help, but it also might just be a
good week or a bad week.Right, Like to go back to our
conversation last week about guys that wereshowing some significant improvements, Well, Jaysavina

(17:26):
last week sat with like a lowtwenties strikeout rate, and then he struck
out like eighteen times this week.I think that's an exaggeration, but it
was bad. It was like threeor four a game for a while there.
And his strikeout rate is back aroundthirty percent, and I'm like,
he might be reverting to the kindof guy that he is. So all
that to say, that's one ofthe coolest things to see is watching guys

(17:48):
make the adjustments. And it's alsoone of the hardest things to pull out.
Is that change a real change.Is that a change that's sustainable or
is this possibly just noise, andI hope we do that well when we
talk about the way guys are evolving. Yeah, And I think for me,
you know, the last four yearsby far the closest I've watched minor

(18:08):
league baseball, watch certain players progressthrough now all four levels of full season,
and with you and other things thatI read learned from, I am
starting to put together some more thingswith hitting it. And I think,
like when we talk about pitching,we talk about pitching to development and pitching
to results, Like, I don'tthink it's the same, but I think

(18:30):
I think I've noticed some things withsome hitters that it was like, hey,
it was like worth maybe not producingall that well for this half a
season or whatever it might be,and now a year later, you're able
to handle pitches in that location orbeing later on a ball and doing some
damage with it or whatever it mightbe, right, or not swinging and

(18:51):
missing it certain types of pitches orwhat have you. Right, So I
think that kind of falls in linewith my week as a whole watching this
week, Matt, like, haveyou ever been like a renaissance fair kind
of guy? Like, have youever partook in I have not the closest
thing is they had this wacky festivalthat was outside of the place where I

(19:12):
went to school. Had a lotof people that would dress up in costumes,
but also a lot of people thatwould just be naked, and it
was like a wild place. Theycall it the Country Fair, but I
was like, not really. WhenI first heard, I was like,
oh, it's like a you know, state fair. I've been to a
bunch of those, Like yeah,it makes sense. Nope, not really
like that, like kind of hippiecommune vibes plus rent fair vibes. I

(19:33):
mean it's super fun, like greatmusic and food and all sorts of great
people watching, but it was notquite that. Yeah, Okay, you
ever go to like a Medieval TimesNo. I think the closest I went
to was like going to the Excaliburin Vegas one time when I was a
kid, you know, because likeI was there for a baseball tournament or
something, and my dad was like, well, we can't do a lot
of the fun stuff in Vegas,so let's go to Excalibur. Like okay,

(19:56):
So that's about the closest I've Ithink. Well, I've been having
a bit of a renaissance here Mattnot only with the Rockies and their half
week of good baseball that breeding mesome new life, some four B side
selections that I don't know. Idon't want to say I wrote off,

(20:17):
but definitely didn't like roster anymore.Definitely wasn't watching as much anymore. But
I know we had mentioned him lastweek, but Matt and I said,
if he has one more good week, then reluctantly talk about him. But
Jo Hendrick Bernango man kind of onone and that it has been all year.
I know we chatted about him someonein the discord. I think the

(20:40):
summation of that discussion between you andI was I'm kind of wondering. It's
hard for me to not wonder thatthere was injury that played into a year
and a half of him basically justsucked on. But he is still only
twenty two years old. I imaginehe is getting called up to double A
pronto, very soon. I wouldthink after this is what his This will

(21:00):
be the fourth season that he haslogged sometime in High A striking out only
twelve percent of the time. Hestrikeouts have never been a big problem for
him. That's what drew me tohim to start with just a high contact
for a guy. But he's hitfive home runs, he's stealing some bases,
although he's also getting caught. I'llslug in six' ten. He
does hit ground balls at what fortysix percent of the time right now,

(21:22):
we've seen that higher with him kindof spraying the ball around as he kind
of always has. Yeah, Idon't know, man, Hendrick Panango has
revitalized my interest I think even morethan him being at the same level for
so long as he might have anice bat and interesting that, but defensively
kind of curbs my overall dynasty enthusiasm. His bat is going to have to

(21:47):
be really really good because I thinkhe's not a good left fielder, but
he kind of had that headlines mylittle renaissance fair here. Yeah, so
you're returning to your your roots withPanango. I mean we talked about this
a while ago. He's one ofthese guys that when I first started reading
some of your stuff, you hadhighlighted him. This probably would have been
back in twenty twenty one, likeyou might have posted about him on a

(22:11):
picture list or something. He poppedon one of your things, and I
was like, you know, ina really deep dynasty league, and I
went to add him, and Ithink one of my main rivals in that
league had read the same article orindependently came to the conclusion that Panago might
be a really exciting young guy.He was at the time nineteen, performing
in High A for the Cubbies andlike you said, not striking out,

(22:34):
showing a little bit of power,showing some speed, pretty exciting little player.
And I got beaten to the punchand my main rival division rival and
one of the other like top tierteams in this thirty teamer that I'm in,
I sniped him the same day.I went to add him late in
the season, and usually that lateyou can just add people for no fab

(22:55):
just because a lot of the teamshad checked out or rosters are full,
and so you see a guy,you're like, yeah, at him for
zero dollars and you get him.So I was so bummed I missed out
on him. And then he startedout twenty two pretty well, but then
got hurt and ended up having kindof a subpar line. Well, repeated
the same level again all at higA for the Cubs, and Panango was

(23:17):
even worse last year, you know, close, like kind of similar overall
lines. He was awful last year. He was awful. Yeah, and
then he's back at hi A againthis year. So this marks his fourth
season in a row in HIA.And so when Nate, you and I
talked about this, I was like, look, Panango has spent four years
at this level. He should becrushing it. And that tempers my enthusiasm

(23:40):
a bit. Sure, sure,sure, I mean the first year was
like, what a little cup ofcoffee at the end of twenty twenty one
I've ever played appearance. It's notnothing, No, okay, I can't
help him. I know there wasan off season surgery head it heading into
last year and he was just,like I said, horrible but uh but
nonetheless has peaked my interests some again. I had some spots and tacked up

(24:00):
a few more shares to something Ididn't think i'd be doing in May.
But here we are. Oh yeah, and I hear that like the guys
that you come back to and thatyou were really on or way higher than
consensus, or you are on reallyearly, and you always have sort of
a soft spot for those guys.And my first one on this list was

(24:21):
George Valera. Maybe a little bitmore of a pretty boy than Penango was,
because he got some hype after acouple of really good seasons back in
twenty nineteen, twenty twenty one,post pandemic, he was legit. He
was young for the Guardians' minor leaguesystem. He kind of tore through it
for a couple of years, andI was way in. I was like,

(24:42):
this is a guy that, yeah, he strikes out a bit,
but the power seems real he walks, and I think this is going to
be a corner outfield masher. Well, he was pretty bad in twenty twenty
two. You know, he wasat Double A, held his own promoted
twenty one years old and trip andwas league average, which for a twenty

(25:02):
one year old in Triple A inthe International League, that's that's pretty good.
And then last year dude was atrociousbelow average for everything, like eighty
four WRC plus, struck out morethan he ever had walked a decent amount,
but just like all the shine woreoff. I tried to acquire him
a bunch, thinking I was likebuying low and just couldn't get him anywhere

(25:23):
nobody was selling. And I stilllike kind of harbored this, like ah,
it's just a bad season. He'sgonna rebound. It's gonna revert back
to the kind of corner outfield sluggerthat I've seen, and we've seen a
little bit of signs of that thisyear. So he's kind of drawing me
back in. And as I makesome trades this upcoming week, I'm going
to have a couple of roster crunchesin some of my leagues, and I

(25:45):
think I'm going to try and targethim again because while the exit Velo numbers
aren't exciting so far from what we'veseen either in the last two years,
he is has a swinging strike rateunder ten percent. He's hitting the ball
in the air and on the linequite a lot. WRC plus is back
above one twenty so it's one twentyseven right now. So he kind of

(26:07):
is drawing me back in. AndI threw on a Cleveland Triple A game
and saw Valera hitting four hole andhe smoked a double, and I was
like, oh, now there's thatswing that I liked. So I'm hopeful
that it portends better things. Youknow, my enthusiasm has definitely cooled a
bit there. I think is stillenough of an interesting hitter here that I'm

(26:29):
going to see if I can getsome get some more George Valera in my
life on the on the QT interesting, I have not been paying attention.
He was very highly thought of inthe prospecting world for a minute there.
Yeah, I mean, you're thatyoung and you make it to triple A
and you're showing some power. It'sinteresting. But yeah, his twenty twenty
three was miserable. So this thiswas like, you know, one of

(26:51):
those b side calls when you seevery little of somebody and you just don't
really have any other great ideas,right, But last year I went with
Leandro Nata of the Phillies right fromor maybe it was a couple of maybe
it was a couple of years ago, whatever it was, it was a
short look. There was like ateenager that they had pushed up the hi
A at the end of the year, and I'm like, what's this guy

(27:12):
all about? Turned him on alittle bit, kind of like to look
at him at the plate. Philly'sscout had told me that internally there's some
people that really like him. Well, I mean that's the case with everybody
of the West. They're not there. But it was like, okay,
I love that. I love thatas a as a classic scout quote that

(27:32):
the analysts and fantasy prospectors drop islike their people internally are really high on
Hi's Like really, you think likethey drafted him and they're trying to pump
him up for either trade value orperformance reasons. Like, no shit,
they're going to tell you that.So I love that one. I love
that. Like I had a scouttell me at a game a couple of
weeks ago. He was like,oh, yeah, we're really high on

(27:55):
insert top five prospect overall here,Like, oh you guys like Jackson Holliday.
Wow, I never would have guessOrioles scout like that's crazy. Another
guy, the Giants guy, actuallyjust a quick side tangent. He was
telling me how high they were internallystill on Helio Ramos and I was like,
oh yeah, really like you guysstill really, Oh yeah, we

(28:17):
think he's gonna star Still. Iwas like, I saw, I say,
he's done a few things his firstweek in the bigs or whatever.
I saw him make a really nicecatch yesterday too, going back to his
arm side like deep and left field. Well maybe maybe they're right, but
I just thought it was a funnyone because I was like, man,
he's been like kind of just okayfor a pretty long time now. But
yeah, yeah, right, dude, Pineda paid no attention to him at

(28:41):
all, happened to turn him on. Some wrote a single and man this
last week mat six games, hewas eleven for twenty two doubles, home
run seven RBIs, walked four times, struck out once. That's a five
fifty average eight hundred slug on theweek. For some reason, it's Monday,

(29:02):
they haven't announced like their players ofthe week. I'm curious to see
if he wins it in the saleor not. Well. On the season,
he's striking out twenty one percent ofthe time, walking nine percent of
the time, slashing three ten,three, eighty, five, four eighty
it's a three seventy three babbit hittingline, drives twenty two percent of the
time, hitting ground balls a littletoo much fifty three percent of the time.

(29:22):
But pulling the ball. Uh.Clay put out that new little app
thing on Discord. It was prettycool. You can pulled like everybody's spray
charts. I was looking at histhis was looking kind of interesting, so
I know it's a Leandro pineda notout of my mind anymore. He's back
and I'm going to try to tunehim on a little bit. He struck
me as an athletic guy. Ithought maybe uh, I thought maybe he'd

(29:42):
run a little bit and was alittle bit faster. Maybe he was a
few years ago. I think he'smore of a corner outfield type. I
don't think he's really been stealing anybags. He's been caught twice as stolen
done. Kind of back on myradar a little bit, as as a
guy to watch another guy on histhird tour at HYA. Hopefully he gets
challenged a bit. True is offwhen I start it's true? Yep.

(30:03):
Well let's go back to the Rockiesand talk about them a bit. I
had snagged Drew Romo pretty late indeep FYPD. That would that have been
like twenty twenty one? Was thathis FYPD year? Well, twenty twenty
was his draft year Draft year,Okay, so maybe it was twenty twenty

(30:25):
one or twenty twenty. But I'dgotten him fairly early on the back of,
you know, great defensive reputation.This guy's going to hit, and
I hadn't really shied away from catchers, yet I was still like, oh,
yeah, you need a good catcher, and so I think I had
quite a few. But anyway,I drafted Romo and early on it went
pretty well. Like he good backto ball skills, you know, kind

(30:47):
of an aggressive hitter in the handymold. His handy percentages are pretty good
throughout the miners, and had areally sterling defensive reputation. But the hitting
kind of took a step back intwenty two and I ended up trading him
in a package, maybe as partof a package to get like Justin Berlander,
as I was trying to push forplayoffs, and he turned things around

(31:08):
in twenty twenty three a bit,like he got promoted to Double A.
Hartford's not as good a place tohit as Spokane, and he hit better,
still showing the low strikeout, lowwalk typology. He's kind of still
flew kind of under the radar though, Like I feel like the prospect Shine
wore off, even though he madea couple of top one hundreds that year.
I think maybe to start the yearhe was off someome. At mid

(31:30):
season, his prospect Shine had definitelydried up. I was kind of out,
like I was like ah, Yeah, he's going to be just a
guy. Maybe he'll catch, maybehe'll figure it out and be a touch
more. But I'm no longer likethis is a Dynasty staple kind of catcher.
But as a twenty two year oldin Triple A, he's showing out
and some of it is Babeb driven, and he still is a bit aggressive

(31:52):
for my taste. Like he Ithink has like one walk on the year
and is striking out twenty two percentof the time, which is acceptable,
but would definitely like to see morewalks out of him. But the rest
of the batter ball profile looks prettysolid. He's definitely showing a little bit
of power, which you love tosee. And he's a guy that in
the past has showed a really nicebatted ball distribution, like ground ball rate

(32:15):
around forty percent, flyball rate inthe thirty to forty percent range, and
hits decent number of line drives.So I love that shape of the production,
and I do think I watched abit of him. It's been two
weeks ago, and he remains tomy eyes at least a pretty good defensive
catcher. So Drew Romo's one thatI think isn't quite getting enough love,

(32:37):
Like I don't think he's on abunch of the public top one hundreds,
especially for a fantasy and I thinkI like him, but he looks really
good. And again I think someof this is like he's not quite a
one to twenty four WRC plus hitter, but it looks like he might be
ninety five to one hundred WRC pluskind of bat at peak in the bigs
and for a catcher at cors who'sgoing to play a lot like sign me.

(33:00):
Yeah, that's an exciting player tome, just offensively. I think
the biggest question was like, areyou going to continue to switch hit or
not? Because you're awful from theright side. It can't possibly be worse,
you know, just staying on theweb side. I'll say most of
my looks have been at him asa lefty right like that's what he does
the most this year early on,and I know that they have talked about

(33:23):
that, that that has been broughtup to him about him just hitting lefty.
But it's very early. He hasn'thad a lot of plate appearances,
but he's hitting three eighteen as alariety right now. Interesting. Yeah,
yeah, so maybe some improvements there, Matt so getting off of some guys
that are in you know, HiA for half a decade you went to

(33:45):
the Triple A. But a coupleof Triple A that's former B side calls
that are are doing it in TripleA right now. Andre's Traparo and Andre
Lipschiz both have a really nice seasonsof Toparo's got nine home runs, just
says ten, which is kind ofsurprising. I mean, I never really
thought of him as a guy whowould be hitting a lot of home runs

(34:06):
at least a few years ago.But I don't know, what do you
think about these two guys? Youthink they're they're gonna get any run this
year? I think both kind offall in that Luken Baker kind of range
where they're they're good hitters because defensetoo. Can he he can play a

(34:28):
corner pretty well. Yeah, yeah, I think there's a good third basement.
Yeah maybe. I mean I thinkfor this is less for for Ellipsies,
because I do think that, youknow, if there is some defense
underlying that. But like Chaparro forme, is in that same kind of
quad a corner back kind of categorywhere yeah, I think he would be

(34:50):
a slightly above average MLB bat,But if it's at first base, what
what does that production really look like? I mean a lot of the guys
that I have highlighted in Triple Ain the past are kind of like this,
like Croy Johnston, Blaine krim Sandrofabian Tersou Ornella's like all are kind
of like this kind of guy,this shape of production where maybe there's some

(35:13):
power, maybe some swinging miss althoughJaparo again I think is maybe a touch
better, more on the Blaine Krimside where he's not going to strike out
quite as much, hit the ballpretty hard, hit the ball in the
air, and get some home runs, and I like that profile a lot.
The challenge is getting the opportunity andwhen you don't have a glove,
like you can't play a corner outfieldposition, or you're stuck to first base

(35:37):
or DH those kinds of guys,I think it's tough to bank on their
production. Some will hit, youknow, like a Joey manessas who finds
that role, hits the ground runningin the majors and can hold on to
that role or even carry. Carpenteris sort of an example of this where
nobody was really on carry Carpenter inthe minors, partly because he's not a

(35:58):
very good defender, but he playedjust well enough in left and right that
he got looks out there and nowplays regularly for the Tigers. Both of
these guys smack of that to me, like good hitters with skills that I
really like, but it's going tobe challenging for them to get opportunities.
And that whole list of guys thatI said, you know, Johnson Crammed,

(36:19):
Fabian Ornellis, Lipsius, Chaparro,Baker, one of them is going
to be a good longtime DH inthe major leagues, but I don't know
which one. Spencer Horwitz is probablyanother one in this list. Like they're
all twenty five plus, they've allmade it to Triple A, they've all
had some success, and they allhave defensive question marks. Somebody from that
group is going to be a fairlylong time useful contributor in the big leagues.

(36:44):
I don't know who, you know, Like, it's hard to say
who's going to get that opportunity andwho's going to run with it. So
guys that I like to bet on, like I usually have a couple of
guys that look like this on myrosters. You know, they're great villains
for injuries. They're great throw insin trades when you're like somebody says,
I really need a near to themajor's power back, and you're like,
I got one of those, andyeah, that actually just recently happened for

(37:06):
me in a in some trade negotiations. So I like rostering this kind of
guy. And I do believe thatseeing this type of guy get some run
and then throw up a one thirtyWRC plus Luke Voight type season, that
happens, and and so I cansee it happening with either of these guys.
I forgot to mention two up top. I wanted to, Uh,
I wanted to give you a littlehigh five. You got another b sider

(37:29):
in the bigs her Bees. That'sright, it's got the call. Yeah,
number number twenty on the board.Nice work, rook, But those
are mine, like I've had quitea few this year. Yeah, yeah,
you're doing well. Do you seeMaldonado Blue saved yesterday? No I
didn't, I didn't. Yeah,yeah, you got, you kind of
got. This is kind of aone to eighty from those last two guys.

(37:49):
Matt. A couple of shortstop glovesthat I think are ticketed for the
majors or at least high probability juston the defense alone. A couple of
guys that I have thrown out inthe past offense the light bat was always,
you know, kind of a bigquestion. So fantasy wise, I
don't know how much we want toget interested about these two guys except for

(38:09):
maybe like a thirty teamer or somethinglike that. Maybe I'm under selling it
a little bit, Matt, butJeremy Revis of the Cardinals, who's in
Double A right now, they've reallykind of I feel like they've kind of
like pushed and they've given him alot of time in spring training and stuff
like that, like at least onthe surface, like putting up some numbers
this year. There's not a lotof pop. He hasn't hit a home
run. He's got like a fiftysix ISO, but he's he's hitting three

(38:34):
ZHO three on base percentage of fourh two, sitting line drives thirty one
percent. He's always hitting line linedrives at a higher percentage, striking out
sixteen percent of the time, walkingthirteen percent of the time. Like,
I gotta be honest, if youwere told me that this year Revs was
in Double A at twenty one justdoing that. I would not bet on
that at all. Been watching hima little bit. And then Noah Miller,

(38:55):
which I think we brought up alittle bit last year. He's in
Dodgers Great Lakes right now. Butman, he continued to hit this year.
He didn't hit any home runs thisweek. He still have or maybe
he did hit one. Think he'sat four at the end of last week.
He's got five home runs on theseason. He's not striking out a
lot, he's walking, He's gettingon base three sixty two clip. His
ISO's one sixty eight. Well,he's hitting line drives twenty one point seven

(39:19):
percent of the time in the airforty percent of the time. I don't
know. You mentioned you've been watchinga little bit of Miller. Two gloves,
whose offense I think has taken ajump and have gotten a little bit
more interesting. Yeah, And ofthe two, I think Miller is a
little more interesting. Even though Reevasis at double A and doing and doing
quite well, I'm skeptical of hisprofile. You know, I've said this

(39:43):
before, but if somebody has anISO of under a to Oh, that's
a really really bad sign for theirfuture production. Like, for the most
part, those guys don't even makethe major leagues because even fast guys,
if they're hitting line drives, theycan turn those into doubles that are high
enough clip or triples, and thathelps the ISO get close to one hundred,
which is like not a good ISO, but is acceptable if you do

(40:07):
other things well, like a lotof the speechters who run kind of sub
one hundred ISOs. But if you'redoing that in the lower minor leagues or
lower to mid minor leagues, sayspretty bad things about something about your production.
Right, Either you're slow and youdon't hit homers, or your bat
at ball profile is such that likeyour extra base hits are few and far

(40:27):
between. That's kind of true forReevus, But with Miller, who we've
kind of his whole reputation is thathe's a plus glove. I think that's
why the Dodgers went after him.He's sort of always been a light back
kind of hitter, but he's continuingto do the light bat things well,
not striking out, walking, hittingline drives, but he's paired it with
a few homers this year. Andhe didn't hit a homer last week,

(40:51):
but he had that four homer barragea couple weeks ago that we talked about
two in a game, which Idon't think he's ever done before, certainly
not in the pros. To me, says like, maybe there's some burgeoning
power here. He's still twenty one, he's in Great Lakes. I wonder
if he's gonna get bumped up,because you know, the guy that was
playing shortstop in Double A Austin Gothieris now bouncing around to a bunch of

(41:12):
different positions up in Oklahoma City.So I could see him get the call
up fairly soon, and maybe hedoes turn into something a little more interesting.
So while I agree generally like theseare both deeply deep cut kind of
targets a little more interested in Miller, I agree, although I kind of
wonder if Revis is better at shortstopthan Miller. But again, defense it's
so hard. I've seen Revis makelast year plays, I think, but

(41:37):
love a little flash. Yeah,and then uh man. So Wednesday we
were chadding and it was a itwas a big, full, fun day
of minor league baseball. A lotof fun Midwest league stuff. Going on
during the day, a lot ofgood pitching matchups. On of good pitching
matchups, we were listing them offto each other, and a lot of
them kind of I don't know,we're na a lot of a lot of

(41:59):
guy hot arms that wasn't their bestouting of the week and all that stuff.
And we actually, of course endedup with just one FQO that day,
Matt, and that was I gota kind of deep cut first year
player draft guy that I was into, Aaron Davenport with the Guardians, who's
now in Double A. He wentsix, four hits, one in run,

(42:20):
one walk, struck out six.I've been wanting to mention him a
few times now. Has he beenas good as I had hoped when he
was my you know, kind offirst year player draft, deep cut get
at the end of my drafts.No, he's repeated high A. But
this year when he's twenty, whenhe's twenty three and he's in Double A
and this is his first Double Atest, there's plenty of numbers that,

(42:43):
you know, aren't that exciting,but this is just a different looking Aaron
Davenport to me, Matt, inthe past, you kind of like,
I don't know, it look kindof looked like a reliever right, like
sort of NAC's effort, a lotof like energy, but he just seems
like way more slowed down now.Is kind of like that now too,
He's you see him spotting east andwest like a lot better. He was

(43:06):
the guy. Part of the intriguewas I don't think his fastball was real
great, but he had really goodsecondaries. He's got a really good curve
ball. And I was like,oh, look at this guy going to
the Guardians. They've helped a lotof guys with not a great fastball,
but good secondaries get better. AndI don't know, I had kind of
written it off like Okay, maybehere in Davenport will have a chance as
a reliever someday. But I'm kindof like, have a little Aaron Davenport

(43:29):
renaissance going on and interested the Westthe rest of the season and see if
he can continue to progress as astarter. Like he just seems like more
of a picture now to me,and more of a starting pitcher at least
trying to be. I can't sayI've watched much of Davenport. First thing
looking at his stats that popped upfor me is that it doesn't strike very
many guys out and didn't really lastyear and hasn't really this year, and

(43:52):
that, you know, is athing that gives me question about his fireability
longer term. But sure, yeah, he turned it in a great outing
this week. See from him iswhat this year all but one of his
outings, and it was close.He was at fifty eight percent, but
it was plus sixty percent strikes.You go look at some of his game
logs the past couple of seasons andyeah, he'd be good for a few

(44:14):
and then just awful for several.The Guardians are still giving him run as
a starter, And uh, yeah, I don't know enough about the boring
pitchers, and let's go back totalking about the real athletes. Our boy
Don HD in Dynasty Dugout Discord,who we play with in the League two.
He has been the biggest. Theyhave a son, Dela Santos fan

(44:37):
DDLS fan that is out there andDela Santos those of you remember he was
selected in the Rule five draft bythe Guardians, which was sort of a
head scratching pickup because they already hada guy who was really similar to DDLS
in their system in Jhen Kenzie Noel, low walk, high power, high
strikeout, young sluggers that have beenpushed up the minor league ladder which sort

(45:01):
of had defensive question mark but reallyintriguing top end power. Well, ddls
didn't stick on the major league roster. It wasn't a huge surprise, and
so he was returned back to theDiamondbacks and they stuck him back at Amarillo
again. This is now his thirdyear, ended twenty twenty two in Double

(45:22):
A and then was there all lastyear and was just okay in both those
stops, Like, strikeout rate waskind of high, really low walk rate,
and he wasn't getting to all ofthe power that he has shown.
But he is mashing, I thinkis the technical term. Thus far in
Double A. I don't really seewhat he's doing there, Like he needs

(45:43):
to be at Triple A to seeif he can handle better pitching. Consistently,
He's still the same shape of production, not walking very much. He's
limited his strikeouts a little bit though. The swing strike rate is still pretty
high, so I expect his strikeoutrate to tick up a bit more from
the twenty one point seven percent thatit is right now. The power remains
real He's got eleven homers and that'spretty good. That's pretty good at double

(46:05):
A for a twenty one year oldrock going to one eighty eight WRC plus
Babbitt's really high at over four htwo. But I just don't think there's
much for him to show at doubleA. And I'd rather see him try
and play defense in the PCL.See if he can stick at third base,
like it seems unlikely that he's goingto, but if he can play
first base and mash like this,like this is an interesting bat. Don

(46:28):
and I have bonded over this,like definitely interested in ddls in dynasty leagues,
especially those that reward hour. AndI think one of the most interesting
improvements that he's done so far isthe batted ball production looks a lot better.
He's dropped his ground ball right belowfifty percent consistently for the first time.
He'd run a sixty percent babbit ata couple of stops, but now

(46:51):
it's down to forty five point ninepercent. Again, it's still early.
These could change, but I wonderif this is related to a swing chain
that he went through towards the endof last season and that continued through a
really good spring training with the Guardiansand then a really great start to the
year with the dived back. SoI kind of am buying this a little

(47:12):
bit. And the path to walkfor this kind of player, as we
mentioned, is tough. But showingthis much power and showing this kind of
success at Double A as a twentyone year old, and I could see
him doing this at Triple A tooif he can do that, This looks
like a major league corner bat tome. And you know, Christian Walker
isn't going to be around forever inArizona. There's DH spots open Arizona two,

(47:35):
so he could be a useful batin a couple of years if he
keeps us up. So D Dls'I'm kind of buying. He's a guy
I've been interested in before but cooledon a bit as he's gone up and
Don might be onto something here.He might be DDLS might be back.
So who do you think gets ashot first, Chaparro or DDLS Chaparro.
I mean, he's got more trustworthyproduction, I'd say, right like,

(47:58):
he doesn't strike out very much,especially right now, you know he's in
Triple A showing a twenty percent strikeoutrate and walking like Chaparo does have a
good plate approach, and I wouldn'treally say that about DDLS, Like at
no stop of any length has heshown good plate discipline. And that's a
thing that tends to get exposed atat higher levels, especially in the major

(48:19):
leagues. Like that's you know,to some extent some of the Rockies problems
where if the babbitt falls and they'rebeing really aggressive and chasing a lot like
then it leads to weaker contact andsort of a cascading effect. And DLS
he doesn't really get cheated when heswings, and he swings a lot,
and so that helps keep the strikeoutrate at sort of tenable levels, but
it also means he's not walking andhe's not providing value that way. So

(48:42):
that's you know, if if wedo see some plate improvements, sort of
if he chases less and starts makinga bit more contact in the zone,
this looks like a Masher type thatand I'd be really really interested in him
as is. I'm still interested,but the plate discipline, I want to
see that if that sticks at higherlevels or for longer too. I mean,

(49:05):
it's still just been one hundred andthirty eight plate appearances this year.
Hitter I wanted to shout is anotherin this same sort of vein. I
didn't realize that this was kind ofmy theme as I was going through some
of these guys. But a firstbase only prospect was twenty five at Triple
A, hitting for some power,striking out a bit too much. Nico
Cavdas Calatas Cavadis, Yeah, ishaving a great start to the Year's cut

(49:31):
his strikeout rate. He's long beena guy who strikes out a lot but
walks a lot. And you know, I'm a three true outcome officionado.
But he's striking out, you know, twenty eight percent of the time on
the back of a nine point threepercent strikeout rate. Compare that to DDLS,
who was twenties low twenties strikeout ratein Double A with a twenty percent

(49:51):
swinging strike rate. It's sort offlipped, but it's because Cavatis walks a
lot. He's got an eighteen percentwalk rate in Triple A. Is hitting
the ball reasonably hard? You know, his top end exibilos aren't anything to
write home about, but he hitsthe ball pretty consistently hard, and so
his averages, and I think hisninetieth percentiles are a little bit better.
So again, he's another guy thatI've been interested for various reasons and then

(50:13):
cooled on a bit as he wasa little more mediocre when he got promoted
to Triple A last year as atwenty four year old. But Cavadas is
running a one ninety five WRC plusand it mostly looks legit again, higher
babbit, but the walks look great. He's getting to power, hitting forty
six percent fly balls like that's whatyou want your sluggers to do, and
it seems decent to me. Iknow Chris Klegg's pretty down on Cavadas,

(50:35):
doesn't think. He thinks he's moreof a platoon kind of bat, and
that's a hard thing to carry,leftenant hitter for a strong side of a
platoon, like they don't most teamsdon't really do that. They want their
corner guys to be masters against both, and I'm not convinced that he couldn't
play, you know, regularly againstboth. Yeah, he's just somebody,
he's off to a great start.Wanted to give him a shout because he's

(50:55):
somebody that I've rostered in places beforeas like one of the staff line type
plate discipline plus approach with good powertypes that, and again he just fits
this mold of I don't know ifhe can play defense well enough. I
don't know if he's really a platoonbat or not. It's interesting enough to
me that I take a shot onhim in deeper leagues going into last year,
I chose Juan Daniel and Canasion asmy red Sox B side arm.

(51:20):
He was a young guy and aball looked like he had a lively arm
more or less with like good frame. My generic take right, I think
I was watching DJ McCarty maybe,and and Canarsion was on the other side,
and I started watching a little bitand looks like he went a little
bit from thrower to pitcher, soto speak. And I started looking at
his season's numbers, and they're nottoo shabby. That outing he went five,

(51:43):
gave up no hits, walked oneguy, struck out six through strikes
over seventy percent three of his outings. He's thrown strikes over seventy percent of
the time. That is not JDand Canarcion in the past. I don't
think On the air twenty two innings, thirty one strikeouts, walk percentage of
eight point six x fit three pointthree eight to one point one four whip

(52:04):
Yeah, I don't know. He'sonly twenty three years old. A lot
of Red Sox arms that get someattention in the lowers, but uh JD
and Canarsion. I'm I'm gonna dosome homework on him his next starter or
two here, and you kind ofdig some more and see what's up with
him. I've watched him a littlebit, and I remember thinking that he
seems sort of like an extreme flyballpitcher. Has that been your experience watching

(52:28):
him too? I can't say thatI've watched him a whole time. Early
last year I was watching him some. He's at forty seven point one percent
right now flyball pretty that's pretty high. Yeah. I think that he's another
one that would be nice to seehim do it in Portland, you know,
get get him a promotion up todouble A. Just kind of mastered
this level and been there for agood amount of time now. So if

(52:52):
he's mastered it, it's just beenover these last five starts because I don't
think he was very good last year. Decent, you know, he wasn't
walking too many. Who's striking outa decent number. He just got pretty
unlucky on the home run and lefton base front, Like everybody who got
on scored. He's a flyball guy, and I think some of those more
of those flyballs were leaving the yard. Like he had almost a two homers

(53:14):
per nine rate, and that's reallyreally really high. Like a high rate
is you know, one point twoor something, and he was almost double
that. Like that's pretty out ofthe norm. And you know, hey,
we've talked about this before as itrelates to Brandon Fott. That's just
not a thing that tends to besticky year over year. Pitchers don't have
a lot of control over it.They have control over how many flyballs they

(53:36):
give up, both like the shapeof their arsenal and how they attack hitters
can lead to more ground balls ormore flyballs, obviously, but which of
those turn into homers isn't a hugeskill, Like it's not something that you
should attribute especially in small samples.Two pictures. So that's one, Like,
okay, it was one nine tonine, But like, is that

(53:57):
really what he's going to do allthe time, or is it going to
be closer to one, and ifit's closer to one and he strands guys
at a reasonable rate like that,he looks good picture. So anyway,
just those are the kind of trioof leck metrics that I look at for
four pictures along with Babe. Butsure, have you watched any of this
Will Johnston guy? The A's No, I don't think so. I watched

(54:19):
some of him. He's kind ofinteresting, I think, yeah. I
mean, he's crushing. He's onethat's on my two watch list, But
I just haven't watched any Yeah,I watched a little bit. I think
he's a little misleading. Maybe isyou think so what he's been doing,
I don't know. It's it's hardman like. I wish we could see
some lefties, like better angles forlefties, especially in the lowers. He's

(54:42):
a softer toss and lefty with afunky delivery. I think he's deceptive.
I think he's got a fastball ora cutter or something that you know it
misses bats somehow, whether it's youknow, rising or whatever sort of movement
right, but very much execution wise. Looks like a reliever to me,
which he was in college. He'stwenty three years old. Probably the maybe

(55:07):
the hottest name, trendiest name,the maybe the biggest splash of the week
was Zebbie Matthews in his Double Adebut. Wasn't my first look at Zebbie
Matthews, but had to say Iwas pretty darn impressed. And I know
that you had beaten me to thepunch at least in one of our leagues.
To him, what do you thinkabout ZEBI here? I like Zebby

(55:29):
quite a bit. It's hard todeny his start to the year. You
know, he's in the top fiveand KSBB four so far this year,
top five in fifth doing it splitbetween high and Double A so far.
And the thing that is maybe mostexciting is he's not walking anybody. He

(55:49):
literally has zero walks on the air. What I find to be super impressive
with that is you understand, thesethese umpires and the miners are in training
behind the plate and they are veryinconsistent from game to game, right,
and just the ability and not towalk anybody in the minor leagues for this
long of a stretch is just superimpressive to me. And you have to
adjust your strike zone to the umpireand for him to be able to do

(56:14):
that and I've seen him do itjust speaks on his ability to execute pitches
at a really high level. Yeah, and some of it is is definitely
earned. He's a bulldog like.He really does fill up the zone and
I think has a lot of confidence, especially in his force team to play
in the zone despite not having overwhelmingvelocity. He's not out there running it

(56:35):
up in the upper nineties. It'sI'm pretty sure like a ninety one to
ninety six kind of a mile anhour fastball. Yhich as a righty.
That's like kind of meh. AndI'd also be interested in some of his
advanced metrics because he looks like sortof a short strider to me, Like,
he doesn't look like a spencer striderwho gets way down the mound and

(56:55):
is coming at you with a reallyflat, like well extended fastball. So
which is interesting and I think thatit might speak he spins it like.
I think that to me looks likethat even though he doesn't get great extension
and it doesn't look like it's froma super flat arm angle. I think
he gets all of his backspin iseffective backspin, and I think he spins

(57:16):
it pretty well because he just getswhifts in the middle of the zone on
a ninety four mile in our fastballroutinely, and so he just lives there.
He'll hump that fastball right in themiddle of his zone, and he
does execute pretty well at the topwhen he gets two strikes, and he
gets bad swings on you know,ninety two or ninety three that he elevated
at or slightly above the zone.But I think his best pitch is his

(57:39):
gyro slider. He has great feelfor landing it, and I think it
plays well off of that riding fourseamer Here's that he's at this level,
just haven't really been able to adjust. It's been pretty impressive to watch him
go back to back pitches. Ninetyfour at the top gets the swing and
the miss, and the next pitchis this gyro slider that's like eighty five,

(58:01):
so pretty firm, but it justdrops straight down right into the middle
of the zone and guys just takeit for strike three because it looked like
it was going to be that samefastball above the zone and they just watch
it go by. So he's gota lot of confidence in those two pitches
for sure, and I think thoseare far and away his most used pitches,

(58:22):
especially for strikeouts, and I dothink he's kind of figured out this
is his game plan, his likePlan A, and he's doing a great
job executing it right now. SoI'm excited about him as a guy that
is really off to a great startand I think has kind of earned it.
I don't always think that is trueof pictures up to this point,
but I kind of think he has, and especially his last couple outings have

(58:45):
been phenomenal. Snagged him. Ithink it was after his last start in
High A, and so it wasnice to see him perform at Double A
as well against the Travelers there.Punched out nine in that game. He
looked great too. Like you've notedmore North South, the North South is
better than the East West execution wiseas well, I think. I know

(59:07):
I've heard some folks like hoping Onand this season's Christian Scott maybe putting words
in their mouths, but you know, execution meets pretty good stuff. I
know Kleig has talked about his stuffticking up since last year and really kind
of ascending and taking off. AndI got to say, someone who watched
good amount of Scott last year earlytwo a year ago in May, like

(59:27):
the execution is not I don't thinkon the on the same sort of level,
at least from all access of thestrike zone, if you will.
But you know, it's still justMay and what he's got five or six
starts under his belt so far thisyear. But I'm with you, man,
I'm always on the prow trying tofind guys with good stuff and the
ability to use it extremely well.And I think Zebbie Matthews is is definitely

(59:50):
up there on my list of sortof the newer guys showing out like that.
Yeah, and the fact that he'sdoing it at double A now,
like it'll be interesting, you know, the Texas this league has some pretty
good teams in it, and we'llsee if he can keep it up.
But yeah, I'm kind of convincedthat this is a real arm he's taken
either a step forward or the tweaksthat he's made are earning him this.
Like it doesn't seem like Flukes tome. Now, He's definitely not this

(01:00:15):
good, but it's encouraging when youhave a run of starts like this.
Like we talked about this, Ithink with respect to Juander Suarez at the
end of last year. When youhave a run like that at the middle
minors, it definitely gives me moreconfidence in saying that this looks like a
real change attributable to the performance,not just a lucky run. So yeah,

(01:00:35):
he's doing it in a pretty compellingway. Well, should we take
a look at the other folks trendingup this week? Matt, let's do
it. Who else is on theupswing? Johnny de Luca is still technically
a prospect, right, I don'tknow is he's doing stuff with Tampa Bay
because he's up like eighteen point threepercent this week. Came off the injured
list and had himself a really goodlook. He hit some homers hit I

(01:00:57):
think he had like a bunch ofRBIs last week. Sort of timely hitting
too. I have him in oneof my deeper leagues and he's been really,
really good. Robert Gasser, whowhat he made his debut? Right?
He's up twelve percent? Quality start? Did he? This? Notund
super shocking to me? Agreed?I like him? Now. This must
be some some rookie ball stats goingup for Brailer Guerrero with the race,

(01:01:19):
he's up seven percent. He's justa seventeen year old. Nick Gonzalez is
up five percent. Zebbie Matthews isup well six percent. Zbbie Matthews up
six percent, Alex Freelan's up threepercent. Joey Estes is up three percent.
Then did you watch any Joey Estesagainst your Mariners? There? Watch
only a bit of it. Ithink that was That was one of the
weekends starts right yeah, Saturday.Yeah, yeah, I was like in

(01:01:42):
the middle of cooking when that onewas on, so I had it on,
but I only I was only likehalf watching. I don't think he's
executing pitching as well as I've everseen him right now at the moment,
like he gave out some gave upsome really loud outs. There was some
nice luck, but dude, hetook one hundred and ten mile per hour
line drive from Julio in the firstinn off his throwing shoulder, and dude
just made the play and just wavedoff the trainer, didn't skip a beat

(01:02:06):
and went five, struck out five, gave up one run on a slider
that he left just a cookie middlemiddle to the cal rally. Joey ESEs
being Joey ESEs man. That guyhas just got balls, dude, I'm
such a fan of joey Es.I hope he crushes. I mean,
just to be honest, there aren'tmany better teams to come up and face

(01:02:27):
right now. Them Harris offense looksterrible. Yol Berdiez we've talked about,
is up three percent. You know, Ramos up three percent, Jacob Wilson
up three percent, Brett Harris uptwo percent. And you see Brett Harris
has three hits since he's been up, and they're all home runs. That
it's just like not Brett Harris.Yeah, that's that's about it. Brian
Ramos is up one and a halfpercent. I don't know is he still

(01:02:49):
hitting for the White Sex. Iknow he was off to a pretty good
start on his call up, butI haven't been saying he was a decent
start. And I actually traded himaway. You'll be interested in this deal.
One of the guys who had asort of interesting roster, fringy,
competitive like, probably was going tomake the playoffs, but then a bunch
of injuries hit in this thirty teamerand he had a big sell off this
weekend. And I've had conversations abouta bunch of his guys before, and

(01:03:14):
I ended up sending Brian Ramos anda couple of other Braden Taylor for the
Rays and somebody else decent. I'mforgetting for Nolan Jones and Tyler McGill.
So I acquired a share of NolanJones, which I felt good about buying
law on, but I was kindof sad to sell Brian Ramos. You
know, I've been a fan ofhis for a long time as somebody who
I thought was a little underrated gotsomething. He'd shown enough to be like

(01:03:37):
a solid, you know, topfifty ish hitting prospect, even with his
struggles against right handed pitching, andso when he got called up, that
helped tip that deal in my favor. And hopefully Jones comes back and is
good. But I'm excited for Ramos. I think he's going to get a
lot of run. He's probably goingto pick up second base eligibility pretty soon,
and I think I think he'll haveadjustments. He's still really really young

(01:04:00):
or something like that. Yeah,as long as he's doing okay, I
expect the White Sox to give Ramosquite a bit of run. So I
was sad to see him go,but it was a trade that made sense
for me. Well, Matt thehottest team in baseball just got a little
bit hotter because they just beat thePadres five to four. Hey, Machado
was up in the bottom of theninth with the bases loaded one out and

(01:04:21):
got them the ground into a doubleplay. Nice work. What nine eight
more game road trips. So I'mjust gonna enjoy this well I can,
because the depression could be coming backat any moment. At any moment,
but let's look ahead to this weekin the miners Matt in the International League,
I'm thinking my eyes might go toOmaha at Saint Paul. I know

(01:04:45):
a guy that you've talked about quitea bit to Shaun Cercy, some grumblings,
some mumblings about him maybe getting someMLB run And I started the year
like the remember I talked about himand Joiner for Haardo as like kind of
similar shape production of like guys thatcould play defense and maybe some interesting power
speed combo. Except Cursey's been waybetter than the heart of up to this

(01:05:09):
point. Yeah, so I'm gonnaflip the coin wrong. And I've been
a fan of Cursey since he wasat college at Utah. He was Utah's
best player back in the day,and I got to watch him quite a
bit, and I'm yet to watchI know you first mentioned him during spring
training in kind of a who thehell is this guy sort of way,
but I'm yet to watch Walter Penningtonof Omaha, who is still thinks striking

(01:05:30):
a bunch of people out, SoI don't know what that's all about.
So maybe I should watch some ofhim, but I don't know. It's
hard. It's hard for me toget to the Triple A. You hate
the Triple A. I like itbecause you could watch most of the feeds
are decent, and you have thestack Cast data, so I love that
combo. Like I often have livefeed, Game Day and the stack cast
feed all up together because I feellike that. I don't know, you

(01:05:50):
just get a lot of information.That's great, That's right. I mean
I definitely do that with like Joeyes this and stuff like that, and
pcl Reno at Round Rock. Idon't know, Delcastillo has been really hot.
Taparo, you know, I don'tknow, Krim, maybe see some
see some long balls. Eastern LeagueEerie at Harrisburg, the Nats called Andre

(01:06:11):
Laura up to double A. Iwatched a bit of him this week,
and I know he's having a niceyear. It was still just like very
Yeah, I don't know, man, I don't know how excited I am,
but but you have to have toget props. He's he's much improved
than he was a couple of yearsago. I know that. And I
haven't watched any Brady House yet thisyear or you know, Handy or Pinkney

(01:06:32):
like at all, and I knowHouses off to a start. Pinckney had
a really hot, hot week,and I don't think I've watched much of
Eerie and curious to see if DraydanHam's up there this week. Yeah,
that'd be fun. Southern League.I think I'm gonna, you know,
Southern League smaller and it One thingabout the Southern League too that maybe I
didn't really realize until this year isthere's a lot of bad angles in this

(01:06:54):
small league. For Double A,it's kind of a tough watch. But
Rocket City is at Tennessee and Ithink it might be time for me to
really get into a Dana start andjust get really nerd out on it again.
Heard some interesting lineup is pretty goodtoo. Yeah, despite what some
might say, I think the Smokey'slineup is a really good test and who

(01:07:14):
knows, maybe we get Pinango inthat lineup this week. Maybe just real
quick on that Smoky's lineup. MoissBy Asteros is just hitting the absolute piss
out of the ball, and Istill think he's underrated. I mean he
he to me is looking like everybodywas saying Samuel Basio was going to be.
I think he's got a great playedapproach and he's huge and probably not

(01:07:36):
a catcher, but boy, canthat guy hit. He's got a lot
of weight to put into it.You know, he's got a lot of
masks. Boy, Yeah. Yeah. In the Texas League, I was
thinking maybe Midland at Springfield no ourb side bat's Cooper Bowman, then Brennan
Malone had really big weeks. Iwas curious to see if one of them

(01:07:58):
was going to win Texas League hitor the week. I'm sure that'll come
out tomorrow, see if they cankeep it going versus you know, Roch
Sick and Badel and I guess TinkKentz, who is kind of just being
a booger again. So Matt,I gave him props. Matt. Ever
since he's just been the same oldsal League Brooklyn at Bowling Green. I'm
thinking maybe Xavier Isaac has had somehas kind of led some really hot Bowling

(01:08:24):
Green bats that I'm not super familiarwith, but just looking at the week
stats had some monster weeks versus Tonde la Cruz Oreana, who have been
racking up big k numbers and thoseare I've watched tong, but those other
two I haven't seen too much.Kind of want to maybe check them out
and see what they're about. NorthwestLeague again, slim pickens Vancouver at Spokane

(01:08:44):
is really kind of the only goodlook, so I guess that's the choice
by default. I was watching ayoung Victor Horrez. We talked about last
week a little bit here, likeis I don't know eight k's and like
five innings or something like that,but watch him and Sullivan Dolander again versus
I guess, maybe the worst lineupin the league. Vancouver watched Olunder throw
up an egg after being nails tostart the year, and he faces a

(01:09:08):
really bad lineup. Finally it justgets rocked right right, That's how it
goes. Midwest League. I meanthe two teams. I've probably been watching
a ton of Midwest League, butLake County and Lansing have been probably the
two teams I've been watching the most, and they play each other this week,
so I just assume tune into themost, uh you know, Sullivan
versus Cafus and Mooney and this,uh that Johnston pitcher is getting called up

(01:09:30):
to Lansing now, so we wouldget another decent look at him. I
know there's a couple of decent anglesin that league, but man, it's
fun having Cafus and Mooney like hittinglike right next to each other in that
lineup. It's such a you guyand a me guy, and they're both
having really really good seasons. ButI mean, Mooney's clearly better. But
the Carolina League, Charleston at Columbiabound to have some good pitching matchups there

(01:09:54):
with like Arondez Pattison, Bosacker versuslike Sworez, Gil Hill Wild some in
that week, there's gonna be agood pitching matchup. I think Florida State
League, I'm thinking Jupiter at Dunedin. Maybe let's get a look at White
and Meyer, who you know,weren't broadcast this last week, and I
think that maybe the last two weeksthey haven't been I want to watch this

(01:10:14):
Perez kid again for Toronto, onlyseen very little and then the Cal League
maybe San Jose at Modesto again,want to see, you know, if
Whitman's supposed to be this advance leftyarm, that could be kind of a
nice test versus with a Wolt andMontes who they need a test man that
keeps chugging along. Emerson had apretty good week that series. Last week,

(01:10:35):
back half of the series was thebetter Fresno pitchers, and I don't
think they did quite as well,but they kind of beat up the first
three games. I still think theydid pretty well and it was not as
much loud contact, but like theywere earning walks like Fermelo, Cole and
Montes all I think had multi walkgames like towards the end of the week,

(01:10:57):
and that, you know, isencouraging because as we had noted,
there are some decent pitchers in thatyeah present rotation, and they've been pitching
really well. So I still thinkthey quitted themselves against decent competition there.
Yeah they're good, man, Thosetwo guys are good. But yeah,
you can follow me along on Twitterat Pitching Specs posting some video, some
stuff that maybe we'll talk about onthe podcast here. But next week,

(01:11:20):
Matt, I don't know, Imight have to get a haircut, maybe
xfoliates a little bit, because we'regoing to get pretty we're talking pretty boys
next week. I think what wemight do is I think Matt might share
his top twenty hitting prospects for Dynasty, and I think I might share my
top twenty pitching prospects for Dynasty.And we will share the list, and

(01:11:41):
I will tell him that where he'sgot it wrong or right and vice versa
or something like that. Sound goodto you, Yeah, sounds fun.
Get into some of these pretty boysand maybe for what we can, like
one week promote this, like we'llget all our get some new listeners as
we're talking about relevant twelve team mixkind of redraft prospects, and then the
next week when people tune in,they're like they're talking about some teenager and

(01:12:05):
a ball, like what about listeningto But yeah, we'll let Chicago Farmer
take us out. Tune in nextweek for the Pretty Boy podcast. Be
well, Bye Bye house. Anhour riding to his head, he hopped
down first, but the lumpbone hisface and on the very next pitch he

(01:12:30):
up and stole second face with gradestspeed. He wasn't born. He had
the dirty Yes Uniforne