May 28, 2024 • 60 mins
On this week's episode of the Razzball Fantasy Baseball Podcast, Grey and B_Don do their best to support each other through these tough times as the #1 player from 2023, Ronald Acuña Jr., has received some terrible injury news. What does it mean for the Braves lineup and who might be coming in for more playing time?
As we’ve reached a third of the way through the season, the guys discuss how you might approach players that are not performing up to standards. Julio Rodriguez hasn’t performed up to his high standards, but both of us are shocked about the Mariners choice to move him in the lineup. JRod was once the hot call up, but are there any prospects this year that you should be rostering to get ahead of the impending FAAB spending.
We go through some of the AL east pitching to discuss a couple of possible breakouts in Clarke Schmidt and Tanner Houck. The Orioles had their rotation shaken up due to injury, but are there any opportunities to take advantage of in their replacements. The show ends as usual with some bullpen SAGNOF talk, waiver wire pickups, and streaming options.
As we’ve reached a third of the way through the season, the guys discuss how you might approach players that are not performing up to standards. Julio Rodriguez hasn’t performed up to his high standards, but both of us are shocked about the Mariners choice to move him in the lineup. JRod was once the hot call up, but are there any prospects this year that you should be rostering to get ahead of the impending FAAB spending.
We go through some of the AL east pitching to discuss a couple of possible breakouts in Clarke Schmidt and Tanner Houck. The Orioles had their rotation shaken up due to injury, but are there any opportunities to take advantage of in their replacements. The show ends as usual with some bullpen SAGNOF talk, waiver wire pickups, and streaming options.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:12):
You like fantasy balls sans chasm thatI shall not me hear myself stand spans
and they can't even count some ofuniforcasom surround. It ain't even better the
health, Well, ye have severalcharges on everyone something else And I'm already
I'm to hear my baby sound justlike your name was, Mark. And
(00:33):
it's a rhyde By podcast. It'sa rapp podcast. It's a rap bop
podcast. It's a ride bo podcast. It's a rapp podcast at a rap
up podcast, at a turn rapbob podcast. Hey, everybody, welcome
(01:08):
back into the Raspball Fantasy Baseball Podcast. I am beat On, joined by
the Great Fantasy Master Authority himself.Great, alright, how's it going over
there? Grey? Not good?Beat On? Not good at all?
Yeah? Are you are you emotionallyhandling it? Okay? Are you?
(01:29):
Are you? Do we need tosend anybody to you? Do we need
to send an extra pet your directionfor support? No. So we're recording
this right after the Ronald Lacuna Juniorinjury. And I'm a little bit I'm
a little bit ver clemmed. I'llbe honest, not good man, you
(01:52):
know what honestly like what's going on, bro? What's going on with the
injury? Man? What is like? I saw the I saw him go
down. So I saw Ronald AcunyaJunior go down in a in a heap
right by by the second base bagin the Braves Pirates game and then they
(02:13):
just let him lay there and theydidn't bring out a cart or anything.
What are they doing? Man?Like? Why are they letting him walk
off the field? Also got alot of thoughts right Also, what's the
deal with it now being a differentknee than the one he had surgery on?
(02:34):
How many proms and this guy havewith knees? Man? What's going
on with that? What? Wait? Are we happy he only has two
knees? Is that? What's goingon? I mean? I wish he
had like six of them right now, because then maybe would we could just
throw one away and be done withit. It didn't look good. Actually
(02:57):
that's a good point. He shouldhave more knees. Yeah, give him
more knees. Grey like Kimmy,can you sacrifice some old people knees?
That so okay, So not exactlya doctor, but listen to this idea.
So like how Tommy John takes thetakes the the thing from the the
(03:17):
other part of the arm or theleg or wherever he takes it from and
puts it in the elbow. Right, what if we took Ronald Kunya's elbow
and we made another knee out ofit? M h, you might be
onto something there if we can stretchit out far enough. I think,
(03:38):
Oh, okay, what if wehad what if okay, Ronald Counyan's got
he seems like he's got pretty goodankles, right, so what if we
took one of his ankles and madeit into a knee? M what if?
How about that? Grace, staystay with me. What if we
just use Ronald o'cunya and showy Otanitogether and that way you get healthy knees,
(04:01):
healthy arm, and then you justget a super player. Oh and
then okay, so then uh sothat was my my first pick of the
draft. I take show Hey Akunyajunior. Yep, that would that would
be how it would work, right, although there might need to be like
six of them just to make itfair, like you might have to give
(04:26):
so okay, tell me actually solisten to uh the previous podcast. Uh
be Don was sick of removing mytyping from the podcast. So he bought
me a silent keyboard. Right,So I'm going to go on to Google
right now and I'm going to googlewhat's going on if I roster Ronald Acuna
(04:51):
Junior in a fantasy league. Holdon, let me see I'm typing right
now. You can't hear it becauseit's a silent keyboard. Uh, Google
AI says to climb onto a chairwith a rope, then hang the rope
from a light fixture and make anews Wait what what the what the hell
(05:15):
is Google a telling me? Idon't I don't know, right, I
don't know about this Google thing.I think Google, it's more threatening the
closer you get the home base.I think that's what it is. You
know, far enough away, it'sstill polite here. You're you're way too
close to I don't know, man, I don't know about this whole AI
(05:39):
thing. Man, Google AI,what are you telling me? Yeah?
Man, this is a this isthis is a bummer, right we are.
We are literally recording this like beforewe have any information. So,
I mean, I guess hopefully hisknee is okay. I don't know,
(06:00):
maybe is it. It's a goodthing that it wasn't the same knee.
Maybe. I don't know if that'sa good thing or a bad thing,
to be honest, I don't know. It seems like a terrible thing either
way. But hopefully we're gonna wakeup on Monday and uh and hear that
he's fine. I don't know.It seems bad though. Yeah, hopefully
(06:21):
everything's okay and he'll be back inand nothing, nothing terrible happens. I
mean, I guess in if wejust assume he's going to miss at least
sometime Gray, whether that is amen o my Ale stint or a longer
Iyel stint. What do we Whatdo you think in regards to the lineup,
(06:44):
who's who's getting more playing time?Like do we think everybody just moves
up one? Do we think MichaelHarris moves to one? Or does Albie's
move to one Harris drops or movesto two? What do you what's your
best guess in regards to happens withthe lineup? Well, I would assume
that Clinic who was kind of doingnothing really until about maybe I think Tuesday
(07:12):
or Wednesday of last week, heseemed to get hot recently. I think
he went three for four in Sunday'sgame, so clinic should I would guess
that he becomes somewhat of a fulltime guy. Duval. I would assume
Duval sees more at bats because andDuval he could potentially have you know,
(07:35):
he could he he could potentially havesome some value in deeper leagues. Harris
would probably go to lead off,like you said, I would get.
I would assume alb stays at two. Austin Riley is is day to day
until September. From from what I'mhearing, Austin Riley is, Austin Riley
(07:59):
is going to go on to thesixty day IL after being day to day
for fifty nine days. Matt Olsen, you know, he stays in the
same Actually, Marcelo Zuna, oddlyenough, is like the only Braves hitter
who's actually doing anything this year.So, you know, when we went
(08:20):
into the season, in the preseason, it looked like the Braves lineup was
gonna be one of the best onesin the league. And you know,
it could still come out of itsearly season funk. But man, it's
like Ozuna and then nothing else.Albi's and Riley have looked terrible. What
you call it? Olsen has pickedit up a little bit of late,
(08:43):
but still like hitting two thirty withI think eight homers, like not doing
much of anything. Not a goodlineup so far this year. But yeah,
I would assume Harris moves up,Clinic gets close to every day uh
at bats now and and and Duvalwill probably get some more at bats as
(09:05):
well. Yeah, I think Daval'sprobably the one who maybe gets more playing
time out of this. I meanhim and Ozuna both are pretty terrible in
regards to fielding, but Duval atleast still can can move around a little
bit, so I would assume hegets over to left field, and then
as you mentioned, Clinic probably shiftsover to center. So I would agree
(09:28):
with those thoughts. Let's, uh, let's move over to something maybe a
little bit more entertaining for you.There was a I guess a story out
about South Prez and his his trackfor Hall of Fame Gray that you want
to talk about, Oh, yeah, no, someone on the MLB Network,
(09:48):
which is it's interesting that, like, I don't really follow other sports,
as most people know, so Idon't know this for a fact,
but it feels like the MLB Networkis run and showcases a lot of voices
that don't really know baseball, whichis weird for the MLB Network. I
(10:09):
don't know if that's a thing thathappens in other sports, but it seems
like MLB Network has a bunch ofpeople who are like, I don't really
know baseball. Yeah. So anyway, there was something on the MLB Network
about how sal Perez is a Hallof Famer because he had five Gold Gloves
(10:31):
and he only is like he's onlymissing Ivan Rodriguez, Pudge. Rodriguez is
homer his career homers by like sixtyor something, and it's like sal Perez
basically needs And they were saying thatsal Perez is a Hall of Famer for
(10:52):
these reasons. That was the reasonsthey were giving. They were like,
sal Perez is a Hall of Famer. Here's the reasons why he has five
gold gloves. To Ivan Rodriguez isI think thirteen and he has like,
you know, so many homers andonly sixty less homers than Ivan Rodriguez.
And it's like, yeah, Imean, south Prez would basically need to
(11:16):
do like another full career to comeanywhere close to what the catcher that Ivan
Rodriguez was. I mean, youknow, even if maybe there was peds
involved there, but still it's likethat's a ludicrous thing to compare. To
compare him five gold gloves versus thirteengold gloves is like salth Perez would have
(11:39):
to play until he's about one hundredand fifty and not lose any sort of
age, decline to get anywhere closeto thirteen gold gloves. And he's also
like almost sixty homers behind Ivan Rodriguez, and like you know, south Prez
is like maybe good for say twentyseven to thirty homers this year, maybe
(12:03):
twenty five homers next year, maybetwenty homers the year. I mean,
and at that point he'd be likethirty seven years old. It's like it's
the most ludicrous argument that they weremaking on MLB network that sal Prez is
a Hall of Famer. I mean, it's like, honestly, I'm all
for a big haul, like Idon't care if they put him in really,
(12:24):
but to compare him to Ivan Rodriguez, because like Rodriguez had thirteen gold
gloves and soal Prez has five,it's like he's nowhere near him and gold
gloves are such it's such a stupidstat to begin with to even to even
use for the Hall of Fame.It's just like I don't know anyway.
(12:46):
This is like I just I justhappen to see that and joke crazy.
Yeah, so we get you sometime to rant there, and you know
it. War isn't a perfect statby any means, but you know,
just as a base here, WillSmith in his shorten much shorter career already
(13:07):
has a higher career war than selPrez. So like, if we're trying
to draw a line of where catchersget in, it's it's got to be
a lot higher than like one hundredand seventh overall in war. I think.
So yeah, I didn't and usinggo gloves should never be I mean,
(13:28):
we should just get rid of goldgloves honestly, if we're not gonna
have people who know what they're doing. But like, it's so stupid if
you think about it. It's like, how do you like you look at
gold gloves like as a benchmark forthe Hall of Fame? Uh, And
the glow glove is given by likenot an arbitrary body. It's like the
(13:50):
goal it's basically like a non arbitrarybody is awarding one award and then using
that award to award a player anotheraward. It's like, this is like
all this is all made up,like a gold glove. It's like it's
nice for I guess a guy's like, you know, man cave, but
(14:11):
it doesn't really mean anything. Imean, you know, it's like,
how how important are gold gloves?Even? It's just the dumbest thing to
look at anyway. Let's driving mecrazy. I mean, I'm sure if
we looked at ballots, there wassomebody who voted for like Greg Maddox after
Greg Maddocks retired, just because itwas exactly it's default to put Greg Maddocks
(14:33):
in his ass the gold glove ontheir voting ball not to mentionine how many
people gold gloves and they think thatthey're awarding a silver slugger. They're like,
oh, I mean he hit alot of homers, so I award
him the gold glove. It's like, wait, what is that doing anything.
It's like Derek Jater hit a highaffranche. That's got to mean he's
good on defense. It's so dumb, and then you use that in order
(14:56):
to award someone in the Hall ofFame. It's like it's like you're making
up fake awards to give someone elsea different fake award, Like okay,
anyway, all right, Greg,let's go ahead and move on to some
fantasy baseball stuff. And you know, we're we're about a third of the
way through the season for for us, and you know where, whether you're
(15:18):
at the top of your league orthe bottom year league, you definitely have
some guys you aren't performing to thelevel that we that you wanted. So
what are you doing with some ofthose slower moving guys, you know,
you know, reach into that thatgigantic brain years and pull some pull some
pearls of wisdom out for us?Gray, I was just actually putting my
(15:46):
elbow on eBay for Ronald Acunya tobuy and use as his knee, So
I had to go through some uhsome online paperwork. As they say,
yeah, so's it's basically at thispoint, right, we're about a third
of the way through. You're gonnahave to be a little bit cutty,
(16:10):
right, You're gonna be a littlebit judgy, a little bit cutty when
it comes to players who are underperforming. I think you know, I
mean, like, for instance,Dansby Swanson, he's at three hundred and
thirteen on the player raider, right, it depends, like this is a
bit of a hedge, a littlebit of a you know, it's a
(16:30):
little bit of a cop out ofan answer, but it depends on the
league, right, So like DansbySwanson, for instance, at Dancy Swanson
at like three thirteen overall in theplay raider, Like if you're in a
shallow league, that's the kind ofguy where like you can move on there.
Under him though, is like AustinRiley who we mentioned earlier. Austin
(16:53):
Riley is actually under him, butI wouldn't drop Austin Riley, right,
I would try hold there. Soit depends like it depends on the league.
But then there's also like in adeeper league, like in a fifteen
team mix league, I wouldn't necessarilydrop Dansby Swanson. So it's like it
it really depends on the league andthe player kind of. But yeah,
(17:17):
so I don't know, it's abit of a cop out, but that's
my feelings on it. Yeah,And I mean I think there's you know,
there's kind of the sliding scale ofwhat did it cost to draft them
as well, you know, ifthey're a top five round guy or so,
like it's really a lot harder todrop those guys is whether you're performing
(17:37):
well or not performing well. Thoseare also the guys that are going to,
you know, help you get ittogether. Yeah. True, So,
I mean I definitely think there's abalancing act, and it definitely depends
on, like you said, whatsize of league, what type of league,
how many roster spots, all ofthat. But yeah, I mean
(17:57):
you're you're looking at your roster andseeing if they're actually going to help you.
And I do think if you're ina stronger position that allows you to
wait it out on some of thoseguys, Whereas you know, if you're
struggling, you need to move onyou just start getting stats immediately when I
mean it's trading them or just outrightletting them go and grabbing whoever's hot that
(18:19):
at that time. Yeah, no, completely. You know, it's like
championships are won and lost on whenyou're dropping people. You know, that's
I sound like a Pac ten coachhere, but man, championships are won
and lost by when you're cutting playersfrom your fantasy team. It's true though,
(18:41):
like this, I think this pastFriday, I was saying on ras
ball, like, you know,Nick Castliano's feels cut a ball, right,
And then he went to Cores andhe hit two homers out of three
games, and it's like, well, I mean, I probably wouldn't have
cut them for he was going toCours, right, But that doesn't that
(19:03):
doesn't fix everything. So it's like, I mean, I would probably because
who knows maybe coming out of course, you know, Cassilianos is now hot,
so I would I would maybe holdfor a little bit, like for
like a couple of days in adaily league, maybe for one more week
in a weekly league. But Cassilianusis really he's been real cutable for a
(19:27):
while. Like we've seen a badseason from him two years ago. I
do not trust him to come outof it. His his peripherals look awful.
But you know, again going backto the cop out hedge answer,
it's like, if the league isdeep, you kind of have to ride
(19:47):
it out, can't. You can'tdrop him in every league. Yeah,
let's look at like something in therealm of our RcLs gray, like somebody
like Evan Carter who obviously is notperforming, like he's gotta go right,
and NRCL you can't. You can'tcontinue to wait around if you're struggling,
(20:08):
or is that somebody that you wouldhang on to? No, you gotta
you gotta cut Evan Carter. Yeah, right, Evan Carter. Somebody like
Austin Riley. You're not I meanthey they're staying around like you're you're crashing.
He's crashing with you. Yeah,yeah, if he's crashing like my
WiFi. Yeah, you're going downwith the ship with Austin Riley. Unfortunately,
(20:33):
but like, okay, so anotherguy like on uh, I think
it was Friday, Julio Rodriguez wasdropped down to the sixth hole in the
Mariners lineup, and that was drivingme crazy because I felt like, you
know, like when Aaron Judge wasslumping in April the Yankee, the Yankees
didn't drop him down in the lineup, like you gotta like ride or die
(20:53):
with certain players on your team.And I felt like it was like,
you know, the upping Julio Rodriguezin a lineup could he easily turned into
him beingcome bitter and the slump prolongingand and things getting worse. Now he
did end up homering on Saturday andthen again and then again on Sunday,
(21:14):
and he was moved up to thethree hole after Saturday, which you know
is another like stupid thing, Likewhat's the logic there, Like if he
if he would have homered on Thursday, he wouldn't have gotten dropped down to
the sixth hole on Friday, Likewhat, what's one Homer? That's so
dumb. I mean, it's reallyit's really stupid if you stop to think
about it. But anyway, JulioRodriguez did Homer on Saturday and Sunday,
(21:37):
and I was saying on Friday hefelt like one of the biggest by low
guys because his stack cast looks incredible, like Julio Rodriga's looks really good under
the hood. So I was buyingon Julio Rodriguez and now he's Homer twice,
And yeah, I mean I thinkJulio Rodrigue is gonna be fine,
like I would. I would stillbe buying him if he if his price
(22:00):
didn't go up too high. Butyeah, like that was that was one
whereas like like certain guys you gottaride and die with, and Hulu Rodrigoz
was definitely a ride or die Yeah, definitely, I mean, definitely in
our game, and even more soyou feel like in like real baseball,
I know that it's just maybe amanager thing where you move a guy and
(22:22):
all of a sudden you're like,oh, he's hitting, and so it
worked, Whereas it's probably just atiming thing. He got the right matchups,
those kind of things, and youjust clicks in there. Certain guys
definitely hit better in certain you know, batting order spots, but it's like
Tulio Rodriguez, like let him,let him figure it out, like he
(22:45):
is the franchise for you. Justjust leave him be, as you mentioned
like Aaron Judge, who definitely hasmore of a track record and everything.
But at the same time, ifwe're just talking about strugglers, like you
would have put him in that samecategory. Yankee's left him there. Now
you know, he's just absolutely mashing. I expect Julio is going to be,
(23:06):
you know, back to his normalself and hitting home runs again sooner
around later. Yeah, agreed,all right, Gray, Speaking of Atlanta,
they're just having all sorts of funthings. They sit. Bryce elder
Down brought up a j Smith shover. He started a game and actually looked
(23:26):
pretty good. Then goes on theil after the game. They've now called
up ray Kerr. It looks likeit could be any kind of mix of
Kerr, maybe Darius Fines, maybethe combination of them. They could bring
Bryce Elder back up. Dylan Dodd'sbeen performing in the minors. What are
you doing with the back end ofthe Braves rotation if you're looking at potentially,
(23:51):
you know, streaming in e ofthese guys or looking at them in
deeper leagues. First off, ifyou're Ray Kerr, how do you not
go by Raymond Kerr and then havethe nickname Perry Mason. It's like that's
obvious, man. I mean,I can help people so much here.
(24:11):
I think, actually, I thinkeveryone that the Braves are now everything the
Braves touched now I think is pollutedlike Michelle Pfeiffer's womb and scarface. And
I'm not interested at all. Iused to be mister, like, you
know what, whenever the Braves touchis gold as far as like the fifth
(24:32):
starter goes with like many like manyyears of just random guys coming out of
nowhere and being good. But nowI don't know, man, the Braves
are really struggling. I you know, Ray Kerr, he doesn't. I
don't know. He looks fine.I guess for like n Now only he
(24:52):
looks like he's got good strikeouts.He kind of looks like a middle reliever,
to be honest, and Vine's Vinesimilarly. So, yeah, I
don't like in mixed leagues. Idon't think there's anything really here unless Elder
comes back and has uh, youknow, it looks better than he was
looking, you know, in hisfirst and so I don't know, but
(25:15):
yeah, yeah, I mean,I honestly think they're they're like, nobody
that takes that job over is gonnabe very interesting. Maybe the most interesting
is just bringing Bryce Elder back upbecause of what he did last year and
just letting him kind of write itout. But as you've mentioned many many
times before on the podcast, theBraves fit starter just kind of has a
(25:38):
season and then maybe doesn't ever repeatthat, so that that might be Bryce
Elder. I don't know. Yeah, So I don't think there's much here.
Gray. In the Atlanta back endof the rotation, they all seem
you said, like, it doesseem like a lot of you know,
strong middle relievers potentially or even longrelievers that they can combine. But I
(26:02):
don't know that any of them areare really built for our game. Let's
talk about some of the top stasheshere Gray as we're looking for. You
know, June is is typically acall up time for prospects. The Super
two starts to hit somewhere in June. You know, it's obviously a mystery.
It's kind of like taxes. Theyjust kind of expect you to know
(26:26):
when it is. They don't actuallytell you, Oh, here's just here's
Super two day. It's you know, you call everybody up. We're just
we're just waiting. But who aresome of those names that you're looking at
at potentially putting on your roster,uh, and and waiting to see when
they're getting called up and maybe gettingahead of the fab bidding war that that's
going to ensue. Oh okay,So I think, uh, Junior Camino
(26:49):
Community commanding your com commic coma comiccommon comic Commune Neo. I think I
think Junior come and come and comeand come coma come. I think he's
probably uh. I think he's probablycoming up at some point, I would
think, because the rays have alreadystarted his clock, so you would think
(27:11):
he would be called up. Imean that would be my guess. James
would I you know, I hearfrom I hear from people that James Wood
is up by no later than Junefirst, So I mean I have to
assume, you know, you canonly take people at their word. And
you know, the people were tellingme James Wood is coming up, so
(27:33):
I gotta assume he's coming up.Also, I think, you know,
Jason Dominguez the Yankees uh prospect.I mean, he was up already last
year, looked good. I don'treally know how the playing time is gonna
work out exactly for that, becauseI mean I would assume Dimingez is definitely
gonna be playing every day. Imean, I wouldn't be shocked if you
(27:57):
know, the Yankees make a trainaid, not not with Domingez necessarily,
but they they make a trade tofree up a spot maybe in their lineup,
or you know, at some pointgion Carlo is gonna get injured,
so that would open up the dH spot. It's just so weird,
like the Verdugo signing or excuse me, trade never really made any sense to
(28:21):
begin with in the pre in thepreseason, so now they have too many
bats. I don't know, Imean, I'm assuming Dimingez is back no
later than the All Star break,right, I mean he has to be.
And then I would guess Jackson Holidayis coming back shortly, right,
I think he's I think Jackson Holidaysprobably you know, due to return.
(28:45):
I don't know if I would necessarilylike for so for most leagues, I
would be sitting on wood and comecoming, come, come, a coming
commie in the coming junior community communia. My Spanish cavin aro. My Spanish
is so good. I took thirteenyears of Spanish, and this is like,
(29:08):
see most people hear me and they'relike, he can't really speak Spanish.
But actually you're the one who youcan't hear Spanish. That's your problem,
that's my problem. So yeah,James would uh comany euro the mingos.
I guess I don't know if i'dbe stashing necessarily anyone else. Like
(29:30):
I liked Kobe Mayo up until abouta week ago until he was hurt.
Oh I did a rhyme. Youdidn't even know I was gonna do a
little rhyme there. Uh yeah,So Mayo hurt his ribs. So yeah,
he's he's now he's no longer onmy radar because the Oreos didn't really
(29:52):
need anyone anyway, so that wasalready a bit of a stretch. But
yeah, I would say probably CameraReno and Wold are the two big ones.
I'd be stashy right now. Yeah, I think they're guys that you
definitely try and get ahead of it. As you mentioned, like would seems
like he's coming. Caman Arrows shouldbe as well, especially with like that
(30:17):
offense not really performing like it didlast year, so there's definitely room to
fit. I think, you knowboth those guys. You know, I
have Jackson Holiday in some leagues whereI drafted him, and I'm just I'm
holding in you know, that situationjust kind of is what it is.
I'm just waiting for him to comeback. They don't really need him,
and he hasn't. He hasn't particularlylit it up since going back down.
(30:41):
But I feel like we know whathe is talent level is, and he
should be back at some point.Just they like Jorge Mateo and he's playing
fine right now. Jordan Westburg's obviouslyplaying great, so there's just there needs
to be somebody that falls off kindof at this point for him to come
(31:02):
up. Whereas before it was reallylike his job to have and to take.
So that's that's the feeling that itgives me right now. And holding
Jackson Holliday, I'm almost just waitingfor an injury, which feels bad m
bad person. Yeah. Yeah.Speaking of the Orioles, their rotation had
(31:26):
a bit of a issue. Theylost two pictures Dean Kramer and John Means.
I think on back to back dayswent to the il Cole Irvin Albert
Swarez likely go back into the rotation. They've been in it. John Heasley,
he's had a spot before. I'mnot sure if they'll go back to
(31:48):
that option or not. There's afew other things going on and then uh,
actually, as we're recording here onSunday, which is day earlier than
we normally do, Kyle Bradish isdoing great things over right, Well he
was. He did have a nohitter, but then Danny Columbey came in
and the first guy he faced,he gave up a home run to men
Dick. You can you can beepthat out later. Uh, by the
(32:15):
way, is there any is thereno hitter? Like if a guy is
throwing like I think I said thison the rast ball already, But like,
if you're throwing a no hitter andyou're and you're not throwing a Maddox,
which is under one hundred pitches fora complete game, right, I
don't know if you're ever gonna beable to throw. I don't know if
(32:36):
we're ever going to see a nohitter again with like a lot of pitches.
Like it doesn't seem possible anymore.I don't know. I mean,
I know Bradish was coming back froman injury, so they're they were trying
to baby him a little bit,But yeah, he got pulled at seven
innings of no hit ball. It'slike, that's crazy. I don't think
(32:59):
like three even five maybe pre twothousand and five, how many pitchers were
pulled with a no hitter. It'sseven innings or less. It's gotta be
very few, very few, right, I mean, like, yeah,
like seven innings of no hit balland you get pulled like, I mean,
(33:20):
you're not even get like I couldsee like if you're like eight and
two thirds and you're up to onehundred and twenty five innings, I mean,
excuse me, one hundred and twentyfive pitches and the managers looking at
the coaches, and the coaches arelooking the managers like, do we let
them throw up to one hundred andthirty pitches? Ah? Okay, let's
do it. Let's go for itnow. It's like seven innings. Yeah,
(33:44):
it's enough enough, man, onehundred and one hundred and two hundred
and three. Yep, get himout of there. No good question anymore.
It's like, oh yeah, seveninnings. Yeah, no, I'm
sorry, man, that's a lotby anyway. Yeah, I think,
(34:04):
uh, sure, as I thinkhas streamer potential. Co Irving. I
know, the streaminator I think actuallylikes co irving a little bit this week,
a little cole irving. I thinka little bit this week. The
streamingtor likes it. But yeah,they're streamers. I don't know, is
(34:27):
looks a little bit more interesting thanthe other ones, but I'm not I'm
not really interested. Yeah, II look, he really liked the Orioles
pitching staff, like I have,like going back a couple of seasons,
and and so I just, uh, I think they're streamers. I don't
(34:47):
think they're more than that. ButI do like them as streaming options,
you know, against not not badmatchups, you know, even kind of
middle of the road matchups. Ithink you're you're okay running them out there,
really as long as the ballpark's nottoo bad. Let's talk about some
pictures that you you definitely want tostart for now, and that is Clark
Schmidt, who is breaking out great. He has ten starts, fifty five
(35:12):
to two thirds inding, and hehas a two five ninety area one one
three whip twenty k rate, sevenand a half percent walk rate. Is
is the Clark Schmidt breakout here oris this kind of a good cell high
point for maximum value? Yeah?No, I mean his his loss is
up a mile. It looks likethe k's and the strikeouts and the command
(35:35):
look good. He looks like hewas always sort of like on the verge
of like there is potential there right, Like they they always felt like he
could be a solid number two tothree. I think they even, like,
you know, they got rid ofMichael King assuming Clark Schmidt was gonna
be the guy, and he lookslike the guy. I like Clark Smitt.
(35:58):
I think he's probably you know,maybe not. I don't think he's
ever going to have like ace potentialand the fact that he has like a
two point five to nine era rightnow, I don't think that's going to
be anywhere close to where he endsup, probably closer to like a three
five to three seven era, whichis fine. I mean that's not bad.
(36:20):
I think he's he's likely like aFantasy number three ish, but definitely
I mean, not awful worthwhile forany league. Yeah, I like Clerk
Schmid. I think even going back, you know, there is someone in
the comments I forget who, butsomeone was saying, how like, even
if you go back like to lastyear, if you throw out a few
(36:43):
like really bad starts, he's gotyou know, he's got close to two
hundred innings of or two hundred andfifty innings or something of like a solid
ra I don't know the exact numbers, numbers schmumbers, but I mean,
yeah, Clark Schmidt looks good.You know, I don't mind him.
(37:04):
I don't think he's an ace,though. I don't think like this is
the beginning of like some sort ofbreakout a guy who a guy who actually
we had a lot of hope forand then sort of has fallen by the
wayside. I know he wasn't onthe podcast outline, but I'm gonna talk
briefly about Hunter Green. So hewas a guy who looked like all he
(37:28):
had to do was command his pitches, And now Hunter Green is commanding his
pitches he's not, and he's throwingto more contact, which with his stuff
totally works. I think Hunter Greenis like he's on the verge of really
breaking out, but looks really excellentalready. I think Hunter Green I was
(37:50):
super worried about coming into the yearbecause of the command, but his command
looks so much better and his strikeoutsare still good enough where I you know,
I think Hunter Green and for whateverreason, because you know, like
when Hunter Green first came up,everyone was like crazy about him. Uh
and now I think, you know, people have sort of forgotten, but
he looks good. I mean,I I like Hunter Green a lot more
(38:15):
than I thought I was going toat this point in the season, Like
I I was kind of out onHunter Green. But I think he's there
again. I think he's I thinkhe's he's fulfilling his potential absolutely, and
Clerk Schmidt fulfills potential. That meansI think, like a fantasy number three.
I think I think he's a littlebit less exciting to me, but
(38:38):
usable rosterable for sure. Yeah,I mean I think Clark smith is is
you know, he's a great He'sa very solid pitcher. I think,
you know, if he's your whatSP three, SP four, You're you're
sitting in a really solid spot andyou can definitely, you know, use
a guy like Clark Schmidt. He'sdoing he's doing great things right now.
(39:00):
I mean, he's obviously performing twentyseven kraiate is, you know, better
than I thought we'd see from him, So that's a nice surprise. He
does have an eighty five and ahalf percent left on base, so that's
that's probably getting a little lucky there, But everything else kind of seems reasonable.
(39:20):
You know, a little bit higherspringing strike, a little lower home
run, the fly ball babbit isin line with what he's done in his
career. So I'd say the yearas probably coming up a little bit.
But that's really all I see inClark Schmid's numbers that don't look legitimate.
You you brought up Hunter of Green. I agree that I think he's looked
(39:40):
great this season. You know,the walk rate, the walk rate's still
pretty much the same, but itfeels different when you watch him throw.
It's It's it's not like he's justyeah, he's just slinging up there and
hoping for the best. It feelslike he's actually, yeah, there's more
intention. I agree. Yeah,So I guess of those two. So
(40:02):
you're saying you a trade clerk Schmidtfour Hunter Green, then yeah, I
would take Hunter Green, okay,And I think that's the deal you can
do because you can use our ownhome player raider right now and be like,
look, Clerk Schmit's high on theplayer raider. I just have a
you know, I just like HunterGreen and you just trying to, yeah,
talk your your trade partners, totallydo that. Use our player raider
(40:24):
and also bring a a slingshot.Hold it, hold a rock in the
slingshot aimed at your opponent's head,and say here, look at our player
raider. Now make the trade.Hit the accept button. Yeah, you
know, Gray, we're talking likea lot of Yankees. I feel like,
(40:45):
last couple of weeks, let's notlet's not play favorites, let's talk.
Let's talk about Tanner Hawk as well, who is having a very nice
season in Boston. He has tenstarts, sixty five innings, one nine
right O nine five W twenty fourand a four point seven percent walk rate.
(41:06):
Is this, I mean, whatabout tanner Hawk versus in the Clark
Spit Hunter Green hierarchy. Where's hefalling in for you? Where is Tanner
Hawk? I think tanner Hawk,Hunter Green Tanner Hawk. I like tanner
See the thing is I like tannerHawk a lot too. So I like
(41:28):
Tanner Hawk more than Clark Schmidt,probably slightly less than Hunter Green, Hunter
Green. His upside is really interesting, where Tanner Hawk I feel like his.
I don't think his upside is quiteas dramatic. Tanner Hawk's is,
like, you know, he's he'snot really a big strikeout guy, good
(41:52):
and is solid enough good command.Right now he's got a one nine four
ARRA, which is kind of it'skind of you know, right now,
he's got a one nine to fourERA, which is kind of ludicrous.
So it's probably like a three anda half EARRA guy with not as exciting
strikeouts. But I still like him. I think he's still usable, He's
(42:15):
rosterable. I you know, Ithink for the most part, like as
long as you're commanding your pitches,like even like we see it, even
with like Rangers Suarez, you know, I keep going back to him,
but he's got great command and eventhough he got hit a little bit in
cores, we see. You know, if a guy has good command,
(42:36):
he's able to limit damage, youknow, Like I was, I think
I said to someone in the commentslast week, like, what's the worst
thing that happens? Like he givesup five solo home runs. It's like
if no one's if no one's onbase through like a walk or something,
then even if he's not right thatday, the damage gets limited. So
(42:57):
in the same way Tanner Hawk,I think Tanner Hull damage could be limited.
So maybe the upside isn't insane,but the downside probably isn't really that
terrible either. So yeah, Ilike Tanner Hulk. I think he's probably
still a number. He's probably afantasy number three ish. Yeah, I
would agree, And I think,you know, I mean, we make
(43:20):
a big deal about k's, butsome of the best pitchers in the game
right now aren't heavy K guys.They just throw enough innings kind of to
make up for not striking out aton per inning. And that's kind of
okay in the game we're in becausethere's so many guys going deep in the
games, which gives you less chancesfor wins. So having the opportunity for
(43:42):
more wins, getting to pile upk's rather than just shoving them all into
five innings, like that's that's fine. And the Hawks that sitting at twenty
five or twenty four percent, like, there's plenty of great pitchers who sit
in that area of twenty four totwenty seven percent, And you know,
if he could stay in that areainstead of like twenty percent, like he's
(44:02):
going to be fine. Like JoseBurrio sits in that area. Aaron Nola
this year is like twenty five percent, and you know he's he's been higher
before. But there's there's guys thatyou just find in that area. So
let's go ahead and move over tothe book. I actually have breaking news.
(44:27):
How do what's the breaking news?Music? Dude? Do do do?
Do you? Ronald Lacuna Junior willbe out a month due to his
knee. It's I mean, themusic makes it sound exciting, but it's
actually not. That's not fun.It's not it's it's not you know,
(44:47):
breaking news isn't always fun. Gray, Sometimes breaking news is terrible, and
it is in this case. Youknow, a cunya wasn't doing what he
was doing last season, But man, that that hurts harder to catch up
to last season though, missing amonth, and that's I mean, that's
(45:08):
just a preliminary you know, timetable. Ah yeah, it stinks, I
think. And then if he comesback, is he gonna run? It's
not good. It's not good.I don't have Yeah, I don't have
a counya in any leagues. Butit's still you know, like I say
(45:30):
all the time, like you know, I don't I'm not rooting for injuries.
If just because I don't have aguy doesn't mean it's necessarily a good
thing for baseball. I don't,you know. I prefer to just have
a counya playing and doing well andstill winning my leagues. So yeah,
it's a bummer. I'm just Iwas just reading the uh the report.
(45:53):
Ah man, oh, well whatare you gonna do? Okay, go
ahead continue? Yeah, this isuh. And he had this injury scare
in like the preseason two, whichterrified me as well, because if you
own him and get a league ortwo like I do, and you spent
a third year budget on him,it hurts. But yeah, let's go
(46:16):
ahead and move over to the bullpens. Gray, let's talk about some save
opportunities or you know, some sagingoff guys. Potentially Michael Kopeck blew his
save opportunity, and well it seemslike it's his job for now. Every
time they give it to him,he kinda you know, he gets a
(46:37):
couple of saves and then this thiskind of thing happens and they take it
away again. Is there they gowith Michael Kopek. If you need saves
and you're chasing every single one,or you may be looking at somebody else,
Uh, you know, I wouldprobably, in all honesty, I
probably wouldn't mess with the White Soxcloser situation if even if if I were
(47:00):
desperate, like if I were reallydesperate, I would probably look for like
read Garrett or Altavino or or likethe next like the next guy, like
you know, like Duran in Minnesotawas struggling, so I was looking at
Griffin Jacks, like I would tryand look at I would try and look
(47:22):
down the road at the next guyversus try and figure out what's going on
with the White Sox. That's justI mean, that's just me being honest.
Like if I were doing fab rightnow, I would look at like
Griffin Jacks read Garrett Adam Altavino,like I would look at something good versus
something versus something With the White Sox, I would I would probably avoid it.
(47:45):
But if I were chasing the WhiteSox, it would be copac for
me. All right, all right, fair enough, Let's move over to
the Mets, where last week wetalked about Edwin Diaz moved into a fluid
role that meant basically, he wasgiving one low leverage opportunity and then given
a save opportunity which he then blew. Gray. So where are you at
(48:09):
on Edwin Diaz and then the Metscloser situation? Uh? Yeah, so
they they took Edwin Diaz out ofthe ninth inning, gave him a low
leverage opportunity, and then put himback in the ninth inning and he blew
it again. It's not good.That's not that's not ideal. Right,
(48:30):
I don't know, I don't youknow, I don't know what they're gonna
do about that, because like theMets, like in like you know,
we kid about the Mets, ofcourse, but like they need Edwin Diaz
to be their closer. So Ilike I've said before, like I like
read Garrett just in general, Ithink Altavino could see saves like I don't.
(48:53):
I don't mind those specs like handcuffedspec pickups, like they're fine.
I would do them. I havedone them in certain leagues. I have
both of those guys in different places. But like the Mets need Edwin Diaz
to be the closer, Like EdwinDiaz isn't gonna be like, oh,
the Mets have a lights out sixinning guy, it's not gonna work.
(49:16):
I mean that's that is not likethey're not They're not there to have Edwin
Diaz be there. They're not thereto have Edwin Diaz be their six inning
guy, right, so they haveto have I mean, five years,
one hundred and two million dollars isnot a U. Is not a contract
(49:36):
you'd give to a middle reliever,right yeah, I mean even if even
if you're Steve Cohen, you're stilllike like the Mets and not to mention
like Edwin Diaz excels as a closerthat works better for the rest of your
team, Like you need Reid Garrettto pitch like the sixth and the seventh.
(49:57):
You need Ottavino for the eighth andyou need Edwin Diaz for the ninth.
That's just that's just how it is. Like that's sort of like what
you need your bullpen to be.Whether it's gonna be that way this week,
next week, or a month fromnow, I don't know. I
mean I would grab Garrett and Altavinofor now, just to see how long
(50:22):
it takes Edwin Diaz to get backto the ninth. I mean it could
be it could be by Wednesday,Edwin Diaz could be back in the ninth
inning. Or it could be likeJuly. Yeah, I mean he could
be a phantomil Stant where it's justlike, hey, just go go relax
for a little bit and come backand I'll suck again. Yeah. The
(50:44):
Phillies Jose Alvarado had his first blownsave of the year. I mean he's
not been like amazing, he justhasn't blown saves great. Do you think
he's in any danger of potentially youlosing his job or I mean they're always
a little bit committed in Philly,But do you think he's in any danger?
No? No, I think Alvaradois the guy. I think probably,
(51:08):
I would say probably, which Hoffmanis like a good handcuff. I
have Hoffman in a few leagues,not necessarily, not necessarily just for the
saves, but you know, ingeneral he's been he's been valuable just in
general. So I have Hoffman,but I think Alvarado. I think it's
(51:30):
Alvarado's job. Yeah, yeah,I think so too. For now,
just monitor it and see what happensthere in Detroit, Tyler Holten got his
first save. Do you think thatthey could be moving to some kind of
committee with Foley, or maybe Holtenis taking over here or just a you
(51:51):
know, opportunity where Holten was wasready. Someone just texted me. I
won't say who the person is,but people would know them. Someone just
texted me that coming into the year, Ronald Decunya Junior was more of an
injury risk than Aaron Judge and hestill went one overall. Which is that's
(52:13):
a fair point. That's fair.Yeah, I would say, I think
fully like Folly just blew the gamereal bad on Sunday, and then the
Tigers came back anyway, because Romonoblew the game even worse. But I
don't know what's going on with ajHinch with Detroit. I'm not sure,
(52:37):
man, because like I saw onSaturday that like Holton got to save and
I was like, why why didn'tFully pitched like the inning before. I
mean, I'm guessing it was aharder part of the lineup. But that's
so stupid too. I mean,I don't know. I feel like managers
just try and like justify their ownjobs. I don't know. I think
(53:00):
Foley is the guy though. Ithink even though Sunday was really bad,
So I guess we'll see, Likeif Foley has another bad outing like next
time out, his job could bein trouble. Yeah, And I will
say in that game, Fully camein the eighth and faced vlad Mashenton Springer,
(53:23):
so I mean it was also onewhere it lined up, you know,
to have have their best reliever comein. So I don't think Folly's
really going anywhere. Alex Vedo earlyseason closer thought of at least in Detroit.
He returned, but he's he's notin this mix at all for now.
(53:45):
Moving over to Colorado, the Rockieskeep giving Justin Lawrence chances and he
keeps blowing them. So at thispoint I assume that's what the Rockies want.
Great, But if they wanted toclose the game out. Do you
think they might go to somebody else? No, I wouldn't. Rockies are
almost worse. I think the Rockiesactually are worse than the White Sox.
I would not. I would notmess with the uh with the Rockies bullpen,
(54:10):
I wouldn't. I wouldn't go nearthat. I don't. You know,
Justin Lawrence at times looks like he'sdecent, like for an inning or
two in the middle of the game, but he has looked terrible in the
ninth inning. And then Jalen Beakslooked okay for like a week there at
the beginning of May. But yeah, it's a it's not been great.
(54:37):
I think the only one who's reallyperformed all season is Austin Gomber, and
they don't seem to want him tobe the the guy. Maybe because he's
because he's a lefty, I guess. I would guess Jalen Beaks is is
who you want if you're going withsomebody. He's another lefty. Though at
(54:59):
again, like the Rockies of thatorganization, we're like, no, we're
not sticking to lefty there, itdoesn't matter, We're not doing it.
So that leads me to Tyler TylerKinley, who is at least a writing
and has been well, he's beenterrible, great he's been he's been pretty
awful. He's been maybe as badas Justin Lawrence. So I ye know,
(55:21):
I don't actually don't know what you'redoing while you say this. Uh,
Kimberl right now is pitching to GavinSheets and on the on the score
Bug on the TV it says KimberrelSheets and I'm like, yeah, he's
absolutely is exactly what Kimberl is.Yep, yeah, yeah, well you
(55:45):
know he's he's getting old. Great, It's all right, we all we
all struggle in our quoterors. Heythree three two? Is he that?
Okay? It hasn't been that bad. This year's just just not what we
used to we're used to, CraigKimberl. Uh, Let's let's move on
to some waivers Gray and then we'llwe'll get it get out of here.
Okay, Yeah? Cool. SoDavid Frye looks like, I mean,
(56:09):
who's David Frye? And how dohe take over the quote unquote Hall of
Fame Sal Perez's body? What what'sgoing on? David Frye? You are
I've been Rod Reagez. David fryyou are Yogi Beara. I don't know
who David Frye. He was asof a week and a half ago,
(56:30):
but he looks incredible now right.And he's also gonna catch your eligibility.
In the last week, he's gottwo homers. He stole bags, hitting
six sixty seven. Okay, DavidFrye. Then we also have JJ Blade
Oakland outfielder. He's been hitting well. He's got three homers in the last
(56:52):
week. Kerry Carpenter. Kerry Carpenterhas three homers last week. He's probably
rostered in most leagues. Matt ErlingTigers altfielder was hitting leadoff on Sunday and
hit two homers. What's more schmotatothan that? Huh Ty? Franz got
(57:14):
into one on Sunday. He turnedon a pitch man. He hit it
like he was an actual slugger.I've never seen Ty frant Hi France and
David Frye together. You got Frenchfries delicious, Paul DeJong, he's been
hot recently. Who puts mustard ontheir fries? You really are from France,
(57:37):
huh Ty. Then you have AndrewMcCutcheon. He's been hitting well lead
off for the Pirates, and NolanChanell has been hitting for leadoff for the
Angels and also has been hitting prettywell. A couple other guys, Nick
Gonzales, Pirate middle infielder. Westill haven't really discussed him at lengths,
(57:57):
but I do like Nick Gonzales.Kevin Polar has been hitting well, Seth
Brown, J P. Crawford,Dylan Moore, Edmundo Sousa, and Patrick
Bailey. So there's some some playerswho have been hitting well. What about
what about your boy Hobby Bias?Greg? Can we get back to A
(58:23):
rosters again? Yeah? You gethim in your AL only rosters now we
can? We can uh, wecan cut alec manoah and add Abby Baias
back onto AL only rosters again.All right, so streaming options real quick
(58:44):
before we get out of here,beIN lively. He still hasn't owned in
your league. He's going versus Washingtonthis week. Stroman at San Francisco.
I mean, you really only worryabout home runs of Strowman, and San
Francisco is pretty great place for that. James Paxton at the Mets, Michael
Walker versus Diego read det Meers versusKansas City, Tenor Baby versus The Washington
(59:05):
Brian Woo versus The Angels, LuisHeal versus The Angels, Cole Irvin versus
Boston, Matt Waldon versus Miami,Tyler Alexander versus Oakland. As always,
if you have specific questions, comefind us on Twitter. I'm at rasbeat
On. Gray is the owner ofthe ras ball account. Yeah, you
can always come on YouTube dot comslash rasball Fantasy. Ask us questions and
(59:28):
comments there, subscribe there, likethe videos, like and subscribe us wherever
you listen to us, whether that'son YouTube or on your podcast listening app
Till next time, Greg, goodluck this week and I'll teuch you later.
But all right, lades
You like fantasy balls sans chasm thatI shall not me hear myself stand spans
and they can't even count some ofuniforcasom surround. It ain't even better the
health, Well, ye have severalcharges on everyone something else And I'm already
I'm to hear my baby sound justlike your name was, Mark. And
(00:33):
it's a rhyde By podcast. It'sa rapp podcast. It's a rap bop
podcast. It's a ride bo podcast. It's a rapp podcast at a rap
up podcast, at a turn rapbob podcast. Hey, everybody, welcome
(01:08):
back into the Raspball Fantasy Baseball Podcast. I am beat On, joined by
the Great Fantasy Master Authority himself.Great, alright, how's it going over
there? Grey? Not good?Beat On? Not good at all?
Yeah? Are you are you emotionallyhandling it? Okay? Are you?
(01:29):
Are you? Do we need tosend anybody to you? Do we need
to send an extra pet your directionfor support? No. So we're recording
this right after the Ronald Lacuna Juniorinjury. And I'm a little bit I'm
a little bit ver clemmed. I'llbe honest, not good man, you
(01:52):
know what honestly like what's going on, bro? What's going on with the
injury? Man? What is like? I saw the I saw him go
down. So I saw Ronald AcunyaJunior go down in a in a heap
right by by the second base bagin the Braves Pirates game and then they
(02:13):
just let him lay there and theydidn't bring out a cart or anything.
What are they doing? Man?Like? Why are they letting him walk
off the field? Also got alot of thoughts right Also, what's the
deal with it now being a differentknee than the one he had surgery on?
(02:34):
How many proms and this guy havewith knees? Man? What's going
on with that? What? Wait? Are we happy he only has two
knees? Is that? What's goingon? I mean? I wish he
had like six of them right now, because then maybe would we could just
throw one away and be done withit. It didn't look good. Actually
(02:57):
that's a good point. He shouldhave more knees. Yeah, give him
more knees. Grey like Kimmy,can you sacrifice some old people knees?
That so okay, So not exactlya doctor, but listen to this idea.
So like how Tommy John takes thetakes the the thing from the the
(03:17):
other part of the arm or theleg or wherever he takes it from and
puts it in the elbow. Right, what if we took Ronald Kunya's elbow
and we made another knee out ofit? M h, you might be
onto something there if we can stretchit out far enough. I think,
(03:38):
Oh, okay, what if wehad what if okay, Ronald Counyan's got
he seems like he's got pretty goodankles, right, so what if we
took one of his ankles and madeit into a knee? M what if?
How about that? Grace, staystay with me. What if we
just use Ronald o'cunya and showy Otanitogether and that way you get healthy knees,
(04:01):
healthy arm, and then you justget a super player. Oh and
then okay, so then uh sothat was my my first pick of the
draft. I take show Hey Akunyajunior. Yep, that would that would
be how it would work, right, although there might need to be like
six of them just to make itfair, like you might have to give
(04:26):
so okay, tell me actually solisten to uh the previous podcast. Uh
be Don was sick of removing mytyping from the podcast. So he bought
me a silent keyboard. Right,So I'm going to go on to Google
right now and I'm going to googlewhat's going on if I roster Ronald Acuna
(04:51):
Junior in a fantasy league. Holdon, let me see I'm typing right
now. You can't hear it becauseit's a silent keyboard. Uh, Google
AI says to climb onto a chairwith a rope, then hang the rope
from a light fixture and make anews Wait what what the what the hell
(05:15):
is Google a telling me? Idon't I don't know, right, I
don't know about this Google thing.I think Google, it's more threatening the
closer you get the home base.I think that's what it is. You
know, far enough away, it'sstill polite here. You're you're way too
close to I don't know, man, I don't know about this whole AI
(05:39):
thing. Man, Google AI,what are you telling me? Yeah?
Man, this is a this isthis is a bummer, right we are.
We are literally recording this like beforewe have any information. So,
I mean, I guess hopefully hisknee is okay. I don't know,
(06:00):
maybe is it. It's a goodthing that it wasn't the same knee.
Maybe. I don't know if that'sa good thing or a bad thing,
to be honest, I don't know. It seems like a terrible thing either
way. But hopefully we're gonna wakeup on Monday and uh and hear that
he's fine. I don't know.It seems bad though. Yeah, hopefully
(06:21):
everything's okay and he'll be back inand nothing, nothing terrible happens. I
mean, I guess in if wejust assume he's going to miss at least
sometime Gray, whether that is amen o my Ale stint or a longer
Iyel stint. What do we Whatdo you think in regards to the lineup,
(06:44):
who's who's getting more playing time?Like do we think everybody just moves
up one? Do we think MichaelHarris moves to one? Or does Albie's
move to one Harris drops or movesto two? What do you what's your
best guess in regards to happens withthe lineup? Well, I would assume
that Clinic who was kind of doingnothing really until about maybe I think Tuesday
(07:12):
or Wednesday of last week, heseemed to get hot recently. I think
he went three for four in Sunday'sgame, so clinic should I would guess
that he becomes somewhat of a fulltime guy. Duval. I would assume
Duval sees more at bats because andDuval he could potentially have you know,
(07:35):
he could he he could potentially havesome some value in deeper leagues. Harris
would probably go to lead off,like you said, I would get.
I would assume alb stays at two. Austin Riley is is day to day
until September. From from what I'mhearing, Austin Riley is, Austin Riley
(07:59):
is going to go on to thesixty day IL after being day to day
for fifty nine days. Matt Olsen, you know, he stays in the
same Actually, Marcelo Zuna, oddlyenough, is like the only Braves hitter
who's actually doing anything this year.So, you know, when we went
(08:20):
into the season, in the preseason, it looked like the Braves lineup was
gonna be one of the best onesin the league. And you know,
it could still come out of itsearly season funk. But man, it's
like Ozuna and then nothing else.Albi's and Riley have looked terrible. What
you call it? Olsen has pickedit up a little bit of late,
(08:43):
but still like hitting two thirty withI think eight homers, like not doing
much of anything. Not a goodlineup so far this year. But yeah,
I would assume Harris moves up,Clinic gets close to every day uh
at bats now and and and Duvalwill probably get some more at bats as
(09:05):
well. Yeah, I think Daval'sprobably the one who maybe gets more playing
time out of this. I meanhim and Ozuna both are pretty terrible in
regards to fielding, but Duval atleast still can can move around a little
bit, so I would assume hegets over to left field, and then
as you mentioned, Clinic probably shiftsover to center. So I would agree
(09:28):
with those thoughts. Let's, uh, let's move over to something maybe a
little bit more entertaining for you.There was a I guess a story out
about South Prez and his his trackfor Hall of Fame Gray that you want
to talk about, Oh, yeah, no, someone on the MLB Network,
(09:48):
which is it's interesting that, like, I don't really follow other sports,
as most people know, so Idon't know this for a fact,
but it feels like the MLB Networkis run and showcases a lot of voices
that don't really know baseball, whichis weird for the MLB Network. I
(10:09):
don't know if that's a thing thathappens in other sports, but it seems
like MLB Network has a bunch ofpeople who are like, I don't really
know baseball. Yeah. So anyway, there was something on the MLB Network
about how sal Perez is a Hallof Famer because he had five Gold Gloves
(10:31):
and he only is like he's onlymissing Ivan Rodriguez, Pudge. Rodriguez is
homer his career homers by like sixtyor something, and it's like sal Perez
basically needs And they were saying thatsal Perez is a Hall of Famer for
(10:52):
these reasons. That was the reasonsthey were giving. They were like,
sal Perez is a Hall of Famer. Here's the reasons why he has five
gold gloves. To Ivan Rodriguez isI think thirteen and he has like,
you know, so many homers andonly sixty less homers than Ivan Rodriguez.
And it's like, yeah, Imean, south Prez would basically need to
(11:16):
do like another full career to comeanywhere close to what the catcher that Ivan
Rodriguez was. I mean, youknow, even if maybe there was peds
involved there, but still it's likethat's a ludicrous thing to compare. To
compare him five gold gloves versus thirteengold gloves is like salth Perez would have
(11:39):
to play until he's about one hundredand fifty and not lose any sort of
age, decline to get anywhere closeto thirteen gold gloves. And he's also
like almost sixty homers behind Ivan Rodriguez, and like you know, south Prez
is like maybe good for say twentyseven to thirty homers this year, maybe
(12:03):
twenty five homers next year, maybetwenty homers the year. I mean,
and at that point he'd be likethirty seven years old. It's like it's
the most ludicrous argument that they weremaking on MLB network that sal Prez is
a Hall of Famer. I mean, it's like, honestly, I'm all
for a big haul, like Idon't care if they put him in really,
(12:24):
but to compare him to Ivan Rodriguez, because like Rodriguez had thirteen gold
gloves and soal Prez has five,it's like he's nowhere near him and gold
gloves are such it's such a stupidstat to begin with to even to even
use for the Hall of Fame.It's just like I don't know anyway.
(12:46):
This is like I just I justhappen to see that and joke crazy.
Yeah, so we get you sometime to rant there, and you know
it. War isn't a perfect statby any means, but you know,
just as a base here, WillSmith in his shorten much shorter career already
(13:07):
has a higher career war than selPrez. So like, if we're trying
to draw a line of where catchersget in, it's it's got to be
a lot higher than like one hundredand seventh overall in war. I think.
So yeah, I didn't and usinggo gloves should never be I mean,
(13:28):
we should just get rid of goldgloves honestly, if we're not gonna
have people who know what they're doing. But like, it's so stupid if
you think about it. It's like, how do you like you look at
gold gloves like as a benchmark forthe Hall of Fame? Uh, And
the glow glove is given by likenot an arbitrary body. It's like the
(13:50):
goal it's basically like a non arbitrarybody is awarding one award and then using
that award to award a player anotheraward. It's like, this is like
all this is all made up,like a gold glove. It's like it's
nice for I guess a guy's like, you know, man cave, but
(14:11):
it doesn't really mean anything. Imean, you know, it's like,
how how important are gold gloves?Even? It's just the dumbest thing to
look at anyway. Let's driving mecrazy. I mean, I'm sure if
we looked at ballots, there wassomebody who voted for like Greg Maddox after
Greg Maddocks retired, just because itwas exactly it's default to put Greg Maddocks
(14:33):
in his ass the gold glove ontheir voting ball not to mentionine how many
people gold gloves and they think thatthey're awarding a silver slugger. They're like,
oh, I mean he hit alot of homers, so I award
him the gold glove. It's like, wait, what is that doing anything.
It's like Derek Jater hit a highaffranche. That's got to mean he's
good on defense. It's so dumb, and then you use that in order
(14:56):
to award someone in the Hall ofFame. It's like it's like you're making
up fake awards to give someone elsea different fake award, Like okay,
anyway, all right, Greg,let's go ahead and move on to some
fantasy baseball stuff. And you know, we're we're about a third of the
way through the season for for us, and you know where, whether you're
(15:18):
at the top of your league orthe bottom year league, you definitely have
some guys you aren't performing to thelevel that we that you wanted. So
what are you doing with some ofthose slower moving guys, you know,
you know, reach into that thatgigantic brain years and pull some pull some
pearls of wisdom out for us?Gray, I was just actually putting my
(15:46):
elbow on eBay for Ronald Acunya tobuy and use as his knee, So
I had to go through some uhsome online paperwork. As they say,
yeah, so's it's basically at thispoint, right, we're about a third
of the way through. You're gonnahave to be a little bit cutty,
(16:10):
right, You're gonna be a littlebit judgy, a little bit cutty when
it comes to players who are underperforming. I think you know, I
mean, like, for instance,Dansby Swanson, he's at three hundred and
thirteen on the player raider, right, it depends, like this is a
bit of a hedge, a littlebit of a you know, it's a
(16:30):
little bit of a cop out ofan answer, but it depends on the
league, right, So like DansbySwanson, for instance, at Dancy Swanson
at like three thirteen overall in theplay raider, Like if you're in a
shallow league, that's the kind ofguy where like you can move on there.
Under him though, is like AustinRiley who we mentioned earlier. Austin
(16:53):
Riley is actually under him, butI wouldn't drop Austin Riley, right,
I would try hold there. Soit depends like it depends on the league.
But then there's also like in adeeper league, like in a fifteen
team mix league, I wouldn't necessarilydrop Dansby Swanson. So it's like it
it really depends on the league andthe player kind of. But yeah,
(17:17):
so I don't know, it's abit of a cop out, but that's
my feelings on it. Yeah,And I mean I think there's you know,
there's kind of the sliding scale ofwhat did it cost to draft them
as well, you know, ifthey're a top five round guy or so,
like it's really a lot harder todrop those guys is whether you're performing
(17:37):
well or not performing well. Thoseare also the guys that are going to,
you know, help you get ittogether. Yeah. True, So,
I mean I definitely think there's abalancing act, and it definitely depends
on, like you said, whatsize of league, what type of league,
how many roster spots, all ofthat. But yeah, I mean
(17:57):
you're you're looking at your roster andseeing if they're actually going to help you.
And I do think if you're ina stronger position that allows you to
wait it out on some of thoseguys, Whereas you know, if you're
struggling, you need to move onyou just start getting stats immediately when I
mean it's trading them or just outrightletting them go and grabbing whoever's hot that
(18:19):
at that time. Yeah, no, completely. You know, it's like
championships are won and lost on whenyou're dropping people. You know, that's
I sound like a Pac ten coachhere, but man, championships are won
and lost by when you're cutting playersfrom your fantasy team. It's true though,
(18:41):
like this, I think this pastFriday, I was saying on ras
ball, like, you know,Nick Castliano's feels cut a ball, right,
And then he went to Cores andhe hit two homers out of three
games, and it's like, well, I mean, I probably wouldn't have
cut them for he was going toCours, right, But that doesn't that
(19:03):
doesn't fix everything. So it's like, I mean, I would probably because
who knows maybe coming out of course, you know, Cassilianos is now hot,
so I would I would maybe holdfor a little bit, like for
like a couple of days in adaily league, maybe for one more week
in a weekly league. But Cassilianusis really he's been real cutable for a
(19:27):
while. Like we've seen a badseason from him two years ago. I
do not trust him to come outof it. His his peripherals look awful.
But you know, again going backto the cop out hedge answer,
it's like, if the league isdeep, you kind of have to ride
(19:47):
it out, can't. You can'tdrop him in every league. Yeah,
let's look at like something in therealm of our RcLs gray, like somebody
like Evan Carter who obviously is notperforming, like he's gotta go right,
and NRCL you can't. You can'tcontinue to wait around if you're struggling,
(20:08):
or is that somebody that you wouldhang on to? No, you gotta
you gotta cut Evan Carter. Yeah, right, Evan Carter. Somebody like
Austin Riley. You're not I meanthey they're staying around like you're you're crashing.
He's crashing with you. Yeah,yeah, if he's crashing like my
WiFi. Yeah, you're going downwith the ship with Austin Riley. Unfortunately,
(20:33):
but like, okay, so anotherguy like on uh, I think
it was Friday, Julio Rodriguez wasdropped down to the sixth hole in the
Mariners lineup, and that was drivingme crazy because I felt like, you
know, like when Aaron Judge wasslumping in April the Yankee, the Yankees
didn't drop him down in the lineup, like you gotta like ride or die
(20:53):
with certain players on your team.And I felt like it was like,
you know, the upping Julio Rodriguezin a lineup could he easily turned into
him beingcome bitter and the slump prolongingand and things getting worse. Now he
did end up homering on Saturday andthen again and then again on Sunday,
(21:14):
and he was moved up to thethree hole after Saturday, which you know
is another like stupid thing, Likewhat's the logic there, Like if he
if he would have homered on Thursday, he wouldn't have gotten dropped down to
the sixth hole on Friday, Likewhat, what's one Homer? That's so
dumb. I mean, it's reallyit's really stupid if you stop to think
about it. But anyway, JulioRodriguez did Homer on Saturday and Sunday,
(21:37):
and I was saying on Friday hefelt like one of the biggest by low
guys because his stack cast looks incredible, like Julio Rodriga's looks really good under
the hood. So I was buyingon Julio Rodriguez and now he's Homer twice,
And yeah, I mean I thinkJulio Rodrigue is gonna be fine,
like I would. I would stillbe buying him if he if his price
(22:00):
didn't go up too high. Butyeah, like that was that was one
whereas like like certain guys you gottaride and die with, and Hulu Rodrigoz
was definitely a ride or die Yeah, definitely, I mean, definitely in
our game, and even more soyou feel like in like real baseball,
I know that it's just maybe amanager thing where you move a guy and
(22:22):
all of a sudden you're like,oh, he's hitting, and so it
worked, Whereas it's probably just atiming thing. He got the right matchups,
those kind of things, and youjust clicks in there. Certain guys
definitely hit better in certain you know, batting order spots, but it's like
Tulio Rodriguez, like let him,let him figure it out, like he
(22:45):
is the franchise for you. Justjust leave him be, as you mentioned
like Aaron Judge, who definitely hasmore of a track record and everything.
But at the same time, ifwe're just talking about strugglers, like you
would have put him in that samecategory. Yankee's left him there. Now
you know, he's just absolutely mashing. I expect Julio is going to be,
(23:06):
you know, back to his normalself and hitting home runs again sooner
around later. Yeah, agreed,all right, Gray, Speaking of Atlanta,
they're just having all sorts of funthings. They sit. Bryce elder
Down brought up a j Smith shover. He started a game and actually looked
(23:26):
pretty good. Then goes on theil after the game. They've now called
up ray Kerr. It looks likeit could be any kind of mix of
Kerr, maybe Darius Fines, maybethe combination of them. They could bring
Bryce Elder back up. Dylan Dodd'sbeen performing in the minors. What are
you doing with the back end ofthe Braves rotation if you're looking at potentially,
(23:51):
you know, streaming in e ofthese guys or looking at them in
deeper leagues. First off, ifyou're Ray Kerr, how do you not
go by Raymond Kerr and then havethe nickname Perry Mason. It's like that's
obvious, man. I mean,I can help people so much here.
(24:11):
I think, actually, I thinkeveryone that the Braves are now everything the
Braves touched now I think is pollutedlike Michelle Pfeiffer's womb and scarface. And
I'm not interested at all. Iused to be mister, like, you
know what, whenever the Braves touchis gold as far as like the fifth
(24:32):
starter goes with like many like manyyears of just random guys coming out of
nowhere and being good. But nowI don't know, man, the Braves
are really struggling. I you know, Ray Kerr, he doesn't. I
don't know. He looks fine.I guess for like n Now only he
(24:52):
looks like he's got good strikeouts.He kind of looks like a middle reliever,
to be honest, and Vine's Vinesimilarly. So, yeah, I
don't like in mixed leagues. Idon't think there's anything really here unless Elder
comes back and has uh, youknow, it looks better than he was
looking, you know, in hisfirst and so I don't know, but
(25:15):
yeah, yeah, I mean,I honestly think they're they're like, nobody
that takes that job over is gonnabe very interesting. Maybe the most interesting
is just bringing Bryce Elder back upbecause of what he did last year and
just letting him kind of write itout. But as you've mentioned many many
times before on the podcast, theBraves fit starter just kind of has a
(25:38):
season and then maybe doesn't ever repeatthat, so that that might be Bryce
Elder. I don't know. Yeah, So I don't think there's much here.
Gray. In the Atlanta back endof the rotation, they all seem
you said, like, it doesseem like a lot of you know,
strong middle relievers potentially or even longrelievers that they can combine. But I
(26:02):
don't know that any of them areare really built for our game. Let's
talk about some of the top stasheshere Gray as we're looking for. You
know, June is is typically acall up time for prospects. The Super
two starts to hit somewhere in June. You know, it's obviously a mystery.
It's kind of like taxes. Theyjust kind of expect you to know
(26:26):
when it is. They don't actuallytell you, Oh, here's just here's
Super two day. It's you know, you call everybody up. We're just
we're just waiting. But who aresome of those names that you're looking at
at potentially putting on your roster,uh, and and waiting to see when
they're getting called up and maybe gettingahead of the fab bidding war that that's
going to ensue. Oh okay,So I think, uh, Junior Camino
(26:49):
Community commanding your com commic coma comiccommon comic Commune Neo. I think I
think Junior come and come and comeand come coma come. I think he's
probably uh. I think he's probablycoming up at some point, I would
think, because the rays have alreadystarted his clock, so you would think
(27:11):
he would be called up. Imean that would be my guess. James
would I you know, I hearfrom I hear from people that James Wood
is up by no later than Junefirst, So I mean I have to
assume, you know, you canonly take people at their word. And
you know, the people were tellingme James Wood is coming up, so
(27:33):
I gotta assume he's coming up.Also, I think, you know,
Jason Dominguez the Yankees uh prospect.I mean, he was up already last
year, looked good. I don'treally know how the playing time is gonna
work out exactly for that, becauseI mean I would assume Dimingez is definitely
gonna be playing every day. Imean, I wouldn't be shocked if you
(27:57):
know, the Yankees make a trainaid, not not with Domingez necessarily,
but they they make a trade tofree up a spot maybe in their lineup,
or you know, at some pointgion Carlo is gonna get injured,
so that would open up the dH spot. It's just so weird,
like the Verdugo signing or excuse me, trade never really made any sense to
(28:21):
begin with in the pre in thepreseason, so now they have too many
bats. I don't know, Imean, I'm assuming Dimingez is back no
later than the All Star break,right, I mean he has to be.
And then I would guess Jackson Holidayis coming back shortly, right,
I think he's I think Jackson Holidaysprobably you know, due to return.
(28:45):
I don't know if I would necessarilylike for so for most leagues, I
would be sitting on wood and comecoming, come, come, a coming
commie in the coming junior community communia. My Spanish cavin aro. My Spanish
is so good. I took thirteenyears of Spanish, and this is like,
(29:08):
see most people hear me and they'relike, he can't really speak Spanish.
But actually you're the one who youcan't hear Spanish. That's your problem,
that's my problem. So yeah,James would uh comany euro the mingos.
I guess I don't know if i'dbe stashing necessarily anyone else. Like
(29:30):
I liked Kobe Mayo up until abouta week ago until he was hurt.
Oh I did a rhyme. Youdidn't even know I was gonna do a
little rhyme there. Uh yeah,So Mayo hurt his ribs. So yeah,
he's he's now he's no longer onmy radar because the Oreos didn't really
(29:52):
need anyone anyway, so that wasalready a bit of a stretch. But
yeah, I would say probably CameraReno and Wold are the two big ones.
I'd be stashy right now. Yeah, I think they're guys that you
definitely try and get ahead of it. As you mentioned, like would seems
like he's coming. Caman Arrows shouldbe as well, especially with like that
(30:17):
offense not really performing like it didlast year, so there's definitely room to
fit. I think, you knowboth those guys. You know, I
have Jackson Holiday in some leagues whereI drafted him, and I'm just I'm
holding in you know, that situationjust kind of is what it is.
I'm just waiting for him to comeback. They don't really need him,
and he hasn't. He hasn't particularlylit it up since going back down.
(30:41):
But I feel like we know whathe is talent level is, and he
should be back at some point.Just they like Jorge Mateo and he's playing
fine right now. Jordan Westburg's obviouslyplaying great, so there's just there needs
to be somebody that falls off kindof at this point for him to come
(31:02):
up. Whereas before it was reallylike his job to have and to take.
So that's that's the feeling that itgives me right now. And holding
Jackson Holliday, I'm almost just waitingfor an injury, which feels bad m
bad person. Yeah. Yeah.Speaking of the Orioles, their rotation had
(31:26):
a bit of a issue. Theylost two pictures Dean Kramer and John Means.
I think on back to back dayswent to the il Cole Irvin Albert
Swarez likely go back into the rotation. They've been in it. John Heasley,
he's had a spot before. I'mnot sure if they'll go back to
(31:48):
that option or not. There's afew other things going on and then uh,
actually, as we're recording here onSunday, which is day earlier than
we normally do, Kyle Bradish isdoing great things over right, Well he
was. He did have a nohitter, but then Danny Columbey came in
and the first guy he faced,he gave up a home run to men
Dick. You can you can beepthat out later. Uh, by the
(32:15):
way, is there any is thereno hitter? Like if a guy is
throwing like I think I said thison the rast ball already, But like,
if you're throwing a no hitter andyou're and you're not throwing a Maddox,
which is under one hundred pitches fora complete game, right, I
don't know if you're ever gonna beable to throw. I don't know if
(32:36):
we're ever going to see a nohitter again with like a lot of pitches.
Like it doesn't seem possible anymore.I don't know. I mean,
I know Bradish was coming back froman injury, so they're they were trying
to baby him a little bit,But yeah, he got pulled at seven
innings of no hit ball. It'slike, that's crazy. I don't think
(32:59):
like three even five maybe pre twothousand and five, how many pitchers were
pulled with a no hitter. It'sseven innings or less. It's gotta be
very few, very few, right, I mean, like, yeah,
like seven innings of no hit balland you get pulled like, I mean,
(33:20):
you're not even get like I couldsee like if you're like eight and
two thirds and you're up to onehundred and twenty five innings, I mean,
excuse me, one hundred and twentyfive pitches and the managers looking at
the coaches, and the coaches arelooking the managers like, do we let
them throw up to one hundred andthirty pitches? Ah? Okay, let's
do it. Let's go for itnow. It's like seven innings. Yeah,
(33:44):
it's enough enough, man, onehundred and one hundred and two hundred
and three. Yep, get himout of there. No good question anymore.
It's like, oh yeah, seveninnings. Yeah, no, I'm
sorry, man, that's a lotby anyway. Yeah, I think,
(34:04):
uh, sure, as I thinkhas streamer potential. Co Irving. I
know, the streaminator I think actuallylikes co irving a little bit this week,
a little cole irving. I thinka little bit this week. The
streamingtor likes it. But yeah,they're streamers. I don't know, is
(34:27):
looks a little bit more interesting thanthe other ones, but I'm not I'm
not really interested. Yeah, II look, he really liked the Orioles
pitching staff, like I have,like going back a couple of seasons,
and and so I just, uh, I think they're streamers. I don't
(34:47):
think they're more than that. ButI do like them as streaming options,
you know, against not not badmatchups, you know, even kind of
middle of the road matchups. Ithink you're you're okay running them out there,
really as long as the ballpark's nottoo bad. Let's talk about some
pictures that you you definitely want tostart for now, and that is Clark
Schmidt, who is breaking out great. He has ten starts, fifty five
(35:12):
to two thirds inding, and hehas a two five ninety area one one
three whip twenty k rate, sevenand a half percent walk rate. Is
is the Clark Schmidt breakout here oris this kind of a good cell high
point for maximum value? Yeah?No, I mean his his loss is
up a mile. It looks likethe k's and the strikeouts and the command
(35:35):
look good. He looks like hewas always sort of like on the verge
of like there is potential there right, Like they they always felt like he
could be a solid number two tothree. I think they even, like,
you know, they got rid ofMichael King assuming Clark Schmidt was gonna
be the guy, and he lookslike the guy. I like Clark Smitt.
(35:58):
I think he's probably you know,maybe not. I don't think he's
ever going to have like ace potentialand the fact that he has like a
two point five to nine era rightnow, I don't think that's going to
be anywhere close to where he endsup, probably closer to like a three
five to three seven era, whichis fine. I mean that's not bad.
(36:20):
I think he's he's likely like aFantasy number three ish, but definitely
I mean, not awful worthwhile forany league. Yeah, I like Clerk
Schmid. I think even going back, you know, there is someone in
the comments I forget who, butsomeone was saying, how like, even
if you go back like to lastyear, if you throw out a few
(36:43):
like really bad starts, he's gotyou know, he's got close to two
hundred innings of or two hundred andfifty innings or something of like a solid
ra I don't know the exact numbers, numbers schmumbers, but I mean,
yeah, Clark Schmidt looks good.You know, I don't mind him.
(37:04):
I don't think he's an ace,though. I don't think like this is
the beginning of like some sort ofbreakout a guy who a guy who actually
we had a lot of hope forand then sort of has fallen by the
wayside. I know he wasn't onthe podcast outline, but I'm gonna talk
briefly about Hunter Green. So hewas a guy who looked like all he
(37:28):
had to do was command his pitches, And now Hunter Green is commanding his
pitches he's not, and he's throwingto more contact, which with his stuff
totally works. I think Hunter Greenis like he's on the verge of really
breaking out, but looks really excellentalready. I think Hunter Green I was
(37:50):
super worried about coming into the yearbecause of the command, but his command
looks so much better and his strikeoutsare still good enough where I you know,
I think Hunter Green and for whateverreason, because you know, like
when Hunter Green first came up,everyone was like crazy about him. Uh
and now I think, you know, people have sort of forgotten, but
he looks good. I mean,I I like Hunter Green a lot more
(38:15):
than I thought I was going toat this point in the season, Like
I I was kind of out onHunter Green. But I think he's there
again. I think he's I thinkhe's he's fulfilling his potential absolutely, and
Clerk Schmidt fulfills potential. That meansI think, like a fantasy number three.
I think I think he's a littlebit less exciting to me, but
(38:38):
usable rosterable for sure. Yeah,I mean I think Clark smith is is
you know, he's a great He'sa very solid pitcher. I think,
you know, if he's your whatSP three, SP four, You're you're
sitting in a really solid spot andyou can definitely, you know, use
a guy like Clark Schmidt. He'sdoing he's doing great things right now.
(39:00):
I mean, he's obviously performing twentyseven kraiate is, you know, better
than I thought we'd see from him, So that's a nice surprise. He
does have an eighty five and ahalf percent left on base, so that's
that's probably getting a little lucky there, But everything else kind of seems reasonable.
(39:20):
You know, a little bit higherspringing strike, a little lower home
run, the fly ball babbit isin line with what he's done in his
career. So I'd say the yearas probably coming up a little bit.
But that's really all I see inClark Schmid's numbers that don't look legitimate.
You you brought up Hunter of Green. I agree that I think he's looked
(39:40):
great this season. You know,the walk rate, the walk rate's still
pretty much the same, but itfeels different when you watch him throw.
It's It's it's not like he's justyeah, he's just slinging up there and
hoping for the best. It feelslike he's actually, yeah, there's more
intention. I agree. Yeah,So I guess of those two. So
(40:02):
you're saying you a trade clerk Schmidtfour Hunter Green, then yeah, I
would take Hunter Green, okay,And I think that's the deal you can
do because you can use our ownhome player raider right now and be like,
look, Clerk Schmit's high on theplayer raider. I just have a
you know, I just like HunterGreen and you just trying to, yeah,
talk your your trade partners, totallydo that. Use our player raider
(40:24):
and also bring a a slingshot.Hold it, hold a rock in the
slingshot aimed at your opponent's head,and say here, look at our player
raider. Now make the trade.Hit the accept button. Yeah, you
know, Gray, we're talking likea lot of Yankees. I feel like,
(40:45):
last couple of weeks, let's notlet's not play favorites, let's talk.
Let's talk about Tanner Hawk as well, who is having a very nice
season in Boston. He has tenstarts, sixty five innings, one nine
right O nine five W twenty fourand a four point seven percent walk rate.
(41:06):
Is this, I mean, whatabout tanner Hawk versus in the Clark
Spit Hunter Green hierarchy. Where's hefalling in for you? Where is Tanner
Hawk? I think tanner Hawk,Hunter Green Tanner Hawk. I like tanner
See the thing is I like tannerHawk a lot too. So I like
(41:28):
Tanner Hawk more than Clark Schmidt,probably slightly less than Hunter Green, Hunter
Green. His upside is really interesting, where Tanner Hawk I feel like his.
I don't think his upside is quiteas dramatic. Tanner Hawk's is,
like, you know, he's he'snot really a big strikeout guy, good
(41:52):
and is solid enough good command.Right now he's got a one nine four
ARRA, which is kind of it'skind of you know, right now,
he's got a one nine to fourERA, which is kind of ludicrous.
So it's probably like a three anda half EARRA guy with not as exciting
strikeouts. But I still like him. I think he's still usable, He's
(42:15):
rosterable. I you know, Ithink for the most part, like as
long as you're commanding your pitches,like even like we see it, even
with like Rangers Suarez, you know, I keep going back to him,
but he's got great command and eventhough he got hit a little bit in
cores, we see. You know, if a guy has good command,
(42:36):
he's able to limit damage, youknow, Like I was, I think
I said to someone in the commentslast week, like, what's the worst
thing that happens? Like he givesup five solo home runs. It's like
if no one's if no one's onbase through like a walk or something,
then even if he's not right thatday, the damage gets limited. So
(42:57):
in the same way Tanner Hawk,I think Tanner Hull damage could be limited.
So maybe the upside isn't insane,but the downside probably isn't really that
terrible either. So yeah, Ilike Tanner Hulk. I think he's probably
still a number. He's probably afantasy number three ish. Yeah, I
would agree, And I think,you know, I mean, we make
(43:20):
a big deal about k's, butsome of the best pitchers in the game
right now aren't heavy K guys.They just throw enough innings kind of to
make up for not striking out aton per inning. And that's kind of
okay in the game we're in becausethere's so many guys going deep in the
games, which gives you less chancesfor wins. So having the opportunity for
(43:42):
more wins, getting to pile upk's rather than just shoving them all into
five innings, like that's that's fine. And the Hawks that sitting at twenty
five or twenty four percent, like, there's plenty of great pitchers who sit
in that area of twenty four totwenty seven percent, And you know,
if he could stay in that areainstead of like twenty percent, like he's
(44:02):
going to be fine. Like JoseBurrio sits in that area. Aaron Nola
this year is like twenty five percent, and you know he's he's been higher
before. But there's there's guys thatyou just find in that area. So
let's go ahead and move over tothe book. I actually have breaking news.
(44:27):
How do what's the breaking news?Music? Dude? Do do do?
Do you? Ronald Lacuna Junior willbe out a month due to his
knee. It's I mean, themusic makes it sound exciting, but it's
actually not. That's not fun.It's not it's it's not you know,
(44:47):
breaking news isn't always fun. Gray, Sometimes breaking news is terrible, and
it is in this case. Youknow, a cunya wasn't doing what he
was doing last season, But man, that that hurts harder to catch up
to last season though, missing amonth, and that's I mean, that's
(45:08):
just a preliminary you know, timetable. Ah yeah, it stinks, I
think. And then if he comesback, is he gonna run? It's
not good. It's not good.I don't have Yeah, I don't have
a counya in any leagues. Butit's still you know, like I say
(45:30):
all the time, like you know, I don't I'm not rooting for injuries.
If just because I don't have aguy doesn't mean it's necessarily a good
thing for baseball. I don't,you know. I prefer to just have
a counya playing and doing well andstill winning my leagues. So yeah,
it's a bummer. I'm just Iwas just reading the uh the report.
(45:53):
Ah man, oh, well whatare you gonna do? Okay, go
ahead continue? Yeah, this isuh. And he had this injury scare
in like the preseason two, whichterrified me as well, because if you
own him and get a league ortwo like I do, and you spent
a third year budget on him,it hurts. But yeah, let's go
(46:16):
ahead and move over to the bullpens. Gray, let's talk about some save
opportunities or you know, some sagingoff guys. Potentially Michael Kopeck blew his
save opportunity, and well it seemslike it's his job for now. Every
time they give it to him,he kinda you know, he gets a
(46:37):
couple of saves and then this thiskind of thing happens and they take it
away again. Is there they gowith Michael Kopek. If you need saves
and you're chasing every single one,or you may be looking at somebody else,
Uh, you know, I wouldprobably, in all honesty, I
probably wouldn't mess with the White Soxcloser situation if even if if I were
(47:00):
desperate, like if I were reallydesperate, I would probably look for like
read Garrett or Altavino or or likethe next like the next guy, like
you know, like Duran in Minnesotawas struggling, so I was looking at
Griffin Jacks, like I would tryand look at I would try and look
(47:22):
down the road at the next guyversus try and figure out what's going on
with the White Sox. That's justI mean, that's just me being honest.
Like if I were doing fab rightnow, I would look at like
Griffin Jacks read Garrett Adam Altavino,like I would look at something good versus
something versus something With the White Sox, I would I would probably avoid it.
(47:45):
But if I were chasing the WhiteSox, it would be copac for
me. All right, all right, fair enough, Let's move over to
the Mets, where last week wetalked about Edwin Diaz moved into a fluid
role that meant basically, he wasgiving one low leverage opportunity and then given
a save opportunity which he then blew. Gray. So where are you at
(48:09):
on Edwin Diaz and then the Metscloser situation? Uh? Yeah, so
they they took Edwin Diaz out ofthe ninth inning, gave him a low
leverage opportunity, and then put himback in the ninth inning and he blew
it again. It's not good.That's not that's not ideal. Right,
(48:30):
I don't know, I don't youknow, I don't know what they're gonna
do about that, because like theMets, like in like you know,
we kid about the Mets, ofcourse, but like they need Edwin Diaz
to be their closer. So Ilike I've said before, like I like
read Garrett just in general, Ithink Altavino could see saves like I don't.
(48:53):
I don't mind those specs like handcuffedspec pickups, like they're fine.
I would do them. I havedone them in certain leagues. I have
both of those guys in different places. But like the Mets need Edwin Diaz
to be the closer, Like EdwinDiaz isn't gonna be like, oh,
the Mets have a lights out sixinning guy, it's not gonna work.
(49:16):
I mean that's that is not likethey're not They're not there to have Edwin
Diaz be there. They're not thereto have Edwin Diaz be their six inning
guy, right, so they haveto have I mean, five years,
one hundred and two million dollars isnot a U. Is not a contract
(49:36):
you'd give to a middle reliever,right yeah, I mean even if even
if you're Steve Cohen, you're stilllike like the Mets and not to mention
like Edwin Diaz excels as a closerthat works better for the rest of your
team, Like you need Reid Garrettto pitch like the sixth and the seventh.
(49:57):
You need Ottavino for the eighth andyou need Edwin Diaz for the ninth.
That's just that's just how it is. Like that's sort of like what
you need your bullpen to be.Whether it's gonna be that way this week,
next week, or a month fromnow, I don't know. I
mean I would grab Garrett and Altavinofor now, just to see how long
(50:22):
it takes Edwin Diaz to get backto the ninth. I mean it could
be it could be by Wednesday,Edwin Diaz could be back in the ninth
inning. Or it could be likeJuly. Yeah, I mean he could
be a phantomil Stant where it's justlike, hey, just go go relax
for a little bit and come backand I'll suck again. Yeah. The
(50:44):
Phillies Jose Alvarado had his first blownsave of the year. I mean he's
not been like amazing, he justhasn't blown saves great. Do you think
he's in any danger of potentially youlosing his job or I mean they're always
a little bit committed in Philly,But do you think he's in any danger?
No? No, I think Alvaradois the guy. I think probably,
(51:08):
I would say probably, which Hoffmanis like a good handcuff. I
have Hoffman in a few leagues,not necessarily, not necessarily just for the
saves, but you know, ingeneral he's been he's been valuable just in
general. So I have Hoffman,but I think Alvarado. I think it's
(51:30):
Alvarado's job. Yeah, yeah,I think so too. For now,
just monitor it and see what happensthere in Detroit, Tyler Holten got his
first save. Do you think thatthey could be moving to some kind of
committee with Foley, or maybe Holtenis taking over here or just a you
(51:51):
know, opportunity where Holten was wasready. Someone just texted me. I
won't say who the person is,but people would know them. Someone just
texted me that coming into the year, Ronald Decunya Junior was more of an
injury risk than Aaron Judge and hestill went one overall. Which is that's
(52:13):
a fair point. That's fair.Yeah, I would say, I think
fully like Folly just blew the gamereal bad on Sunday, and then the
Tigers came back anyway, because Romonoblew the game even worse. But I
don't know what's going on with ajHinch with Detroit. I'm not sure,
(52:37):
man, because like I saw onSaturday that like Holton got to save and
I was like, why why didn'tFully pitched like the inning before. I
mean, I'm guessing it was aharder part of the lineup. But that's
so stupid too. I mean,I don't know. I feel like managers
just try and like justify their ownjobs. I don't know. I think
(53:00):
Foley is the guy though. Ithink even though Sunday was really bad,
So I guess we'll see, Likeif Foley has another bad outing like next
time out, his job could bein trouble. Yeah, And I will
say in that game, Fully camein the eighth and faced vlad Mashenton Springer,
(53:23):
so I mean it was also onewhere it lined up, you know,
to have have their best reliever comein. So I don't think Folly's
really going anywhere. Alex Vedo earlyseason closer thought of at least in Detroit.
He returned, but he's he's notin this mix at all for now.
(53:45):
Moving over to Colorado, the Rockieskeep giving Justin Lawrence chances and he
keeps blowing them. So at thispoint I assume that's what the Rockies want.
Great, But if they wanted toclose the game out. Do you
think they might go to somebody else? No, I wouldn't. Rockies are
almost worse. I think the Rockiesactually are worse than the White Sox.
I would not. I would notmess with the uh with the Rockies bullpen,
(54:10):
I wouldn't. I wouldn't go nearthat. I don't. You know,
Justin Lawrence at times looks like he'sdecent, like for an inning or
two in the middle of the game, but he has looked terrible in the
ninth inning. And then Jalen Beakslooked okay for like a week there at
the beginning of May. But yeah, it's a it's not been great.
(54:37):
I think the only one who's reallyperformed all season is Austin Gomber, and
they don't seem to want him tobe the the guy. Maybe because he's
because he's a lefty, I guess. I would guess Jalen Beaks is is
who you want if you're going withsomebody. He's another lefty. Though at
(54:59):
again, like the Rockies of thatorganization, we're like, no, we're
not sticking to lefty there, itdoesn't matter, We're not doing it.
So that leads me to Tyler TylerKinley, who is at least a writing
and has been well, he's beenterrible, great he's been he's been pretty
awful. He's been maybe as badas Justin Lawrence. So I ye know,
(55:21):
I don't actually don't know what you'redoing while you say this. Uh,
Kimberl right now is pitching to GavinSheets and on the on the score
Bug on the TV it says KimberrelSheets and I'm like, yeah, he's
absolutely is exactly what Kimberl is.Yep, yeah, yeah, well you
(55:45):
know he's he's getting old. Great, It's all right, we all we
all struggle in our quoterors. Heythree three two? Is he that?
Okay? It hasn't been that bad. This year's just just not what we
used to we're used to, CraigKimberl. Uh, Let's let's move on
to some waivers Gray and then we'llwe'll get it get out of here.
Okay, Yeah? Cool. SoDavid Frye looks like, I mean,
(56:09):
who's David Frye? And how dohe take over the quote unquote Hall of
Fame Sal Perez's body? What what'sgoing on? David Frye? You are
I've been Rod Reagez. David fryyou are Yogi Beara. I don't know
who David Frye. He was asof a week and a half ago,
(56:30):
but he looks incredible now right.And he's also gonna catch your eligibility.
In the last week, he's gottwo homers. He stole bags, hitting
six sixty seven. Okay, DavidFrye. Then we also have JJ Blade
Oakland outfielder. He's been hitting well. He's got three homers in the last
(56:52):
week. Kerry Carpenter. Kerry Carpenterhas three homers last week. He's probably
rostered in most leagues. Matt ErlingTigers altfielder was hitting leadoff on Sunday and
hit two homers. What's more schmotatothan that? Huh Ty? Franz got
(57:14):
into one on Sunday. He turnedon a pitch man. He hit it
like he was an actual slugger.I've never seen Ty frant Hi France and
David Frye together. You got Frenchfries delicious, Paul DeJong, he's been
hot recently. Who puts mustard ontheir fries? You really are from France,
(57:37):
huh Ty. Then you have AndrewMcCutcheon. He's been hitting well lead
off for the Pirates, and NolanChanell has been hitting for leadoff for the
Angels and also has been hitting prettywell. A couple other guys, Nick
Gonzales, Pirate middle infielder. Westill haven't really discussed him at lengths,
(57:57):
but I do like Nick Gonzales.Kevin Polar has been hitting well, Seth
Brown, J P. Crawford,Dylan Moore, Edmundo Sousa, and Patrick
Bailey. So there's some some playerswho have been hitting well. What about
what about your boy Hobby Bias?Greg? Can we get back to A
(58:23):
rosters again? Yeah? You gethim in your AL only rosters now we
can? We can uh, wecan cut alec manoah and add Abby Baias
back onto AL only rosters again.All right, so streaming options real quick
(58:44):
before we get out of here,beIN lively. He still hasn't owned in
your league. He's going versus Washingtonthis week. Stroman at San Francisco.
I mean, you really only worryabout home runs of Strowman, and San
Francisco is pretty great place for that. James Paxton at the Mets, Michael
Walker versus Diego read det Meers versusKansas City, Tenor Baby versus The Washington
(59:05):
Brian Woo versus The Angels, LuisHeal versus The Angels, Cole Irvin versus
Boston, Matt Waldon versus Miami,Tyler Alexander versus Oakland. As always,
if you have specific questions, comefind us on Twitter. I'm at rasbeat
On. Gray is the owner ofthe ras ball account. Yeah, you
can always come on YouTube dot comslash rasball Fantasy. Ask us questions and
(59:28):
comments there, subscribe there, likethe videos, like and subscribe us wherever
you listen to us, whether that'son YouTube or on your podcast listening app
Till next time, Greg, goodluck this week and I'll teuch you later.
But all right, lades
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