Rates & Barrels - Passing Through the AL East

Episode Date: June 18, 2020

Rundown0:38 Obligatory 2020 Season Update5:00 Front Offices Are Still Highly Motivated in Shortened Season13:20 What is Teoscar Hernandez's Ceiling?16:21 The Case for Derek Fisher20:51 Nate Pearson & Taxi Squads32:09 Yandy Díaz is Undervalued35:40 Brendan McKay's Projections vs. Short-Term Role43:16 Alex Cobb's Changeup is Back, But...48:24 Hunter Harvey to Close?53:02 Austin Hays: Leadoff Hitter?56:25 Boston's Lack of a Complete Rotation60:05 Darwinzon Hernandez or Josh Taylor?64:51 Outlook For A Healthier Alex Verdugo68:59 Giancarlo Stanton & Pushing Reset74:44 Jordan Montgomery vs. Jonathan Loasiga Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarrisFollow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRipere-mail: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels, episode number 105. It's Thursday, June 18th. Derek Van Ryper here with Eo Saris. On this episode, we are closing out our Divisional Rewind series with the AL East as we continue to revisit players on each team that we might have previously overlooked or we simply have just found something

new and interesting in our extended prep time for this 2020 season. Before we start going team by team on this episode, Eno, a quick update on where things stand. I think it's fair to say that we are much closer to having some sort of agreement for the 2020 season than where we were when this week began how much closer it is whatever you can debate that but it would almost surprise me if we didn't have something agreed upon for 2020 season by this time next week and i think it could even happen a little sooner

yeah yeah it's been a yo-yo of a week man i've i don't know if people could hear it in our voices on tuesday but that was a fairly low point you were trying to i felt like you were trying to cheer me up by saying it's not as bad as it seemed last night but I felt like you were trying to cheer me up by saying it's not as bad as it seemed last night. But yeah, Monday felt pretty low. And then last night was like, oh, it's like 100% done. And now, of course, today it's not quite as good as it was yesterday. But it does definitely feel like we are headed towards an agreement.

Yeah, that's why I'm living my life in generalities right now i don't want to get my hopes up too high like if i'm not going to get as low as everybody else was when things looked really bad to begin the week then i can't be all in you know dancing around the living room with the dog uh shotgunning beers on the lawn i can't get to that level until it's a signed, sealed, and delivered deal. Well, I've been fairly steady around 65% to 70% likely of the season. I would say Monday was my low and the closest that I got to 50-50, with a little bit of just extra pessimism baked in beyond the numbers themselves. but I'd say I'm closer to 75% now. And I guess the way it's actionable for me is that it feels like it's close enough to happening

where I'm starting to make a more concerted push to update rankings and to start putting some DraftKits 2.0 materials together. Whereas in the last couple of weeks, it didn't feel like things were close enough to getting done where that was A, worth the time, and B, something I was really motivated to do. I think for a lot of people, if you follow other writers and podcasters and just people around the game,

there is definitely a creative sort of drain that people have been experiencing in the last couple of weeks, especially. I think for some it hit right away, like probably soon after opening day would have happened. People were just missing baseball and didn't really feel like digging in more was something that they really wanted to do, so I completely understand that. But it's really the first time in a few weeks, outside of prepping for various podcasts, where I've kind of felt the nudge in between shows to start getting ready for written content. And that feels kind of good to have that little push again. Yeah, yeah, definitely.

And we can get down to sort of analyzing you know what this will mean what the 60 game season will mean what uh i think it'll be 60 maybe 65 what the dh will mean what the expanded playoffs might mean it is interesting the expanded playoffs doesn't seem like a fantasy thing, but it might be. We kind of treat the bad teams as a place where the young players will play the most and they'll punt and this and that. And look at a team like the Blue Jays. How are they going to make their decisions if they start out well and it's a short season and suddenly they could make the playoffs are they you know is a player is a young player that we like when we'll talk about specifics

later is a young player we like more or less likely to play um is a is a veteran like a travis shaw more likely to play because he's got a higher floor or you know and we're gonna have to make decisions uh quicker than we feel uh comfortable with probably because one week is equal to three weeks yeah there's not nearly as much time to absorb what's happening to wait for things to stabilize teams are gonna have to make quick decisions and we as fantasy players are going to have to follow suit and i think the lingering question for me with the expanded playoffs is you know which teams are going to push forward and do the things that a contending team in a full season would do such as call up young players like that's a big question but how much of a carrot is it going to be for teams financially to make the postseason?

Is there enough incentive for a team to say, you know what, let's bring up this player, let's sacrifice the year of control later, because making the playoffs gives us enough of a financial windfall. It's worth that risk. Trying to understand how teams are looking at that part of the puzzle is also probably a part of the analysis with how individual players could be handled yeah one thing that i will point out is i talked to an executive for a story i wrote today about the legitimacy angle and said something like you know will will a team trade for matt boyd this year basically and he said hell yeah someone's gonna

trade for matt boyd and i said well is it not necessarily like a legitimate season like a legitimate win like you know is it um you know would you necessarily shove your chips all in for this season he said hell yeah if we're winning we're winning, we're going to go for it. He said, listen, if a star of ours goes down with COVID and another star goes down for TJ or something, and we have a bad season and we don't make the playoffs and we're on the hot seat already, we could get fired. We're going to be treated by ownership in the same zero-sum way that we always are. How many wins did you get? Did you make the playoffs? Did you make any progress?

And so I think that there will be some trades, and there will be some teams that try to win it all this year. So I think that's actually, that was a comforting conversation for me. As much as it's like, oh, God, silly owners. You couldn't give your management team a pass on this kind of a year, then you'll never give them a pass. And yes, the answer is ownership will never give anyone a pass. We've learned that. Right. Well, arguably, it's a situation where there's even more pressure

on people internally to put together a team that does well this year because I think owners might look at high-priced people they have in their front office and say, you know what, this is a way to cut some costs. We can promote someone who makes a lot less to be the GM and let our GM go or reduce our scouting department further. There's a lot of bad things that could happen just to save money inside the game because there are a lot of other people who have already been let go by organizations

who are just going to be looking for an opportunity. So I could see that being leveraged internally as well. The economics of the postseason are totally different in that the players aren't really paid for the postseason. I don't know if that's something that everybody knows necessarily, but in terms of this kind of backseat commenting on the labor negotiations, but they don't really get paid for the postseason. The way that they get paid, as I understand it from a player, was they get 60% of the gate for the first three games. And I have no idea why it's structured that way. It's pretty weird. It keeps them out of all the

TV money. The longer the series goes, the better it is for the owners you know it's like a very weird way to do it but that just essentially means that they're not paid for the postseason in the way that we think of it and even the most recent negotiated or the most recent proposal from ownership to i don't forget which way which direction it is i think it's from ownership to players had like a basically a fixed number for the postseason i think it said basically 50 million dollars for the players the postseason or something right so if you fix that number and you add a bunch of play a bunch of teams you're bidding a bunch of carrots out there for all these teams to make the postseason and i think as much as i hate the 16-team postseason idea, I do like the idea of every team trying to win. Yeah, that's pretty refreshing, actually.

Yeah. And baseball is, I think baseball is a little bit different than basketball. I feel like the better team wins in basketball more often. I mean, when I think back on like major upsets in the basketball playoffs, like I can think of like one or two. Whereas I think if you had 16 teams in baseball, like a team like the Blue Jays, like think about even like something as simple

as the Giants run from being the wildcard contender. I think it was 2012, they were the wildcard. And they were down 3-0 or like 2-0 and in the game they were down to the Reds and then Buster Posey hit that big grand slam and

they just won the rest of the games in Cincinnati and then won the whole thing I think they can do an improbable run in baseball and I it's i think there's actually it's a really interesting tension in baseball between legitimacy and excitement and in parody so i do want any team to feel like they can do it i want every team to try and win but i also kind of like 162 games because it does a really good job of willowing out any illegitimate sort of contenders for the crown. Like, I'm cool with 162 games.

We get the best teams. We know they're the best teams. And then the playoffs, anything can happen. Right? I'm cool with that. With 60 games and a 16-team playoff, we're getting a little close to anything can happen in a bad way. Like, I don't know.

I don't know if I'm comfortable with like the giants winning the world series this year. I mean, that would make me feel a little dirty. It's possible. It's still, it still seems like a pretty big, long,

I still think at the very bottom, the true rebuilding teams, it's just long enough where it'd be like you said with the sims in the article earlier this week like it's possible but it's still very unlikely that they would even make the playoffs and i think where i think you do see that boost is we've talked about this in the past it's just like the jays the phillies teams that were kind of in the jays were lower playoff odds than they probably should have been, in my opinion, based on how young that team is

and some things that could have gone right for them anyway. The White Sox, the Reds, teams that were spending, teams that were pushing in the right direction, their odds were already going to go up in a short season. You add those extra six playoff teams, and obviously they get a big boost there. The young teams have the error bars going in the right direction is how i always put it you know even an old team the error bars are going

the wrong direction they the the amount of upside they have is less than the amount of downside they have due to injury or old age or attrition you know whereas if you look at a team like the jays yeah injury can hit them like anybody else there could could be some attrition. I guess Gritchick could age early. Travis Shaw could not bounce back. Ryu could have been over his skis a little bit and come back to earth. But then there's the rest of the roster, which is like super young and has most of their error bars on the positive side, where Bo Bichette could just you know become a superstar

vlad guerrero could become a superstar craig cavendish could become a superstar lourdes guriel jr could become a superstar all four of those guys could be superstars rowdy telez could be a really good competent player danny jansen could be a really good competent player jasker hernandez has the possibility of being a really good proper proper player so i think we just segued into doing the blue jays real quick i'm sorry about that i don't know what the rundown said as you were saying that i just flipped them on the run now it's made them at least it seems like here comes the segue yeah to ask her hernandez was on the rundown anyway um i think he's he's one of the Jays that doesn't get talked about a lot, even though he does get some attention because of StatCast.

And I think the question I would always come to with a guy like Hernandez is, what is missing? What is the thing that really stands out? While StatCast numbers are good and you see red ink and you see things that generally are good indicators, it's strikeouts, but within his strikeout rate, is he a guy who's just reaching all the time? What is the core flaw in Teoscar Hernandez

that has kept him from unlocking what those raw tools kind of point to? Yeah, it's amazing to me they had above average walk rate last year because my impression is that he doesn't really have a good sense of the zone. In terms of swing rates, he's above, he's aggressive. In terms of reach rates, for his career, he's been fairly aggressive. But actually, fairly average. So, you know, maybe it's a little bit more of a question of dealing with spin or something.

I mean, his slider pitch values are pretty poor. It could be, oh, you know who the comp is then? Jorge Soler. Well, there's some ceiling there. If that's the case, if that's the comp, right? I mean, when it clicks. Soler also kind of transitioning to being a DH, right? So there's that lack of defensive value, right?

And there's the problem with spin in the zone. Yeah, breaking pitches did tear up to oscar hernandez last year crushed the mistakes nine homers on breaking balls but hit 178 x slug at 358 lots of whiffs probably swung too much at them you know one thing that can help uh it was one thing that adrian belchery once told me which is that like if you kind of look for the high pitch um then you uh then the then even breaking balls in the zone look worse um and if you look at um his swing rates in terms of just like at all pitches, he's kind of a low middle guy that does swing at some high pitches. So, in fact, kind of recentering his approach at the top of the zone might help him even with breaking balls in the zone and just make them look further away.

So I'm not saying that necessarily I'm a hitting coach and this is the fix for Tasker Hernandez, but I'm saying that if he does break out, it could be something as simple as that. Which again, you're still getting something along the way, even if the breakout doesn't happen. And I think it's a question of how much is he going to play? Is he an everyday guy? Is he a four starts per week sort of guy? There's a few moving parts around this team that kind of shape that and he has a role in it of course if he's playing well then he pushes someone

like travis shaw out of some playing time or roddy telez out of some playing time but the way the the depth chart is configured you could easily see hernandez just being the dh every day with some sort of configuration of like Gurriel, Gritchick, and either Derek Fisher, who we're about to talk about in a minute, or some other forgotten depth outfielder, Anthony Alford or someone like that could end up taking on a larger role. I mean, there is opportunity. Billy.

Yeah. Never Billy McKinney. Yeah, I really hope that Derek Fisher doesn't go the way of my erstwhile affection for Billy McKinney. I really hope that Derek Fisher doesn't go the way of my erstwhile affection for Billy McKinney. But I would caution people that they are in the same bucket. So you can like these types of players, but do not spend more than like a dollar. You know what I'm saying? This is like the dollar bin guys that E know has always been super fascinated with and loves you know it's kind of like you talk about nando's obsession with guys like that right like i have i have my type too and it's it's the mckinney fisher

type but um one thing i will point out is stackhouse outs above average has Teoscar as 328th out of 382 outfielders. So I don't, you know, Fangraphs has him doing 44% of the time in right field. I think a winning lineup is more, you know, Gritchuk, Gurriel. Fisher, baby. Fisher. I mean, Fisher can be a goodriel, Fisher, baby. Fisher. I mean, Fisher can be a good defender, though, right? I mean, that's part of the way. He might be a nine-hitter if he's not hitting,

but he might be a good enough defender to keep getting playing time. Well, he's 294, so he's an ounce above average last year. But he's also less established in terms of less sample, in terms of defensive sample. I think we've seen a fair amount of sample from Diasco Hernandez to say that he's probably a DH. Whereas Fischer, I think, could play. And Grichuk has been fine in center.

It wouldn't be the greatest outfield, but Grichuk was 48th, actually, as an outfielder by by outs above average so I think that would be an okay and Gurriel is moves all right you know it's been a question of injury but I think a fully healthy I want to win tonight's game for me is Gurriel and left Grichuk and center Fisher and right Teoscar at DH and then I have no idea what to do at first. I think there would be some sort of like who's playing well between rowdy and Travis Shaw, but you would play to Oscar in the DH spot over whichever one of those first baseman isn't in the lineup. I think so. Um, there's enough lefty pop, um, on this team. I think, I don don't know maybe maybe with vlad being righty and um

bo bichette uh being a righty uh and i think fisher is lefty but gritchick is already maybe you have enough righty pop maybe um maybeoscar ends up on the wrong side of a platoon in DH. That would be the worst-case scenario. But Rowdy hasn't established himself. Rowdy Tellez is kind of still in that Derek Fisher bin, but actually behind Derek Fisher, I think. But in terms of stat cast, his numbers are really great. So basically, I think I would start the season,

my beginning of the season, we're trying to win this game, has Shaw at first base and Rowdy on the bench with maybe Panic on the bench, Drury on the bench, and Jonathan Davis or Anthony Alford, whoever is kind of impressing me better because those are decent defensive center fielder types. That would be kind of my general bench. I would start Jansen over McGuire myself, but they're both pretty good catchers. So that's my win today lineup. And it includes Derek Fisher. So that's why part of why I'm into him is a playing time opportunity for Derek Fisher, I think more than what Fangrass represents on their depth chart. And it has something to do with not wanting to play Teoscar on the outfield. Let's talk about something you kind of hinted at a little earlier, just Nate Pearson and what could be taxi squad purgatory. This was a note that I saw from Caitlin McGrath. She covers the Blue Jays for The Athletic.

a note that I saw from Caitlin McGrath. She covers the Blue Jays for The Athletic. And the suggestion was that Pearson is almost certainly a part of the taxi squad, which definitely makes sense because you want to make sure he's doing something this year. He's close enough to the big leagues where that's the right way to go. But I think there is this sort of unknown with players on the cusp and whether or not teams are going to push them into the role and actually give them big league innings in the case of a pitcher or big league at bats in the case of a hitter or if they're going to just hold them in case they need them and make sure they're

around members of the big league coaching staff as a part of that taxi squad so what do you do with someone like Pearson who I've been maybe mistakenly putting in the same bucket for mixed league purposes as Spencer Howard, as guys that throw hard, that have good secondary pitches, that are better than the back-end options on their respective teams? Should we be a little more careful with Nate Pearson, thinking about how the Jays might want to just hold him on the taxi squad as opposed to pushing him into big league innings. Yeah, I think there's a lot of different ways to approach this in terms of do we focus on their quality as pitchers? Do we focus on the depth chart and the people blocking them? But in the end, I actually think that it's the likelihood

that the team is competitive and is going to make the playoffs that is the most important and yet again we find basically a 50-50 split because with the expanded playoffs i would say both of these teams are playoff teams yeah i would agree but a little bit less likely a little bit less likely on the Jays, maybe. And in terms of people in their way, maybe a little bit more in their way in Toronto. We were talking about how the fourth best pitcher on the Jays is Chase Anderson, who with a DH in both leagues, I would take over Zach Eflin.

who with a DH in both leagues, I would take over Zach Eflin. So the fourth best pitcher in Toronto is better than the fourth best pitcher in Philadelphia. So that's two out of the three things. Without even getting to the talent of Pearson and Howard, two out of three things favor Howard. Slightly. By the slimmest of margins. I would agree with all that. I think that's the key. It's a slim margin. And if you think making the postseason is within reach, being a little more aggressive makes sense, especially

with pitching. You know, I think waiting and waiting and waiting on pitching and trying to delay service time and saving pitchers for good, it's risky. They break. You'd rather take that little chance now, get that development time in, and play both the short-term smartest combination

of players and max out your rotation and give yourself the best path for long-term development as well and it's the easiest it's the easiest way to push your chips in it's a lot harder than trading nate pearson for an established pitcher right like wow like what if you got two years of control of this other pitcher and he's hurt for one of them and you didn't make it in the year that you took to pitch in and pe goes and dominates for someone else. It's very different that than, let's say, oh, well, the seventh year. I don't know.

What's going to happen in the seventh year? That could be the sundown of this team. Yeah, like why are we looking seven years down the road? Like if anything that's happening in the world is teaching us anything, stop looking so far into the future. Like be reasonable Pearson in this in this roster and uh you know given uh Thornton and Kay and Borucchi and Yamaguchi like this team has some decent depth but Pearson has the front line ability so if you really want

to like say oh you know what like we're make the playoffs, and who's my number one and who's my number two starter? It's going to be Ryu and Pearson, right? And all the rest of those guys are differing depth, like four-inning to two-inning guys. You know what I mean? Roark is fine, but you kind of would rather take him out in the fifth if you could.

So I think I can see this team, like honestly, I could see this team winning it all. This is the kind of team that I could see surprising us all this year. Yeah, I think talent-wise, they have enough. And then the conditions are such that they can be in just the right position to pull it all together like that's and that's kind of where the floor though is like i don't think teams below the level of the jays can really actually do it i think the giants nightmare that you described like

i still it would it would take so much far out pretty far out there. Who's their number one starter? Yeah, there's those questions. They don't have the position players that are already in the big leagues who are projected to become stars. They don't have that. Guerrero and Bichette. Yeah, they don't have that. I think that's the key ingredient that makes the Jays kind of pop

as that sleeper team. Yeah, and the Jays even have that thing with Fisher and Rowdy Tellez where they have secondary players that could pop. I don't really love Anthony Kaye, and as much as I've been a Thornton supporter, I mostly think he could be a league average pitcher. From looking at the numbers I've got,

he basically has league average stuff and league average command in terms of the stuff and command plus numbers I use. So I think he could be like a four or five pitcher. But, you know, basically his team has in Ryu like a one or a two. In Rourke, Anderson, Shoemaker, and Thornton, a bunch of four fives. And then in Pearson, mostly a guy who could bridge the gap between those two. Decent enough depth in the starting pitching. The bullpen's not great, but bullpens are the kind of thing where someone can pop.

If Reed Foley becomes a full-time reliever, I have a lot more belief in him. I think he could get a few more ticks on the fastball and focus on what works for him. All of a sudden, Reid Foley, Giles, maybe somebody else pops. You could get something going. Should I say why I like Fisher? Yeah, go ahead. You should actually find his hard-hit comps oh yeah i was uh fisher is interesting um i'm gonna comp him to somebody maybe we can use it as a segue um very similar

to yandy diaz well i do like yandy diaz a lot so we should talk about the rays we'll get to the rays in just a second okay i think we're hopping around. Well, we got to make a call on Nate Pearson. Okay. All we did was talk about the unknown, which everybody listening to this show

was fully aware of before they turned on the podcast. He'll pitch in the big leagues this year and more than a half share. All right. So yeah,

you're rounding up and are you drafting him in a 12-team mixed league like in the Roto-Wire Online Championship style league where you get those seven bench spots? Is he good enough to be drafted in that format?

Yeah. All right, so that means he's probably like a top three. I'm earmarking at least two spots on that bench, and maybe I'm more aggressive on that than other people because I did that in my Roto-Wire Championship, and some people pushed back. But I'm earmarking two spots on my bench to try and get ahead of Fabu Palooza and basically pop two type high-end prospects in the draft that I'm going to hold on to and hope that they

come up early and that I avoid having to spend 30% of my FAB on them. Right. Because I already own them. Well, and I think the key there is, as I've said before, it's the willingness to cut them and accept the fact that, hey, two, three weeks in, the role's not there. You have to make that quick decision. If you're capable of doing that, absolutely load up more than you normally would to avoid falling off and i and i'm also that's my fault is that i'm not i'm not that good at that cutthroat in this but i am good

at uncovering decent people on the wire uh that i can kind of rotate in in a spot above them to try and keep them longer you know what i mean, especially if you're good at finding the guys that are second and third options in terms of conditional bids. If you're not chasing the guys that everybody wants on the wire that week, that's where you can do really well. It's like, well, you... I think I did okay on that last year. Like, I haven't been as strong in FAB as I'd like, but all of my teams got better over

the course of the year, which I think speaks some to my FAB as I'd like, but all of my teams got better over the course of the year, which I think speaks some to my FAB ability. And we talked about my general strategy is to try to go after those second ones. That's why I ended up with Oscar Mercado and Michael Chavis last year. But if you kind of look at all the misses that some of those big fab-a-paloozas happened,

there is a way to do the second best player. But if you kind of look at all the misses that some of those big fab-a-paloozas happened, there is a way to do the second best player approach and profit. Yeah, it worked really well if you ended up with Mercado instead of Brendan Rodgers, for example. Yeah, exactly. But you can miss in the middle too. Nicky Lopez, I apologize for any and all Nicky Lopez advice that lopez last season because it turned out to be very very wrong at least when you miss in the middle it costs you less yeah right exactly smelling good is important it thinks the hawthorne smelling good is easier than ever it's time to move on from that old bottle of cologne and time to start taking care of your hair and your skin

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ATHLETIC to get 10% off your first purchase. That's hawthorne.co and use my promo code ATHLETIC to get 10% off your first purchase. Hothorn.co. Confirming for the sixth or seventh show in a row now, I do smell better than I did before I had Hothorn products in my home. That's good because you used to smell terrible. Well, it's nice. We don't work in the same location. So, you know, my stench is not really your problem. Count your blessings. your blessings exactly let's go to the raise you mentioned yandy diaz and i think it's still kind of amazing to me that cleveland couldn't get yandy diaz to do what the raise did last year i think the number that

still just jumps off the page to me when you're messing around with StatCast leaderboards is the average exit velocity on fly balls and line drives when you have it just set to the qualified default. You see Yandy Diaz as a guy that's near the top of that list. He is tied for 11th in average exit velocity on fly balls and line drives and the names ahead of him snow judge nelson cruz fran mil reyes donaldson schwarber solaire mitch garver matt

chapman matt olsen those guys all just hit the crap out of the ball and the main thing is that he just needs to get to that optimal launch angle more often. But last season was a big step in the right direction for him. Yeah, and in a league where batting average keeps dropping, it's like 250 now as the league average batting average, he has a high floor, you know, because he is going to connect at least 15 times in a full season, maybe 20, and, you maybe 20 for homers. But because he hits the snot out of the ball, he's going to turn some of those grounders into hits. He has a good

strikeout rate and a good walk rate. So he's a good hitter. He's just a good hitter. He's got a good hit tool. He's got a good sense of the zone he's going to give you good obp he's going to hit near the top of the lineup so i think the floor is pretty good i know that injury has to be part of the conversation because it really he didn't recover well off of that bone injury he even was still suffering from it in the playoffs, even after he came back. Seems to be kind of the guy where things linger for a while. He hasn't really ever hit more. Like he's only once in his career surpassed 500 plate appearances in a season, maybe twice.

He's never done 600. So it's hard to say that his floor is really high because their injury is part of that. But in terms of like, you know, he's healthy today and I'm plugging him into my roster, that kind of floor, it's a fairly high floor with a decently high ceiling. And the ceiling, I think I would describe as kind of a guy who could hit 300 with 25 homers in, you know, in a full season. Whereas, you know, the floor is more like 275 with 15 homers. It's a pretty good floor and a pretty good ceiling.

Not really, really high ceiling because he still hit 50% of the balls on the ground last year. I think you're describing from a profile standpoint, Yuli Gurriel with a better OBP. And when you look at the price for Yandy Diaz and drafts since May 1st, ADP is around $250. And look at where Yuli Gurriel is after the season he had a year ago. He's gone 100 picks earlier than that. They're both first and third eligible. And I think Yuli is overpriced and Yandy is underpriced. Yuli hit 31 last year and his full season pace this year won't be near 31. Right. I think for the reasons you mentioned with that OBP being up, the counting stats, and where Yandy Diaz hits in the lineup, that also gives him just a really nice floor. So he's

kind of what I would describe as an obvious buy at the price this season. Looking through the Fangraphs auction calculator as I was going back and adjusting some ranks, I ran it with the bat and I was looking at the projected dollar values. A couple things stood out to me. Maybe I'm a little too high on Patrick Corbin and Sonny Gray, and I have to rethink that, but Brendan McKay popped up within $1.50 of the projected values of Corbin and Gray. McKay was actually pretty much identical in value to David Price, who I like quite a bit. And it kind of comes down to expected usage again, and whether or not you believe that the dominance we saw from McKay in the minor leagues actually

foreshadows a high level of success in the big leagues, or if there was just a case where maybe he was overmatching competition there and he has some legitimate flaws to work through so where do you go with mckay do you do you trust the projections do you trust more uh in the actual stuff ratings and the command scores like where are you at on mckay going into this season where you know he's gonna have some big league innings but we don't know how exactly the Rays intend to deploy him. Yeah, I actually had some inside knowledge before the season that he was going to be sent down. I mean, it seems silly to put it that way because it seemed probably the most likely outcome given options and the way the team was coming together.

I think we even discussed it as the most likely option. given options and the way the team was coming together. I think we even discussed it as a most likely option. But I think the extra depth, like the extra roster spots and the emphasis on depth is going to be equally as good for the Tampa Bay Rays in real life as it will be annoying for people playing fantasy baseball and wanting to roster those because you know the one thing that was going to push this team to actually start someone full-time at a position on the diamond was that you couldn't platoon everybody because there wasn't enough roster spots to do that and now we're going to give them more roster spots so there's a possible platoon in center, a possible platoon in right, at second, at third, at first, and at DH. Like, it's possible they'll platoon six spots if you give them enough roster spots to do that.

Yeah, that's going to be annoying for sure. That's going to be annoying for sure. I think where I fall with Brendan McKay and seeing him as the guy on the outside looking in, he was optioned down, and I think as you said, it wasn't just to hold somebody on the roster longer the way we saw with Cleveland where Aaron Savali and Zach Plesak got optioned down. The Rays aren't doing that. I think what he has is he has— They want him to be a starter, and with Yarbrough as the fifth starter,

I think they would rather he started in the minor leagues. That was what would have been in the past. I think that has some relevance to how they'll use him this year. I think that he's less likely to be a one-inning reliever than to be the glue guy, along with maybe Trevor Richards, where they're pitching three innings in the middle of ballgames. Yeah, I mean, you could look at Yarbrough and Chirinos and say, you know what?

We're going to put McKay with Yanni and we're going to put Richards with Yarbrough and we're going to wreak havoc on teams with those four or five spots. I think that would be terrible to prepare for a game like that. To be like, and I think it would be even more terrible than the standard opener strategy to know like, oh, we're going to get like and and and i think it'd be even more terrible than the standard opener strategy to know like oh we're gonna get like three innings each of completely different players yanni tiranos is gonna come and blow the doors off on the right end right side and then mckay's gonna come and blow the doors off on the left side for two or three innings i think that'll be terrible to

prepare for in terms of setting your lineup in terms of preparing for the game as a hitter and yarborough is going to come out and throw 89 from the left uh and then richards is going to throw that devastating change up from the right like even if you tried to do a reverse stack or something um you know and play lefties against yarborough it would still be tough i think pure nightmare uh if that's how they do it and i think think the other angle with McKay that doesn't really exist with Richards, I don't think Richards is going to be more than a bulk reliever at this point. I think the Rays are going to find that as the

optimal way to use him. The breaking ball is not very good. If that changes, then sure, we can re-examine everything. But I think the other path for McKay is that you have Charlie Morton, Blake Snell, and Tyler Glasnow, three pitchers we really like, three guys that are fantastic, but three guys that have elevated injury risk. There's no way around that. And I think that gives me a little bit more

reason to take on McKay in the possible three-inning role max to begin the season, knowing that if any one of those three guys goes down, Brendan McKay is probably the guy they turn to to take on that rotation spot. Yes, yes. If Yarbrough stumbles, and there's definitely a possibility he stumbles given his velocity, to be blunt about it.

There's not a lot of people who are successful at his velocity. If he stumbles at all, I think he could easily switch roles and become more of a more traditional lefty reliever or like a two-inning lefty reliever. Thinking about what we're just talking about nate pearson pearson goes a little earlier in drafts than than brendan mckay but let's just say you're in that stage and you're looking at those two guys who are you more comfortable having on your roster in a mixed league i just rather have pearson i just i see

his his stuff numbers are better i think his stuff is better. You know, for McKay, one of the things that's interesting is that though he throws hard, you know, I'm not sure that everything is necessarily as far along as I'd like in terms of the non-curveball stuff. So like, for example, his stuff plus numbers on his fastball 99, despite having decent velocity, uh, one Oh five on the curveball. So yes, that combo there is pretty good. Uh, but then you look at the change up 88 and the cutter 84. So I don't know if he needs to separate the cutter and the curve more or make it more of a slider or do something with that, uh, hard breaking ball. But I do think that there is another step he needs to make in his development before um i'm totally on top of it i guess for me i'm a little more optimistic that he can still

do it since as a two-way player he wasn't focusing entirely on pitching during his time at louisville yeah i just i feel like they probably were primarily i think they probably it was more like we'll let you hit in the cage as opposed to like we're going to spend three hours talking to you today about hitting right i think that's where things have gone for him more as a pro now where they're kind of just saying like you're really a pitcher you could still hit some but we see you as a pitcher uh so i'm still holding out some hope that the strikeout rates are there too like if you just want to return to kind of old school like a little bit more old school analysis like the strikeout and walk rates are great the home run rate rates rates were great in the minors so um there is definitely and even even last year he struck out 26 of the guys he faced uh that's pretty decent for uh your first 49 innings in the major leagues yeah and he was there is definitely... And even last year, he struck out 26% of the guys he faced.

That's pretty decent for your first 49 innings in the major leagues. Yeah, and he was crushing AA and AAA last season before getting that opportunity. We talk about the Rays a lot, so we're going to move away from the Rays. Let's go talk about the Orioles. The case for John Means has been made on this show, so I'm going to steer away from John Means as well. I thought I'd have to rename the show.

Yeah, so before we started the show, you were talking about Alex Cobb kind of popping up on you in a few places. And you kind of run into this problem sometimes where you look for things that stand out as good indicators. And sometimes you see players who you just don't believe in at all maybe getting kind of flagged by those indicators. Is that part of what's happening for you with Alex Cobb right now? Yeah, it's like I don't want to put my name on this one.

You know what I mean? My analysis says like, okay, here, look, stuff plus 145 on the curveball, 106 on the changeup, 94 on the fastball. That's not a great fastball number. We've seen people succeed at a much worse number than that. And then in terms of Command Plus, I think he has a positive number there too. He had 112 in Command Plus. In fact, in terms of combined overall stuff and command numbers,

one of his closest comps is Brandon Woodruff. Like, what? It's so weird. So weird. I mean, I guess it's enough for you to say, oh, well, you know, he's a crackpot. Shut up. I mean, the one thing, though, is that Cobb used to be good,

and you can look at the pitch profiles, and you will notice that his changeup came back. And you can even see in the numbers, his swinging strike rate was back to where it was when he was good last year. It's just that he gave up 6.6 homers per nine. I know it's a small sample, but the homers are going to be a big deal. And so they affect all of his projections and and are enough to say hey stay away probably but like honestly if like in al labor if i'm having trouble with a if i need a starting pitcher and in his first two starts i see the change up is good and he's got a little bit more like six

and a half to seven strikeouts per nine uh in the, and he's not giving up homers left and right. I may put like a couple dollars FAB on him and try to get him. He's really got to push that K rate at least to the high teens. I mean, look at the last four years. He's been well under 20%. The best strikeout rate we've seen from Alex Cobb in the last four seasons was 2017. That was only 17.3%. This is hard to live on.

Yeah. And the fastball being a 94 and stuff, I think you can also see in the ground ball rate. When he was with the Rays, he had plus, plus ground ball rates, 55, 58, 59. And then his last year with the Rays was 48, and his first year with the Orioles, 49.5, and and then 46 last year that's a fairly large discrepancy because when he was above 50 percent with the ground ball rate he had better home run rates you know then when he started falling below that his home run rate went up so maybe it is just that the fastball is gone and he can only go so

far with that splange the the thing that he throws, the split change that he throws, and then the curveball. Those are two really good pitches, but I don't think necessarily he can do exactly with them what he wants to do. Let me look at his Command Plus numbers for those pitches. Even if they are okay, could he really throw a split finger and a curveball for a lot of strikes maybe the curveball but the command plus on the split fingers 118 could he throw the split finger

for strikes and for the curveballs 102 could i mean i don't know that's average command on the curveball i'd listen look sometimes you got to look at the back of the baseball card, right? And the back of the baseball card for Cobb is a nightmare. I think it might be similar to what we've experienced in recent years with Jason Vargas where you get these weird stretches where he pitches well and you start to trust him and the pitch mix is really odd. And it works in little spurts,

but it doesn't work consistently enough to where you can rely on it. I think that's where I kind of bump up against the wall and say, I just can't bring myself to do it. I think in labor, like an AL only league, there's probably a time and a place, maybe in a mixed league down the stretch for like a two-start week or something in the right he would have to have he would have to have shown a longer like in my situation where i'm like

putting two dollars on him after a week i wouldn't do that in a mixed league right yeah so maybe how about this maybe september i'll sum him up alex cobb is the second best starter on the baltimore orioles it's that's a really nice thing to say but i don't think it's a very instructive uh oh god it's terrible you know i want to open my eyes i'm gonna stop looking at it yeah we'll try something else we'll try something something more exciting. So last time we talked about the Orioles, I don't even know if we brought up Hunter Harvey, but he was tracking toward maybe being the closer when the season was on track to start back in March.

I wonder if that happens right away. I mean, with Hunter Harvey, he's gone through a ton injury-wise. They didn't really have an established closer. Michael Gibbons, just kind of okay, not great. So Hunter Harvey, is he the guy who leads this team in saves? Or does it not even really matter? Because even in this shortened season, if he's sharing the role, he's just not quite good enough yet to actually be a net positive for us as fantasy players.

Well, I think one thing that might hold him back in the short term is that they're going to still kind of use the oven mitts when they use them. My evidence for this is his usage pattern last year. He didn't even pitch once on back-to-back days in fact he had three days of rest between every time he was used even though he was being used in one instance um in fact he had 11 days of rest before his last usage so i i would assume that givens will still get even if harvey becomes slightly more of the um closer with the capital c that givens will still get, even if Harvey becomes slightly more of the closer with the capital C, that Givens will still get a few chances. I say only a few because maybe they won't even need a closer on back-to-back days.

Yeah, it's not really a problem for them. I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry, Orioles fans. I mean, you have to laugh at your own team a little bit too, or else you'll never make it. No, you'll just cry. I mean, look, long term. I like Givens. I like Givens. They might be headed in the right direction.

I think that's a possibility. I think within the position players, you find some interesting fantasy options. Renato Nunez is a guy that I think in a long season, maybe you were staying away from, but in a long season maybe you were staying away from but in a short season you're a little more competent in yeah he's projectively worth less than half a win uh because he's basically a dh um that will be below league average with the bat despite all the power because he just strikes out a lot doesn't get on base. And it's kind of a one-note thing, especially power in that park gets kind of, gets demerited because, yeah, I guess it's easy to hit homers in that park.

So, you know, in a full season, I said there's risk that, you know, Trey Mancini is the starter somewhere and stewart and hayes and santander are playing well and smith is playing well and all these players and ruiz is playing well at third and all these players have a little bit more to do with the future than ronaldo nunez um who is you know a 26 year old who's never going to be more than a below average dh most. So, you know, there could have been a chance to edge him out. But now, of course, post-COVID, we've got Trey Mancini out for the year and more roster spots and just more of a soft landing for him where he'll at least play some.

And at some point, maybe Chris Davis gets bought out and Nunez plays first until Mancini comes back. Yeah, I think Mancini is a long shot to play this year. It was something he wrote about for the Players' Tribune back in April. He's, of course, being treated for colon cancer, so all the best to him as he tries to make that recovery. The other really interesting player, tries to make that recovery. The other really interesting player, I think, from a now-has-a-lot-more-playing-time standpoint is Austin Hayes,

and I think that was kind of the plan all along, and I think he might even be the leadoff guy on this team. That's where the extra little surge in value might come from, and people might remember we saw Austin Hayes at the end of 2017. He made a 20-game appearance late in the year with the Orioles. Struggled a bit as a 21-year-old rookie, but that was after he tore up high A and double A. He hit 32 homers that year, split between those two levels, spent 64 games at high A and double A before debuting. Injuries have been just a major problem for him, really for most of the last two seasons and the minors he hasn't had anything close to that same level of success that we saw in 2017 but

still just 24 years old and i think he's a really interesting player that some people have sort of forgotten about yeah yeah and i think his defense is good enough to to i don't know always play center but play center in the short term um you know he had he was above average and stack ass outs above average 160 um 160th out of 380 um i don't know i don't necessarily says that portenzi is going to be a great center fielder throughout, but enough to do it for now. And I think that's important because that's the easiest place to put him, especially since he's not projected to have an above-average bat. But from a fantasy angle, he should have an above-average bat

because he'll steal some. He should be able to hit 20 homers, and his up-and-down walk rate is less important unless you're in an obp league right and i think the fact that he's flashed some lower strikeout rates in the upper levels of the minor leagues like 20 ish percent even a tick lower at some stops that gives me some hope as well i just think there's a few ways it could go right for austin hayes his ADP is right around that pick 250 range. Like it's 263 since May 1st. It puts him next to Corey Dickerson, Sam Hilliard, Shogo Akiyama. I think Hilliard and Hayes is kind of an interesting toss-up.

The Coors Factor really twists that one up, especially when you look at Colorado having a DH available. That probably pushes me more towards Hilliard, but I don't think that's a totally unreasonable question to look at those two but hilliard's playing time is riskier given the way colorado has treated young players and uh given his strikeout rate he's just riskier for uh falling off i guess than hayes yeah i would agree with that you know the team is worse in baltimore so they're more likely to just stick Hayes out there

and let him go up and down as he will. Hayes is a little bit, therefore, I think, higher floor, Hilliard higher ceiling. Yeah, it might depend on what you need. If you need the playing time and stability, Hayes is the way to go if you want to take that swing. The deeper the league. Yeah, the deeper the league, more Hayes.

The deeper your outfield more hilliard yeah i think that's a good way to look at it if you're dealing with a condition like erectile dysfunction you want treatment asap that's why our friends at roman have spent years building a digital platform that can connect you with the doctor licensed in your state all from the comfort of home roman makes it convenient to get the treatment you need on your schedule just grab your phone or computer complete a free online visit and you'll hear back from a u.s licensed Thank you. doctor anytime you have questions or want to adjust your treatment plan. With Roman, there are no commitments and you can cancel anytime. So if you're struggling with ED, go to getroman.com slash rates for a free online visit and free two-day shipping. That's getroman.com slash rates for a free online visit and free two-day shipping. It's not an accident that I've buried the Red Sox

and Yankees on this outline. I think anytime anyone previews teams, the AL East usually comes first, and then the Yankees and Red Sox sort of lead that discussion. But I figured let's put them at the end of the series to really send a message that we don't have an East Coast bias or anything like that. I don't know who that message is intended for. Yeah, we're anti-East Coast at this point. What are the Red Sox doing with their pitching staff? I mean, this was something that I was just kind of beginning to unpack

when everything came to a halt back in March. They didn't have a great plan. And Chris Sale getting hurt really threw gasoline on the fire. But even if Sale were a part of this rotation, Sale, Erod, Ivaldi, 1 through 3, sure, you feel good about that group. Martin Perez, for flashes last year, maybe looked like he unlocked something.

That didn't happen. They brought in Colin McHugh. He was still behind other pitchers before. Maybe he's caught up now as spring training potentially starts up again. Ryan Weber, Brian Johnson, what are they doing? Do you have any reason to be optimistic

about any starter on this depth chart behind Erod and Nate Evaldi at this point? When McHugh is going well, yeah. He can hide the fastball because he has really good command of his breaking pitches. There's a chance that maybe he can bring the curveball back.

He kind of went to more of a slider shape on that breaking ball than the curveball shape. Maybe that wasn't actually the right move because 2019 was not necessarily his best year. In fact, it was his worst year with the Astros. So maybe he could kind of go backwards a little bit and get back to, I think something like 2016 could be doable if he has that bulk in him, I think something like 2016 could be doable if he has that bulk in him, where he had a 4-3 ERA, 1-4 whip, and was a capable back-end rotation guy. And if you add that to Evaldi and Rodriguez, now you've got three and you've got to figure out two.

But I'm not sure that I see the two that I, like, I want to put, I want to be like, everybody watch out for Tanner Hawk, y'all. I don't know. I got nothing for you in terms of, you know, back-end starters. Like, Brian Johnson doesn't do anything for me. Ryan Weber doesn't do anything for me. Heyan weber doesn't do anything for me he has like a decent sinker but um you know in today's game and even like even given that decent sinker like last year a 48.6 percent ground ball rate and you know the the the rubric back when we like did more you know ground ball rate type analysis the rubric was always that like you had to be clear of like 52-53%

before it was really a big deal even like 49-50% was like okay but there was even some research in like Sierra the skills what does Sierra stand for but you know Sierra on interactive skills interactive

era um i think in sierra there was some research that there was like um exponential effects with ground ball rate like if you got to 60 it was very different than like 55 which was very different than 50 you know um so 49 might okay, but it's not that great. And look at his home run rate. 1.11, I don't know. This is what happens when you put a lot of balls in play. You have a 5 ERA. Yep, things tend to go wrong.

I think this is a bullpen that maybe has a few more interesting arms in it than I was giving it credit for. Maybe he has a few more interesting arms in it than I was giving it credit for. Darwinzen Hernandez is a lefty who looks like he could just be nasty out of the pen. No idea where the ball is going. He's great. But yeah, 26 walks in 30 to 30 innings. I've seen people suggest that he's a sleeper for saves because they don't have a lot of faith in Brandon Workman holding up. And while I have that same skepticism that a lot of people have with Workman,

Hernandez isn't necessarily the next guy up for that job, even though he has the strikeout rate to maybe close. We kind of stumbled into someone else before the show who might be overlooked. Oh, were you talking about Josh Taylor? Josh Taylor, yeah. It might be an issue that he's a lefty do they have another good lefty in that pen it's it's either hernandez or taylor yeah like those are the only two lefties and if taylor is wild that kind of creates a problem but uh maybe he's less wild if you limit the pitches he throws and limit pitching throwing to righties, right?

Because the, the, the more you limit someone to just using them in their most comfortable places, then the more they're better. Like for example, his walk rate against lefties was six per nine, which I'm not like, that's not great,

but his walk rate against righties was nine per nine. So, you know, maybe you make Darwin's and more of a lefty specialist. That's not great, but his walk rate against righties was 9 per 9. Maybe you make Darwin's in more of a lefty specialist. And Josh Taylor, who also throws pretty hard. He threw 95 miles an hour, had a good slider, and also threw some occasional curveballs. balls and in terms of splits didn't have as wild as splits walked 1.8 lefties per nine and walked 3.9 righties per nine so just generally a safer guy all around and just had great strikeout rates in the minors ever since he stopped starting and really just seems to deserve most of his era last year when he had a nice sparkling 304 era so if a lefty closes in that

bullpen i think it's taylor and if a righty other than workman closes i think it's it's barns as much as i think hembree and waldron are okay and brazier's okay like you know at some point barns could take that uh role finally for himself yeah i think i would agree with that as far as barns still being the most likely fallback option but if for some reason he's outstanding stuff and i don't believe that someone who's blown a few saves like you know can never be a closer like i just don't i i don't know maybe i'm foolish about that but i don't i don't think that he's uh this he's a really good reliever. Look at this. He's put up three and a half wins in three years. That's really good.

And the K rate, north of 35% in back-to-back seasons, it comes with walks, but plenty of whiffs along the way. Some position player thoughts here. Christian Vasquez had an amazing season last year. I haven't really found anybody who goes to the mat defending it as his new baseline. I mean, we're talking about a guy who's already 29 years old, didn't really ever project to be more than just a contact sort of hitter, and he found 23 home runs last season. Seems like there's nowhere to go but down,

but is there anything he holds onto from those gains? 6% barrel rate, no appreciable change in launch angle, just a slight uptick in exit velocity. His expected slugging last year was 30, 40 points lower than what he actually did. So I think he's much more likely to do something like the expected slugging, which was like a 440 expected slugging. I'd like to see what the Bat-X says. Very interested. The Bat-X is no more in love with Christian Vasquez than the bat, which suggests to me that the back of the baseball card and the stat cast numbers agree that he's more of like a 400-second guy.

That said, he doesn't strike out as much as most bad catchers. So 260, 14 homers, there's a lot of leagues where that plays. I wouldn't pay for 280 and 20 homers. Curse you two catcher leagues. He's just outside the top 200 in terms of ADP. He's probably a little overdrafted, but you look at guys like Carson Kelly, who's going a little behind him.

Jorge Alfaro, who's got some problems, of course, but has a lot of tools. You can kind of see the other guys in that range and talk yourself into those guys instead. I mean, Vasquez is fine if he falls a little, but not a guy that I'm drafting at the price. Last Red Sox player that I want to talk about is Alex Verdugo. Healthy, at least healthier, much healthier than he was back in the spring. I think that bodes well for his chances of maybe hitting the ground running with his new team.

But what's your take on Verdugo? I mean, a lefty who started off last season hitting the ball really well and then just fell apart. And some of that might have been the back and the oblique problem that he's been dealing with. But do you see a truly good, well-rounded hitter? Or do you just see mostly hit tool and not enough real pop to put behind it?

Yeah, I mean, I have to throw the caveats out first. Because the caveats are that I like people with good hit tools. I like good strikeout rates. And the injury could have affected his exit velocity, his maximum exit velocity numbers, reducing his apparent ceiling when it's actually better than that. But I will point out that he does not hit the ball in great angles when he hits it hard, and he does not have a great max exit velocity. So in terms of players that have similar hard hit angles and maximum exit velocity and

sort of hit distributions in terms of where they hit the ball hard, the comps are Hernan Perez, Ben Gamal, you'd have to be generous to make a David Bowie so it's not even David Bowie I mean I don't know Jose Rondon, Austin Romine Ahmed Rosario like

I and then look at his spray charts and what you see I don't think that the spray charts necessarily favor his fit with Fenway he goes the opposite way a lot and that might seem like a positive it is a positive for his hit tool for his ability to cover the plate um and for his batting average however uh it's not going to be a positive for his power because going the opposite way in boston means uh doubles off of the off the big monster i just don't think that he's going to hit it over the big monster.

I love when you call it the big monster. It's one of my favorites. Every once in a while, I'm German. And also in center field, he has another group of homers to center field, and center field, dude, in Fenway is really deep. I mean, you can picture it in your mind, right? Like that weird corner that's out there.

Yeah, I just pictured Jackie Bradley Jr. running forever and tracking down fly balls that would have been home runs in other parks. That's the other place that Verdugo, he doesn't really hit down the line, which is what you'd want a lefty to do for power in Fenway. So I would cap his cap is aggressive because of the caveats I said earlier, but I would cap his full season power production at around 15. And that's not even really talking that much about the ongoing health issues that he's dealt with the back oblique problem for him has been pretty significant

like are we gonna really give him you know five to ten stolen bases given all those issues i think i think we're talking about a guy who um will look uh will like take a very different path to yandy Diaz's numbers and also cost a lot more. Yeah, he's gone probably about two to three rounds earlier in most redraft leagues right now. David Peralta is the outfielder going closest to him. I'd rather have David Peralta than Alex Verdugo.

They are kind of similar, though, in terms of the stats you're expecting to get. Yeah, I mean, they're taking very different roads to get there but um you know 350 obp 280 to 300 batting average 15 homers like you know it's a it's interesting that i think that they kind of land in the same place in very different ways let's wrap up today's show with a little bit of yankees talk. I'm here for a 65-game healthy season from Giancarlo Stanton. I mean, who isn't, right? I still think he could be really good.

I think he's burned enough people. This is something I think it was Vlad Sedler was a guest on the Roto-Wire show with Scott Jensen, and they were talking about Stanton. He's burned enough people over the years where the price is finally affordable. He's not getting that third-round ADP despite the missed time. He's more like a fifth-round guy, ADP of about 66 since May 1st.

Give me some other fifth-rounders for context because in the fifth round, I could see me wanting to be more safe and getting more floor. All right. I'll give you some names. So would-you-rathers. We'll start.

Eloy Jimenez or Giancarlo Stanton? I started with a good one. Yeah, Eloy. I'm taking Eloy. Okay. Chris Bryant or Giancarlo Stanton? The shoulder, butt, eligibilities,

Bryant. Okay. Max Muncy or John Carlos Stanton? Oh, now we're getting closer. Now we're getting closer. I don't necessarily think that Max Muncy

has a big collapse potential and with the deep rosters, we talked about how I like Max Muncy. He's a CIMI, which is good. But in terms of what I think they could do, I think that it's kind of similar in terms of mediocre batting average,

lots of power, and Stanton has more power. If one of these guys was going to hit 20 homers in 60 games, it's going to be Stan. Yeah. It's fun to think about that. It gets a lot closer there.

Uh, I could, I could be, I guess with a certain, like if I had gone a little bit steals heavy early, um, I might, I might go for broke there and just be like,

Hey, this is going to be the kind of season. This is going to be a high variance season. So there could be an argument made for having a high variance draft and sort of leaning into it and just putting stanton on your team and just being like hey i'm going to win the main event if stanton hits 22 homers i think the the price is pretty appropriate i just think i'm comfortable having him in this context that now that he should be completely healthy again whereas back in march i couldn't do it i couldn't subject myself to a player with a soft tissue injury like that right but is this not like

like the judge where they're like this next mri won't be his last mri at least like you know most of the news is like yeah he's ready to go straight up against judge i mean they're actually in the same neighborhood at least adp wise judge goes about 10 picks earlier but would you choose stanton or would you choose judge the last thing says judge has yet to resume swinging i mean it was last is the end of the last month but we're in we're in such a void with news. What's going to happen is, if spring training starts up again... So much news.

The updates on players who were just completely stuck or in rehab, all those updates are going to come in and... So many people will be hurt. Pinball, man. It's going to be pinball in the news. I think I'd rather take the guy who is not currently hurt. That's just the smart way to handle it. Generally, it's a good thing not to take the guy who's currently hurt, unless you're getting five rounds for him.

I've got one more going to the other direction. Joey Gallo is cheaper than stanton by about 10 picks so is far ahead of stanton as judges that's about as far behind of him the gallo is right now who do you like better between those two guys man if they're both healthy i'm taking um i'm taking stanton in a second i just joey gall like, I feel like last year was just a peak year for him in terms of just like

turning everything into the right outcomes. Maybe not last year. I'm talking about 2018, aren't I? What am I talking about here? Gallo was like last season. No, no, last year I think. Yeah, everything was working.

And, like, I know that BABIP analysis is a little bit old school, but, like, a.368 BABIP, you know, his expected batting average last year was.229, just in line with, like, listen to his expected SXBA,.222,.232,.229. And then his actual BA is.9, 206, 253. Like, what's the outlier? So as much as I like the power, I think he's going to hit more like 220 next year.

And so I think I would take Stanton. I just can't sit here and choose the guy that struck out 38% of the time last year and has always struck out at least 38% of the time last year and is always struck out at least 35% of the time. And we're talking about more than 1500 big league plate appearances now. It's just, this is, this is who Joey Gallo is. Yeah. And I know that Gallo's minor league numbers had more walks in it than Chris Davis, but I just smell it. Just a tiny little smell of Chris Davis.

I'm sorry, I don't want to say Joey Gallo is Chris Davis. Those similarities are clear. More athletic, more of a walk rate history in the minor leagues, but I think he may have a similar short peak. There's one more thing I wanted to bring up about the Yankees,

and it pertains to the back of their rotation. James Paxton should be totally healthy, which gives them a pretty big boost in that rotation. I do like Paxton a lot, especially at the price. So as you build up the rotation, Cole, Paxton, Tanaka, Jay Happ's got a spot to call his own. I think to begin the season at least. And then you have Jordan Montgomery.

Versus Jonathan Loaiziga. For that last spot. Previously when Paxton was hurt. They were both going to get a chance. To maybe open the year on the rotation. And whoever pitched better was probably going to stay. Once Paxton came back. So between Montgomery and Loaiziga,

who do you like more as a late pitching dart? Loaiziga opener, Montgomery bulk. That's my call. Herman is the glue starter. He's going to miss a season, isn't he? He is still suspended, yeah. And he has to serve it out, and it's actually become longer in reference to the full season.

It's kind of like Pineda, right? Pineda's suspension was like, oh, well, maybe you'll reserve him because he'll come back and be fine. Well, now his suspension is the whole season. Yeah, so there's 63 games left on Domingo suspension and the season is going to be about 65, 65. Yeah.

So, uh, I think if, if the wise thing is not the opener for Montgomery, uh, because if they, if they do do that, then somebody like,

uh, Chad Bettis or, uh, Davey Garcia, who I like, would have to be kind of on the roster as the glue guy, right? As the kind of maybe comes in the fourth inning and pitches till the sixth, right?

Yeah. So without that, I think that generally Montgomery is the start. Loaiziga is because I don't think they want to start Garcia's clock right away, and he could maybe develop a little bit. Garcia's going to be on the taxi squad as the first starter up. If it's more of an injury, then Luiziga's going to spot start for Paxton because something hurts a little.

You know what I mean? Yeah. The typical Paxton random injury, like tripped over something strained his forearm so they'll try to like yeah they'll try to like start they'll try to like pitch the wise guy every three days for three innings um wherever they can and kind of use them that way and kind of keep them semi-stretched out but also just kid gloves for him because he's like you know he has the one of the worst injury histories ever seen great stuff but you know just a just an appalling paucity of innings pitched it's amazing really to

see how much time he's missed i do think shorter outings are probably his future even though i think there's still a question as to just how much that actually protects a pitcher i think it's it's one of those things where you you just assume that by pitching fewer innings you're less likely to get hurt but i think it's also an expectation sort of thing where if you put him in the role and you expect him to go five and he's hurt and he's not you're you're hurting yourself if you don't have good depth. The Yankees have pretty good starting pitching depth right now since Paxton came back. I think Davey Garcia is a nice wild card, and he makes a lot of sense for the taxi squad,

but he's not in the Nate Pearson situation where I would say he's definitely going to get big league innings this year. I think a couple things have to break his way if he's going to make that debut. I agree. I agree. But I do think he might be in the next tier. Interesting on the next group of pitchers that might pitch this year. How would you compare a Tariq Skubal to Davey Garcia? Because I like both of them.

Tariq Skubal has nobody in front of him and will probably make the taxi squad because they want to keep him developing, but they also don't necessarily want to start his time. Yeah. I am more likely to take the flyer on Skubal because I think there's a better chance that he's getting full starts if he does get the opportunity. And Garcia's going to get not just like, Garcia's up

from the taxi squad for two weeks. I think the Yankees are going to be real careful with Garcia, even if they bring him up. Whereas if Scooble gets the chance, they're going to just let him pitch. The Tigers are one of the hardest teams to figure out with all this because, I've said

it before, like Mize and Manning and Scooble and Faito, they're such an important part of the future. You want them pitching, but if you can control them and have them on the taxi squad and just have them kind of working out, getting their innings, getting their work in, is that good enough for their development? Maybe, but also that's a lot of pitchers to put on a taxi squad and not use.

That means that Jordan Zimmerman may have to power through a 750 ERA for the season because they're just like, nope. I know it's obvious what's happening here, but nope. They're the very low probability playoff team that if they just push their prospect chips in,

the pitching prospects that is, and just said, let's just see what happens, they could be the more realistic like whoa like they actually made the playoffs and and won some playoff games like i yeah i just think that's how good two to zero can be yeah yeah it's gonna be ugly like from from an offensive standpoint but i think the pitching could surprise in a good way if they use all of them i just don't think they're going to do that. That seems so out of step with how teams function.

They still haven't signed a single $20,000 signee. I wrote a piece today about all the crap that teams were doing to try and sign those $20,000 signees, and the Tigers didn't sign a single one, which means I think that their player development is not that great so the the players think their player development is not that great and even though the system is not that great at least from a hitter standpoint no hitter was like i want to sign there because their hitting is thin whereas hitters signed in the droves and pitchers signed

in the droves of the red socks because the Sox player development is great and their farm system is thin. I mean, that's one thing that people are focusing on the Royals, and yeah, they did some things right. But the Red Sox cleaned up. They had like 13 signees, and I think it's mostly because the farm system is temporarily down and they have a good player development system in place. Maybe a little bit of a perfect storm, but yeah, getting that extra influx of talent helps. Yeah, the Cubs, for example, also signed like 10 guys from 20,000, and they haven't done anything out of the norm in terms of treating their minor leaguers well.

They just have a bad farm system and have a good reputation. Opportunity to play whenever the minor league seasons actually come back. If you're enjoying the show on a platform that allows you to rate and review it, please take the time to do that. We greatly appreciate it. If you're not already a subscriber to The Athletic, you can support the

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We are back with you on Tuesday. Thanks for listening.