Rates & Barrels - Strolling Back Through the AL Central

Episode Date: May 26, 2020

Rundown3:44 Re-examining Mitch Garver's 2019 Breakout9:26 DVR Makes Another Plea for Byron Buxton10:03 Favorite Depth Starting Pitcher in Minnesota?12:49 Best Fallback Option for Saves15:38 50-Man Chances: Kirilloff, Larnach & Lewis19:19 Re-Considering Carlos Carrasco23:11 Who Gets Saves if Hand Falters?26:13 Roster Expansion Winners in Cleveland31:16 Warming Up to Domingo Santana37:28 Can You Justify Tim Anderson's 2020 ADP?41:27 Does Nick Madrigal Have 2020 Redraft Appeal?46:02 Dylan Cease & Falling In Love with GIFs53:01 Is Reynaldo Lopez Bullpen Bound?58:58 The Royals Like Ryan O'Hearn, Should You?61:56 Looking for a Spark in the KC Bullpen65:53 JaCoby Jones' Previously Ignored Improvement70:39 Why Do Good Teams Give Away C.J. Cron?73:35 Deciding on Skubal, Mize & Manning Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarrisFollow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRipere-mail: [e-mail] Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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Join us for an opening ceremony, then take on your climb with our heart-pumping playlist. Join us on June 13th from coast to coast as we come together to climb, conquer, cure. Register at lls.org slash bigclimb. Welcome to Rates and Barrels, episode number 98. It is May 26th. Derek Van Ryper here with Eno Saris. We continue our trip through each team's depth chart on this episode. We're going to focus on the AL Central. Eno, how's it going for you coming out of the extended weekend? It was a good break. I ate a lot.

I drank a lot of hazy IPAs. And I enjoyed the good weather. Did some yoga with the kids. We did a run where I ran and they biked. It was one of the slowest miles I've ever run. It was one of the slowest miles I've ever run. But we did our best to kind of get out of the house a little bit, and I think we had some fun.

Fresh air is good. I got a good run in on, what day was that? Sunday, Sunday morning. And it was a year, I'm going to say a 2020 personal record for a 5K. I don't know if it's an all-time record because I don't keep very detailed year-over-year times, but it was faster than the last dozen or so runs that I've gone on. So I'm making some sort of progress.

And it's just nice to be able to run outside and not have to run on the treadmill at this point since the switch has flipped. We went from wintry spring garbage to actual, like, 85-degree humid days. But, yeah, like, can we have, like, a – like, can we pour one out for the idea of spring? The concept of spring? Like, it was 97 degrees in Palo Alto yesterday. Seemed a little hot for um the end of may like what the hell we went yeah we we i can't complain too hard we have pretty good

weather here all the time and we probably had something that you'd call a spring but uh that's really warm for this time of year for sure and uh i think generally that's really warm for this time of year, for sure. And I think generally that's something I noticed when I lived in New York was, you know, especially when spring training, you're like, oh, March, like sweet spring training grass. And then you look outside and you're like, God, it's cold out there and wet and gross. And then you might have a little bit of April and then May. It's already getting hot. So, you know, that was, I would think that's something that's sort of happening around the world.

Yeah, it's not pleasant, and the fictional concept, now fictional concept of spring is one that I really do cherish. But it'll be good. It's just nice to be outside a lot more at this point. Let's begin our tour of the AL Central. Let's start with the Minnesota Twins. I think they are one of the most fascinating teams in the league. And of course, last year, they had some major steps

forward, really in all facets. The offense reached some levels that we hadn't really seen from the Twins in a long time. The pitching was great as well. And I was looking at the 2019 league-wide barrel rate leaderboard. Four twins last season were in the top 10. That, of course, is the barrels per plate appearance leaderboard. Nelson Cruz, Miguel Sano, CJ Krohn, who's now a Tiger, we'll talk about him later, and Mitch Garver, all inside that top 10. And Garver was a guy that took a pretty big step last season. He had a 3.9% barrel rate per plate appearance in 2018. So a jump to 9.7, more than doubled what he was doing with the barrel rate. I just wonder how sustainable that improvement is. And he's going to play a lot more, of course, without Jason Castro on this roster. But anytime you give a player a lot more

playing time, it becomes a question of just how much they could give back skills-wise with that increased role. Yeah, I'm not actually that worried. I mean, yes, the barrels per batted ball event, that's the gold standard when it comes to looking at power, and it's very sticky from year to year. So what do you do in the face of someone who's made a really big step forward in barrels per batted ball event? Now you've got a guy who is internally inconsistent. He had a 5% barrel rate in 2018 and a 15.5% barrel rate last year, you feel like he's going to regress some. But with the reason that I like Mitch Garver is that, you know, he made other, he made other strides that kind of point out the strength in his game. So it's not just the power. It's the fact that he's really disciplined and he went from a 39% swing rate in his first two seasons to 35% last year, he only reached 18% of the pitches he saw outside of the zone,

and the league average is around 30. So he's a league leader in that regard. So what I think is going to happen is he's going to still have the 340 on base percentage. He's still going to be a valuable batter. He's still going to bat a lot,. He's still going to bat a lot, so that's going to help his runs and RBI totals. And if he is more of a true talent, 20 to 25 homer hitter guy,

or more of a last year 31 and 359 plate appearances, I think there'll be some regression in the power department. We just don't see those kinds of huge leaps without a little bit of regression. Yeah, I have to think that teams are going to pitch him a little bit differently. He hit 25 of his 31 home runs last year off fastballs.

He hit 341 and slugged 838 against fastballs in 2019. Under 200 average against breaking balls and off-speed pitches. Under 400 slug on breaking. Under 300 slug on off-speed. It's a little bit like what we saw from Jose Ramirez. This was the Clay Link tweet that shook the world in the 2019 draft season that ramirez did so much of his damage against fastballs that he had some some flaws that need to be corrected and i don't think that single-handedly explains what happened to jose ramirez you know first half of last season versus second half of last season but it is a pretty drastic split to see that much production coming on one pitch type and you know pretty yeah clear struggles against breaking and off-speed stuff.

And you just described the situation in which he could still be the same quality of batter and yet face regression because of the pitchers and their strategy towards him. I figure he'd see a lot more breaking balls in the zone for strikes, for example. He could adjust to that a little bit, too. It's not like he's locked in just being a below-average breaking ball hitter forever. Right, right, right.

But it wouldn't be as good as maybe feasting on fastballs. But generally, he's a good hitter. I mean, if you look at it, his swing strike rate is really low. His reach rate is really low. He might be so passive that he passives his way into some extra strikeouts. But overall, it's been great for him. And I definitely think he's one of the top three catcher in the league am i crazy no i don't think that's crazy i mean jt real mudo is kind of in a tier of zone gary sanchez probably has a slight

leg up over grandal but i i don't know grandal okay so not top three so he's there with contreras at like four and five yeah and adp has him at five it has him ahead of Sal Perez ahead of Will Smith ahead of Wilson Ramos I mean that that kind of that all checks out I think so yeah like for example he's not as like risky as Will Smith in that Will Smith has the really large fly ball rate um and doesn't really have the same underlying statistics when it comes to his walk rate, his approach at the plate. I mean, yes, he's got a decent approach at the plate, but he also doesn't have an 8% swing strike rate. So, you know, Smith is a little bit more boom or bust this year when it comes to what his batting average is going to look like in particular. I've made this point before.

I'll make it again very quickly this time. Byron Buxton, who, of course, is coming back from major shoulder surgery, apparently was going to be ready for opening day back in March. That was definitely not clear two weeks out from it. So he should be ready to go as things start to pick up again. Big jump in exit velocity last season, brought the K rate down a bit, had a lot of injuries. It's been just part of what he's been as a player. But at the price again this year, I'm still in on Buxton. I think there's still quite a bit to like as it goes with that profile. The pitching side, though, is also really interesting.

You get past even the top four, Barrios, Maeda, Odorizzi, Rich Hill. I think we've talked about those guys at various points throughout the winter, throughout the last few months. But who in this organization, when you go deeper than that top four, is most likely to exceed expectations and kind of emerge as a fantasy value as the fifth starter or as an injury replacement if one of those top four guys goes down with an injury at some point? You know, there's a reason to believe that Randy Dobnak is not a long-term starter, but he might be perfect for this season.

He's had some platoon splits and might have a hard time getting through line of the third time through the order with that funky arm slot and the kind of sidearm problems, platoon problems that usually comes with it, I think are going to come for him. However, if you're pitching guys four innings and you need a two-inning guy in the middle, it's going to be Randy Dobnak. I think that fits his skill set perfectly. In terms of a guy stepping in and doing better than we thought, it's a boring answer, but I actually think it's Hulish Sassin. I think that last year was a bad year for him, but he could step in. Four years before that, he was useful. He's got slider command. He's got a great slider. And between his fastball and

slider, he can get through three or four innings. So I think there might actually be some sort of, you know, Shasin Dobnak at the back end of the rotation to begin the season where one of them slides into a kind of glue guy role once Hill, if Hill doesn't start the season with them, once Hill is healthy. I do think Hill will be good to go, though, just based on the initial timetable. We'll see if that happens once things do pick up again. Homer Bailey is the other guy that I'm kind of intrigued by because he was changing some things up last year between his time with the Royals and with the A's.

149 Ks and 163 innings. It was the first time since 2014 that he finished a season with an ERA below 5. So the bar was extremely low. But as we've said time and time again, the Twins are one of those organizations that have a good plan for pitching right now. So definitely willing to look at Bailey in some deeper formats. 15-plus mixed leagues. Maybe as a two-start guy, of course, in leagues more shallow than that.

And we'll see if he sticks beyond that. Looking at the bullpen, if Taylor Rodgers were to falter, and I don't have a compelling argument against him at all, I think Tyler Duffy is a guy that has caught my eye as someone who was a bit more nasty than I realized last year. 34.5% K rate. Had that fastball slider combo working really well. Home run rate was a tick on the high side, but that was the case for a lot of relievers last year. So I don't know if it's necessarily a lock.

Like if Rodgers were to share the job with somebody or if you were to get hurt, I'm not sure it's a lock that Sergio Romo or someone who's done the job before would be the guy. I think Duffy might be a bit of a deep sleeper for some saves if the situation arises. I've seen some bullpen charts where Rodgers was listed as being likely to lose his job. And I think I know where it comes from. I think I can understand it a little bit because, you know, Rodgers used to be around a 93 guy. And then last year he pumped up to 95 on the fastball. And you can see literally what velocity does for a person when he was striking out, you know, 24, uh, you know, 28% of his batters and

then jumped to 32%, um, in 2019. So, you know, the strikeout rate goes up uh you know and he looks more like a closer at 95 but what if he drops to 94.1 last you know next year that'd still be above where he was in 2018 but it would be significantly below where he was last year he's 29 years old um reliever velocity loss is tied to more production loss in relievers so that's part of the volatility of year-to-year and relievers and i think if he had you know a 9k9 next year uh and a two and a half bb9 uh gave up a few more homers all of a sudden his era is in the mid threes um and maybe as you say uh duffy uh slides in there uh ahead of him um on the other hand uh tyler duffy himself is 29 years old and just had uh you know a velocity increase and a strikeout rate increase so he could fall back um but you know just the fact that they traded away bruisdard, Granarol, to me says that they think that they

have what they need in the bullpen and with Taylor Rodgers in particular. So that's some degree of a vote of confidence, isn't it? Trading away the guy who throws a million miles an hour and everyone said could be the closer of the future. Yeah, I think so. I think Taylor Rodgers is legit, but it's one of those bullpens that I wasn't thinking a lot about who would actually get saves if something happened to him until we had extra time to invest in that exercise.

Well, are there any 50-man roster winners in this situation? Trying to look across and see if there's anybody exciting. Maybe Willen's a studio that probably makes a 30-man roster. I've seen some 30-man projections already.

Some 50-man projections already. I've seen third catchers. Which is interesting for two catcher AL leagues. There might be a bunch of catchers and they might all be unplayable. Right, just chopping up the playing time. I figure like Smeltzer or Thorpe, they're at least on the 50 man. They're probably on the 30 man, actually, as glue guys. But both of them have just really low velocity.

I like Thorpe's, uh, collection of pitches some. So there's, there's some, some ability there to maybe, uh, pitch past his,

his thing. But I, uh, in terms of, of rookies prospects that, uh, that might see some time this year, uh,

I don't think Larnach or any of those guys are ready. Kirilov maybe. They're, I mean They're tricky, though, because both Kirilov and Larnach played at AA last season. Kirilov had more time there, but they're right on that bubble. I think the Twins, being a team that has playoff aspirations this year, are in a tricky spot where they want to make sure those guys are getting reps. I think they could make the 50 man. I think Royce Lewis is kind of in that same sort of boat.

Yeah, you know what? They'll make the 50 man, because they want to have some upside, and they want to keep these guys developing. So I think Larnak and Kirilov might both make the 50 man. And then you're just waiting for an injury, right? You're just waiting. I don't think either two is going to make the 50 man and then you're just late waiting for an injury right you're just waiting i don't think anyone's gonna either two is gonna make the 30 man because you have marvin gonzalez playing

everywhere you have lisa lisa raya is playing everywhere um well maybe they maybe which one would you say makes it larnach had a better season by wrRC Plus and a little bit more defensive versatility. So maybe Larnock makes this roster? Because when I look at the outfielders, I just see Marlon Gonzalez, Jake Cave. It's not a great depth team. And Buxton's like an injury risk, right? Buxton's style and history alone

make you think twice about making sure you've got a center fielder available that you like. And maybe that's Jake Cave defensively and somebody else picks up some slack offensively. Miguel Sano's injury history is pretty bad too. Yes, Kirloff could play there. Yeah, because if Sano goes down with a bad injury,

do you really want to play Marwin Gonzalez every day? Not really. And the same thing if Nelson Cruz were to get hurt, even though he's a DH, I mean, if he were to break down... I think the chances that Kirilov and Larnach play this year have gone through the roof.

Yeah. They probably were not on my redraft radar outside of ale only reserve picks now they've inched their way up they are dude jeez i thought they were i thought they were too far away but you know they're you know they're they're gonna make the 50 man if they're on the 50 man that then they're gonna then they're gonna play at some point. Then there is a chance. Yeah. That's all you need. Let's move on to Cleveland.

We've had a discussion in the not-so-distant past about Aaron Savalle and Zach Pleszak, so no need to rehash that. I think you're on the Savalle side of that one. I'm on the Pleszak side. More interesting to me in the Cleveland pitching situation right now is Carlos Carrasco. I took a step back for a second. I mean, 2019, he was sidelined for leukemia.

He beat that, which you look at what happened to him last year. It's hard to evaluate anything that was going on on the field, given the nature of what he was dealing with. The injury history beyond that is a bit concerning. In 2015, he had some shoulder inflammation. He had strained hamstrings in 2016. He had an elbow contusion in 2018. So you add that to the elbow inflammation he was dealing with when things were happening earlier this spring, I understand where some concern comes from.

It's easy to see it. But look at the five-year window from 2014 to 2018. During that time, he was 12th among all pitchers, minimum 300 innings pitched, and K-BB percentage, 22.3%. 327 ERA, 109 whip over those five years. That's basically Steven Strasburg in terms of ratios and in terms of strikeout rate from 14 to 18. The May ADP, only seven drafts, 152 overall. I think at that price especially, I'm buying for a Carlos Carrasco bounce back. I feel like I've been a little higher on him than most throughout this draft season, but looking at that body of work i'm convinced that he can get back to something very close to that level yeah and i

i bought a couple shares of him because he fell into that you know sort of 25 to 30 range and i thought he could be better than that especially when it comes to per innings pitched work. I can't speak for his volume because he's only hit 190-plus twice in his career, and he's had those injuries you mentioned. But in this situation, I wouldn't necessarily push it to draft him, and I don't mean to be crass or whatever,

but this is what we do. He's at risk. I think I've heard that he wants to play, but he may not play. When I reached out to Dave Cameron, who used to be my editor at Fangraphs and he's now with the Padres at the beginning of this thing. And, you know, he admitted that he was at risk because he had had leukemia before. Um, and, uh, so he was, he was

staying close to home early on in this thing and trying to avoid contact with other people. So that worries me a little bit. I have to be honest and just put that out there as ugly as it is. But otherwise, yeah, skills-wise, I'm there. I think that he's getting close to losing that little bit of velocity that will matter. Um, and it may have already happened. He's at 93,

five, or he used to be at sort of 95 plus 94 plus. Um, so I would watch the radar gun and watch his comments about, uh, health and playing. Um, and,

uh, I doubt that the one thing is I doubt that, uh, that baseball is going to take that choice away from the player. Uh, so maybe if he's saying he's going to play, then he's going to play. Yeah. It is worth monitoring that situation too.

And it's a good point to make that his situation health wise is a lot more precarious than just the typical player, which again, everybody is exposing themselves to added risk, but he already has elevated risk because of what he had to deal with a year ago. Emmanuel Classé was suspended, of course, a few weeks back, and I know you're a Brad Hand skeptic at this point. I think that's probably fair to say. Is James Karinczak the deep league stash that you want,

or is it somebody else in that bullpen that you're turning to at this point? It is weird that Karinchak got demoted, and we talked about how that might just be to keep some NRIs on the roster. I think they loaded up with some veteran NRIs to play at some of their weak depth positions, like their outfield situation is kind of cobbled together is how I would describe it. Um, and, uh, you know, in terms of middle infield backups

or infield backups in general, uh, they've got Christian Arroyo and Chang. Um, and I don't think either of those guys is ready or is good. Sorry. Maybe it's just that they're not ready. So I think that Kerr and Shaq will be back up soon. Hand will keep the job for a little bit, and then it'll devolve into some sort of platoon group situation with Oliver Perez and Brad Hand and Kerinchak sort of trying to get around the rules and face enough batters and while their way into some good bullpen results.

Because this is not what I would consider a strong bullpen all of a sudden. I think Hand is falling off. Perez is one of the most weakened by the new rules when it comes to relievers. Simber is kind of a one-trick pony. And Klasse is now gone for, I guess, the season. That's a weird thing about getting popped for 80 games is it used to be half a season. But, you know, I like James Hoyt a little bit,

but, you know, he like James Hoyt a little bit, but, you know, he hasn't – he's got like one good season. No, he has no good seasons under his belt in the majors. Still looking for the first one. Still looking for the first. But he throws 94 and has a cool split finger, and I've always like sort of kept my eye on him. So there's a chance he pops and joins the group.

I doubt he becomes the only guy. chance he pops um and joins the group i doubt he becomes the only guy uh but uh i don't see with class a gone and karin check in the minors it's not as easy to see the future on this one yeah i i think i'm gonna lean on the belief that for civale plisak and karin check it really was about not sending guys down who didn't have options waiting to make those decisions and seeing how things would play out and they're going to bring all three of those pitchers back into the fold and they're all going to be part of it because of expanded roster i mean did you say savalian police sack went down too yeah yeah that's where i was just yeah those guys like this was all because of how the rosters had to work yeah those that's a fourth and fifth starting pitcher like if they like who's their fourth and fifth starting pitchers right now

if it's not them you know so uh yeah they're coming back up logan allen i think is our glue guy that we like here um i put him in reserves at the at al labor because i think he's going to come in in a lot of fifth innings uh in fourth innings, and pitch for two or three innings. He has good slider command, a wide variety of pitches, and he's totally the kind of pitcher that the Indians seem to make into better than other teams can because of that slider command and because of the wide variety of pitches like you

think about plesak none of his pitches are that good but he has a lot of them yeah and he has good slider weapons civale like decent amount of pitches good slider command otherwise not a great pitcher uh but they they turn those guys into fourth and fifth starters pretty easily and then every once in a while they pop and become shane beaver i think the other depth guys that i'm kind of interested in here they don't have elite prospects knocking on the door like their best prospects are a few years away uh but daniel johnson is pretty interesting to me 371 obp at triple a last year yeah he came up for power and speed like he has some good stat cast numbers. Yeah, he could just do a little bit of everything,

and clearly they have some questions depth-wise in their outfield. I wonder if Tristan McKenzie gets on the 50 man just in case. I mean, they want him to pitch. He hasn't pitched in two years. Yeah. One year?

He didn't pitch in 2019. Okay. Sorry, my head is... I'm already starting to mean like, he didn't pitched in two years yeah one year he pitched he didn't pitch in 2019 okay sorry my head i'm already starting to mean like we didn't pitch in 2020 either can't hold that against them yet since nobody has yeah but 90 innings in 2018 i think they'll want him to i was talking to um a a farm director about their plans for the 50 man. And we were talking about a player that got drafted and hadn't pitched, uh, because he had pitched a lot in the college season. So they thought, Hey,

we're just going to shut you down, uh, and start you up again next year. Um, and they were worried that in this situation, they wouldn't now they'd come and they wouldn't now have pitched for like almost two years, you know? And they were worried about that.

So I think the Indians, just looking, sort of scanning their top prospects and who was at AA before, I think they'll want McKenzie in the major leagues and not in the major leagues, but like on the 50-man roster and playing in a place where they can see him and check his health and monitor him closely uh and perhaps get him into major league games because he was an exciting prospect at one point so yeah i think mckenzie and johnson there's a chance they put nolan jones on the 50 man as uh that sort of 20th man we discussed when it comes to C.J. Abrams, just like a high-quality batter that they don't want to play in the major leagues this year, but they want him to continue his progression.

Yeah, I'm with you on that one as well. The other name that is probably just lost in the shuffle because he doesn't have a place to play initially is Bobby Bradley. There's really nothing left for him to prove in the minors anyway and since there you know probably won't be a minor league season can we get him a 30 man roster okay so what are the the starters are eight right no nine in the al uh the starters are nine um and we've got uh you you got a cap on pitchers at well it was 13 but are they going to on pitchers. Well, it was 13. But are they going to cap pitchers at 15, though?

If it's a 30-man? Let's assume they do. That's what they've done so far. I would figure they would. At least for part of the season. We've got 15 batters. We've got nine starters. We've got two catchers. All right, so that's 11.

Christian Arroyo has to make it. He's like the only one. I guess Chang has to make it. That's 12 and 13 bowers is 14 um i guess christian arroyo could make it not chang because we're already at 14 you could get away with one uh bowers is 14 to shields is 15 So the last spot is Chang versus Bradley. And there's just such a versatility. Yeah, right.

There's such a big difference. I have to think that these Indians would take Chang. Right. So that puts Bradley on the taxi squad. They already have two DHs too with Reyes and Santana. I'm amazed they have to play one of those guys in the outfield yes they do not great not great not great not great at all um speaking of domingo santana i'm kind of warming up to him a little bit everyone's chasing fran mill reyes and his adp and those limited may drafts has gone way up he's up to 93 a little bit. Everyone's chasing Franmil Reyes, and his ADP in those limited May drafts has gone

way up. He's up to 93 for an ADP with a min pick of 80. I understand the appeal. I mean, he hits the ball really hard. The power is real. The playing time's there. I think Domingo Santana, though, reminds me a little bit of Oakland's Chris Davis in terms of

how streaky he can be as a hitter. And he was hurt late last year, too. I think it's pretty clear. If you look at his rolling hard hit rates, his contact percentage in the zone from August on, it was a wrist injury, if I'm not mistaken. His ADP is 285 in May. The power is real.

I don't think anyone doubts that. He actually chips in with a few steals. And the batting average floor seems to be a little bit higher than people realize with Domingo Santana as well so he's a guy that I didn't really draft at all back in February and March who I'm probably going to start sneaking onto some rosters at that price in that 275 to 300 range I think that he's also a good example of why of how our metrics have improved you know early on we saw uh the ground ball rate pretty high uh the fly ball rate low and we thought maybe this is a guy who just hits

it hard but hits it on the ground too much uh but as we've you know learned a little bit more and as the stack cast metrics have come out you know we can now see that he's always had a double digit barrel rate um you rate in every season. And yes, that last year was his peak, but coming off of basically 10% to 11% barrels to 12.5% is not... Nothing happened last year that is so big that it has to regress. He was basically the same guy he was in the past, which is a guy who hits the ball hard and actually barrels the ball pretty well. And that's why he has a.357 Babbitt for his career. It's not because he hits

too many ground balls. It's because he hits the ball really hard and he actually barrels the ball well. So, you know, the thing that's a little bit weird for me is just that there's such a wide gulf between Reyes and Santana in the eyes of many. They felt the need to trade for Fran Mill Reyes when they got Domingo Santana for like $2 million. They both are league average walk rate, too many strikeouts, viability on the field type power hitters. And I don't see there being that wide of a gulf between them. I'm on board with your analysis on this one, 100%. I wonder what it is about Fran Milreis that they see internally that we're not necessarily seeing on the outside

that prompted them to i guess the barrel rate is better you know if domingo santana's 10 you know you know 10 to 12 as his possible outcomes for barrel rate uh it looks like um frown mill had a 11.6 in his first year and 14.8 last year which is top 10 of the top five percent of the league. So I guess Fran Mill's a little bit better than Domingo Santana, like a better version of him and younger, but very similar. And if you're talking about an 81-game season, like, yeah, either one of these guys could pop and the other guy will get hurt and hit 240 and see the DL.

Yeah, both capable of being sneaky team leaders or even among league leaders in home runs though in a shortened season. That's exactly the profile. You wrote about that profile I think two weeks ago now. Time is still a bit of a mess.

The other little nugget on Domingo Santana, I've got to bring it up anytime I see it. Ex-Wobacon. Expected Woba on contact. Actually pretty good. You see some red ink there both last season and in 2017 on his savant page. Santana. If you're going

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I was looking at those May ADPs. And I just wondered, can a case be made to buy in on Tim Anderson at his 2020 ADP? 88 is his ADP in those May drafts. It's really high, and of course, I don't think anybody could have seen the batting average that Tim Anderson brought to the table last year coming. There's a lot to like with him skills-wise. There's things to be concerned about in the plate skills that's always been part of who he is as a player. But when you start to unpack it,

do you ever find something that makes you believe that what we saw last year, or at least a large part of it, is actually real? Yeah, I mean, if you look at his expected batting average, you could say something like, well, uh, he had a expected two 94 last year.

Um, and so he's going to regress and that's, you know, that was lucky. But if you also look at his expected batting averages due to his, you know, his balls and play the stack cast stuff, uh,

in the past, like in 2018, it was two 27 and in 2017, it was two 49. Um, And in each of those cases, he outproduced his expected batting average because of his speed is my guess. I know that they are including speed in some of these metrics, but there's like, they're just including it. And then there's nailing it and getting exactly right for every different player so the fact that this player has over has has reached beyond his expected batting average and has the speed uh i'm going to uh i'm going to give him credit for that so um i do think he's a batting average

asset that's i think it's something that you could debate and before this year you would have said no because he went from 283 to 257, 240. You'd say, nope, he strikes out too much. He's not a batting average asset. So I will say, I think he's gotten something out of his growth. And I will say that I think he can hit better than 280 next year

and have as many homers as steals. Yeah, I mean, I think the power, as we've seen now over three seasons is settling in as high teens even low 20s power he missed some time with an injury last year probably would have passed that 2018 total when he hit 20 home runs i i think this is actually a really solid profile and maybe we get fixated at least i get fixated too much on an extremely low walk rate. That's not typically something you see in an elite player, but he does a lot of things very well. There's no question about playing time.

And like we've said for everybody on this team, they're getting better as far as the overall quality of the lineup, and that brings up the floor for counting stats as well. Yeah, the one thing I would say is 26 years old in the dynasty context, I do find these red flags more larger red flags because, you know, in any given year we can project him, we can have some certainty on how we project him. We can see that his projected batting averages are all around 280. You can have some belief in what his true talent is at any given time. But when you're talking about projecting out three, four years,

you have to think that somebody with a 3% walk rate is going to get figured out by pitchers. And right now, he's super athletic, and he's in his peak range, and he's making the most contact he'll ever make. He's making the most contact he ever made and he struck out 21% of the time last year. So you'll see the bell curve happen with a strikeout rate where two or three years from now he's going to be striking out 25%, 26% of the time, I'm guessing, again. And that'll be the beginning of a – he'll be a short peak guy. And he'll be a guy that you want to trade away early in Dynasty Leagues rather than late. It's a pretty stark contrast to what you get from the projected starter at second base now for the White Sox.

Nick Madrigal, who has never struck out 5% at any level in the White Sox system. Such a strange player. I mean, people by now know that he's small and he doesn't hit the ball very hard, but he puts the ball in play a ton. He actually draws walks and he runs well. And if he fields his position at an average or better clip, that drives playing time. But the question everybody comes back to is just, is this going to work against big league pitching? And is he going to be mixed league viable in his first season? I definitely have a new school hitting coach in my ears saying this won't work. They'll knock the bat out of his hands.

He just doesn't have the power. They'll fill up the zone and, um, you know, he'll, he'll just have a lot of weak contact on his bill. Um, but, and I don't want to make a one person statistical comp or anything. Uh, but the projections look okay. You know, for like a 95 WRC plus might be able to be a league average player by being above average and other facets of the game like you mentioned. Also, some

chance that he walks more than the projections suggest. They're all about sort of 5-6%. But here's a one-person comp that's a little bit interesting, I think. Luis Arias. And

it's not that far out because if you just look at what ariah has done in the minor leagues it's really it's really comparable i mean i can't really tell the difference uh you know looking up and down arise like had sub 100 isos in the minor league strikeout rates around eight percent maybe he walked a tad more than Madrigal, but he also had more time. I mean, he's been playing in the minor league since 2014. And it is instructive to see that the Twins didn't rush him up and they didn't necessarily think of him maybe as a big asset

in the way that they thought of Rosario and these other guys that they've developed, or Buxton even. But they got real value out of him. I mean, he got two wins out of him last year, and he's projected for another two wins. I don't know. I used to think Madrigal wouldn't do it, but maybe having an elite hit tool

will be enough to make it past the power tool. So definitely, I think he's one of the most fascinating players. I'm kind of glad that I don't have a lot of shares. I can just watch it and try to learn from it and see what happens because I definitely am skeptical. He's got such an odd floor and ceiling that he's the kind of player that I would panic on quickly if I did have him a lot of places.

And like you, I don't have him anywhere yet. I mean, he could be buried in the bottom third of the order initially. That hurts him quite a bit as well. It is interesting. I think Arias is a good comp. I think of other players, maybe like a David Fletcher type player. Nicky Lopez. Dean Gordon.

Anderson Simmons as a hitter, of course. Anderson Simmons. Gordon struck out more often, yeah. Simmons probably has more raw power, at least he did earlier in his career, but he doesn't hit the ball very hard at this point. I mean, the floor is super utility backup. Yeah.

I mean, that's a decent floor. It's just for an early first round pick though. I'm not excited about that. Ceiling is probably like 320 in a full season, like 30 steals and five homers. Yeah, I think so. I think a ton is going to ride on the stolen bases. If he's running a good bit, then where he's going, he's profitable.

If he's not running, he's going to be a Hanser Alberto type player where he's just batting average and nothing else. That's actually an interesting middle of the road comp because Hanser Alberto played but just did not provide that much fantasy value. He was definitely just a deep league guy. Yeah. If you picked him up in AL only, no problem.

If you picked him up in mixed, you probably were missing out on something, even though he was playing. Yeah, you probably could have had a better player on your team. I mean, he hit.305, but... Yeah. I want to talk about pitching here for just a minute, and I was spending time over at pitcher list and watching dylan ceases arsenal i love their their gif database they have over there

and you know the gif database for for guys with good stuff i think can make it really easy to just fall in love with a pitcher but just that guy yeah he really is because i came away like really excited and i looked back at the numbers obviously struggled with walks at triple a and the big leagues last year the home run rate spiked in his debut which for a rookie in the year of the rabbit ball i mean i don't think you can hold that against him forever but clearly he has the raw stuff to get big league hitters out i just wonder how quickly it's going to happen is this a rapid growth like we're talking about him as a top 25 pitcher a year from now sort of profile or is it going to be ups and downs

where you're getting those big k performances he goes out tears up a lineup looks really good and then just is his own worst enemy for a start after that like is he going to be a roller coaster player where you know the highs are really high but the lows are extremely frustrating especially in this season here in 2020 man so on august 29th last year he pitched two innings and gave up eight earned runs at home against Minnesota. There's no way. I was streaming and spot playing him. There's no way he would have started in that game, I don't think. Just Minnesota at home in Chicago.

Next start, though, you might have started him because he's at Cleveland. Nice park. He got 11 strikeouts in 6.2 start, though, you might have started him because he's at Cleveland. Nice park. He got 11 strikeouts in 6.2 innings with four on runs, so you're like, okay, that's pretty good. And then he finished with two starts at Detroit and at Seattle, which you definitely would have started him in, with 11 innings of two-run ball with 13 strikeouts against five walks.

That's a good finish to the season. And I think that speaks to what you're talking about. But I also think that he has some really obvious things that he needs to change in terms of the spin on his fastball and the spin efficiency. He cuts the fastball, which robs the fastball of spin efficiency and robs it of ride. And if he can stop cutting the fastball and get that ride back,

I think that he could effectively mirror the spin on his fastball and curveball and have a two-pitch threat there that's really good and then be able to throw in the changeup in the slider to keep people on their toes. So I think he has everything he needs to be a top guy, and that's why I keep touting him. That's why I'm really into him. I also know that we're hoping for a Hugh Darvish outcome, which will have some bad seasons in it even once he gets going, because he has command plus like Hugh Darvish, but also a pretty exciting arsenal

like Hugh Darvish. So I think a Hugh Darvish but also like a pretty exciting arsenal like you Darvish so I think a you Darvish type career is in in the making for him it is possible for him it's a pretty nice comp really if if that's what we're looking at I mean other than one underwhelming season in 2018 you Darvishish has been excellent. He's pushed up into the top five, top ten range, at least, among starters at his best because of his strikeout potential as well. As far as roster winners go, as you start looking at this team,

the White Sox are definitely a team on the rise. We like what they've been doing this offseason, trades they've made the last couple of years. They're clearly headed in the right direction. When you start looking at expanded rosters, this is not a team that is helped by expanded rosters. No, no. Luis Garcia?

Lurie? Lurie, that's it. Lurie Garcia. Oh, man, of course it's Lurie. I'm thinking Nationals, Luis. Cuthbert? Yeah, Chesler Cuthbert. That's maybe.

Yeah, Chesler Cuthbert. That's maybe. And, you know, I actually was going to draft Danny Mendick in AL Labor in the reserve rounds because he's expected to be their utility infielder. And that's interesting to me in terms of having lots of eligibilities and maybe looking himself into some playing time where he could hit 240 with 15-15 type stats. It's not super exciting

for anybody else. It's very hyper specific advice there. I will do an audio dot dot dot and let you take the reins here. I don't know. Adam Engel? I guess Lurie Garcia and Danny Mendick are the winners. Woo-hoo.

I think the White Sox plan is to play their regulars as much as they possibly can and not lean too much to their depth. I think as far as the 50-man goes, you obviously would want to put Andrew Vaughn on there because if you do lose Encarnacion or Jose Abreu, you don't have a lot of interesting major league bench guys to fill in those spots. You want to go ahead and give him a shot. And he's good enough that you want to keep him developing.

I think he's one of the consensus top three prospect for them, even if you don't count Kopech or whatever. three prospect for them even um you know if you don't count copec or whatever but yeah copec's gonna make it and he's gonna be back in the uh in the rotation pretty soon i i would assume that when this is going running on all cylinders um you know if things go the way they want geo gonzalez is their glue guy um or maybe geo gonzalez starts the season and copec comes up uh once somebody's hurt that sort of deal. I don't see a lot of depth behind that. I think Rodon's going to miss the season, right? He says he could be pitching by June.

Yeah, he might actually give them something. I think it's going to be interesting to see how they make the pieces fit in that rotation. Because now that they have more options, if Ronaldodo lopez is bad ronaldo lopez he could be bullpen bound at this point you know you add kopeck and rodon back here's a equation here's a weird a weird uh bold prediction rodrigo lopez or carlos rodon ends the season as the white socks closer okay so ronaldo lopez not rodrigo bad god i had a real like late 90s problem today yeah even rodrigo lopez dallas perez you're looking at baseball cards this weekend they're not even good yeah i was they're not

even good ones was odalis pres any good i remember maybe drafting it a couple times maybe one sneaky surprisingly good season, but I don't recall sustained success. No, you're right. 2004 for the Dodgers, he did well. I'm going to put that in my back pocket in case we do a 2004 retro draft. And 2002. Otherwise, forget Odalis Perez.

Yes, Ronaldo Lopez, I just think that he could power through like he the one thing that's weird is that he his lowest velocity inning is his first inning so it would require like a kind of a complete uh reworking of his warm-up routine and his just his uh makeup and and just the way that he kind of approaches the game. But Rodon, I think, could easily come firing bullets out of the bullpen. I liked him quite a bit when he first came into the league. I know he was really overworked at NC State, but he was a guy that I thought was going to be at least like a number three

starter with lots of Ks, with upside to be much more than that to use the the word that i've sort of quietly banned from myself over the last year or so but clearly a team that does not have championship caliber depth just yet and i think you're going to see higher volumes of playing time on the projected starters with the white socks than you will most most places which could make them a bit more appealing, right? We keep talking about teams that can mix and match and platoon a few more spots with the larger rosters and do some different things. I think they can leverage some pitching things a little bit,

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moving through the bottom two teams in the AL Central. I think part of this exercise is trying to say nice things about more players. Then I have failed. It's not the stated goal, but I think it's sort of where my mind was at. It'd be nice to say some nice things about some players that we haven't said nice things about.

Nicky Lopez, who has been a machine in pretty much all the Sims I've been looking at for the last couple of months. Weird, isn't it? I'm not sure you could read a whole lot into that, but he kind of fits the description of what we were talking about with Nick Madrigal. We have this low K rate. It hasn't hit the ball very hard. Fields is positioned. Well, can steal some bases. The,

the sleepers for the batting average titles are these guys we're talking about, by the way, Arias, Madrigal, Lopez. Like if, if there's a surprise batting average winner this year,

it's one of them with a 360 batting average. Yeah, I think you're probably right. And I just, I look at Lopez, I think with Madrigal it's easier to see that the speed is a fantasy carrying tool. I think that could be how he exceeds expectations. I think Lopez can run, but he doesn't run quite like Magical.

It's below average power. Who's more likely to be mixed league relevant? Is it my right to think it's Magical by a good bit because of the steals? All right. So there's probably not a whole lot there to unpack with Lopez. I just thought it was weird

that he was tearing up the Sims. I was a little bit excited about him last year when he came up. As much as the White Sox have made it to this point on our better team, they're not going to benefit from these added roster. The Royals are still a worse team, and the players that are going to benefit from the added roster slots are not very good. However, the Royals do up their ability to put lottery tickets on the field. And I say this because, you know, Brett Phillips, love the guy, but, you know, he hasn't been able to figure out, you know, how to get the most of his patience at the plate, his ability to decipher the zone.

He's got that down, but he can't hit the ball with any authority. I mean, he had like an 85-mile-an-hour exit velocity last year. It's just not going to work. But I do know that he went to work over the offseason with some of the newer tools at his disposal for hitting. So there's the chance that he figures something out big time and he has some of the athletic ability and he now he has a roster spot and might have been up in the air a little bit, but now he's got some playing time out there as

like the fourth outfielder. And I think Starling is going to make this roster. And I think even less of Starling as a hitter than Brett Phillips. But he's going to get some playing time. And I think for Starling, if he's figured out some contact ability, he could be a useful piece. But I doubt that either of them becomes a real thing. Is it ownable? Maybe even an AL only would kind of be a long shot. But they might be,

and now they have more roster spot to play with. They have more rope, basically. I turned over a lot of stones with the Royals and didn't really find anything. That's what I'm talking about. The one guy that they like who I don't see it is Ryan O'Hearn. He's lined up to be a big side platoon bat at first base.

Could creep up a little higher in the order than he should. Hit seven homers in his last 35 games last season. Got the K rate under 30% during that span. Walked almost 10% of the time for the season as a whole. I had a top 50 exit velocity on fly balls and line drives if that does anything for you but other than that that's about all i've got for ryan o'hearn i i just didn't see a sleeper or an overlooked player i mean michael franco talked about in this show before low k rate doesn't hit the ball the way you expect him to he's at least got the benefit of a lot of playing time as well,

and there's not much there to push him. Yeah. I'm trying to look through the top prospects, which I've said before that I'm disappointed in this list because they've been bad for long enough that this list should be better. And they keep picking against industry standard which maybe it'll work but it makes me think that daniel lynch and chris bubich are not going to be uh that great because daniel lynch you know is a sinker first guy and we're you know we're just

seeing fewer and fewer of those in leagues this year uh as every year goes by. I look at Khalil Lee and Kyle Isbell, their top stateside outfield prospects, and neither one of them is really doing anything with the bat that I find super interesting. Kyle Isbell hit 52% of his contact on the ground last year, and Khalil Lee hit 59% of his contact on the ground. Why are they still developing ground ball hitters? What is going on?

And I know that Khalil Lee had 53 stolen bases, and that's exciting, and maybe they're telling him to hit it on the ground because you're fast, hit it on the ground. But that really, really lops off his ceiling in terms of real-life ceiling. In terms of somebody, if we're looking around for somebody to get excited about, I suppose Khalil Lee is the guy. He probably makes the 50-man roster, and if anybody gets hurt or they get tired of Bubba Starling,

or maybe even if they're good, if they win some games, they might pull up Khalil Lee and put him in the majors just to improve some spot. Maybe make Dozier the first baseman because O'Hearn doesn't work out. Or maybe one of those guys is hurt or Phillips and Starling are just not making strides. So I think that's a possible one there, but there would be a speed play, and it's not sure that Khalil Lee is going to be an improvement on anybody in the major leagues.

Now, no guarantees at this point in his development, especially on the pitching side. Also difficult to find things to be encouraged by. I got to give credit to James Anderson and Clay Link. They were digging into this bullpen a few weeks back, and they found Glenn Sparkman with increased velocity this spring. He was 96, 97 this spring. I didn't like him at all as a starter,

but you get a guy who's throwing 96, 97 out of the pen, okay, that's kind of interesting, especially if the Royals are not contending and if ian kennedy you know were to get traded elsewhere then we'd have the who closes in kansas city question and sparkman's a guy that previously i would have just said no chance but now with that velo i think it's at least a possibility yeah the other one that was thrown well in spring was Trevor Rosenthal. Blast from the past. Hasn't been good since 2017. Only pitched 15 innings in 2018 and 2019 combined. Injury stuff. But last note here says Rosenthal separated himself as one of the team's best relievers in camp. Alec Lewis from

The Athletic reports. So, you know, he's it before, and I could see him doing it again. Those are your two names there. In terms of glue guys, I suppose that maybe that's the role that Jorge Lopez... I had to say something. I had to say Jorge Lopez's name once. I knew it was coming. It had to happen.

Maybe that's the role that Jorge Lopez can find, or I will just restate my past prediction that Jorge Lopez becomes a closer someday. He could be the guy that I hope Glenn Sparkman becomes. I mean, that's possible, and it wouldn't make me sad to see Jorge Lopez prove you right on that level. That'd be cool.

It says here that Jesse Hahn may have been on the outside looking in on a 26-man roster. Maybe he makes a 30-man roster, but if we're talking about keeping healthy, he's got 4.2 innings. I had the minor league tab off. This is going to change everything. He's got 7.1 innings. I did like Jesse Hahn once upon a time. Yeah, he had a very difficult time staying healthy.

Oh, he had five innings in 2018. Oh, man. Dude, he is the nicest guy. He's a really, really nice guy. I feel really bad for him. But he already had one Tommy John in high school, I think, and then the Rays got him, and I think he had a second Tommy John in the major leagues.

And then, I don't know, I think that 2019 might have been his third, 2018. It's a situation. When guys come back from that even once, I think we don't realize how difficult that is to come back from it twice and to even get back to the big leagues just says a lot about anybody's dedication to the craft. It'd be a nice story to see Jesse Hahn find his way

onto the field and into some innings for the Royals at some point. He got drafted in 2010, dude. Man. Ten years later, he has 290 innings in the majors. That's a grind. That is a grind. It's a lot of rehab. Yeah.

Oh, man. Well, there's an athletics piece in there, but we should probably move on because the Royals are just depressing the crap out of me right now. Yeah, there's an athletics piece in there, but we should probably move on because the Royals are just depressing the crap out of me right now. Yeah, let's go to the Tigers. That'll fix everything. These teams were ordered this way for a reason. If it felt like the episode was top-heavy with the more interesting teams,

you have figured out our method. All right, here's what I got on the Tigers. I want to fly through it because I don't think these players are actually that interesting. Jacoby Jones was doing some things better than usual last year. And I had not previously

noticed or acknowledged it. He was walking more than ever. His hard hit rate jumped up over 10 percentage points last year. The XBA points to a better batting average than what he actually hit, more like a 250 type hitter. Playing time is king

and they don't seem to have any urgency to play Daz Cameron in 2020. So Jacoby Jones might just play a lot more than people expect and he might quietly give you a nice little bump of power and speed. More of a deep league mixed guy but not someone to be ignored and i think i had him more in the ignore folder uh well the you know the

plate discipline is rough the the hit tool is a bit of an issue uh the strikeout rate's really high so like he is going to be the kind of guy that if you want to play him you have to either be punting batting average or be strong in batting average otherwise because he may put up a 220. One of the projections is for a 220. But in a short season, he could get the good side of the luck coin, hit 240, 245s, as many homers as steals, and definitely be useful, which is more than I could say for a lot of this roster. The other name that sticks out to me

that I've owned in some deep leagues and actually traded Joey Votto for, that league is a 12-team league where Joey Votto had almost no trade value. It's Kristen Stewart. They have to play him, right? How could they not? Yeah.

I think it's like one of those guys who's just not that good. He's on a bad team, and they end up having to play him. And in a full season, he would have hit 240 with 20 homers. Yeah. I think he could be a solid run producer yeah it's about a tepid uh a recommendation as i can give for someone victor reyes is fast cameron may have been started doing some interesting things last year but could you spend time with the yankees you might you know you might be coached a little bit among there's other teams that do that too,

but he was hitting the ball in the air with authority more often. Still runs very well, 87th percentile sprint speed. He's always had the ability to draw walks. Patience is definitely something Cameron Maben has always had. I think I certainly don't want two of Jacoby Jones and Cameron Maben on my rosters. But again, in deep leagues, one of those guys might lead off. I'd probably actually lean more towards Maben as the more useful fantasy play of the two.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, predicted to be league average. Also projected to have a good OVP, which means more at-bats at the top of the lineup and more likelihood of playing every day. Also, you know, Maben, like, you know, dedicated himself to hitting the ball harder recently

and decided that it was okay for him to lift the ball. Oh, my God. With the Yankees. Who would have thought? So I think he's actually the most exciting non-Jacob E. Jones character in that outfield. And I guess Victor Reyes is a true fourth outfielder type. And then the 50-man roster type that we could root a little bit for is Travis Demerit or Demerit.

Demerit would be kind of a rough last name. Yeah, he was hitting ninth in the spring game we went to, and there were guys that are nowhere near that roster who are hitting ahead of them and i i know batting orders even in the regular season don't usually tell us a lot about a player what they think about them yeah like because in spring you're trying to get guys reps before you take them out of the game potentially right yeah they did not care they just don't care yeah i thought that was a bit odd i I mean, I'm talking just really bizarre players hitting in front of him, guys that were like double A, non-prospects.

It didn't make any sense at all. But they should let him play. Why not? Pop for steroids once. Here's the other Tigers question before we wrap it up and we'll have the pitching real quick too. C.J. Krohn hit the ball really hard a lot last year. Two good teams now have moved on from him in consecutive winners.

Here he is in Detroit. It's going to be in the heart of the order. Playing time is not going to be a problem. Why are smart teams just letting him go year over year? What are we missing here? Yeah, let me see. It's weird that he's a righty, I guess. But I guess last year he was below league average as a righty.

But for his career, right on right, he's 5% better than the league average. I guess that's not a super exciting number. So I guess maybe teams feel like he's one bad season from being the wrong side platoon, first baseman type. And that's pretty expensive, I guess, year over year with arbitration, things like that. Yeah, he's hit enough home runs to be worth something,

to be a $6.1 million salary this year. The Rays are kind of really cutthroat at this. something to be a $6.1 million salary this year. I can't speak. The Rays are kind of really cutthroat at this. So that they didn't stick around for a $6 million salary doesn't surprise me too much. But the Twins making the same decision makes me think that it's something about his handedness. And I just whopped the mic with my elbow. Old-timey radio. Hey!

Anyway, I think that Krohn is a deep league play. I think that if you got him as your mixed league first baseman, you should have another first baseman on your bench. Yeah, it might be more of just to play the schedules. This year, the schedules might be pretty homogenous where it's just six or seven games every week for everybody. In that case, then you're left to choose matchups, and he might be an on-the-roster, off-the-roster sort of guy

despite the strong stat cast numbers. Yeah, the stat cast numbers are great, and I should be all over this guy, but you're right that the two teams making this decision mean something. Also, he's a weird fit for this tigers team because it's not like he's gonna be he's gonna be a free agent in 2021 so it's not like they're getting they're like it's not like they found a guy on the market that could turn into a player for them long term you know it's like they just gotta you know somebody else steps forward and i don't know who it is but if somebody uh if there's a roster crunch and they want to play somebody at first,

like Candelario and Lugo are good. Oh, my God, what am I even saying? What if Candelario... Horrific depth chart. Yeah, it's really horrific. What if Candelario and Willy Castro and Nico Gerdrum are okay? And Krohn's not that great. That wouldn't be the strangest thing ever.

Then maybe Candelario plays first. Krohn falls into a platoon DH situation for the rest of the season. They're just not going to be involved in his future unless he whoops the ball and they want to re-sign him. And even then, would they re-sign him? He probably wants like two and ten at least i don't know it would seem like a weird deal for the tigers i don't think he's gonna be there after this season um pitching side is where things are a bit more interesting you know they have to answer that question what do you do in a shortened season

do you want to keep scooble and mize and man? Do you want to keep Scooble and Mize and Manning? Do you want to keep those guys on the taxi squad? Do you want to get them some innings in the big leagues this year? Just how do you keep those guys on track for what I would assume to be a competitive window that really begins in 2022? But how do you deal with that? I mean, they have innings available they don't have to throw zimmerman and nova out there they could just use the young guys however they want and then let zimmerman and nova sort of like backfill around them since they're already committed to paying those guys and yet do you want to start the clock you know i actually think that it's a little bit

like uh the braves with their bunch of pitchers. You don't know which ones are going to pop. And so there has to be a learning process from an organizational standpoint, too, about who do you want to keep around and who do you want to trade away and who's going to be in the rotation. You have to kind of figure that out. Even if you think you have an embarrassment of riches, you can't just sort of hoard them in the minor leagues

waiting for hitting to turn up because you're actually going to need to trade some of those guys for hitting because there's no hitting. Yeah. There's just not enough. Isaac Paredes is a guy that probably, with expanded rosters on the hitting side, hangs around.

You could see him maybe being a part of the plan. I mentioned Cameron before. He's probably a taxi squad guy, not a 30-band guy from the jump. Franklin Perez, kind of a forgotten prospect in all of this. Maybe he's a guy that gets a look. I think they have enough interesting young pitchers. They should, at the very least, make them multi-inning relievers. They don't see them as long-term starters and just kind of test guys out that way.

Yeah, and then the problem, though, is if you you do that that they may not use all their pitches but um you know what though they'll still be pitching in the bullpens with major league pitching coaches they'll still be shaping their pitches uh with major league pitching coaches i've heard from matt boyd that uh their major league squad is good. I think that you put Skubal, Manning, and Mize on that 50-man roster, get them pitching with their major league pitching coach, and as it looks, you start working them in there. You put Jordan Zimmerman into a glue role. Like you said, him and nova are glue

guys they after your pitcher goes four and you're still in the game zimmerman uh third time through the order last year had a 13.5 era yeah maybe don't let him go through the order a third time and just give those innings to somebody who's a bigger part of the future and that might be the best for everybody my guy is scooble i know that uh you know maize and manning have more people like them and probably uh for good reason maybe they should be liked more but like uh at price in terms of acquiring these guys uh scooble is the one that i like at price i think uh people want too much for manning and wise if you're trying to trade for them yeah i'm trying to trade. Yeah. The pedigree of both of those guys, Manning and Mize,

probably is a big part of that. I'm a TV screen. Got the KVO replays on right now. Don't forget about Michael Fulmer completely. He'll be 15 months removed from Tommy John surgery in June. Probably worth a mention because he was not on my radar back in the spring, but maybe there's a little bit of a case for it now. And as always, he'll be

the first guy to take Jordan Zimmerman's job. Yep, he will be. We do love Spencer Turnbull on this podcast. Confirmed. And have a little bit of love for Daniel Norris too. I still think at the very least he could be a good reliever which is not just as simple as flipping the switch i'm not trying to oversimplify it but i think his his breaking pitches could be

good enough add a little velo to the fastball yeah change up the mix a little bit it it makes sense and you don't have to go to that fastball as often as he does the start right and with command being an issue that becomes less of an issue in shorter stints, and maybe he can stop throwing the pitches he can't control and that sort of deal. Exactly. All right. So if you're enjoying this show on a platform that allows you to rate and review this podcast, please take a moment to do that.

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