Latest / Cards & Categories / Ep. 34 : Prospect Picks To Click

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Ep. 34 : Prospect Picks To Click · Cards & Categories

• 0:15
  Hello, and welcome everybody to episode thirty four of Cards and Categories. I
• 0:20
  am Mike Coolard here from rasball, joined as always by my very good friend
• 0:25
  Jeremy Brewer, also from rasball. How are you doing tonight, Bud?
• 0:29
  I'm doing just great tonight. Exciting night of fantasy baseball discussion. Less exciting
• 0:35
  that everybody's hurt due to spring training, and so if you've already drafted you
• 0:40
  probably are you hating the spring training at this point, but at least it
• 0:44
  gives us some fun things to talk about. So I'm looking forward tonight.
• 0:47
  Yeah, I ended his slow draft season, like I'm still doing my TGFBI
• 0:51
  draft and RAS Slam just started on Monday, so lots of slow drafts going
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  on, and it's almost like a game of roulette trying to pick players and
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  hoping that they don't blow out like some of the news that we got this
• 1:03
  week. But I'm not going to bury the lead this week. We do
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  have a great fantasy show coming up. It's been kind of a lark,
• 1:10
  a light cards week that in terms of both controversies and releases, it's been
• 1:15
  pretty slow. So I think we're just going to go into a fantasy only
• 1:21
  pod today here really, and the main attraction we have is we're going to
• 1:25
  go division by division and each pick a pick to click. I would say
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  from like a dynasty perspective of like a prospect that we like either for the
• 1:34
  opportunity, the skill set, or just what their price is right now where
• 1:40
  we see it going. So yeah, I think it should be a fun
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  little keeper dynasty episode. As you and I we both had a home aut
• 1:49
  anew auction draft this past Monday, so that's kind of where we're in the
• 1:53
  mood for and getting into. I love autonew It's a great deep forty man
• 1:57
  or forty roster, forty person roster like format with keeper elements that highly recommended
• 2:04
  if you're into fantasy baseball. But yeah, Brew, you want to just
• 2:07
  roll right into the news here as we record on Wednesday, the sixth,
• 2:12
  let's roll right in. It is a jam pack news of the same exact
• 2:15
  thing all over the league. So how about you you kick us off here
• 2:20
  with exciting news of everybody's hurt. Well before that, we do have one
• 2:23
  signing. Oh well, I dismatched him match, although also kind of sad
• 2:30
  because Matt Chapman did not get any of the money that he was looking for
• 2:32
  this offseason as he signs with the Dodgers for a three year deal that is
• 2:40
  in the books technically as a three year, fifty four million dollar deal,
• 2:44
  but in all actuality, it's more like a one year, eighteen million dollar
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  deal, as it's got player options player opt outs after every one of those
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  three years, and I would guess that he wants to try to do what
• 2:58
  he can and to leave San Francisco hit the free agent market again in the
• 3:04
  off season of twenty twenty four going to twenty twenty five. So Matt Chapman
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  is joining the San Francisco Giants to be their everyday third baseman. Brew What
• 3:13
  do you think this means overall for Chapman and maybe any other fortunes in San
• 3:17
  Francisco. Yeah, you know, it's it's for Chapman. It's probably not
• 3:23
  the best landing spot of that that ballpark not too terribly exciting in that lineup,
• 3:27
  I would say, is not too terribly exciting. So U for a
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  guy that's looking kind of for a bounce back year, which I think we've
• 3:34
  been saying for a few years with with Matt Chapman. You know, he
• 3:37
  he had such a fantastic start to last year, and you know, it
• 3:40
  looked like he really figured things out. But I think that underscores how absolutely
• 3:46
  terrible he was in the in the second half, you know, he he
• 3:52
  made it. You know, the second half he had fifty two games,
• 3:53
  he hit a paltry two oh five with five homers, and that nothing literally
• 4:00
  nothing else. And I would say I didn't run the splits. Uh,
• 4:05
  it was really March. In April he hit three eighty four with five homers,
• 4:10
  and then his average the rest of the year, an average, you
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  know, give it, take it for what's worth every month was two o
• 4:15
  two two sixty seven. He was just dreadful. And so I I I
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  look at this one and I kind of understand why, Like maybe he got
• 4:27
  a bigger contract than he should have. He's a he's a great club,
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  and there's something to be said for that, especially in that that that ballpark
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  there, he's you know, one of the few third basements that can make
• 4:38
  a spacious foul territory worthwhile in that in San Francisco there. So I agree
• 4:46
  with you. It is probably a one year deal, but if nothing else,
• 4:50
  he definitely cashed in because if he has another year like the the UH
• 4:56
  was the latter five sixths of the year. He's he's made for the next
• 5:00
  few years there in San Francisco. But from an overall perspective, really the
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  I think the biggest piece for me is who did he ultimately kick out of
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  the lineup, And I'm not sure it's really clear of who he ultimately kicks
• 5:17
  out. But what I'm worried about is, you know what he had ultimately
• 5:23
  does to a guy like h was it who am I thinking was playing playing
• 5:29
  third base before almost sand the ball? Well, it probably takes like Wilmer
• 5:36
  Flores or JD. Davis to the bench. Was too exciting there. But
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  I think what it really does is for some of that younger talent that was
• 5:45
  probably looking to make a debut, you're taking away like the d H spot
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  more or less. You know, you got so layer there, so he's
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  gonna be kind of forced in there. There's not as much opportunities to cycle
• 5:59
  guys through and keep guys fresh, So I think ultimately it's it's kind of
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  a not event for me from a fantasy perspective, I'm just not too excited
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  by the Chapman signing, so I don't know. Am I am I off
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  there? Am I disappointment on this one? Or or are you on the
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  same track. I think I'm a little bit rosier on Matt Chapman than you,
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  just because it is a good, solid landing spot that I think there
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  was a really outsized worry that you know, he could lend up somewhere as
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  like a part time player, which it would have been really difficult, just
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  given that his prowess on defense is really what carries his overall value. That
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  I don't think this is going to be a bad deal for the Giants overall,
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  just because the fifty four million more than pays for what his defense provides,
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  and so the Bats all gravy from there. I mean, obviously the
• 6:49
  park factor is really brutal here, but we did bring up when Hore Hilaire
• 6:54
  went there that the home run factor for Righty's is a little closer to nel,
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  so that does help. But Matt Chapman's approach last year also went more
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  to right center then it has in previous years, which is just it's into
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  Triple's Alley, Like, it's great if he could get it out there,
• 7:11
  but if people can run down those balls, that he's sitting into that alley
• 7:15
  not great. So I think part of it is just the overall fantasy price
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  for Matt Chapman. I actually have taken him in a couple spots already,
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  including my TGFBI squad, just because the price has bottomed out. He's going
• 7:30
  pretty much right next to you, Heniosuarez, and I looked at the NFBC
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  Draft Champions data since the beginning of February, and it's been holding pretty steady.
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  That even his Men pick is two thirty, so it's not where it
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  has been in previous years. And I think he's just fallen so far that
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  it's gotten to the point where for mid twenties home runs, which I think
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  you can count on here as well as RBIs and runs that should push into
• 7:58
  the mid seventies minimum and maybe go higher that you know, he could find
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  something extra with a new team. He is, he's familiar with the Bay
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  Area, which is great being in Oakland for so long, And on top
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  of it, he put up some just fantastic bad ball stats last year,
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  even though he was real terrible for five sixth of the year, Like you
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  said, I mean, he put up a career high fifty six point one
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  percent hard hit percent. He put up a barrel rate of seventeen point one
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  percent, so the bad is still dynamic. He even, I mean his
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  MAXIV was higher last year than it was in twenty one or twenty two,
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  so it's not that all the skills have degraded. And I was looking back
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  at like his injury report that I know there was a hand issue in August
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  and September, which September was real dreadful for him, so I think you
• 8:48
  can chalk that up. But before that it seemed like he had a small
• 8:52
  toe injury or something. But I do wonder, like what happened from April
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  into the rest of the year, because even if there's just like a I
• 9:01
  mean, he was like a one eighty WRC plus player in April. That
• 9:05
  I mean, I'm not asking anything more than Matt Champman to play to what
• 9:11
  is honestly like his zips line of it's right in the middle of all the
• 9:15
  projections on fangraphs, and that's like a two forty one average with twenty two
• 9:20
  homers. Zips I think is a little light on runs and RBI at seventy
• 9:24
  three and sixty five apiece, but I think that's a good deal for where
• 9:28
  he's going, and he gives you everyday production with like that being the floor.
• 9:33
  So I'm interested in Matt Chapman as like a late really kind of cover
• 9:39
  yourself third baseman and corner. But I'm not something that you can kind of
• 9:43
  depend on maybe the way you could have back in like twenty eighteen, twenty
• 9:48
  nineteen, twenty twenty. Yeah, it'll be interesting to see what happens,
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  right, It's really matter which Matt Chapman shows up. So if you're talking
• 9:56
  about a dart throw, not maybe a good clubhouse guy for your team,
• 10:01
  give it a chance, because we all know that that's really the important piece
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  about fantasy is building the right clubhouse atmosphere exactly. Yeah, you got to
• 10:07
  get that defense going for you too. Okay, And this one we're gonna
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  get into the injury news now, because we got into this last week that
• 10:18
  spring training opens up and everybody kind of breaks because once you're ramping things back
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  up after the winter off or winter of training where maybe you push yourself too
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  hard, guys just tend to break, and especially pictures. So we've got
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  quite the bevy of injuries here this week and this one right off the bat.
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  I know it's going to break your heart that I'm not even sure you're
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  gonna want to pot after I mentioned this, but Sunny Gray left his start
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  the other day with a strained hamstring. Opening Day is now in doubt for
• 10:50
  Sunny Gray. That I think it's more so just a ramping up issue that
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  it doesn't seem like the hamstring is anything too serious, but it should kind
• 10:58
  of keep him from per resting for a couple of weeks, and then when
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  you add up that timeline, there's just no way for him to get back
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  to Opening Day. So Brew, how how sad were you when this game
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  acrosscross your your desk in terms of like the injury news and what do you
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  think it does two Sunny Gray's outlook for twenty twenty four, Yeah, it
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  was. It was disappointing to see on a mini backs. You know,
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  the fact that I own him literally everywhere, and as a Cardinals fan,
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  that kind of hurt to see that. That said, at least it's I
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  hate to say, at least it's a hammy. It has been something that
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  historically has hampered Sunny Gray, but it's not an arm issue. It's not
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  you know, a back issue. It's not something that you're really sitting there
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  going uh even like a turf toe, like landing foot something like that,
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  like, yeah, the hammy gets stretched out and make sure that you're you're
• 11:50
  in a good spot to get it back out there. But it's not like
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  it's the the end of the world for a picture. And so if I'm
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  taking my glass half full, you know, the discounts greater for Sunny Gray,
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  and I'm going to if I have not yet drafted, I'm going to
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  be looking at that discount. And I think, you know, he's he
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  might miss a start or two as he ramps up. Clearly as we get
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  close to the season here, if we see that the ramp up's not taking
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  place, I'd be a little more concerned, But overall, I'm not too
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  concerned. The interesting thing that I do hope, so I hope it gets
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  us a little bit more. Look at Zach Thompson. They're in Saint Louis.
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  I don't think that Zach Thompson is maybe the greatest thing out there,
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  but you know, he's a former first rounder. You know, he's got
• 12:33
  some decent tools, and I think it'd be nice to see what this guy
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  got behind. You know, the pitching rotation that averages like thirty five years
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  old. I'll get a twenty six year old in there and see what happens
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  with the decade off the odometer. So you know, it's very possible with
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  off days and stuff that doesn't even happen. But at least in the spring
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  training, I think they get you a few more looks as they have to
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  prepare just just in case. So this one. I did cry for a
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  little while when this first came came out, but I've overcome and the good
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  news is now I can draft him as an injured pitcher exactly and continue to
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  perpetuate my issues. And I mean I will say I think I might be
• 13:20
  fading him just like a tad, maybe like a rank or two. I
• 13:24
  mean, part of it is he's honestly, he's been going earlier in drafts
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  than I would think. Partly, I mean, you're banging the drum,
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  but I mean basically this pod has inflated his value. I recognize that.
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  I'm sorry. I mean part of it too is Gray our colleague at Rasball
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  also bangs the drum for Sonny Gray. Well, I guess we're if we're
• 13:46
  sharing credits, Okay, so there are certainly believers. And I think what
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  does worry me here a little bit is that Sonny Gray did deal with hamstring
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  issues in twenty twenty two. So it's not great to have soft tissues flare
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  up on you like this. So I do want to see how he progresses.
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  But yeah, I'm not too worried about taking him right now that like,
• 14:07
  maybe I'll take him a little bit lower than I was initially planning for,
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  but I think you can still plan to get somewhere between like twenty eight
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  to thirty starts a sunny Gray and that's still going to be pretty formidable at
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  this point in the season. Yeah, absolutely, all right, speaking of
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  soft tissue injuries flaring up, we've also got the very very rugged and old
• 14:31
  Justin Verlander going to start the season on the injured list with a shoulder injury,
• 14:35
  his right shoulder. That I think this is pretty similar to what he
• 14:39
  struggled with last year with the Mets before he moved over to the Astros.
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  And so it seems like, I mean, he's forty one, right,
• 14:48
  so like the shoulder is going to be barking at you here and there and
• 14:52
  I think I am concerned, but like, I don't know. At the
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  same time, it is justin Verlander. Even even when he came back on
• 15:00
  the mound last year, he looked pretty good down the stretch and got into
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  a little bit of like a vintage form. The strikeouts certainly took a step
• 15:09
  back, but in terms of what you're looking for from innings and era and
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  whip and wins, like, he was kind of the same bulldog that he's
• 15:20
  been for quite some time. And I think today in today's offensive environment,
• 15:24
  like I I'm fading Verlander again a little bit here, but I'm also not
• 15:31
  overly concerned, just because Verlander's price and drafts right now has been I think,
• 15:35
  really fantastic, and it's even dropped with his shoulder injury. But the
• 15:41
  ceiling that you could get out of Verlander, there aren't many dudes around him
• 15:43
  in the draft that are that have a similar ceiling to Verlander, just because
• 15:48
  you've seen it, and everyone else that has any sort of upside from a
• 15:54
  strikeout perspective or being able to go on a tear that is younger is certainly
• 15:58
  going much much earlier than just in Verlander and drafts. Yeah, I think
• 16:03
  you're right, Verlander is you know it is I would say scary because it
• 16:07
  is a shoulder issue and that's not what we want to be talking about at
• 16:14
  any point in time with with a pitcher. I think where I start to
• 16:18
  get a little worried with with Verlander is you put the age with shoulder issue.
• 16:25
  And again, he was pretty good when he was with Houston last year.
• 16:29
  I think you did have like a mid threes e r A. Walks
• 16:32
  were down, k's were down for him to a degree, they were actually
• 16:36
  below a kp per inning. So yeah, I mean he was, he
• 16:41
  was decent. I think that the question comes to is like at what there
• 16:47
  At some point it's I I'm going to compare a picture to a hitter like
• 16:51
  Nelson Cruz was the same conversation we had, you know for a few years
• 16:53
  there with like, well the guy I keep sitting forty home runs and he's
• 16:57
  ageless, wonder and then literally just fell off the face of the planet.
• 17:00
  Yeah, and was gone, you know, a little injury and then it
• 17:04
  was that was it. And I'm like a little cautious that's what's happening with
• 17:10
  Verlander is that like he just isn't gonna make it back, and then he's
• 17:11
  gonna get back and get a little hurt, and then we're gonna be done
• 17:15
  with Justin Verlander, which hurts. Like a guy like that to your point,
• 17:19
  he is a bulldog. So I'm I'm probably fading him a little bit
• 17:23
  more. I just the reports around him have just been like he's not gonna
• 17:27
  be ready. It's it's not very specific, they're vague enough, and like
• 17:33
  I feel like I've seen this before with the guys, like well, he
• 17:36
  just won't be ready, and it's like June before he's ready, and then
• 17:38
  he's got to ramp up, do the minor league rehab assignment, and then
• 17:44
  he gets three starts and he's on the aisle again. Right, So I'm
• 17:47
  I'm fading him a little bit more because he's he isn't free at this point.
• 17:52
  But I see the dart throw with him, because it is very Justin
• 17:57
  Verlander. You could absolutely after like one start and have a s young season.
• 18:02
  So like it's it's that there's so much variability there that if you have
• 18:07
  a pretty solid base from a starting pitching perspective, then yeah, take take
• 18:11
  the shot. If you're counting on him for much, probably move On.
• 18:15
  Yeah, and in that NFBC Draft Champions to data I was talking about since
• 18:21
  the beginning of February, it looks like his max pick right now is two
• 18:25
  oh five. So I mean, if you're in a draft where he is
• 18:29
  falling to two o five, I mean that's where like Aovaldi and fought and
• 18:34
  even like Kyle Bradish is going in that that's a pretty unfair average, I
• 18:40
  guess. But like, you know, it's starting to get into like guys
• 18:42
  who you're on the precipice of cutting after two bad starts. So like I'm
• 18:48
  starting to really be interested in Verlander as he tumbles down to like past pick
• 18:55
  one fifty and getting closer and closer pick two hundred. Yeah, I think
• 18:59
  for me to be too interested, I think I need another you know,
• 19:02
  thirty to forty picks. I need to see them around two fifty. Just
• 19:04
  look at the other guys that are going there. Still I'm still willing to
• 19:07
  take you know, a flyer on. You know some of the guys like
• 19:11
  Charlie Morton, TODJ. Bradley, you know, Cutter Crawford, you know
• 19:18
  the guys like that that I'm but once you get that two fifty range,
• 19:21
  and it's just like a like a crab shoot at that point. Yeah,
• 19:23
  exactly, take your poison. So you're probably right if you do want them,
• 19:27
  you probably can't wait all the way to that point. But there's there's
• 19:30
  a few interesting names. They're still worth worth getting some milea John, yeah,
• 19:34
  absolutely, and a much more serious injury. Now. So it looks
• 19:41
  like Lucas Giolito with the Boston Red Sox has a torn UCL out UCL.
• 19:48
  So that's the ligament in the elbow. It is not I guess it's not
• 19:53
  fully torn. It's got a tear, which still not that great, but
• 19:57
  also yeah, yeah, a flexer strain. And so when you get those
• 20:02
  two in conjunction, that's pretty indicative that Tommy John surgery's coming down. And
• 20:07
  even all of the reports from Boston, including Alex core Like, they've been
• 20:14
  pretty grim. So I don't think we can count on anything from Lucas Steelito
• 20:18
  coming up in the season, which I think, obviously from a fantasy perspective,
• 20:23
  he's just a total avoid that there's no point in bringing him on board,
• 20:27
  which kind of works because I don't even he wasn't even like on any
• 20:32
  of my boards that I've been in drafts where he does go and I just
• 20:37
  even signing in Boston, I just needed to see it to believe it.
• 20:41
  In terms of the era was I think in a skyrocket anyway. But I
• 20:45
  think with this actually kind of opens up is the Boston starting rotation is a
• 20:52
  mess, and so it's starting to really unravel for the Red Sox if they
• 20:57
  can't put together a rotation, Like what's to stop them from really trying to
• 21:02
  tear this thing apart in terms of moving pieces around, because like I mean,
• 21:07
  you're not gonna win any sort of playoff spots without a rotation or do
• 21:11
  they go the other way and bring in Montgomery and Snell or other pieces.
• 21:15
  So anything that you see currently in Boston that interests you from like a starring
• 21:22
  rotation perspective or guy that might step up into Lucas Giulido's rotation spot, Yeah,
• 21:27
  I think that that's the piece that that intrigues me. I'm trying to
• 21:30
  pull up the Russer resource page here because I looked on the Yankees instead of
• 21:34
  Boston, But you know, I think it, Yeah, it definitely is.
• 21:40
  I'm like, when did Garrett Hole start playing for the for the Red
• 21:44
  Sox? Here I think what it what it does does is it gives some
• 21:48
  other guys a chance. Like I'm a big Cutter Crawford fan, you know,
• 21:52
  it firmly puts him in that rotation. I'm a big Tannor Howe fant,
• 21:57
  Garrett Whitlock fan. I think those guys have a ton of potential that
• 22:02
  that they've both been used in this kind of swingman long relief maybe a starter
• 22:06
  role for a few years. And it's really hard, I think, as
• 22:10
  a young pitcher to to be jumping between roles and really work on your arsenal
• 22:15
  because when you go into that relief mode, you're picking your two best pitches
• 22:18
  and you're just going out there and flinging them get the strikeouts. But then
• 22:21
  you go to the start, you've got to adjust and adapt, and if
• 22:25
  you don't give him a chance to do that, that's gonna be a challenge.
• 22:27
  So I actually I look at this as an opportunity for some of those
• 22:32
  young guys, you know, to come through guys that have maybe you know,
• 22:37
  three or less years of service time and really figure out what you have
• 22:41
  at this point. So maybe in the grand scheme of things, this is
• 22:45
  the best thing that could happen to Boston. Giolito looked like a disaster in
• 22:49
  spring training. He looked like a disaster the last two years. Maybe this
• 22:52
  might, I hate to say it, this might be the end of Lucas
• 22:56
  Giolito as we know it. He's Keith coming back in two years on a
• 22:57
  minor league deal somewhere. Yeah, coming off of what he's done. But
• 23:03
  uh, I I I'm actually a little bit excited by the what it forces
• 23:07
  the Red Sox to do. And I don't think they're gonna go out and
• 23:10
  sign somebody. I I think that they're gonna be like, well, this
• 23:12
  is a chance to figure out what they what they have. Uh. If
• 23:15
  anything, it's gonna they're gonna move on from a guy like Kenley Jansen a
• 23:19
  lot faster this this year than anything else, because he's about the only thing
• 23:25
  that they're u they have for a trade ship perspective that was some of some
• 23:30
  use there. Yeah, And I do like what this could do for Garrett
• 23:36
  lock in the rotation that he is projected for a like your A that's right
• 23:41
  around four. So I mean that's gonna be a little bit below lye average.
• 23:45
  Honestly, it's gonna obviously come down to how many innings you can get
• 23:49
  out Garrett. With Locke, he's been in a swing manish role, bouncing
• 23:53
  between rotation bullpen, opener, follower, and so I know, sure like
• 24:00
  how much total production you could get out of Garrett Whitlock for fantasy. But
• 24:03
  I like him out the gate, and especially when you start analyzing your starting
• 24:10
  pitching from a fantasy perspective, almost in kind of like two three four week
• 24:14
  batches to look at matchups and just see who's throwing the best. I think
• 24:18
  Garrett Whitlock could start pretty well for you out of the gate in April,
• 24:22
  just because Boston. Also, like, even though it is I love touting
• 24:27
  how much of an ostpensive environment in April, it's still it's not it's just
• 24:33
  like too cold in Boston, And so it creates some really sneaky good pitching
• 24:38
  matchups because like the ball just dies immediately in the air when it's like thirty
• 24:42
  five degrees in Boston. So I do like what Garrett Witluck could give you
• 24:48
  out of the gate, and who knows, like you might be able to
• 24:49
  write them for a pretty good majority of the year fantasy viz. Yeah,
• 24:53
  So I really think it comes down to you got a few interesting guys.
• 24:56
  We're fighting for that last spot, and they got a few interesting guys that
• 25:00
  will have the last two spots. Yeah, so in Boston. So it'll
• 25:03
  be fun to watch in spring training here to see who really separates themselves.
• 25:07
  Yeah, and I think on I mean, on the flip side of the
• 25:08
  coin, if Boston doesn't do anything with this rotation, it's already thin and
• 25:12
  when you get down to that minor league staff, it is bad, like
• 25:17
  they have no pitching depth coming through. And so if this is what they
• 25:22
  roll into the season with, I am immediately gonna start looking to stream bats
• 25:26
  against the Red Sox in Fenway because the pitching staff is just going to be
• 25:32
  in shambles by June. If this is what the Red Sox decide to go
• 25:36
  with. Yeah, And I question is just from a straight baseball perpective,
• 25:40
  not a fancy perspective. If they if they get off to a slow start
• 25:44
  here and it you know, it sounds like they're even considering signing Brian Bellow
• 25:47
  to like a long term deal, which I'm a little iffy on that,
• 25:49
  Like, I don't think i've seen enough from below to be like, yeah,
• 25:52
  let's lock this guy in, but maybe maybe it's cheaper. And I'm
• 25:56
  thinking, but when you when you hit that point and you need to restock,
• 25:59
  Like, what are they treating they Are they going to actually move on
• 26:03
  from from Devors? I highly doubt that. Yeah, Trevor story hasn't built
• 26:08
  up enough equity there. You're not moving away from Duran or Casas or maybe
• 26:15
  Yoshida, but like you don't have the guys to even flip. Like when
• 26:21
  the Red Sox become so thin, like so fast. I know it was
• 26:26
  happening, but man, it looks it looks leak. They're in Boston,
• 26:30
  Yeah, I mean part of it is they haven't spent any money. That
• 26:33
  their payroll was one one hundred and ninety nine million at the end of last
• 26:38
  year and it's going to be only one hundred and seventy nine million projected this
• 26:41
  year. That. Yeah, I don't get why they're not like immediately signing
• 26:45
  both Smell and Montgomery, slotting them in and trying to I mean, I
• 26:49
  think that's enough to make them compete for the division. It's just those two
• 26:52
  starters would do it. We'll see what happens. I'm not I'm not putting
• 26:56
  a lot of eggs that best at all. Okay, we're sticking in the
• 27:02
  Al East with another injured pitcher, and yeah, I think these are just
• 27:06
  going to keep on coming for a couple of weeks. Like I said,
• 27:07
  so here we go another one, and this one's a little bit less severe,
• 27:12
  But certainly I think the warning lights are gonna start flashing because it goes
• 27:17
  back to what we're discussing with Sonny Gray and Justin Verlander. At this point,
• 27:21
  if you're missing any time in spring training as a pitcher, opening days
• 27:26
  in doubt, just in terms of ramping up because it's so early in the
• 27:29
  process, they're only getting stretched out as pictures right now. So Kevin Gausman
• 27:34
  for the Toronto Blue Jays also has a sore shoulder. Doesn't seem as severe
• 27:40
  as Justin Verlanders, as Toronto has not said anything about Gausman hitting the eyel,
• 27:45
  but I do think that if he's behind another week or two, he's
• 27:49
  going to be in the same boat as Sonny Gray in terms of just being
• 27:53
  too far behind in terms of ramping up and spring training, and on top
• 27:59
  of it, shoulder aren't good. Like I think we can both agree that
• 28:03
  the hamstring that Sonny Gray is dealing with is a little less concerning. And
• 28:07
  you've got somebody in Goussman who's been throwing lots of ace level innings for the
• 28:12
  past few years, and I've always thought he's had a really funky delivery that
• 28:18
  just doesn't look like it's the most comfortable. And so I am already was
• 28:26
  fading Kevin Gousman. As like we when we did our top ten starting pitchers
• 28:30
  draft, I think we had him a little bit later than what the consensus
• 28:36
  NFBC data has been, And certainly in leagues that I've been drafting currently,
• 28:40
  I haven't even come close to considering Gousman any of the drafts. So if
• 28:45
  this lingers any longer, I mean I think I'll have pretty much no Gousman
• 28:52
  chares, because it just is not somebody who I had a lot of faith
• 28:57
  in coming into the season being able to repeat what he did. He's only
• 29:00
  got the fastball splitter, and if you're losing ticks off that fastball and the
• 29:04
  shoulders barking, it could go south real fast for Kevin Gousman. Yeah,
• 29:08
  I think we forget Goalsan's not like spring Chicken anymore. I mean, he's
• 29:12
  thirty three years old, Like you know that you're hitting that point as a
• 29:17
  picture that unless you're the you're a Verlander or Schurezer type that can really go
• 29:22
  deep, Like you're getting to that point where there's diminishing returns. So I'm
• 29:26
  I'm right there with you. I'm I'm I've never felt great about Gossman.
• 29:32
  There's always been some question marks there, even though the results look good.
• 29:34
  Yeah, I think this is this is concerning They're they're trying to downplay it.
• 29:41
  They're saying, but to your point, it's a shoulder. The shoulders
• 29:44
  always scare me. It's always there when you when it's an elbow like it's
• 29:48
  it's good or bad, like it's it's it's like you generally know, shoulder
• 29:52
  is that kind of thing that just takes like four months for them to say,
• 29:55
  well, I think we're gonna be back, but oh, we're actually
• 29:57
  gonna go under the knife and lose the rest of the seas and and so
• 30:00
  you end up hitting and hauling all year on that thing. Then the thing
• 30:03
  for the Blue Jays, though, is they were relying on Gosman like hard
• 30:08
  relying on them. Their their rotation the top four was pretty pretty decent with
• 30:14
  Gosmin, Barrios, Bassett and Kakuchi like that was pretty pretty good. But
• 30:18
  then you got to number five and they were like hoping alec Minoa would do
• 30:22
  it and it's not. I don't that was blind hope. I don't know
• 30:26
  if that was a bun. Right now, Roster Resource has Bowden Francis in
• 30:30
  there, I think you will get that fifth spot. Yeah, yeah,
• 30:33
  but I don't know that he is going to earn it or just back into
• 30:36
  it. What what? What is interesting though, is there's a few names
• 30:40
  down in the miners unlike Boston that are exciting. We got Ricky Tietam in
• 30:44
  there. You got Yariel Rodriguez there. I think there's a few other ones
• 30:48
  as you go down there, maybe a further down the list, little further
• 30:51
  away, that are interesting. So you know, if this is something long
• 30:56
  term or something to keep him out for a while, there's probably some some
• 31:00
  opportunities for some young guys to come in and get some innings there. I
• 31:03
  don't think Bowden Francis is going to be like a big hurdle to keep everybody
• 31:07
  out of the way type thing. When you get like a Teeayman ready to
• 31:11
  go. But that might be jumping to conclusions here, but I'm I'm a
• 31:15
  little I'm a little concerned with this one. But if it I think,
• 31:21
  you know, as as the next week unfolds, if it's bad, then
• 31:26
  you need to start looking at that minor system. If it's not, I'm
• 31:29
  still probably staying away. Just the confidence I have on that shoulders definitely questionable.
• 31:34
  Yeah, I mean, and even Teeeman himself has been dealing with small
• 31:38
  injuries that I mean, it's been like just I know, it's been his
• 31:42
  career, and I mean, it's it is a little worrisome, but it
• 31:45
  does make me want to throw dart dart at teetam In just like a little
• 31:49
  earlier than I maybe would have. But part of is Bowden Francis is a
• 31:53
  pretty solid pitcher. Like I think if you're in a super deep league or
• 31:59
  especially a only like and you're looking for somebody who's really cheap and just might
• 32:02
  be working innings, and especially if you're in a wins league, I mean,
• 32:07
  Mouden Francis, I think it's going to be a bit of a sneaky
• 32:09
  pick in terms of like especially what like Zach Lttel was last year for the
• 32:14
  Rays. You know, some of these back end arms on good teams that
• 32:19
  can develop players really produce some nice fantasy assets. So I will be probably
• 32:24
  having some Bowden Francis shares, especially if this Gaussman shoulder injury lingers even for
• 32:32
  another week at this point, like it should, we should have it cleared
• 32:37
  up by the time we record next week, I would think. In terms
• 32:38
  of whether or not we're taking about in Frances, Yeah, but we will
• 32:44
  see. You know's he's the front runner, but they're not ruling anybody else
• 32:47
  out there with you know, Mitch White or Espino or Teeta men and they
• 32:52
  were already considering those guys for the Manora spot. So yeah, at least
• 32:58
  they had some options considered exactly okay, and sticking again in the Ale East,
• 33:02
  We've got one more injury to go over. And this is a guy
• 33:07
  I was actually having some interest in, but I needed to see some modicum
• 33:13
  of health, and now that I haven't seen it, he's totally off my
• 33:16
  boards. I'm not even gonna touch him. And that is Shane Baz who
• 33:22
  tweaked his oblique picking up a weight this week. In terms of training that
• 33:25
  like, this was a guy who's coming off of a Tommy John surgery that
• 33:31
  kept him out all of last year, and even before that, it was
• 33:35
  always kind of touch and go with his elbow and just his violent delivery and
• 33:40
  upper level velocity that Shane Baz was always an injury risk. And if he's
• 33:46
  tweaking his oblique picking up weights, I mean, I'm not sure I'm ever
• 33:52
  gonna be interested in Shane Bass now, just until he can actually establish himself,
• 33:55
  because he does seem a little bit like he's made of glass if he
• 34:00
  can't, like after all that rehab too, after getting through the Tommy John
• 34:05
  surgery and all of the build up it requires and all the weightlifting it requires
• 34:10
  to get to this point, and he's straining a lot of all or oblique
• 34:16
  of like all things like that is not a great spot to be straining if
• 34:23
  you're a pitcher as well. So like that is, I think I'm totally
• 34:27
  out on Shane Pass after Like I'm glad that I didn't take him anywhere in
• 34:30
  any recent drafts because I was looking at the projections love him and he really
• 34:36
  pops out from a strikeout perspective in a lower er, But I don't know
• 34:42
  how many innings you're gonna get at all this year. Yeah, I really
• 34:46
  like Shane be As. I really like the potential and the capability there.
• 34:51
  But you're right, like, this isn't the hammy. Luckily it's not a
• 34:54
  shoulder and arm, so I mean, like we're kind of in between here.
• 34:58
  But bleaks aren't like quick healing injuries. Those are the ones that seem
• 35:02
  to linger and it and take a little bit more time than than you expect.
• 35:07
  So I think because of that, they're gonna just move slowly with him,
• 35:13
  because like when he's back, they want him to be fully healthy.
• 35:15
  So I'm maybe a little bit more willing to take a gamble on him,
• 35:19
  but like it's the kind of guy at the end of the draft I got
• 35:22
  an open eye l spot or something like that, or maybe midway through spring
• 35:24
  training I might try to add into the team just to see, you know,
• 35:29
  where he comes back. Again, it's not an arm injury, so
• 35:31
  I'm I'm happy with that. Maybe gives him a little more time with the
• 35:35
  the arm to h to recover and get where it needs to be. So
• 35:38
  I'm a little bit intrigues just of the of an absolute dart throw, but
• 35:45
  it is really disappointing because like we finally thought we'd get to see what Shane
• 35:49
  Bass was and like for an extended time. I know he's we've seen him
• 35:52
  before, but you know, I think we have a total of forwardy innings
• 35:58
  of Shane Baz and they've been fantastic innings. They've been really excited, but
• 36:05
  they've spread out over two years and just not enough to be had. So
• 36:09
  yep, Shane bed has unfortunate probably not gonna be touching him in the drafts.
• 36:14
  Maybe maybe taking a flyer on the way for wire. Yeah, And
• 36:17
  honestly, roster resource doesn't even have him making the rotation anyway at this point.
• 36:22
  That that's the other I think issue here is that the Rays are notorious
• 36:28
  for their pitching depth and being able to create pitchers out of thin air,
• 36:30
  so it's not like they need to rush Shane Bads along. So I think
• 36:35
  they will slow play this and it could easily turn into a season where you're
• 36:39
  looking at like sixty or fewer earnings out of Shane Bads after he gets things
• 36:45
  back up and you know, works his way through some minor league rehabstance,
• 36:50
  and I'm sure he might pick up another nick here or there, so it
• 36:53
  wouldn't be too surprised. Okay, well, I think that covers us for
• 36:59
  most of the bigger news and notes that have hit. I'm just scrolling through
• 37:04
  MLB trade rumors just to make sure because these picture injuries have been hitting hard
• 37:08
  and fast, and didn't know if anything had happened during today's action. But
• 37:13
  I think we're in the clear for right now, until obviously I post this
• 37:15
  pod tomorrow and somebody else is going down for sure, we better go to
• 37:19
  break here quiet quickly here, just in case we don't want to get hurt
• 37:22
  on our watch. Yeah, I agree, Okay, well with that,
• 37:25
  we are going to take a break, and when we come back, we
• 37:28
  will discuss our favorite prospects from each division and give that'll end up giving six
• 37:35
  apiece six divisions in the MLB, so a total of twelve prospects that we
• 37:39
  like as picks to click. Stick around, and we'll be right back,
• 38:00
  all right, Welcome back, everybody. We are going to get into our
• 38:01
  categories discussion and we're going dynasty slash keeper discussion today as we're going to go
• 38:08
  division by division and each give a pick to click within that division. Either
• 38:15
  somebody that we're looking to buy or draft or bring on board any sort of
• 38:21
  dynasty keeper league situations for fantasy, as well as guys that we think might
• 38:25
  just rise in value, So like, you want to get in now while
• 38:30
  the floor is still a little bit lower. Although I'm looking at our list
• 38:34
  that we've worked up and some of these prices are starting to rise, So
• 38:37
  I think there'll also be players that we just really like the skills and really
• 38:40
  like where the ceilings are going to be. So we're trying to get in
• 38:45
  on these guys now. So brew any sort of like specific strategies when you
• 38:51
  were looking at these guys for our discussion that you're really trying to hone in
• 38:54
  on. Yeah, I mean I was looking to think so the assignment was
• 39:00
  vague enough, which was was so as I looked at it, you know,
• 39:04
  I was looking for guys. You know, we all know the Jackson
• 39:07
  Holidays and you know, any big name out there, and so I wanted
• 39:10
  to really stick away from those and be like, who are the guys that
• 39:15
  are you know, maybe late this year, maybe next year that really could
• 39:20
  jump up the rankings and make an outsized impact to a team. So I'm
• 39:27
  I really didn't want to go too far away. I want guys that we're
• 39:29
  going to be, you know, three four years away or anything like that.
• 39:31
  I was really looking for guys that were kind of up and coming,
• 39:35
  but not your top twenty prospects or anything like that. The guys that are
• 39:38
  still still if you're in a you know, maybe a slightly you know,
• 39:43
  smaller league, you might be available. Or guys that as you're looking to
• 39:47
  make a deal, they might be the throw in type thing that could be
• 39:52
  a part of something that you're looking to do. So didn't want to spend
• 39:57
  the time on the guys we already knew, and wanted to really a little
• 40:00
  bit deeper in the minor league pool. I'm sure we didn't get as deep
• 40:02
  as we possibly could have. Maybe that's for a different pod, but there's
• 40:06
  there's still some names here that I don't think everybody's gonna know, and that's
• 40:09
  that's the exciting part. Hopefully we uncover a gym for somebody. Yeah,
• 40:13
  I totally agree that. Obviously, like the top guys are, also the
• 40:16
  prices to trade for them are astronomical. Me whoever holds Jackson Holliday in your
• 40:22
  league, I'm sure you can't approach them with just about any trade that'll make
• 40:25
  sense in terms of value to pry him away. Whereas these guys, I
• 40:30
  think you should be able to get them for pretty reasonable prices right now.
• 40:34
  And I'm looking through list. I think all of them hit double A at
• 40:38
  the lowest last year. Lots of guys who obviously hit triple A two,
• 40:43
  so, lots of lots of players who should be right around the corner and
• 40:47
  easy call ups, you know, if they either get hot or are needed
• 40:51
  for an injury sub. Okay, well, let's dive right into it,
• 40:54
  and we will start in the American League in the Al East, and I'll
• 41:01
  kick us off. We'll go. I'm gonna go. Actually, I think
• 41:06
  after we gave that opener, this might be the one guy that I think
• 41:09
  might cause the most controversy, just viola in terms of pricing, especially just
• 41:16
  because of the Yankees tax I think is what's gonna cost you here, and
• 41:21
  that is Spencer Jones, an outfielder from the New York Yankees, mostly because
• 41:25
  like the raw ability out of him, as we've seen his spring trainee.
• 41:30
  He's blasted a home run already. He's got a absolutely hulking six to sixth
• 41:36
  frame that like looks like left handed Aaron Judge when he's in the box.
• 41:40
  But what I really like here out of Spencer Jones is that it's not all
• 41:45
  power. He's actually still trying to find his power stroke, as he only
• 41:47
  hit sixteen homers over one hundred and seventeen minor league games last year. And
• 41:52
  you know, the strikeouts I think are a little worrisome, but the nice
• 41:58
  thing is that they're in check. He was able to to He had a
• 42:00
  twenty nine percent strikeout rate at high A and it went it hovered around the
• 42:05
  same area at twenty eight point two percent in double A. So that's why
• 42:07
  I like to see, is like an approach that's not degrading as you're moving
• 42:12
  up in the minors. And on top of it all, Spencer Jones was
• 42:15
  only twenty two when he made to double A, so he was certainly younger
• 42:19
  than that level overall. And the gravy on top here is actually that Spencer
• 42:23
  Jones I think could be a really significant speed asset. He had forty three
• 42:28
  stolen bases over those two minor league stops last year that I think, especially
• 42:32
  if he gets a shot in the outfield this year, for the Yankees.
• 42:37
  You're talking about a huge left handed guy that gets to play half of his
• 42:40
  games in Yankee Stadium with that short right field porch. But what I also
• 42:45
  like is that if he's struggling, it's a little bit in terms of like
• 42:49
  what Anthony Volpi offered you last year at a short stop, is that if
• 42:52
  the bat is struggling, I think Spencer Jones will run more to try to
• 42:58
  make up for it and try to provide some production value. And so I
• 43:01
  think that's why he's somebody that I'm really starting to target, just because,
• 43:07
  like all these things that I've talked about are even before like he's projected to
• 43:13
  really get into more game power. He's only on fangrafts at like a fifty
• 43:16
  game power with a seventy max. The frame, the six to sixth frame
• 43:22
  just provides so much leverage that I mean, it's not out of bounds to
• 43:25
  see a ceiling season out of Spencer Jones somewhere in the forty forty range.
• 43:30
  And so that's part of it, is like I'm buying in on Spencer Jones
• 43:35
  just because even if the price might be a little bit higher in the trade
• 43:38
  market right now, the ceiling is significant for where he is in rankings and
• 43:45
  what it's going to cost you. Yeah, so I ofto admit that I
• 43:50
  almost put Spencer Jones on my on my list and then and then I thought
• 43:53
  about the principles who we're trying to do, and I quickly removed him.
• 43:58
  But I can't disagree with anything you say there. Maybe the most interesting thing
• 44:04
  here is you look at that outfield, there's gonna be opportunities, Like we're
• 44:07
  we're talking about a group that is all about health between Aaron Judge and Carlo
• 44:14
  Stanton, right, And I get Stanton's gonna be expected to be the DH,
• 44:16
  but you know he's probably gonna hurt himself daching. And then I'm always
• 44:20
  scared of Aaron Judge being the center fielder like that just scares me for what
• 44:25
  you're paying that guy and put him in a position that he could go all
• 44:31
  out and hurt himself running all over the field there. So I think that
• 44:36
  there's a legitimate path to playing time, even though he is behind some big
• 44:40
  names. And to your point that what they they did with Vulpey, they
• 44:45
  just really stuck with him. You know, it means if they decide that
• 44:47
  they're gonna go to Jones. I think they're gonna go to Jones and they're
• 44:50
  gonna actually give him a chance. He's looked good in the spring training.
• 44:53
  To your point, he is a massive human being. He makes Aaron Judge
• 44:57
  look normal, so that that's just fun. But I can't really disagree with
• 45:04
  you here. And as you look at maybe that the top prospect list,
• 45:07
  I think he this is from memory, I don't know, but I want
• 45:09
  to say he's in the top thirty generally. Maybe it's back in the twenties,
• 45:15
  depending on which publication you're going with. Thirty three. Yeah, So
• 45:20
  like it's not unreasonable that he might be available, might be somebody that you
• 45:23
  can grab. But it's if he keeps having a good spring training, keeps
• 45:29
  being making some noise, that's going to quickly disappear. Yeah, exactly.
• 45:32
  And I think especially like if he hits another couple of tanks the way he
• 45:37
  did in the first week, and especially as pictures are kind of starting to
• 45:40
  focus more on throwing actual game plans, you know, then this price is
• 45:47
  going to skyrocket, that it's going to become unreasonable. But I think this
• 45:52
  is maybe about as low as it's going to go until he does reach the
• 45:57
  majors at this point, Okay, let's bounce it over to you. Who's
• 46:00
  your alies pick. Yeah, so I'm gonna go maybe a little bit further
• 46:05
  off, but I'm gonna go just across the rival here with the Red Sox,
• 46:07
  and I'm gonna I'm gonna look at Kyle Teel, catcher for the Red
• 46:12
  Sox. Didn't make a double A last season, but he's got a total
• 46:15
  of twenty six games that he's played in the minor leagues for the Red Sox.
• 46:22
  And yeah, that's because he was drafted just last year in the draft
• 46:27
  coming out of Virginia. He was the fourteenth overall pick. I believe he
• 46:32
  was considered generally a top ten talent coming out of there. And he's one
• 46:37
  of those guys that say has a decent ceiling, but more of a high
• 46:40
  floor. He's a very talented catcher. From a defensive perspective, I think
• 46:45
  there are maybe a few questions maybe about his his hit tool is, you
• 46:51
  know, is he gonna be a really big power hitter, But being a
• 46:55
  decent defensive catcher already, that's usually what something that takes a while to develop.
• 47:00
  He does seem that he has a much more interesting profile as we look
• 47:06
  at catchers anymore, of like he's he's gonna be solid, He's he's gonna
• 47:08
  be athletic, and he might be able to bring a few more things to
• 47:13
  the table. In just in twenty six games, he did steal three bases,
• 47:15
  like he's gonna toss in a few of those. And you know,
• 47:19
  he hit well above three hundred and every stop. He was at very much
• 47:22
  a line drive hitter. Probably not a guy that's going to developed massive power
• 47:28
  down the line, but maybe a fifteen you can see maybe a twenty homer
• 47:32
  season. So but if you're talking a fifteen to ten hitting two ninety,
• 47:37
  like, that's really it's a really solid catcher in our game. So there's
• 47:43
  a lot there's something to like about that there. And the other thing that
• 47:45
  I really like about him, and again we're talking small sample size here,
• 47:49
  but his walk rate was you know, Kevin Eucalis esque, like he was
• 47:55
  walking almost twenty percent of the time across his stops in the minors, and
• 48:01
  the strikeouts weren't too concerning. Again, small samples, So I think there's
• 48:07
  a lot to like there, and there's a lot of potential growth for this
• 48:12
  guy being a college bad he can't go straight through that system, and it's
• 48:15
  not like there's much in really there in Boston blocking the guy. And as
• 48:21
  we just kind of talked about earlier, this could, I don't say,
• 48:22
  be a lost season for Boston, but they very well could be looking for
• 48:27
  the future. And I don't think Kyle Teal makes it up this year unless
• 48:32
  he just you know, blows the league. Way he they are they didn't
• 48:36
  bring him to spring training, but I think it's a better chance that,
• 48:39
  you know, he's somebody that's up maybe midyear next year. So from a
• 48:45
  dynasty perspective, not too far off, but far enough off that people aren't
• 48:50
  going to be holding on to him with with an iron clad pist. Yeah,
• 48:55
  I totally agree. And a lot of like the reports about Heal too,
• 49:00
  or just it's what you want to see in terms of a catcher being
• 49:02
  like a leader and like he's getting some like farrotech comps just being coming through
• 49:07
  the Boston system. He's a lefty bat, righty throw, which is great
• 49:12
  too, because it makes it easy to pla tune with a righty throw,
• 49:15
  righty bat catcher in that way. I mean your catcher's only gonna be playing
• 49:20
  four or five times a week anyway, so that's perfect. I was gonna
• 49:23
  say that Connor Wong is the perfect person for that, because I think Connor
• 49:27
  Wong fits better in like a split platoon situation. But Connor Wong is awful
• 49:32
  against left handed battery left handed pitchers. As a right handed bat, He's
• 49:37
  a career twenty two WRC plus against lefties, career ninety nine WRC plus against
• 49:42
  righty. So I don't know what's going on there. Yeah, I wasn't
• 49:47
  too excited about Connor Wong at any point, so I don't think that there's
• 49:52
  gonna be a lot of block there, which is probably good in the long
• 49:57
  term. But yeah, I do really like where Kyle Teal can go and
• 50:01
  how quickly he can move through this Boston system because there isn't much in front
• 50:06
  of him from a catching depth perspective, Like Wong is there, and then
• 50:09
  you got Ruyce mcguires his back up, and they have Roberto Perez hanging out
• 50:14
  in triple A is like an injury back up. But if Teal continues to
• 50:19
  show I also like that he has that great eye, great discipline at the
• 50:22
  plate. You love to see that. I think as from a catcher too,
• 50:24
  that like it just shows his understanding of the game and how it flows
• 50:30
  overall. So I think there's a good chance you see Teal by the end
• 50:34
  of the season. And I mean I think come next year, he's going
• 50:38
  to be really a pretty hyped up player because, like, if he's able
• 50:43
  to remain rookie eligible, he does have a shot at a Rookie of the
• 50:47
  Year next year going into twenty twenty five. So yeah, all those reasons,
• 50:53
  I think. I'm also in on Kyle Teal that the bat looks pretty
• 50:57
  good. I don't think it's you're ever going to look for anything amazing,
• 51:00
  but like he could be a non zero in stolen bases as an as a
• 51:04
  catcher, decent catcher counting stats and then you know something like a two sixty
• 51:09
  two seventy average that I think he is a lot like Gabby Moreno, but
• 51:15
  a'll tick more speed and from the left side. Yeah, I think he's
• 51:22
  a good one to look at, and he's far enough away, not talked
• 51:24
  about enough that I yeah, I think you can get him pretty cheap,
• 51:28
  and especially in Dynasty format, just hold on to him for a year and
• 51:31
  you'll be pretty happy. Yeah, or even first year player drafts. I'm
• 51:36
  sure there's still a few out there for dynasty players that haven't kicked off that
• 51:39
  I think I would move him a little bit further up those boards than I
• 51:43
  especially would for a catcher, Like usually I'm out on dynasty catchers, but
• 51:45
  Teal's got a lot of those things that make the floor much safer. Yeah,
• 51:51
  he's diet Harry Ford. Yeah, I think, I mean, yeah,
• 51:53
  that's about right. And he came in it looks forty like forty seventh
• 51:59
  on the VP list, so a little bit lower. Okay, We're going
• 52:02
  to go now to the AL Central, which I'm not gonna lie. This
• 52:07
  was the hardest one just because, like there are decent prospects in like the
• 52:12
  Sox system as they're rebuilding, but I don't have any faith that the Socks
• 52:16
  will get the most out of them. And that's the way a lot of
• 52:19
  the other teams in the AL Central kind of operate that outside of Cleveland and
• 52:23
  pitching, not a great track record of like developing guys coming through systems necessarily
• 52:30
  in the AL Central. But I think we both found two pretty decent guys
• 52:34
  and Brew. I'll let you kick off here for the Al Central. Yeah,
• 52:37
  this is gonna be the first one that I butcher the name, because
• 52:42
  it wouldn't be a podcast without me butchering some name. So you correct me
• 52:46
  here, But Chase the Lotter, I think that's how I it. And
• 52:51
  so Chase the Lotter is definitely an intriguing prospect. He's you know, he's
• 52:58
  twenty two. You know, he was first rounder in twenty He twenty two,
• 53:02
  was the first rounder in twenty twenty two, and he's he's been making
• 53:07
  making some noise. He had really kind of a breakout season last year.
• 53:12
  He didn't you know, when he got drafted. First year, he didn't
• 53:15
  play. But you know, just looking at his his High A stats,
• 53:20
  he was scrussed. Forty two games he hit he hit only hit four home
• 53:25
  runs, stle three bases, hit three sixty six, but he was very
• 53:30
  his plate approach was so solid. He is a hit roughly three fifty three
• 53:37
  sixty at each stop that he saw. He was str walking more than he
• 53:42
  struck out. And he's actually in the spring training this year. He got
• 53:46
  some some a little bit of lift at the end of the season as they
• 53:50
  moved him up to double A and he seemed did not he did not seem
• 53:52
  overmatched to any degree. And so he's already, you know, already launched
• 53:59
  a homer in spring training, hitting four forty four. So he's you know,
• 54:02
  holding his his own at this point in time. So I think it's
• 54:06
  a he's he's one of those guys that just if you watch him, has
• 54:09
  just a very pretty swing, seems very natural to play. And again in
• 54:15
  a lineup or in an organization that that's gonna have a lot of opportunity for
• 54:19
  him to play. I don't think there's anything in uh in Cleveland that's ultimately
• 54:24
  going to hold him hold him back. So he's one of those guys I
• 54:29
  could see up you know, maybe mid year. He's one that the power
• 54:34
  you have to kind of hope the power kind of develops and follows. Yeah,
• 54:38
  and so but I'm looking at him a little bit more, and I'm
• 54:40
  going to call it like Alex Kierloff mold of maybe or what we hoped Alex
• 54:45
  Kirloff would be a little bit high, higher batting average, kind of solid
• 54:51
  all around profile for for a chase the ladder. So I really like him.
• 54:55
  He's he's still I would call it green enough or hasn't shown a enough
• 55:00
  in the miners that I think he's still affordable still somebody can go out there
• 55:02
  and get But you are kind of betting on that that first round talent,
• 55:08
  the you know, the projectability of of of him at this point in time
• 55:13
  with that, you know, pretty impressive six or four frame. Yeah,
• 55:16
  lefty bat, like you know, there's a there's a lot to like and
• 55:20
  it's the kind of toolsy guy that you look at. So what do you
• 55:23
  think are you in on on Chase? Yeah? I think so too.
• 55:28
  And actually he's the highest rank guy that we're going to talk about. He's
• 55:30
  thirty first on PPS list, So he's writing in the Spencer Jones range.
• 55:34
  But I don't think the love for him in the fantasy realm is there quite
• 55:39
  as much as there is with Spencer Jones, because with Jones, I mean,
• 55:44
  the stone bases popped right off the page. With the Louder, it's
• 55:47
  it's just a good solid bat and so it doesn't show up quite as you
• 55:52
  know, it's not as sexy when you are only looking at I do think
• 55:57
  that you know his home runs and stone bases for the first couple of years
• 56:00
  when it comes up, are going to be somewhere in the mid teens.
• 56:04
  But like you said, he's six foot four. Cleveland has a positive home
• 56:07
  run factor for left handed bats. The right field porches shorter than people I
• 56:13
  think realize sometimes and so there are elements there that, like you could see
• 56:17
  Chase the lotter, I think in his peak pushing something maybe more of like
• 56:22
  a Kyle Tucker with a little less speed and just like a good bat to
• 56:29
  ball player, good high average and so especially given in Cleveland, I mean,
• 56:36
  you've only got a clear ramon Lariano and Miles Straw, and my boy
• 56:39
  asked Von FLOORI al for playing time to crack the league, and that's not
• 56:45
  too tall of a task. In addition it I do think the latter can
• 56:50
  play center, which will help him a lot that you know, if Miles
• 56:53
  Straw falls flat on his face or runs into an injury, that allows Cleveland
• 56:58
  to call up the louder and try to find some lightning in a bottle.
• 57:01
  It's actually part of the reason why when when we did our al Central preview
• 57:05
  that I picked Cleveland is because I think if they they have the best minor
• 57:10
  league system, I think in this Division. And if they start bringing some
• 57:15
  of those young players up from the minor leagues and pushing them in this year,
• 57:19
  I think that could really propel them past Minnesota. Yeah, it's it's
• 57:24
  gonna be It's gonna be interesting to see where what Cleveland decides to do if
• 57:29
  some of this talent comes through the system. Uh and I and I hate
• 57:32
  to say it, but Cleveland seems to become a minor league talent pipeline,
• 57:37
  which is which is kind of kind of great for them to actually have something
• 57:40
  to write home about. So anyway, especially when if you if you include
• 57:45
  junior Kemeniro in that details details. So how about you, were you sitting
• 57:52
  there in the in the central Okay, I'm gonna go up to Detroit and
• 57:57
  pick a picture. I'm going with the the pitching Wilmer Flores, same moniker
• 58:04
  as the infielder down in San Francisco. But this Wilmer Flores is twenty three.
• 58:08
  He's six foot four, and the biggest reason here is I mean,
• 58:13
  he had an awful twenty twenty three as he really took a step back and
• 58:19
  mostly is all in fastball velocity that he used to be throwing around ninety nine
• 58:23
  ninety eight back in twenty twenty two, and that's when he was putting up
• 58:28
  some pretty eye popping K nine numbers down in double A and single A,
• 58:32
  high A worth, you know, twelve thirteen, K nine and just looked
• 58:37
  absolutely electric. I was thinking that he could find that form again last year
• 58:43
  that he made appearances in my Waiver Wire column, but the fastball just never
• 58:47
  really came around last year. I don't know what exactly it was. But
• 58:52
  he has shown up to spring training this year and the fastball is back,
• 58:55
  baby, It's back at ninety nine ninety eight. And if that's the case,
• 59:01
  he might end up being the surprise starting pitcher in Detroit, even with
• 59:07
  all the other talent around there, because just on electricity alone, I mean
• 59:13
  that is, if he's back to that wipeout slider as well, because I
• 59:17
  think the velocity step back also just took everything else away from him that it
• 59:23
  wasn't allowing anything else from his arsenal to play up. I mean, if
• 59:29
  he's back in ninety nine, not only is he in play I think for
• 59:31
  a rotation spot, but Detroit's got one of the weakest bullpens in the entire
• 59:36
  league, and if they're trying to win this year. There has been some
• 59:40
  fear that Flores could end up as a reliever long term anyway, that if
• 59:45
  they want to make the quick conversion move him into a high leverage spot.
• 59:49
  I think there's a chance that he gets some work there. But I love
• 59:52
  what Wilmer Flores has been looking like in spring training, and if he's bouncing
• 59:58
  back to where he was in twenty twenty two, I'm all in, baby.
• 1:00:02
  Yeah. I think that's the big question is what do you what are
• 1:00:05
  you getting with more Flores? Like, if you have last year's version,
• 1:00:09
  you got a bullpen arm. If you have nothing, if that's the yeah,
• 1:00:14
  And so if you have the version from what was that twenty one,
• 1:00:17
  twenty two, then just twenty two, Yeah, just twenty two, then
• 1:00:22
  yeah, you should be excited. And he's a guy that seems to have
• 1:00:25
  pretty good control, keeps the ball on the ground, all the all the
• 1:00:29
  things that we kind of look for. Yeah, so it is. But
• 1:00:31
  what I like about him in the kind of the conversation we're having is he's
• 1:00:37
  not gonna be hard to obtain. It's it's not gonna be that you're pain
• 1:00:40
  a whole lot there. It's you might be able to watch them on the
• 1:00:43
  waiver wire and see like, hey, this has this looking and if there's
• 1:00:46
  any inkling that he might get a call or things are working well or during
• 1:00:51
  spring training and then you can grab him at that point in time. So
• 1:00:53
  I think he is one of the further down discussions that we're going to hit
• 1:00:59
  today, And if you look at him, it's it. It's not that
• 1:01:02
  hard to see that if if he figures some things out, he's got a
• 1:01:07
  really good profile, you know that he can deliver on. It does seem
• 1:01:10
  that Detroit does produce some pretty good starters, and now they can't generally keep
• 1:01:16
  him healthy, so that might by be another another issue. But yeah,
• 1:01:22
  I think Flores is intriguing. Definitely a guy that I would be watching.
• 1:01:27
  And if that uptick is real and he can maintain it, then he's he's
• 1:01:30
  definitely has a chance to stick in the rotation. But he's also is one
• 1:01:35
  of those guys that even if they're a velocity uptick is is real and he
• 1:01:38
  goes in the bullpen. Your point, it's that that's also interesting. It's
• 1:01:44
  just a question of that velocity. Yeah, yeah, exactly, and that
• 1:01:46
  I think that's the number one indicator here that like, if there's any degradation
• 1:01:52
  of that velocity here over the spring training, I'm back out. But if
• 1:01:57
  Song as one where Flores is working in the upper nineties, I think he's
• 1:02:00
  somebody that's gonna be just a really fantastic cheap arm All right, Now,
• 1:02:07
  we're gonna move on to the Ale West, and we both picked players from
• 1:02:13
  the same team, which I don't think is terribly coincidental because honestly, a
• 1:02:16
  lot of the system is in the Ale West, are not great between Oakland
• 1:02:22
  and Los Angeles, or the hype is all there in Seattle in Texas that
• 1:02:28
  like, I don't think anybody in any dynasty keeper situations are going to give
• 1:02:32
  you a fair deal on Wyatt Langford or Evan Carter or the aforementioned Harry Ford.
• 1:02:39
  So there's one team that I think there are some good at possibilities on
• 1:02:44
  that's the Houston Astros. So Brew who is your fist first pick down in
• 1:02:47
  Houston. Yeah, so I'm gonna go And I did not look up where
• 1:02:51
  his prospect ranking is, but I'm gonna go with he's not on the top
• 1:02:54
  one hundred. So there we go, going a little deeper Joey low Perffito
• 1:03:00
  and I I think, you know, I'm gonna make a comp here because
• 1:03:05
  you stole a second ago. He reminds me a little bit of Kyle Tucker.
• 1:03:09
  Really, okay, you know he he does. You know, if
• 1:03:13
  you look at how he's performed, you know, just just last year,
• 1:03:19
  he you know, he he had a very similar you know, i'd say
• 1:03:23
  season, but let's just go from the top. He's a he's a lefty
• 1:03:29
  that throws right handed. He's six four and he's six four or sorry,
• 1:03:37
  he's six three, two twenty. Kyle Tucker bat's lefty throws righty six four
• 1:03:45
  h two hundred soaking wet. So maybe not quite the foot comparison there.
• 1:03:52
  But if you look at what he did just last year, and we'll just
• 1:03:58
  we'll just look at what he did in Double A, because he was across
• 1:04:00
  three levels last year. Just in in Double A he had eighty four games,
• 1:04:05
  nineteen homers, twenty steals, only caught three times, and hit two
• 1:04:11
  ninety six thirte walk rate, low twenty k rates, not really elevated by
• 1:04:19
  babip or anything like that very much. Kind of a line drive hitter.
• 1:04:25
  He's not a power hitter. He's the guy that hits the ball hard and
• 1:04:27
  they just happened to go out again. That that makes me think a little
• 1:04:30
  bit of of Kyle Tucker as well. And so I think that there's he's
• 1:04:34
  one of those guys that can play, you know, all over the outfield.
• 1:04:40
  Uh so that he's got a lot of flexibility for for the Astros.
• 1:04:45
  So I think that he's a guy that's gonna get get a chance with him.
• 1:04:48
  You know, he is another guy that they brought to spring training.
• 1:04:51
  Give him a chance. You know, he's got a whole tenant bats and
• 1:04:56
  it's done pretty pretty well when he's been given given that opportunity. That's probably
• 1:05:00
  is a little bit harder team to kind of break in with because the Astros
• 1:05:05
  are a little bit more competitive and expecting to do more. That's where the
• 1:05:10
  Kyle Tucker compliments in for him, because Kyle Tucker is going to be blocking
• 1:05:16
  him there. You know, you have a fan favorite of yourself on the
• 1:05:20
  spot with Chas McCormick going to keep him out there. But I guess you
• 1:05:27
  could look because Quinn Jake Myers is probably not the biggest thing to overcome there.
• 1:05:31
  So I do I think Joey Lopraffito has a good chance to make an
• 1:05:36
  impact in twenty twenty four and he had just hasn't gotten a lot of love,
• 1:05:43
  and I don't see a really good reason why. So I'm gonna say
• 1:05:47
  there, I like, I like, I like Joey. Yeah, And
• 1:05:53
  I mean you mentioned Loprafito as an outfielder, but he played plenty at second
• 1:05:58
  base and first base last year as well too, that he's not going to
• 1:06:01
  quite qualify there, I don't think. But I mean I think low Berfido
• 1:06:05
  could pick it up in season because it doesn't take too much to qualify in
• 1:06:11
  season, and then if he picks up first base, I think that's where
• 1:06:14
  low Berffido becomes a really huge asset in fantasy, because I think what you're
• 1:06:19
  looking at in Lowperfido is somebody who's going to be like mid teens homers and
• 1:06:24
  stolen bases. If you can get those stolen bases out of a corner spot
• 1:06:28
  for the price that low Perfido is, that is absolutely found gold. As
• 1:06:33
  well as Houston's bench is not quite as formidable as you as it has been
• 1:06:40
  in the past, and you alluded to it with the Jake Myers, but
• 1:06:43
  also John Singleton is there, Grey Kessinger is there. Who is Don Kessinger's
• 1:06:48
  like grandson, but like, I had no idea who he was outside that,
• 1:06:51
  And so you're looking at a path to playing time for low Berfido coming
• 1:06:58
  off the bench or being a left handed bat to platoon with. He almost
• 1:07:02
  made the majors last year. There's lots of rumblings that it's gonna come up
• 1:07:05
  that he was a pretty hot pick to pick up in September because he was
• 1:07:12
  on fire in Double A all year. So yeah, I like Loprafito as
• 1:07:15
  well, and especially if you're in a league where somehow he did remain eligible
• 1:07:19
  at first base in second base absolutely, Like it's really tough to find a
• 1:07:24
  first second outfield eligibility guy and covers really some of the hardest spots to find
• 1:07:30
  depth within fantasy right now. Yeah, so I he's to me, he's
• 1:07:34
  he's a no brainer pickup. I've been grabbing him where I can, And
• 1:07:39
  again, what I think what I like about him is he's he's very close
• 1:07:43
  to the majors and he's putting up numbers, and so you're for a guy
• 1:07:46
  that you can get without investing too much and can get potential production this year.
• 1:07:51
  That's what that's a lot to like. So how about you where are
• 1:07:55
  you looking? You've already alluded to it, You're you're looking in Houston as
• 1:07:59
  well? What part of the diamond or are you looking at? Yeah,
• 1:08:02
  I'm gonna go with the pitcher here, and so this actually corresponds with Justin
• 1:08:08
  Berlander not being ready for the beginning of the season. And my pick is
• 1:08:12
  Spencer Araghetty. I think that's how you say. It looks like I think
• 1:08:15
  so, Yeah, Spencer Araghetty's forget Yeah Araghetty because he's entering into the competition
• 1:08:25
  for the fifth rotation spot. Now, this is another guy who was really
• 1:08:30
  there's lots of rumblings that he was gonna come up at the end of last
• 1:08:32
  year, and I'm not sure why he didn't get shout in Houston honestly,
• 1:08:38
  because I think he would be great out of the bullpen too. He's a
• 1:08:41
  little bit volatile in terms of like high strikeout but some high walks. But
• 1:08:45
  it is the strikeoutside like here that there is a chance that Spencer Araghetty could
• 1:08:49
  be providing you somewhere in the range of like nine to ten k nine for
• 1:08:56
  such a cheap price with a league averagesh RA And honestly, as I've been
• 1:09:01
  going through some of the drafts this year, that that's really hard to find,
• 1:09:05
  like even like you say, Kakuchi is starting to like move up boards
• 1:09:11
  and some of the back end pitching options are just horrendous. So you're not
• 1:09:15
  finding any strikeouts and honestly you're barely finding e RA help anymore. So if
• 1:09:21
  Spencer Agetti can make this rotation and stick a little bit too, like,
• 1:09:26
  that's huge, and Houston should roll into quite a few wins. And he's
• 1:09:30
  only got to beat out JP France and Brandon Black here, who both kind
• 1:09:34
  of stumbled last year in this role as the fifth starter. So I think
• 1:09:39
  that Houston could mix it up and give Raghetti the job out of spring.
• 1:09:44
  And if that happens and he pitches well enough, you know, it's not
• 1:09:46
  like Verlander, who knows how long that that shoulder injury will take. But
• 1:09:53
  I mean you're also looking at eventually Luis Garcia should be working this way back
• 1:09:58
  from Tommy John surgery. It's the coolers is injured as always there, Christian
• 1:10:02
  Javier has been inconsistent and like bounced around in and out of the bullpen.
• 1:10:08
  Jose Erkidi has battled shoulder issues and it has also been inconsistent. So there's
• 1:10:13
  a lot of runway for Raghetty to seize a job, and especially if he
• 1:10:17
  gets rolling with a couple of big strikeout games and finds a bit of a
• 1:10:21
  groove in the majors to be able to hone some more control. I think
• 1:10:26
  this could be a really sneaky pick that you know, could really rocket up
• 1:10:30
  starting pitching ranks pretty quick. Yeah, He's there's a lot of talent there,
• 1:10:34
  which is I think what I like about Arraghetty the walks is the concern,
• 1:10:40
  Like that's I think what I'm watching for in spring training is is he
• 1:10:44
  have that Does he have that control in check? But I think that that's
• 1:10:48
  definitely there's a potential there, and it does seem like the Houston starting five
• 1:10:56
  is made of glass for lack of better terms. And you know, he's
• 1:11:00
  twenty four years old, like he just little left to left to prove in
• 1:11:02
  the minors. You know, he he's he's spent the last few years in
• 1:11:08
  Double A and Triple A, so you know, there's not much else to
• 1:11:12
  do for him, So let's let's see what he We'll see what he has
• 1:11:15
  to give. So another guy that liked that's he's close to the majors and
• 1:11:18
  he definitely has some upside. Like I said, the the control is what's
• 1:11:24
  interesting here, is like, is that gonna gonna gonna play? And if
• 1:11:28
  it does, then man, this is gonna be fun to watch. If
• 1:11:31
  it doesn't, hey, it wasn't that big of a gamble exactly. Yeah,
• 1:11:34
  that's part of it too, is the price is pretty cheap on Arigaty
• 1:11:38
  here. He has had one outing of twinnings where he didn't walk anybody,
• 1:11:42
  struck out three, but give up seven hits. So maybe he's he's working
• 1:11:45
  on something down in spring training, but definitely somebody to keep an eye on
• 1:11:48
  as spring and folds. All right, now, we're going to move over
• 1:11:53
  to the National League, So we're gonna start in the East again here and
• 1:11:59
  Brew I'm gonna bound sit over to you for your NL East pick. Yeah,
• 1:12:02
  so we're gonna start in the pitching factory of the NL East, which
• 1:12:06
  is the Atlanta Braids, and I'm gonna gonna go for another projectable arm here.
• 1:12:15
  Twenty twenty three, first round pick twenty fourth overall. Hirston Waldrip Waldrop
• 1:12:21
  is after one, you know, one season in twenty three. He was
• 1:12:29
  all the way up to Triple A last season after coming out of Florida.
• 1:12:33
  He is an absolute high upside arm. He has nasty stuff, which seems
• 1:12:39
  like what the Braves have been going for. They're just going for these high
• 1:12:42
  octane arms with nasty stuff and then hoping they can kind of rein them in.
• 1:12:46
  You know. He he was more of a nine or ten cape may
• 1:12:50
  more ten or plus a cap for nine guy. He has a nasty,
• 1:12:57
  nasty splitter and that keeps the ball on the ground and that's you know me.
• 1:13:02
  I love love guys that can do that. You know. He he's
• 1:13:05
  a guy that you could easily see, you know, fifty sixty ground ball
• 1:13:09
  rate with with that, with that splitter, and I think he brings it,
• 1:13:15
  you know, in the high eighties. And if you're a big pitch
• 1:13:18
  grip fan, uh, you know, we do a little search for the
• 1:13:21
  pitch grip on his his split change. I don't know how a human hand
• 1:13:27
  can do what personal wall grips can can do. It's painful to look at,
• 1:13:31
  but it is an absolute split uh split Grip that is is just nasty.
• 1:13:39
  You know, as he was coming out of last year's draft, everybody
• 1:13:42
  was talking about Paul Skeens. You know, he's he arguably had the second
• 1:13:45
  best stuff in that draft class. If there wasn't Skeens there, we'd be
• 1:13:48
  talking about him a heck of a lot more. So, you know,
• 1:13:54
  it's it's hard to know with seeing so little of him, and he did
• 1:13:59
  even when he was in college. He was a little bit of a hot
• 1:14:02
  and cold pitcher and he's still trying to figure things out. But what I
• 1:14:05
  like is he's in that Braves system, which really seems to to pump out
• 1:14:11
  and really rein in that talent. And for me, if the Land of
• 1:14:15
  Braves promote you into that rotation, I'm buying it already. I'm buying it
• 1:14:19
  already just to the fact that the Braves are bought into you. So I
• 1:14:24
  think Waldrip's you know, even if he comes up as a relief arm this
• 1:14:29
  year, I think he's a great investment because he's gonna get a starting chance
• 1:14:33
  down the road. But even if he is in a relief role, he's
• 1:14:36
  going to be bringing the high octane stuff. He's going to be striking guys
• 1:14:40
  out and that there's a lot to like there. So I don't know where
• 1:14:45
  were you? Are you a Waldrop fan? Yeah? I absolutely love Waldrip.
• 1:14:49
  Also, I was wrong this is the highest guy on the VP list.
• 1:14:53
  Actually he's at thirty. But we just took the We just took the
• 1:14:57
  guys in like thirty through thirty three somehow else. Yeah, I think it's
• 1:15:00
  more of a function of baseball perspectus is just in on Waldrop because he's only
• 1:15:04
  eighty fifth I think on the Fangraft's top one hundred, and I mean,
• 1:15:10
  honestly, there's at this point, like if you're in a first year player
• 1:15:14
  draft, there's a decent argument to be taking Waldrop kind of like on par
• 1:15:19
  with Skeens, just because there are concerns about Skien's fastball shape and especially if
• 1:15:25
  he can't be piping it in all the time. At one oh one,
• 1:15:28
  Skeens might run into some trouble. Waldrop is seemingly in a better situation just
• 1:15:34
  because I think you really nailed it with the Braves. Give me a lot
• 1:15:40
  of confidence being able to develop an arm like this that it reminds me,
• 1:15:44
  honestly a bit of Spencer Strider in terms of I think Strider's fastball was far
• 1:15:47
  superior, but harnessing somebody that just throws some of the nastiest stuff on earth
• 1:15:55
  and then letting it ride in the major leagues that I don't have any concerns
• 1:16:00
  about the Braves allowing Hrston Waldrip to move up when he's ready, And I
• 1:16:04
  mean the guys in front of him are not the healthiest you know you've got.
• 1:16:09
  I mean, Strider's a Stalwarts, so I'm not worried about Strider,
• 1:16:12
  but Freed has had a barking elbow now for a couple of years. Charlie
• 1:16:15
  Morton's forty. Chris Sale is Chris Sale. Ranaldo Lopez is trying to stretch
• 1:16:20
  himself out after being a reliever for two and a half years. So if
• 1:16:26
  Waldrop performs, I think the Braves will move them very quickly. And I'm
• 1:16:30
  worried that Schemes might just get caught in the whole befuddled system of being a
• 1:16:35
  Pittsburgh Pirate and you could see Waldrop maybe being the better player. So yeah,
• 1:16:41
  I love Waldrip, and especially if you're looking at first year player dress,
• 1:16:45
  I think he's my easy number three pitcher after Yamamoto and Skiens. But
• 1:16:49
  like I just said that, I mean, I not very far away from
• 1:16:56
  like putting Waldrip ahead of schemes, just based on some of the news that
• 1:16:59
  we've getting out of Pirates Camp and just the way that organization runs. Yeah,
• 1:17:03
  so I think you're absolutely right. There's a lot lot to like in
• 1:17:08
  Atlanta there. So how about you are you are you strayed far away or
• 1:17:13
  are you sticking your ye with Atlanta? No, I'm also sticking Atlanta because
• 1:17:16
  this system is absurd and they just develop and find and develop talent more efficiently
• 1:17:25
  than I mean, any team that I can think of right now. It's
• 1:17:29
  kind of absurd, honestly. And this guy I think is gonna be the
• 1:17:35
  person who shoots up all sorts of lists because he was a relative unknown last
• 1:17:41
  year, and that is Nacho Alvarez Junior that I think he's also part of
• 1:17:45
  the reason why the Braves felt confident moving on for von Grissom because as a
• 1:17:50
  twenty year old last year in hi A, he slashed two eighty four,
• 1:17:55
  three ninety five, three ninety one, and that came with a thirteen percent
• 1:18:00
  walk rate, seventeen percent k rate, seven Homer sixteen steels, So I
• 1:18:04
  mean, he's not going to be like the biggest home run guy, but
• 1:18:08
  this is like exactly like Von Grissom, but maybe even better in terms of
• 1:18:14
  the bat is absurd. He's got a one to twenty three WRC plus last
• 1:18:18
  year in Hi A Zips already calls for him to be an eighty two WRC
• 1:18:24
  plus player in twenty twenty four. I think that this is who's gonna end
• 1:18:30
  up replacing Orlando Rcia on the infield for the Braves in the near future.
• 1:18:34
  That na Choe Alvarez Junior is. I mean, I think he's going to
• 1:18:39
  be really flying up all sorts of Dynasty rankings. He's in back ends of
• 1:18:43
  top hundreds right now, but that's partly because he was in just high a
• 1:18:47
  last year and the bat really started breaking out. That the walk rate and
• 1:18:53
  his control of the zone is superb. And so I'm a lot of the
• 1:18:59
  things that, like when we went through our Boston preview in al East,
• 1:19:04
  I picked Von Grisom, and I think you can copy and paste a lot
• 1:19:08
  of what I said here onto Nacho Alvarez and you're looking at I think a
• 1:19:14
  second basement shortstop Dynasty prospect player with like I would say his ceiling is probably
• 1:19:20
  something like a two eighty two ninety average, maybe like fifteen homers, but
• 1:19:27
  I mean the steals could get up in like the thirties. That he seems
• 1:19:30
  to have an eye for being able to run the bases, and on top
• 1:19:32
  of it all, he just seems like a great ballplayer from all the reports
• 1:19:35
  that I've read. Yeah, and I'm not as nearly familiar with with Nacho
• 1:19:41
  besides the fact that, I mean the name is just like fantasy gold,
• 1:19:46
  and I think you right as you look at him, like the power is
• 1:19:51
  probably not ever going to be the calling card, Like ten to fifteen homers
• 1:19:57
  is kind of what you expect. But overall, like he's that kind of
• 1:20:00
  guy that most likely is going to be at the top of the lineup because
• 1:20:02
  he gets on base and he has the speed to make something happen, and
• 1:20:06
  he's he's gonna hit for relatively high average, and so I think that there's
• 1:20:11
  a lot to like there. And you know, as I feel like the
• 1:20:14
  inverse argument we've had with like Michael Harris there in Atlanta, where you just
• 1:20:17
  can't get out of the bottom of the lineup, there this is like the
• 1:20:19
  prototypical guy at the top of the lineup, and you know he's still he's,
• 1:20:25
  what just twenty one years old. You know, he's he was a
• 1:20:30
  drafty in twenty twenty two, a fifth round pick, so you know,
• 1:20:34
  he's his prospect. Patrick's not as high, but he's really shown a lot
• 1:20:39
  as he came through that system, and again he got himself in by the
• 1:20:43
  spring training. Seems like he's holding his own so far. Not any guy
• 1:20:47
  that has any chance of breaking it the team out of spring training, you
• 1:20:53
  know, especially with just what they have. You're right or see is maybe
• 1:20:56
  the area he needs to aim at. But yeah, I think there's a
• 1:21:00
  lot to like here. For for Nacho, you know, seems to be
• 1:21:04
  a pretty solid defender as well, So yeah, there's a lot to like
• 1:21:10
  there. And I think he's one of those guys that, again don't invest
• 1:21:13
  in him as thinking that he's like this all star player waiting to happen.
• 1:21:16
  He's just going to be a really reliable, useful middle and field maybe back,
• 1:21:23
  you know, back half, starting shortstop, depending on how he develops.
• 1:21:29
  Yeah, and I think out of everybody that we've discussed here, this
• 1:21:31
  is maybe the one guy that I don't know if he's going to make it
• 1:21:38
  to the majors this year. Just I mean, I guess we prefaced it
• 1:21:41
  that I think everybody had hit double a, but this might be the only
• 1:21:44
  one that didn't hit double a last year. And part of it is like
• 1:21:48
  Orlando Orcia is signed through through twenty twenty five, but he's entering his age
• 1:21:55
  thirty season here, and I mean, he was out of baseball pretty much
• 1:21:59
  almost in terms of being a bench fodder piece. That it's not hard to
• 1:22:03
  see that happening to Orlando Arcia again, that they could convert him into some
• 1:22:10
  sort of bench piece in twenty twenty five if they like Nacho. But I
• 1:22:13
  do think that this is like one of the last chances to get Nacho Alparez
• 1:22:17
  before the hype really starts getting to him. Yep, absolutely fair. Okay,
• 1:22:21
  Well, let's move on to the NL Central, and I take back
• 1:22:25
  all that talk about all of us of the top prospects being picked from BP,
• 1:22:30
  because now we finally I think hit the top. I'm gonna go with
• 1:22:32
  my pick first. It's Matt Shaw, who I talked about on our NL
• 1:22:36
  Central preview as well. I just love Matt Shaw. That like, he
• 1:22:42
  was drafted last year thirteenth overall, and immediately when it happened, pretty much
• 1:22:46
  all sorts of industry people and prospect hounds were like, wow, that's a
• 1:22:50
  steal for the Cubs falling to thirteenth, and he just is a pure bat
• 1:22:58
  again that like, I think, what's going to make him a little bit
• 1:23:01
  sneakier than like what the prospect ranking obviously incorporates his defensive abilities too and being
• 1:23:10
  able to play up the middle, but I think when from a fantasy perspective,
• 1:23:14
  people look at his overall stat line that you know, he only combined
• 1:23:18
  between high and double A last year put up seven homers and thirteen stolen bases,
• 1:23:25
  but the batting average was superb. The walk rate was low, but
• 1:23:29
  the kve rate was low too. So he's got real great pat control,
• 1:23:31
  real great feel for the zone, and I think he's gonna just hit like
• 1:23:36
  this is a guy who I see coming up to the majors. I think
• 1:23:42
  a lot of like the stuff that we said in terms of the peak for
• 1:23:44
  Nacho Avreas, that's what you're looking at for Matt Shaw. But the proximity
• 1:23:48
  to the majors I think is a lot closer than maybe people would think for
• 1:23:55
  a first round, first round pick just in the previous year, especially at
• 1:23:59
  a at a position position player, because I mean, guys don't make it
• 1:24:04
  through that fast. But it seems that Matt Shaw's bat is ready to go,
• 1:24:09
  and especially in a dynasty keeper format. I think the bat is so
• 1:24:14
  good that he's somebody that can learn on the fly and maybe find some power
• 1:24:19
  that I don't think it's out of the range to think that there's some sort
• 1:24:25
  of upper tier that maybe is like a twenty thirty season out of Matt Shaw
• 1:24:28
  on his prime, and it's gonna be coming with Honestly, I think he
• 1:24:30
  could push a three hundred batting average in the majors. It's a little bit
• 1:24:34
  of like Nico Horner with a little bit more pop I think, in a
• 1:24:38
  little less speed as well as the Cubs should have the pathway just some playing
• 1:24:44
  time, which I really liked. Will we covered them for our Anal Central
• 1:24:46
  preview, even with Cody Bellinger signing there that I wonder how long the Christopher
• 1:24:53
  Morell at their base experiment's gonna last. He is not a great defender,
• 1:24:58
  and I mean not sure who if they would be willing to shift Nico Horner
• 1:25:01
  to the third and bring Shaw up because it doesn't seem like Shaw has the
• 1:25:05
  arm for third base. But I think there's an infield spot that could be
• 1:25:10
  available in Chicago, you know, soon enough for Shaw. So the only
• 1:25:15
  disagreement I have is that Shaw got all of his reps this off season prepping
• 1:25:19
  at third base. Okay, yeah, And and so because of that,
• 1:25:25
  I think they're the Cubs are reading exactly what you're laying down here, which
• 1:25:30
  is Christopher Morel is not going to be the long term answer at third base,
• 1:25:33
  and they're very well they're they're trying him out there. To your point,
• 1:25:36
  does he have the arm, He has the bat, and there's there's
• 1:25:41
  a lot of Nick Madrigal there last year. I don't think they care about
• 1:25:44
  third base arm. That's very true. It's uh not not not a big
• 1:25:49
  bar to cross there. So I'm right there with you. Matt Shaw is
• 1:25:54
  a lot to like. He's very projectable as such a scout term by the
• 1:25:59
  way, very projectable. Yeah, but I think there's a lot to like
• 1:26:01
  with him there, and since he he did get that kind of off season
• 1:26:05
  prep work at third looks like that that's where they're really grooming for. He's
• 1:26:10
  of all the guys that we've talked about here, he's the one guy that
• 1:26:13
  I I could make the argument that he could try to break Camp. I
• 1:26:17
  don't think it happens, but he's the one that, you know, you
• 1:26:21
  could argue that maybe Spencer Jones if there's an injury, but I just don't
• 1:26:26
  see that that happening. So I think you're right. Matt Shaw's intriguing a
• 1:26:30
  lot to like, and the Cubs look like they're prepping very well for Yeah.
• 1:26:36
  I yeah, I absolutely love them, and I think it's gonna really
• 1:26:41
  hurt if he's not good. Like especially, I mean, I don't get
• 1:26:45
  behind Cubs prospects too often, and I've just liked everything that I've seen and
• 1:26:49
  read about Matt Shaw, So I think he's got the potential be kind of
• 1:26:54
  special. Okay, who are you going to pick in the annual central here?
• 1:26:58
  Well, just to keep the theme of rival going, h we started
• 1:27:00
  over in the Al East. I'm going to go with a prospect who I'm
• 1:27:05
  going to butcher their dame over with the Cardinals, and it's Thomas so JC
• 1:27:12
  and that's what it is. I think you're pretty close, right, I'm
• 1:27:15
  I'm pretty close because I looked up the fanatical spelling of we're gonna go with
• 1:27:20
  Thomas at this point because I'm done trying to get that right. Yeah,
• 1:27:24
  Big Tom, Big Tom. And you know he he came over in the
• 1:27:30
  Jordan Montgomery trade last year. You know, he's he's a guy that's just
• 1:27:34
  twenty one. He'll he'll be twenty two here, uh in the in the
• 1:27:39
  spring, and he has absolutely hit everywhere in the Myers. He he hit
• 1:27:44
  a little rough fast as he came over to the Cardinals and the whole thirteen
• 1:27:45
  games is when he was up in triple A. But he when he came
• 1:27:49
  over, uh in Double A, he was just raking. So you know,
• 1:27:54
  if you look at the twenty twenty three season on a hole where he
• 1:27:57
  he got i'd say one hundred and adish games. You know, he he
• 1:28:01
  hit twenty six homers, he sold thirteen bases and hit roughly three hundred.
• 1:28:10
  Yeah, he was a little a little rough, like I said, in
• 1:28:12
  Triple A, but he absolutely just hits wherever he's been at. Really exciting
• 1:28:19
  prospect to coming as he came over. And he's he's not a he's not
• 1:28:25
  a big presence. I from what I've seen, I didn't look up actually
• 1:28:29
  his he's five eleven five. He's I'm bigger than this guy, but mostly
• 1:28:35
  round versus height. But you know he is a big fly ball hitter and
• 1:28:44
  that power. It's you know, there's some guys you've seen the miners that
• 1:28:46
  like they're hitting his line drives like will developed, like that is his swing.
• 1:28:50
  He is a live ball hitter all day and he is going up there
• 1:28:55
  to do some damage. And there's a lot to like about that. He
• 1:28:59
  also plays literally every infield position. Yeah, and so he you know,
• 1:29:04
  the Cardinals do have a what could be a difficult infield to break into,
• 1:29:10
  but it's not that hard to squint and look at shortstop with Mason Winn and
• 1:29:13
  Brandon Crawford to be like, maybe Win takes these a little more development.
• 1:29:17
  Crawford's more a bench player these days. There's a spot for him. You
• 1:29:20
  know, you look at second base and Donovan's kind of playing all over the
• 1:29:25
  place. Gorman his back can't seem to hold up, like you could easily
• 1:29:29
  see him sliding there. So that you know, he's a good guy that
• 1:29:30
  can they can get some opportunities for the Cardinals. So I think he's he
• 1:29:35
  got a little bit of a name last year with the trade. I think
• 1:29:41
  that put a little bit of a highlight on him, but he really hasn't
• 1:29:44
  seemed to take off in fantasy circles too much at this point. But it
• 1:29:48
  won't take much for him to kind of hit the ground running here in Triple
• 1:29:54
  A this year for him to be a pretty hot commodity. Yeah, I
• 1:29:59
  like Sigate. I've been pronouncing it Segacy, but you said Segosie, so
• 1:30:02
  I think it's Segosi so so JC so jc so jac Big Tom, that
• 1:30:09
  Big Tom. Let's go with that. What's easier, Yeah, that this
• 1:30:13
  is another just great middle infield bat here. That Again, I don't think
• 1:30:16
  the ceilings like anything terribly special, but the batting average boon that like he
• 1:30:21
  can provide. And I think that's what we've highlighted in a lot of these
• 1:30:26
  guys so far, is that we like the batting average floors. And it's
• 1:30:30
  been I think tough over the past few years to find prospects that provide a
• 1:30:34
  great batting average floor outside of like Juan Soto's and stuff, and so the
• 1:30:39
  very like supremely talented guys will give it to you, but finding it on
• 1:30:43
  the back end has been I think tougher and tougher in Dynasty, and especially
• 1:30:46
  if you're talking up the middle players like so Gacy, who you know,
• 1:30:51
  by the time he gets up to the Cardinals, you know might have second,
• 1:30:56
  short, third, first base eligibility that he could really be just a
• 1:31:01
  jack of all trades for your bench. And even though like the infield looks
• 1:31:06
  a little crowded in Saint Louis, I think it's a much clearer path to
• 1:31:11
  playing time than you it might seem just at first glance, partly because so
• 1:31:16
  Gacy made it to Triple A last year, so he's going to open up
• 1:31:20
  in Triple AH, he should be like one of the first guys ready to
• 1:31:26
  come up from Triple A the bench in Saint Louis, I don't know how
• 1:31:30
  much Matt Carpenter and Brandon Crawford play that they're almost coaches slash mascots at this
• 1:31:38
  point that I'm I just don't see how many much. I don't know how
• 1:31:42
  much they're actually going to play them. So, I mean, if anybody
• 1:31:45
  in the starting lineup does get injured, I think they could bring so Gaysey
• 1:31:48
  up and put him right in as well as I mean, Nolan Gorman is
• 1:31:55
  destined to get to be a dh like in his future that I wonder how
• 1:32:02
  many errors it takes at second pace before you know they might move on to
• 1:32:06
  so Gasey and trying to move Gorman into the dh ROL full time. Or
• 1:32:12
  I mean Tommy Edmund should be starting the season on the injured list, which
• 1:32:17
  roster resource already reflects. With Dylan Carlson in the starting lineup, who knows
• 1:32:23
  how long it takes for Tommy Edmund's risk to come back. So there's it's
• 1:32:28
  only going to take I think one injury for Sagacy to really get his chance
• 1:32:32
  at Saint Louis, And if that happens, he should slot in and like
• 1:32:36
  the seven hole in a pretty good lineup. That I mean, it's a
• 1:32:41
  pretty good chance that you can get some pretty good run production out of him.
• 1:32:45
  Yeah, I'm right there with you. So I think he's a definite
• 1:32:48
  guy you want to pick up, and he's it wouldn't be a surprising at
• 1:32:55
  all to see him making an impact this year, So I'm like him.
• 1:32:59
  Yeah, Okay, let's move on to the NL West and who are you
• 1:33:05
  going to pick for your NL West player. Yeah, so I'm cheating because
• 1:33:11
  I haven't cheated this exercise the whole time. So I'm picking two players in
• 1:33:15
  the NL West from the same team, and that's going to be Robbie Snelling
• 1:33:19
  and Drew Thorpe out in San Diego. Those two, I'm gonna say that
• 1:33:26
  they're identical pictures, but they're very similar pictures. They are high strikeout,
• 1:33:31
  good control pictures. You know, Thorpe maybe a little bit more volatile of
• 1:33:38
  the of the two. Snelling seemed to be a little more consistent. Thorpe
• 1:33:41
  has a little more higher upside from a strikeout perspective than than what Snelling appears
• 1:33:46
  to do. Both of them, you know, have have made it up
• 1:33:49
  to I believe Snelling what was already up to double A. And Forpe I
• 1:33:59
  believe as as well, if he Thorpe may have even got to triple A,
• 1:34:02
  if actually he did get only to double A there with with with the
• 1:34:09
  Yankees. But what I what I like is when you look at that San
• 1:34:14
  Diego rotation, I way say what to like about San Diego rotation, but
• 1:34:20
  it gets pretty thin at the back end there at Musk Grove who should be
• 1:34:27
  pretty solid. Michael King, I really like Darvish. I'm never sure what
• 1:34:31
  I think about Darbish anymore. You know, he might have seventeen different pitches,
• 1:34:35
  but he's also on the wrong side of thirty here, he's he'll be
• 1:34:40
  thirty eight this year later in the year, and then at the back end
• 1:34:45
  of the rotation you have Johnny Britto and Randy Vasquez. Is the guys penciled
• 1:34:48
  in there, and that is not too exciting for a team that I think
• 1:34:53
  still wants to compete. I believe they can. I mean, honestly,
• 1:34:57
  they're right in the wild card projections. They are as one of the I
• 1:35:00
  would say one of the strongest lineups in the majors one through five. Don't
• 1:35:03
  look at six through nine by by any means. Maybe if roster resources in
• 1:35:12
  the eighth hole right now, I did Jackson Jackson Merrill. So I'm not
• 1:35:16
  holding my breath yet, but that that that would be interesting. So I
• 1:35:19
  like them for two reasons. I think both of them are extremely talented pictures.
• 1:35:24
  I think they have pretty high floors, and uh, they're not gonna
• 1:35:28
  be the highest of ceiling pictures, but they're easily you can see them as
• 1:35:31
  number twos, and if a few things break right, their control really holds
• 1:35:35
  in there, you might be say back end ones is absolutely possible. So
• 1:35:41
  I think both of them get chances this year. I think both of them
• 1:35:44
  are primed to to be there, and both of them relatively keep the ball
• 1:35:48
  on the ground with a pretty solid defense behind them. So I like both
• 1:35:51
  of those guys there. I said, I'm cheating. I couldn't could get
• 1:35:56
  through a whole segment year without bending the rules. Yeah, I meant Park,
• 1:36:00
  if if we had to nail you down, which one you're taken?
• 1:36:02
  Though, if you had nail me down, I'm taking snelling. I think
• 1:36:05
  he is. He has a better pedigree. I think his stuff's looked a
• 1:36:09
  little bit better, you know. I think, I said Thorpe has a
• 1:36:13
  little bit more volatility in that profile. And I'm just not as convinced that
• 1:36:18
  we really know what he's going to bring. I think it's the he might
• 1:36:24
  actually have a higher upside, but he also might have a higher or a
• 1:36:26
  lower downside. How's that? Or So if you had to force I I'd
• 1:36:30
  be taking snelling of the two of them. But I don't think they're I
• 1:36:33
  don't actually I think team one of the teams we just drafted earlier this week.
• 1:36:38
  You and I I have both of them, So yeah, I think
• 1:36:43
  I actually prefer Thorpe myself. Just coming through the Yankee system. The Yankees
• 1:36:47
  have shown to be able to develop pitching better than the Padres, and watching
• 1:36:53
  video of Drew Thorpe's change up is life changing. It is a dirty left
• 1:36:58
  handed change up, and I I love left handed change ups. They just
• 1:37:01
  look so beautiful. I think it's like the epitome of what baseball is.
• 1:37:05
  So I'm I lean a little bit more Drew Thorpe, but I think they're
• 1:37:10
  both great, and I think they're both good byes right now in dynasty keeper
• 1:37:14
  situations because everyone's eyes I think are focused on Giro or Arte, who I
• 1:37:19
  brought up in art in our West preview, that he's becoming the sexy pick
• 1:37:24
  with his like fourteen K nine, but just you don't know where that the
• 1:37:29
  ball is coming out. Plus Giro is on the forty man roster, while
• 1:37:33
  Snelling and Thorpe aren't. But I mean, it doesn't take too many injuries
• 1:37:39
  in a pitching staff to get a couple of those guys on the sixty day
• 1:37:43
  IL before you bring up Snelling and Thorpe, So I think they'll probably both
• 1:37:48
  be mainstays in the rotation around like June just given them that, like you'll
• 1:37:54
  probably I think between Brito and Vasquez, the Padres will find out though they're
• 1:37:59
  both better situated for bullpen rolls. You hope that Michael King can continue pitching,
• 1:38:04
  well you Darvish is coming off of an elbow injury, and I mean
• 1:38:09
  Joe Muscove hasn't looked great in spring training, but I think Muscow will be
• 1:38:13
  fine. So I think there's a figure out. Yeah, there's gonna be
• 1:38:15
  plenty of opportunities though for Snowing and Thworpe to throw down the stretch in San
• 1:38:18
  Diego. Absolutely, So I think they're they're they're easy buys. Price isn't
• 1:38:24
  too high yet. How about you let's finish it out. Who do you
• 1:38:27
  have in the n L West? Okay? This one is good? Like
• 1:38:31
  this is I mean swinging for the fences just because, like, I think
• 1:38:35
  the range of outcomes on this pick is the highest of anything that we got.
• 1:38:41
  But like the ceiling is just so tremendous. I am all in on
• 1:38:45
  yan Kiel Fernandez, outfielder, from the Rockies, mostly because of that outfielder
• 1:38:50
  for the Rockies. But like a lot of the swing comparisons that I've read
• 1:38:55
  about are like, he's like a smaller Jordan from the left side. He
• 1:39:00
  just swings out of his socks. And the k raid obviously was a little
• 1:39:03
  concerning in Double A last year at thirty two percent, but it's his first
• 1:39:08
  taste there in Double A, and you still like to see that the power
• 1:39:13
  was coming through and he was still I mean he was twenty one in twenty
• 1:39:16
  twenty one at Double A last year. He was a very young dude.
• 1:39:19
  So I've liked what I've seen from him in Hi A last year as well,
• 1:39:25
  with the seventeen homers and the I'm looking at my Baseball perspective books,
• 1:39:30
  so one thirty one DRC plus and so I think this is going to be
• 1:39:35
  It's if he wasn't in Colorado, he would be a nothing. But man,
• 1:39:41
  you dream on like eighty percent of the player of Jordan Alvarez and you
• 1:39:46
  put him in cooerist field, I mean the ceiling, I mean it could
• 1:39:53
  be like forty fifty homers possibly if as a left handed bat. And so
• 1:39:58
  I'm snapping him up everywhere I can in Dynasty and Keeper League formats, knowing
• 1:40:02
  that this is a play more for twenty twenty five. But I do think
• 1:40:08
  that as jan kil Fernandez goes back and replete, repeats double A and shows
• 1:40:13
  improvement in double A, that the hype's gonna start building pretty fast. Like
• 1:40:16
  it didn't take very long for the zach Viene hype to reach a level that
• 1:40:23
  was just way too rich and totally crashed and burned like cryptocurrency. But Yan
• 1:40:30
  kill Fernandez, I think it's another chance here to get in while you can
• 1:40:34
  and take a lottery ticket on what that upside could be, because I don't
• 1:40:41
  know what it is, and I will fully admit that there's a good chance
• 1:40:44
  that young kill Fernandez crashes out here and is a nothing. But at this
• 1:40:47
  price where he's going right now, I'm willing to buy those lottery tickets and
• 1:40:53
  hoping that I can find somebody who could be a forty homer bat for Super
• 1:40:58
  Duper Cheap and Dynasty and Keeper Leak formats right now. Yeah, I think
• 1:41:01
  the point that you said lottery ticket, I think that's that's the assessment,
• 1:41:06
  and that you can you can look at his profile and it's it's like what
• 1:41:11
  you say with numbers, you can numbers can tell any story you want,
• 1:41:14
  and you look at it and you can tell whatever story you want with you
• 1:41:15
  and kill Franandez. Like you can be like, man, he's a forty
• 1:41:18
  Homer guy. He could be your don like and you could also look in
• 1:41:21
  and go, man, he could be Adam Dunn. Yeah, exactly like
• 1:41:30
  it's the outcomes are so vast, and I think that's why these conversations are
• 1:41:35
  interesting, because it just comes down to ultimately the cost right and if if
• 1:41:40
  you got the roster spot, this is the kind of guy that, like,
• 1:41:43
  you can pick him up for nothing, throw him there, see what
• 1:41:45
  happens. The thing for me is, man, I don't know what the
• 1:41:49
  heck to think about Colorado and prospects. They they just like literally the like
• 1:42:00
  as frustrats me, just almost as much as Colorado does, maybe not quite
• 1:42:04
  as much. I'm probably still Colorado is probably on the biggest one that list,
• 1:42:09
  But I just don't know what they're gonna do with a guy like that.
• 1:42:11
  I just don't know, uh, you know, high upside, high
• 1:42:15
  downside. They don't seem to want to throw those guys in there. And
• 1:42:19
  they you know, he gets three or four partial seasons trying to figure it
• 1:42:23
  out. That's just he's just gonna burn out and kill you. But it's
• 1:42:29
  you're right, it's a lottery ticket. I think that that's a it's a
• 1:42:31
  fun one to try to take and you know he fizzles out here like the
• 1:42:36
  next three months, you just drop and move on. Yeah, exactly,
• 1:42:40
  that's that's not no problem with that. I mean yeah. And the other
• 1:42:44
  thing too, is like if he does take off and he turns it around
• 1:42:47
  in double A and if he starts, you know, putting up a like
• 1:42:51
  one twenty WRC plus in double A as a twenty one year old with Colorado
• 1:42:58
  insight, like, I think the price from a Dynasty Keeper fantasy perspective is
• 1:43:02
  going to go quite high. And then you can cash in the lottery ticket.
• 1:43:06
  You can decide if you want to to trade it and see if you
• 1:43:11
  can get something that was certainly more expensive than what he is right now,
• 1:43:15
  or try to see if that lottery ticket will come through. So, I
• 1:43:18
  mean, I think that's what it's all about. It's just that like the
• 1:43:21
  overall value and prospect pedigree that like he that cash that he'll hold for people
• 1:43:28
  I think is about to increase over the next couple of months, partly because
• 1:43:32
  I said, like, yeah, getting to double A the first time after
• 1:43:35
  high A, like that is the biggest jump in the minors, and it's
• 1:43:40
  not surprising he didn't succeed his first time around. But I mean, if
• 1:43:45
  jan kil Fernandez can succeed his second time around, it's going to go through
• 1:43:51
  the roof. Absolutely, yeah, it'll be It'll be fun to watch one
• 1:43:55
  way or the other, that's for sure, I know, yeah, and
• 1:43:58
  that is part of it. I do just kind of want to see him
• 1:44:00
  hit in Colorado that I think he could mash some pretty crazy taters. I
• 1:44:04
  do also echo like your sentiment about the Rockies development system, because it is
• 1:44:10
  confounding between like the way they rushed Tovar up in the way that they've slow
• 1:44:15
  cooked other players like Sam Hilliard over the years that I just don't That's the
• 1:44:21
  other thing, too, is like that's what makes Sean kill just such a
• 1:44:25
  huge lottery ticket. I don't know if they're gonna fast track him the way
• 1:44:28
  they did Ezegil Tobar or if they do meddle around with him and he's up
• 1:44:32
  and down and can't find best Brendan Rodgers. How the hell that's gone?
• 1:44:36
  Yeah, exactly, Well there's an injury pattern there, so like that's not
• 1:44:41
  helping Brendan Rodgers. But yeah, yeah, uh okay, Well I think
• 1:44:45
  that was a great dive into some of these players. Hopefully we helped identify
• 1:44:49
  some players to put on your radar to either watch over spring training and see
• 1:44:55
  where they're actual like values and stats end up, or to start targeting in
• 1:45:00
  your dynasty keeper formats for trades in the early part of the season or if
• 1:45:08
  you have to hit a rebuild time with summer, maybe these are some of
• 1:45:11
  the guys that you want to start identifying. So yeah, brew this was
• 1:45:15
  a great roundup. We got through twelve dudes in pretty efficient times. So
• 1:45:18
  I think it's time to wrap it up here. Let people know where they
• 1:45:21
  can find you. Yeah, find me over on Twitter slash ex a Jay
• 1:45:26
  Brewer seventeen. Find me on the weekends on ras ball doing hitter profiles and
• 1:45:30
  top one hundred hitters. If you jumped in last week, we just kicked
• 1:45:34
  off the top one hundred with the top twenty hitters and then promptly, you
• 1:45:41
  know, just kind of wore myself out worry about Ronaldacunia for the next twenty
• 1:45:44
  four hours after that posted. Yeah, but I believe that the comment I
• 1:45:49
  made to somebody in the in the comments was it's merely a fleshmound, as
• 1:45:56
  you know. It's it's we'll see what comes out of it. Just a
• 1:45:59
  miniscus nope deal, Yeah, no, no big deal. But find me
• 1:46:01
  there on the weekends. We'll be cutting down the top one hundred hitters up
• 1:46:05
  until the season, and then throughout the season we'll be we will be ranked
• 1:46:10
  reranking those guys every two weeks, just to see where it comes out in
• 1:46:14
  the wash. So coolly, how about you. Yeah, you can find
• 1:46:16
  me on Twitter, slash x and blue Sky at mcool seven. And I
• 1:46:23
  haven't started up on ras ball yet in terms of writing my weekly Waiver Wire
• 1:46:28
  article, but that will be hitting on Saturdays once the season starts, and
• 1:46:32
  based on the drafts I've had so far, it's gonna be interesting. In
• 1:46:35
  the first month that it is. The bottom parts of the player pools are
• 1:46:41
  dry, so it's going to be some pretty good garbage that will be sifting
• 1:46:45
  through together on ras ball during those articles. But yeah, you can also
• 1:46:48
  find the podcast on Twitter slash x at cards Categories. You can email the
• 1:46:55
  pod at cards Categories at gmail dot com and yeah, we'll be back here,
• 1:47:00
  same time, same place next week. Thanks again for sticking around and
• 1:47:03
  supporting the pod. If you haven't yet, please go rate, review the
• 1:47:08
  pod wherever you're listening to us, especially if it's on Apple Podcasts or Spotify.
• 1:47:13
  Any ratings and reviews help us get into different lists in different listeners ears,
• 1:47:18
  so we appreciate any sorts of feedback that we get through that those platforms.
• 1:47:24
  So hopefully you've enjoyed this coverage of Dynasty and Keeper players and we'll be
• 1:47:31
  back again next week, same time, same place, See you then,