Latest / Cards & Categories / Ep. 45 : Biggest Movers In The Top 100 Hitters
Transcript
- 0:15Hello, Wen, Welcome everybody to episode forty five of Cards and Categories.
- 0:20I am Mike Coolard from Rasball. Join here as always by my very good
- 0:25friend Jeremy Brewer, also from Rasball. How you doing tonight, Bud doing
- 0:29great? Looking forward to a fun show. I am excited because you put
- 0:33me on the spot tonight talk about rankings. So let's go. I'm ready
- 0:36to get into it tonight. Yeah. I mean, you just dropped your
- 0:40re update of the top one hundred hitters this past Sunday. We are recording
- 0:45this a little bit early for us. We're recording on Tuesday, May twenty
- 0:49first, and so you have a lot of defending of yourself to do.
- 0:53I know you've already been battling it out in the comments a little bit,
- 0:57although I'll admit I don't think you have too much defend. I thought it
- 1:00was a pretty solid list in terms of updating some of the priors on bats
- 1:03that have been struggling that we talked about in our episode last week. So
- 1:08there are certainly players that you've dropped in your rankings that we covered last week
- 1:12in episode forty four before you even released the list, because it was kind
- 1:17of glaringly obvious. Those guys are struggling, but you've also, I think,
- 1:22nailed a lot of up incomers that are showing better skills and deserve to
- 1:26be top one hundred hitters. So we'll get into that in the second half
- 1:30of our show. But let's open up with our typical news and notes.
- 1:34If you're ready, let's go. I'm ready. Hopefully, no obliques,
- 1:41no elbows, Let's see how far we can get. I got some elbows
- 1:46and some obliques for you, but not lots. It has been a little
- 1:49bit quieter again because I do think that we're starting to get into a little
- 1:53bit of a rhythm on the season in terms of the guys who were battling
- 1:57stuff in the spring and carried it into to the early season have already kind
- 2:01of gone down or they've worked through it. So I think we're starting to
- 2:05get to a point where we're getting a little bit more of a stasis than
- 2:08what we've had the past few weeks when we record and just we're moving through
- 2:14mountains and mountains of injuries. But let's open with our first one, and
- 2:17that is picture Zach Eflin from the Tampa Bay Rays. He is hitting the
- 2:23injured list with a back issue, So it sounds similar to he battled this
- 2:29last year and was out for a few weeks, and right now it looks
- 2:32like the Rays are pegging him to be out two to fourish weeks, but
- 2:38it's a little unknown because backs can be a little boky. And with this,
- 2:42I mean, I think the Rays will end up doing their typical Ray
- 2:46thing, filling in for that spot in the rotation. But we did have
- 2:50Taj Bradley returned recently, Tyler Alexander started looking good for the Rays. But
- 2:55Zach Glifflin was a pretty highly ranked starting pitcher I think for most people coming
- 3:00into the season, just giving the volume in his great twenty twenty three.
- 3:04So Brew, if you have any shares of efflyin out there, what are
- 3:07you doing with him? And like I can say that I've got a few,
- 3:12and I was using him as like a number two starter. It's been
- 3:15a little bit of a different disappointing season so far for him. Yeah,
- 3:17I do not have any Zach Eflin shares. I don't know that. I
- 3:22was a believer coming in and I'm not sure if it's the raise or Zach
- 3:27Eflin. I generally want to pay like eighty cents on the dollar for anybody
- 3:31coming from the Rays just because of uncertainty of what in the world they're going
- 3:34to do. But yeah, you know, he is a guy that you
- 3:37drafted, you planned on, you expected that he was going to be a
- 3:40key part of your rotation because he you know, sixteen one season last year,
- 3:46three and a half era, you know, more strikeouts than innings like
- 3:51that, low whip like that. That's exactly what you're what you're looking for.
- 3:54And if you looked at his you know, underlying metrics, he looked
- 3:59great. Wait, everything was was right where you'd want it to be.
- 4:02He's limiting hard hits, he's keeping on the ground, he was his basketball
- 4:09velocity is not the highest, so that, you know, that always gives
- 4:12a little pause of like how sustainable if your control is not ideal? But
- 4:16you know it, it's had to say. It's it's fallen off a cliff
- 4:20this year, and it's it's hard to know exactly why, as I've dug
- 4:26in it. To me, it seems to the degree that well, the
- 4:29he is definitely struggling a little bit with his uh movement of his pitches,
- 4:33and I don't know if that comes down to an injury like we're talking about
- 4:38with the with the back injury or if that's just cropped up. I I
- 4:42don't really know, so I'm right now I think Applin's a hold just because
- 4:47between the injury and the performance being down, it's it's hard to move him.
- 4:53If the strikeouts were up, I think you could you could do something
- 4:55with him, But those aren't there, and nothing underline says that he's just
- 4:59had bad luck. So we're looking like skill regression plus injury, you're not
- 5:04gonna find a buyer. That's that's the unfortunate thing here with that Flyn.
- 5:08Yeah, And I mean the swinging strike rate has ticked down a little bit.
- 5:11It was eleven point one percent last year. It's nine point four percent
- 5:15now, So there has been some degradation in the skills kind of underlying everything.
- 5:19But I do think a lot of those kind of slight tweaks in terms
- 5:24of you know, the ground ball rate being a little bit down, the
- 5:27strikeouts not quite being as that there is as much less movement on the pitches.
- 5:31Like you said, I think that all really does point to he's probably
- 5:35been battling this back for a little bit and hasn't felt comfortable, hasn't been
- 5:40able to finish all the way through the pitches as his you know, back
- 5:44snags at some point. He's a he's an old, thirty year old man,
- 5:46so you don't know when those back issues are going to catch you.
- 5:49But yeah, I think I'm in the same boat. I still think that
- 5:54Zach Goughlin can be a pretty solid fantasy starter for you. Maybe not the
- 6:00same strikeout level he gave us last year, but something that settles into,
- 6:03you know, like a eight and a half K nine, just over one
- 6:08walk per nine with a mid threes era, that's a pretty solid number two.
- 6:14Yeah. I think a lot of it comes down for me is what
- 6:15kind of league are you in. Are you in a league that is an
- 6:18encapped or not. If you're in a league that is is an encapped,
- 6:24then it hurts a little bit more because of the strikeouts you're chasing. If
- 6:27you don't have a cap and you're just kind of looking to roll guys out
- 6:29there for ratios and potential wins, I think Ethlyn has a little bit more
- 6:32value. But yeah, you gotta let them build back up, you gotta
- 6:35let them get healthy and then capitalize or trade at that point, So it's
- 6:40it's gonna it's gonna be a little while before we see Zach Eflin back and
- 6:44hopefully hopefully he gets right. Yeah, Okay. The next set of injury
- 6:49news is it's a little bit of like a flurry of moves from the Los
- 6:54Angeles Dodgers, as Maximumksy hit the io with an oblique strain. But as
- 7:00we're speaking today on Tuesday, May twenty first, again, he apparently was
- 7:04taking grounders today, so the oblique strain might not be significant and we might
- 7:12see Max Monthsey back in just the minimum, you know, two weeks or
- 7:15so. But along with that, the Dodgers also called up Miguel Vargas and
- 7:19option James Outman. I think it was only a matter of time before Vargas
- 7:24came up, as he was shredding Triple A and I was counting on him
- 7:29just to outright replace Gavin Lux and they would flip spots. But this should
- 7:33open up a little bit more time for Miguil Vargas to be able to show
- 7:38what he can do in the big league level again. And for Outman,
- 7:41I mean Outman has looked broken all year in terms of just not being able
- 7:46to make the correct contact and was carrying the team with his center field glove
- 7:54as opposed to anything he was offering with the bat. So it was really
- 7:57a matter of time before Outman went down, especially since Pajez has come up
- 8:01and looked pretty steady there in the Dodgers outfield. But yeah, there's a
- 8:05there's a lot here to unpack with the Los Angeles Dodgers. So Brew,
- 8:09what are you doing with the three of them? Between Max Munsey, Miguel
- 8:11Vargas and James Outman here. Well, if I if I didn't know better,
- 8:16I'd say Max Munsey was like fifty three years old, but apparently he's
- 8:18thirty three, and it doesn't seem that way. It feels like he's been
- 8:24around forever and feels like he's breaking down. So I for me, I'm
- 8:28I'm almost just basically out on Max Munsey. He's been playing with Mendoze line
- 8:33for years and uh seems to be kind of teetering on health from the last
- 8:39few years, even though he's got a these amount of games and it just
- 8:41seems like he's always banged up. So Munsey is a guy that I'm not
- 8:45really playing with at all, even though there is valuable stats there, and
- 8:50he hits the ball hard. It's just not a guy that the profile that
- 8:52I'm too excited with. The guy that I'm most excited about here, I
- 8:56guess it's really an obvious one, the guy that got hurt or the guy
- 9:01that got sent down. But I am actually very excited about Miguel Vargas.
- 9:05This is deep analysis right here, but I'm excited about Vargas just in general.
- 9:11For the last year year and a half, I thought this was a
- 9:13guy that like deserved a shot and I should make something out of it.
- 9:18And he got a shot last year, but he was just like incredibly unlucky
- 9:22with that shot. He he was baby to death. Nothing was making it
- 9:28really relatively out of the park. You know. It just seemed like nothing
- 9:31was working for him. Even though he hit the ball decently hard. He
- 9:37you know, did did the things right. He only struck out twenty percent
- 9:41of the time. But if you look at his minor league profile the last
- 9:45three years, this is a guy that's a three hundred hitter that more or
- 9:50less walks as much as he strikes out, probably has twenty to twenty five
- 9:56homer power, sneaky ten steel kind of guy and Dodgers lineup the what's not
- 10:03to like? So you've plugging a guy that he could be a twenty five
- 10:07homer two ninety bat with counting stats and a few steals to boot, like
- 10:11that's an all star for the Dodgers. It's just didn't come together the first
- 10:16time around. And I think that means he's on sale now. Uh not
- 10:20Chris sale, just on general sale. And I think for me, I'm
- 10:24buying if there's a chance out there, absolutely buy and absolutely acquiring him where
- 10:30I can, because I think people are gonna look at the major results and
- 10:33be like, come on, Like it's one thing if a guy like Lux,
- 10:37I think it's a good example comes up and had all this pedigree,
- 10:41but this never seems to get his footing. Bargas came up, had some
- 10:45issues, went down, re showed that he is that good, and he's
- 10:48up now, like I'm giving him it's a shot. So I don't know,
- 10:50how about you? Am I am I too bullishoun on Vargas here?
- 10:54No, I mean I do think that some of the hype that was surrounding
- 10:58him last year, remember how early he was going in drafts in some places
- 11:03last year, like in the first tennis rounds. By kind of the end
- 11:05of draft season, it felt like that the Dodgers hype had really gotten to
- 11:11Miguil Vargas, especially because it looked like he could just hold a spot on
- 11:15that Dodgers infield. But he stumbled out of the gate in terms of being
- 11:22injured. He had a hairline fracture in his pinky during spring training and he
- 11:26just played through it that I don't know if you do you remember last spring
- 11:31like he would just like go up for at bats and not swing at all.
- 11:35He would just stand there and he was getting getting quote unquote reps exactly
- 11:41that I mean he and he knows how to work a walk. He has
- 11:43a great feel for the strike zone, as you can see coming through the
- 11:48minors. He's always had a double digital walk rate and even posted it last
- 11:52year in his eighty one games the Dodgers and so Fargas, I think the
- 11:56question was always whether or not he could find any of the power and his
- 12:00stroke, and I think the extra year of development now that he's twenty four
- 12:03has really helped him out. He put up a two eighty eight ISO down
- 12:07in Triple A with the Dodgers. Before getting called up, I was having
- 12:11him included my waiver wire piece kind of buried in the back end of top
- 12:16fifteen pickups as it. I was just waiting for the Dodgers one day to
- 12:20make that swap from lux to him, like I said, at second base.
- 12:24And now that it's happening, yeah, I think he warrants, you
- 12:28know, pick up in every fifteen team league. I bet in lots of
- 12:33dynasties. He was already kind of getting scooped up because you could see the
- 12:37skills starting to come back together for Vargas. But yeah, fifteen teamers picking
- 12:41him up twelve teamers. I think it depends on my situation. But if
- 12:45you're desperate at second base, am I like it's you could certainly go worse
- 12:48places. And Vargas is playing a little bit of left field it looks like
- 12:52to start, so he could pick up outfield. The problem is he's just
- 12:56not quite slated for full time bats in the Dodgers lineup. But I think
- 13:01given the LA lineup and given his talent level, if he somehow starts getting
- 13:07into more full time at bets, he's certainly viable in shallow leagues. Yeah,
- 13:15I fully agree. Okay, the next piece of news, and here's
- 13:18your elbow. Garrett Wicklock is being shelved with a elbow ligament damage. It
- 13:24looks like it is his UCL in his right elbow, so he's been working
- 13:28his way back from injury. He was actually maybe going to make a start
- 13:33for the Red Sox this week, but was experiencing pain in that elbow and
- 13:37was shut down. So I think we know where this story goes. Unless
- 13:41you're Kyle Bradish. I guess like maybe there is where Garrett Whitlock ends up
- 13:48in that bucket. But given the way that he was ominously shut down,
- 13:52and I think they're getting another opinion. So it does look like I would
- 13:56think that Garrett Wodlock is going to be out, you know, for the
- 13:58next year or so with some source magnificant injury. I guess does this warrant
- 14:03maybe holding on to him in any sort of longer term dynasty leagues given what
- 14:09you know about the Boston pitching development factory, now where Garrett Whitlock's talent level
- 14:15was before he got injured, and I mean we're still kind of earlish into
- 14:18the season, like given current surgery timelines from Tommy John there's a possibility Garrett
- 14:24Whitlock could get his way back onto the field by the end of next year
- 14:30if he does have to do significant elbow injury. Here. Yeah, I
- 14:33know this goes beyond everything that I were preach about injuries, but I am
- 14:39I'm cutting bait on Garrett Whitlock. There we go, and and it hurts
- 14:43me because I actually really love Garrett Whitlock and Tanner Houck out there in Boston.
- 14:48Like we haven't really exposed the glory that is Tanner Houck and and I
- 14:54think we need to do that at some point. But that's not what we're
- 14:58here to talk about. It to talk about Garret Whitlock. Whitlock, he
- 15:01looked great this year on the surface numbers, but he has been incredibly lucky.
- 15:07And you know, his velocity is is not what it has been when
- 15:11he was in the bullpen. And he's you know, being a starter now.
- 15:16You know, he was in the like ninety six and stuff on the
- 15:20bullpen. He's in like the ninety threes as as a starter, and that's
- 15:26that's that's a challenge for him. But he's got very lucky with batle ball,
- 15:31leaving guys on base. His x c ra Is four point two x
- 15:35FI three point seven five compared to his era that's under two strikeouts haven't been
- 15:41there as much. They're only going we're only talking about four games, so
- 15:45I get it that a lot of that can change, but it's we're talking
- 15:50about probably two years, like probably two years here, and by that point
- 15:56you don't know what the recovery looks like. So at a third year on
- 16:00there of Discovery, and it's gonna be a while before we talk about Garrett
- 16:03Whitlock again, and he's going to be in this probably year thirty season before
- 16:10he's really worth talking about again. Maybe I'm a Debbie downer here, but
- 16:15he hasn't shown us enough to really occupy a roster spot or il spot going
- 16:19forward. If you have a free one, sure stash him. But otherwise
- 16:25I'm cutting bait on Whitlock probably as soon as we get to hear more about
- 16:29that second opinion, But if I get a roster crunch before then, I'm
- 16:33not looking back. Yeah, I agree even in Dynasties too, but I
- 16:37do. I mean, I'm going to keep him on my watch list because
- 16:40I do think that he's got a really good arsenal to be able to close,
- 16:45and I think he's been able to show enough throughout these past two years
- 16:48that I don't think he can quite cut it as a starting pitcher in terms
- 16:52of just durability. So I think it is time probably for Boston to start
- 16:56thinking about a long term bullpen position for him that could end up in saves,
- 17:02given kind of how fluid things are in Boston right now. Yeah,
- 17:06just the future in terms of ken Lee being there and Liam signed, but
- 17:11don't know where it's going to go. We got a few years let that
- 17:14one play out, yeah, exactly, and I guess we can use that
- 17:18to get into another fluid closer situation that I kind of hinted at it with
- 17:22that terminology, because I don't know if I've ever seen a closer situation being
- 17:26referred to as fluid. But that's not what you want to hear if you're
- 17:30Edwin Diaz of the New York Mets. He's just really struggled of late.
- 17:34The philosophy has been down since his fantastic season in twenty twenty two. Remember,
- 17:41he missed all of last year with a torn pateeller tendon in his knee
- 17:45that he suffered during the WBC. But I think a lot of the issues
- 17:49that Diaz has been running into and you can see it, especially in the
- 17:53huge three run homer he gave up to Josh Bell over the weekend. That
- 17:57really coincided with this news of Diaz being moved out of the closer role is
- 18:04that he's never really had the best control. That Diaz has really relied on
- 18:10that electric fastball and then batter is not being prepared for the velocity on it
- 18:17falling for the slider out of the zone. But without the extra kind of
- 18:21tick or so of velocity, the overall kind of package doesn't work as well.
- 18:26It reminds me a little bit of like a right handed a role as
- 18:29Chapman, where like Chapman has sometimes gone through these struggles where the VLO dips,
- 18:34the arsenal is just a little bit easier to catch up to. So
- 18:38I just want to check in see what you are thinking about Edwin Diaz and
- 18:42just the Mets bullpen overall. Yeah, I think it's this is a tough
- 18:48one because Diaz has been so good for so long, but he's been off
- 18:53more or less a year or so from pitching. But it wasn't n the
- 18:57injury, so the arm should be better than ever. And you're right,
- 19:00it's not. It's not a stuff thing, it's a knowing where the stuff's
- 19:03going thing, which is sometimes just as hard, uh for closers. And
- 19:11he does look lost. Yet at the same time, I have a hard
- 19:14time seeing the Mets really trying to move away from him, because if they
- 19:18want to capitalize on his value at any point, or the fact that they're
- 19:21paying him like that, that that that's hard to move away from. But
- 19:26at the at this point, like they have to, they have to step
- 19:29away and give him a chance to reset himself and maybe he finds it again.
- 19:33But maybe we're looking at the end of Edwin Diaz as as we know
- 19:34it as a lockdown closer. I know you love the guy and it's been
- 19:40one of your crushes in the closure market for a long time. But what
- 19:44I'm excited about is the opportunity to talk about Reed Garrett. I don't know
- 19:48about you, but read Garrett. He is exciting. I think he's just
- 19:53what the Mets need in the back of that bullpen. Besides the fact that
- 19:57he's this big, burly Lumberjackalie, dude, if you haven't seen the look
- 20:02it up like I got a beard. He's got a beard, like he's
- 20:06got a man's man's beard. But he has really changed things up this year
- 20:11and the results are just astonishing. His strikeout rate has he was kind of
- 20:18a nothing. He's thirty one years old, and he was basically walking got
- 20:22more guys than striking out guys the last few years, and then when he
- 20:26came into this year, he's really changed it up and his arsenal has become
- 20:32basically like a sweeper, slighter, split finger thing, and he's basically said,
- 20:37you know what, I'm not throwing anything else, and that's that's really
- 20:44played beneficial for him and nobody can touch him. If you look at the
- 20:47Savant page, it is just straight red. There is nothing nothing prettier than
- 20:53that pitching. Is he as good as he's showing right now? Probably not,
- 20:56But if you watch him pitch like it's nobody knows what to do with
- 21:02it, Nobody knows what to do with it. And he's going multiple innings
- 21:03striking out like four or five six guys type of thing. He's a Mason
- 21:08Miller want to be. So I'm excited about read Garrett. Yeah, I
- 21:14mean I think as long as the sweeper is working, you got you gotta
- 21:18write him, because I think I don't. It is a little strange seeing
- 21:22who's gonna get like an opportunity to close there in New York, given that
- 21:27Adam Monovino has kind of done that at times over his career, Jorge Lopez
- 21:32has looked brilliant as a closer before. And you know, you got to
- 21:37wonder whether or not the New York Mets have the forty two to hand it
- 21:40over to Read Garrett, who has had quite the journeyman career, And certainly,
- 21:45yeah, I love the stuff, and if he's available in your leagues,
- 21:48I mean, just the rates that he's giving you as a reliever and
- 21:53the strikeouts right now fourteen point eight for nine, it's incredible that, like
- 22:02you've got to just use him as long as you can. But I do
- 22:04think that Edwin Diaz probably gets this closer job back after a couple of weeks,
- 22:07after he kind of gets his mind right and gets a little bit of
- 22:11a break from the limelight because all the reasons you said in terms of especially
- 22:15the investment in Dias overall, and you just got to think that that ability
- 22:22to refine his form will be in there some point. Maybe he just kind
- 22:26of needs that need to heal up a little further or get a little bit
- 22:30more back into game action for the season. You know, I don't know.
- 22:34Yeah, we'll see, but I'm with you. I think we get
- 22:38a fun, fun splash of maybe maybe if you saves thrown across Garrett gets
- 22:44a little bit of limelight, and then we go back to where we were.
- 22:48Yeah, and it does look like, as we've talked, Eloyamenez has
- 22:51injured himself during the White Sox Blue Jays game, So we'll see where that
- 22:55goes. He came in from scoring a run and was a little gimpy,
- 22:59then came out for his next at bat. And I guess this is kind
- 23:03of an alert maybe that if you have Eloy on any of your teams.
- 23:07I have one chair of them in our in our Experts League for Rasball,
- 23:11which I'm closing in on first place, like it's going to be tight.
- 23:15I was in eleventh maybe like two or three weeks ago that it's one of
- 23:19the tightest leagues I've ever seen. But I do have Eloy there. I'm
- 23:22immediately dropping him when we're done with this podcast, because I think that's probably
- 23:27what he should be done across all leagues at this point, that you're not
- 23:32getting any production from Eloy when he is in there. He was hitting in
- 23:34the two twenties, and yeah, if he's going to be banged up all
- 23:37the time, I think it's time to find greener pastures. Yeah. Unfortunately,
- 23:44like you know, when you say Eloy is hurt, like I have
- 23:47the check to see, like was he healthy first? Oh, I didn't
- 23:51realize he was back from the last ones. Uh so, yeah, it's
- 23:55I think we were talking about before the podcast. But a lot of potential
- 24:00and just too many injuries holding Elo back. The number of times I tried
- 24:06to trade for elover the last few years, I'm so glad that I failed.
- 24:08Yeah, exactly. Yeah, it's safe from yourself. And I bet
- 24:11the White Sox still wish they had Kevin Pillara back, said nobody ever.
- 24:18He's been really hot. I had him suggested as a pretty big pickup this
- 24:21week. So okay, let's get into just a little bit of card news,
- 24:25as we've had some updates in the calendar since we ran through it a
- 24:30couple of weeks ago. We did have twenty twenty four archive Signature Series.
- 24:34The retired edition came out last week, which is if you recall from when
- 24:40we discussed this, for the active players, the signature series is tops recollecting
- 24:45cards that have been out there in the field, having the players sign them
- 24:48and then they stamp them. I think that the retired player ones are way
- 24:52more fun than the modern players because obviously you get like old school like eighty
- 24:59KRT eighties cards and stuff. But according to the marketing materials, Pops did
- 25:03put some at least one one of one Mantle out there that's pictured kind of
- 25:10in everything that they've rolled out, which I'm not sure how they got that,
- 25:14but that's quite the outlay to be able to pick up that sign Mickey
- 25:18Mantle card to put it into the signature series. But have you ever opened
- 25:22a signature series And if you haven't, like, what do you kind of
- 25:26think of the set and the gimmick of it overall? Yeah, I'll have
- 25:32to admit that this is the set that got me back and collecting in COVID
- 25:37and that sounds really ridiculous, but it came down to a like ten dollars
- 25:42eBay voucher and I'm like, what can I do with this, and I
- 25:45think I bought a Burt Blyleven breaker spot in a signature series break and hit
- 25:55a Burt Blyleven auto, so I made like five dollars and that was that
- 26:02led to a series of poor choices in spending too much time in breaking.
- 26:06But but yeah, I think it's a fun product. I think you make
- 26:10the point it's almost better with retired players than the new ones because also the
- 26:15new players, like it's cards that were just like you saw like two years
- 26:17ago, three years ago, so it's like they just took him back,
- 26:19said like backstock and signed it and stamped and it's just like, hey,
- 26:22it's a one of one of his first bowman, Like no, I don't
- 26:27buy it. Like you can't just stamp it and say it is like you
- 26:32made like one hundred thousands of these. You can't just stamp it and say
- 26:36it's a one on one now, which I guess that's kind of like what
- 26:37they're doing the first card and Top series one. But but yeah, I
- 26:44think it's it's a fun product. I do think it's hard for the standard
- 26:48collector because it is like a single in case auto per box, and I
- 26:52think what sixty seventy Bucks somewhere in there. So you're pretty much gonna lose
- 26:59on most most boxes that you open, unless you get really lucky with a
- 27:04big name like a to your point of Pooholes or you know, Jeter or
- 27:10somebody you know, go back a little further mantle. Yeah, those are
- 27:14those are pretty nice. Yeah, And I think they also they make great
- 27:17gifts if you're kind of like unsure what to buy somebody, because like it's
- 27:21not a bad price range for buying one box, and like, yeah,
- 27:23it is a little bit of like a lottery ticket in terms of who you
- 27:27hit. But I think that's a good use of it, like that I
- 27:30would look forward to, like trying to do sometime in the future. Yeah,
- 27:37Okay, we got tomorrow on May twenty second, twenty twenty three Tops
- 27:42Chrome Platinum and Anniversary coming out. I will say that this has been kind
- 27:47of disorienting seeing on Reddit as people have gotten some of this product early and
- 27:52have been ripping it and posting it, and you're seeing all the rookies from
- 27:56last year from twenty twenty three, because this is still a twenty twenty three
- 28:00product. You're just like, whoa man, I think they got the errors
- 28:04on these rookie card stamps wrong, But nope, it's twenty twenty three.
- 28:08So we've joked about this many times that we think that twenty twenty three is
- 28:14finally put to bed. But I mean, I'm still holding out for Stadium
- 28:17Club Chrome at this point, might still be revived. Maybe they'll print it
- 28:22next year or something, twenty twenty three Stadium Club Chrome in twenty five.
- 28:26But yeah, I will link to the checklist if you are interested in twenty
- 28:30twenty three Chrome Platinum Anniversary. We actually covered back when twenty twenty two Chrome
- 28:37Platinum Anniversary came out as one of our early podcasts when it came out last
- 28:42summer, So I think if you want to know our thoughts on the series
- 28:47overall, you can go back to that. Then I think we've got two
- 28:51of the bigger guys coming up on the calendar in just a couple of weeks.
- 28:55On June twelfth. We've got Top Series two coming out, and we
- 28:59also got Donor Is coming out Classic Panini product. Those will both hit the
- 29:03shelves on June twelfth, so we will have more of a serious preview when
- 29:08we get closer to those dates. But yeah, Brew, what do you
- 29:12think do you should we take a little break and then come back with your
- 29:15Top one hundred. Let's take a quick break. I've a chance to get
- 29:18ready to get a nice cold drink and let's go. Yeah, And if
- 29:22you need that link to Bruce Top one hundred, you can find in the
- 29:26show notes. Pull it up before we take this break, and you can
- 29:30get a little taste of what we're going to be talking about. Stick around,
- 29:48all right, Welcome back, everybody. We are going to get into
- 29:52discussing bruce top one hundred hitters that he posted this past Sunday on ras Ball.
- 29:57So, like I said before the break, check out the show notes
- 30:00so you can get the link to that article and you can get the full
- 30:03Top one hundred. This represents your first update since you put out the full
- 30:07Top one hundred in the first week of the season, and so I thought
- 30:11it'd be a good time to go through the list and find some of the
- 30:17biggest risers that we've had, either you know, moving up the list or
- 30:21fully entering the list from out of nowhere. Then discuss a few players that
- 30:26we had fall out of your top one hundred list, and also just kind
- 30:30of go through some methodology and comparing it to others that might have ranks out
- 30:34there in the industry. So Brew kind of like give us a little bit
- 30:38of background on how you're building these rankings. What sorts of like key metrics
- 30:44are you looking at, and how is that influencing how these players are moving
- 30:48up and down your top one hundred. Yeah, I think rankings is one
- 30:52of the hardest things to do out there because like it's guaranteed to be wrong.
- 30:57But that's also what kind of makes fun and and I can you know,
- 31:02I even looking at the rankings now as we're talking about literally two days
- 31:06after after I posted them, and I'm gonna I probably should have moved that
- 31:08guy. I don't think that's that's true anymore. And uh, it's it's
- 31:14it's more that that art. And you know what what I end up doing
- 31:18is, you know, early season rankings, like beginning of the year rankings.
- 31:22You know, it's looking at last year. It's kind of, uh,
- 31:25playing who's made improvements, what the situation has gotten better, things like
- 31:29that. But really as the season goes on, it's really trying to see
- 31:32like whose skills have changed or updated, or who's got lucky, who hasn't
- 31:37so you know what what I actually have behind the scenes is what all of
- 31:41us fantasy nerves is a massive database of data. And I'm I got my
- 31:47own homegrown calculation here that tries to combine all kinds of fun facts from hard
- 31:52hit rates to exit velocities to babe IP to strike out rates, walk rates.
- 31:56You know, looks at the profile across the five cat goories, how
- 32:00do you play from the how many deviations from the mean are? You like,
- 32:04get a big litany of things, and essentially I let the computer do
- 32:07the math to see, hey, based on kind of the things that I
- 32:10generally look at, what are the what do the rankings look like? And
- 32:14then adjust from there and and you know, use the eye test or say,
- 32:17hey, I get that we're putting Ryan hearn number one right now because
- 32:22the how he's doing from the splits perspective. But he's probably not number one
- 32:27in the in the rankings. And don't worry, my rankings did not actually
- 32:30put Ryan O'Hearn at the top. I will tell you, you know,
- 32:35it throws guys like you know, William Contrare's away at the top. He
- 32:39gets great great Marx Marcello Zuna continues to get great marks in my rankings just
- 32:45because he's the Jesus out of the ball, but nobody wants to actually rank
- 32:49him there because he plays utility only and it's Marcello Zuna and you just don't
- 32:53feel personally right sometimes about ranking him high. But yeah, it's ever.
- 32:59Every week is about moving guys up down, trying to figure out where they
- 33:01where they fit. And I go through that that you know, mental gymnastics
- 33:07of like guy by guy. If I was drafting today, would I take
- 33:09this guy above, the guy above him, got the guy below, and
- 33:13move him around. And you can just spend hours just going through move moving
- 33:19guys up down. Uh, get your Excel spreadsheets safe mode. Could mind
- 33:23just crash as I mess with it so much? So it's it's definitely definitely
- 33:28entertaining. But the only thing I'll call out you call you out correct.
- 33:30This is actually my third rankings for the season I had preseason I did.
- 33:35I did do an update about about three weeks ago, maybe it's even just
- 33:38two weeks ago, and uh, this one here because otherwise at least one
- 33:43of the guys we're gonna talk about makes zero sense relatives of preseason rankings.
- 33:46But that's okay. So this is though, this is the one where it
- 33:51starts to stabilize for me, Like I think at this point, like things
- 33:53are really starting to stabilize to the rest of the season. Except for those
- 33:57arguments you get like this has been the best guy in the world or this
- 34:00guy has been the worst in the world. It's like, yeah, well,
- 34:01these are the rest of the season rankings. What you've done now means
- 34:06nothing to me. All right, well, let's keep that in mind with
- 34:09discussions here. And so the first player that I'm gonna bring up, I
- 34:15think he stands out the most in your list because he's the highest ranked player
- 34:20with an NR next to him, meaning that he was not ranked. So
- 34:24I guess, is this compared to a few weeks ago or thee Yeah,
- 34:29so this will be compared a few weeks ago, So okay, so even
- 34:31that, yeah, so even though compared a few weeks ago, and I'll
- 34:37call him out here, Brett Rooker has jumped significantly up the rankings. I
- 34:43have him as my sixty first hitter overall, and that is an aggressive rank
- 34:47And you know, I do a lot of benchmarking just to see where the
- 34:51rest of the industry has him, and I'm I'm gonna say I've I've kind
- 34:57of lapped the field here on Brett Rooker at this point. I'm he's frank
- 35:01sixty one in my heart, and he's roughly sixty four spots above the industry
- 35:07average. So you know, we're doubling up here. Keeping context. This
- 35:12is how I view the players, not necessarily the value that they might actually
- 35:15have on the market, right, you have to adjust for that the differentials
- 35:20what you're looking for. But you know, I'm really excited about Brent Rooker.
- 35:25He was basically free at the draft table this year, and even as
- 35:29a few weeks ago you could get him pretty pretty reasonable. But he has
- 35:32He was kicking around like fifteen team like consideration my waiver Wired article just like
- 35:38a few weeks ago, and like I couldn't even like put him in for
- 35:43talking about ten and twelve teams in the past couple of weeks because his ownership
- 35:47rates went from zero to one hundred like overnight. Yeah, I think people
- 35:52recognize that, like he he has matured significantly as a hitter. I mean,
- 35:57if I think it's one of those he's get paid for the Oakland sales
- 36:00tax type of thing to a degree that Yeah, I was like, ah,
- 36:02he's in Oakland, there's nobody to drive in the outfields a long ways
- 36:06away. He's a thirty homer bat that's gonna hit two twelve and not many
- 36:12RBIs. Like, yeah, we just talked about Max Muncie. Like,
- 36:15guys, guy that's gonna hit two hundred with thirty home runs. He's gonna
- 36:19have a few more RBIs with the lineup's okay in LA. But the what
- 36:23excites me about Rooker this this time around, why he jumps so significantly in
- 36:28my rankings, is it looks like he he uh took took a book out
- 36:35of pedros Ariano in a major league uh and to figure out how to hit
- 36:38the off speed And yeah, it's it's it's slight, but he has.
- 36:45He's on better against the four seamer. Don't get me get me wrong,
- 36:50But last year against like your sinkers, your sliders, I mean he was
- 36:54hitting against sliders. Last year he hit one thirty nine, Like he could
- 37:00not handle the slider. He was just dreadful against curveballs. He hit one
- 37:05forty. This year he against the curveball. Well, he's sitting two hundred,
- 37:10so it's quite a bit better. But against the slider, he's hitting
- 37:15two seventy three, and teams are attacking him with that because seeing that he's
- 37:19he's was able to hit the fastball sore backed off the fastball to getting the
- 37:22sinkers and the sliders, the cutters, and and he's handling those and he's
- 37:29not swinging it all of them. He's actually controlling himself outside the zone relatively,
- 37:32so when he's getting his pitch, he's capitalizing. AND's what's interesting.
- 37:39And you know, his batting average to eighty one is like fully supported this
- 37:45year. He his ex batting average is two seventy six. He doesn't have
- 37:49a whole lot of luck metrics like it all looks legitimate. And he also
- 37:53just hits the Jesus out of the ball like he is top ten percent and
- 37:58literally every you know, barrel, hard hit, X of velocity, launch
- 38:01angle, you know all those things that you want to see, and he
- 38:06just strikes out a lot like that's the only problem. So I look at
- 38:10him and you compare him to other guys and you're like, yeah, like
- 38:15I will absolutely take that profile with the strikeouts and uh take us to the
- 38:19bank. So I'm loving Brent Rooker and I'm I'm I'm investing heavily. Yeah,
- 38:25I think it makes sense because you can even see it that, like,
- 38:30between last year and this year, the actual kind of like profile of
- 38:36him hasn't changed, and I think people probably lost track of where his season
- 38:39ended. Last year he had thirty homers hit two forty six, which I
- 38:44mean, considering that power output, it's not that bad and that all kind
- 38:49of amounted to a one twenty seven WRC plus and the runs in RBI are
- 38:53light because he was in Oakland. But Oakland's a better team this year than
- 38:58there were last year. And yeah, I think you're looking at essentially a
- 39:01guy that was like again to like, I mean, we all really we're
- 39:08hot and heavy in terms of owning like Hunter Renfro a couple of years ago,
- 39:15you know, like he was a bit of a fantasy darling, and
- 39:17I think that Rooker is better than that. So you can take I think
- 39:24a lot of the performance that we've seen out of Rooker, and I think
- 39:29most of the projection systems have done this at this point too, and saying
- 39:34this is who he is, Like he hits the ball really hard, and
- 39:37he is going to be hot and cold, but you've got to write it
- 39:39out for an entire season to set and forget the thirty homers that he's going
- 39:45to give you. Yeah, And you know the thing is the projection systems.
- 39:49They're still calling for him to hit two thirty and I think he's going
- 39:52to be sixty to seventy. And if that's the case, I mean you're
- 39:59looking at something special here. The only thing holding him back is the Oakland
- 40:02lineup not being as good as other places. But I think it's more stigma
- 40:07at this point than actual truth. Yeah, I think so too. Okay,
- 40:10well, let's get on to the next guy that you had move up
- 40:14quite a bit, and I wanted to highlight this one just because Christian Yelich
- 40:16moved up from up into number twenty nine. That's up fifteen spots. I'm
- 40:22guessing this is a little bit because a couple of weeks ago you had him
- 40:27stashed lower because of the back injury. But he has come back and even
- 40:30last night he stole two, basically stole home on the Marlins as they weren't
- 40:35paying attention getting the ball back from the catcher to Ryan Weathers. It was
- 40:39pretty crazy. To watch, But I love this ranking that, like,
- 40:44I think Christian Yelich has been pretty underrated and was in draft season, like
- 40:49he fell in a lot of drafts and I got a share or two that
- 40:53I was kind of surprised by giving his stolen base output from last year.
- 40:59And I guess we'll see a little bit how the back injury treats him here
- 41:04over the next few weeks. But I think I'm lockstep with you in terms
- 41:08of moving Christian Yelich back up into like top twenty five ish range of a
- 41:14hitter that like you can really depend on it for a good fantasy team.
- 41:19I'm guessing that's kind of what you're thinking too. Yeah, you're right there,
- 41:22Like he's he looks like he's like this is hard to say healthy when
- 41:27he was just injured, but like he looks like he's back to Christian Yellish
- 41:30is a few years ago and he there's something about the Christian Yellish profile that
- 41:36just isn't exciting from like a fantasy like perspective. Maybe it's like a real
- 41:42world like the personality is a subdued personality, Like he just doesn't get the
- 41:46spotlight. But when you look at what he's doing. The production's there.
- 41:50It's across every single category and he's a five category guy, and there's very
- 41:57very little when you look at what he's doing that like should give you any
- 42:00concern, Like he's not a high strikeout guy. He does walk, you
- 42:05know, he's he's got his launch angle has really actually improved this year,
- 42:08which is gonna help him get the ball out of the ballpark, you know.
- 42:13And you know, it's funny you talk about like Comps the first comp
- 42:15that Baseball Savant gives hims Gunner Henderson like, and you can see it,
- 42:21like he is hitting the ball really really well, and he just does everything
- 42:25well. There's not one thing that Yelich doesn't do across the board. And
- 42:32I think he's unfortunately because of injuries, kind of been you know, dialed
- 42:37down a bit over the last few years. So you're absolutely right, he's
- 42:40jumping back up because he's healthy and even if he just is what he who
- 42:45he was last year, and that's kind of who we were drafting. The
- 42:46guy that's basically twenty thirty with one hundred runs, almost eighty RBIs and hitting
- 42:52two eighty. You're thrilled with Christian Yellis that's like that is a almost you
- 42:59know, top thirty hit her, but with it just being a little bit
- 43:02lucky, which he seems like he's in the ball a little better this year.
- 43:07Yeah, no, no question. So I really like Christian Yellich here.
- 43:10You're right, he's moving up. I got the sandwiches between Raphael Devers
- 43:15and C. Dre Abrams, like that's he's back where he belongs. Yeah,
- 43:21I totally agree. All right. The next large riser that we have
- 43:25is catcher Ryan Jeffers from the Minnesota Twins, moving up twenty four spots to
- 43:30number seventy four. For you, I think this is maybe a lot of
- 43:36like what we said about Brent Rooker. You can almost copy and paste here.
- 43:39But what do you loving and right Ryan Jeffers's profile and why you moving
- 43:44him up your list? Yeah? Jeffers, you know, I'll come and
- 43:47call this in a correction. You know, he looked good early in the
- 43:52season, and I just like I discounted it, right, I discounted it
- 43:55to you know, it's early season, small samples size. You know,
- 44:00is he really improved as a hitter? And I think the answer is,
- 44:06yeah, he's improved as a hitter. But I say that, but at
- 44:10the same time not that much. Like if you look back at what he's
- 44:15done in prior years, the profile looks relatively similar, Like he's just getting
- 44:21full playing time and taking advantage of it with a little bit of luck.
- 44:27Like the balls flying out of the ballpark a little bit more, he is
- 44:30pulling the ball a little bit more. So the profile has not actually changed
- 44:36that much. It's just full playing time and leaning into it. So I
- 44:39think Jeffers, for whatever reason, we've been kind of down on him,
- 44:44and he's actually just a very, very solid catcher, and so it was
- 44:47time to recognize that a lot of other catchers that we were high going into
- 44:52the year haven't really panned out, and Jeffers has just been solid, solid
- 44:58production. So I'm licking what he is. I don't want to hope I
- 45:00did overcorrect my rankings going after Jeffers, but I had to put him right
- 45:05above Yanni or Diaz just to make a point in the rankings because he has
- 45:10looked better kind of what we hoped for a guy like, yeah, your
- 45:14ideas to deliver. So liking Jeffers really from the power perspective, But at
- 45:21the same time, you know, don't overdo it here with Jeffers because he's
- 45:27still has an injury history and a good situation going well. So there's a
- 45:32little bit of luck biked in here too. Yeah. I mean, I
- 45:36think this is gonna be a little weird to actually cite given our fantasy game,
- 45:39but Ryan Jeffers's defense is really improved, at least in the small sample
- 45:45size that we've got so far. You can see it in his his framing
- 45:50runs on stat casts. He used to be in one of the Bob and
- 45:52tiers and now he's moved up. He's not gotten better as like an overall
- 45:57catcher, because the blocking skill are still kind of weak and so is his
- 46:00arm. But I think it's a little bit of almost what the Cardinals did
- 46:06with Wilson Contres, where you can take a catcher like this and mold him
- 46:10into a better framer and if the bat can stick, well, I mean,
- 46:15we knew that Jeffers had the bat to be able to play every day.
- 46:17It was just a matter of whether or not he could actually make that
- 46:21glove stick. It's sticking enough, and so as long as Jeffers can keep
- 46:24those framing runs going, and I think he's going to have the lion's share
- 46:30of the playing time in Minnesota. If that phrase it all, then I
- 46:34think you find him back into the situation where it was last year and not
- 46:37playing you know, quite at the full time level. But I mean he
- 46:42is twenty seven. I think that this is kind of what the Twins plan
- 46:45for his progression has been. So yeah, given some of the catchers that
- 46:50we've lost in the pool and just how difficult it can be to find power
- 46:55at catcher right now, it seems like I love Jeff because yeah, he's
- 47:01got a lot of things coming together in terms of played approach, just like
- 47:07overall, like the mix of youth and having a veteran presence like really goes
- 47:12together in being a good catcher. And so yeah, I would be moving
- 47:16him up rankingless as well that I think he's an easy top ten catcher for
- 47:21rest of the season. Yep, right there, So that's why he's moving
- 47:25on up. Okay, next guy we got is San Diego Padres outfielder Jerrikson
- 47:31Profar, who has moved up your list from not ranked to eighty one,
- 47:37And mostly just because I got to do a little bit of victory lap here,
- 47:40because I've pulled up fab week two when I suggested Jerks and Profar as
- 47:45an only League pickup, and honestly since that point, he's been hot as
- 47:52all get out that it does seem that this is kind of maybe what prime
- 47:58prospect Profar could have turned into. It just kind of took him a little
- 48:00longer because bounce among organizations, bouncing around positions, bouncing to and from Colorado,
- 48:07like that really killed him last year. I picked this up when I
- 48:13suggested him as a possible fantasy player is because like, even despite all of
- 48:17it last year, like he was great in Colorado, and I think the
- 48:21going to and from altitude got to him a lot. He found a home
- 48:24back in San Diego, and Profi is really settled back in. Every time
- 48:30I check in on his profile, I want to like look at it and
- 48:35be skeptical and see, like where the luck is going to run out for
- 48:38Profar. But everything's just been looking really solid in terms of plate, approach,
- 48:45contact, even just luck that like he really has deserved his results so
- 48:51far. And so I'm guessing that's a lot of what you were seeing as
- 48:53well when you moved him up, because it does look like Jerks and Profar
- 48:58has grown in to some of the prospect expectations that we've had fro him all
- 49:04along. Yeah, you're absolutely right. It's this weird feeling like why why
- 49:08is he jumping what I have in my day behind the scenes twenty five spots
- 49:14because he was like one oh six previously in my rankings. I just don't
- 49:17publish past one hundred just because of the ridicule I would receive. But you
- 49:23know it, You're absolutely right. It's like somehow like jerks and profiles,
- 49:27like finally maturing into his own as a prospect at age thirty one. Like
- 49:31that's what it's like if you look every year going back like three or four
- 49:37years, like every metric just gets a little better, a little better,
- 49:39a little better. It was. I actually found it interesting looking at his
- 49:44results against the fastball, like that's you know, he's a guy that's,
- 49:49uh, throughout his career has seen like the forcing fastball between thirty five and
- 49:53forty percent of the time every season, Like he just gets pounded with that
- 49:59heat because he can't handle it. And you know, just going back a
- 50:02few years ago, like going back and looking just at the run value that
- 50:07the savant provides on the fourteing fastball. Twenty nineteen, he was a nut
- 50:10go ten run value. Twenty twenty, he was negative one twenty twenty one
- 50:15zero twenty two, back to negative four twenty three four twenty twenty four eleven.
- 50:20Like he's like he's mature and be able to hit the fastball, Like
- 50:23he'd just say, it's that simple, and then all these other things come
- 50:27around because now they can't attack him with the fastball, and now get some
- 50:30other pitches to hit and it's working out. At the same time, I
- 50:34kind of get the same feeling that you are, Like I'm just waiting for
- 50:37the shoot to drop. I just can't find where it's gonna drop. That's
- 50:39why he's not higher. That's because I just I feel like something's gonna the
- 50:43wheels are gonna fall off somewhere. I just don't know where. Yeah,
- 50:45I mean, he isn't hitting a lot of barrels, but he's just squaring
- 50:50up line drives, and I it is really hard to believe in that sometimes
- 50:55because I think we've gotten also pretty used to end on barrels, and you
- 51:00know, I think Profar has kind of molded himself into just a pretty well
- 51:07rounded player. You can also see it on his hit spray chart that he's
- 51:10using all the field. Obviously he's switch hitting, so like that's what's causing
- 51:15like the all the right field bombs. But it allows him to just kind
- 51:21of like be a solid hitter at the plate. And maybe it's just a
- 51:25reps thing too. You know, he is closing in on four thousand plate
- 51:29appearances that he's got lots of experience. Again only thirty one, So honestly,
- 51:37are you buying Profar in dynasty leagues? Because like, if this keeps
- 51:42up, like you think that there's another kind of two three, four years,
- 51:45maybe that Profar could settle into where he's at. I don't think he's
- 51:51always going to be what he is now, which is, you know,
- 51:52a three thirty nine hitter with a nine thirty nine ohps. But what's to
- 51:57stop him from being like a eighty two ninety hitter with something like an eight
- 52:04hundred seven to fifty ops. Oh man, that's that's tough. I just
- 52:08you know, it's it's that like, man, we've we've vested so many
- 52:12times and been disappointed so many times. Like I just don't think I could
- 52:15I mean, if yeah, if I've got him a like last guy on
- 52:19the Bench type thing in the Dynasty, and I got I'm free, Sure
- 52:21I'm hanging on. Am I acquiring him at a cost? Probably not.
- 52:27I just don't know if I can, if I can buy it. And
- 52:29it's not because the numbers, it's not anything there. It's just like I
- 52:31feel like I've seen this show before and I'm just I think we just got
- 52:36the extended cut this time. Okay, Well, I mean you can also
- 52:39just see it and its like it's rolling ex wOBA on Savanna. It just
- 52:44is going up, and I think we're I'm gonna like earmark this to check
- 52:49back in maybe around the All Star break on Profar because I can't tell if
- 52:52I'm just like finally I'm excited because I've been waiting for this prospect breakout for
- 52:59thirteen years or it's just you know, gonna be a little bit of a
- 53:02flash in a pan when we look back at in a couple months. And
- 53:06the thing is, I think one of us will be absolutely correct, Like
- 53:08I don't know which one right, It's gonna either he's gonna gonna continue this
- 53:13or it's gonna fall off a cliff. Like it's one of those Okay,
- 53:16all right. The next one we've got is this one is another kind of
- 53:20just significant move in terms of once you're getting high up the list, there's
- 53:23not too much further to go. And that is Anthony Volpi, shortstop from
- 53:28the Yankees, has moved up seven spots to number thirty five on your list,
- 53:31and Volpi has really settled in as the leadoff hitter for a potent New
- 53:37York Yankees offense. He's slashing two sixty nine, three, forty three,
- 53:40four twenty five for a one to twenty three WRC plus on pace for roughly
- 53:46eighteen to twenty homers and something like upper twenties maybe thirty stolen bases. So
- 53:52it does look like the kind of best case scenario for what you're looking from
- 53:59for Volpi last year is coming to fruition this year, as maybe some people
- 54:04got burnt by him last year. And I think the biggest thing here is
- 54:07obviously he has cut the strikeouts, he's cut down the whiffs, and that's
- 54:12just boosted the batting average, which sunk you last year when he hit two
- 54:15nine anything else maybe underneath the hood brew that is really indicating to you that,
- 54:22yes, this is Anthony Volpi, twenty three year old really rounding into
- 54:27an all star form. Yeah, I think it's you know, it's a
- 54:30few things. One, you know, he he's hitting the top that lineup,
- 54:35where that was a struggle last year. He also seems to be much
- 54:39more comfortable on the base path and at the plate. You know, is
- 54:44his uh you know, is the the strength of the contact that much better?
- 54:51No, not necessarily, but to your point, it was that the
- 54:53average really sunk us last year. He went twenty twenty last year, and
- 54:58so you're not sitting You're going if only this guy he was a twenty twenty
- 55:01hitter. He just hit two oh nine, and he had some poor luck
- 55:06last year that drove that two oh nine. He's got some average luck this
- 55:12year which is driving him that two sixty five. And he's still was he
- 55:15just twenty two, Sorry, he's twenty three. He just turned twenty three,
- 55:21and he's still growing. He's still learning as a hitter, and so
- 55:24I think there's just even more growth to come. And he's one of those
- 55:28guys that since the top of that Yankees lineup, being a little bit more
- 55:31patient, getting on base a little bit more even when he has off games,
- 55:36he's going to be scoring runs and he's actually one of those guys as
- 55:38RBI opportunities as a leadoff hitter, and I think he can actually run more
- 55:45than what he is. He's one of the fastest guys in the majors,
- 55:50like he's he's top fifteen percent sprint speed doesn't always translate to stolen bases,
- 55:58but you know, for for who he is, Like if he just keeps
- 56:01getting more and more comfortable, I think there's more and more to like here.
- 56:05So it's more of if he's continued to grow on what he did last
- 56:09year, and I wouldn't be surprised if he ended up with a twenty thirty
- 56:15twenty twenty five, thirty five season and hit two sixty and that is incredible,
- 56:22Like that's that's up there with those guys you're talking about in the first
- 56:23round. If Julio did that this year, you'd be thrilled with how he's
- 56:29started. The same with Corbyn Carroll like they did that be like, yeah,
- 56:31it's been a good year. It was a little regression, but good
- 56:34for you. And Bullpe is just not he's not being recognized for what production
- 56:38he's putting out because he kind of say, squandered, but he had a
- 56:43rough go last year and the Yankees just stuck with him, which I think
- 56:45people kind of got even more frustrated with. So I'm liking Bullpay. I
- 56:50know I'm high on him, but I think there's still more in the tank.
- 56:53Yeah, I agree, and you can see it in just thislevant going
- 56:58down to his run values by pitch type. That the buggerboo for him last
- 57:02year was that was a slider and he just really struggled on being able to
- 57:07put the bat on sliders. And he has turned that around. As you
- 57:12know, he had a whift percentage of thirty one percent against the slider.
- 57:15This year he's cut it to twenty eight percent. But the biggest thing is
- 57:19that he's gone from a one forty seven batting average to a three fourteen batting
- 57:22average on sliders while not really yielding anything on the fastballs. So I think
- 57:27it's just a maturation of the process for Vulpy. I guess I mean at
- 57:35this point, second round bat next year, maybe, I mean I think
- 57:40he can. I he still has to finish the season strong and still like
- 57:45show that this is true growth. But to your point, like I feel
- 57:49like he's on an upward trajectory of growth like he continues, like, so
- 57:52I would be surprised, like month over month over month, things keep looking
- 57:54better. And yeah, he he absolutely could be in that second round conversation
- 58:00if he continues to build like he's building. Okay, Yeah, I think
- 58:02that's really fair. Okay, let's move on to just a few follers.
- 58:07So, like I said at the beginning of the episode, we did highlight
- 58:12a bunch of just struggling bats last week, So I think that's a good
- 58:15place to check out if you're looking for some analysis on those players and maybe
- 58:21what we're also looking for in terms of why to maybe cut guys or start
- 58:25moving on from guys at this point in the season, you know, on
- 58:29the flip side of when we've seen some of the improvements either in plate approach
- 58:34or against certain pitches. I think a lot of these other players that we're
- 58:37going to talk about, I guess there's only three of them here that we're
- 58:38going to talk about for followers, but they're guys who have seen degradations in
- 58:45just their overall skills and things have not been looking good for them. So
- 58:49the first guy I want to highlight is the first of a pair of Blue
- 58:53Jays. Things have not been going well in Toronto, and the big reason
- 58:58is Vladimir Greau Junior continues to struggle out the gate and a lot of it
- 59:04is just he's not growing into what the stat cast numbers are telling us.
- 59:08He's looked great on the stat cast numbers. I do think a little bit
- 59:12too, is like I'm going to start doing this next year with vlad Garreau
- 59:15Junior, is that the projections are just not doing a great job of like
- 59:22translating his previous work in the minor leagues. And I think that season in
- 59:25Dunedin in twenty twenty one with his age and just kind of like projecting that
- 59:32out properly. And so what we're getting every year is that the Vladimir Guerrero
- 59:37projections that are you know, inherent in a lot of our game is what's
- 59:45causing Vladimir Guerrero to be ranked so high every year. And I mean I
- 59:50fell for it in a couple of leagues because he just kept slipping into like
- 59:53third and fourth rounds, And honestly, I think in most projection systems he
- 59:59was like a top twenty five ish bat By value for most places so you
- 1:00:06know, it said he should go into the second round, and I just
- 1:00:08had to bite when he was starting to slip. And I kind of regret
- 1:00:12it now because Brew, I know you're making your own projections and maybe didn't
- 1:00:15fall victim to this as much, because I think even before this, you
- 1:00:22had Vaimir Guerrero Junior obviously at thirty three, which is probably pretty low to
- 1:00:25the rest of the industry as well. So what is it in his profile
- 1:00:30that has you doubting what he could be in the future compared to I think
- 1:00:36what the expectations are. Yeah, there's a few things. You're right.
- 1:00:39I've traditionally been lower on Guerrero for a few reasons. One, he just
- 1:00:46doesn't run, And look at him, he doesn't have the body type for
- 1:00:51he's not his daddy's so he's not gonna run, And so that just immediately
- 1:00:57pegs you down probably to the end of the second round at best. Like
- 1:01:00if you look at guys that we're talking about and that like late top twenty
- 1:01:04hitters, early top twenty, like they're all guys that can still run or
- 1:01:08they've got something very unique about them. So guys I have that range that
- 1:01:13don't run are like Adley Rutchman, who's like far and away in my mind,
- 1:01:17the best catcher out there. You're talking about Austin Riley, who is
- 1:01:22absolutely a beast, and batting average beast as well. He hasn't been as
- 1:01:25good lately, but I think there's still a lot there. Pete Alonzo,
- 1:01:28which the other guy that drives you nuts. But if the guy can hit
- 1:01:30fifty homers, like you're talking about, these guys that are so far out
- 1:01:34of the range of the standard for the position or for the stats are giving
- 1:01:39up. The thing with Vlad is he should hit for a good average,
- 1:01:45and he does, but without the speed, without being a really fast guy,
- 1:01:50and without really you know, he has power, but he hits the
- 1:01:53ball incredibly hard, not in the air, and I'm I'm not a physicist
- 1:02:00here, but I'm pretty sure to get over the fence, it has to
- 1:02:05go through the air. And you know, the last few years his fly
- 1:02:09ball rate has been around thirty thirty five percent, and that's just incredibly low
- 1:02:16for a power hitter. I have to look to see the league average is
- 1:02:24a little bit lower than that. But he's actually hitting ground balls at like
- 1:02:30forty to five, almost fifty percent of the time and without with doing that,
- 1:02:35Like he's just a great line drive hitter, Like he's a great line
- 1:02:38drive hitter. And it's like, I hate to say, we're almost talking
- 1:02:42about the same way we talked about Jerks and profar, Like he's a really
- 1:02:45solid hitter with line drives, sprays it across the field, things like that,
- 1:02:52And yeah, he's stronger than profile, I'll give you that, but
- 1:02:57it's just not translating to the results that you want. And so when you
- 1:03:00don't hit the ball in the air and you don't get incredibly lucky, you're
- 1:03:05talking about a guy hits two seventy five twenty homers and the lineup that's kind
- 1:03:08of scuffling eighty runs and RBIs like, that's not that exciting. And so
- 1:03:15because he doesn't contribute across those categories is one of the reasons I've had him
- 1:03:19lower. But also he had to be so successful at his what he did,
- 1:03:22Like if he has doesn't have a brilliant season at hitting the ball line
- 1:03:29drives and getting over the fence just a little bit, you're going to be
- 1:03:31disappointed. So that's why I've been low on him in the past, And
- 1:03:35I think it's just coming to fruition. And so I'm like, I think
- 1:03:38in the past I've been actually pulled up by by other rankings, be like,
- 1:03:42can I be really that low and glad? I mean, the talent's
- 1:03:44there, we've seen him in the derby what he can do, but that's
- 1:03:47just not the hitter he is. And that's fine. He's a better real
- 1:03:50world hitter than he is a fantasy hitter. That's fine. Yeah, And
- 1:03:53I mean I think a lot of the projection systems still quite haven't caught up,
- 1:03:58because like even with rest of the season rankings, just straight off of
- 1:04:02our site ras ball, he's projected as fourteenth, which would make him the
- 1:04:10number one first baseman, even over Breddie Freeman. I don't believe that.
- 1:04:14Like, I think that he is down probably closer to where you're talking about
- 1:04:18like Josh Naylor and Cody Bellinger. Honestly, Like that's where I'm kind of
- 1:04:23tearing him from a first baseman perspective, because I think he's even far below
- 1:04:29like the Bryce Harper Pete Alonso level, because I mean, even though those
- 1:04:34guys aren't giving you the stolen bases, they are giving you more power and
- 1:04:41just in terms of like what we're looking for in a power hitter. I
- 1:04:45think you can see it compared to what we're talking about with Brent Rooker.
- 1:04:48You know, Brent Rooker is actually like the flip of when you were saying
- 1:04:53Vlad's flyball and ground ball rates like they were inversed for Brent Rooker, they
- 1:04:58are just about four Bryce Harper too, but Bryce Harper is a little bit
- 1:05:04closer, like he does hit more ground balls, but like, yeah,
- 1:05:06you want to see somebody who's living more in like the forty five percent range
- 1:05:12on fly balls. It just doesn't seem like Vlad can get the barrel head
- 1:05:15around to get that launch angle maybe, And I just yeah, I think
- 1:05:20from a long term perspective too, I don't know if it's ever going to
- 1:05:24be there for Vlad as well. So I think also, yeah, if
- 1:05:28I'm in a dynasty situation with him, I'm keeping that in mind as I'm
- 1:05:31maybe fielding offers here throughout the summer. Yeah, I think I've got I'm
- 1:05:35sitting there right behind Christian Walker from a first base perspective, and you know,
- 1:05:41I don't have any qualms taking Christian Walker over from and I got three
- 1:05:45spots above Josh Naylor. Yeah, like, you're right right in that spot,
- 1:05:48and I don't. And I'd even struggle if I if I hit it
- 1:05:53game to a draft, like I'm looking like a man, do I do
- 1:05:56I want lad? Like I'm probably that's where I'm like zagging going to get
- 1:05:59a starting pitcher or something like that, because I'm not ruled with anything really
- 1:06:01in that general range. But I think your dynasty point is spot on like
- 1:06:06that. That's where if he gets hot, gets a Player of the Week
- 1:06:10or something like that, that's when you start shopping him and get some value
- 1:06:14because he is who he is, Like, let's let's not kill ourselves.
- 1:06:16Okay. Yeah, And maybe a little bit in that vein, we'll talk
- 1:06:19about the other Toronto blue Jay that you had fallen significantly, and that is
- 1:06:25Justin Turner, the thirty nine year old. So I think that's pretty much
- 1:06:30what you lay out in the article is he's getting old, and the new
- 1:06:34bat speed metric does not like Justin Turner. He's the second worst in terms
- 1:06:40of bat speed behind Luisa Rise. And so you're thinking that maybe it's starting
- 1:06:45to fall apart for Justin Turner up in Toronto and anything else that you're looking
- 1:06:48at other than maybe just like his raw stat line that is indicating that,
- 1:06:55yeah, it generally is the raw stat line, but it's the trend of
- 1:06:58that. Like this is if you look across the last four years. It
- 1:07:01started when he was in la in twenty twenty one, and ever since then,
- 1:07:05if you just look across the majority of the metrics that you're looking for
- 1:07:11at Justin Turner, they all are just degrading a little bit. Walk rate
- 1:07:15has gone down every year since then, strikeout rate has generally gone up.
- 1:07:20There's a little waiver in that since then. Exit Alazzi has gone down every
- 1:07:25year since then. Like it's just across the board, all of these hard
- 1:07:29hit rate down every year since then, Like they're all just slightly ticking down.
- 1:07:34And to me, that just says, hey, father, times catching
- 1:07:39up with Justin Turner. And he did have probably a better ballpark last year
- 1:07:45for his swing, went in Boston, and so that definitely kind of boosted
- 1:07:50his numbers. And so now when he's in Toronto, some of those long
- 1:07:55flies are not making it out out of the ballpark and it's it might just
- 1:08:01be time. And I think for me, the icing on the cake was
- 1:08:03like as I started looking at those new basspeed metrics, as is telling him,
- 1:08:08like, all right, well, if he's not getting the bass speed
- 1:08:11there, unless he's swinging like a thirty six ounce bat, which he's not.
- 1:08:15I couldn't find griod metrics on that, but I think he's swinging like
- 1:08:18a thirty one ounce bat, which is still a pretty heavy bat, thirty
- 1:08:23one and a half something like that, but still like, unless you're swinging
- 1:08:29like the George Herman Ruth kind of bad here, you don't have enough momentum
- 1:08:34inertia built up in that thing for to go out out of the ballpark.
- 1:08:40So, you know, I hate say it because I love Justin Turner.
- 1:08:44I think he's just been a hidden value for years. I think it's just
- 1:08:47starting to it's just it's tailing off finely. And it's not that it's not
- 1:08:51that it's going to be like completely gone, but something similar we've help with
- 1:08:55lad, Like if the rest of that lineup is not doing what it needs
- 1:08:58to do, it's not his power's not there, average is there, he
- 1:09:02doesn't have the counting stats like it's becoming kind of an empty stat line at
- 1:09:05this point. Yeah, I definitely agree. Okay, well, let's get
- 1:09:10out of Toronto and go to when they're foes. For this one's a little
- 1:09:14bit more of a deeper cut because you can't quite call or you can't quite
- 1:09:17figure it out straight from your list. Because Josh Low, outfielder for the
- 1:09:21Tampa Bay Rays, fell completely off the list. So he recently returned from
- 1:09:27the injured list and has slotted back into the Tampa Bay Rays lineup. So
- 1:09:33let me know, Burt, what do you what do you see in the
- 1:09:36return from Josh Lo so far that is giving you concern that you've pushed him
- 1:09:42out of your top one hundred. Yeah, it's you know, it's it's
- 1:09:45a few things I talked earlier about the Tampa Bay tax that's definitely at play
- 1:09:53here. For Low, He's traditionally been a guy that really struggles with the
- 1:10:00splits and so he just he struggles with left handers significantly. And I think
- 1:10:05it was last year he hit if I can pull it up here, he
- 1:10:09hit two thirty eight with two homers against lefties. He was hit three hundred,
- 1:10:14was eighteen against righty's, And you know, this year coming back,
- 1:10:17he's he's not facing lefties basically at all. He's had five at bats out
- 1:10:23of his forty five at bats against lefties, so the playing time is a
- 1:10:26little bit questionable. And also just as he comes back, it looks like
- 1:10:30he's just got a significant amount of rust and I'm I'm not certain that you
- 1:10:35know he's not running either. It's early, so maybe that's gonna getta change.
- 1:10:43But for a guy that you know you were hoping for, you know,
- 1:10:45twenty thirty last year, and through twelve games, he hasn't attempted to
- 1:10:50steal, and he definitely looks like he's a little ginger is not the right
- 1:10:57term, but still trying to get get fully back. I'm kind of I'm
- 1:11:01shying away. It just feels like he's not quite where he needs to be.
- 1:11:05There's not big numbers go into this one that just the eye test says
- 1:11:10that the rays aren't fully baked in and he's also not fully back. That's
- 1:11:15why he's dropping down. Yeah, And I think part of it too is
- 1:11:18I do wonder if he is still pretty banged up, because I think he
- 1:11:23not only battled an oblique that kept him out, but also a hamstring injury,
- 1:11:27and just like it seems like lots of different parts of his body were
- 1:11:32ranking down in him. That's kind of tough to all pull together. And
- 1:11:38I mean I was gonna maybe chalk it up to last year being a flash
- 1:11:42in the pan, but he got stronger as the year went on. You
- 1:11:45know, he really struggled in July, but finished strong down the stretch and
- 1:11:49was able to round out the season and was starting to get more at bats
- 1:11:54against lefties. I think that's maybe a little bit of like an indicator that
- 1:11:58if there's certainly like I would say, you know, twenty seven or twenty
- 1:12:04eight of the front offices out there are smarter than me, and definitely like
- 1:12:11the cream of the crop is the rays, and so like when they start
- 1:12:15fiddling with people in the lineups, and you know, if you start seeing
- 1:12:18Josh Lowe getting more at bats against lefties, I think that's a pretty good
- 1:12:23indicator too, that he's back to a better health platform, you know,
- 1:12:29and just in terms of where he was last year. So that's something I
- 1:12:32think to keep your eye on. Is just like Tampa does a pretty good
- 1:12:35job I think of being cutting edge of not only like integrating a lot of
- 1:12:42some of the stats in stat cast data that we're looking at, but if
- 1:12:46there's any team that I'm guessing is using biometric data to track their players and
- 1:12:50determine strength, quickness, you know, agility, things like that in measuring
- 1:12:58it up and gets healthy base it would be the Tampa Bay Rays. So
- 1:13:01they are certainly a team. When I see them moving guys up and down
- 1:13:04and out the lineup, I take notice and kind of follow suit. Yeah,
- 1:13:10I think you're right. I said, there's a blessing the curse of
- 1:13:13the of the Rays. They seem like they know what they're doing and it's
- 1:13:15gonna be gonna be tough. That said, Low is one of those guys
- 1:13:19that I'd be like, I would say buying, but like if somebody else
- 1:13:23is fully cutting bait with them, especially in a dynasty type format, I'm
- 1:13:27definitely, you know, interested in rolling the dice there because if he is
- 1:13:31still just banged up and it's just going to take some time to get that
- 1:13:33rust off and get healthy and he can start working his way back in.
- 1:13:38There's a lot of potential there, maybe more in a daily league than a
- 1:13:41weekly league just because of the platoon situation there. But I think there might
- 1:13:46be buy an opportunity. I just my faith for the rest of this year
- 1:13:49is limited until he really seems to break out of that, and so more
- 1:13:55long term, I'm a little bit more hopeful for Low. He's probably one
- 1:13:58of those that really would benefit from getting out of Tampa and just being thrust
- 1:14:01into full time playing time somewhere else, even against lefties, Like if he
- 1:14:05gets traded, I'd be much more interested in Josh Low. Yeah, just
- 1:14:10because from the counting stat perspective, he accrus so many steals for you that,
- 1:14:15yeah, Low and full playing time without having to worry about a platoon
- 1:14:17could be just like a monster player for the fancy game exactly. Okay,
- 1:14:24well, yeah we did it. We got through some of these top one
- 1:14:26hundred hitters. Like I said, I will link to Brew's piece in the
- 1:14:30show notes, so check it out there if you want more details on the
- 1:14:34ins and outs of the rankings. And like I said, we covered maybe
- 1:14:39some of the biggest movers, but certainly there were other guys either showing new
- 1:14:43skills. I think of tel Marte like he was another guy who really jumped
- 1:14:46up your list, and you provide great analysis on some other players like Cabrian
- 1:14:51Hayes for us. So check out Brew's work where He posted it this past
- 1:14:57Sunday on ras ball and yeah, brew I know that's where they can find
- 1:15:00you other weekends going forward, but let everybody else there know where they can
- 1:15:03find you on social media platforms as well. Yep, you can find me
- 1:15:08over at Twitter slash x whatever we're on these days, Jaybrewer one seven,
- 1:15:13find me there, Cooley, how about you? Yeah, you can find
- 1:15:16me on Twitter slash x at mCOL seven, same handle for Blue Sky.
- 1:15:23I will continue posting those waiver wire articles for you on rasball on Saturdays,
- 1:15:28where I can find the next jerks in profar for you, hopefully that I
- 1:15:32don't think there's any of them left on any free agent pools anymore, but
- 1:15:36if one crops up, we'll cover them on Saturdays on ras Ball. You
- 1:15:41can also check out some cards and category merchandise, which is down in the
- 1:15:45show link show notes as well, there's a link to the store to pick
- 1:15:49up hats, t shirts, baby onesies, whatever you might want with the
- 1:15:54Cards and Categories logo. If there's anything missing, certainly send an email to
- 1:15:59the pod at Cardscategories at gmail dot com or contact us on Twitter slash x
- 1:16:04at cards Categories. If you've made it to the end of this episode.
- 1:16:09We appreciate any ratings, reviews, feedback, comments, likes on any of
- 1:16:15the areas or spots where you're listening to podcasts. It really helps us find
- 1:16:19new audiences out there. And we're gonna wrap it up for this week.
- 1:16:23We will see you, same time, same place next week. Bye.