• J.J. Putz is off of the DL and back on the Diamondbacks bullpen. He threw a scoreless inning last night but he’s still behind Brad Ziegler as the Addison Reed handcuff. Reed had been diagnosed with a “tired arm” previously but he returned to the ninth inning in this afternoon’s game and struck out two Astros en route to his 16th save of the season. Reed’s fly ball tendencies and previous struggles this season should keep Ziegler on your roster a bit longer for speculative saves but the job is firmly in Reed’s hands.

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Episode 127

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is now live! Eno Sarris and Nicholas Minnix discuss Grant Balfour and the Rays’ bullpen, the Orioles’ bullpen, Joe Nathan, Tyler Skaggs and Hector Santiago, Eddie Butler and Tyler Matzek, Kevin Gausman, the much anticipated call-up of Gregory Polanco, a touch on Kendrys Morales, Manny Machado, and requested topics Carlos Gonzalez and Brett Lawrie, with more requested subjects coming in the next episode.

As usual, don’t hesitate to tweet us any fantasy questions you have so that we may answer them on our next episode.

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Judging from my twitter comments, it looks like there’s a window of opportunity for those of you that want to buy Kevin Gausman, for this year or for your keeper teams. But we know that Gausman has flaws. The question is: how likely is he to correct those flaws and become the fantasy superstar that his velocity and minor league record seems to suggest is possible?

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J.J. Hardy entered the season as the No. 14 shortstop on the consensus rankings, has ranked 28th in production to date and yet still ranks No. 15 on the latest shortstop consensus rankings. Obviously, then, there’s a fair amount of optimism that his slow start is going to turn around.

Because, well, yeah, Hardy has zero home runs to date despite having spent the last seven seasons as one of the more reliable power producers at the position. From 2007 to 2013, Hardy ranked fifth at the position in WAR, sixth in plate appearances, third in home runs, ninth in runs and fifth in RBI; the average and OBP were never great, but save for a down 2009-2010 pairing where he was limited by injuries (and a demotion), he’s been a rare and steady source of home runs and RBI at a position devoid of them.

And this year, he has gone deep exactly zero times, adding just 15 RBI in 222 plate appearances (he missed a handful of games with minor back and thigh ailments). So, what gives?
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As injuries start to pile up as we get closer and closer to the middle points of the season, specialists that either hit for power or steal some bases become a bit more attractive when looking on the waiver wire to fill holes.
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Agenda

1. Ideal Lineup Followup
2. Daily DFS
3. Wednesday Picks
4. Table

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It’s hard to put into words how excited I am was (note below) for tonight’s Cleveland-Kansas City match-up. In case you didn’t know, Corey Kluber and Yordano Ventura (thank you, Based God, for sparing his elbow for now) are squaring off tonight. Kluber’s 2014 dominance isn’t a secret. Ventura’s prowess and potential is well known thanks to his triple digit heat. But let’s get some numbers involved.

There’s a ton of sexiness in that chart. Obviously, Kluber’s been the better pitcher – only Felix Hernandez has been better in 2014. His peripherals have been impressive for quite some time, but so far, his run prevention stats have caught up as well. Despite the Indians’ terrible defense, he’s still rocking a sub 3.30 ERA. Rather impressive.

Ventura might lack results at this point, but he’s one of the most aesthetically pleasing pitchers in the game. We all know about his fastball, which has averaged a tick over 96 mph to this point. His change-up, however, seems to be overlooked a little. According to pitchf/x, 14.4% of the pitches he’s thrown thus far has been a change-up, and they’ve averaged 86.2 mph – roughly a 10 mph difference. That difference in mph, combined with the pitch’s movement, has lead to a swSTR of 15.3%.

Edit: Thanks to the rain, Jason Vargas was pushed back until tonight. I’m leaving the chart and notes because Ventura is awesome, and Kluber is still pitching. Thanks for nothing, weather. 

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It’s not cool to cheer for injuries, but for us dumpster-divers, well, sometimes guys getting hurt is what it takes to unearth opportunities. As it happens, the Diamondbacks have seen a couple of guys knocked to the sidelines in recent days, and while that’s unfortunate, we’d be remiss if we didn’t look at two players who are stepping up — both of whom have potential value in NL-only leagues.
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Rankings lists always result in a firestorm of comments as everyone values players differently. It’s hard enough to do such an exercise in the preseason, but in the middle of the season is even more difficult. How much do you weight such a small sample of performance when you have an entire body of work to analyze from a player? Is the skills change real or just a mirage? So like I did in the preseason, I’m going to compare my updated rankings with the rest of the crew. I removed my rankings from the consensus and then reordered it to get a truer picture of what the other guys are feeling. We’ll start with the catchers. I won’t include everyone, only the noteworthy names.

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Today marks the seventh anniversary of the final episode of “The Sopranos.” The last episode wasn’t at all what I expected — particularly the final scene — though I still find myself going back and watching select episodes of the show.

On today’s agenda:
1. Lonnie Chisenhall’s big day
2. Strong game from Scott Van Slyke
3. Michael Cuddyer to the disabled list
4. Grégory Polanco gets the call
5. The daily five

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