After striking out more than a third of opposing batters he faced during his time at Double-A and Triple-A this season, Astros prospect Joshua James finally got the call to make his Major League debut on Saturday. Given the stacked Astros rotation, it wasn’t that much of a surprise that it took until rosters expanded for James to get his chance. It turned out to be a mixed bag of a start, which is to be expected during a pitcher’s first career Major League start. But let’s rewind for a moment and learn how James got to this point.

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At the beginning of this week, I identified and discussed a group of hitters who suffered through miserable slumps at the beginning of the season, only to return to form, or better, the rest of the way. I then did the same for some of the players who enjoyed fantastic performances in April, just to regress back to what had always been expected the rest of the way. Though this was by no means an exhaustive study, the lesson for all these players is to trust their entire body of work, not the small sample of a month.

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In just a couple of days, rosters will expand, new faces will be recalled, and you’ll have a slew of choices for your deep league teams. But until that time, you’re still stuck with the same group of mehs. Here are two recommendations.

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Yesterday, I cherry-picked a group of hitters who suffered through miserable Aprils, only to return to form, or better, ever since the calendar flipped to May. It wasn’t the most convincing of arguments to trust the hitter’s entire body of work, but it did serve as a reminder that you shouldn’t make hasty moves based on such a small sample of performance. Today, I’ll discuss some hitters who had monster Aprils, but have predictably regressed to what we expected the rest of the way.

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With just a little more than a month of the season to go, it’s easy to forget who the April heroes and zeroes were. You complained when your supposed-to-be-star stunk up the joint in April, but now that it’s the end of August and he’s doing what you expected, you are thankful you didn’t foolishly drop the player. Let’s look at some of April’s biggest disappointments that have been as good as advertised since the calendar flipped to May. These examples remind us to trust the hitter’s entire body of work, not just the last couple of weeks.

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Every season there are numerous starting pitchers who surprise, rewarding those owners who spent heavily on hitting during the draft, with a plan of rostering cheaper breakout/sleeper type pitchers and improving their staff during the season. Though these three surprises haven’t earned a ton of mixed league value, they weren’t really even forecasted to return positive value in even mono leagues. Let’s discuss the trio, who all happen to be left-handed.

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Need an outfielder in your deep league? Here are two options.

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I feel like there hasn’t been nearly enough fanfare that we’re witnessing not just one amazing rookie campaign, but two in the National League East. Ronald Acuna was perhaps the most anticipated prospect to make his debut this season, while Juan Soto was decidedly less so. Although clearly a strong prospect, I admittedly never even heard of the guy. Maybe because each of them opened the season in the minors and have accrued just over 300 plate appearances, which is essentially half a season, you might not realize how incredible they have performed offensively. Their owners are certainly smiling ear to ear, but the more important question is which we should prefer to own next year. Obviously, we still have over a month of the season left and things could change. But let’s take an early stab at answering the question.

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Prospects, prospects, prospects! Back on July 25th, I recommended stashing Sean Reid-Foley. It wasn’t because I’m fond of hyphenated last names (I am!), but because in a deep league, finding a starting pitcher with true strikeout potential is gold. Over the last couple of days, it has been reported that three more prospects will or at likely to, make their debuts either during this upcoming week or before the season ends. Let’s discuss them.

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Every so often, I like to peruse recent starting pitcher performance, as skills seemingly change far more often than for hitters. That’s because all it might take is an added pitch, ditching of one, or simply changing the mix. So let’s discuss some of the surprises that appear near inside the top 20 over the last 30 days, our of 93 qualified pitchers.

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