American League

Angels

• Niko Kavadas (DH) only starts against righties.

• Mickey Moniak mainly starts in center field with Kevin Pillar starting about a third of the time. Read the rest of this entry »

8/30/24

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live. Support the show by subscribing to our Patreon!!

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2-START FOR WEEK 23

• Eduardo Rodriguez LAD, at HOU
• Brayan Bello at NYM, CHW
• Kyle Freeland at ATL, at MIL
• Chris Flexen 플렉센 at BAL, at BOS
• Brant Hurter at SDP, at OAK

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While the NFBC Main Event garners most of the attention, there are a handful of leagues with even a larger entry fee ($2.5K to $15K). They were originally named “High Stakes Leagues” and there are ten of them. With so much money on the line, these fantasy managers try to gain any advantage. Most of the time, these managers will be a week or two ahead of everyone else on their adds. Here are the players and some information on the ones added in five or more leagues. Read the rest of this entry »

General

Keep a list of articles on late-season options for next season. Teams will eventually look to the same subs and it’s a good idea to have some evaluation of their talent. Here are some articles from Pitcher List on pitching and hitting stashes. Read the rest of this entry »

8/28/24

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live. Support the show by subscribing to our Patreon!!

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• @justinmasonfwfb – Co-Host/Producer

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SURGING ARMS DOWN THE STRETCH (L30 Leaderboard)

• Bryan Woo/Bryce Miller – been great all yr, but deserve some love
• Sean Manaea – 2.90 ERA, 0.90 WHIP, 24% K-BB in L7 
• Bowden Francis – 1.33 ERA, 0.44 WHIP, 32% K-BB in L4
• Ryne Nelson – 2.76 ERA, 0.95 WHIP, 21% K-BB in L10

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Ewww, ugly board after the lock starters. And even some of the locks have wicked matchups (Hunter Brown, Sonny Gray, Bowden Francis, Cristopher Sánchez, and Brady Singer all facing top 6 offenses v. their respective handedness). The 2-x guys are either would-be 3-x’s who aren’t super trustworthy right now (Kutter Crawford,  Bobby Miller) or a complete wildcard who has impressed of late but still not sure we know who he is as a pitcher (Keider Montero). Just be careful out there, y’all!

Brayan Bello absolutely smoked the Jays tonight with 8 shutout innings, allowing just 2 hits and a walk with 9 punchies in his best start of the season. That doesn’t necessarily give me more confidence in Crawford, though, as he’s struggling more than Bello was ahead of this start. Crawford’s toting an 8.13 ERA, 1.26 WHIP, and 11% K-BB in his last 7 starts.

Miller was strong last time out (6 IP/3 ER/0 BB/7 Ks), but that was against Tampa Bay which is way different than facing Baltimore. He did still allow 2 HRs to account for all 3 of those runs. That’s a shakyyy 2-x reco. Just saying I could see it in 12s and 15s, but it’s more of an upside shoot-the-moon play. Hayden Birdsong and Cade Povich are even deeper Hail Mary shots.

I know Francis draws the difficult Red Sox, but he is absolutely dialed in right now and I just can’t see passing on the start: 1.91 ERA, 0.61 WHIP, 26% K-BB in 33 IP since returning on July 29th. In that span, his ranks in those categories are 5th, 1st, and 7th in baseball (min. 25 IP).

Speaking of dialed in, Ryne Nelson’s been on fire even longer with a 2.76 ERA, 0.95 WHIP, 21% K-BB in 62 IP since July 1st. He ranks 12th, 8th, and 18th in that time, though unfortunately is just 4-0 despite Arizona playing well and going 8-2 during those 10 outings.

By the way, MacKenzie Gore possibly finding his footing again with a 2nd straight gem (6 IP/2 ER/6 Ks, W v. NYY) on a night when Dylan Crews hit his first MLB HR and James Wood steals 3 bases as they go 4-for-8 with 3 RBI, 2 R has to give Nats fans some hope.

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When you have a pitch that can be thrown in the zone, induce weak contact, and get called strikes, you throw it and you throw it often. However, last season (2023) the sinker’s usage hit its lowest point within the Statcast era among starting pitchers, down to 13.9%. A slight resurgence this season has brought its usage up to 15.0%. Compared to a 22.8% usage in 2015, the start of the statcast era, the sinker no longer sits at the popular kid’s lunch table.

However, if we change the split to view the sinkers utilization by relievers, we see the resurgence started earlier and with a little more gusto:

Relievers have been doing crazy things with their sinkers when you look at the data. The obvious ones like throwing it faster with more movement are apparent, but throwing it in unusual locations seems to be a thing. While all those small changes are occurring, we can still rely on what is happening on average to help us make quick comparisons. For example, a swinging strike rate of 10% on a four-seam fastball is average. A 10% swinging strike rate on a sinker is really good. This post serves to help navigate benchmark statistics on the sinker.

Four-seamers | Sinkers | Cutters
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We haven’t really seen Skenes limited so he’s still a full-go starter.

Bibee’s 2.86 ERA since May 13th is tied for 7th-best, juuust behind Wheeler and Ragans at 2.85 and Skubal at 2.83 in that same time period. I bring this up only because there was some concern about Bibee because of his 4.91 ERA in the 8 starts before that despite a solid 18% K-BB. The 1.3 HR9 was a big issue and he’s shaved it down to 0.9 during this current 17-start run.

Musgrove and E-Rod have looked a lot more like themselves over their last 3 starts and I’ve got them back in the lineup everywhere without incident. It doesn’t mean they are risk-free or anything, just that I’m once again trusting them at a level in line with their name value.

Arrighetti seems to have turned a corner with his 7 shutout IP v. COL which kickstarted a 3.53 ERA, 1.10 WHIP, 24% K-BB in 58.7 IP after a rough 6.36 ERA through his first 13 starts that included two 7 ER starts.

TOR’s offensive surge of late is giving me some pause with mid-tier arms. I’m certainly open to starting Bello, but not racing to do so.

I consider myself pretty open to extreme runs on either end from just about any player over a given month, but I cannot fathom how many bold predictions I would’ve had to go through to get to Bido reeling off a 1.17 ERA, 0.87 WHIP, and 16% K-BB in his L4 starts (23 IP). And yet, here we are! I can see starting him in 10s in the right context, but it’s not a must in Cincy.

Leiter returns to the majors with the best possible matchup and he’s looked much better in the minors of late, highlighted by 44 Ks in his last 28 IP.

I barely trust Buehler in good matchups right now so I’m certainly not starting him v. BAL.

I’ll have my chat at 1pm CT today (Wednesday) if you have any questions!

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History made!

June 26th: Danny Jansen catches for the Blue Jays vs the Red Sox. The game was suspended by rain.

The game resumed today with Danny Jansen catching for the Red Sox vs the Blue Jays.

The first player in MLB History to play for both teams in the same game pic.twitter.com/zS9CQxZGtK

— Barstool Sports (@barstoolsports) August 26, 2024

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I am so sorry about dropping the ball on the 2-start sheet today. It slipped my mind this morning and I committed to some other tasks that ate up most of my day. Of the 2-start guys whose team didn’t play Monday meaning they can still be adjusted in the lineup at a lot of outlets, here is what I’m thinking:

• Pfaadt is starting everywhere even w/a tough NYM and LAD combo
• Lodolo is 15s and deeper eligible even w/OAK playing better in general and MIL lurking on the weekend, but there is big risk given his poor Aug. (8.84 ERA in 18.3 IP)
• Cueto is one of my favorite SPs ever so full bias on the table but at DET/v. SEA is enticing. DET’s young roster is playing better of late (5.6 R/G w/a 6-2 record in the L8), but I’d still take a shot in 15s where I’m trying to catch lightning in a bottle.
• Myers is starting everywhere. I know the sparkling 2.85 ERA isn’t fully supported by his metrics but even 5-6 IP w/3-4 ER in each outing puts him in a good spot to pull win.
• Manaea is a lineup lock right now so even though the at ARI isn’t easy, he can hopefully make up any potential damage w/the at CHW weekend start.
• Webb is a must-start in all formats, of course.
• Heaney has an amazing 2-step w/at CHW and v. OAK (again, all respect to OAK playing competently and their strength of HRs is Heaney’s weakness, but I’m still starting him everywhere).

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