Tuesday’s lowly owned starters are a sad lot. Some decent arms have their ownership up like Daniel Mengden and Tyler Anderson. It’s like “Aces and Duds” today.

Just eyeballing some names, I may hold off and use some the guys going Wednesday (e.g. Andriese, Ynoa, Leiter)

Rafael Montero (3% owned) vs Atlanta (R.A. Dickey)

Montero is a perfectly good option for a team needing just strikeouts and Wins and doesn’t care about their ERA and WHIP. The game against Atlanta is winnable and Montero is averaging 8.6 K/9 as a starter. His value gets destroyed by the 5.0 BB/9 and the problem it causes to WHIP and ERA.
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We’ll be writing each day up again like last week, but here’s a quick primer on the pitching slate next week for possibly available arms.

*all stats cited for the 2nd half unless otherwise noted

Lefty

Tyler Anderson v. MIA – It is in Coors, but MIA has the 4th-worst wOBA v. lefties (.304) in the second half thanks to just a .126 ISO.

Brent Suter v. CIN – CIN has the 26th wOBA v. lefties (.305).

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Continuing our series of looking at widely available starters who might be worth a stream down the stretch, here is a look at Sunday. Tough slate with a general lack of really intriguing arms and then some of the ones who are appealing have to face very difficult matchups. These are ranked in order of how much I like them:

Luiz Gohara, ATL (4%) v. PHI (Pivetta)

He walked four in four during his MLB debut, but he’s been walk-free in his last two starts – both against Washington – allowing five earned in 12.3 IP with 10 K. Facing Texas and then Washington twice to open your MLB career is brutal, so this will be his best matchup by far. The Phillies are 27th in wOBA against lefties with a .308 mark. You might want to hang onto him for next week at Miami if this goes well.

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Quite a few aces (and Matt Harvey) are throwing on Saturday so owners may not have many open slots but here are some lowly owned starters. While I normally limit my ownership rate to 10%, I bumped it up to increase the options.

Henderson Alvarez (1% owned) vs Braves (Julio Teheran)

Starting Alvarez is like playing Russian roulette with five chambers filled. It may kind of possibly end up good, but likely not. The basic issue is that it’s about impossible to have a feel for his talent level with spotty starts since coming back from shoulder surgery. Instead of trying to make sense of the rehab starts, I will let Steamer and Zips do the work. They put him with a near 5.00 ERA and 5.5 K/9. If those stats along with a possible Win, if he can make it five innings, against Teheran and the Braves are usable, start him.

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Continuing my Quick Looks series, today looks at a pair of NL East arm…

Mark Leiter

It’s like the 26-year-old righty didn’t exist before this season. I like to look at previous reports on popup guys to see what has changed. I was able to find one report on him at 2080baseball.com.

“A senior sign out of New Jersey Institute of Technology, he certainly got on some radars when he posted a 20-strikeout game his senior year before being drafted by his favorite hometown team, the Phillies. He doesn’t have pure “stuff” – his fastball barely touches 90 – but he’s a smart pitcher who works with what he has and has posted a 3.37 career ERA in 95 games, 69 of them starts, over 445 2/3 innings. He underwent shoulder surgery prior to the 2016 season but enjoyed a strong campaign that summer and now gets his call-up just a few games into his Triple-A debut.”

It’s not exciting but it’s at least a starting point. Now to move onto the starts I watched. There are no good camera angles for any of his starts. The best was against the Mets (9/4) when he lasted just three innings (video from it). Also, I watch his last start at home (9/15) against Oakland to see if anything changed.

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I’ll be looking at starters owned in less than 30% of CBS leagues.

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The march towards inning caps and strikeout titles continues with today’s lowly owned pitchers (<10% in Yahoo! leagues)

Gabriel Ynoa (0% owned) vs. Rays (Matt Andriese)

I spent way too much time analyzing Ynoa (I’ve decided to do a Quick Look on him and Leiter tomorrow). He’s shown some major-league talent and may just be one pitch from being a top-50 starting pitcher.

The 24-year-old throws a 4-seamer, sinker,  and a slider. He throws his slider (35%) more than either fastball (28% for each) to help his strikeout numbers. This season, he has allowed an above average rate of flyballs (32% GB%) but maintained a respectable 1.1 HR/9. His 7.6 K/9 is reasonable, especially paired up with a 1.9 BB/9. Both values are in line with his recent minor-league performance. Signs point to a potential sleeper but I have my doubts about a pitcher’s upside with only one breaking pitch.

I would gladly start him this game against Tampa who leads the majors in striking out. My only reservation is if he gives up too many home runs in Camden Yards and runs up his ERA.

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I’m continuing Jeff’s series of looking at widely available starters who might be worth a stream in the final days of the season. I think Jeff was using a 10% or lower threshold, but I bumped it to 20% for one guy because I think he’ll still be out there in a ton of leagues and worth a scoop. These are ranked in order of how much I like them, but I’ll have a concise ranking at the bottom that shows the drop offs in confidence:

Tyler Chatwood, COL (18%) at SF (Moore)

Chatwood on the road has been one of the more bankable streamers for the last two seasons. Last year, he posted a nice 1.69 ERA in 80 IP away from Coors, in spite of a meager 1.7 K/BB ratio. He’s up to 3.41 in 71.3 IP this year while actually lowering his K/BB down to 1.5. He has a career 1.67 ERA, 0.91 WHIP, and 3.0 K/BB ratio at AT&T Park over 43 IP, including just 1 ER in 22 IP there since the start of last year.

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Our series on low ownership starters continues with those pitchers owned in less than 10% of Yahoo! leagues who are expected to throw Tuesday.

Travis Wood (1% at Yahoo) vs Diamondbacks (Zack Godley)

I put the minimum strikeout rate needed for streaming consideration at 6.5 K/9. Wood just meets the benchmark but that’s it for his positive traits. His BB/9 is a 4.2. He has a 6.80 ERA. His ERA estimators are near 5.50. He’s facing Zack Godley and Diamondbacks, so the Win chances are slim. Probably look elsewhere.

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Here’s your daily dose of lowly owned starters. When Ubaldo Jimenez is the top choice, owners should know today’s pickings are slim.

Max Fried (1% owned) vs Mets (Jacob deGrom)

I can’t come up with a reason to start Fried. Also, I can’t come up with a good pun. His strikeout rate (6.5 K/9 with upside) is acceptable for these lowly owned starters but that’s where the positive traits end. He’s always had walk issues and his walk rate (5.9 BB/9) is almost higher than his strikeouts. His near five ERA (4.70) is near his ERA estimators. Also, he hasn’t gone far into his games to even get a Win averaging just 4.1 IP per start. The low strikeout and low win chances mean a pass for me.

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