| | | | Wednesday, April 9, 2025 | | Let's talk about a player whose name may not have been mentioned once before in the Fantasy Baseball Today Newsletter: Kyren Paris. | | Why have we never said Paris' name before? Well, because despite some vaguely interesting power/speed numbers in the minors, he has always looked like a pretty fringe-y talent, thanks to a massive 31% strikeout rate across Double-A and Triple-A. For a guy with a max exit velocity of 110 mph, who only had four batted balls all last season over 105 mph, that was just way too much swing-and-miss for him to ever likely matter as anything more than a utility player. That's not the kind of player we tend to care about for Fantasy. | | But he homered Tuesday, his first in just 26 plate appearances, and is suddenly hitting .429/.538/.952 on the season. He's forcing the Angels into giving him real run here after he forced the team to carry him into the regular season after hitting .400/.449/.667 this spring. | | But this is just a small-sample-size start we can safely ignore, right? The minor-league track record is a lot more important than a few weeks to open the season, right? I'm inclined to lean that way, but it's worth noting that Paris did spend the offseason rebuilding his swing – a "180-degree swing change" according to Richard Schenck, Aaron Judge's personal hitting coach, who Paris worked with this spring. | | That's all we have to go on here. That and a good spring and then a few weeks to open the season, which really isn't very much at all. But it's not nothing, especially when Paris showed some intriguing skills that were being held back by his contact issues in the minors. If he's solved those, maybe there could be something here. | | Of course, with Zach Neto starting his minor-league rehab assignment this week, playing time in the Angels infield could be a lot harder to come by pretty soon. Paris might only have a week or two to keep making his case, so his margin for error here is awfully slim. | | I'm betting against Paris being someone who matters all season for Fantasy, but I'm at least somewhat open to the possibility. If you've got a roster spot to play with and don't have a high-priority need to fill – unlikely, given the rash of injuries around MLB in the past week, I know – I don't mind adding Paris in a categories league, just in case there's something real here. | | And with that, let's move on to some names we have talked about. Here's everything else you need to know about from Tuesday's action: | | | | Wednesday's top waiver-wire targets | | | | Here's who else we're looking to add coming out of Tuesday's action: | | Shane Smith, SP, White Sox (20%) – It's probably too late to say the White Sox pulled a diamond in the rough from the Rule 5 draft here, but I bet the Brewers wish they still had Smith, huh? He garnered nine whiffs on 83 pitches in this one against a lineup that doesn't swing-and-miss very much – he generated one especially ugly whiff from Steven Kwan, something you don't see very often – and rewarded anyone who streamed him. I think Smith is still mostly just a points league option thanks to his RP eligibility, but this start has me thinking there could be more there – especially when you look at his 29.6% strikeout rate, 7.6% walk rate, and 3.06 ERA in the minors last season. | | Josh Jung, 3B, Rangers (71%) – Talent has never really been the question for Jung, who hasn't even made it a week before requiring an IL stint in each of the past two seasons. Skepticism is needed, given his extensive injury history, but he is currently healthy after coming off the IL Tuesday, going 3 for 4 with a double, triple, run, and RBI. The only time he's managed to make it through most of a whole season healthy in 2023, Jung had 23 homers, 70 RBI, and 75 runs in 122 games, and there's 30-homer upside in a good lineup if he can avoid injuries this time. I understand if you're skeptical, but at least it won't cost you a draft pick to add him this time. | | Dillon Dingler, C, Tigers (8%) – Dingler probably needed a bigger role for the Tigers anyway, and with Jake Rogers going on the IL Tuesday, that's exactly what he's going to get. Dingler was never a big-time prospect, but he did hit .257/.344/.4589 in his minor-league career with solid power (and even better numbers in Triple-A), and now he's off to a nice start to this season, hitting .364 with his second homer Tuesday. I don't think he's a star or anything, but Dingler has enough pop to at least be worth a look if you're cycling through otherwise underwhelming options for your No. 2 catcher spot. | | | | Sean Murphy, C, Braves (39%) – Of course, the problem with adding Dingler is, Murphy is pretty widely available right now and I'd rather have him. I do think the Braves are going to be pretty careful about his playing time with top prospect Drake Baldwin around as his backup, but if Murphy can stay healthy and get back to even his 2023 levels of production, he's a must-start catcher in any two-catcher league. Go make sure he isn't available in yours. | | Landen Roupp, RP, Giants (27%) – We'll start with the caveat that the Reds are one of the best matchups in the league right now. Then we'll add that Roupp had just seven whiffs in this one, so he wasn't exactly dominant, despite allowing just one run in six innings of work. He did a good job of limiting hard contact, sure, but there was more contact than you typically prefer to see. I think could make a case for him being worth adding ahead of Smith, another RP-only pitcher, on the basis of Roupp being on a much better team, and his minor-league track record is probably a bit stronger. It'd just be nice to see some upside here from Roupp before viewing him as much more than a matchup-dependent SPaRP. | | Easton Lucas, SP, Blue Jays (7%) – Taking a shutout into the sixth inning against the Red Sox will get my attention, especially if it comes with eight strikeouts. I'm still mostly inclined to dismiss Lucas, who is 28 and has a limited track record of success as a starter. But that lack of experience as a starter might actually, weirdly, be a reason to give him a longer look. Before last season, he hadn't started a game since 2019, but he had some success pitching in longer chunks across three team's Triple-A affiliates in 2024, and now he's showing some flashes here in the Blue Jays rotation. He's probably just an AL-only target for now, but maybe there's some Bowden Francis funkiness going on here. | | | | Tuesday's standouts | | Tarik Skubal, vs. NYY: 6 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 6 K – After a couple of iffy starts, Skubal looked like himself in this one, and he probably could have gone even longer, but I'm guessing the Tigers decided to give him an early-ish hook due to the cold temperatures in Detroit. I have zero concerns about Skubal right now. | | Paul Skenes, Pirates vs. STL: 6 IP, 6 H, 5 ER, 1 BB, 7 K – I also have no concerns about Skenes, who gave up some rare loud contact but still had 15 swinging strikes in this one. He entered this start allowing a paltry 82.6 mph average exit velocity and a ton of ground balls, so he's allowed one iffy start. I don't expect there to be many of those as long as he's healthy. | | Garrett Crochet, Red Sox vs. TOR: 5.2 IP, 5 H, 1 ER, 4 BB, 5 K – Crochet admitted his stuff was "terrible " Tuesday, and went further, saying, "There really hasn't been a start this year where I feel like I've had my best stuff." And he has a 1.45 ERA, albeit with three unearned runs Tuesday and with just 17 strikeouts and seven walks in 18.2 innings of work overall, which is moderately disappointing. I'm not particularly concerned about Crochet, but I would be lying if I had the same amount of confidence with him as I have with Skubal and Skenes, simply because Crochet only really has a three-month track record as a high-level starting pitcher at basically any level. My concern coming in was about how he would hold up for a full season, so seeing him scuffling a bit early on is definitely not ideal. | | Chris Sale, Braves vs. PHI: 4.2 IP, 9 H, 5 ER, 0 BB, 5 K – Sale definitely hasn't looked sharp, failing to record a quality start in three straight outings – something he also did in his first three starts last season, albeit with significantly better underlying stats at the time. His four-seamer was sitting at just 92.7 mph in this one, more than two full ticks down from last season, which obviously isn't what you want. I certainly don't want to hit the panic button for Sale after three starts, but this isn't what we signed up for. | | Cole Ragans, Royals vs. MIN: 6 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 11 K – Finally, an ace who lived up to expectations. Ragans had everything working for him in this one, generating 18 swinging strikes on 96 pitches, led by nine with his changeup. His velocity is right where it was last season on average, but what's nice about Ragans is, even when his velocity dipped at the end of last season, his performance was never really affected. That's two double-digit strikeout outings in a row, so I think we can safely say Ragans is still an ace. | | Framber Valdez, Astros @SEA: 6 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 8 K – That's a nice bounceback from Valdez, who leaned on his curveball as his main pitch and garnered good results from it again. That was the approach that fueled his second-half breakout last season, and so far, he's up to 21 strikeouts in 18 innings of work, which is a good sign. If Valdez can be an above-average strikeout pitcher, it solves the one complaint people have about him as a Fantasy ace. It's still early, but this is a good start. | | Pablo Lopez, Twins @KC: 4.2 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 6 K – I wanted to highlight this piece from TwinsDaily.com about how Lopez has added a kick-change and moved a bit to the third-base side of the rubber this season, interesting changes for a pitcher who seemed like he had settled in as a boring, "you-know-what-you're-getting" type. And you should still read that breakdown of what's changed for Lopez here. But the bigger story here is that Lopez left the game after just 78 pitches due to hamstring tightness, an often ominous diagnosis. He'll undergo an MRI on his hamstring, and we should prepare to be without Lopez for a little while, given how tricky hamstring injuries tend to be. | | Luis Castillo, Mariners vs. HOU: 5 IP, 5 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 6 K – I would feel better about him if the fastball was still sitting at 95-plus mph, but I do think reports of Castillo's demise have been at least a little bit exaggerated. He isn't an ace anymore, but some people were talking about him like he was on the verge of falling apart, and I don't think we're close to there yet. He racked up 12 swinging strikes with his four-seamer in this one and it was good to see him finish with more strikeouts than innings pitched for the first time. I will note that Castillo has benefitted from all three starts coming at home so far, so we might not know where he's really at until he's away from the pitcher-friendly confines of T-Mobile Park. | | Sonny Gray, Cardinals @PIT: 5 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 4 K – Gray's velocity continues to fluctuate, and it was down 0.9 mph on pretty much all of his pitches Tuesday. That, combined with his exit after only 71 pitches feels a bit ominous, though I haven't seen any sign that this was the result of any kind of injury. If Gray hadn't dealt with an elbow injury last September, I'd probably ignore this, so let's just file that one away as something to watch – his early exit very well may have just been the result of the very cold weather in Pittsburgh. | | Shane Baz, Rays vs. LAA: 7 IP, 3 H, 2 ER, 4 BB, 6 K – We had to wait a full week for Baz's second start, and it was … fine. Underwhelming, probably. That's mostly relative to how dominant he was in his first one, as following up a 10-strikeout outing was always going to lead to disappointment. He wasn't bad, of course, but his fastball velocity was down 0.7 mph and his secondaries weren't working all that well for him – his curveball, which generated eight whiffs last time out, got just two this time. Again, Baz wasn't bad, so I'm not suggesting you need to panic, or anything. But after he showed signs of ace upside in his first outing, I was hoping we'd see a more exciting follow-up than this one, something to suggest Baz might be taking a true step forward. I'm not sure we can assume that after this one. | | Nick Lodolo , Reds @SF: 6 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 3 K – What's going on with the curveball? I know you turn to me for answers to those kinds of questions, but unfortunately, I just don't know! He lost his feel for the pitch in the second half of last season, but that was due to a finger injury that ultimately derailed his season, and Lodolo is, as far as I can tell, perfectly healthy right now. And yet only one swing and miss with the curveball in this one? He's getting less glove-side movement with the pitch than last year, which might help him command the pitch better, but could lead to fewer swinging strikes, which probably isn't a tradeoff I'd want Lodolo to make in the long run, given his lack of other reliable swing-and-miss pitches. We've got three quality starts in a row, so I can't complain too much. But with just eight strikeouts in 18.2 innings, I feel like I can complain at least a little bit. This isn't what I signed up for! | | Clay Holmes, Mets vs. MIA: 5.1 IP, 5 H, 4 ER, 3 BB, 10 K – Holmes pitched better than his line would make you think. He struggled in the first inning, and then locked in against an overmatched Marlins lineup, before running into a bit of bad luck in the sixth – and his bullpen did him no favors. It's still not ideal that, three starts into this experiment of him moving back to the rotation, we haven't seen one truly good start from Holmes, and I think the people who were drafting him as if this would be a smooth transition got out over their skis this spring. And I'd certainly prefer that his velocity didn't drop 1.8 mph in this one. But on the whole, I'm not dropping Holmes or anything. Not yet, at least. | | Jameson Taillon, Cubs vs. TEX: 6 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 1 BB, 6 K – I was worried about the upcoming schedule for Taillon, but it worked out here against a talented Rangers lineup that just hasn't found its way yet. You got a quality start out of him here, but it's still the Padres, Diamondbacks, and Phillies in the next three starts, so I'm still trying to steer clear. | | Charlie Morton, Orioles @ARI: 5 IP, 4 H, 4 ER, 5 BB, 4 K – Charlie Morton is 62% rostered. He doesn't need to be. | | Ben Lively, Guardians vs. CHW: 5 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 3 BB, 4 K – You got a decent, not great outing from Lively if you streamed him against this great matchup. I wouldn't push my luck against the Royals the next time out. | | News and notes | | It was a rough day for the Padres Tuesday. First, Jackson Merrill was placed on the IL with a hamstring issue. Then Fernando Tatis left the game with a shoulder injury, while Jake Cronenworth left with a leg injury. The severity of the latter two injuries isn't known yet, but with Tatis' history of shoulder issues, that one is especially concerning. | | Matt McLain was placed on the IL with a left hamstring strain. That probably should've happened a few days ago, but he was backdated and could be back in a week if the injury isn't too serious. With hamstrings, you're usually better off assuming the minimum stay on the IL will be too optimistic, but that's just my perspective. | | Wyatt Langford left Tuesday night due to right side tightness. It's a little concerning since he dealt with a left oblique injury during spring training, but we don't have any further details as of Tuesday evening. | | Pablo Lopez left his start early due to right hamstring tightness. He will get an MRI on Wednesday, but the injury is thought to be minor at this point. | | Zach Eflin is going on the IL with a low-grade lat strain. He's shut down from throwing for a week. Kyle Gibson will probably get his timetable to the majors accelerated, but he probably won't matter for most Fantasy players. | | Jonny DeLuca was placed on the IL with a right shoulder strain. | | He's expected to miss 2-4 weeks. The Rays started Christopher Morel, Kam Misner, and Jake Mangum in the outfield Tuesday, and all three could be Fantasy relevant if they get hot. | | Blake Snell, who's on the IL with a shoulder injury, will be shut down from throwing until Monday. It sounds like it should be a pretty short IL stay, but I'm not sure a minimum-length stay is all that likely. | | Spencer Arrighetti was placed on the IL with a fractured right thumb. They haven't said anything on a timetable, but I'd guess we won't see him until mid-May at the earliest. | | Reynaldo Lopez underwent arthroscopic shoulder surgery Tuesday and will be shut down for 12 weeks. And then he'll need to build back up, so in a best-case scenario you're probably talking about an August return. I'm dropping him anywhere I don't have unlimited IL spots, basically. | | Spencer Strider has a target of about 90 pitches for his rehab start Thursday, which is likely to be his final one before being activated. | | CJ Abrams has missed two straight due to right thigh tightness. | | Nestor Cortes received a PRP injection in his left elbow but remains without a timetable. | | Lane Thomas left after getting hit by a pitch on the right wrist. He was diagnosed with a contusion, hopefully nothing more. | | Francisco Alvarez will begin a rehab assignment Wednesday. He's on the IL with a hamate fracture in his left hand and will probably need at least two weeks of games before he's ready. He remains worth stashing. | | Victor Robles was diagnosed with a small fracture in the humeral head of his left shoulder and is expected to be sidelined at least 12 weeks. | | Josh Lowe is moving pretty pain-free, according to manager Kevin Cash. Lowe is on the IL with a Grade 2 right oblique strain and is still a ways away from returning. | | Ranger Suarez will begin a rehab assignment at Single-A on Thursday. He's on the IL with lower-back stiffness. | | Landon Knack will start Wednesday for the Dodgers. He has some talent, but I'll need to see something from him at the MLB level before saying he's worth adding. | | | | | | | | UEFA Champions League | | Golazo Network | The UEFA Champions League Quarterfinals continues on today with coverage starting at 2 PM ET. Don't miss a moment, streaming exclusively on Paramount+!
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