| | | | Wednesday, March 26, 2025 | | One day left until Opening Day ... | | It's (almost) all over except for the lineup-setting. I've got one draft left tonight, and a few of you probably do too, so here, for the last time, is our Draft Day Cheat Sheet with everything you need to make sure you're ready. | | For the rest of us, it's on to Week 1. In today's newsletter, we're looking at the best and worst hitting matchups for Week 1, plus the best sleeper pitcher options, both from Scott White. He'll have the skinny on the fringe options to consider streaming every week, and we'll have that here for you every week moving forward on Monday morning to make sure you're ready to set your lineups. | | Before we get to that, however, let's run down the last-minute news you need to know about from around MLB yesterday: | | Cam Smith officially made the Astros roster – All signs – and several reports – pointed this direction, and it's happening. Smith is extremely unproven as a professional, so we don't have a ton to go on here besides draft capital (he was the No. 14 pick last year) and the Astros' evident enthusiasm for him. He's not the highest probability bet, but he deserves to be drafted in all Fantasy formats around the 200th pick for upside alone. Jared Jones will avoid surgery – Jones has no torn ligaments in his elbow, per MLB.com, and thus will not require surgery. He will still be shut down for six weeks to let the injury recover before restarting a throwing program, which probably puts him on the shelf until June at the earliest. There's no guarantee he gets through this with the same stuff – or avoids a more serious setback – but for now, he's a viable late-round target in leagues with IL spots. Carmen Mlodzinski will be the Pirates' fifth starter ahead of a few more exciting options who were sent back to the minors, and he probably only matters in NL-only leagues. Aroldis Chapman will be the Red Sox closer – This one doesn't really come as much of a surprise, as Liam Hendriks just didn't look like his old self this spring. Chapman can still be serviceable in the role while racking up big strikeout numbers, and should be rostered in all leagues where saves matter. Evan Carter was optioned to Triple-A – I was hoping for a bounceback season from Carter, but he just didn't look right this spring. He had a back injury that ultimately required surgery in the offseason, and while there's still some upside here when he eventually gets the call again, he'll need to give us – and the Rangers – something to get excited about down in Round Rock before he's worth our attention. Ben Brown will be the Cubs No. 5 starter – I'll admit, this one comes as something of a surprise – he pitched out of the bullpen in the team's opening series against the Dodgers in Tokyo and didn't exactly dominate this spring. But Brown has put up big strikeout numbers at every level, including in the majors, thanks to his wicked curveball. There's plenty of upside here, and he's worth a late-round pick in most leagues if you're looking for a high-upside pitcher to stash. Grayson Rodriguez will attempt to throw a bullpen session this week – Rodriguez is working his way back from elbow inflammation, but he's making good progress after imaging revealed no structural damage. He probably has a month of rehab ahead of him before he can get back to the rotation, and there's no guarantee the stuff will be there after his velocity was down this spring. But I'll be stashing Rodriguez anywhere I can as long as he's working his way back. Connor Norby is out four weeks with an oblique strain – This is a bummer for a guy looking to build on a solid rookie season. Norby is a pretty fringe option in 12-team leagues, but if he can replicate last year's success, there's 20-homer, 10-steal upside here, so hopefully he's back on the field sometime in April. Luke Jackson could get saves for the Rangers – We've been treating Chris Martin as the default option for saves all preseason, but the Rangers notably never actually came out and named him the closer. And manager Bruce Bochy told reporters he expects things to be "pretty close" to how he deployed the bullpen in Tuesday's exhibition game, which saw Martin worth the eighth inning while Jackson got the ninth. That's not concrete, but it's enough to push Jackson into the late-round speculative save discussion. | | Alright, let's put all that drafting behind us and actually get those players in our lineups. It's time for Week 1. | | | | Week 1 Preview | | | | Most weeks, this preview is going to be pretty straightforward, but not Week 1. Because "Week 1" means different things in different leagues. Most leagues are just going to count the games from Thursday through Sunday as Week 1, with the subsequent Week 2 beginning Monday serving as the first full week of the Fantasy season. Which means you're mostly starting your studs, especially because the handful of teams that are set to play four games this week are likely to be pretty generous with days off this weekend, leading to many players only playing three games even if they're scheduled for four. | | (Which reminds me: Do not worry when a player gets a day off this weekend. Most managers like to get everyone involved in the first series of the season before settling into a routine lineup, so you should expect even "everyday" players to get a day off early on, especially for players who are less experienced. It doesn't necessarily mean anything is amiss.) | | But some leagues will be combining the first two "weeks" of the season into one longer scoring format, running from March 27 through April 6. The benefit of that is that every pitcher is on more or less even footing, with most projected starters likely to start twice between now and then; the downside is, if one of your players gets hurt this weekend, you're stuck with them in your lineup for an extra-long time. For this week, we'll focus on both schedule types, but moving forward, our weekly preview newsletter -- which will come out Monday mornings, by the way -- will be a bit more streamlined than this. | | | | Waiver Priorities | | Earlier this week, I wrote about the top waiver-wire targets for the first run, and while some of the roster rates have surely changed since then, most of the names are going to still be pretty relevant. Scott usually focuses on players in the 60-80% rostered range for his sleeper pitchers and hitters, so I'll focus on lower-end options here: | | C: Ivan Herrera, Cardinals (44%) – Deep-league target: Hunter Goodman, Rockies (8%)1B: Spencer Torkelson, Tigers (36%) – Deep-league target: Gavin Sheets, Padres (5%) 2B: David Hamilton, Red Sox (34%) – Deep-league target: Curtis Mead, Rays (11%) 3B: Joseph Ortiz, Brewers (28%) – Deep-league target: Brett Baty, Mets (17%) SS: Jacob Wilson, Athletics (27%) – Deep-league target: Max Muncy , Athletics (2%)OF: Victor Scott II, Cardinals (19%), J.J. Bleday, Athletics (48%), Matt Wallner, Twins (48%) – Deep-league targets: Alan Roden, Blue Jays (6%), Jordan Beck, Rockies (8%)SP: Casey Mize, Tigers (38%), Jack Leiter, Rangers (34%), Max Meyer, Marlins (39%) – Deep-league targets: Cade Povich, Orioles (10%), Chris Paddack, Twins (9%)RP: Kris Bubic, Royals (41%), Aroldis Chapman, Red Sox (55%) – Deep-league target: Scott Barlow, Reds (2%), Marc Church, Rangers (4%) | | Pitching Preview | | Every week, Scott White will give us the top sleeper pitchers plus his rankings of the projected two-start pitchers for the upcoming week. Two-start pitchers aren't really relevant this week, so we're focusing on the short Week 1 and the longer Week 1+. | | Top sleeper pitchers for Week 1 | | Jose Soriano, SP, Angels @CHWDrew Rasmussen, RP, Rays vs. COL Nick Martinez, RP, Reds vs. SFTomoyuki Sugano, SP, Orioles @TOR Taj Bradley , SP, Rays vs. COL | | Soriano hasn't been on too many radars this spring, but he has some pretty interesting skills -- huge groundball rates plus a very good curveball to generate whiffs with. He reworked his slider this spring with the hopes of it being another putaway pitch, and there could be some sneaky upside here. Rasmussen is also more interesting after Shane McClanahan's nerve injury guaranteed him a spot in a five-man rotation. The Rockies are one of the more exploitable matchups when they are on the road, so I like him here. | | Top sleeper pitchers for Week 1+ | Jose Soriano, SP, Angels @CHW, vs. CLEJustin Verlander, SP, Giants @CIN, vs. SEA
Mitch Keller, SP, Pirates @MIA, vs. TB Casey Mize, SP, Tigers @SEA, vs. CHWChris Paddack, SP, Twins @CHW, vs. HOU | | It's hard to ask for a softer landing spot for Mize, who added another tick or two to his fastball and tweaked his slider grip to give himself another couple of looks with his breaking balls. The nice thing here is, if Mize does well, great, you might have a useful Fantasy option on your hands; if he struggles in Seattle and against the White Sox , though, you can probably feel pretty good about dropping him. Paddack is in a similar spot after he showed some surprising swing-and-miss upside late in the spring. If he doesn't do well against the White Sox, we can probably write him off as a potential difference-maker. | | | | Hitting preview | | Before we get to the best sleeper hitters for Week 1, let's take a look at the best and worst hitter matchups this weekend: | | Best hitter matchups for short Week 1 | 1. Red Sox @TEX4
2. Pirates @MIA4
3. Marlins PIT4
4. Rays COL3
5. Angels @CHW3 | | Worst hitter matchups for short Week 1 | 1. Reds SF3
2. Phillies @WAS3
3. Tigers @LAD3
4. Cardinals MIN3
5. Guardians @KC3 | | Top sleeper hitters for short Week 1 | Lourdes Gurriel, OF, Diamondbacks CHC4 Jorge Soler, OF, Angels @CHW3Michael Toglia, 1B, Rockies @TB3 Matt Wallner, OF, Twins @STL3 Taylor Ward, OF, Angels @CHW3
| | This is a funny list because, for the most part, they are exactly the kinds of guys who look a lot less interesting during draft season than they will be once the season starts. In drafts, we're always chasing upside, almost to the exclusion of everything else, and these guys mostly don't have that, which tends to push them down. But they're nice to have around when all those upside picks inevitably flame out. | | The one exception here is Toglia, who has legitimate upside as a potential 30-homer hitter with double-digit steals speed. The biggest question is whether he'll manage a merely bad batting average, rather than last season's nearly unplayable .218 mark. I'm a believer. | | Best hitter matchups for Week 1 | 1. Blue Jays BAL4, WAS3, @NYM3
2. Angels @CHW3, @STL3, CLE3
3. Red Sox @TEX4, @BAL3, STL3
4. Pirates @MIA4, @TB3, NYY3
5. Rays COL3, PIT3, @TEX3 | | Worst hitter matchups for Week 1+ | 1. Dodgers DET3, ATL3, @PHI3
2. Giants @CIN3, @HOU3, SEA3
3. Padres ATL4, CLE3, @CHC3
4. Nationals PHI3, @TOR3, ARI3
5. Orioles @TOR4, BOS3, @KC3 | | Top sleeper hitters for Week 1+ | | Lourdes Gurriel, OF, Diamondbacks CHC4, @NYY3, @WAS3Jorge Soler, OF, Angels @CHW3, @STL3, CLE3Michael Toglia, 1B, Rockies @TB3, @PHI3, ATH3Matt Wallner, OF, Twins @STL3, @CHW3, HOU3Jonathan Aranda, 1B, Rays COL3, PIT3, @TEX3 | | Wallner and Aranda's value will likely depend on what the probable pitchers for their upcoming series look like, and the tough thing about this part of the season is, that's harder to pin down than usual. In part because there are usually some extra days off, which might lead teams to shuffle their rotation more than usual. We're also dealing with an extra four days of schedule to account for, which is four extra days for the projected schedule of pitchers to change. Both Wallner and Aranda should start against all righties, but they might be strict platoon players early on, so don't be surprised if there are a few extra days off sprinkled in here. For what it's worth, both are only scheduled to face one left-hander in the first 11 days of the season. For now. | | | | | | | | Golazo Network | | Highlights & Analysis | Watch LIVE global soccer coverage on the CBS Sports Golazo Network, available FOR FREE on the CBS Sports App, Pluto TV and streaming on Paramount+.
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