| | | | Monday, June 2, 2025 | | We've got a whole lot to get to before we get you ready to set your lineups for Week 11, including a couple of bit prospect promotions and some big injury news. And if you want more help setting your lineup or making any trades, head to the comments of our Week 11 Waiver Wire column and leave your question. I'll be answering them tomorrow at 2 pm, so I hope we hear from you! | | Now here's what you need to know before you set your Week 11 lineups: | | Week 11 Preview | | | | Jac Caglianone is getting the call, and that's very exciting -- he's one of the top prospects in baseball after hitting 15 homers in the first 49 games of his season. There's legit 40-homer potential here, and there really aren't many red flags in his contact profile -- he has struck out 20% of the time this season and has a perfectly reasonable 31% chase rate and 87% in-zone contact rate so far in Triple-A. I would expect there to be some strikeout issues here given his size and aggressive swing, but he's a must-add player in all formats for the upside alone. | | And Caglianone isn't alone. Before we get to the rest of the top waiver-wire targets for Week 11, here are four other players who were promoted this weekend (or will be promoted this week) who are worth a look: | | Cole Young, SS, Mariners -- Young has a terrific approach at the plate, with more walks than strikeouts so far at Triple-A. There isn't a ton of power or foot speed, but he has a career-high of 11 homers and 23 steals, and combined with what could be a .270 batting average, that's a fairly interesting player. He isn't a must-roster player, but Young is worth a flier, especially since he'll be eligible at the much shallower second base position with three more appearances. Coby Mayo, 3B, Orioles -- The Orioles haven't done Mayo any favors with their handling of him over the past few seasons, but he also hasn't taken advantage of the opportunities he has had. He is still a .267/.363/.522 with 42 homers in 196 games at Triple-A, but he has struggled to make contact this time around. With Ryan Mountcastle on the IL, Mayo has another chance here, so let's hope they give him the chance to take advantage of it. Mick Abel, SP, Phillies -- Abel will make his return to the Phillies rotation a few weeks after striking out nine in six shutout innings in his MLB debut. It's probably just a short-term thing with Aaron Nola likely coming back from the IL in a few weeks, but Abel has a chance for now, and pitchers always get hurt, so another opportunity could open up before long. Let's hope he takes advantage of it. Shay Whitcomb, 3B, Astros -- Whitcomb is already 26 and didn't do much in the majors last season, so he won't come with many expectations this time. But he has played 161 games at Triple-A over the past two seasons and he has 43 homers and 32 steals, numbers that make me want to see him get a real chance, at least. | | | | Week 11 waiver targets | | In addition to Caglianone, we have a bunch of pitchers down in the minors worth stashing, led by Bubba Chandler and Eury Perez. Here's who else we're looking to add this week: | C: Tyler Stephenson, Reds (45%)1B: Josh Bell, Nationals (9%)
2B: Brett Baty, Mets (46%)3B: Marcelo Mayer, Red Sox (62%)SS: Chase Meidroth, White Sox (38%)OF: Miguel Vargas, White Sox (62%), Tyler O'Neill, Orioles (52%), Matt Wallner, Twins (33%) SP: Zebby Matthews, Twins (44%), Bubba Chandler, Pirates (78%)Eury Perez, Marlins (69%), Logan Henderson, Brewers (66%) RP: Camilo Doval, Giants (66%), Daniel Palencia, Cubs (53%) | | For more deep-league targets, plus my thoughts on each of those players and more, head here. | | Week 11 sleeper hitters | | Best hitter matchups for Week 1 | 1. Tigers @CHW4 CHC3
2. Mets @LAD4, @COL3
3. Twins @ATH4, TOR3
4. Mariners BAL3, @LAA3
5. Phillies @TOR3, @PIT3 | | | | Worst hitter matchups for Week 11 | 1. Pirates HOU3, PHI3
2. Blue Jays PHI3, @MIN3
3. Guardians @NYY3, HOU3
4. Giants SD4, ATL3
5. Diamondbacks @ATL3, @CIN3 | | Top sleeper hitters for Week 11 | | Jonathan Aranda, 1B, Rays (77%) TEX3, MIA3 Rhys Hoskins, 1B, Brewers (74%) @CIN3, SD3Miguel Vargas, 3B, White Sox (62%) DET4, KC3 Jake Burger, 1B, Rangers (68%) @TB3, @WAS3 Michael Busch, 1B, Cubs (77%) @WAS3, @DET3 | | Week 11 Sleeper Pitchers | | You can check out Scott's two-start pitcher rankings here, too. He ranks every projected two-start pitcher for the upcoming week, tiering them from must-starts to no-thanks. | | Top sleeper pitchers for Week 11 | | Lance McCullers, Astros (34%) at PIT, at CLE Shane Smith, White Sox (54%) vs. DET, vs. KC Ryan Weathers, Marlins (73%) at TB Hayden Birdsong, Giants (76%) vs. ATL Michael Wacha, Royals (77%) at CHW | | | | Weekend Standouts | | Good pitchers | | Framber Valdez , Astros vs. TB: 9 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 9 K – Valdez finished May with five straight quality starts, generating 42 strikeouts in 42 innings with a 2.36 ERA. It's a nice turnaround after an iffy April, and we love to see him right at a strikeout per inning. The curveball has been incredible lately, which explains most of the turnaround, though I don't necessarily think this means he's just going to pitch like this all season – when he turned things around last season, he did so by throwing his curveball around 40% of the time in July and August, and he wasn't anywhere close to that in May. | | Jacob deGrom, Rangers vs. STL: 6 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 3 BB, 4 K – deGrom showed no lingering effects from whatever it was that went wrong in his previous start, though he was hardly dominant – he now has four strikeouts to five walks in 11.1 innings over the past two starts now. His velocity was down a bit, but not to an alarming level, so I'm choosing not to be alarmed. But I'd sure love to see a classic deGrom start the next time out. | | Spencer Schwellenbach, Braves vs. BOS: 6.1 IP, 5 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 11 K – Schwellenbach has heard your complaints about the lack of strikeouts and decided to do something about it. That's consecutive starts with 11 strikeouts after eight straight with six or fewer. Facing a lefty-heavy Red Sox lineup, Schwellenbach turned to his four-seamer 54% of the time (season average is 32.2%), and it was terrific for him, generating eight whiffs, 12 fouls, and 18 called strikes on 53 pitches – yes, just 15 balls on 53 pitches. It has become a very good swing-and-miss four-seamer with an extra tick of velocity from last season, and maybe continuing to focus on that can help overcome some of the swing-and-miss he has lost with his splitter and curveball from last season. Schwellenbach hadn't quite taken the ace leap some were hoping for, but these last two starts look more like the upside we were expecting. He remains a must-start pitcher. | | Kris Bubic, Royals vs. DET: 7 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 2 BB, 9 K – Two-thirds of the way through the season, Bubic has a 1.45 ERA, a 2.83 xERA, and a 26.1% strikeout rate, and the only question I have at this point is whether he can keep it up for a full season – and whether the Royals are going to look to limit him at some point. They haven't really talked about that much so far, so maybe we just don't need to worry about it. | | Sonny Gray, Reds @TEX: 7 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 10 K – Gray is a frustrating pitcher to roster in Fantasy, because the bad starts tend to be really bad, and they can skew his season-long numbers for a while. But he's already mostly corrected from the two starts in early May where he was tagged for 11 runs, with his season-long ERA down to 3.65 after this one. His overall strikeout rate isn't quite where it was last season, but with 10 strikeouts in two of his past three starts, he's getting there. He probably just needs to be in your lineup every week, and you just have to live with the occasional blow-ups. | | Andrew Abbott, Reds @CHC: 7 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 8 K – I've talked about Abbott as a confusing or weird player in the past, but he's actually succeeding in pretty typical ways of late. In May, he managed a 0.55 ERA over 32.2 innings, and he did it with more strikeouts than innings pitched plus good control (10 walks in those 32.2 innings of work). Abbott has always limited hard contact well, but he struggled to both throw strikes and miss bats in the past. Right now he's doing it all well, and I'm starting to buy in on him as a top-40 SP. | | Gavin Williams, Guardians vs. LAA: 6.2 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 6 K – Williams' four-seamer didn't miss a single bat in this one, as the Angels opted to just not swing at it. In the past, this might have derailed Williams' entire start, but he was able to turn to his cutter, which he threw 29 times, generating seven whiffs and some weak contact to make up for the lack of fastball whiffs. Starts like this just make it even more confusing why Williams just straight up refused to throw it for most of April and didn't throw it even 10 times in a game until his past three starts. But I don't think it's a coincidence that he's performed much better since re-introducing the pitch. I don't quite understand Williams, but I feel pretty good about starting him these days, which is a long way from where I was in April. | | Taj Bradley, Rays @HOU: 7 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 10 K – I think the primary takeaway from Bradley is just that he's always going to be frustrating. The stuff is good enough to lead to brilliant starts like this, but it usually isn't good enough consistently enough, and nearly 60 starts into his career, that probably isn't going to change moving forward. He's probably good enough to be worth rostering in most leagues, but not good enough to be someone you can trust every time out there. I'd prefer if he was someone else's problem. | | Grant Holmes , Braves vs. BOS: 5.2 IP, 6 H, 3 ER, 1 BB, 9 K – That's probably where I'm at with Holmes, too, though he at least has a shorter track record of being frustrating. And, for what it's worth, his control was significantly better in May than in June, as he allowed just 10 walks across his six starts – with no more than two in five of them. If Holmes' command can stay that good, he might just be a must-start pitcher, but the sample size is small enough that I remain skeptical. He's worth starting in every league where his SPaRP eligibility counts, but he's a frustrating low-end starting option everywhere else, I think. | | Ryan Pepiot , Rays @HOU: 6.2 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 4 K – Pepiot finished off a terrific May, as he allowed just a 2.23 ERA and 0.94 WHIP in 36 innings across six starts. That's awesome. The 22 strikeouts in those 36 innings are significantly less awesome, and make it much harder to buy into his success. His entire arsenal has pretty much taken a step back from last season, most notably with his four-seamer whiff rate dropping from 31.4% to 20.1% despite very similar physical characteristics. You could take that as a reason to be optimistic, but I don't really think the strikeouts are coming back, which probably leaves Pepiot in a pretty fringey range of the SP rankings. | | Chris Paddack , Twins @SEA: 8 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 10 K – Here's something I didn't really notice until today: Paddack has a new slider! He started throwing it in his first start in May, and it's coming in about 2.5 mph harder than the previous version, with less drop, and it's performed much better – he got five of his 17 swinging strikes on Sunday with the pitch to push the whiff rate over 30% for the season. That's no small thing for a pitcher who hasn't had a pitch with a 30% whiff rate since 2022. This is the first start of the season where Paddack had more than six strikeouts, so I don't want to overreact to one outing. But he does have a 2.47 ERA over the past 11 starts and it sure looks like he isn't going to lose his job the way many expected back in April. I can't say I have a ton of interest in him for Fantasy still, but he's a viable streamer with matchups against the Blue Jays, Rangers, and Reds on the way over the next few weeks. | | Jack Leiter , Rangers vs. STL: 5.2 IP, 3 H, 0 ER, 2 BB, 6 K – Leiter needed this one. He hasn't been terrible since coming back from his blister, but he had been deeply unimpressive, with at least three walks in four of his previous six starts. This was also his first start with more strikeouts than innings pitched since April, though, with just nine swinging strikes on 96 pitches, it's not like he was at his filthiest or anything. Leiter flashed some upside in his first few starts of the season, but it's been much less impressive since, and I'm not sure this start was enough to change that outlook, unfortunately. | | Ben Brown, Cubs vs. CIN: 6 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 9 K – After a couple of really rough starts, the Cubs switched Brown to a bulk reliever role, and he dominated the Reds after an opener. The problem with Brown is, even when he pitches well, it's not like he really does anything differently – it's almost always 60% fastballs, 35% curveballs, and just hoping he misses enough bats to get away with such a limited arsenal. When things are working, Brown looks incredible, but I don't know if we've seen enough growth from him to get excited about this one. | | Charlie Morton , Orioles vs. CHW: 6.2 IP, 6 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 7 K – Credit where it's due. Morton was left for dead after a disastrous start that saw him pulled from the rotation as he finished April with a 9.45 ERA. He started showing much better command in his bulk relief role, and he has carried that over in his return to the rotation, as this was his second start in as many tried with two or fewer walks. Morton suddenly has a 3.00 ERA and 1.00 ERA with 26 strikeouts in 27 innings since the start of May and can at least be considered among the streaming options, though I'm not sure I'd trust him in Sacramento this week. | | Bad pitching performances | | Jesus Luzardo, Phillies vs. MIL: 3.1 IP, 12 H, 12 ER, 3 BB, 4 K – Well, that's how you add nearly a run and a half to your ERA in late May. I'm inclined to give Luzardo a pass for this because he's been so terrific otherwise – even after this one, his 3.58 ERA and 3.35 xERA are terrific. Luzardo was never going to sustain a low-2.00s ERA, and sometimes the regression monster comes for you all at once. His track record isn't necessarily strong enough to write this off entirely, but I'm not too worried. | | Bryce Miller, Mariners vs. MIN: 4 IP, 5 H, 3 ER, 1 BB, 2 K – Relatively speaking, this was hardly a disaster, especially in the context of Miller making his return from an elbow injury. But it sure didn't make me feel like Miller is likely to make the return to must-start status anytime soon. He missed eight bats on 71 pitches, and his fastball velocity was still down about 1 mph from last season. You probably can't drop Miller, but if he has a good start in the next few turns, I would actively be looking to sell him if I could. | | Ryan Weathers, Marlins vs. SF: 6 IP, 5 H, 4 ER, 3 BB, 7 K – Where are we at on Weathers? He has a 2.49 ERA through his first six starts, but this was his first start where he finished the sixth inning, and it was also his weakest start overall. His 25.3% strikeout rate and 8% walk rate are fine, but is "fine" good enough when you're backed up by a bad offense and defense? I still think there's more upside to be found than he has shown, and his 17 swinging strikes Sunday highlight it. I remain pretty optimistic about him moving forward. | Will Warren, Yankees @LAD: 1.1 IP, 6 H, 7 ER, 4 BB, 2 K – Woof. Warren had been quite good before this, but this start makes that hard to say – it raised his May ERA from 2.70 to 4.82 by itself. Of course, even during that stretch of success, he had just one quality start in six tries, so we weren't running out to print up his Cy Young campaign even before this one. If you started Warren against the Dodgers, that was a mistake, and I'd probably try to avoid him against Boston this week, too. But I'm not just auto-dropping Warren right now, either.
Brandon Pfaadt, Diamondbacks vs. WAS: 0 IP, 6 H, 8 ER, 0 BB, 0 K – Pfaadt is just impossible to wrap your head around. He'll have starts where he looks absolutely unhittable and then starts where he looks … well, like this. His strikeout rate has been well below average all season and he's been allowing a lot of loud contact all along, so this kind of outing was probably always inevitable, and I'm not at all opposed to dropping him at this point. | | Casey Mize, Tigers @KC: 3.1 IP, 8 H, 3 ER, 2 BB, 4 K – I haven't really believed in Mize's breakout, but I'm trying to avoid confirmation bias since this was really his first bad start of the season. But his success this season hasn't been built on significantly improved bat-missing abilities, and while his control has been good, it's not so much better than his career that I think that explains it. He's thriving on a lot of weak contact, and that's a skill that takes a long time before you can really believe in it. I don't, and I'll take the opportunity to try and sell high on Mize if I can. | | Hitter Standouts | | Cal Raleigh, C, Mariners – There's been a lot of talk lately about whether Raleigh should be the No. 1 catcher in Fantasy, and right now, all I'll say is this: Ask me at the end of the season. Right now, it doesn't really matter – nobody is trading Raleigh for William Contreras right now anyway. Raleigh is on an absolutely absurd heater, opening the season with at least 10 homers in each of the first two months, including six in his past six games. He's making a bit more contact than in years past, and he's doing a ton more damage when he makes contact, sporting a career-best .521 expected wOBA on contact while also pulling the ball in the air a league-high 40.1% of the time – eat your heart out, Isaac Paredes. I don't expect Raleigh to remain on a 60-homer pace and put up the best season by a catcher in MLB history, but I'm certainly not doubting him as a general rule – if you want to sell high on Raleigh right now, you need to get a king's ransom to do it. | | Marcus Semien , 2B, Rangers – I was willing to get Semien the benefit of the doubt for a couple of months, but I pretty much gave up last week, dropping him to 20th in my second-base rankings and nearly outside of the top-200 in my overall rankings. So, of course, he finally shows life this weekend, reaching base four times in two of the three games and going 7 for 8 with six runs scored and three driven in. His overall production is still lousy – he raised his OPS nearly 100 points this weekend, but to just .561 – and his underlying data still looks deeply mediocre. Which is to say, I'm not regretting my decision to move Semien down … yet. | | Junior Caminero, 3B, Rays – Hah, Caminero. That's five homers in the past nine games for Caminero, who has been working in recent weeks with his personal hitting coach to try to get his swing right. That work seems to be paying off, as he has multiple hits in six of his past 10 games, too. Caminero has always had the raw power to be a difference maker, but he has struggled in his brief time in the majors to actualize that power consistently. If he is figuring it out right now, I think there's a top-20 ceiling here – something like what Vladimir Guerrero Jr. or Marcell Ozuna are capable of at their best. Let's hope that's what he's turning into. | | Xavier Edwards, SS, Marlins – Edwards made up for lost time in his return from the IL Sunday, going 5 for 5 to raise his season-long batting average by a whopping 20 points. .282 is pretty close to the breakeven point for Edwards to be a must-roster player in Fantasy, given how little he does otherwise with the bat, though we also probably need him running more than he has been – a 30-steal pace is fine, but pretty middling for a guy with zero power. Hopefully, he gets going here soon. | | Addison Barger, 3B, Blue Jays – Barger is on fire. He homered in all three games this weekend and is hitting .316 over the past 22, with 13 runs, 14 RBI, and an OPS north of 1.000. And he's not getting a bunch of flukey bloop singles – his average exit velocity in that stretch is 95.8 mph. We don't really have a track record to back this up – he hit .197 in 69 MLB games last season and hasn't had a stretch in the minors with a wRC+ higher than 120 in more than 60 games since 2022 – but if you're looking for a hot-hand play, he's certainly hot right now. | | News and notes | | All eyes on Corbin Burnes. He left his start Sunday due to right elbow inflammation, and you could tell he knew something was wrong as soon as he released the pitch. He'll undergo an MRI on Monday morning, so hopefully we'll know his prognosis soon, though I wouldn't be planning to start him this week either way. At this point, I'm just hoping he's not out until next summer. | | It turns out Yordan Alvarez is dealing with a fracture in his hand that is 60% healed. He'll be shut down from hitting until the fracture is fully healed. It's unfathomable that the Astros would misdiagnose a fracture for their best player two years in a row, and yet here we are. Alvarez took batting practice last week before they decided on further testing that identified the fracture. Hopefully, Alvarez will be out just a few more weeks, but at this point, who knows? | | Apparently Mookie Betts is dealing with a fractured toe but expects to miss just "a couple of days". He missed the entire weekend series against the Yankees, so maybe that means he'll be good to go this week. I wouldn't risk it, especially with how mediocre he has been this season. | | Bryce Harper has missed five straight after getting hit by a pitch on his right elbow earlier in the week. Harper said he's optimistic about playing Tuesday, so I'm inclined to keep him in my lineup. | | Kyle Tucker left early Sunday with a jammed right ring finger he suffered on a slide into second base. X-rays came back negative so hopefully, this is just a day-to-day situation. | | Cole Ragans made a rehab start at Double-A on Saturday, getting up to 62 pitches. He could be activated to start Thursday against the Cardinals, but I'd prefer to play it safe with my lineups if I can. | | The Rangers placed Nathan Eovaldi on the IL with triceps fatigue. He actually played catch in recent days and said he felt good but the Rangers opted to play it safe, which is probably smart given his history. Hopefully, this doesn't derail his excellent season. Kumar Rocker is set to return and take Eovaldi's spot in the rotation this Wednesday against the Rays, but he needs to give us a reason to believe in him before we do. | | Jackson Jobe went on the IL with a Grade 1 flexor strain, which is always scary for any pitcher. His velo was down in his latest start, too. | | The Rays optioned Chandler Simpson to Triple-A and activated Jake Mangum from the IL. Simpson was hitting .285 and wreaking havoc on the bases, but also hit for no power and was playing poor defense, so I suppose the demotion is defensible, even if it's extremely frustrating from a Fantasy perspective. | | Anthony Santander was placed on the IL due to left shoulder inflammation. Maybe that explains why he's had such a mediocre season so far? Alan Roden was recalled and he was crushing it in the minors, so that's a name to watch. | | Cedric Mullins went on the IL due to a right hamstring strain, retroactive to May 29. Dylan Carlson and Jorge Mateo are seeing extended run. | | Jazz Chisholm could be activated as soon as Tuesday and will play third base upon his return. | | Christian Yelich left Sunday after getting hit by a pitch on his right hand. X-rays came back negative, so hopefully that's just a short-term setback – Yelich has five homers over the past eight games, so it would be bad timing for him to miss multiple games. | | Sean Manaea will face hitters before beginning a rehab assignment in early June. He remains a viable stash, especially once Chandler and Perez and the rest of the higher-priority stashes are called up. | | Adolis Garcia has been on the bench three straight as part of a mental reset. He's struggling yet again this season and while I'm not dropping him across the board, I can't say I have high expectations at this point. | | It turns out AJ Smith-Shawver has a torn UCL in his right elbow and will require season-ending surgery. | | Other players who went on the IL this weekend: | | Austin Hays with a left foot contusion, retroactive to May 29Zach Dezenzo with left hand inflammation Daulton Varsho with a left hamstring strainJordan Walker with left wrist inflammationRyan Mountcastle with a right hamstring strain Lane Thomas with plantar fasciitisLiam Hendriks with right hip inflammation Lucas Erceg with a lower-back strain | | | | | | | | Golazo Network | | 24/7 Sports News | 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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