| | | | Monday, August 26, 2024 | | Before we get to everything you need to set your Week 23 lineup, here's one detail you need to know: The first game Monday is at 1:10 pm ET between the Royals and Guardians, so make sure you've got your lineups set a little earlier than usual. | | Also: The Blue Jays and Red Sox are resuming a suspended game from June at 2:05 pm. In CBS Fantasy leagues, those results won't count for H2H leagues this week, though stats for the game will be updated in Rotisserie leagues based on lineups set back in late June. Also, here's a fun wrinkle: Red Sox catcher Danny Jansen will end up playing for both sides in that one, as he was in the Blue Jays lineup when the game was initially played and will be in for the Red Sox when play resumes. Incredibly, this is the first time this has happened in MLB history. Even more incredibly: Jansen was the batter when the game was originally suspended, which means he will be behind the plate for a plate appearance he began. How could you not be romantic about baseball? | | Week 23 Preview | | | | Week 23 waiver targets | | Before you do anything else, go make sure Dylan Crews wasn't added in your league. The No. 2 pick in last year's draft is getting the call for his MLB debut Monday with the Nationals, and while his minor-league numbers aren't incredible, I'd rather take the chance on him getting hot down the stretch than any other widely available outfielder at this point. I've got more thoughts on Crews here, while Scott White wrote about what he's done in the minors in last week's Prospects Report column. | C: Jacob Stallings, Rockies (2%)
1B: Spencer Torkelson, Tigers (46%)
2B: Connor Norby, Marlins (18%)
3B: Shay Whitcomb, Astros (19%)
SS: Ernie Clement, Blue Jays (44%)
OF: Parker Meadows, Tigers (25%), Tommy Edman, Dodgers (58%), Joey Loperfido, Blue Jays (15%)
SP: Spencer Arrighetti, Astros (72%), Jacob deGrom , Rangers (70%), Bowden Francis, Blue Jays (55%) | | For more deep-league targets, plus my thoughts on each of those players and more, head here. | | | | Week 23 sleeper hitters | | Best hitter matchups for Week 23: | 1. Rockies MIA4, BAL3
2. Tigers @CHW1, LAA3, BOS3
3. White Sox DET1, TEX3, NYM3
4. Red Sox TOR4, @DET3
5. Marlins @COL4, @SF3 | | Worst hitter matchups for Week 23: | 1. Angels @DET3, SEA3
2. Rays @SEA3, SD3
3. Phillies HOU3, ATL4
4. Twins ATL3, TOR3
5. Braves @MIN3, @PHI4 | | Top sleeper hitters for Week 23: | 1. Masataka Yoshida, OF, Red Sox (76%) TOR4, @DET3
2. Mark Vientos, 3B, Mets (79%) @ARI3, @CHW3
3. Michael Toglia, 1B, Rockies (52%) MIA4, BAL3
4. Kerry Carpenter, OF, Tigers (78%) @CHW1, LAA3, BOS3
5. Jake McCarthy, OF, Diamondbacks (75%) NYM3, LAD3 | | Week 23 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 pitches for Week 23: | 1. Jeffrey Springs, Rays (74%) at SEA
2. Jameson Taillon, Cubs (72%) at PIT, at WAS
3. Andrew Heaney, Rangers (30%) at CHW, vs. OAK
4. Tobias Myers, Brewers (69%) vs. SF, at CIN
5. Cody Bradford, Rangers (49%) vs. OAK | | | | Weekend Standouts | | Good pitching | | Pablo Lopez , Twins vs. STL: 7 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 9 K – On June 18, Lopez's ERA peaked for the season at 5.63 after he was tagged for five runs in four innings against the Rays. After Saturday's start, he now has a 2.65 ERA with 74 strikeouts in 68 innings of work over 11 starts since. This season isn't going to end up with the numbers you hoped for from Lopez, but in the depths of his struggles, we kept telling you not to lose faith, and it's a good example of why selling low on an established star out of frustration (absent actual indicators of a skills decline, which weren't really present for Lopez) is usually a bad idea. | | Zac Gallen , Diamondbacks @BOS: 6 IP, 2 H, 0 ER, 4 BB, 9 K – On that note, Gallen has been one of the toughest pitchers in the league to figure out for a while. His pitch mix and velocity have largely been what we expect, but he just hasn't looked right for a while, and that was true even in this one, despite the six shutout innings. He walked four and had been averaging 4.1 walks per nine innings in his previous nine starts, with a 5.24 ERA. The results were better on the whole here, thanks to Gallen's curveball looking better than it has in a while. Is that enough to make him a must-start pitcher again the rest of the way? I think it's genuinely a coin flip to start him against the Dodgers this week, but I'm probably doing it. | | Ranger Suarez, Phillies @KC: 5 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 6 K – That's exactly what you were hoping for from Suarez coming back from his back injury against a very tough matchup. He didn't generate many whiffs, but he did allow just two hard-hit balls in this one, while allowing an average exit velocity against of just 74.5 mph. Suarez seemed like he had been hitting a wall prior to the injury, so if you didn't start him in this one, I don't blame you. But I'm fine getting him back in the lineup this week against the Blue Jays. | | | | Bryan Woo, Mariners vs. SF: 7 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K – Despite superficially impressive run prevention metrics, I never really bought into Woo early in the season. He wasn't getting many strikeouts with his fastball-heavy approach, and was averaging under five innings per start as of the end of July on just 70 pitches per start. And then suddenly, the calendar turns to August and Woo is throwing his secondaries more often, generating decent strikeout numbers, and pitching into the seventh inning in four consecutive starts after not doing so once in the first four months of the season. This is still the guy who left multiple starts this season with injuries, so it may all end in tears. But right now, he sure looks like a must-start pitcher. | | Joe Musgrove, Padres vs. NYM: 7 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 0 BB, 9 K – I'll admit, I was pretty skeptical of Musgrove coming back from his elbow injury, but it's hard to ask for much more than what he's given us so far. After Friday's outing, he's up to 15.2 innings with 16 strikeouts and just one earned run allowed. This was his first start of more than 4.1 innings and he threw just 75 pitches, so some limitations moving seem pretty reasonable to expect. But his velocity is actually up a little bit and the results speak for themselves. It sure looks like he's going to be a solid starting option moving forward. | | Carlos Rodon, Yankees vs. COL: 6 IP, 4 H, 0 ER, 1 BB, 5 K – Rodon has looked more like the guy we want him to be in the second half of the season, sporting a 2.67 ERA, 1.07 WHIP, and 10.96 K/9 over his past six starts. He also has 14 wins on the season, tied for the second-most in baseball, which sure comes as a surprise to me. I've tried to avoid flip-flopping in my expectations for Rodon despite how much his results have varied this season, so I'll just stick with what I've mostly been saying all along: He's a solid No. 3 SP who will frustrate you with volatility. But at the end of the day, you probably want to just keep him in your lineup. | | Kevin Gausman, Blue Jays vs. LAA: 7 IP, 2 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 10 K – Gausman is kind of like Rodon in a lot of ways, but at this point in their careers, Rodon is much more capable of sustained dominance. This was in some ways a vintage start from Gausman: 10 strikeouts in seven innings with 20 whiffs on 94 pitches is ace-level stuff. In other ways … well, he threw a decent amount of sliders and sinkers in this one, which isn't the vintage Gausman formula at all . He's had to find other ways to succeed this season with both his four-seamer and splitter not working as well, and he's stumbled on some success lately, with a 3.13 ERA and 1.04 WHIP over his past nine starts. Of course, that also comes with just 50 strikeouts in 60.1 innings of work including this start, so don't mistake this for a total return to form. He's an iffy start against the Twins this week, but I'd probably keep him in there. | | Bowden Francis, Blue Jays vs. LAA: 8 IP, 1 H, 1 ER, 3 BB, 12 K – Francis has been pretty tremendous since returning to the Blue Jays rotation, in large part thanks to increased reliance on his splitter, the usage of which he nearly doubled in this start to 34%. The effect of that splitter on Francis' repertoire has been hard to overstate, as it has become his best quality of contact pitch and his only true ground ball pitch – no small thing for a guy who gave up 49 homers in 256.1 career innings at Triple-A. He took a no-hitter into the ninth in this one and now has a 1.33 ERA and 0.44 WHIP over his past four starts. Do I completely buy into this breakout turn? Not necessarily, but I'm a lot less skeptical of it than you might think, given how important the splitter seems to be here. He might just have figured it out. | | Bobby Miller , Dodgers vs. TB: 6 IP, 7 H, 3 ER 0 BB, 9 K – I'm significantly more skeptical that Miller has figured it out here, in his first quality start since literally his first start of the season back in May. He was still getting hit hard (96.9 mph average exit velocity), hence the three runs allowed despite the strikeouts (and 18 whiffs). I don't want to be too negative here, because it's genuinely the first even mildly optimistic start Miller has made in months, and if you want to make a bet on some upside, I certainly don't mind adding him where available. I just need to see more than one good start before I buy in at this point. | | Gavin Stone , Dodgers vs. TB: 7 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 2 BB, 7 K – Stone might have had himself one of the best two-start weeks of any pitcher all season, striking out 17 over 14 one-run innings this week. That he did that after a stretch of seven starts with a 6.12 ERA where he failed to pitch six innings in six of those starts means that those of you in the 70% of CBS Fantasy leagues where he was started are braver than me. Stone has been throwing more changeups and sliders lately, and that's probably for the best as those have been his best pitches all season – and they might both just be very, very good pitches. Is Stone figuring out how to pitch around his mediocre fastballs? We've certainly seen very useful stretches from him at times this season, and while this two-start week might end up the high-water mark for his season, I do think we're back to the point where Stone should be pretty useful for Fantasy. | | Ryne Nelson, Diamondbacks @BOS: 6 IP, 5 H, 2 ER, 1 BB, 7 K – The Diamondbacks finally pulled the plug on Jordan Montgomery in the rotation, meaning the streaking Nelson's job is secure … for as long as he keeps pitching well. Something clicked for Nelson around the All-Star break, and he's just been terrific since, sporting a 2.91 ERA with 49 strikeouts in 43.1 innings over seven starts since. He's been leaning on his fastball in a big way in that stretch, and he threw it 63% of the time Friday. What's interesting there is that the four-seamer doesn't exactly look like a dominant pitch; even during his very good run of late, it has a pretty pedestrian whiff rate right around 20%, with decent, but hardly elite results on balls in play. The approach is working for him lately, and he's finding ways to generate strikeouts without a dominant out pitch, and I certainly fear this approach will catch up to him at some point. But I think I'd have to start him against the Mets this week with how well he's pitching right now. | | DJ Herz, Nationals @ATL: 5 IP, 1 H, 0 ER, 3 BB, 8 K – We kind of got the whole Herz show in this one – the whiff-heavy upside and the walk-heavy inefficiency that threatens to hold the whole thing back. Herz is clearly talented, and he's been very solid lately, with a 2.62 ERA and 1.17 WHIP over the past seven starts. That's come with 42 strikeouts in that stretch, but also fewer than five innings per start on average. He's close. If Herz can limit the walks a bit better and become more efficient, there's a legitimately useful Fantasy option here, and he's a decent streamer against the Cubs this week. | | Zebby Matthews, Twins vs. STL: 5 IP, 4 H, 1 ER, 0 BB, 7 K – Matthews' biggest strength might also be what holds him back: He throws a ton of pitches in the strike zone. That leads to elite walk rates, but probably also limits the swing-and-miss upside against the wrong matchups. It worked for him against the Cardinals , and this might be a situation where you look at the matchups before deciding to use him – he struggled mightily against the Padres, the most contact-heavy team in the league, in his previous start. This week, he gets a Blue Jays team that is right in the middle of the pack in wOBA and top-10 in strikeout rate against right-handed pitchers, so I wouldn't expect dominance. | | Matthew Boyd, Tigers vs. TEX: 6 IP, 3 H, 1 ER, 1 BB, 4 K – Boyd has some superficially solid numbers, sporting a 2.70 ERA and 0.90 WHIP through his first three starts. But that has come with just 12 strikeouts in 16.2 innings, so I'm not particularly excited about the prospect of adding him outside of very deep leagues. | | Bad Pitching | | Blake Snell, Giants @SEA: 3 IP, 0 H, 2 ER, 6 BB, 5 K – In the midst of another historic run of dominance, Snell dropped this gem, because he is, if nothing else, one of the funniest pitchers of all time. This is the first time all season a starter allowed multiple hits without allowing a hit. Zero hits allowed, 2.00 WHIP, 6.00 ERA. Blake Snell is truly one of a kind! | | Seth Lugo , Royals vs. PHI: 5.1 IP, 11 H, 5 ER, 1 BB, 3 K – At the end of June, Lugo's ERA fell as low as 2.17 as he garnered the first All-Star selection of his career. It's been mostly all downhill since then, and after Sunday's game, he now has a 5.30 ERA in his past nine starts. I've been a skeptic of Lugo's all along, so you know I'm not particularly surprised. He's been one of the best stories in baseball and is still capable of brilliance – see three different starts of at least seven innings and no more than two earned runs even during this stretch. But on the whole, Lugo has turned back into a pumpkin, and I'm trying to avoid him at Houston this week if I can. | | Tanner Houck, Red Sox vs. ARI: 6 IP, 7 H, 6 ER, 4 BB, 2 K – Houck has still managed mostly solid results lately, but it feels like it could fall apart very quickly, and maybe Sunday was the start of it. Including this one, Houck has 32 strikeouts to 25 walks since the start of July, with a 4.41 ERA. The ability to generate weak contact consistently may keep the bottom from falling out entirely, but I really don't feel very confident in starting Houck right now. | | Taj Bradley , Rays @LAD: 6 IP, 7 H, 5 ER, 0 BB, 5 K – As quickly as Bradley seemed to find "it" he lost "it." He had a stretch of nine straight starts from early June to late July where he allowed no more than two earned runs, and since that one ended on July 31, he hasn't had even one start in five tries with fewer than three. He always gave up hard contact, but Bradley has lost the strikeout upside lately, and that means that hard contact is both coming even more frequently and tends to happen with runners on base more often. That's a bad combination, and while the upside here is obviously high, I don't see how you can start him at this point. I'm trying really hard not to drop Bradley, but I can't say he's must-roster, even. | | Paul Blackburn, Mets @SD: 2.1 IP, 10 H, 5 ER, 0 BB, 1 K – Even before Blackburn was forced from Friday's start after being hit with a comebacker on his hand, he was looking pretty droppable. Blackburn opened his Mets career with two very strong quality starts, but followed that up with six earned over four innings, and then had this clunker two starts later. He was placed on the 15-day IL after this one, and can be dropped in pretty much all formats. | | Cade Povich, Orioles vs. HOU: 5 IP, 8 H, 5 ER, 2 BB, 3 K – Yeah, that leap from Triple-A to the majors is a tough one. Povich has more than held his own in the very tough International League, but has shown little of that ability so far in the majors. He relies on generating chases for his strikeouts, and major-league hitters just haven't been biting, with a minuscule 24.7% chase rate. Combine that with an 85.8% in-zone contact rate (league average is 82%) and it's pretty easy to see why things are going wrong for Povich. It's frustrating because the bar for Fantasy relevance is pretty low when you have the Orioles backing you up, but he just can't seem to clear it yet. | | Hitting | Junior Caminero, SS, Rays – Caminero played a series opposite Shohei Ohtani this weekend, and he managed to have seven of the nine hardest-hit balls for either team across the three games. Yeah, we might be talking about a truly special player, here. Caminero went 6 for 13 this weekend with five runs scored, two homers, and three RBI, and has looked every bit like one of the best young hitters in baseball in his first couple of weeks. There's a decent chance we're drafting him as a top-50 player in 2025.
JT Realmuto , C, Phillies – Given his age (33) and position, the ending could come fairly quickly for Realmuto. So we really needed to see signs of life, and we got them this weekend with a two-homer game Saturday against the Royals. Before this series, he had just a .640 OPS since coming back from his knee surgery, with no steals, a bad sign for a player at this position who relied on his athleticism as much as Realmuto. I don't know if he'll turn things around from here, but it was nice to see that showing, at least. | | Eugenio Suarez, 3B, Diamondbacks – Suarez went 3 for 5 with his 19th homer Friday and then followed it up with a 4-for-4 showing with his 20th homer Sunday, as he continued to turn his season around. Over his past 42 games – more than a quarter of the season! – Suarez is hitting .309 with 14 homers, 45 RBI, and an OPS over .950. He is still somehow only 68% rostered, and that needs to be much higher based on this heater. | | Pete Crow-Armstrong , OF, Cubs – For both real life and Fantasy, Crow-Armstrong has a really strong, broad base of skills that could make the path to stardom relatively straightforward. He just has to hit. Not a ton, mind you; given his speed and defense, he'll be a high-end player if he's just a pretty good hitter. Over the past 25 games, he's been a lot better than that, with a .289 average and an OPS over .900. There is legitimate 20-homer, 30-steal upside here if he can keep this up, and the underlying, batted-ball data suggests it may not be a total fluke, as he's been hitting the ball harder in the second half, too. | | News and notes | | This was a rough weekend for catcher injuries, beginning with the continuation of a bad-luck season for Willson Contreras. He suffered a fractured forearm when he got hit by a backswing while catching earlier in the season, and now he's going on the IL with a fractured middle finger on his right hand after being hit by a pitch. And now he has a fractured middle finger on his right hand because of a hit by pitch. The Cardinals are expected to recall Ivan Herrera on Sunday, who could be an option in deeper two-catcher leagues. | | Joey Bart is expected to be placed on the IL due to a left hamstring injury. | | Some other replacements to consider in one-catcher leagues: Shea Langeliers (68% rostered), Austin Wells (43%), Adrian Del Castillo (35%). In deeper two catcher leagues: Alejandro Kirk (16%), Miguel Amaya (4%), or Nick Fortes (4%). | | Yordan Alvarez has missed three straight due to neck discomfort, but I still think I'd start him this week. | | Astros GM Dana Brown said Friday that he hopes Kyle Tucker will be able to return in early September. While Tucker has been upping his baseball activities, he still feels soreness in his right leg at times. | | Tyler Glasnow played catch from 60 feet this weekend, but Dave Roberts admitted Glasnow will be out longer than expected. They still expect Glasnow to pitch again during the regular season. | | Yoshinobu Yamamoto will begin a rehab assignment this Wednesday with an eye to return in mid-September. | | Pirates GM Ben Cherington acknowledged Sunday that there is a range of innings that the Pirates don't want Paul Skenes to surpass this season, which could lead to more abbreviated starts over the final month. I don't think it will be a Garrett Crochet situation where he maxes out at four innings, but if Skenes is struggling, they might have a quicker hook than they have so far. | | Jazz Chisholm returned from the IL Friday. | | Hunter Greene is confirmed to be dealing with inflammation in his right elbow after an MRI revealed no UCL damage. He hasn't been ruled out for this season, but I feel like that might be inevitable. | | Michael Harris left Sunday with hand soreness after getting hit by a pitch. | | Robbie Ray exited Sunday's start due to left hamstring tightness. Hamstrings are always tricky and often require IL stints even if they are minor, so I wouldn't plan on having him in my lineup this weekend. | | Jacob deGrom will make his next rehab start at Triple-A on Tuesday. | | Torey Lovullo said Friday that he wants to get Paul Sewald back to being a closer eventually, but added he's pleased with what Justin Martinez has been able to do in the role. I think we'd have to see Martinez flop before Sewald gets another chance right now. | | Carlos Correa, who has been out since July 20 due to right plantar fasciitis, will not return before the end of August. His return keeps getting pushed back due to soreness after running. | | Shane Baz was scratched from his start Sunday due to the flu. | | Xavier Edwards left early on Friday due to lower back discomfort. He underwent imaging, which came back negative, and is day to day. I'd try to avoid him here just in case it turns out to be an IL injury. | | Yu Darvish was activated from the restricted list Friday after dealing with a personal issue but was then shifted to the 15-day IL. Darvish said he's feeling good and his placement on the IL was just a matter of ramping up. | | The Diamondbacks have moved Jordan Montgomery to the bullpen, opting to keep Ryne Nelson in the rotation instead. | | Jack Leiter will be called up to start Wednesday against the White Sox. Leiter's last nine starts at Triple-A: 2.57 ERA, 1.24 WHIP, 13.5 K/9, 3.9 BB/9. In deeper leagues, he's a very interesting name to watch. | | Here's a name we haven't heard in a while: Kumar Rocker was promoted to Triple-A and he's been awesome in his brief return from Tommy John surgery: 2.03 ERA, 0.90 WHIP, 37 K over 26.2 IP. He hasn't completed five innings in a start yet but could be playing his way into consideration for a 2025 role. | | Other players who went on the IL this weekend: | | Andrew Abbott with a left shoulder strain. | | Alex Call with a partial tear of the plantar fascia in his left foot. | | Javier Baez due to lumbar spine and hip inflammation. | | Paul Blackburn due to a right hand contusion. | | | | | | | | UEFA Champions League | | CBS Sports College Challenge | Relive the best moments of the UEFA Champions League 24/7 before the new season kicks off! The UEFA Champions League channel is a 24-hour streaming channel serving nonstop goals, highlights and full match replays. Find it on the CBS Sports App and streaming on Paramount+.
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