The Cubs lost Kyle Hendricks. Who is this Adbert Alzolay kid? Trevor Williams is set to return this week for the Pirates. Chris Archer is a mess. Is it time to give up on the former dominant righty? Foltynewicz just cannot seem to get on track. Dakota Hudson gets grounders, but that’s it. Jurado looked sharp, until Sunday. Leake has been on one hell of a roll of late. Martin Perez is suddenly struggling. Who could have predicted that? Anibal Sanchez is getting it done. No one predicted that. Trent Thornton brings strikeouts, but anything else? Spencer Turnbull has been a solid inning eater. Is Logan Allen of the Padres a pickup? Finally, is Lewis Brinson someone to think about in deep leagues?
CUBS ROTATION CALL
We’re all excited about the return of Craig Kimbrel back into the world of fantasy relevance, we hope he’s closing by the end of the month for the Cubs, but they have an issue to deal with on the hill as Kyle Hendricks has been placed on the 10-day DL with shoulder inflammation. The team doesn’t expect this to be a long-term injury, but it sounds like he could be out for about three weeks.
The Cubs could turn to Mike Montgomery, Tyler Chatwood or Adbert Alzolay to fill the rotation spot. “Alzolay is on a real roll at Triple-A, and we’d been planning even before this to possibly give him a couple of spot starts at some point over the next month or so,” GM Theo Epstein said, “just to get his feet wet and also give our veteran rotation guys a little bit of a breather during a stretch in the schedule where we don’t have a lot of off days… We’ll see if we can find a way to get him some time up here and also give an opportunity to the guys in the pen who have been waiting for their turns, as well,” Epstein said.
Who is Alzolay?
Alzolay is a 24 year old righty who has had a lot of success in six starts at Triple-A (3.09 ERA, 0.94 WHIP, 12.94 K/9 with a 1.69 BB/9) including 40 punchouts and three walks his last 28 innings. His fastball grades out as a 60 (20-80 scale) and hits the mid 90’s. The changeup is decent pitch, but it’s the curveball that’s his second-best offering (it often gets 60 marks as well). He projects as a third starter in the bigs in a best-case scenario. He suffered through a lat issue last season that limited him to just 39.2 innings, and he’s still looking for his first season of 125-innings pitched. He’s only at 36 innings this season as the Cubs have been cautious with him after he injured his side in March. Durability is an obvious concern as is the amount of starts anyone will make as it seems that there will only be an opening in the rotation for few weeks.
As of this writing, we don’t know for sure that Alzolay will be called up, so we’re all just guessing a bit at the moment.
WILLIAMS RETURNING
Trevor Williams has been out with a side issue since May, but he’s ready to return Wednesday to face the Tigers.
Last season in 31 starts, Williams went 14-10 with a 3.11 ERA and 1.18 WHIP.
This season in nine starts, Williams is 2-1 with a 3.33 ERA and a 1.13 WHIP.
Williams is a good pitcher.
He’s not a great fantasy option though as he just doesn’t get strikeouts. Last season he had a 6.64 K/9 rate. This season the mark is 7.00. In this day and age where the league average is over 8.8 per nine, Williams falls behind significantly.
Should also be noted that his GB-rate of 40 percent since the starts of last season has led to 1.10 GB/FB ratio, and that mark is below the league average. Adding that his hard hit rate is a four year high at 34.1 percent, just two ticks below the league average of 34.3 percent, and that his launch angle against is over 13 percent since the start of last season (league average 11.0 percent), and you can tell that he’s been extremely fortunate that his HR/9 rate has been 0.75 the last two seasons.
He’s been effective, but I’m just not a fan.
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PADRES PROMOTE LOGAN ALLEN
The Padres will promote lefty Logan Allen to start Tuesday against the Brewers. I’ve been writing about Allen weekly in the Prospect Watch column. Here is what I wrote about him in the preseason Rookies To Watch. “A big lefty, Allen has a less than elite fastball, though it does have some late life. That doesn’t stop him from trying to get inside to righties, he’s certainly not afraid, but his best pitch is likely his changeup. He ranks highly in pitchability, though there is legitimate concern if he will be able to bring his strikeout per inning numbers from the minors to the majors. He threw 125 innings int 2017 and followed that up with 148.2 in 2019. At some point, perhaps early in the year, he should be starting games for the Padres, and it wouldn’t be a total shock if he posted numbers similar to Joey Lucchesi this season (minus a few strikeouts of course).”
Allen might only make one starts as the Padres are coming up on three off-days in eight days. He could end up just being a bridge to Chris Paddack. Allen has allowed 14 runs over 15 innings his last three outings, so he’s hardly in a groove at the moment which cautions against using him in any format for the matchup with the Brewers.
ARMS – A LOOK AROUND
Chris Archer cannot get on track. Just cannot. He’s allowed at least four earned runs in 6-of-8 starts, and in the seven starts he’s made since the IL stint, the numbers are vomit inducing: 2-4, 6.93 ERA, 1.67 WHIP, 1.90 K/BB thanks to a 5.02 BB/9 rate and a 2.87 HR/9 mark. He’s been awful. Flat out. If you’re in a dynasty league still hold him. If you’re in a keeper league, boy, the cost had better be super low if you’re holding on to him. If you’re in a non-keeper league, the only thing keeping him on a roster at this point is his name. Yes, in non-keepers you can drop Chris Archer. #Ugh
Mike Foltynewicz held the Phils to one run over six innings Sunday which was the good. The bad was the five walks. That’s nine his last two games – walks that is. He still doesn’t look right to me (I eyeballed a good deal of the Sunday start). The GB/FB is down (0.85), the HR/FB rate is up (20.8), the pull rate is up (49.1 percent) as is the hard-hit rate (five percent above his norm).
Dakota Hudson owns a pathetic 1.50 K/BB ratio thanks to a pathetic 6.19 K/9 and horrible 4.12 BB/9 rate. You just can’t have sustained success with numbers like that, even if you have a bonkers high 3.39 GB/FB ratio. Simply put – too many balls in play, too many free passes and that 58 percent first pitch strike rate speaks doom.
Ariel Jurado was looking good, until his Sunday start against the Reds when he allowed seven runs while gaining just nine outs. That beating came on the heels of 4-straight quality starts. Jurado doesn’t miss bats (6.85 K/9) and relies on grounders (50 percent for his career). Worry about the homers linger, and he’s not much different than the guy listed next, though he has no level of long-term success in the majors.
Mike Leake allowed 12 runs in back-to-back outings. Over the last four outings, Leake has allowed a total of nine runs. Moreover, Leake has thrown four quality starts and tossed at least seven innings each time out, an amazing thing in 2019 baseball. He is what he is, but he’s rolling right now.
Martin Perez had everyone falling all over themselves about six weeks ago. Some folks were more excited to have Perez on their roster than to have a chance to make out with Kate Beckinsale, which is utter nonsense. As I warned, over and over, it was a long season, Perez had been awful for years, and when teams got a look at that cutter and started to figure things out, I expected Perez to struggle. Over his last five starts he has a 6.75 ERA, a 1.75 WHIP, 4.50 walks per nine. He’s stunk.
Anibal Sanchez, someone no one can figure out, is rolling. You never know when the wheels will fall off and he will careen down the mountain, but check out his work right now. Over his last seven outings, Anibal has a 1.87 ERA, 1.01 WHIP, 8.55 K/9 and 2.67 BB/9, and over his last four starts he’s allowed four runs over four outings. Yep, there it is.
Trent Thornton has a 3.69 ERA over his last seven outings allowing as many as four earned runs a single time. Last time out he held the mighty Astros to nothing, no runs, over 6.2 innings in Houston. Impressive. He’s only allowed a homer in four outings, but he has walked three batters in each of his last five outings, so it’s hardly surprising to see his WHIP the last seven starts sitting at 1.44. He’s been brutal at home (6.39 ERA, .365 wOBA) but pretty darn solid on the road (2.98 ERA, .283 wOBA).
Spencer Turnbull was beaten for six runs the last time out by the Indians, this coming on the heels of five runs allowed over three starts. Overall, the rookie has a 3.27 ERA, 1.33 WHIP, an 8.38 K/9 and a 2.48 K/BB ratio. He has only three wins, lack of support Tigers, with a 1.56 GB/FB ratio. He’s a solid arm, but the ratios figure to do nothing to boost your squad, and with the lack of win upside, he’s a streaming option unless you’re in a 15-teamer or AL-only.
And one bat…
BRINSON TIME IN FLORIDA?
Lewis Brinson was a top-20 prospect in baseball according to many sources for a couple of seasons. He crushed it in the minors, displaying power, speed and strong defense in the outfield. He went 20/20 in 2013, had a 1.004 OPS with 20/18 in 100 games in 2015, and in 2017 in just 76 games at Triple-A he went .331-13-48-66-11. It was hit time. In 2018 with the Marlins he was awful (.199-11-42-31-2 with a .577 OPS in 109 games). In 2019 he was worse with a .510 OPS in 27 games. Whispers of him being a Quad-A player were everywhere (too good for the minors, not good enough for the big leagues).
Brinson didn’t take the demotion this season and squirrel himself away in the corner. He went back to work. Brinson in 41 games at Triple-A this season has killed it with a .920 OPS and he has eight homers and six steals as well. Garrett Cooper and Harold Ramirez are hitting in the Marlins outfield, but Curtis Granderson and Rosell Herrera are doing nothing with the bat meaning that Brinson could be called up soon, and he’s still got a strong skill set even though we haven’t seen it much at the big-league level. Just a guy to keep in mind if you’re looking for an outfield boost.
Ray Flowers can be heard Monday-Friday, 8-10 PM EDT on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). Follow Ray’s work on Twitter (@baseballguys) and be sure to listen to his podcast work too.
