Hitters Aren’t Gavin A Good Time

Try not to do ledes about the same player, especially not in quick succession, but Gavin Williams is working with fire right now and there were five games yesterday.

MLB doing their schedule: Rob Manfred, “Let’s put a game here, and here…”
“Hey, Rob, like, I dig how you’re doing the schedule, ya know. Like putting 34 games on Wednesday and five games on Thursday, but when you say, ‘Let’s put a game here and here…’ You’re pinning games to a chicken, and why are you doing this blindfolded and why are there chickens in your office?”

Gavin’s dope though, so let’s run it back! Yesterday, he went 7 IP, 0 ER, 2 hits, zero walks, 11 Ks, lowering  his ERA to 3.78. His underlying numbers are some of the prettiest in baseball too. It’s why I put him in my Buy column at the break. I’ll be buy for Gavin–Wait, that’s not what I’m saying. Hold your wieners here! His 11.1 K/9, 2.6 BB/9, 2.98 xFIP and a 45.6% GB rate pops, daddy. No foolsies, those are better than Paul Skenes, Chris Sale and Chase Burns. Combined! No, not combined. I don’t even know what that means. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Patrick Bailey – 1-for-4 and his 2nd homer this week, which I knew without looking it up. Not because I’m related to him. Not because I have all his rookie cards and I plan to retire on them–well, I do, but that’s not the reason. I know because I actually roster this schmohawk in one league, and I benched him this week. Sonavabench!

Taj Bradley – 7 IP, 1 ER, 5 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 3.69. Ya know how I was flouting Gavin’s numbers? Well, I wasn’t! Flouting doesn’t mean that! (Just did a Google.) I was talking about Gavin’s stats being some of the best in baseball and Taj’s are. Dot dot dot. Not that bad! Not as good as Gavin’s, but 10.1 K/9, 3.6 BB/9 plays.

Ty France – 1-for-4, 2 RBIs and his 16th homer, hitting, well, let’s keep that a secret for a second. So, I picked up France yesterday for a batty call — who am I, Napoleon? — and he homered, so if I picked up France on Opening Day, I would’ve got something like 162 homers from France this year. Don’t do the math yourself, you make a weird face when doing math and it makes you look ugly. So, Part II: Another So, Huh?: In this afternoon’s Buy column, I make an offhanded comment about Vlad Jr. and how France is out-homering him. Yeah, but he can’t touch Vlad Jr. when it comes to average, right? France is hitting .275! That’s almost twenty points higher than Vlad Jr.!

Griffin Canning – 2 2/3 IP, 4 ER, ERA at 6.97. “That could be me!” That’s Chris Paddack punching the air.

Chris Sale – 6 IP, 3 ER, 6 baserunners, 11 Ks, ERA at 2.19. I can’t tell if Sale is overrated, underrated, or just rated. I think it’s the last option, but not if you list them A, B, C, because, well, you know.

Ozzie Albies – 2-for-4, and his 16th homer, and 2nd homer in four games. Good things happen when Ozzie keeps the head on that bat.

Dominic Smith – 1-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 7th homer. Dom Smith would have zero to one homer this year on another team. Just something about the Braves that brings out the good stuff. Well, except in Austin Riley (1-for-4), who went back to being miserable.

Michael Harris II – 2-for-4, 2 runs and his 19th homer. For some reason, Megahertz reminded me of Kurtz, and I sighed so loudly saying, “MegaKurtz,” that Cougs was like, “You’re mumbling nonsense again.” I know, darling!

Drake Baldwin – 1-for-4 and his 19th homer. As our man VinWins said in yesterday’s comments, Drake Baldwin jumped 44 spots in the last week on the Player Rater (and now likely more with the home run), and Baldwin is back in the top 20 overall. An insane year for catchers. Two catchers are in the top five overall, and Dillon Dingler is almost in the top 10 overall for all players! Like everyone saw a catcher hit 60 homers last year and was like, “You like that? Why didn’t you say anything? I can do that!”

Tyler Locklear – 2-for-2, 2 RBIs and his 1st homer. He was a triple short of the cycle. Otherwise known as a Biscuit Pants Cycle.

Brandon Pfaadt – 6 IP, 2 ER, 9 baserunners, 1 K, ERA at 4.43. He has a 2.49 ERA in July. Wait, it gets better! [sees he has 12 Ks in 21 2/3 IP in that time] Okay, no, it doesn’t get better. I could see trying him, but hideousness seems around the corner.

Michael McGreevy – 6 1/3 IP, 4 ER, 10 baserunners, 3 Ks, ERA at 3.07. One final note on Pfaadt: “Hideousness seems around the corner?” Yeah, that’s been McGreevy the whole season and he still has a 3.07 ERA, which would be leading all my leagues.

Troy Melton – 5 IP, 2 ER, 9 baserunners, 5 Ks, ERA at 1.95. It’s funny how some pitchers come up, don’t pitch that well, but have these great ERAs. Melton, for one. It never hurts any pitcher to not walk guys. Melton’s 2.9 BB/9 isn’t elite, but his 8.3 K/9 makes it work, just enough. See, funny!

James Outman – 1-for-3, 3 RBIs and his 4th homer. The Great Knoche told people to pick up Outman yesterday for today’s game. Well played, my man! Yes, it was for steals, but you’re turning your nose up at homers now? Shame on you. (He did try to steal, too, but was caught.)

Isaac Collins – 1-for-3, 2 RBIs and his 6th homer. Dropped The Bartender in one of my deeper leagues last week, and this past Sunday someone else picked him up and I chortled, “You fool! He sucks!” But the fool, who sucks, was I.

Randy Dobnak – 5 IP, 0 ER, 5 baserunners, 3 Ks, ERA at 1.42. Even more impressively, he drove the entire team to the stadium in his Ford Escape.

Ian Seymour – 6 IP, 2 ER, 6 baserunners, 7 Ks, ERA at 4.64 as he followed Casey Legumey. A solid Yarbro appearance, and his underlying numbers are monocle-worthy, but also [giant red flag] He was facing the Blew Jays.

Shane Bieber – 7 IP, 1 ER, 3 hits, zero walks, 3 Ks, ERA at 4.70. It’s time we did a check-in on Bieber! …okay, so I googled Bieber and watched six hours of music videos. What do these have to do with Shane Bieber? Bieber’s underlying numbers are hideous, and it’s nice that he’s strung together a couple good starts. Better than being strung out, but he’s iffy at best. Maybe Streamonator, if desperate.

James Triantos – Was called up by the Cubs. How cool is this:

Hearing the Cubs are calling up James Triantos to make his MLB debut.

— Geoff Pontes (@GeoffPontesBA) July 23, 2026

That’s Ralph, our old prospect writer, out there breaking news. Mean’s while, our current prospect writer Itch wants to break knees (mine). Itch also said this for James Triantos, “It’s easy to like the contact-rich Triantos, who struck out just 9.7 percent of the time in 89 Double-A games while slashing .300/.345/.437 with seven home runs and 38 stolen bases. It’s not as easy to see how he’ll mix in with this club. A second-round pick in 2021, Triantos is a right-handed hitter at 5’11” 195 lbs who can play second or third but isn’t great at either spot. Though it looks today like he’s blocked about seven different ways, thing can change in a hurry whenever the team starts sorting. I’d like to sort my knuckles on Grey’s face.” Dude, c’mon! That Itch quote was from 2025, as Triantos sorta languished with seemingly no way out, due to more blockage than your arteries after eating a Godmother sub. He still has massive playing time concerns. He’s 23 now (he’s an ancestry website?) and he went 7/18/.306 with a 11.6 K% in Triple-A. He’s the kind guy that doesn’t blow you away for fantasy, but he should be a major leaguer. At worst, he’s bad Bo Bichette. At best, he’s good Bo Bichette. Is there a moderate Bichette? Mo Bichette?