Deep-league greetings, friends, and here’s hoping that you are holding your own in your leagues.  The injuries keep coming, and information about how long players may be out is vaguer than ever, making setting a weekly lineup full of players that you know will be healthy beyond difficult even in a standard league.  And as we all know, what’s difficult in a standard league is often next to impossible in a deep league.  All I’m saying is that if you’re finding the fantasy baseball waters particularly tough to navigate this year, you are not alone.  And with that thought, let’s look at a few names who may be of interest to those of us in NL-only, AL-only, and other particularly deep leagues.

Please, blog, may I have some more?

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See all of today’s starting lineups

# MLB Starting Lineups For Sun 8/3
ARI | ATH | BAL | BOS | CHC | CHW | CLE | COL | DET | HOU | KC | LAA | LAD | MIA | MIL | MIN | NYM | NYY | PHI | PIT | SD | SEA | SF | STL | TB | TEX | TOR | WSH | ATL | CIN | OAK

The rookies are coming, the rookies are coming!  If you’re like me, you’re looking at your roster right about now and trying to figure out where in the world all these guys are going to play.  I’d love to grab Vidal Brujan and sit on him until he’s called up, but as it is I have Joey Wendle, Jazz Chisholm and now Brendan Rodgers battling with Marcus Semien, Dansby Swanson and Francisco Lindor (who I drafted way too much of) for playing time.  When Moustakas gets healthy, I’m going to have real middle infield trouble.  It’s a good problem to have, but it makes playing rookie hot potato very difficult.  Do we cut bait with Wendle despite his heater?  Drop Dansby despite that lineup?  At least Jarren Duran is in the outfield, a spot with slightly more lineup flexibility.  How are you all handling the game of rookie hot potato?  Are you just hoping you can beat your league mates to the wire when the time comes?  Do you have a similar lineup crunch you hope will work itself out via trade or injury?  Are you grabbing and holding or constantly adding and dropping every night hoping your rookie is rostered when they get the call?  All of this is a good reminder to leave those last couple roster spots on offense able to be churned over.  There is no issue with leaving an RCL draft knowing you’ll be hitting the waiver wire for your OF5, UTIL and CI/MI spots.  There are players every year that pop from the waiver wire, just keep those eyes peeled.  Right now, point your eyes below for the rest of the week that was, week 7 in the RCLs:

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Welcome to another installment of Tuesday MLB DFS here on Razzball. We have a near full slate of games on tonight’s main slate, with near perfect weather in most places. It’s warm across the land and bats are beginning to show life. As hard as it is to believe, we’ve gone almost a full week without a no hitter. Seasonal stats are beginning to become more useful as we near the 50 game mark for most teams. 

 

We welcome the return of a decent arm in the Mets’ rotation as average MLB Starting Pitcher Jacob deGrom returns to the mound after missing two starts due to side issues. But seriously, he couldn’t ask for a better matchup to return to as he takes on the Rockies at home. This slate isn’t lacking in stud arms as there are 8 or 9 guys who are likely aces on seasonal teams. However, out of the group of 8 or 9, I’m going to focus my energy on 2 or 3. Good luck tonight, stay positive and visualize that bank roll spiking like Bitcoin in April. Visualize your success! You HAVE to believe it to be true before it can happen. Go with your gut and do it with confidence. Let’s go! 

 

New to FanDuel? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well, be sure to read our content and subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays. Just remember to sign up through us before jumping into the fray. It’s how we know you care!

Please, blog, may I have some more?

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Let’s take one more victory lap around my standing desk prior to moving on for good. A hirsute Donkey Teeth said to me in March, “I need a bold prediction from you for this season.” I wrote back, “That they’ll let you within 500 feet of a school.” He wrote back, “About baseball.” I wrote back, “The school will have a baseball team?” He wrote back, “Major League Baseball.” I wrote back, “Venmo me $100 for wasting my time.” Then, after a week back-and-forth, I said the first bold prediction that came to my mind: Keston Hiura‘s batting average would bottom out and he’d be demoted. He was going in the first 50 picks of drafts. This was not a willy and/or nilly bold prediction. People loved Keston Hiura. After that bold prediction, I doubled down, and he was my first sell of the season, telling you to get rid of him the day after Opening Day. *begins to pant* Okay, I’m winded, victory lap over. Keston Hiura (1-for-3, 1 run) was recalled yesterday, and I picked him up in all leagues. I, Mr. Don’t Draft Keston, picked him up? Yes, because now his price isn’t a 4th round pick, but free. Free’s good. Hiura still had strikeout issues in the minors — 34.2%, which is honestly laughably bad. If his price weren’t free, I’d prolly pass. It’s funny how many people are now suddenly excited about Hiura when he seems to have exactly the same problem. Serious question: Are the Brewers capable of teaching how to not strikeout? *looks randomly at their entire team* Forget it, I can answer myself. So, grab Hiura for the speed/power, but don’t be surprised if he still hits in the .180 range. Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

The following details are from secret documents released by RazzAnon in a major investigation, sponsored by Manscaped. 

In 2020, New Line Sports apparel — sick of only selling Fernando Tatis Jr. shirseys — met in secret with one Mr. Robert Manfred in a Dennys somewhere outside of Taos, New Mexico. The topic of conversation? Ridding the world of hits. “We want people to love Wade Miley, and buy several of his sweatbands,” one employee was caught saying on tape recorder. What followed was a year-long effort to rid the world of hits, bat flips, dingers, and dongers. “A no-hitter every game was our ideal, maybe one or two bunts at most,” said Carleton Evers, the social media marketing manager. “We just wanted to change the game of baseball into pitching highlights with ball trails on every pitch.”

Manfred, no stranger to messing with the game he oversaw, put low-T District of Columbia senator Miles Miller in charge of ending the hit parade. “When we went to Nationals games, we didn’t want to see Sexy Dr. Pepper,” Miles said to YouTube reporter BurningFastball, “we just wanted to see Erick Fedde whiffing batter after batter after batter. Perfect innings, every inning. That was the plan. Change pitchers every 6 batters or so. The optimal time to stand up, buy a beer and a hot dog, and get an Austin Voth shirsey.”

RazzAnon will conduct a meet-up at the baseball Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio, on June 31st to release more details about what we’ve found, connecting Manfred to Richard Branson, Carrot Top, and a secret underground cabal of Cuban cigar manufacturers stealing humidor technology from the United States. Stay frosty, friends!

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In the dawn of blurb time, there were single-celled blurbs. They were a simple organism that regurgitated relevant counting stats and percentages, and they survived by eating game scores in the spring and summer months, only to hibernate during the winter. As the eons marched on, the first blurb crawled from one of the oceans onto dry land. These blurbs were more organically complex, including recommendations to pick up or drop certain players, dependent on certain conditions. Some blurbs even survived during the winter months on a diet of trade rumors and roster moves. 

And then one day there was an explosion. 

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I really didn’t understand the whole Bo Bichette is greater than Vladimir Guerrero Jr. movement that took place this draft season. That’s not a knock on Bichette by any means, but instead an affirmation that Vlad is a very special player that came into this league as the highly touted number one prospect ahead of Fernando Tatis Jr, Eloy Jimenez, Kyle Tucker and Bo Bichette. While it does seem like Bo had a smoother transition into the big leagues, anyone that thought Vlad wasn’t going to find his groove likely made a bad decision (or three) along the way. A few years ago there were many preaching that Guerrero Jr. was going to become the best player in the game. Well the hype train has just arrived at the station as he currently leads all hitters in fantasy points. I know Ronald Acuna Jr. has been lighting the roto world on fire, but he still has less points than Vlad. By the way, what’s the deal with there being so many top tier hitters with a Jr. at the end of their name? I wonder if I should change my name to malamoney Jr.

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Razzball Patreon members receive our weekly podcast where Grey cackles about the funniest news stories we’ve found over the past week, plus you get that warm fuzzy feeling of supporting your favorite fantasy sports site in all the land.

It’s your favorite hour of the week! I Can’t Believe It’s Not Not News is back again with all the Billy Hurley jokes and Grey Albright cackles you can handle. First up, a drunk man at Kid Rock’s Steakhouse uses his colostomy bag as a weapon against the police and Billy Hurley is there for it.  Then scientists solve the “Giant Penis Man’s” origin date but Grey is very skeptical about whether or not the scientists actually know what they’re doing. Finally, we head down under as an Australian woman wakes up with an Irish accent after surgery and an Australian diver spots a fish sporting a gold wedding band.

Tune in now for all the laughs and Albright cackles you can handle by signing up for the exclusive Razzball Patreon Club for only $5/month, or upgrade to receive the weekly podcast plus early access to all of Grey’s 2021 fantasy baseball buy/sell posts for just $13/month!

Find all of this week’s stories here:

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Greetings! Hope everybody had a great weekend and a profitable out there in DFS land and wagering land if you do that as well. Hot and Cold for me this week as some teams popped this week (Hello Braves and Giants I see you) that I didn’t have too much exposure too so no bueno there if you didn’t have any players on those two teams. I have been doing a lot of diversifying players and looking at some park factors and umpiring trends as well to try and make sure I am giving myself the best opportunities to cash in on some nuances that other players might not be utilizing in their lineups. It’s been a mixed bag honestly but it’s still pretty new so I’m ok with the result so far. Just some things to think about when building your own lineups. All right let’s get to it, shall we?

New to FanDuel? Scared of feeling like a small fish in a big pond? Well, be sure to read our content and subscribe to the DFSBot for your daily baseball plays. Just remember to sign up through us before jumping into the fray. It’s how we know you care!

Please, blog, may I have some more?

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Maybe I’m just a guy that puts feety pajamas on over his head. Maybe I walk into a Subway and ask a sandwich artist, “Do you smell onions?” Maybe I stare at people playing Jenga and try to move the pieces with telekinesis. Maybe I pronounce the D in Django. Maybe I call diner waitresses “Sweetheart” and old guys “Sonny.” Maybe I could be wrong, but Austin Riley (2-for-4, 5 RBIs and his 8th and 9th homer, hitting .320) feels like he’s headed to be a top 25 player drafted next year. In December of last year, I wrote an Austin Riley sleeper. I have hand eyes like in Pan’s Labyrinth, and those hands are pressed up against Statcast. I said in that sleeper that Riley was a guy who could be drafted after 250 and have top 50 overall value. It was December and I wrote that in November, so while I was very fortune tellery to foresee Austin Riley, his ADP was 202th overall in NFBC, not 250. Still huge value if the top 50 value comes to fruition. As I mentioned last week, he flattened his swing a lot, becoming more of a .280 hitter, than the .240 one he was coming into the year. The only question mark now is with a flatter swing, can he still homer? This week’s six homers does a good job of saying flatter does not make the ironing bored. Pun…and a miss! Anyway, here’s what I saw this weekend in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

Another week and yet again, another No-Hitter. This time courtesy of the veteran Corey Kluber. No-Hitters have somewhat lost their novelty this season for me because of the vast amount of them in such a short period of time. Also, a fun stat, if you face either the Mariners, the Indians, or the Rangers you have just under a 5% chance of throwing a No-Hitter. We’ve never seen anything like this, so all we can do is embrace it and that is the plan. The last few weeks I have picked a stud pitcher to throw one and seeing how that’s not really the trend, we’re going to switch it up and the pick this week is…Yusei Kikuchi. We’ll get to him later on.

Other Noteworthy news, Jacob DeGrom is set to return Tuesday lining him up for a 2 start week. Kenta Maeda was placed on the IL with an Abductor Strain. Chris Sale has started a throwing program and is pitching off a mound which is good news to hear. Noah Syndergaard’s Rehab Assignment in AAA is beginning this week, so if he’s still on the waiver wire he’s somebody to monitor closely. And lastly, Scott Kazmir pitched last week for the Giants for the first time in over 5 years! What an unlikely thing to say, but who doesn’t love a good comeback story. That’s the news, and there’s a bevy of must-start pitchers this week so let’s begin!

Please, blog, may I have some more?

At the start of the season, I was certain Ozzie Albies was the top fantasy second basemen, followed closely by DJ LeMahieu. I was so smart to rank them there and I knew it. Filling out my top five were Whit Merrfield, Keston Hiura, and Brandon Lowe all ranked in my Top 5.

I wish I could say I was spot on about all five players. But if there is one thing that I should have learned in my lifetime, it is that what I am certain about in baseball is not always the way things turn out.

My initial Top 5 currently has only one player still there. Thanks, Merrifield, for living up to expectations so far. The rest of you, ugh. Albies, LeMahieu, and Lowe all struggled out of the gates but have since shown signs of life at the plate. And if you are an owner of Hiura, I’m sorry. I hope you enjoyed the two-run homer he hit for the Triple-A Nashville Sounds the other day. So outside of Merrifield, my Top 5 was completely wrong.

So who is now in the Top 5 and fills out the rest of the rankings? Has Albies done enough to crack the Top 10? Has LeMehieu or Lowe? Let’s find out.

Please, blog, may I have some more?