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As they say in Anaheim, “If you can’t get to see the Cherry Blossoms in Japan, you should get to see the Gin Blossoms in concert at the Hard Rock or Shohei Ohtani.”  One Anaheim-born woman, Gina, was so excited about Ohtani that she got a tattoo of the Japanese symbol for strength, that she later found out was a tattoo of Calvin pissing on a Grateful Dead logo. Gina did it in honor of Ohtani, so it’s still close to her heart, though mostly because it’s covering a third nipple.  Yesterday, Ohtani became the first Japanese born player to hit for the cycle, going 4-for-4, 2 runs, 3 RBIs with his 8th homer.  The closest previous Asian cycle was Kurt Suzuki.  When Ohtani becomes Hot-tani, there’s few players that can match him for sheer excitement, though Ian Kinsler wears sheer pantyhose under his uni, if that counts.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

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See all of today’s starting lineups

# MLB Starting Lineups For Wed 8/6
ARI | ATH | ATL | BAL | BOS | CHC | CHW | CIN | CLE | COL | DET | HOU | KC | LAA | LAD | MIA | MIL | MIN | NYM | NYY | PHI | PIT | SD | SEA | SF | STL | TB | TEX | TOR | WSH | OAK

It’s June, in case you don’t own a calendar or Mayan solar stone. Fantasy owners can no longer afford to hold their breath in any given category. Now is the time to take your shots on middle relievers and hope they earn you a save or two. It’s nice if they can give you strikeouts or stellar ratios in the meantime. Check your wire for the names below.

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B_Don and Donkey Teeth are joined once again by the Fantasy Master Lothario on this week’s special guest edition of the Ditka, Sausage, and Fantasy Sports Podcast about Baseball. As a warm up, Grey ejaculates stories of his many, many, MANY visits to the sperm repository. Once the guys finally pry Albright’s mind away from P*rnHub, they get to discussing their level of belief in some of this year’s mid-season breakout players.

As late June approaches, find out to what degree you should trust hot hitting Eduardo Escobar, Josh Bell, Rafael Devers, Edwin Encarnacion, and Hunter Pence. The Ditka Dudes featuring Albright also chat about a couple of the hottest arms in the game: post hype breakout, Lucas Giolito, and surprise ace, Jake Odorizzi. Grab a cup, some lotion, and your favorite nudie magazine; we’re heading straight to the bank!
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If you’re looking to save some cash to use elsewhere and like to be bold, turn your attention to Rowdy Tellez (1B: $2,300). He doesn’t hit the ball often, but when he does it goes a long way. To wit, he has only 42 hits in 185 ABs on the season but 10 of them have left the yard. Boom goes the dynamite. Most importantly, he just looks like a slugger, which is to say…thicc. The price is right so take a gamble. You either bet big or you go home, you gotta risk it to get the biscuit.

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!

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[brid autoplay=”true” video=”420844″ player=”10951″ title=”Fantasy Baseball 2019 Mailbag Week 12″]

The Padres sent Chris Paddack down to Single-A to limit his innings. When Nick Margevicius heard the news, he said, “Damn, guess I’ll be limited too.” Padres, “Nah, you good, throw 270 IP if you can.”  Paddack being sent down to the minors feels like an encapsulation of all that’s wrong with baseball.  Or at least that element.  That whole manipulation of young players element.  Paddack won’t pitch in Single-A.  He’s going for a rest.  A vacay, of sorts.  A little ‘how’s your father’ in Lake Elisnore at the House of Alfredo Griffindoor. He has to be back in 20 days (due to service time), and he will be. My guess is in two weeks.  Why any team thinks it’s better to shut down a guy early and start them up again vs. shut them down in August is beyond me. Member how well that helped Julio Urias? He needed surgery to correct things. To put it in laymen’s terms, shut down your car in the dead of winter and restart it or leave it running while you run into CVS?  Okay, maybe the Consumer Value Store scenario depends on some of your janky neighborhoods, but you catch the drift.  Either way, I’m trying to hold Paddack in most leagues; he’ll likely only miss three starts.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

Please, blog, may I have some more?

The White Sox front office announced that top pitching prospect Dylan Cease could be up in July. My guess is it will be post All-Star Break, which by and by is the perfect time to make roster moves while the rest of your league is in rest mode. Cease is one of my favorite pitching specs, even though he hasn’t had the best of seasons in Triple-A (4.10 ERA) and his player photo looks like a second grader who was told to say ‘cheese’. I still think Cease is one of the best stashes for the second half of 2019 and will eventually round into a 2/3 starter in the majors. Here’s what else is happening around the minor leagues…

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Super Duper!

Mitch Haniger, OF, Oh God: *Vomits uncontrollably* *Still* Replacement: Who does this white bread Garrett Cooper (7.2%) kid think he is anyway? Well dating back to May 15th he has 28 hits, 19 runs, 5 HRs, 16 RBI in 86 ABs. He’s firmly entrenched as the Marlins #2 hitter right now and is really making the most of it. He’s not some spring chicken either — he’s a 28-year-old career minor leaguer who has always had a solid hit tool hitting .305 AVG/.371 OBP across 1,640 minor league ABs. He has 15-20 HR power, absolutely no speed (think: negative stolen bases somehow,) but he’s a great fill-in option who isn’t going to kill your ratios.

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Mike Soroka (Braves, ESPN position rank: 9)has been excellent so far this year, to the tune of a 7-1 record with a stellar 1.38 ERA and 0.87 WHIP.  Through his first 65 1/3 innings of work, he has posted 57K:17BB and opponents are batting just .169 against him. Soroka has been a top 10 SP according to ESPN’s positional Player Rater. Not bad for someone who went undrafted in most formats, with an NFBC ADP of 388. He has been elite through his first 10 starts, allowing more than 1 run just once. Soroka has only let up 1 HR so far this year, and holds a solid 6.5% walk rate. He has displayed great command with his pitches and has been excellent at generating ground balls. His 58.4% ground ball rate ranks 3rd among MLB pitchers with at least 60 IP.

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So Didi was activated and played on Friday, and FanDuel surprised the heck out of me by preemptively raising his price to $3,000. The only conclusion I can draw from this is that random price setting guy at FanDuel reads my articles. So thank you, random FanDuel Price Setting Guy for doing the dirty work and making Didi Gregorius $3,000 instead of $2,000, you truly are a Real American Hero (cue the music from those Bud Light ads about Real American Heros / Real Men of Genius). I got nothing else for an introduction today, but the next time I need FanDuel to do something, I shall make sure to include it in the article.

On to the picks…

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?

[brid autoplay=”true” video=”420844″ player=”10951″ title=”Fantasy Baseball 2019 Mailbag Week 12″]

Chris Archer (6 IP, 7 ER, ERA at 5.73) allowed four homers to the first five hitters he faced in the 2nd inning.  The only way things could look worse for Chris Archer and, specifically the Pirates, is if Austin Meadows hit all four homers wearing different colored sombreros.  “Hola!  I am Austin Prairieritto!”  “Hola!  I am Tijuana Meadows!”  “Hola!  I am Roberto Hernandez!”  “Hola!  Imagine my exclamation marks are in the front of my sentences but upside down!”  Okay, I’m Daffy like a duck talking about a Spanish Meadows when it was the Braves who mollywhopped Archer.  A Spanish Robert Loggia, “Archer is a pitcher that don’t throw straight.”  As I said yesterday, it’s not whether the record of four straight hitters with a home run is going to fall this year, it’s only how soon and with how many homers total.  8 straight hitters with a homer?  9?  12?  Yesterday, Brian McCann (2-for-4, 4 RBIs) hit his 4th and 5th homer, going Yardo Montalban hitting them where da plane da plane goes.  Josh Donaldson (1-for-4) hit his 9th homer, managing to control his Hulk-smash anger until the appropriate time — at the DMV.  Nick Markakis (1-for-2, 2 runs) hit his 6th homer for his 2nd Sparkakis in two days, and Ozzie Albies (1-for-3, hitting .270) hit his 10th homer, 3rd in two games.  ProContractsAreWhatWeKnow dot com said Albies earned $17.87 between homers.  Albies looks like he’s come out of his May funk, but he still has no place to move up in the lineup.  Well, maybe he can replace Austin Riley, whose average has dropped eighty points in a week.  Anyway, here’s what else I saw yesterday in fantasy baseball:

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The dynamic duo is back with lots of Redbull talk, a tribute to Geto Boys Bushwick Bill, and all the fantasy baseball goodies to rot your chompers. We kick off the podcast discussing Uber-Prospect Yordan Alvarez’s call-up, follow it up with some second half rankings and projections for Lucas Giolito, Julio Teheran, amongst others, before taking you home with the top adds in week 11 of 2019 fantasy baseball. It’s a rollercoaster of emotion with lots of twists and turns, bring your kids and a change of underwear. It’s that good.

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I hope everyone had a wonderful tenth week of fun in the Razzball Commenter Leagues.  The Yordan Alvarez party has officially started and it started off with a bang. Even people in my leagues that aren’t usually prospect-hounds are excited.  The numbers in Triple-A have been pretty insane, I’ll admit, but for those of us with zero RCL shares, I hope this is a quick cup of coffee. I’m afraid he’s here to stay though and I completely whiffed on stashing him.  Shame on me. In the meantime, I’ve got Kyle Tucker still burning a hole in my bench in a few RCLs. Goodness, gracious these Astros are stacked. If I were you, I’d take a peak around my league at who had Yordan stashed (Donkey Teeth) and plan accordingly if they happen to be behind you in the power department (we are tied in the ‘Perts League in HRs).  We could have another Austin Riley on our hands! I’ll be very curious to see what Yordan draws on the trade market the next few weeks. Now, for the rest of the week that was, week 10 in the RCLs:

Please, blog, may I have some more?