Depending on how your season’s going, it may be hard for you to believe that we’re already about a month in, because time is flying so fast as your teams are happily hovering at the top of the standings. Or, it may feel more like the all star break should have been here a week ago, due to the injury and disappointment-fueled slog you feel like you’re in the middle of. It’s been a roller coaster for several of my teams, but I’m going to try to focus on the positive this week, with a reminder of how the lack of options can sometimes be a very, very good thing. I have a couple teams, as I’m sure many of you do, where my starters have been dropping like flies since before the season started. I’ve basically had to just play any pitcher left standing, leading to some scary starts from pitchers that I might not have activated if I’d had better-looking options. But for at least one half week, it’s worked out swimmingly, with two surprise gems from Mitchell Parker against the Orioles, and Reese Olson against the seemingly unstoppable Padres.
It’s hard to imagine Parker’s WHIP staying below 1 much longer, or Olson having another start anywhere near that great this season, but I’ll happily take the stats as I piece things together week to week. In some deep leagues, of course, it can always feel like you’re starting guys that shouldn’t be in an active lineup, but that makes it that much sweeter when one of those players comes through with a solid game or two. Since roster depth is something we all aim for, whether it’s currently being tested or not, let’s move on to this week’s list of players — all just 10% owned or less in CBS leagues — that may be on our deep or deepish league radar.
AL
Ryan Gusto. Gusto claims our lede this week via the combination of a great start and a cool name. But is there really anything to see here? In deeper leagues, we can’t be as patient as others while we wait to find out. Gusto has already pitched 22 2/3 innings this season (7 appearances including three starts) and so far his fantasy numbers are pretty spectacular: a K an inning, with a 2.78 ERA and 1.10 WHIP, and 3 beautiful W’s. He’s been doing a great job of leading with his fastball and mixing it up a bit from there, but I don’t think it takes an advanced analyst to predict that some regression is in store here. In the deeper leagues, though, Gusto could continue to have value as we see where the coming weeks take him. In the deepest leagues, he might even be serviceable as a long man out of the bullpen if he ends up back there, assuming he can adjust to hitters while they adjust to him at the big league level.
Patrick Corbin. Yes, it’s time for our annual “wait, am I so desperate for pitching that I should consider picking up Patrick Corbin in a deep league?” blurb. Evidently that desperation is real, as Corbin’s ownership has doubled from 3 to 6% in CBS leagues over the last week. His numbers in a small 3-start sample so far are what I’d describe as predictably gross: 5 walks and 10 Ks in 14.1 innings, with a WHIP of 1.53. He does have two of those coveted wins I alluded to above, though, so if the matchup looks survivable (I should probably mention Corbin is a Texas Ranger now), I guess you could grit your teeth and try to ride out a start or two.
Ben Williamson. Since deep league starting pitching is one of the more stressful elements of the fantasy game in my opinion, let’s move on to some hitters. This draft season, I had to opt out of participating in the CBS Sports Analysts AL-only auction league this year due to some scheduling conflicts. I’ll admit that not having that ridiculously deep league where I can see who is scraping whom off the bottom of the free agent barrel has led to situations like Williamson sneaking into the Mariners lineup without me realizing it. He’s been playing third base regularly, though not daily, but so far, so good with the numbers as he’s hitting .310 with a homer. He’s also getting some kudos for his defense, which can’t hurt with the playing time. He’s only 24, but his minor league numbers don’t exactly scream “MLB third baseman,” as he has all of 4 homers in 565 at bats. He does have a great average and OBP plus 22 steals, though, and he’s already swiped two bags in the majors.
Will Wilson. Wilson is this week’s true deep league, 0% owned player. I suppose this honor could also have gone to Weston Wilson of the Phillies, who is rocking a .500 average after going 1 for 2 so far this season, but Will is an infielder for the Guardians. He was a minor league rule 5 pick back in December, and earned his recent promotion after a spectacular start at triple A that included 6 homers in 18 games. This seems like an odd time for his promotion, given that there’s not really a playing time opening in Cleveland for him right now (his first appearance was at third). It still puts him on the radar, though, for now in the deepest leagues, and perhaps later this summer in slightly shallower formats.
NL
Eric Wagaman. Perhaps it’s the somewhat comically low bar set by everyone else on this list, but I think I’d say Wagaman is the player this week that is sparking the most optimism for me in terms of a longer term deep league outlook. I feel like finding deep league value in the Marlins lineup is going to be a constant search and work in progress all season, and that deep league value will occasionally roller coaster up to borderline mixed league relevance, e.g. Otto Lopez of late. It will also regularly plummet to oblivion, see, Jonah Bride. Anyhow, I’m on Team Wagaman for deep leagues for the moment after watching a handful of his at bats. The real-life results have certainly been there, as he’s hitting .274 with three homers and a steal. (Just noticed his 9% ownership at the time I wrote this Wednesday night has already gone up to 11%… not gonna remove him from this post even though he’s technically over this week’s ownership threshold, but I am gonna note that others are paying him some attention).
Mickey Moniak. Moniak, who we seem to talk about on a fairly regular basis here at RITD (sigh), has had a significant ownership increase of late himself, going from 3 to 10%. With Zac Veen back in the minors (pause while we all take a moment to reflect on whether or not there has ever been a Major League Baseball team with a more messed up approach to developing prospects), Moniak perhaps has a bit more job security? The number crunchers say he’s developed some plate discipline in this very small sample size of at bats in 2025. This is starting to feel like a ‘boy who cried wolf’ kind of situation but I may have to grab Moniak in at least one deep league on the off chance this finally turns in to something, given the number of times in the past I’ve rostered him for it to turn into absolutely nothing.
Alex Verdugo. Verdugo’s recently-left-for-dead career is at least temporarily rising from the ashes, with his current but perhaps short-lived chance in the outfield for the Braves. He’s hanging in there so far with a .273 average, which includes a four hit game last week. We’ll see if he can make enough of an impact to stick on the roster and stay very deep league relevant as the season progresses.
Enmanuel Valdez. I recently grabbed Valdez (who qualifies at first and second in most leagues) in a couple NL-only leagues where I was struggling mightily to fill my corner infield spot. I must say that even after rostering him, I was surprised to see that he was batting cleanup for the Pirates the other day. He doesn’t mind taking a free pass (he has 9 walks vs. 11 Ks in 63 plate appearances so far this year), which I always appreciate — perhaps more than I should — in a hitter. There’s not much in his profile to suggest that he’s more than a 26-year old fringe major leaguer who happens to be getting a shot at some MLB at bats right now, but if you need a guy like that as badly as I did, he might be worth a look.
Laura Really digging deep: Tim Tawa or Jose Tena.
I picked up Wagaman in shallow RCLs this week; still holding him on 1 team. His last 7 days (.308/2 HR/1 SB) much better than my other CI options – Mountcastle, Bellinger, and Aranda.
Hey Vin! I love it when a fringe deep league guy can help in an RCL type lineup for a while… the tricky part is always trying to figure out whether to keep holding or when to cut bait. I was really liking grabbing Mouncastle late in drafts this year but sure hasn’t worked out so far. My timing has been horrible so far with trying to stream CI… who knew the move was to just draft Wilmer and let him sit there and rack up stats for a month!
Would you swap out Schanuel for either Mervis or Wegman for a CI slot in a points redraft?
Probably not, unless you can stream/go back and forth and just try to play the hot hand based on schedule and match ups. Schanuel is boring and I’m not holding my breath for a real breakout of any kind, but at least he seems to have a long leash in terms of piling up the at bats. The player rater has him ranked the highest of the three, but I think it’s relatively close on paper so if you have a strong feeling about making a switch go for it.
That’s as deep as it gets! Good stuff as always!
Thanks for reading! May have to go a tiny bit shallower next week so we can actually talk about some potentially interesting players ha ha.
“Verdugo’s recently-left-for-dead career” lololol
I am very interested in Gusto
All the young unproven guys terrify me, but they can’t be much worse than some of the “good” pitchers have been on occasion already this year!