Fantasy Baseball Week 4 Preview: Top 10 sleeper pitchers feature Ryan Weathers, Randy Vasquez
Some of the pitchers already surging on the waiver wire happen to line up for two starts
By
Scott White
•
1 min read
Streaming pitchers isn't for the faint of heart, but if you find yourself without enough reliable options in a given scoring period, it may be what you need to stay afloat. Scott White has 10 recommendations for the upcoming scoring period, all rostered in less than 80 percent of CBS Sports leagues. Generally, only the top two or three are full-throated endorsements, while the rest are more about making the best of a bad situation.
Be sure to check back Sunday for the latest updates.
Sleeper pitchers for Week 4 (April 13-19)
Ryan Weathers took a little off his pitches to focus on better strike-throwing in his latest outing and ended up delivering an eight-inning gem against the Athletics. He has two favorable matchups this week, particularly the first against the most strikeout-prone lineup in baseball.
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Braxton Ashcraft is a ground-ball pitcher who misses bats better than most, which gives him a high floor. His matchup against the Nationals this week gives him a high ceiling.
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Ryne Nelson righted the ship against a tough Mets lineup in his most recent start, which makes me less fearful of his tough matchups this week. A pitcher with a 3.33 ERA, 1.05 WHIP, and 8.0 K/9 over his past 251 2/3 innings is basically a must when he's in line for two starts.
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After three starts, Grant Holmes has already put to rest the concerns about his elbow coming into the season, and he should enjoy an uptick in strikeouts soon enough, given that his slider is sporting a 50 percent whiff rate. His second matchup against the Phillies could be tough, but you'll take two however you can get them.
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Joey Cantillo hasn't been around as long as Holmes, but he profiles similarly as a quality bat-misser whose outings will tend to run short and WHIP will tend to run high. Also like Holmes, he has one good matchup and one bad one this week.
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Jeffrey Springs' fastball is up only a little this year, but judging by the early results, it seems to have made a world of difference. He's allowed a combined three hits in his past two starts, striking out 13 over 13 innings, and has two inviting matchups this week.
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Though he's been effective so far, Mitch Keller presents a ton of ERA and WHIP risk for categories leagues (and without much strikeout upside), which could obviously be doubly damaging in a two-start week. This recommendation is more for points leagues, where such ratio stats aren't scored directly, and Keller's knack for pitching deep into games is of more value.
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Though Will Warren hasn't been bad, per se, two of his three starts have fallen short of the five-inning mark that's the minimum threshold for a pitcher to matter in Fantasy. He'll get two bites at the apple this week, though, and both of his matchups are favorable.
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The Mariners lineup is off to a rough start, and part of that is having the second-most strikeouts of any team. Randy Vasquez has been a surprising source of strikeouts early on, thanks to a fastball that's up about 1 mph and features an additional inch of induced vertical break.
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Michael Burrows has been pretty bad so far, even with a couple favorable matchups, but I still have faith in the Astros' plan for him. I might roll the dice in a two-start week, particularly with one being against an ice cold Mariners lineup.
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