Certain developments from the weekend are probably too obvious to mention here.
John Means and Alek Manoah both having UCL damage, for instance. What more needs to be said? Means has already been ruled out for the year. Manoah probably will be. Few players lost more value this weekend than them, but that's about where the discussion ends. Likewise, Steven Kwan coming off the IL and Blake Snell going on it were major developments that more or less speak for themselves.
Other developments aren't as significant but are more deserving of intellectual rigor. Let's examine those, shall we?
Stock Up
It took real faith to stick with Mitch Keller through his rocky April, a month when so many pitchers were emerging on the waiver wire. Then again, he's the sort of pitcher who will always require a leap of faith. He defies convention in that he gets strikeouts without the benefit of whiffs and is lacking a true put-away pitch, but he's nimble enough to tinker his way out of any rough patch. He seems to have done that in his past five starts -- putting together a 1.34 ERA, 0.92 WHIP and 7.2 K/9 -- but specifically, I want to focus on the last four. That's when he began throwing his cutter harder (by more than 1 mph). The league may catch up to it eventually, but when it does, you can feel confident he'll make another tweak to get back on track.
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Gavin Stone's five scoreless innings Sunday give him a 1.64 ERA and 0.95 WHIP over his past seven starts, but his 6.4 K/9 during that stretch is cause for concern. The fear is that he's an incomplete pitcher, having a world-beating changeup but not a strong enough breaking ball to hold up as a conventional starting pitcher. That's what makes Sunday's start so noteworthy. He actually faded the changeup, making it his fourth-most-thrown pitch on the day, and emphasized the slider, which was responsible for nine of his 15 swinging strikes. It's the second time in four starts that the slider has been a big bat-misser for him, so he's making strides toward gaining the main thing he's lacking.
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Yimi Garcia worked the ninth inning of a tie game Friday and picked up the Blue Jays' only save of the weekend Sunday, confirming that he'll be the one to fill in for injured closer Jordan Romano. And judging by his other numbers, he could be a nice fit in the role. The problem is that we don't have a clue how long Romano will be out. The injury is a recurrence of the elbow inflammation that sidelined him for the start of the season -- and he had pitched poorly since returning. But an MRI revealed no structural damage, in which case he may only need a couple weeks off. If Hector Neris or Trevor Megill is available in your league, then they should still take priority over Garcia.
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Yes, Ryan Weathers' ERA and WHIP both went up with Saturday's start, but it's kind of flown under the radar how low they were to begin with. Even including this latest start, he has a 1.67 ERA and 0.81 WHIP in his past four, bringing him to 3.41 and 1.12 for the year. So why am I shining a light on it now? This latest start saw Weathers notch a season-high 11 strikeouts, which are the one thing he's been lacking, and I don't think it was a fluke. Of his 21 swinging strikes Saturday, 13 came on the changeup, which has a 40 percent whiff rate. That's elite and suggests a high strikeout rate is possible, but the changeup isn't even close to being Weathers' best swing-and-miss pitch. His sweeper has a 55 percent whiff rate, which is almost unheard of. The two pitches together point to a seriously high ceiling that Weathers may be on the verge of meeting.
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Albert Suarez was plenty interesting even in a swingman role for the Orioles, but with the news this weekend that John Means and Tyler Wells are both done for the year with UCL injuries, it's safe to assume the 34-year-old is part of the rotation for the foreseeable future. Wait, did I say 34-year-old? You may not have heard of him prior to this year, but it's true. He saw some time with the Giants in 2016 and 2017 but has mostly been a minor-league journeyman. What changed was a velocity jump of 3 mph this spring. He's pitched to a 1.57 ERA and 0.99 WHIP so far, and while the strikeout rate is lacking, his 12.8 percent swinging-strike rate (same as MacKenzie Gore) suggests there's more to be had there. With the Orioles offense backing him, it won't take much for Suarez to become Fantasy-relevant.
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Stock Down
This latest start for Walker Buehler makes it 1 in 5 where he's been of any real value in Fantasy. He's failing on every level, basically. There are too many walks, too many home runs and not nearly enough swings and misses. While he's throwing about as hard as before his second Tommy John surgery, he may be using more effort to get there, compromising his command. His one good start May 18 saw him shave half a mile per hour off his fastball, which led to him walking no one and throwing 71 percent of his pitches for strikes. Given his ace history, it's too early to give up on Buehler, but for as reliable as Tommy John surgery is known to be, far fewer pitchers get back to form after a second one. And in a pitching-rich environment, the leash will run out quickly.
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For as unhelpful as Buehler has been, I'm not sure Jordan Montgomery has had even one start that was of high impact in Fantasy. His best two (April 19 and May 18) saw him strike out a combined five over 13 innings. He was never a big strikeout pitcher, but his 5.7 per nine innings this year would be far and away a career low. And mostly, hits have replaced them. So what's gone wrong? Arguably his best pitch, the curveball, just hasn't had the same movement this year, breaking too much both vertically and horizontally. His latest start Friday makes it pretty clear that he's not on the verge of figuring things out, and there's no reason to cling to him with starting pitching being in such surplus right now.
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Though he was scarcely drafted in Fantasy, James McArthur quickly emerged as the closer for a surprising Royals team, collecting 11 saves through their first 47 games. He's had precisely zero over their past 14 and just turned in his ugliest outing of the season Friday, giving up four runs on four hits without recording an out. He then worked the eighth inning in his next appearance Sunday -- to get out of a jam, yes, but it still may indicate that manager Matt Quatraro is hedging on him as the closer. And could you blame him? McArthur doesn't have the overpowering fastball you'd normally want from a closer, and his stat line is just a mess now. His saving grace is that no one else in that bullpen has looked the part either, but if the Royals hope to stay in contention, they can't settle for giving away games late.
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At no point has Luis Severino looked "right" for the Mets this year, but it was easier to dismiss when he had a 2.31 ERA and 1.06 WHIP in six April starts. In five starts since then, he has a 4.97 ERA and 1.31 WHIP, so it's time to face the reality that the Severino we once knew and loved is gone. He's abandoned his changeup and completely altered the profile of his slider. His 8.6 percent swinging-strike rate is the sort you see from Marcus Stroman, which makes sense because Severino has reinvented himself as a ground-ball pitcher, leaning more and more on his sinker as he pitches more and more to contact. It's an approach that may prevent total collapse, but it doesn't offer nearly as much upside for Fantasy. Just by virtue of him having the sixth-lowest K/BB rate among qualifiers, it's probably safe to move on.
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It's fair to say that Spencer Torkelson had already been dropped in shallower leagues, judging by his 76 percent roster rate, but in anything deeper, you may have felt obligated to hold onto him, recognizing that he got off to a slow start last year as well before emerging as a big-time slugger in the second half. After all, home runs have been lacking this year, and you wouldn't want to forfeit what could be a premium source of them. Well, the Tigers just let you off the hook, optioning Torkelson to Triple-A Sunday. Maybe he gets his swing right down there and comes back to deliver the power numbers he's capable of, but clearly, the turnaround isn't imminent. You can cut him loose without the nagging fear it'll backfire.
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