After this weekend, we can take a little break. Once the final pitch is thrown on Sunday, there won't be another game that matters until Thursday -- and that game features the Mets, so your mileage may vary on how much it actually matters.
Of course, that doesn't mean we're just hitting pause on the season. The Fantasy Baseball Today podcast and newsletter will be here throughout the All-Star break to get you prepped for the second half of the season, and that starts with a look ahead ... in some cases, well ahead.
Scott White dropped his mid-season top prospects list Thursday, and while he doesn't go as deep as he did prior to the season, there are good reasons for that. For one, a bunch of would-be top prospects are already up in the majors, making a huge impact on pennant races right now. And a bunch of other prospects have made their debut but didn't stick around, and Scott is sticking with the 50 best players who haven't made their MLB debut yet.
Oh, and then there's this: The prospect pool hasn't been replenished by new MLB draft picks yet. That'll happen this weekend, when the White Sox make the No. 1 pick at 1 pm on Saturday. Eventually, you'll get to know names like Grady Emerson, Roch Cholowsky, and Vahn Lackey, the top three projected picks in Mike Axisa's latest mock draft. But Scott hasn't included them here, so we'll have to wait until the offseason to see where they land.
With that out of the way, let's get to know the top five prospects on Scott's list, including their potential chances of making an impact in the second half, and then head here to see the rest of the top 50:
1. Jesus Made, SS, Brewers
Age: 19
2026 levels: Double-A
2026 stats: .274 BA (299 AB), 8 HR, 24 SB, .776 OPS, 33 BB, 49 K
Though a higher home run output would bolster his case, Jesus Made is more than holding his own as a 19-year-old at Double-A and still has the makings of a Jose Ramirez type.
Second half call-up is ... unlikely.
2. Leo De Vries, SS, Athletics
Age: 19
2026 levels: Double-A
2026 stats: .280 BA (289 AB), 10 HR, 30 SB, .797 OPS, 38 BB, 75 K
Leo De Vries is also still growing into his power but has upped his stolen base game this year and remains well ahead of schedule as a 19-year-old at Double-A.
Second half call-up is ... unlikely.
3. Franklin Arias, SS, Red Sox
Age: 20
2026 levels: Double-A
2026 stats: .332 BA (256 AB), 17 HR, 5 SB, 1.020 OPS, 34 BB, 38 K
Franklin Arias' bat skills were evident in the lower minors, but the leap he's made as a power hitter this year has him threatening to overtake Made and De Vries, even if he's not the base-stealer they are.
Second half call-up is ... unlikely.
4. Kade Anderson, SP, Mariners
Age: 22
2026 levels: Double-A
2026 stats: 8-1, 1.36 ERA, 0.69 WHIP, 72 2/3 IP, 10 BB, 108 K
My heart wanted to place Kade Anderson No. 1, given that he's closer to the majors than the three ahead of him here and a near lock for an immediate impact in Fantasy, for as thoroughly as he's dominated Double-A.
Second half call-up is ... expected.
5. Josue De Paula, OF, Dodgers
Age: 21
2026 levels: Double-A
2026 stats: .320 BA (319 AB), 15 HR, 25 SB, .966 OPS, 53 BB, 49 K
The bat will need to carry Josue De Paula since he brings almost no defensive value, but with every move up the ladder, it looks increasingly like it will -- and handily.
Second half call-up is ... possible.
For the rest of the list, head here.
Pre-game Lineup Card
Here's what you might have missed from CBSSports.com's MLB coverage in recent days:
Week 16 Trade Values! My rankings have been updated for both H2H points and Roto leagues for Week 16. Go check out the latest changes and get some guidelines for a deal as we near the halfway point of the season.
IL stash rankings. Scott White takes a look at the top 50 players worth stashing on your IL heading into the All-Star break.
Rookie rankings. Dayn Perry updates the rookie rankings, and yep, Kevin McGonigle is still at the top. But he's joined by three other rookie All-Stars in what is shaping up to be one of the best rookie classes we've ever seen.
2016 MLB redraft. Mike Axisaa looks back with the benefit of hindsight and has Pete Alonso jumping into the top five.
Griffin injury fallout. What does Konnor Grriffin's injury mean for the Rookie of the Year race and the Pirates chances of making the playoffs? Dayn Perry looks into it.
Hitting the Wire
The top waiver-wire targets from Thursday's action:
Ryan Waldschmidt, OF, Diamondbacks (24%) – Waldschmidt really struggled in his first taste of the majors, but with the Diamondbacks set to recall him Friday, I remain intrigued by the talent. With his power and speed potential, he has a very Fantasy-friendly skill set, and he has put that on full display down at Triple-A, hitting .288/.405/.492 with six homers and six steals in 51 games. His overly passive approach at the plate got exposed in his previous stint with the D-Backs, but in any five-outfielder league, I'm willing to give him another try to figure it out.
Caleb Durbin, 3B, Red Sox (59%) – Durbin got off to a miserable start to the season, but he's been crushing it for a while now. After he hit his ninth homer Thursday he is now hitting .297 with eight homers, 22 runs, 23 RBI, and six steals over his past 36 games with an OPS over .900. He still isn't hitting the ball hard (his best average exit velocity for a month this season was actually in April, which was just 85.1 mph), but he has a good approach at the plate and is doing a better job elevating the ball to the pull side in the air more consistently. Durbin is playing over his head, but I think he's a reasonably fine hot-hand play right now.
Bailey Ober, SP, Twins (54%) – Full disclosure here: I don't really have any faith in Ober. He pitched well in his return from an elbow injury Thursday, striking out five over five one-run innings, and prior to his final couple of starts before the injury, he had a very solid 3.46 ERA. But his velocity is still way down around 88 mph and he has barely been missing any bats this season, ranking in the 15th percentile or worse in both whiff and strikeout rate. I'm including him here because he's a big name and I'm sure some of you will be interested in adding him, but I don't think it's worth it.
Three Up, Three Down
Three big performances that have players trending up, and three that have the arrow pointing in the opposite direction.
Three Up
Gavin Williams turned it around
The most frustrating pitcher in baseball strikes again! Williams is capable of performances of the most astonishing brilliance, as he reminded us Thursday when he struck out 11 over seven innings against the Twins with just three hits and one walk en route to two earned runs allowed. And he's also capable of absolutely sinking your team for weeks on end, as he did while putting up a 6.60 ERA and 1.43 WHIP from June 1 through July 3, a span of six starts where he didn't manage even a single quality start. And the thing is, you can't really know when the good times are coming or going; those six starts came immediately before Thursday's gem, and were preceded by a three-start stretch where he struck out 22, walked just two, and allowed three earned runs over 21 innings. It's true that every pitcher goes through good and bad stretches over the course of the season, and focusing on any given stretch is usually going to lead you wrong more often than just taking their overall production at face value. But with Williams, it feels especially stark; the highs are as high as any pitcher gets, but the lows make him look like he barely belongs in the rotation. And what makes this all the more confusing is that Williams' underlying metrics are all over the place: His xERA is 4.66, a truly terrible mark, while his FIP is 3.76 and his xFIP is 3.25, ranging from "pretty good" to "outright great." That's the Gavin Williams experience, and it all adds up to a pitcher who is probably one of the 36 or so best in Fantasy, but who will never actually pitch like the 36th-best pitcher in Fantasy for long; he'll pitch like the best for a month or so, and then like one of the worst for equally long. It's … frustrating.
Framber Valdez looked like himself
Speaking of frustrating pitchers! As mediocre as Valdez has been, I've never really been moved to lose faith in him this season because this is just what he does sometimes. He's an incredibly volatile pitcher because he relies so heavily on a high-70s curveball, which is just an inherently tough pitch to command consistently; it's similar to how splitter-heavy pitchers like Kevin Gausman just seem to go through stretches where they lose the feel for their best pitch and struggle for a while. But the thing is, Valdez always seems to get it back eventually, and you definitely want to be there when he does, for starts like Thursday's, when he struck out nine over seven one-run innings. The curveball generated eight of his 18 swinging strikes and had a 44% called-plus-swinging-strike rate, and the rest of the arsenal followed along with it, as it so often does. Valdez still has a 4.10 ERA for the season, but I'm willing to bet on it being something closer to his 3.43 career mark moving forward, if not better.
Chase DeLauter is looking refreshed
DeLauter got off to an absurd start to his MLB career, but he spent most of the next few months putting up pretty pedestrian numbers before going on the IL with a fractured rib cage. And DeLauter acknowledged that getting a break, even one from injury, might not necessarily have been a bad thing. "[The IL stint] was definitely a good little break for me for the legs and stuff like that," he told MLB.com earlier in the week. He homered again Thursday, his second in nine games since coming off the IL, and he's hitting .362 since that span, so I kind of buy the theory that he needed a bit of a "reset." Remember, DeLauter has never played a full season, and even getting through two straight months without injury is something new for him, so it makes sense that he might have been hitting a wall in the early summer months. But the underlying skill set remains very strong, and I still think DeLauter has Michael Brantley-esque upside.
Three Down
Bryce Miller didn't look right
If it were just one bad start, I wouldn't even note it. But we do have to spend some time on this Miller start, because his velocity was down 1 mph or more across basically his entire arsenal. That may not mean anything – velocity fluctuates throughout the season for every pitcher – but Miller pitched through bone spurs last season that never get removed via surgery, so that's always going to be in the back of my mind when I see his velocity dip like this. And that's especially true when he also struggled to go along with it. I'm not panicking – Miller is still a top-20 SP for me – but I'm going to be watching his first start out of the All-Star break very closely to make sure his velocity is where it should be.
Reid Detmers fooled us all
I'm kind of at the same point with Detmers that I reached with Mackenzie Gore yesterday, where I'm just not sure he's worth the trouble anymore. He's talented, and there will be stretches where he misses a ton of bats and is super effective, but it just never seems to last. We fell for one such stretch in June, and he has rewarded us with 17 earned runs over his past four starts. Detmers' underlying stats are much better than his actual 4.39 ERA, but he has always underperformed his peripherals, so I'm not sure we should expect this season to be any different. Maybe a trade could help Detmers unlock something, so if you want to hold onto him through the deadline, that makes some sense. But if you also decide he isn't worth the trouble and just go with someone like Troy Melton or Ian Seymour instead, I wouldn't blame you.
Yes, you can drop Bryce Elder
Yeah, I think we're done here. You don't necessarily have to drop Elder across the board, but I think you can, and that's something nobody was going to say a month ago. Well, in that month, his ERA has risen from 2.66 to 4.12 thanks to four straight non-quality starts. In that span, Elder has allowed 22 runs in 18 innings and has largely undone all of his good work from earlier in the season for players in 52% of CBS Fantasy leagues where he was still rostered. And this start came after the Braves gave him extra time off between starts to recover, so it's not like we can chalk the three homers in four innings up to him being run down. I think we can chalk it up to something that was always true: Elder just isn't a very good pitcher. He's had stretches of success in the past – though none as long or as impressive as the one to open this season, to be fair – but he has always ultimately turned back into a bad pitcher in the long run.
Extra Innings
We had some "unwritten rules" nonsense
I initially typed "we had more perfect game discourse Thursday," but that would be an exaggeration. What happened is that Gavin Williams reached the fifth inning without allowing a baserunner, and then Royce Lewis dropped in a bloop single to right field. This would not be noteworthy, except that bloop single came after two failed attempts by Lewis to drop in a bunt for a hit, which was met with consternation from some on the Guardians and in the Guardians' broadcast booth, who responded by saying, "There is no justice in this world."
Ignoring the fact that a bunt is a viable way to attempt to get on base, and trying to get on base in what was at that point a one-run game is, in fact, what every player should be trying to do … there's no such thing as a "perfect game" in the fifth inning! Williams retired 13 batters in a row to start the game, which is a neat feat, but hardly something that needs to be treated with the kind of deference I've seen people talk about this with. That's not a "perfect game bid", that's just four good innings. Bunting for a hit in the ninth inning of a 10-run game is fair game in my opinion – Don't like it? Play defense, bub! – but doing it in the fifth inning of a one-run game? That's just a guy trying to get the tying run on.
