Tanner Roark - I like Tanner Roark. I think he can be a solid back-end starter due primarily to his excellent control and one other thing......his schedule. Roark's peripherals have actually gotten worse across the board in the second half, yet his ERA is nearly three-quarters of a run lower. The schedule has certainly helped, as in his last 10 starts he's seen 6 bottom-10 offenses, one mid-tier offense (MIA), the Pirates without McCutchen, the orioles without a DH, and the Brewers, a solid offense that becomes much better against LHP. You might think that I'm expecting less out of Roark down the stretch, but the schedule doesn't exactly get any more difficult with 3 more bottom-10 offenses scheduled for his last 6 starts (and none better than 15th-ranked). Even though his peripherals are lagging, I still expect Roark to perform reasonably well down the stretch, although likely not quite at the sub-3.00 ERA that we've seen to this point.
Oscar Taveras - Taveras had a 6-game hitting streak snapped by Francisco Liriano and the Pirates on Monday, dropping his 2014 line to 233/273/307. Everyone from fantasy owners to Cards fans are getting impatient with the phenom, but the Cards themselves don't appear to fall into that group. The likelihood of power developing is somewhat up in the air with Taveras, although he is just 22, but the fact remains that he has never hit below .300 at any level in the minors. He doesn't have contact issues, and he hits offspeed pitches well. Most of the normal weaknesses that you look for in a young hitter aren't there, but he's inexperienced against top-level pitching, and it's been proven well more often than not that it's easier for pitching to adjust to major league hitting than the converse. I think Taveras is already boosting the production a bit, although he isn't tremendously likely to be a big help down the stretch in shallow formats. I'd be perfectly happy to deal for him with an eye toward 2015 however, regardless of format.
Travis D'Arnaud - D'Arnaud homered again Sunday, giving him as many homers in 31 games after the break as he had in the first half (6). D'Arnaud makes decent contact for a young power hitter, but he's been completely hamstrung by BABIPs down around .240 during his MLB tenure. It is unlikely that those will persist to that extent, and he does have good power for a catcher. I think that D'Arnaud is a perfectly serviceable 2nd catcher right now, and I still have hopes that he will blossom into a top-12 player at the position as soon as next spring.
Jacob Lamb - Lamb is up and playing against RHP at 3B for the D-Backs, and as a guy that's 24 years of age with a career minor league line of 321/408/553, he should be on the radar. Lamb had 59 XBH (39 doubles) in under 400 ABs this year at AA and AAA, but he does have a lot of swing-and-miss in his game so the AVG could be a bit of an issue at the top level. He merits a look as an injury stopgap or high-risk choice in deeper leagues for the stretch run.
Tyler Matzek - Colorado pitchers are the "Typhoid Mary" of the fantasy baseball world, but Matzek has had a couple interesting starts in a row now, after a solid 7 IP, 2 ER victory over the Giants Monday. Matzek is a lefty with good velocity and solid breaking pitches that's posted an FIP ERA of 4.40 this year. Nothing special there, but in his last two outings Matzek has bumped his swinging strike% up into the 9% range from his 7.7% figure for the year, and he's done it while posting a GB:FB ratio of 30:4. He still pitches in Colorado, so this isn't likely for the faint of heart, but he's moved into the "potential high-risk add" category in deeper leagues.
