Since the end of May, few starting pitchers have faired better than Taijuan Walker. Curiously, Walker's price is $8,200 tomorrow against the Tigers, down from $9,200 from his last start despite his 30.3 point performance. That's enough to make me all-in on Walker tomorrow vs. the Tigers as they'll be without Miguel Cabrera. Rest of season, I like Walker as a top 50 start with upside for top 30 if he can limit the home run. His K rate is elite above 9.50 since early June with an xFIP of 2.88.
Carlos Carrasco was roughed up by the Astros last night, giving up five earned runs in just four innings. The results could have been even worst as he allowed 10 hits and a walk in the outing; such is the volatility of baseball games, as Carrasco had a near no-hitter last start and dominated again the start before that. I'm still a huge fan of Carrasco; even last night, he generated 46.7% ground balls, so I'm not counting on the .643 BABIP continuing going forward. If you're a Carrasco owner, this is a tough game; if you're not, take this as an opportunity to toss an offer for him as this may have been another frustrating outcome for them given his underperformance all year.
I anticipated Phil Hughes would get roughed up quite a bit against the Orioles last night, then I saw that since July 1 the Orioles are batting just .195 with a .107 ISO and wRC+ of 55. Thus, Hughes had an effective start allowing 2 earned runs over 6.1 innings, though he was very fortunate. He induced 29.2% GBs with only 3 strikeouts. Hughes has been a completely different pitcher from his 2014 performance; the underlying reason is likely due to a number of things, but perhaps mostly from a 1.3 MPH decrease on his fastball. Hitters are making contact 89.6% of the time vs. Hughes, up from 84.3% last year. This is an alarming trend, so I can't recommend Hughes going forward this year despite last night's adequate start.
All five-foot-six of Jose Altuve was elected to his third All-Star Game on Sunday. Altuve was 2-for-5 last night, but was caught stealing. Altuve has now been caught stealing 8 times this year vs. 24 stolen bases. Last year, he was caught only 9 times in 65 attempts, so we've seen a big decline his Altuve's stolen base efficiency. Coupled with a decline in Altuve's BABIP, this means we aren't likely to see 56 stolen bases repeated (or surpassed) in 2015. It's actually quite interesting how different of a season Altuve is having; he's already tallied last year's 7 home runs, but his 16 doubles are far off pace from last year's 47, so is ISO is only up 6 points on the year! Altuve will provide excellent value going forward, but if I had to make a decision on it, I'll say 2014 will go down as his career year.
I still get surprised to see Ryan Raburn batting 4th or 5th in the Indians lineup. I expect to rip the Indians when seeing this, but simply put, Raburn is destroying lefties this season. His wRC+ is 167 on the year (vs. 79 against righties). Raburn has career splits like this, but not nearly this dramatic (119 vs. 86 wRC+). He's a DFS must against lefties (despite last night's performance vs. Keuchel) and warrants starting in daily leagues and even some weekly mixed leagues because the Indians will pinch hit him frequently with RISP when he doesn't start. Raburn's average will likely fall as the season goes on, but he's made enough strides to his game (career low K rate; career high walk rate) to warrant usability.
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