Fantasy Baseball Pickups - Check the wire for Willie Calhoun!

SiriusXM and fantasy alarm analyst Jennifer Piacenti joins Yahoo Fantasy's Scott Pianowski to offer some waiver wire adds for fantasy managers.

Video Transcript

[COMPUTER GAME MUSIC]

SCOTT PIANOWSKI: Still early in the Fantasy Baseball season, but it's never too early to get some roster love from the waiver wire. I'm Scott Pianowski, and we're joined by Jen Piacenti of "Fantasy Alarm" on Sirius XM. Jen, I need a hitter. You got some help for me in Texas?

JENNIFER PIACENTI: I do. I have some help for you in Dallas. It's Willie Calhoun, and I don't know about you, but I'm really thrilled to see what he's been doing lately. You know, he had that huge power breakout in 2019. He swatted 21 home runs in only 83 games. And for those of you keeping track at home, that's a 41-home-run pace. But then, of course, he had a down 2020. You know, he took a 95-mile-per-hour fastball to the face in spring training, and so you can't really blame him for that-- just limited starts last year. But since he came back to the team this year on April 17th, he's batting .316 with three home runs and only nine strikeouts.

And, Saturday, he was even one triple short of the cycle. So his average exit velo is the highest of his career. His max-exit velo is in the 77th percentile of the league. He's hitting the ball hard 44% of the time, and he's only striking out 16% of the time. If he continues to hit, I expect he's going to be moved up in the batting order, and I just-- I have to put value on anyone who has this kind of plate discipline in a year where the league batting average is at an all-time low of .233. I can't believe it, but Calhoun is only rostered in 9% of Yahoo leagues. I'm putting my FAB bids in this week.

SCOTT PIANOWSKI: Yeah, I'd like to end this segment right now and just make sure he's not rostered in some of my leagues. That's a great call with a post-hype sleeper. We've never really known if Calhoun could play defense, but as long as he's got a spot in the lineup, that bat is going to play. One of my favorite cheats for fantasy baseball is, let's get as many fire-breathing dragons in the bullpen as we can. I don't care if they're getting saves or not, and let's smooth those ERAs and let's smooth those ratios and try to find those guys on winning teams. I know the Yankees are off to a little bit of a slow start, but we all know they're going to be a 90-plus-win team. And I look at what Chad Green and Jon Loaisiga are doing right now. Their ERAs are right around 1.00. Their WHIPs are well under 1.00, great walk-to-strikeout ratio, and again looking at a team that's probably going to-- I think 95, 100 wins by the end of the season.

And as more and more wins go away from starting pitchers and go into the bullpens, I have some really roster-- roster-heavy, reliever-heavy teams where I think I'm going to get some wins from some of these guys. You'll get the occasional save, as well. So the Padres have a really deep bullpen. You might want to do some shopping there. But I've-- I've done a lot of proactive pickups of Green and Loaisiga. I think I'll be rostering them all season. Jen, you got another hitter for me?

JENNIFER PIACENTI: Well, actually, I'm going to piggyback on what you did and talk about a pitcher. I'm going down to Texas again. And I think you're right about it's hard to chase wins and even saves this year, so I've really got my eye on Luis Garcia. Now, obviously, there's a lot of Luis Garcias. This is the one that plays for Houston. In five appearances, Garcia has allowed 2 earned runs or less. His ERA is 2.70. He has a 15% swinging-strike rate, so that's the 13th-best in the league.

And I know a lot of people this week-- they lost Dustin May. You know, Jesus Luzardo now on the IL for a little bit. Luis Garcia is someone you may be able to plug in, because Jake Odorizzi has been having the forearm tightness. We don't know when Framber Valdez is coming back. And as you said, the cool thing about Luis Garcia is, especially in points leagues, he's start eligible, right? So you can plug him into that relief-pitcher spot, rack up a lot of points. I absolutely love it. You know, he has five pitches. This guy's pitch arsenal is deep, and he gets whiffs on all of them. His last outing-- 14 swinging strikes. He does have a little bit of a fly-ball, you know, tendency, but Statcast still says his expected ERA is 3.66. So I'm pushing my chips in on Luis Garcia. Also, under 10% rostered in Yahoo leagues. I think, last I checked, it was 4%.

SCOTT PIANOWSKI: And, man, do we love those relief pitchers who have starting-pitcher eligibility. Just gives you the max amount of roster flexibility. You can put your best team on the field every day. And roster flexibility is the reason why I like Josh Rojas in Arizona. He had a really big spring, and then he just couldn't hit for about two weeks, and he got dropped en masse in Yahoo leagues, but he's been hitting the crap out of the ball lately-- four home runs and a .348 average over the last week.

And you mentioned all these injuries. Rojas qualifies at second, shortstop, and the outfield. And he's got a lot of spot-- a lot of ways into the lineup in Arizona. Even when people start to come back, if he's hitting, he's going to have a spot in this lineup. So somebody probably cut him early April. They were frustrated. We want production right away, and sometimes we're not patient with some of our later-round picks. I bet he's been dropped in a lot of the medium and shallower formats-- right now, 43% rostered in Yahoo. Make sure Josh Rojas is not percolating on your waiver wire.