Straight Cheese Streaming Starting Pitchers Week 7

This is my weekly column where I suggest low-owned starting pitchers that have a matchup in their favor in the coming week to help your fantasy baseball team. Most of these hurlers are to be used and tossed back to the waiver wire. Some of them will graduate from the wire and find a permanent space on a roster, hopefully yours. This week we are looking at streaming starting pitchers week 7.

My process is to look at wOBA, ISO and K% to identify weak-hitting lineups. Conversely, for pitchers I look at wOBA, ISO against and their K%.

Streaming Starting Pitchers Week 5 Review

Before we get into next week’s pitchers to stream let’s look back at my previous recommendations, streaming starting pitchers week 5. Note we have to look back two weeks since last week’s Straight Cheese is for the current week. Got it? Good.

Damn you, Swanson. I had a pretty good thing going until you came in on Sunday and crushed my hopes; much like Arya crushing the Night King’s hopes of an endless night.

Instead, I had an endless night of restlessness second guessing my Swanson pick. Speaking of GOT, could I get the camera crew to go back and make it so I can’t see Swanson’s performance, much like they did with the Battle of Winterfell?

All statistics, ownership and projected starting dates are as of Thursday morning, May 2.

Streaming Starting Pitchers Week 7

Continuing on with the GoT thread… we still have more to get to, so here’s three pitchers I’m telling you to stream next week.

LHP Wade Miley, HOU
Owned Y15%/E10% · vs. Texas Rangers – Thursday, May 9th

Okay, there is a reason that Miley is sitting out on your waiver wire. Everyone knows that his current 3.52 ERA and 1.14 WHIP are not who he is. Dude doesn’t even strike anyone out (15.2 K% and 5.67 K/9). His 4.52 xFIP this year and a career 4.23 ERA tell me that things are going to eventually get ugly.

But not next week when Texas comes to town. The Rangers struggle mightily against southpaws on the road: 0.229 wOBA (29th), 0.70 ISO (30th) and 33.6 K% (30th). Let’s all do the right thing here and stream Miley for this start and toss him back to the free agent pool where he belongs.

RHP Jake Odorizzi, MIN
Owned Y22%/E10% · vs. Detroit Tigers – Friday, May 10th

Odorizzi is similar to Miley in that everyone knows that he is probably worse than his stats indicate (3.34 ERA, 4.68 xFIP and 1.11 WHIP). What he brings to the table that Miley doesn’t is strikeouts: 25.0 K% and 9.10 K/9.

Those K’s will come into play when Detroit comes to town. The Tigers are currently last in MLB with 30.7 K% vs. RHP on the road. They also rank towards the bottom in wOBA (0.275 / 27th) and ISO (0.127 / 27th) in the same split.

You know what to do, now go do it.

LHP Manny Banuelos, CHW
Owned Y3%/E2% · at Toronto Blue Jays – Friday, May 10th at Cleveland Indians – Thursday, May 9th

Banuelos was recently moved to the starting rotation filling in the vacated spot when Ervin Santana was released. In two starts he has a 1.86 ERA, 3.44 xFIP, 1.45 WHIP and 10 strikeouts in 9.2 innings (24.4 K%). The WHIP is a little high but everything else I like. Now, if you ask me if he is worth keeping long term, I’ll say no because he is 28 years old and only has 46.1 MLB innings. In those innings he has a 4.26 xFIP and 18.7 K%.

What I am telling you to do though is stream him against the Blue Jays next week. Toronto comes into the contest struggling against LHP at home: 0.247 wOBA (29th), 0.087 ISO (29th) and 26.1 K% (21st).

Now that we know his start has been moved up to Thursday in Cleveland I want to recommend him even more! The Indians are even worse than the Blue Jays against LHP at home: through Monday’s games they had a 0.250 wOBA (28th), 0.74 ISO (28th) and strikeout 36.7% of the time (worst in MLB)! Stream him confidently and thank me later.

Extra Cheese

Here is where I recommend a two-start pitcher for you to stream. Please bear in mind that things can change after this article is posted. Injuries, rain delays, managerial moves, etc. can happen.

Well, make it two weeks in a row where the dude I’m telling you to get in there for two starts only ends up with one. Unfortunately, the one start we got from Pineda, in a word, painful.

RHP Anthony DeSclafani, CIN
Owned Y11%/E7% – vs. San Francisco (Mon May 6) & at SF (Sat May 11)

I recently found out that DeSclafini’s nickname is ‘Tony Disco’ and that made me like him more. Desclafini comes into the two matchups with a 3.48 ERA, 4.36 xFIP, 1.16 WHIP and 36 strikeouts in 3 innings (27.7 K%). More impressively is that his last three starts have been splendid: 0.51 ERA, 2.42 xFIP, 1.06 WHIP and 20 strikeouts in 17.2 innings (32.6 K%).

Let’s ride this hot streak as he takes on the Giants twice next week:

• SF vs. RHP on the road: 0.311 wOBA (17th), 0.193 ISO (11th) and 20.2 K% (5th)
• SF vs. RHP at home: 0.235 wOBA (30th), 0.100 ISO (30th) and 25.7 K% (24th)

Yeah, I know those numbers on the road are a little surprising but, beggars can’t be choosers. Let’s roll Disco Tony out there next week and “Knock on Wood” that “I Will Survive” and keep on “Stayin’ Alive”.