Albert Suarez has been great this season, throwing 70.1 innings with a 2.82 ERA and 55 strikeouts. However, he has struggled recently, allowing a 4.91 ERA over his last 25.2 innings of work. He has a great matchup to start the week, so he is worth using here, but there is some risk.
Tanner Houck has been fantastic in the first half, throwing 117 innings with a 2.54 ERA and 112 strikeouts. He struggled a bit before the break which is the reason he is not a must-start option, but the Rockies are a terrible offense and the Yankees were struggling before the break, so these are nice matchups.
Christian Scott is a really good pitching prospect who has been up and down in his first season in the Majors. He has a nice matchup with the Marlins and a tough one versus the Braves, but he is such a talented pitcher you should use him in most formats.
Mitchell Parker had been one of the big surprises in fantasy this year before getting beat up in two of his last three starts. He faces a good Padres offense and a Cardinals offense that has been better as of late, so this is a tough set of matchups with some risk.
Javier Assad has been great this season and probably deserves to be higher on this list. However, he is going up against two of the better lineups in baseball that are good at making a lot of contact, which is something Assad can struggle with. You probably aren’t sitting him here, but there is risk.
Carlos Rodon was struggling before the break, especially with walks and home runs. The velocity and strikeouts were still there, but any time Rodon looks off it worries you because of his long injury history. The Rays are a nice matchup and you aren’t running away from the Red Sox, but it is hard to know what you will get from Rodon.
Zack Littell probably deserves to be higher on this list. However, he has two tough matchups versus a good Yankees team in New York and a Reds offense that has a lot of upside. He had a couple of bad starts in the month before the break. I think he is usable because the Yankees had been struggling before the break and the Reds aren’t as good offensively away from home.
Michael Lorenzen has been great since joining the Rangers but struggled in two of his last three starts before the break against the Angels who aren’t very good and the Orioles who are. These are pretty good matchups but the risk is there with his walk rate and home run issues, but I would roll with him in a lot of leagues.
Lance Lynn has been up and down all season, but he is getting a nice set of matchups versus a Washington offense and a Pittsburgh offense that are lackluster, at best. There is a risk because of his homer-prone ways, but both games are in pitcher’s parks. He is worth streaming if you can afford a potential blowup.
I love Robbie Ray, but it is hard to know how the Giants will use him coming off of Tommy John surgery. He has looked good in AAA, but there is a lot of risk here.
I love Max Meyer as a talent, but the Marlins aren’t a team that gives him a lot of win potential and the matchups here aren’t great. Throw in the fact we don’t know how deep he will go into the games and he becomes more difficult to use outside of really deep leagues.
Justin Mason is the lead fantasy writer and analyst for Friendswithfantasybenefits.com. He is a writer at Fangraphs and Fantasy Pros. You can hear him on the Radio on the FWFB, TGFBI and the Sleeper and the Bust Podcasts. He also runs The Great Fantasy Baseball Invitational and the Bay Area Roto Fantasy (BARF) league.
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