Fantasy Sports

It was a towering blast, but it traveled only 345 feet, and a fan interfered with the ball over the fence, though it was correctly decided that it would have been a homer anyway. Statcast said it would have left nine of the 30 ballparks. It was Rutschman’s second career walkoff homer. He has four homers in his last three games after totaling five in his first 37. His OPS has jumped from .781 to .859 as a result of those three games.

De La Cruz supplied the lone runs for either side in a low-scoring Wednesday afternoon matinee at Comerica Park courtesy of a gargantuan 422-foot blast to left-center field off Tigers starter Casey Mize in the opening frame. It was his lone hit in four at-bats and his ninth round-tripper of the season. The 27-year-old corner outfielder has put together a nice breakthrough campaign so far for the struggling Marlins, batting .256 (46-for-180) with 25 runs scored, nine homers, 24 RBI and one steal through 45 contests.

Contreras is rapidly evolving into one of the premier four-category contributors in the entire fantasy landscape as his latest three-hit performance, his sixth of the season, raises his batting average to an astronomical .359 mark through 43 contests. The 26-year-old backstop crushed a three-run homer off Pirates southpaw Martín Pérez in the third inning and also added an RBI triple a couple frames later as Milwaukee hit five homers in a blowout victory. He’s up to 39 runs scored and 34 homers already to go along with six homers and three steals as well. There isn’t much left to say at this point besides legitimately asking if he’s going to surpass Orioles superstar Adley Rutschman as the consensus top catcher in fantasy at some point in the future.

Gasser got plenty of support from Milwaukee’s offense, which wound up tagging opposing starter Martín Pérez for nine runs over five frames to open the contest, enabling Gasser to cruise to a relatively easy win in his second big league outing. He finished with two strikeouts and only issued one walk. The 24-year-old southpaw wasn’t overpowering, as evidenced by just eight swinging strikes, but he managed to avoid hard contact in this one, limiting Pittsburgh’s lineup to just six batted balls with an exit velocity in excess of 95 mph. He’ll bring a sparkling 0.82 ERA, 0.82 WHIP and 6/1 K/BB ratio across 11 innings (two starts) into an extremely tasty road matchup on Tuesday against the Marlins.

Canzone was hitting .219/.286/.531 in 14 games before going down with a shoulder injury. He was ahead of Luke Raley on the depth chart at that point, but with Raley heating up, he might take more of a backseat for now, at least assuming that Mitch Garver is able to return to the DH spot in the coming days. If Garver lands on the IL, both Raley and Canzone could start in the outfield against righties, with Mitch Haniger DHing. That is the alignment today, as Canzone is playing left and batting seventh.

Lodolo still hasn’t had any arm problems as a major leaguer, but the rest of his body keeps betraying him. The 26-year-old was looking like a potential All-Star with his 3.34 ERA and 43/9 K/BB ratio in six starts since returning from his last round of problems with his left leg. Nick Martinez could return to the rotation in his place.

This is a surprise, but the Mets needed a starter for today (Joey Lucchesi, who is coming up from Triple-A) and the team just doesn’t have many optionable pitchers; it was just Buttó, Christian Scott and Reed Garrett. Buttó, who was 1-3 with a 3.08 ERA in seven starts, might rejoin the rotation in 10 days, though the Mets will also have Tylor Megill and David Peterson as rotation candidates then.

It seems like this is a consequence of the struggling Cedric Mullins being dropped to the ninth spot today, and manager Brandon Hyde not wanting to stack lefties. Still, Henderson hits more like a No. 3 or No. 4 hitter than a leadoff man anyway; he’s sitting at .264/.339/.553 this year and .257/.331/.495 for his career. Jordan Westburg is leading off today. It’d be great for his value if this becomes permanent, but it doesn’t sound like that’s what Hyde is planning at the moment.

It’s kind of weird to acquire a player like the 28-year-old Julks and send him down, but that’s been part of the White Sox’s philosophy in recent years; send him down, get him used to playing in a weaker organization and then call him up once he’s adapted. Julks spent most of last year in the majors with the Astros, hitting .245/.297/.352, but he’s been stuck in Triple-A this season, batting .266/.358/.444 with five homers and six steals in 148 plate appearances. He fits best as a fourth-outfielder type, but the White Sox might give him a shot as a regular later. Rodriguez, a 20-year-old reliever, has given up three earned runs in 3 2/3 innings in Rookie ball this year.