Fantasy Baseball Waiver Wire Adds: Week 13
The waiver wire has plenty of goodies available for the taking, so let's try to get a leg up on our fellow league members and make some moves where needed.
The four players below are all owned in fewer than 50% of ESPN leagues and could give your squad a shot in the arm as we move through June.
Domingo German - New York Yankees (SP)
With a 2-4 record this season, Domingo German may be a starting pitcher that is easy to overlook.
Not so fast, my friends -- ignoring the young New York Yankees' hurler would be a big mistake, especially if your fantasy staff is in need of some help.
Over 60 1/3 innings pitched, the rookie right-hander possesses an impressive 27.4% strikeout rate and an eye-popping 15.3% swinging-strike rate. While German doesn't have enough innings to qualify, if he did, that would give him the fourth-best swinging-strike rate in the league, behind only Chris Sale, Max Scherzer and Jacob deGrom.
With a 4.77 ERA, it's easy to understand why German is available in more than half of leagues, but with his ability to get whiffs, he's someone you should be picking up right away.
Matt Duffy - Tampa Bay Rays (3B)
After longtime Tampa Bay Rays member Evan Longoria became a San Francisco Giant this offseason, it may be easy to confuse Matthew Duffy as the guy that came over as part of the swap.
Let's hit the rewind button. Duffy actually came over at the trade deadline in 2016 as part of a deal that sent southpaw Matt Moore. It's easy to lose track of Duffy as he's been recovering from injuries for the majority of the last 18 months.
Fast forward to 2018, when Duffy owns an impressive .348 weighted on-base average (wOBA), primarily on the strength of a .321 batting average over 255 plate appearances. Perhaps even more impressive is Duffy's recent run of play. So far in June, Duffy has blasted his way to a .398 wOBA and .184 isolated power (ISO).
It may have taken some time, but we could be seeing the Duffy of 2015, who racked up 77 runs and 77 RBIs. If you need help at the hot corner, check out Duffy.
Freddy Peralta - Milwaukee Brewers (SP)
The Milwaukee Brewers' flame-throwing righty certainly got his major league career off to an auspicious start. On May 13th, in Coors Field no less, Freddy Peralta held the Colorado Rockies to a single hit while striking out 13 over 5 2/3 innings pitched.
But his next start against the Minnesota Twins didn't go quite so well as he allowed four earned runs over four frames, and he was subsequently demoted back to Triple-A, which was partly due to Chase Anderson getting healthy.
Called back up this week, Peralta sparkled yet again, striking out seven over six scoreless innings and allowing only two hits. So what do we make of Peralta?
If he can control the free passes (he's posted a double-digit walk rate in each of his last five stops in the minors), there is a ton of strikeout goodness we want to own, including a strikeout rate of 28.0% or better in six of his last seven stops down on the farm. While it's a limited sample size of only three starts, Peralta has a swinging-strike rate of 14.3% in the major leagues in 2018.
It could be dicey expecting Peralta to stick with the Brewers the rest of the year, but when he is up, we could see some solid fantasy numbers out of him.
Yan Gomes - Cleveland Indians (C)
From a fantasy perspective, the catching position can be a bit of a wasteland, especially if you are looking for home run potential. Of the 27 catchers with at least 150 plate appearances, only 7 have ISO marks greater than .200.
Yan Gomes, however, sits widely available in most leagues, and he's got plenty of pop in that bat. In 2018, Gomes owns a .212 ISO with 9 homers this season, and he's making great contact with a 43.2% hard-hit rate and 48.0% fly-ball rate.
The Cleveland Indians' catcher certainly is no stranger to striking out -- he owns a 31.0% strikeout rate this year -- but there's plenty his power more than makes up for the whiffs at such a thin position. Check out Gomes if you need some help at catcher.
