Waiver Wire Week Beaver
- John Gerbino
- 21 hours ago
- 13 min read
Updated: 12 minutes ago
I won't lie to ya - this week's Waiver Wire post is more or less a final version of the Midweek post, so if you read that, well then good. And if you did, well thank you! There a few additions, though, including the now promoted Dylan Beavers!
Dylan Beavers The time has come - the Beaver ascends to the show, and the stage is set. Will the man I've staked my entire fantasy reputation on actually perform to the level of expectations I've set since May 6th? Or will he pull a Jacob Melton and crumble under the spotlight? Camden Yards is a beautiful park... Dylan Beavers is a beautiful ballplayer... so we can only hope this relationship works out for the best. Beavers ends his AAA campaign slashing .301 with 18 HRs, 22 SBs, and a .934 OPS. Beavers managed to realize his full toolset after an offseason of working on hitting 4-seam fastballs, a pitch he had struggled with leading up to the 2025 campaign. Exactly how well did he fare against the 4-seam fastball? Oh...I don't know....he only finished the campaign with a .319 xBA, .486 xSLG, and 45% hard-hit rate against the most common pitch in baseball! Some other pitches he excels against: Sinker - .330 xBA, .502 xSLG, 44% hard-hit Sweeper - .314 xBA, .629 xSLG, 50% hard-hit Slider - .254 xBA, .519 xSLG, 48% hard-hit
In reality, Beavers has only one pitch he really struggles with - the splitter. That's good news, as the Splitter is one of the most uncommon pitches in the baseball landscape. Otherwise, his ability to hit the most common pitches, including primary pitches like the 4-seam and sinker, will have him most likely finding success right from the jump.
When it comes to the statcast metrics, Beavers ends his wonderful time at AAA with a delightfully sexy graphic. Every single metric comes in above the 50th percentile minus his swing% and zone-swing % - and that's perfectly fine when he finds himself with a 90th percentile BB% and 78th percentile zone-contact %.
When Beavers actually decides to swing, he makes quality contact. When Beavers decides not to swing, he's usually findimg himself walking over to first. Adding to his wonderful plate discipline and bat-to-ball skills are some exteremely respectable exit velocities and hard-hit rates, which had been a question mark for Beavers coming into 2025. Although he was 6'5, he was a lanky, thin 6'5 - but the potential has always been there for him to fill out his frame in the offseason, and that he did. Beavers may not look entirely strong in his upper-half, but take a good look at his base (yeah, you heard me) when he makes his debut today. This dude has a powerful lower-half, and he most certainly does not skip leg day. And I guess that also explains how he's so damned fast - his 23 stolen bases was good for 13th at AAA. And the kicker is, Beavers missed about a month of playing time due to injuries. When Beavers played, he was one of the premiere 5-tool guys in the game.
Beavers could be exactly what the Orioles need at the top of the lineup - a guy who crushes RHP, finds ways to get on base, and can set the table for Gunnar Henderson - something that's very much lacked on this 2025 Orioles roster. And if all goes well, a Gunnar/Beavers combo in 2026 could be spicy as fuck.
Braxton Ashcraft
The last time I wrote about Braxton Ashcraft, it was of the possibility that he may wind up being the setup guy in the bullpen, and therefore relevant in Holds leagues. What I didn't expect is that he'd become a starter. This is better. Ashcraft has some absolutely nasty stuff, with fangraphs projecting him a 107 stuff + alongside some really nice Prospectsavant Stuff+ ratings. Although he has some awesome velocity, with the fastball clocking in at 97 mph, his bread and butter pitch is actually the slider, which currently boasts a .189 xBA and 40% K rate. If you were interested in Troy Melton because he throws filth, then you should probably be just as intruiged by Ashcraft. In yesterday's start, he threw 5 innings with 4Ks, 0 BBs, a 1.60 ERA, and a 0.60 WHIP. An absolute gem, even if he couldn't go six innings. And the outing before that? 3.1 innings pitched with 4 Ks, 1 BB, a 2.70 ERA, and a 1.20 WHIP. Take a shot on this guy, the talent is there.
Brett Harris
You probably didn't read this, but if you did, you may have an idea as to who Brett Harris even is. If you didn't, well, here ya go - Brett Harris!
Harris had really just been stuck at AAA thanks to Andujar's resurgent season, and with Andujar out of the way and kicking ass for the Reds, it's officially Brett Harris time out in Sacramento. I will admit, that since I last wrote about Harris, his power metrics have dwindled a bit. That's not exactly what you want to see upon promotion, but hey, everybody slumps. Harris hit .282 with 12 dingers and an .862 .OPS at AAA, and surprisingly, 7 stolen bases. This guy really excells at making contact and staying within the zone - his 95th percentile Chase rate and 83rd percentile K rate are a testament some fundamentally sound bat-to-ball skills and discipline. That's probably the number one thing to look for with guys coming out of AAA, and it should make Harris an RBI producer with upside in a surprisingly potent A's lineup. I figure that with Wilson coming back soon, Harris should see most time at 3B with Hernaiz unfortunately being the odd man out, but we'll see. Harris is a nice speculative add in dynasty leagues, and could find himself producing in redraft in deeper leagues.
Daylen Lile
He hit a HR yesterday. Nice. Here's what I wrote only a few days ago. "You already know I'm a Daylen Lile stan, and Lile has only continued to impress over the last week with a .341 BA and .835 OPS. Hiding behind a modest .262 BA and less-than-impressive .697 OPS lies a metric powerhouse just waiting to show the baseball world that he's going to be one of the top outfielders in the game. You may be thinking "man, Gerbil, you're crazy on this one." Maybe. But at age 22, I see the foundation of a future star - extremely good speed (90th percentile), some elite bat-to-ball skills, and awesome launch angles. There's a ton to build on for the kid, and with a bit more muscle and seasoning, good things are around the corner."
Lile has now hit .291 with a .795 OPS over the past month, numbers you expect to see with these kinds metrics - and extremely nice for a rookie nobody had really known about. Keep Lile, AKA the next Mookie Betts, on your mind.
Kyle Karros
Karros had a nice 2/3 day yesterday, and that's the kind of statline I think we'll grow accustomed to seeing with Karros. He's very good at making contact, and when he does, he's squaring up on the ball nearly 40% of the time. Impressive for the rookie.
"The Rockies have been sneaky with these promotions down the stretch, and although all of the focus has been turned towards Mr. Warming Bernabel, I'd argue Karros is the guy to be watching right now. At 6'5 and only age 23, Karros has raced through the Rockies system this year, dominating along the way:
AA: 234 PAs, .294 BA, .861 OPS
AAA: 68 PAs, .306 BA, .828 OPS
Pretty impressive for the kid, who also hit .311 with an .875 OPS at high A in 2024. Now Karros has made it to The Show, and he hasn't even slowed down a bit, slashing .333 with an .893 OPS across 24 PAs. His bat-to-ball and discipline metrics have been elite, and his hard-hit rate also suggests there's some power to tap into here. His excellent AAA zone-contact, whiff, and swing rates have carried over to the MLB level without any issue."
Ben Rice
And the statcast grows evermore beautiful as his squared-up and chase rates slowly approach the 90th percentile, in hopes of joining the ranks of his elite hard-hit, barrel, and average exit velocity percentiles. His OPS very quickly approaches .800 thanks to a nice little 2/5 showing yesterday. This kid has special bat talent, and go ahead, give me shit for glazing. Glazed rice cakes are probably delicious.
"The time has arrived - Ben Rice will officially see everyday at-bats, thanks to an unfortunate Paul Goldschmidt injury. PSA: We do not condone excitement over injury here at Gerbil Sports.... But damn, look at that fucking statcast... Somehow, it's only gotten better over the last few weeks, with his squared-up and chase rates steadily climbing towards the 90th + percentiles. No longer will too many days off throwing off his rhythm be an excuse for Ben Rice under-peforming his expected numbers - he is officially the Yankees middle-of-the-order bat, and is expected to produce behind Stanton and Judge for a team that desperately needs some wins. Will you be the Ben Rice owner, when Ben Rice goes on a league-winning tear? When he hits 10 HRs over the next two weeks? For a more in depeth look at changes Rice has made to his hitting approach, check out this piece from a few weeks ago."
Miguel Andujar
Miguel Andujar has officially graduated from the Hot Guys List, as his recent play is simply too good to ignore. Congratulations, Miguel!
Andujar hasn't been exactly relevant since 2018, when he should have won ROTY over one Mr. Shohei Ohtani. And now that Ohtani has a bunch of MVPs and is bound for the HOF... we really couldn't give that to Andujar? Damn. Nevertheless, 2025 is the year of Miguel Andujar, as he slashes .309 with an .822 OPS, despite having literally no power under the hood. But when you have an 84th percentile whiff rate, and can put the ball in play consistently, and in the right spots, good things can happen.
What are those right spots?:
Miguel Andujar is really abusing the single up the middle, and his batted ball tendencies back that up - Straight GB% of 23.9%, Straight AIR % of 23.0 %. Yes, his statcast suggests he's going to regress, but his uncanny ability to hit the ball up the middle currently defies what we're seeing in the metrics. He's not getting lucky, he just happens to have the perfect angle of attack on the baseball.
Yoendrys Gomez
Nothing has changed since my write-up on Yoendrys a few days ago :
"Over in the GerbilSports Patreon discord, we were shooting the shit, discussing some minor-league prospects, when one of our members enthusiastically jumped in to break the news that Yoendrys Gomez was taking the mound for the White Sox. Shout out to my boy Massimo. We immediately started to do some digging into how he had been performing at the minor league level, and as you can clearly see below, he's been completely lights out compared to how poor he looked for the Dodgers earlier in the year, before being DFA'd. The Sauron-Red statcast and overall PS Score of 91.35 only reflects what his stuff ratings tell us - this guy is looking more like his 2023-self, when fangraphs projected him a 115 pitching+ grade at the MLB level.
Every pitch in his aresenal is graded over 100 with some beautiful xBA and Whiff rates, but we'll focus on his top four by usage:
105 grade 4-seam, .202 xBA, 24.39% whiff
108 grade sweeper, .133 xBA, 53.97% whiff (damn)
103 grade cutter, .280 xBA, 32.26% whiff (maybe his weakest pitch)
110 grade curve, .210 xBA, 42.86% whiff
Throwing that 4-seam 43.6% of the time with this kind of value is mightily impressive, and where his 4-seam only averaged 93.4 mph in the MLB earlier this year, it had been averaging 94.3 mph at AAA - one mph is quite the difference, when you're touching 96 at the top end and 93 at the low end, as opposed to 95 top and 92 low. But beyond the fastball, the curveball absolutely decimated in the outing."
Check out his start
Bryce Teodosio
Armed with only speed and a vision, Teodosio has, somehow, defied all odds and continued to hit over .300 despite having some of the worst statcast metrics you'll ever see. His hitting ability at AAA has carried over at a 1:1 ratio from AAA (where his metrics also failed to capture his ability to hit), because this guy just has that xDAWG that defies anything statcast can measure.
Teodosio just knows how to put the ball in play deep in counts, and I really, truly believe he's a savant of some sort, that knows how to place the ball exactly where he wants it. He then uses fuck-you speed to beat out would-be groundouts. When I compared him to Chandler Simpson in that reddit post, I was doing him a disservice - Chandler Simpson should be compared to Bryce Teodosio, this generation's Ichiro Suzuki.
Dillon Dingler
Dingler is never mentioned in ROTY talks, but why? Dingler has had a fairly competent season on the hitting front, slashing .272 with a .746 OPS - above the MLB average, and way above the C average. And by way of being on the Tigers, he's racked up a healthy 37 runs and 49 RBIs across only 320 ABs. His defense at the position is some of the best in all of baseball, and yeah, it's not fantasy relevant, but he still deserves some respect.
Then you see the xBA of .294 and xSLG of .479, and realize, the Tigers, going forward, have a real weapon on their hands. Not only can he help you down the stretch in redraft, but could wind up being the breakout catcher of 2026 as a late sleeper or pickup off the waiver wire. Three things can happen, and will probably happen:
They lower the seams on the ball, leading to a hitter's year.
Dillon Dingler earns more starts after proving himself in 2025.
Dillon Dingler improves.
These three, in conjuction, should be quite powerful for a guy with a ton of potential.
Joey Ortiz
In the midweek post, we talked about a change Ortiz made to his batting stance. Check it out:
"I'm not a Joey Ortiz fan. I don't like what I've seen from him over the years, and haven't anticpated him being very good at any point this year. But once again, Joey Ortiz goes on one of his little hot stretches, and I have to do my due dilligence - has this guy made any adjustments that could make this success sustainable, or was he just thrown in the microwave for a bit?
So, it turns out that at least this time, Joey Ortiz has made an adjustment to his stance - he now finds himself at a 4 degree open stance angle, as opposed to 12 degrees open going back to not only before the all-star break, but even last year. This is a new adjustment for Ortiz in the early stages of his career, and because of this, we have to pay a bit of attention - his new intercept point now has him going 3 degrees oppo, as opposed to 2 degrees pull. Let's see how a larger sample size plays out before we draw conclusions. I will admit, though, that after looking over his game logs, his xBAs against offspeed pitches (the pitches he's struggled with in 2025) in individual games since the adjustment are encouraging."
Jacob Lopez & Jack Perkins (Minus Ginn)
This statcast-dominating duo out in Sacramento should be considered must-own in deep leagues. While Lopez coninues his incredible run of having not given up a run in four consecutive outings, Perkins continues to flash the kind of stuff that can take over a game, even if he's a bit rough around the edges. Ginn has been put in the corner for punishment until further notice.
Masataka Yoshida
As I type this, Masataka had a HR robbed my Marsee on a beautiful catch. Damn. Even so, he's 1/2 with 2 RBIs on the day, and has been quietly one of the hottest hitters in the entire league over the past week, owed to a really nice Pull Air rate since the beginning of August!
This is a fantastic development for a guy who's had a groundball issue at the MLB level, and although he's still often hitting groundballs when he's not pulling the ball in the air, he's doing enough with the balls he does manage to lift, leading to a really nice 99th percentile squared up rate. Masataka seems like one of the safer options currently on the waiver wire.
Tyler Freeman
You may have given up on Freeman over the past few weeks as he slowed down a bit from what was, admittedly, an unsustainable and torrid pace. And sure, Tyler isn't the .850+ OPS hitter he had been during that stretch; but when it comes to getting on base, there's few players better.
His .287 xBA only slightly dwarfs his actual .306 BA, and his .383 OBP is something you shouldn't expect to decrease too much going forward. This seems to be who Tyler Freeman is now - a high contact, slap hitter that takes walks when he needs to. And with 4 stolen bases and 7 runs over the past 15 games, Freeman is genuinely just a really solid contributor. Yesterday's game was a bit stunning, though, because he hit this absolute nuke:
As Freeman develops in Coors and works on his launch angle, the sky seems to be the limit for the contact specialist - there's power hidden deep within this kid, hidden potential. I've always said that the Tyler Freeman we've seen is the normal Tyler Freeman - not hot, getting hits at less than optimal launch angles. But when he gets hot and finds the sweet spot? Well, 445 foot bombs are on the table.
Nolan McLean
McLean's first appearance really couldn't have gone better. No earned runs, 8 Ks, 1.13 WHIP....well, maybe a few too many walks. But who cares - McLean looked the part of a future ace. Let's see that pitch mix!
McLean wound up throwing his Sweeper 36% of the time for a .322 xBA - not great, but he escaped with an actual .250 BA against.
He threw the 95 MPH Sinker 26% of the time for a .123 xBA and an actual BA of .000 against. This was a pitch that impressed me quite a bit, as he touched 96 mph several times with some good location - fantastic velocity for a guy who's bread and butter is actually the curveball.
And speaking of the curveball, his sexiest pitch coming out of AAA - 21% usage, .149 xBA, .167BA, and a lovely 45.5% whiff rate with a 44.4% putaway rate. Exactly what we wanted to see out of one of the best curveballs in baseball across all leagues!
Brenton Doyle
It's about time. I wish Brenton nothing but the best, but man was reaching for him early a death-blow to my season. Maybe 2026 will be his year.
