There is gold in them thar hills, folks! Fantasy gold, that is. Throughout spring training, you were told how you can wait on starting pitching in your drafts, and with the season not even a week old, we already are reaping the benefits of adhering to that philosophy.
It might be just one start per pitcher right now, and we know that sample size plays a huge factor in the overall results, but you can’t help but get a little excited seeing some of those late-round investments pay immediate dividends.
* Reds left-hander Brandon Finnegan was a touted prospect in the Royals’ farm system when he first arrived, and he was a major piece coming back to Cincinnati when they parted with Johnny Cueto in 2015. Scouts loved his three-pitch arsenal, the command of his secondary offerings and, most of all, his strikeout upside.
Fantasy owners were told to pay attention, and after a year of learning the ropes, he was able to come out strong this season and dominate. Facing the Phillies may not be the most daunting of tasks, but seven scoreless frames of one-hit ball with one walk and nine strikeouts is exactly what we’ve been looking for from him.
* Avoiding Rockies pitchers has long been the plan, but when Jon Gray showed us last year that you could pitch at Coors Field without posting an ERA somewhere in the stratosphere, more attention turned to Antonio Senzatela, a 22-year old right-hander who, despite never pitching above the Double-A level, impressed the coaches enough to give him a spot in the starting rotation. He exhibited strong command of his off-speed stuff and looked sharp with his mid-90s fastball. Nerves were in play when he was facing the Brewers in hitter-friendly Miller Park, but the youngster shined bright with five shutout innings and six strikeouts.
* Fantasy owners were treated to some real nice performances here in the first week as others like, Kendall Graveman and Dylan Bundy, joined the aforementioned, overlooked youngsters. You certainly cannot expect them to do this every time they take the mound — they’ll take their lumps like everyone else. But to know they’re available and fully capable of producing pitching lines of this caliber at times, you should rest easy in knowing there is strength to be had among all this pitching depth.
Howard Bender is the managing editor at FantasyAlarm.com and host of “Fantasy Sports Tonight” on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Saturdays at 2 p.m. and Sundays at 8 p.m.). Follow him on Twitter @rotobuzzguy.