It's a big week for prospects, as the Detroit Tigers are set to promote a pair of young pitchers who should rank among your top fantasy pickups of the week. If available in your league, consider adding the following three players:
Casey Mize, SP, Detroit Tigers
His long-awaited major league debut will come Wednesday -- two years, two months and 15 days after he was tabbed the first overall pick in the 2018 amateur draft. Mize might've arrived sooner, if not for shoulder soreness that cost him nearly four weeks while with Double-A Erie in the middle of 2019 and ultimately convinced the Tigers to shut him down for the season in mid-August with only 109⅓ total innings pitched in the minors, but that shouldn't dampen any enthusiasm about his promotion. Mize's shoulder issues have been an off-and-on problem, but the important thing is that he's healthy today, prepared to contribute, and, in a short season, shouldn't face any sort of workload limitation (at least not for so long as the Tigers are in contention).
Mize's control (walked only 5.4% of the batters he has faced as a professional) coupled with his command of four different plus pitches (four-seam fastball, slider, cutter and split-finger fastball) are what make him so appealing a prospect. Kiley McDaniel's No. 14 overall (and No. 6 starting pitching) prospect during the preseason, Mize's appeal is his high floor relative to that of a typical rookie pitcher. In many ways, I think of him as another Aaron Nola, likely to break through immediately but perhaps lacking in future Cy Young award upside, though Mize's injuries might be a bigger long-term problem.
Surely Mize warrants your add in every league, and in fact should be your top choice of the week with a hefty FAAB bid.
Tarik Skubal, SP, Detroit Tigers
Not that Skubal is a poor consolation prize for those who miss out on Mize, and it's not a bad idea at all to aggressively pursue both off free agency this week. Skubal will debut Tuesday, one day before Mize, and while a lot of things can (and probably will) happen between now and then, that grants him the possibility of making as many as nine starts to Mize's eight, should each pitch on exactly four days' rest the remainder of the way. If the Tigers are serious about contending right now, it's something they should entertain.
Skubal, McDaniel's No. 79 overall prospect in the preseason, is more of a risk/reward pitcher between the two Tigers, best illustrated by his massive strikeout totals thus far as a professional. In 33 career appearances, 25 of them starts, the left-hander has a 37.1% K rate. That said, he's not too experienced, with only nine starts in Double-A ball, and lacks the command of his secondary pitches that Mize has.
That the Tigers don't have as easy a remaining schedule as you might think -- a lot of Chicago Cubs, Minnesota Twins and Milwaukee Brewers ahead -- makes Skubal tougher to trust in shallow mixed formats, though he's well worth the speculative add.
Corbin Burnes, SP, Milwaukee Brewers
Speaking of high-upside arms entering rotations on Tuesday, Burnes might have the widest range of potential outcomes of them all. The stats say it all: Entering play on Monday, his 36.4% strikeout rate was sixth highest among pitchers with at least 15 innings pitched, and his 16.7% walk rate was third highest among that same group. Naturally, he'll need to rein in the latter if he's to stick in the Brewers' rotation, but considering his rate has been typically half that at any other point in his professional career, the early walks seem an aberration.
Burnes' slider is a legitimate strikeout pitch, capable of driving his K-per-nine ratio into double digits, and he has eased off some of his four-seam fastball usage to throw more two-seamers, though his ground ball rate hasn't increased to reflect it, as is frequently the case for other pitchers. He still has electric stuff, having whiffed at least one-third of the hitters he has faced in each of his four appearances, and it's important to note that the Brewers do have a lot of Pittsburgh Pirates, Tigers and Kansas City Royals on their remaining schedule (14 of their final 40 games). At the very least, it should be easy to determine the optimal times to use Burnes.