Fantasy Baseball: Starting pitchers I'm reluctant to add

If you've had any success with your waiver claims this season, you're hurting for roster space right now. Scott White says some starting pitcher pickups are easier to pass up than others.

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When it comes to playing the waiver wire, I'm not one to discriminate.

I'll pick up a player I don't fully believe in just in case I'm wrong, riding the wave of perception to give myself the highest chance of corralling the legitimate breakouts instead of living and dying with my own personal favorites.

That's because my favorites are often wrong -- perhaps as often as they're right -- and so to cling to them while everyone else plunders the waiver wire, claiming all of its glittering prizes, is ultimately self-defeating.

You want to give yourself as many opportunities as possible to snag the studs nobody sees coming, and you do that by stashing the logical candidates at the point of highest demand -- i.e., the players making the most noise right now. Because if they're not making noise, nobody's hearing them, and if nobody's hearing them, they're not in demand. And all you're doing, then, is playing favorites.

Of course, roster space is finite, and if you've been cycling through high-demand waiver claims, chances are you've already corralled a legitimate breakout or two. Aledmys Diaz has ascended to must-own status. Adam Conley as well. The expendables you used to get them have already been expended, of course, and if you work your way further up your roster ... well, let's just say you're not dropping a Jason Heyward or Freddie Freeman no matter how low-demand their numbers make them out to be. They're too high-end for that.

You may have to be a little more discerning with your waiver claims, then. That's where I find myself in in some of my Head-to-Head leagues (21-man rosters) especially, and so at least for the starting pitchers attracting the most attention right now, I'm finding reasons to doubt rather than believe -- and usually talking myself out of them as a result.

Which isn't to say I wouldn't be thrilled to have any of them in a different scenario, but if you, like me, find yourself in a spot where you'd have to drop a player of considerable value to add one of these eight, you might want to pump the brakes.

Granted, it's a narrow selection, what with power pitchers all the rage these days, but the only knuckleballer I can remember making an honest-to-goodness difference in Fantasy Baseball over the last 15 years is R.A. Dickey -- and even his was mostly limited to that Cy Young-winning 2012 season. It's too unreliable of a pitch, which is kind of the point, but on those days when it's just floating over the plate, the correction can be unforgiving.

Six starts, though -- that's something resembling consistency. Each time, Wright has gotten double-digit swings-and-misses, and he still has yet to allow more than two earned runs in a game. History makes me think I should know better, but the eternal question: What if I'm wrong? I didn't stand on principle with Dickey in 2012, and look where that got me.

Following up an 11-strikeout effort against the Padres with seven one-hit innings against the Giants confirms what I already suspected about Gray: He's the most talented pitcher in Rockies history. But of course, both of those starts came on the road, where he now has a 2.18 ERA compared to 9.20 at his circus of a home.

Maybe the obvious answer is not to start him at home -- you'd keep him around just for his road starts if they're anything like these last two. I'm not sure they will be in the long run, though. Rockies pitchers still want to be good at home, after all, and the struggle to become that can mess with their mechanics, which is why talented pitchers of the past -- Mike Hampton and Drew Pomeranz, for example -- ultimately struggled on the road as well. With so few success stories over the Rockies' 24-year history, I'm not liking Gray's chances.

That's all I've got. At 15 percent ownership, Duffey isn't exactly in high demand, and if you'll remember from my intro, that's the most important quality for a prospective waiver claim.

But the irony is he's probably the most convincing of any of the pitchers on this list. Maybe the fact he's still winless keeps him under the radar, but he just had nine strikeouts over seven innings against the White Sox after recording more than a strikeout per inning in his previous start as well. His curveball has big swing-and-miss potential, as he showed down the stretch last year, and now that he's here to stay (presumably over Jose Berrios) with Tommy Milone out of the picture, he could make an impact much like Jerad Eickhoff has for the Phillies.

This is a case where the chance of him becoming a hot commodity is so great that you may want to beat the rush to the waiver wire now.

Devenski hasn't put up other-worldly numbers, but he has at least held his own so far. It'll take more than that, though, to win me over given his lack of pedigree. I suspect most Fantasy owners are in the same boat, which is why his ownership rate is still south of 20 percent, but it has been on the rise. He is officially on the radar. How long he'll stay there is anybody guess, but he hasn't convinced me he deserves to stick in the rotation with Lance McCullers set to return from a sore shoulder later this week.

Ultimately, it's not my decision, of course, but even if the Astros decide to go another direction, it just means they'll have Mike Fiers or Doug Fister ready to step in at the first sign of trouble, which could come soon for a pitcher whose minor-league track record suggests he's little more than organizational depth. Remember Chris Heston? I feel like Devenski is the Astros version.

Latos' average fastball velocity has been on the decline for a couple years now, but for his first few starts this year, the one-time flamethrower was peaking in the high 80s. Somehow, he made it work, going 4-0 with a 0.74 ERA, and that's why he's owned in 84 percent of CBSSports.com leagues.

Or at least that's how he came to be owned in so many. It's beyond me why he still is after all the correction in his last two turns, during which he allowed eight earned runs on 18 hits over 10 innings. I'm not even moved by his spike in velocity last time out. A 92-mph fastball is still nothing compared to what he had in 2013, when he was last an impact pitcher in Fantasy. Latos might be the least attractive of all these pitchers to me, including Devenski.

Karns' nine-strikeout effort Saturday was something to see and, when paired with his two-hit effort April 26, gives him two dominant outings in his last three. The problem is those same two starts have been his only two against the Astros, who lead the majors in strikeouts. Karns' starts against every other opponent have been something in the neighborhood of ordinary.

Which isn't to say he can't be a useful Fantasy option. He averaged nearly a strikeout per inning in 27 appearances (including 26 starts) for the Rays last season. He also had walk and home run issues -- posting similar rates, actually, to what he has now -- and the end result was a so-so ERA and WHIP. "Useful" is probably as good as it gets for Karns, making him a low-priority pickup.

Taillon has been nothing short of brilliant at Triple-A so far and is, at first glance, deserving of a promotion. But some extenuating circumstances may dissuade the Pirates from making that call. His five starts this year are his first since 2013. He lost the last two seasons to Tommy John surgery and hernia surgery. They'll want to be cautious with his innings, of course, and putting him in a more competitive setting might compromise that goal.

Also -- and I may be making too much of this given Aaron Nola's success this year -- I'm underwhelmed by Taillon's strikeout rates in the minors. Even this year, he's at only 7.7 per nine, and I hoped for more from the player drafted second overall, between Bryce Harper and Manny Machado in 2010. Of course, that pedigree counts for something in and of itself, and I'm not saying Taillon is a bad stash, necessarily. If I was ranking the stashability of all minor-league pitchers, though, I'd slot Blake Snell and Tyler Glasnow ahead of him.

I'd slot Urias behind Taillon, though, because so far all we've heard about a potential call-up for the 19-year-old is for a bullpen role, which would of course make him useless in Fantasy. It was only something the Dodgers were discussing and doesn't appear imminent, but it's clear he's too good for Triple-A.

Where else would the Dodgers put him, though? They're not hurting for rotation options with Ross Stripling pitching well last time out and Mike Bolsinger working his way back from injury (with Hyun-Jin Ryu soon to follow). Maybe I'm overestimating the Dodgers' stake in Stripling and Bolsinger -- or Alex Wood, for that matter -- but they have every excuse to take it slow with Urias, who would be the first teenager to start a major-league game since Felix Hernandez in 2005. There's a reason for that.