Fantasy Baseball Waiver Wire: Mike Leake, Ian Kennedy offer pitcher help

Heath Cummings looks at the first weekend of baseball and offers his waiver wire advice.

• Week 2: Top Sleeper Hitters | Two-Start Pitchers
  

It's just four days. For a lot of everyday players, it's just two or three games. Now is not the time to overreact. But you also shouldn't just sit on your hands. 

Most of the guys in today's waiver wire were under-owned after Fantasy Baseball draft season and their performance early just highlighted that, especially Mike Leake. 

Leake isn't an exciting Fantasy option, because he doesn't rack up big strikeout numbers. But he does give you something that is becoming much more rare in Fantasy: Innings. Leake has thrown at least 186 in four of his last five seasons, and has a FIP of 4.04 or better in four of those seasons. He's pitching for a good team with a solid defense, and went seven solid innings in his 2018 debut. Leake should be universally owned and started in points leagues and deserves consideration in Rotisserie as well, depending on the construction of your roster.

Unlike Leake, Ian Kennedy was a disaster last season. But after six innings against the White Sox, I'm ready to give him another look.

Kennedy is a fly ball pitcher who has always struggled with home runs, but that's not a bad recipe early in the year with half of his starts in Kauffman Stadium. There's also more strikeout potential here than with Leake (Kennedy has struck out 174-plus in five out of six seasons before last year. 

Most importantly, he's available in some pretty deep leagues. I would be running to the waiver wire in any league deeper than 12 teams, and I'd consider him in 12-team points leagues.

Mitch Haniger was one of Scott White's favorites this time a year ago, but injuries derailed his hoped-for breakout campaign. Maybe delayed is a better word. 

Haniger has come to the plate 11 times so far in 2018. He's walked twice and homered twice. He's been hit by a pitch and doubled. One thing he has not done is strike out. 

In Haniger's last three seasons in the minor leagues he posted a walk rate over 10 percent and a strikeout rate below 20 percent. Combine that with the fact that he's created hard contact 35 percent of the time in the majors, and it's easy to see a recipe for an extremely productive Fantasy asset in any format. Haniger should be universally owned in any league 10 teams or deeper.

The White Sox are one of many that say they're going with a closer-by-committee this season. This rarely lasts, so we're pretty quick to jump on the first guy to succeed in the role. For the White Sox, that guy was Joakim Soria on Saturday night. 

A quick look at Soria's ERA (3.70) from 2017 may lead you to believe that he can't hold the role. But he also had a 2.23 FIP and a K/9 of 10.3. That FIP ranked 10th among qualifying relievers. Maybe the most important thing is that Soria has a clear track record of success in this role, and to managers that matters a lot. I'd add Soria in an categories league, but understand if you want to hold off in points for now. Soria may not get every save opportunity in April, but he's taken the first step towards establishing himself in that role.

This year looks like one of the worst I can remember for SPARPs (Starting Pitchers As Relief Pitchers), so when one has success, we're going to talk about it. Mike Minor gave up two runs over 4.2 innings while striking out five Astros on Sunday. It was the lefty's first major league start since 2014, so we'll forgive him for not working deeper into the game. 

I still have concerns over just how deep Minor will be able to pitch and just how well he'll hold up, but this was a big first step. I'll be even more interested to see him pitch against a lineup that isn't one of the best in baseball. But for now, I'm adding him in any points league where he's available. 

I shied away from most Angels pitchers because of the six-man rotation, and the injury concerns surrounding all of them. But when Tyler Skaggs pitches like that, I can't ignore him any longer.

Skaggs fired 6.1 scoreless innings against the Athletics and generated 15 swinging strikes. Those types of numbers will play even if he only pitches once a week. I was also thrilled by the fact they let him throw 98 pitches in his debut, which indicates a confidence in his health that I didn't have. 

I'd like to see Skaggs do it one more time before I say he should be owned everywhere, but he definitely needs to be owned in more than 41 percent of leagues.