by Ray Kuhn
As the pennant races heat up, both on the diamond and in your fantasy leagues, things are getting a little more challenging for the last few weeks of the season. With the expanding rosters and teams clearly out of contention, playing time is being handled a little differently than it was over the first five months of the season, and fantasy owners are often left scrambling for at bats. These conflicting agendas do make things more difficult, but everyone is dealing with the same issues.
With that being said, let’s take a look at some of the performances that stood out on the field from a busy Tuesday night around the league:
1) Another Solid Outing for Musgrove
No, Joe Musgrove is not Gerrit Cole and he likely won’t ever get confused for him, but the young right-hander is getting off to a solid start as a Pirate. Musgrove has moved past the early season DL stint, and he has become a reliable member of the Pirates’ rotation. On Tuesday, he picked up his sixth victory of the year with 6.1 innings of two run ball. The right-hander struck out eight batters while allowing five hits and lowering his ERA for the season to 3.75. Through 17 starts so far this season, Musgrove has struck out 88 batters in 103.1 innings of work while compiling a respectable 1.18 WHIP. With a 3.77 FIP and just 1.83 walks per nine innings, Musgrove is starting pitcher to keep an eye on for the rest of the season and also going into 2019. Read more