Fantasy Baseball: What Does The Jose Quintana Deal Do To The Fantasy Landscape?
By Mike Marteny
What is the fantasy impact of the Jose Quintana Deal?
The Cubs make the first splash of the 2017 non-waiver trade deadline by acquiring left handed pitcher Jose Quintana from the White Sox. With Quintana under team control for several more years, the Cubs didn’t mind giving up some prospects. Here are the details of the deal:
In Quintana the Cubs get someone with ace potential that wont have to be the ace of their staff. Quintana spent all six of his major league seasons on the South Side, but will move north with this deal. He was 50-54 with a 3.51 ERA in 169 starts for the White Sox. The best news for the Cubs though is that Quintana has a 2.51 career ERA at Wrigley Field.
Though Quintana has never posted an ERA higher than his rookie season mark of 3.76, his 4.49 mark at the break stands to easily be the worst of his career. The good news for the Cubs is that July is his best month. Quintana has a 2.80 career ERA in July.
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What does this do for the fantasy landscape? Quintana has been dropped in many standard league already. Should he be picked back up? The answer is yes! He has pitched well in Wrigley in his career, and a move to the National League should help out his ERA quite a bit since he will face one less hitter per game. Quintana still possesses great strikeout potential and will have a better offense backing him, which should help his win total. If he is available in your league, go grab him! In N.L. only leagues, this is the kind of waiver claim that could change your season. Don’t hesitate!
The big loser in this deal will be Mike Montgomery in the short term and Eddie Butler in the long term. Both were fringe players in middle sized leagues anyway, but this does take away some streaming options, particularly with Montgomery. It means one less cheap pitcher on DFS slates too!
The winner for the White Sox could be top prospect Lucas Giolito. Giolito came over this winter for Adam Eaton, which is already a steal for the Sox and Giolito hasn’t thrown a pitch in the majors yet. That could change very quickly. If it does, Giolito is worth an add in all deep leagues, and is a good streaming option in all formats. His strikeout potential will make him a nice DFS punt in favorable matchups.
Eloy Jimenez is the star of this deal for the White Sox, and will be the future anchor of this outfield. If you are in a dynasty league and he is still out there, make sure you get him. Chances are he isn’t unless you are in an A.L. only version. In that case, blow your bank. He is the number 5 prospect in the minors, and could be in Chicago as early as next summer.
Dylan Cease is thought by many to be the best pitching prospect in the Cubs system. He is putting up absurd numbers in the Midwest League (2.79 ERA in 13 starts; 74 strikeouts in 51.2 innings), but likely wont make his major league debut until 2019.
Matt Rose is struggling a bit at high A, but he has 14 home runs in only 233 at bats. At 22, he still has plenty of time to figure out how to hit for average. Like Cease and Jimenez, he is at least two years away from the majors.
Bryant Flete is playing well at high A this year, but he has already been in the minors for nearly six years. At this point, the chances are better than he never makes the majors at all.
Stay tuned for other analysis of trade deadline deals and all of our DFS picks all summer long!