RADIO
Seattle Mariners starting pitcher Yusei Kikuchi is a fantasy baseball waiver wire pickup and add heading into Week 8 of the MLB season.
BALLER MOVE: Add in 12-Team Leagues
ROSTERED IN: 37% of leagues
ANALYSIS: What's a guy gotta do to get a higher rostered percentage, huh? How about striking out 11 Dodgers over 6 1/3 innings while allowing three earned runs? Or pitching seven scoreless, one-hit innings against the Houston Astros while striking out seven?
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Well, Seattle Mariners starting pitcher Yusei Kikuchi has accomplished both of those feats in two of his last three starts. In the other one, he pitched seven innings against the Baltimore Orioles and allowed just three earned runs while striking out seven.
So needless to say, Kikuchi is in the midst of a great string of starts, yet still, his roster rate remains well below 50%.
The Mariners' six-man rotation is certainly to blame for a good chunk of Kikuchi's low rostered percentage, but with the way he's pitching, he will be more than able to make up for that extra off day.
Due to a couple of bad starts in mid-April, Kikuchi's season-long ERA of 4.30 isn't too pretty, but his season-long WHIP is still looking strong at 1.09. His 25.6% strikeout rate is a slight increase from last year's 24.2% clip and his walk rate is down from 10.3% in 2020 to 7.4% this year.
Kikuchi should be added at least for next week in absolutely every league. He is slated to be a two-start pitcher in Week 8 with a juicy matchup against the Detroit Tigers on Monday and a tough matchup against the San Diego Padres on Sunday. In deep leagues, he should remain on rosters even after Week 8 unless he falters across his two starts.
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