Dustin

May

May took the defeat to fall to 3-4 with a 4.85 ERA, but that hardly tells the whole picture. Since giving up 13 runs in his first two outings, he’s turned in five quality starts in six tries, with his lone miss being an outing in which he allowed one run in 5 1/3 innings. He’ll work at home against the Royals next week. We still wouldn’t rate him as a good option in mixed leagues, but he’s definitely holding up his end of the bargain with the Cardinals so far.

May tossed a scoreless first inning, then gave up a pair of runs on a walk and two hits in the second. Two more hits brought a third run in to score in the fifth. May would give the Cardinals a scoreless sixth to finish with a quality start against his former team. He struck out three. The 28-year-old right-hander will take a 5.15 ERA, 1.53 WHIP, and a 25/9 K/BB ratio across 36 2/3 innings into a start against the Padres in San Diego on Friday.

May deserves some credit for settling down after giving up runs in back-to-back frames to open the contest as he managed to keep the Cardinals within striking distance until they rallied in the ninth inning to take him off the hook. He finished with two strikeouts and issued a pair of walks. He’s allowed two earned runs or fewer in four consecutive starts since being shelled for 13 runs combined in his first two outings. He’ll take the ball on Sunday against the Dodgers to cap off a two-start week.

May struck out five and walked one. He’s now one of 23 major league pitchers with three wins, even though his ERA stands at 5.84, the league is hitting .337 against him and he’s averaging just less than five innings per start. He’ll face the Pirates next time out.

May struck out four and walked one, but posted just a six percent whiff rate and threw only 55 percent of his first-pitches for strikes. You might get away with streaming May next week against the Marlins, but it’s really hard to trust a pitcher in fantasy baseball who misses so few bats.

The 28-year-old right-hander struck out four batters on the night and did not allow a base on balls. The Red Sox scratched out a pair of runs against him in the second inning on a fielder’s choice, an error and Trevor Story stealing home on a double steal. That was the extent of the damage though as May turned in his best start of the season against his former club. He got seven whiffs on 75 pitches on the night, posting a CSW of 32 percent. He’ll try to further improve upon his cringe-inducing 9.45 ERA and 1.80 WHIP when he takes on the Guardians at home on Wednesday.

Not great. May took a 104-mph line drive off his lower right left from Tigers leadoff man Colt Keith but was able to remain in the contest. That decision led to the floodgates opening with seven hits, including a pair of homers, before he was pulled in the fourth inning at 79 pitches. He served up a two-run homer to Kerry Carpenter as part of a 33-pitch opening frame and gave up a two-run blast to Zach McKinstry in the fourth before departing. He struck out four and handed out two walks. He’ll bring a preposterously high 15.95 ERA into a home outing against the Red Sox on Friday. He’s the definition of a stay-away for fantasy purposes.

May walked one batter on the afternoon while striking out three. The Rays scratched out three runs against him in the second inning, then added three more with three RBI doubles in the fourth inning. The 28-year-old hurler got just four swings and misses on 61 pitches on the day, posting a miserable CSW of 23 percent. He’ll try to put this one behind him and get back on track when he takes on the Tigers in Detroit on Saturday.

We don’t have any Statcast data since this contest took place at Double-A Hammons Field but May turned in a strong performance in his final tune-up before opening the season in St. Louis’ rotation. The 28-year-old figures to take the ball this weekend against the Rays at Busch Stadium. His immediate fantasy appeal is strictly limited to deeper formats until he strings together a handful of quality outings.

He also struck out three and walked one while posting a 20 percent whiff rate and 20 percent CSW. You rarely see a pitcher get just seven called strikes in five full innings of work, but that’s what May did today. The right-hander threw 55 strikes on the day today, and the Nationals swung at 46 of them. Perhaps Washington was simply being aggressive, or perhaps May wasn’t really fooling hitters, which might be why Washington had eight hard-hit balls. Regardless, he maintained his fastball velocity throughout the outing, which is good news. That puts him on the fantasy radar, but until we start seeing consistent whiffs, it’s hard to get too excited.