There's no replacement for a high-end hurler, of course, but if you're looking to stream pitchers, you've come to the right place. Scott White has 10 recommendations for the upcoming scoring period, all rostered in no more than 80 percent of CBS Sports leagues. Most likely, they're the best you'll find off the waiver wire.
All information is up to date as of Sunday evening.
Sleeper pitchers for Week 18 (July 24-30)
Two of Kenta Maeda's past three starts have been absolute gems, which is good timing given his favorable matchups this week. If you take out the one disaster start that immediately preceded a trip to the IL, he has a 3.20 ERA, 1.07 WHIP and 11.0 K/9 on the year.
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Tarik Skubal still has yet to go more than four innings since returning from flexor surgery and is coming off by far his worst start in three chances -- and at the Royals, no less. But we were all pretty excited about how he looked in his first two outings, and he'll get two bites at the apple this week.
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Aaron Civale is sporting a 2.71 ERA after allowing two earned runs or fewer in his past four starts. We've been down this road with him before and haven't liked how it turned out, but we can expect him at his best this week with matchups as favorable as the Royals and White Sox.
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Dean Kremer is about as two-faced as pitchers come, which is why the ERA is so high, but he also has 10 wins for a reason. When he's on, he works deep into games and has a good offense backing him, and the Aaron Judge-less Yankees make for a particularly favorable matchup in his second turn this week.
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Logan Allen's return from the minors last time out saw him strike out eight over five one-hit innings. It was a performance good enough to earn him the benefit of the doubt with the Royals and White Sox on the schedule this week.
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Since returning from the minors, Grayson Rodriguez has looked more like the power pitcher he was advertised to be, delivering particularly encouraging results in his second turn against the Rays over the weekend. He's in for a much better matchup in Week 18 against the Aaron Judge-less Yankees.
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Gavin Williams has mostly just kept his head above the water in the majors so far, but his one real gem was a seven-inning, one-hit effort against the Royals on June 27. He'll be facing that same bottom-feeder lineup this week.
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Kyle Hendricks rebounded from a couple of shaky starts with a one-run effort against the Nationals and has a similar matchup at the White Sox to open this week. His second matchup at the Cardinals is tougher, but not so tough that it's a net negative.
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Making heavy use of his curveball, Seth Lugo has a quality start in three of his last four outings after delivering one at Detroit over the weekend. He'll benefit from a similarly favorable matchup against the Pirates in Week 18.
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Griffin Canning gets hit pretty hard at times, but he's also capable of piling up strikeouts at a nice clip, recording 12 last time out. Hopefully he can repeat the feat with a matchup as favorable as the Tigers this week.
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