Welcome to Rates and barrels. It is Friday, July 12th. Derek Van Riper, Enosaris here with you doing the Thursday episode on Friday this week and for I think most weeks going forward because we figured, hey, why not?

Move the stream up a day, move the fantasy content back a day.

It might be the best of all worlds on this episode.

We'll take a look at the recent dominance of Paul Skeens, who carried a no hitter into the seventh

through the seventh inning in his start against the Brewers on Thursday.

We've got some mailbag questions wondering about where Garrett Cole stands after his

first few turns off the IL, the struggles of Josh L, Luis Castillo, Slider.

We've got some project prospect stuff today, and we've got some weekend waiver preview

pickups to discuss as well.

So we begin today, Eno, with Paul Skeen's, lifted after seven no-hit innings against

the Brewers.

Pitch count was just in that triple-digit range where everyone starts to be

nervous. And given the way the pirates have handled Paul Skeens up to this point, I was not

surprised that he was taken out of this game. He had an interview on MLB Network afterwards

didn't seem to have any overwhelming problem with it.

Just given the situation, it was a one-nothing game, and they could use their two best relievers and Colin Holderman and Earlis Chapman to finish it off.

And other than some traffic that Colin Holderman had to deal with, the pirates did get the win.

So at the end of the day, I think everybody was happy, except for people who wanted to

see Paul Skeens make a run at the no-no.

And given that we're up against the All-Star break, I think there was a case to be made

for letting him go a little bit longer if they wanted to do it.

But I don't think it was necessarily a missed opportunity that we should skewer them for either.

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