Oh boy. It finally looks the MLB is ready to crack down on pitchers using foreign substances. Perhaps that's why Gerrit Cole's spin rate was down on Thursday; you can read more about it below. Opposing Cole, however, was the real story of that game as Ryan Yarbrough tossed a complete game, the first by a Rays starting pitcher since 2016. Yarbrough remains fringy at best but this is a reminder that you can stream your pitchers against the Yankees right now while they're struggling.

On the hitter side of things, Charlie Blackmon looks to be back as he went 3 for 4 with a home run and three RBI. He's batting .319 over his last 15 games. I think you can still acquire him on the cheap, too. Blackmon isn't flashy and he turns 35 years old in less than a month but he's actually posting the best Statcast numbers of his career. Go get him before others realize just how good he's been.

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Yankees SP Gerrit Cole wasn't his sharpest on Thursday in what has otherwise been a Cy Young-worthy season -- he allowed five runs in five innings -- but that isn't the narrative now. The narrative has shifted to focusing on Cole's spin rate going down on the night. If you don't yet know why Twitter was set ablaze by Cole's spin rate dropping, there is curious speculation surrounding the fact that this happened on the same day multiple MLB insiders reported that starting pitchers are using sticky substances to improve their spin rate, and Cole was named in the reports.

Here's an exact Tweet from The Athletic's Ken Rosenthal: "Evidence was presented at the MLB owners meetings to suggest that the use of illegal foreign substances by pitchers trying to enhance spin rates and get an edge is very prevalent in the game. So the crackdown will now commence in earnest."

Max Goldstein provided more data on Twitter: "Gerrit Cole's four-seam fastball had an average spin rate of 2436 rpm today. The last outing during which his average fastball spin rate was lower than that was September 21, 2018."

All the while, Cole still had 15 swinging strikes on 92 pitches and he only allowed five hard-hit balls. His average exit velocity against was 83 mph. I had people telling me after this start that Gerrit Cole is "done" because he can't use sticky substances anymore. I wanted to put my head through my computer. Thankfully, Scott helped talk some sense back into me. He sees Cole as just being off in tonight's outing and doesn't buy into the narrative that this will derail his entire career. Having said that, the fact that the fastball was down over 100 rpm is at least a bit curious.

The only thing we know now is that baseball will be cracking down on the usage of these substances and the idea is to restore some balance in the game so that pitchers aren't so advantaged and hitters don't have to sell out so hard for the home run. It will be interesting to watch spin rates across the league now as the MLB cracks down on the usage of foreign sticky substances.

For more on Cole's spin rate and a deep dive into the situation, Chris Towers has you covered in the intro to his waivers.

Brewers OF Christian Yelich went 1 for 3 with his second homer and he is batting .171 with a 35% K rate since returning from the IL. This begs the question: is Yelich the perfect buy-low, or is now the time to sell him before he completely bottoms out?

Scott would be looking to shop him now because it seems like there will be more believers out there. Scott doesn't feel like he can count on him for the remainder of this season.

Scott recently did a deep dive on the best prospects in baseball right now with five on the verge and five on the periphery. You can find that here.

*Rostered in 75% of leagues or fewer

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