Fantasy Baseball Waiver Wire: Week of August 31

There’s just under a month remaining in the MLB season, so every game is crucial to your fantasy team’s title push.

In head-to-head leagues, your playoffs are likely underway at this point. Best practice would be to map out your pitchers for the week, including which streamers you’re targeting in daily leagues. Be sure to max out your transactions or starts, if need be; there’s no title in your future if you can’t get past the quarterfinals or semifinals.

In rotisserie and weekly leagues, keep trying to maximize your team’s statistical output. Play any two-start pitchers that you feel good about, as well as your platoon bats that project to face the most opposite-handed pitching this week.

Many of the names mentioned below are guys that I have covered already at some point this year, but these are players that I strongly feel will contribute to a championship pursuit in a 10-team league.

Sam Antonacci, CWS 2B, 3B, OF (21% owned)

2026 Stats: 463 PA, .269/.365/.394, 8 HR, 17 SB, 120 wRC+

A rookie who wasn’t on many draft boards entering this season, Antonacci has been a premier table-setter for the first-place White Sox. He doesn’t swing the bat hard (69.9-mph bat speed) or barrel the ball often (5.3%), but he has a mature approach for a young player.

Antonacci boasts a strong 41.7% zone swing% minus out-of-zone swing% (Z-O%), indicating that he’s aggressive in the zone while taking balls outside of it. When he swings the bat, the left-handed hitter misses just 15.4% of the time.

Frequently batting leadoff against opposing right-handed pitchers, Antonacci is a solid producer in batting average, on-base percentage, runs, and steals.

Zac Thornton, NYM SP (18% owned)

2026 Stats: 61.1 IP, 2.93 ERA, 1.16 WHIP, 12.7% K-BB%, 4.23 SIERA

A beneficiary of the Mets’ lost 2026 season, Thornton has been successful in his audition for a rotation spot with the club moving forward. He’s a crafty lefty who throws in the low nineties, but offers three fastballs and seven total pitches in his arsenal.

While it will ultimately be up to Thornton’s command for him to be an effective starter for years to come, his solid 6.3% walk rate is a good start. I don’t love this profile for dynasty leagues or as a set-it-and-forget-it guy, but he can be utilized as a streamer against bad offenses.

This week, Thornton lines up for a date with the San Francisco Giants. The Giants’ offense has been one of the least inspiring in baseball this year, making this matchup an ideal time to deploy Thornton.

Jared Jones, PIT SP (12% owned)

2026 Stats: 72.2 IP, 4.83 ERA, 1.28 WHIP, 17.9% K-BB%, 4.14 SIERA

At face value, Jones’ return from Tommy John surgery hasn’t gone as planned. He’s only made it through five innings once in his last five starts, walking 12, striking out 25, and allowing 17 earned runs over that 20.2-inning sample.

My hope springs eternal for starters that have a hard fastball and an above-average K-BB%. Even though Jones is having trouble with his command, he’s still generating enough swing-and-miss that greater success is likely to come his way soon.

Fortunately for Jones, he too projects to face the Giants this week. Perhaps this coming start will give Jones some positive momentum to finish the year on a high note. Even though most trade deadlines have likely passed in fantasy leagues, Jones could be an excellent buy-low in dynasty formats this offseason.

Heriberto Hernandez, MIA OF (8% owned)

2026 Stats: 391 PA, .232/.312/.467, 22 HR, 10 SB, 112 wRC+

I have been banging the drum since April that Hernandez is a fantasy-relevant player this season. It’s astonishing to me that his ownership rate is so low, since he has consistently raked after being recalled from a brief demotion to Triple-A in May. Hernandez is the least-owned bat with 20 homers on ESPN.

There’s so much to like here: his 74.5-mph bat speed, 13.6% barrel rate, and 44.9% Z-O% are all indicators that he can do serious damage in the zone. Though there’s a good deal of swing-and-miss in his profile as well, that can just be the price of doing business when you’re able to drive the ball as well as Hernandez can.

While he’s not much of an average or OBP helper, Hernandez is quick (28.5 ft/s sprint speed) and has stolen ten bases. Start him with confidence down the stretch and see if you can still buy low on him in dynasty this offseason.

Ben Joyce, LAA RP (7% owned)

2026 Stats: 8.1 IP, 3 SV, 3.24 ERA, 0.96 WHIP, 21.2% K-BB%, 3.18 SIERA

If you’re searching for saves on the wire, Joyce is the closer with the most intrigue owned in less than 10% of leagues. Joyce possesses an electric fastball that regularly hits triple digits, which he leans on heavily. Sometimes, that’s all a reliever really needs to be effective.

Joyce returned earlier this month from shoulder surgery in May of 2025, so he may still be a work in progress for the remainder of the season. Command issues have plagued Joyce in his brief big-league career, but his ability to generate whiffs has allowed him to remain an effective back-end reliever.

While the Angels may not get many save opportunities and Joyce may be at risk of blowing some of the chances he does get, his exciting ceiling makes him worth scooping up for save chances.