Bryce Harper was supposed to be the next superstar. And while 9.5 WAR over his first three seasons is nothing to sneeze at, it’s a bit of a disappointment. For the most part though, he has performed pretty well at the plate, posting a .355 wOBA during his career. Unfortunately, injuries have gotten the best of him in recent years. In 2013, he missed a month with a left knee injury that ultimately required offseason surgery. In 2014, he hurt his left thumb when he dove head-first into third base on a triple and missed about two months of action. So then it’s no surprise that a graph of his plate appearance totals over his first three seasons look like this:

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Think of Matt Kemp and you might have a few different ways to sum up his work to date. Athletic. Oft-injured. Unrefined. These aren’t bad words to use, even if they sometimes seem to be used too often with certain populations. Kemp strikes out a lot, doesn’t walk a lot, doesn’t have a good glove, but hits the ball hard and can run fast. And he’s hurt a lot. The question — after a bounce-back year in his age-29 season — is if these things are always true.

Because Kemp showed up in the top fifteen outfielders this past season, and it would be hard to project him to do anything close to the same again if all those things were true.

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This past season was a pretty productive one for Brandon Moss. The Oakland Athletics’ outfielder-first baseman hit a subpar .234, but his 25 dingers helped to place him in the top 40 outfielders by Zach Sanders’ standards. His $12-plus in earnings would make him a top-15 first baseman, in case he went that way for fantasy baseball players. The recession on offense made Moss’ numbers more valuable in rotisserie leagues.

The 2014 campaign could have been better, perhaps notably so, for Moss, in fact. The slugger went yard for the 23^rd time this season on July 24, yet he finished with a total that tied him for 21^st in the majors in that category. He much more resembled the hitter he was in 2013 (.267 ISO) prior to the All-Star break this year (.268/.349/.530, 21 jacks, and a .262 ISO in 364 PAs) than he did after it (.173/.310/.274, 4 HR, and a .101 ISO in 216 PAs). Moss wasn’t the same by the end of July.

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Writing on the subject of Charlie Blackmon, Carson Cistulli once quipped, he’s “neither black nor Jamaican.” Our own FG+ player cap described him as “unlikely to ever be better than a fourth outfielder in real life.” Fantasy owners agreed and passed on drafting him according to FantasyPros. So how then did he provide a $25 season, ninth best among all outfielders?
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It’s hard not to fall in love with the fantasy potential of Jason Heyward, especially for those of us who can’t forget the can’t-miss hype surrounding his debut and a rookie season that seemed like the precursor to imminent superstardom. So it’s difficult to shake the tinge of disappointment that’s come to hang around Heyward in the past couple of years, not necessarily because he’s done anything wrong — he is, after all, just 25 years old and boasts a career .345 wOBA — but because in him we see fantasy studliness, and can’t help but feel let down each year when he falls short of making good on his immense potential.
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The Marlins second best prospect heading into the 2013 season, Christian Yelich was understandably hyped upon his debut with the team last year. He didn’t disappoint, accumulating 1.4 WAR over slightly less than half a season. From a fantasy perspective, he offered contributions in four categories, despite being on the worst offense in baseball. It didn’t lead to a whole lot of preseason love in our consensus fantasy rankings though, as he ranked just 59th. We were all wrong, as he finished 23rd in value, offering somewhat similar production to fellow all-around contributor Starling Marte.

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Michael Cuddyer and the Mets have kicked off the offseason, agreeing to a two-year contract.

Cuddyer spent the last three seasons in Colorado, and it did wonderful things for the right-hander; Cuddyer only managed to play in 49 games in 2014, but he was so productive while on the field that he was nearly a replacement-level outfielder in standard leagues. A healthy Cuddyer in Coors was excellent, but Citi Field isn’t as kind. Coors is consistently the best park in baseball for hitters, but Citi Field is about 10 percentage points worse in right-handed HR park factors, and far worse in terms of singles and doubles. The good news is that playing in New York should be easier than Cuddyer’s time in Minnesota, where he hit 66 homers over his final three seasons with the Twins. Cuddyer was still around his prime then, but at least we have a sample of his skills outside of paradise.

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Coming into 2014, the question wasn’t if Billy Hamilton was going to steal a bunch of bases, the question was how many. I had my doubts he could hit well enough to stay in the lineup. He hit better than I expected and racked up 38 first half stolen bases. Then his production dropped off hard. The number of stolen bases fell to 18 in the second half. While 56 stolen base is nothing to sneer at, people see the possibility of 75+ stolen bases. Will the second half decline continue into 2015?

Hamilton’s 2014 season can be broken down into the two distinct halves.

Half: AVG/OBP/SLG, BB%, K%, SB(SB%),
1H: .285/.319/.423, 5%, 18%, 38 (72%)
2H: .200/.254/.257, 7%, 21%, 18 (69%)

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When a 27-year-old doubles his previous best in homers, seasoned stats lovers everywhere give him the virtual pat on the head. That’s nice, thanks for 2014, but we’re not moving your needle too much in 2015. You won’t be projected to be top ten in the outfield despite coming in second in the end-of year rankings this past season.

But look over Michael Brantley’s particular history — the slowly growing homer totals, and the athleticism he always brought to the table — and it’s tempting to fall in love. What might his regression actually look like, and if it’s a little better than his projections, could he make a sharp pickup in a league full of sharps, all busy patting him on the head?

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Coming into 2014, I was very high on George Springer. After seeing him play in both Double-A and Triple-A in 2013, I was so confident in his abilities that I wrote a column explaining why Springer was still worth drafting and holding in standard mixed leagues, even if he started the season in Triple-A.

The 24-year-old spent exactly 13 games back down in Triple-A to start the season, hitting .353/.459/.647, with eight extra-base hits and four steals. That was enough to convince the Astros to call him up and give him the everyday right-field job. At first, he struggled to adjust, hitting just .182/.262/.218 in his first 14 major-league games. As it turned out, two weeks was about all the adjusting he needed to do.

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