Carl Crawford has stolen a base in each of his last four games and in five of his last six. I have had a few too many false starts in assuming Crawford was back to the player he was in Tampa Bay since he left for Boston and both his health and his production abruptly left him. However, this is the first time since I accepted that Crawford would never return to his former self that I questioned whether Crawford might still be as fast as he ever was.
The Orioles have not had a lot of luck with their pitching prospects of late, most recently thanks to Dylan Bundy’s Tommy John surgery. That is part of the reason that Kevin Gausman is such an exciting pitcher for them. Also he throws really, really hard. When he finally reached the majors to stay as a starter in June, Orioles fans and fantasy owners were ready for Gausman to strike out a ton of batters and become the ace of Baltimore’s staff. Instead, Gausman has struck out more than three batters fewer per nine innings this season than he did in his stint in the majors in 2013, and his overall numbers have declined further since the All-Star Break.
The dog days of summer are frequently the dog days of fantasy baseball, as many teams will feel locked into their current place in the standings now that players have had four months of the season to establish a baseline of expected performance. It is more difficult to trade for a player if his owner agrees with you on his value. However, some players will still improve over the final two months of the season, even some that you had already accepted as disappointments. The recent play of three veteran outfielders, all of whom have underperformed relative to their preseason expectations, has piqued my interest in particular.
It is a bizarro right field in Tampa Bay this season. Wil Myers seemed assured to follow up his .293/.354/.478 rookie half-season with a top 40 outfield season, at the very least. Instead, Myers hit just .227/.313/.354 in the first third of the season and then landed on the 60-day DL with a wrist injury. Meanwhile, the bulk of the optimism that surrounded Kevin Kiermaier before he was promoted in mid-May was related to his defense. Two months and a .308/.359/.538 triple slash later, Kiermaier has been a much better Wil Myers than Wil Myers has been.
This post is not about Kevin Kiermaier. August Fagerstrom and Ben Duronio said it all in their recent real baseball and fantasy articles, respectively. This article is about Jake Odorizzi.
It may be because he is teammates with Felix Hernandez, who has been the No. 1 pitcher on ESPN’s player rater this season. It may be because he was already 31 years old before he threw his first pitch in the majors. It may be because he missed the first month of the season with a finger injury. Whatever the case, Hisashi Iwakuma has dominated batters very quietly this season. He deserves some attention.
Pretend you didn’t read the headline of this article and try to guess which pitchers have the most strikeouts so far in July. The usual suspects of Max Scherzer, David Price, Zack Greinke, Stephen Strasburg, and Chris Sale were all in the top 12 after their first two starts of the month. The medalist entering Wednesday was Garrett Richards with 20 strikeouts. He is no surprise at the top of the list after the first half he has put together, one that could land him in the All-Star Game if he can win the fan vote. The man just behind him with 19 strikeouts? He’s more of a surprise.
The only player more invisible than a middle reliever in fantasy is a middle reliever who did not start the season in the majors. Not only does he lack those shiny saves, but he may not even qualify for the leaderboards you would use to uncover relievers who could help your ratios or possibly inherit a closer role down the line.
This season, there are quite a few relievers who have burst onto the scene with a lot of promise and, in many cases, a lot of strikeouts. What follows are some of those players who have caught my eye. Few are in play for saves, but these players are worth your consideration in holds leagues, deeper formats, and Ottoneu.
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David Price works pretty hard to make sure his teammates don’t have to. Price struck out 11 Pirates and walked just one yesterday afternoon, and he barely improved a strikeout-to-walk rate that was already north of 10-to-1. But even with 11 strikeouts, Price still allowed nearly two thirds of his opposing batters to put the ball in play. Every pitcher needs help from his defense, even Price.
Very soon, Price may have new teammates behind him. Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times reported that the Blue Jays, Cardinals, Giants, Indians, and Yankees were heavily scouting Price in his previous start. One thing those teams have in common is that they’re in the playoff hunt this season, which the Rays decidedly are not. At the very least, Price’s 6-7 record can stand to improve no matter where he lands. However, those teams also have several major differences that will likely have an impact on Price’s numbers for the rest of the season. Price is an ace, and there is not a situation in baseball bad enough to make him not so. But the team that Price ends up on could mean the difference between him being a top five starter and a top 15 one.
When a player has a poor start to the season, it can be very difficult to properly rate him in fantasy. Even when he starts to play to his previously established career standards, that one bad month can drag down his season totals for the rest of the year. While it is important to not overrate the most recent month’s production in lieu of the bad month in April, when that recent month matches a player’s track record, it is pretty clear which is the anomaly. Here are a handful of players who suffered from poor starts this season and have heated up with the weather.
In his first half season in the majors, Wil Myers was impressive. He hit .293/.354/.478 with 13 home runs and five steals, handily winning the AL Rookie of the Year despite not playing a game before June 18.
This year has been a different story for Myers. He’s hitting just .227 with an OBP barely clear of .300. His four home runs and one steal are well short of the paces he set in 2013. His strikeout rate, walk rate, and batted ball profile are very similar to last season. There’s no obvious culprit, but Myers has been bad.