The lists of new regular faces never ends! Since I had two more player requests in the comments of yesterday’s post, let’s continue on discussing those who have just recently earned everyday playing time, whether because of a trade deadline deal, injury, or whatever else.
The trade deadline has now passed and not surprisingly, there was a ton of movement and new opportunities for players to take on full-time roles have arisen. All but one of these players now finding themselves with regular playing time is a result of deadline deals, with the the other being the beneficiary of an injury to the incumbent.
Man, waiting for the excitement of trade deadline day is hard. Why must teams wait until the last minute to complete a trade?! So to finish off my week of posting, let’s once again discuss another group of new everyday starters. Once the trade deadline passes, we will likely have a ton more worthy of discussion.
We don’t need to wait for the trade deadline to pass to analyze a slew of players who have recently come into regular playing time. So let’s continue our dive into new everyday starters.
I won’t claim to know as much about Bitcoin as some of my peers, but I know enough to determine that winning $100K of it would be great. For the more crypto-skeptical baseball fans out there, MLB and their new contest sponsor, FTX, are offering cold, hard cash as an alternative reward for their new promo contest. The challenge? Guess who will hit the longest home run of the rest of the season, the distance in feet of that home run, and the type of home run (solo, 2-run, etc.,). Let’s take a look at the details of the Moon Blast contest and see if our more enlightened way of thinking can help make a prediction.
It’s been a while since running a series of New Everyday Starters posts and man, do we have a slew of them right now. Between injury replacements and minor league call-ups, it might be easier than ever to find a replacement for your injured starter. Let’s discuss five of those new regulars and determine if they have a place on your roster.
The trade deadline is this Friday and could be an absolute banger. It is shaping up to be a seller’s market with a very clear set of buyers and sellers and the latter having some legitimate players to move that could alter the playoff picture substantially. There is understandable excitement related to the players who will be moved, but I want to focus on the holes their departures will open as that can often create some interesting buying opportunities for us in the fantasy realm, often at a discounted price, too. Here are six hitters who could deliver some fantasy upside if a spot opens for them.
Brendan Rodgers/Garrett Hampson | OF/2B, COL – Potential Trade: Trevor Story
Story has to get traded, right? RIGHT?! I would say the Rockies can’t possibly botch it, but we know that’s not true. They’ve shown time and again that they are capable of botching anything. His departure would likely change the fate of two guys (assuming they don’t get a shortstop back in return) as the 2B platoon of Rodgers and Hampson could both become full-timers.
Both are markedly better against lefties, but the extra volume alone can sometimes be enough to drive value, especially for Rockies given their home park. Speaking of, they have a dead even 28-28 home-road split post deadline. Well, technically that’s not 100% true, but I’m thinking more about weekly leagues and standard Sunday pickups so starting next Monday it’s 28-28.
It seems like the Rays always have a logjam of hitters and rotations at most positions, and that has now gotten even more logjammy with their acquisition of DH Nelson Cruz. Cruz hasn’t played in the field since 2018, which means for as long as he is starting, the DH slot is going to be filled. That’s bad news for many of their hitters who will likely see a playing time cut, albeit not a significant one since it will likely be a different player on the bench each day. The logjam is likely to worsen again once Manuel Margot returns from the IL. Alas, this isn’t an article on the rest of the Rays hitters, it’s about Cruz’s move from Minnesota to Tampa. From a strictly ballpark change perspective, how might this switch in home venue affect his performance? Let’s consult the park factors.
The top prospects just keep on coming! On Friday when baseball returned after the all-star break, the Red Sox recalled their third best prospect and 55th overall ranked prospect, Jarren Duran. Then on Sunday, the Angels recalled their top prospect and ninth overall ranked prospect, Brandon Marsh. Let’s dive into each of their statistical records and investigate their chances of fantasy success this year.
Yesterday, I asked you to vote on which group of pitchers you expect to post a better ERA over the rest of the season. One group was composed of the 10 biggest SIERA overperformers, while the other included the underperformers. For the first time, I’m going to take the same polling idea and use it for hitters. So let’s follow the same concept and compare two groups of hitters based on xwOBA overperformance and underperformance. We know that xwOBA isn’t perfect. Neither is SIERA. In fact, no estimated/expected/forecasted equation is going to be perfect because there will always be a player or multiples that figure out how to do something we have a difficult time quantifying or there’s simply bound to be players each year that fall into either end of the extremes for no reason at all except for randomness. So let’s keep that in mind when reviewing these two groups.
