Today’s deep league waiver wire highlights an outfielder I am somewhat shocked still has such a low ownership percentage and a pitcher who you should get an early jump on.

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Maybe fans should retort “NoMo LoMo” next time Logan Morrison quips “no homo” on twitter — especially if they’ve been laboring along with the Marlin outfielder on their roster. He’s still owned on 48% of Yahoo rosters, but that number might drop in the coming weeks if we can’t find hope in his statistical line. Let’s give it a shot — even though my Bold Prediction, that Lucas Duda would outshine him in every roto-relevant way, looks like it’ll come true no matter what.

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Right along the fringe of most leagues, there’s a class of mostly-replaceable, mostly-interchangeable, mostly-lefty, definitely-still-useful platoon outfielders. If you only play them when they have the handedness advantage, and act cutthroat about them when you face a roster crunch, you can get the most out of them while reducing your risk. It’s a tried-and-true strategy in most head-to-head leagues on the pitching side, where streaming is ubiquitous. Maybe it makes sense to have a semi-streaming spot on your offense in your tighter, more active leagues — and if that’s the case, it probably makes sense for that player to be a first basemen or outfielder.

Here are some guys in the National League that fit the description of a fantasy-platoon outfielder. Either their complete offensive upside is only above replacement when they have the platoon advantage, or they legitimately seem to have a platoon situation going on. If there are so many of this type in one half of the league, maybe they truly are replaceable in your standard mixed league.

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Per usual on Mondays, here is the latest news on some of the American League outfield eligible players.

Bullish:
Colby Rasmus – As noted in the comment section of my last AL OF Tiered Update Ranking, Rasmus decided to go on a tear as soon as I dropped him down to tier eight. Over the past 14 days, Rasmus has a .320 average, three home runs, 10 runs and even eight RBI’s. The RBI production is surprising because over that same 14 day time span, he has hit from the number two spot eight out of twelve games. Rasmus has broken broken my heart in the past, but I might get sucked in his tools yet again. He is only owned in 40% of Yahoo! and 67% of ESPN leagues, go grab him while he is hot. Read the rest of this entry »

Today’s waiver wire brings you two rookies who have come into more important roles of late, one an outfielder and one a relief pitcher.

Norichika Aoki | OF | Brewers | Owned: 3% Yahoo! and 1.7% ESPN

Aoki turned 30 years old earlier this year, but technically he’s a rookie after coming over from Japan. He opened the season as a reserve player with Ryan Braun, Corey Hart, and Carlos Gomez/Nyjer Morgan entrenched in the outfield, but he’s seen more playing time lately because Mat Gamel’s season-ending knee injury has forced Hart to play some first base. It wasn’t just Gamel’s injury though, Aoki earned his spot.

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Currently, I am playing in seven different roto leagues and if there is a common thread to be found in each one, it’s that just a handful of stolen bases can vault a number of teams up in the standings by an average of five points.  Unless you’re sitting at the top of the stolen base category or sitting in last by a ridiculously large margin, a boost in steals could mean the difference between languishing in the bottom third of your league standings and competing for the championship.  Here are a pair of outfielders who just might be able to help… Read the rest of this entry »

For most of his three full seasons in the big leagues prior to 2012, Dexter Fowler had been a decent (if unexciting) placeholder in the middle of the Colorado outfield. His wOBA marks of .345, .335, & .346 between 2009-11 were roughly average, and while he chipped in a few steals (52 over the three seasons) and a nice amount of triples (39), he was generally an unremarkable player, held back largely by a strikeout rate (23.1% last year) that usually only works when it’s balanced out by considerable power. Last June, he really hit rock bottom when instead of rejoining the Rockies after recovering from an abdominal injury, he was optioned back to Triple-A. And why not? At the time, he was hitting just .238/.340/.348 with only two successful steals in eight attempts.

Fowler even struggled back in the minors, hitting only .237/.345/.381 in 27 games for Colorado Springs. When he returned to the Rockies after the All-Star Break, it was less because he had forced his way back and more because Carlos Gonzalez had been dealing with a sore wrist, creating a need for another outfielder. But Fowler doubled in his first game back and scored ten runs in his first eight games; over the remainder of the season, he was a new player, hitting .288/.381/.498 with 37 extra-base hits and ten steals.

Despite his hot finish to 2011, few believed he’d suddenly turned a corner. At Yahoo!, for example, he was ranked as the 48th-best outfielder heading into 2012; here at FanGraphs, our consensus rankings placed him 62nd. Yet here we are, two months into 2012, and Fowler has the sixth-highest wOBA of any qualified outfielder, a ranking which had been third overall before Tuesday’s hitless outing.

Should we have seen this coming?

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The great thing about playing in a league deeper than 12-team mixed for a change is I can now simply check out the week’s pickups in the 15-team LABR league for inspiration. Both the players highlighted today were won with FAAB this past Monday.

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It may be a day late, but I assure it isn’t a dollar short. Today marks the updated tiers for American League outfield eligible players.

Tier One:
Josh Hamilton
Curtis Granderson
Jose Bautista
Adrian Gonzalez

Joey Bats was able to re-enter the upper echelon. Over the past 30 days he’s hit .348 with nine home runs and 23 RBI’s. Combine this past month with what he should project to do the rest of the season and you have yourself a top shelf player. Hamilton and Granderson continue to mash about as well as anyone could expect, so they’ve managed to hang onto the top spots as of right now. Now OF eligible in Yahoo! formats, A-Gon has seen himself debut in the tiered rankings where I think he will be come the end of the season. I think we would all be shocked if he didn’t end up as a top tier player.

Tier Two:
Adam Jones
Mike Trout
Austin Jackson

The biggest jump here is Trout becoming more or less an instant super star level player. This type of offensive production from someone so young truly ranks among the best names in the history of the game. Trout has so far been a solid source for average, OBP, power, steals and he has even chipped in 20 RBI’s already. I assumed he would be a very good player later down the road. I didn’t expect him to be great from the word go. Even while being on the 15-day disabled list, I am optimistic about Jackson for the rest of the season. This may change as soon next week, as he is going take live batting practice for the first time today and be evaluated afterwards. Read the rest of this entry »

Two years ago, when Jose Bautista was enjoying his 50 HR breakout, I was enjoying slotting him in to my lineup on a daily basis in the original ottoneu league. A $1 in-season auction pickup, Joey Bats anchored my last championship team before getting voted off through the off-season arbitration process. He was a stalwart for me again last year, but this April was a different story.

May has been better, but has Bautista turned a corner or had the pauper-turned-prince turned back again?

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