Last week, I covered four prospects rostered in less than 10% of Ottoneu leagues who deserve more attention. This week, I want to go the other direction and look at prospects who are rostered in too many leagues. This proved far more difficult, for a couple of reasons.
Yesterday, I listed and reviewed the six hitters who had posted a 30%+ HR/FB rate at Triple-A this season. Sadly, the list didn’t result in a whole lot of actionable advice. Today, I’ll shift to a related metric, ISO. In terms of overall offense, it’s more important than HR/FB rate since it accounts for doubles and triples as well. Given the number of duplicates on both lists and an attempt to capture more actionable players, I extended the list to the top 10. Let’s hope this time the names are more interesting.
Let’s move our Triple-A review to hitters. Us fantasy owners probably care most about a prospect’s home run potential, so let’s review the HR/FB rate leaders. These are the guys who have recorded at least 150 PAs and posted a HR/FB rate of at least 30%.
Yesterday, I reviewed the pitcher SwStk% leaders at Triple-A hoping to uncover some potentially exciting stashes. The list was a bit underwhelming, though it did include some of the very best prospects. So what if we really don’t care how the strikeouts are generated, just that the pitcher is racking them up? Let’s now look at the strikeout rate leaders at Triple-A and see if there are any additional names to keep watch on.
If you’re in a deep league and your free agent pool is barren, now is a good time to start perusing the minor league leaderboards for potential callups who could earn positive fantasy value. Today, I’ll start with pitcher SwStk% leaders. In my non-scientific observations, a pitcher’s minor league SwStk% better correlates with his MLB strikeout rate. That means that if I see a high strikeout rate without a high SwStk% in the minors (such as a 30% strikeout rate, but only 11% SwStk%), I’m not optimistic the pitcher will post a strong strikeout rate in the Majors. On the other hand, if I see a high SwStk%, but mediocre strikeout rate, I think there’s more upside, and won’t shy away.
For a variety of reasons, since the start of June I have been reloading my Ottoneu rosters with prospects and have been surprised to see some interesting names almost universally available. While I am not a prospect expert by trade, I love scouting stat lines, reading scouting reports, and finding prospects who others may not have noticed yet. These four players are all rostered in less than 10% of Ottoneu leagues and should be on your radar.
The Prospects Episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.
Guest: Eric Cross
Strategy Section
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Prospects have become increasingly important to winning re-draft fantasy leagues. Of course, they have always been major in-season acquisitions, but now they’re making their presence felt at the draft table, too. With more fantasy managers aware of the prospects who are likely to make an impact in a given season, the battle for their services has become much more fevered, leading some managers to stash desirable prospects for a month or two rather than try to pluck them off the wire once they are called up and risk missing out.
These 27 guys aren’t draftable in every format, but I wanted to cast a wide net so that the list has utility across many formats. All of them should be in the majors for a substantial portion of the 2022 season. It is worth familiarizing yourself with them so you are ready to bid on the ones who aren’t draftable in your particular league.
These rankings are now available on The Board on the 2022 Fantasy Rankings tab, where you can also see the Top 130 Dynasty Rankings!
The average draft position (ADP) included is from Draft Champions leagues from January 20 to February 20 at the NFBC, which you can find here. These leagues draft 50 players and that’s all they get for the year — no pickups or drops. That means all the relevant prospects get selected, which helps give us an idea of how the market views them.
Bobby Witt Jr. | SS, KCR | 90 ADP
The market is remarkably excited for Witt, making him a consistent top 100 pick in winter drafts. From a talent perspective, it’s easy to understand why. A dominant effort at Double- and Triple-A saw Witt come up just shy of an insane 30/30/100/100 season, as he hit .290/.361/.576 with 33 HR, 29 SB, 97 RBI, and 99 R in 564 PA. There is some swing-and-miss to his game that will likely be exposed at the big-league level, but his power and speed are remarkably tantalizing for many fantasy managers. The question is when will Witt debut? We don’t know for certain, especially with the CBA in limbo during the lockout, but the consensus seems to be that he will be up within the first month of the season, leaving more than enough time to make a substantial impact. Read the rest of this entry »
The September Prospects Episode of the Beat the Shift Podcast – a baseball podcast for fantasy baseball players.
Guest: James Anderson
Strategy Section
Prospects
Injury Guru’s Trivia of the Week
Prospect Discussion
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We are entering the dog days of the season and this season is of course particularly unique because we’re coming off the pandemic year. The dog days could hit harder than normal and have teams pushing hard for reinforcements to ensure their major league arms can get to the finish line of the regular season and beyond if they are contenders. Here are five guys who be called up (or back up) to make a late-season impact.
Joe Ryan | MIN – 35% K, 5% BB, 3.63 ERA, 0.79 WHIP in 57 IP
Ryan was in the Nelson Cruz deal and though the Twins are toast for the year, they should still consider giving the 25-year-old righty a look soon. Brilliant command of his fastball has fueled elite K%-BB% all the way up the minor league ladder along with being a bit old for each level, too. He fared pretty well for Team USA in the Olympics, too, with 10 K and 1 BB in 4.7 IP. It’s time to see if this heater is going to find MLB success and if they turn him loose, he could be a nice SP pickup in a lot of formats.
Aaron Ashby | MIL – 36% K, 12% BB, 4.48 ERA, 1.38 WHIP in 62.3 IP
Ashby made his debut earlier this year and it didn’t go well, allowing seven runs (four earned) on four hits and three walks while getting just two outs. He struggled in his first two outings back in Triple-A after the debut, but then settled down with a 2.08 ERA, 0.97 WHIP, 38 K, and 6 BB in 21.7 IP. He is actually back today (Tuesday, August 10th) for the doubleheader against the Cubs and could be a key piece to helping Milwaukee rest the three aces down the stretch. This is a volatile profile, but the huge strikeout ability gives him some real upside.