Michael Busch’s Fight For Positive Value

For baseball fans visiting FanGraphs who do not play fantasy baseball, leaderboards will do. Scroll to the bottom right corner of the main page and all baseball fans can see that, of course, Aaron Judge and Juan Soto are the current leaders in wOBA and wRC+. They can see that Chris Sale and Tarik Skubal have the lowest ERAs in the game and that Emmanuel Clase and Kirby Yates have the lowest reliever ERA in the game. But we fantasy baseball players need something more. We need to see who has been valuable from a specific set of league parameters. Bring in year-to-date auction values with the FanGraphs auction calculator! Doing so will illuminate your roster with positive and negative values. For example, Michael Busch is on his way to being one of the greatest values of the 2024 season. Yet, early last week he had a negative value next to his name on our auction calculator. Then, he hit four home runs and accumulated 11 RBI and seven runs in a short span of 25 plate appearances, shooting him into positive value territory. Take a look at how Busch’s value has changed, compared to his preseason value projection (Steamer), over the last few weeks:

If you treat Michael Busch like a third baseman, which he is not, Willi Castro is his biggest competition. Busch’s explosive September has coincided with a Willi Castro slump where he’s gone 5 for 32 in the month. What’s more, Castro stopped running in the second half of the season, stealing only three of his 13 total bases in the second half, adding a goose egg in July.  All the while, Michael Busch has been slowly striking out less and making contact in the zone more often:

If this were a literal foot race to the finish line, Busch would be the runner who suddenly finds another gear and sprints to the line, sneaking up on the guy in front of him who started thinking a little too early about the slice of pizza waiting for him at the congratulations tent. As he prepares to cross the line, you can bet he’ll be leaning in, bowing, and throwing his upper body out in front to get the centimeter he needs to beat out…. Alex Bregman:

A few stolen bases might do the trick. But, again, while Busch has held 3B eligibility in most formats this season, he really isn’t a third-baseman. He’s only held down the hot corner once this season. “You wanna be a first baseman? Fine! We’ll treat you like a first baseman!”…and what a treat it is. Change the priority setting on the calculator so that anyone who qualifies at the 1B position is adjusted that way and Busch is still bringing in $3.50, good for 22nd behind David Fry ($3.90), Jake Cronenworth ($6.50) and Cody Bellinger ($10.50). It’s been a down year for 3B production.

Take a look at Busch’s transaction log on his player page (if you’re a member) or in RosterResource (if you’re not, but…I mean…come on) and you’ll see that the last transaction was the trade that sent him to Chicago along with RP Yency Almonte for OF Zyhir Hope and SP Jackson Ferris. Prior to that, Busch’s next transaction came when he was optioned to the minors by the Dodgers at the start of September after slashing only .167/.247/.292 in 81 plate appearances. Now, after nearly a full season of work, Busch’s 2024 slash line reads, .255/.337/.450, a major improvement after being given ample time to develop as an everyday player.

The Cubs certainly had other options at 1B this season, but Busch has taken the lion’s share of games at the position, 127 compared with the next most utilized players Patrick Wisdom (18 games) and Cody Bellinger (17 games). Is his defense good enough to keep him there long-term? Amongst qualified positions at first base, of which there are 18, Busch ranks third in defensive runs saved (DRS), fifth in outs above average (OAA), and sixth in “Def”.

Load up the auction calculator in it’s default form (YTD), keeping positions prioritized in the most fantasy-relevant way, and you’ll see that Busch holds a $6.00 as a first baseman. That makes him the 84th-best player this season. His ADP, provided by the NFBC, going into the year was 347. While many fantasy pundits (and some non-fantasy writers) were excited about his potential given his trade to Chicago, few were willing to define him as a top-100 pick, and rightfully so. He had never proven himself in the big leagues. He had, however, torn up the minor leagues, specifically AAA across the 2022 and 2023 seasons. His slash line in that time was an exciting .293/.385/.544 with 48 home runs spanning across 973 plate appearances in the two seasons. That’s the type of stuff that makes fantasy managers push the “Keeper” button on a player. Finally, in 2024, and with the Chicago Cubs, Busch has been allowed to flourish, and it has worked.

Michael Busch is not a superstar, yet. He’s still holding onto a 29.0% K% for the year, but it’s been trending down all season long as shown by the graph above. Is this a breakout year? It depends on your definition, but it is a clear example of a player who showcased skill and potential but lacked opportunity. Busch was finally given that opportunity in 2024 and has taken every advantage, instilling himself as an everyday player.

Who else is on the cusp of breaking the positive value mark in 2024? Here are all the players with $1 above or below the replacement mark through games played 9/16:

Let the fight to the finish line begin!