Ottoneu Hot Right Now: May 1, 2024

The 2024 version of Hot Right Now will typically include three sections:

1. Current Auctions: A closer look at players being auctioned at a high rate.
2. Roster Adds: Analysis of players with high add% changes.
3. Hot Performers: Players with a high P/G or P/IP in recent weeks.

The FanGraphs Ottoneu team plans to run this feature weekly, updating fantasy managers on the biggest movers in Ottoneu leagues with an analysis of how these players could or could not help your roster.

As we have done in previous posts, I am also going to rate each player on the following scale:

• Don’t Bother – This means that even as auctions are started, other teams are adding this player, or he is on a hot streak, I am just not interested in adding this player. I don’t see them being worth a roster spot.
• Don’t Stress – I can see why you would add this player. I can totally understand placing a bid, but I am not super worried about winning this player. I would bid $1 for sure, maybe a bit more, as long as it doesn’t impact my roster at all.
• Don’t Go Crazy – I would like to add this player, but I am not willing to hamper my team to do it. I’ll look for cuts, and if I can clear money to make a big bid without losing players I’ll regret cutting, I will do it.
• Don’t Lose – These players rarely come up but they do, from time-to-time. These are guys that I am willing to make a difficult cut to add. Don’t expect to see this designation used often.

Current Auctions

Jordan Beck – 124 auctions

It’s call-up season, but while some of the other recently promoted prospects were already rostered, Jordan Beck was just hanging out there on the wire, waiting to be auctioned. And so here come the auctions. Beck is just over 26% rostered as of Tuesday night, which both does and doesn’t make sense. It does because the FanGraphs prospect team has him rated as the #11 prospect in a not-so-great system and his first taste of the high minors (Double-A last year) was pretty uninspiring (limited power and unlimited strikeouts are a bad combination).

But it also doesn’t make sense because he is a solid power bat and he was tearing up Triple-A this year. After hitting 5 HR in 50 games in Double-A last year, he hit 5 more in Triple-A this year, while also cutting his K-rate from over 30% to under 20%. This is all small samples and noisy, but it is still fun and exciting!

Beck made his debut Tuesday and went 2-4 with two singles, one strike out, and three hard-hit balls (97.4, 99.3, and 102.1 mph).

There remains a lot of risk. It is possible the newfound, low-ish K-rate is a result of real, meaningful improvement, but it is way too early to say that, let alone to say that it will carry over into MLB. But the power is real and Coors won’t hurt. He’s certainly worth a look and probably should be in lineups for home games. But he is a non-elite prospect with real question marks, so if it isn’t working, don’t be surprised.

Verdict: Don’t go crazy.

Jo Adell – 96 auctions.

Where is that “It’s happening” gif when you need it? The long-promised Jo Adell breakout is finally here! Well, maybe.

Adell is off to a great start, with a 174 wRC+ in 63 PA. He has 4 HR, 3 2B, 1 3B, and 5 SB. He is striking out just 22.2% of the time which is a huge improvement. He is making more contact and swinging less freely and that all looks good.

Except his swing rate outside the zone hasn’t really improved (in fact it is higher than last year) and he is swinging in the zone a lot less. We wanted less chase, not less attacking pitches he can wallop. He is still in the bottom third of the league in contact rate and even worse on contact rate in the zone. He’s brought down his swinging strike rate by taking more called strikes and making more contact on pitches outside the zone.

In a small sample this year, Adell is seeing fewer pitches in the heart of the zone and swinging at those pitches less often, while seeing more pitches in the shadow and chase zones and swinging at those pitches more often. It is way too few PA to draw sweeping conclusions but it isn’t a ringing endorsement for an improved approach.

But the results can’t be denied. And they aren’t just a fluke, as his xwOBA and wOBA are very much in line with one another. This is a case where you have a choice – you can be skeptical (and skepticism is warranted) and let someone else take the risk and likely have that someone else have a $3+ cap penalty on their hands in the future. Or you can take the plunge and buy-in for a few bucks, knowing that if there are real improvements driving these results, you might have a $20 OF on your hands for a nice single-digit price.

I am going to take the plunge, ride the hot streak, and move on if it comes to that.

Verdict: Don’t go crazy.

Nick Senzel – 55 auctions.

Hit four HR in three games, you get a bunch of auctions. That’s just how it goes. And we have two long-awaited breakouts in a single column!

But I am, if anything, even more skeptical here, with a caveat. The skepticism is that his exit velocity and hard-hit rate haven’t moved, while his barrel rate has more than tripled and is driving his improvement. His walks are down, his strikeouts are up. This is all about better quality of contact.

I am hesitant, however, to buy in on a massive increase in barrel rate from a guy who isn’t hitting the ball harder and has an extremely low line-drive rate. It isn’t clear to me that he is squaring the ball up more often and he isn’t hitting it harder so the increased barrel rate feels more like “a thing that happened” than “a meaningful improvement in his skills and therefore something you can rely on continuing into the future.”

The caveat here is that Senzel has been very good against LHP in his career, particularly last year and this year. So if you do go pick him up, you can fairly safely use him when he faces a lefty starter, which raises the floor on him above Adell. A solid hitter on the small side of a platoon is enough floor to be worth holding, but not enough to get me excited.

Verdict: Don’t stress.

Roster Adds

 

Mitchell Parker (61.56%) and Reed Garrett (49.06%) were the two most added players in the last seven days, but they were both also covered in my article last week. I don’t have anything new to add now.

Wilyer Abreu – Leagues with an Add (7 days): 37.19%

Abreu hit the ground running last year and this year he has picked up right where he left off. He has even walked a bit more and struck out a bit less! However, his xwOBA is way down (like sub-.300 going into Tuesdays action) and that has to give you at least a little pause, given the insane BABIPs he has run since coming up last year.

His career .372 wOBA makes him look like a star, while his career .326 xwOBA makes him look pretty pedestrian. So which is legit?

A little like Adell, the answer is “we don’t know yet.” So this is another case where you have to decide if you want to wait to be right to take a gamble right now. Right now, I am buying Abreu and putting him in my lineups. But don’t forget that this is still under 200 plate appearances.

Verdict: Don’t Go Crazy.

Luis Garcia Jr. – Leagues with an Add (7 days): 28.75%

Garcia is off to the best start of his young career, with a .331 wOBA over 90 PA. He has a career-high hard-hit rate and a career-high barrel rate. This is good news and maybe qualifies as yet another long-awaited breakout.

Garcia, however, is also pulling the ball less than he ever has which might be good for him as a baseball player but is not going to be good for his power. And as it stands, with his career-best contact quality and with his career-high BABIP, he is still at just 4.4 P/G (and trending down). It’s possible the improved contact quality is just a hot streak and he will go right back to being a sub-4.0 P/G player (which he has been over the last week plus).

It’s also possible he continues to run the best BABIP and best contact quality of his career and is…still a sub-4.5 bat.

Verdict: Don’t Bother.

Orelvis Martinez – Leagues with an Add (7 days): 28.44%

Now, if you want a MI who can be a difference-maker, this is where I would look. Still rostered in only about 2/3rds of leagues, Martinez is off to a tremendous start in 2024. He has had an interesting prospect history. He first appeared in FanGraphs rankings in the 2018 in-season update, with a 40 FV. By 2020, he was a top 100 prospect with a 50 FV rating. In 2021 he moved into the top 50, but in 2022 he was outside the top 100 again. As of 2023, he was still seen as high-risk and his grade had dropped to 45.

But in his second go at Triple-A, he is putting up one of the lowest K-rates he has had at any level while flashing the intriguing power that made him exciting in the first place. Everything looks good and he looks ready for a shot. Meanwhile, the Jays are 15-16 and in 4th place. They are certainly not out of the race and it is not like they need to panic, but they need to find some improvements to make a real run at the post-season.

Martinez is mostly playing 2B this year after mostly playing 3B and SS last year. The Jays have Cavan Biggio and Isiah Kiner-Falefa taking most of their PA at 2B and 3B this year, and while both are off to good starts, neither has a track record that suggests they should hold back a bat like Martinez. Especially on a team in the bottom ten in HR who could clearly use some added power.

Martinez will get his shot and if you wait for him to get the call to start an auction, you’ll be stuck paying a higher price. That said, not every team has room for another prospect, so it is not crucial that you get him right now just know that the window will close quickly when the Jays are ready.

Verdict: Don’t Stress.

Hot Performers

Stats reflect the last 14 days for both hitters and pitchers.

Mike Tauchman – 8.5 P/G

Tauchman is just 10% rostered and tearing the cover off the ball, so he is worth a look. And Tauchman wasn’t half bad last year, either. He has improved his BB% and K% this year, but he had a .345 xwOBA last year (just a .330 wOBA). He has no major platoon split either year, either. I don’t think he will keep this up, but last year’s 4.23 P/G was pulled down by a combination of a lot of PH appearances and an overall line that was below his xwOBA. He was worth 4.88 P/G when he started last year, is performing a bit better this year, and maybe deserved better last year. That’s intriguing.

Daulton Varsho – 8.0 P/G

Varsho is nearly-universally rostered so there isn’t much to do here. But given how quickly people wrote him off as “not valuable if he is not a C,” it’s impressive just how good he has been this year.

Jon Gray – 7.2 P/IP

Gray managed a couple of solid years in Colorado and another in Texas, but never became the ace many hoped he would. But he is pitching better than ever this year, and these stats don’t even include his 8 inning, 3 K, 0 BB, 0 HR, 3 H performance last night.

Gray had always been a roughly 50% fastball guy until he dropped that number down last year, but this year he has taken it a step further, throwing his slider more than his fastball. That’s reason to believe.

Hayden Wesneski – 6.7 P/IP

Wesneski was a darling last year but is less than 10% rostered this year. But while the results have been great, there haven’t been any strikeouts and that really hampers his value in Ottoneu. He should be on your watchlist though. Early on, we are seeing more grounders and a lot less hard contact. For a guy who was killed by homers last year, that is intriguing.