In a series of four articles, Ray Flowers will review the first half fantasy baseball performances across the land. He will a series of questions such as – most and least valuable players at each position. There will be four articles in the series, written during the 2024 MLB All-Star Break: Infielders, Outfielders, Starting Pitchers & Relievers.
POSITIONAL VIDEO REVIEW
For my video review of a host of infielders. and their first half efforts, here you go.
*Players reviewed include:
CATCHER: Connor Wong, David Fry, Danny Jansen
FIRST BASE: Vinnie Pasquantino, Paul Goldschmidt, Matt Olson
SECOND BASE: Ozzie Albies, Jake Cronenworth, Brice Turang
THIRD BASE: Manny Machado, Chrisopher Morel, Jordan Westburg
SHORTSTOP: Ha-Seong Kim, Anthony Volpe, Oneil Cruz
THE DAILY SHOW
Don’t forget about FREE show, Fantasy Sports Daily, M-F, 12pm EST. On the show this morning, here is a list of players we touched on.
You’re really missing out if you don’t tune in to the show either on the website, on YouTube, or at your favorite podcast service.
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1st HALF AWARDS
Positional MVP: BOBBY WITT JR. KC
Went .276-30-96-97-49 last year leading to him being a top-3 pick in pretty much every draft. Was it reasonable to expect improvement this year? Well, he “only” has 22 steals, but my goodness has he been spectacular going .323-16-63-75-22. That’s a full season pace of .323-27-105-125-40. He’s earning all of it too with a .324 xBA and a xSLG that is forty-one points higher than his .558 mark. A true superstar who has improved each year of his career.
Positional LVP: MATT OLSON ATL
Olson’s ADP was top-20 overall. Coming off a season of .283-54-139-127 we all knew that regression was coming, but .229-13-44-41? Come on. This guy has gone 30-90 each of his last four seasons of 125 games played so he’s gonna have to pick up the pace to reach that set of numbers. Even if he gets there, there’s virtually no chance he matches his three year average of 42-117. OK, he’s not getting there – no chance. Let’s shot for 30-90. After all, his 13 percent HR/FB would be a career low number and the rate was 22 percent the last three years. Some positive homer regression is coming.
Most Disappointing (non-injury): BO BICHETTE TOR
Bichette had an ADP in the top-40 overall. Right now… he’s barely top-40 at shortstop. Astounding, catastrophic failure right here as he’s on a 160 game pace of .221-8-60-58-10. Read that again. This is a fella who came into this season with a three year average of .298-24-89-94-14. In five seasons this guy has never hit below .290… and he’s batting .221. In order to get his average up to .290 he would need to get 33-straight hits without making an out. Simply hasn’t driven the baseball at any point this season. All the metrics are down – virtually everything across the board. Even if he is “himself” in the second half, this season is going down as a failure.
Out of nowhere Performer: BRICE TURANG MIL, LUIS GARCIA JR. WAS
I spoke about Turang above in some detail during the show.
Garcia has spent 48 games hitting 3-4-5 for the Nats. Yeah, that’s how messy their offense has been this season. Still, he has been very productive across the board at .281-11-45-34-12. He hasn’t don’t anything to stand out in any category but he’s compiled his way, thanks to health, to the 12th spot at the second base position ahead of names like India/Albies/Gimenez/Gorman/Hoerner/Arraez. No reason to think he can’t keep this up, but also nothing going on here to get excited about.
Best Rookie: CEDDANNE RAFAELLA, BOS
Has played 58 games in the infield and 57 in the outfield which is – unique. He’s hit 8/9 seventy-nine times in 93 games and he’s batting .246 with a .272 OBP. Hell, his wOBA is just .296 and his wRC+ is 84. He’s been a below average fantasy performer but… he’s been very effective in 5×5 going .246-11-52-45-11. That performance gives him a legit shot to go .250-20-90-80-20 and it’s why he is currently ranked 13th at the shortstop position. Holes abound at this point of his development, but the power/speed skills play.
Worst Rookie: JACKSON HOLLIDAY, BAL
The 20 year old appeared in 10 games with two hits and 18 strikeouts in 36 plate appearances as the results were flabbergastingly bad (not even sure if that is a word). In 64 games at Triple-A, around injury, he’s scored 68 times while getting on base at a .442 clip. His time will come, but it just wasn’t in the cards for the first half of 2024.
Most Fortunate: JOSH SMITH TEX
Name? Super boring. Offensive game? Boring. Entered the year as a super-sub option with second (Semien), third (Jung) and shortstop (Seager) full up for the Rangers. However, Seager has missed some time with health while Jung has only played four games opening up daily playing time for Smith. Not just part of the lineup, Smith has somehow hit third 27 times, his highest total in any lineup spot, and worked his way to a line of .293-10-40-45-5. Over 163 games his first two seasons in the Majors he went .191-8-31-52-5 with a .592 OPS, so he’s only added .102 points to his batting average and .269 points to his OPS. Of course he did.
Least Fortunate: CHRISTOPHER MOREL CHC
For more on Morel and his improvements this season, see the video above.
Biggest Miss: ONEIL CRUZ PIT / PAUL GOLDSCHMIDT STL
I discussed Cruz and Goldschmidt in the video above. I’m still a fan of one of the two. Which one do you think that is? Crus us currently top-4 percent in baseball in exit velocity, hard-hit rate, barrel rate and bat speed (he’s also top-1 percent in arm strength). The tools for sheer dominance are present. Don’t overlook that if you scale his 183 career games down to 162 you end up with an effort of .241-29-93-84-18. Yep.
Biggest Hit: LUIS RENGIFO LAA
Second base, third base, shortstop and outfield eligibility – yes please. As I wrote in the preseason… “With an ADP hovering around the 250 range, we’re talking about a roughly 20th round selection. With the versatility he brings, I’m totally fine at that price point, as you should be.” He’s currently hurt, but he’s blown past even my wildest expectations with an effort, a superb one, of .315-6-25-36-22 with an OPS of .800. He’s been one of the biggest hits of the first half at any position.
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