Young players are all the rage. We are coming off of one of the best seasons in recent memory for rookie players to emerge and play a big part in the fantasy landscape. A year later we need to take a look at the crop of last year’s rookie to see who may have a sophomore slump and who may take another step forward. Here is my full fantasy baseball primer for second-year hitters. Below we dive into a few notable names.
Fantasy Baseball Draft Advice
Corbin Carroll (OF – ARI): NFBC ADP 4.82
Carroll is coming off of a massive rookie campaign where he hit .285/.362/.506 with 25 home runs and 54 stolen bases in 645 plate appearances. Carroll was the top prospect in baseball before his call-up and did not disappoint. He made fantastic contact in the zone and showed amazing speed in the field and on the basepaths. He is an elite option and has a great argument to go in the top three of fantasy drafts.
Elly De La Cruz (SS/3B – CIN): NFBC ADP 21.08
Cruz burst onto the scene in June hitting .325/.363/.524 with four home runs and 16 stolen bases in his first 135 plate appearances. However, he then struggled, hitting .191/.271/.355 with nine home runs and 19 stolen bases in the second half. The tools are flashy. De La Cruz has a ton of speed and plenty of power, but he strikes out at an enormous rate which makes him a risky bet to produce even a league-average batting average. There is a ton of upside in the profile, but the floor is very low especially on a stacked offense like the Reds that could afford to send De La Cruz to the minors if he struggles.
Gunnar Henderson (SS/3B – BAL): NFBC ADP 29.58
Henderson is coming off of a great season in which he hit .255/.325/.489 with 28 home runs and 10 stolen bases. He struggled out the gate hitting .201/.332/.370 with five home runs and two stolen bases, but was great after that hitting .276/.332/.534 with 23 home runs and eight stolen bases. However, not everything under the hood was not perfect. Henderson struggled versus lefties hitting .209 against them during the season. While it seems unlikely that the AL Rookie of the Year would lose playing time, he needs to improve against southpaws in order to take his game to the next level and this is a steep price to pay for a guy that hurts you against left handed pitching.
Nolan Jones (OF/1B – COL): NFBC ADP 57.83
Jones hit .297/.389/.542 this past season with 20 home runs and 20 stolen bases in 424 plate appearances. Power has never been in question for the former prospect, but he showed some surprising speed on the base paths. It is hard to believe that he will steal that many bases again, but he definitely could push 10-15 stolen bases in 2024. The big question is the batting average. He was very lucky on balls in play, running a .401 BABIP which is well above the league BABIP of .297 and above the Rockies team BABIP (which typically runs high because of the thin air and larger outfield in Colorado) of .315. Some normalization of Jones’ BABIP should cause his average to drop a fair amount. He is being drafted off of the breakout, but I think there is some bust factor at play here for him.
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