Oak's Corner: This Week’s Players of Note

The Week That Was

• Roberto Osuna struggled early in the season; blowing three of his first four save opportunities after starting the season on the 10-Day DL. Since that third blown save on April 27th, Osuna has converted 16 consecutive saves and has only allowed three runs in 20 innings, good for a 1.35 ERA in that stretch. Over the last month, he leads MLB with 12 saves, three more than anyone else in that span. Osuna has bumped up his strikeout rate to 11.77 K/9, which is backed up by an elite 19.4 percent swinging strike rate. The 22-year-old closer appears to be getting better, as he has also dropped his walk rate to under 1.00 BB/9 on the season while allowing under 20 percent hard contact. If I were drafting tomorrow for the rest of the season, Osuna would be my fourth closer off the board after Craig Kimbrel, Kenley Jansen and Greg Holland. It's crazy he is only 22 and already has 73 career saves.

• I happened to find myself at Marlins batting practice at Petco Park earlier this season, and, as expected, Giancarlo Stanton was hitting some absolute mammoth homers. What surprised me though was that Marcell Ozuna was matching his distance, exhibiting the same level of power as Stanton. Ozuna has been a total monster so far this season, hitting .333 with 17 homers and 47 RBI. Ozuna has always had power, but after topping out at 23 home runs in 2014 and 2016, it was a question of whether that power would ever translate to big home run totals. Ozuna has elevated his hard hit rate to a career-high 42.7 percent, leading to a .257 ISO. Surprisingly with the homer surge, Ozuna is actually at a career-low 30.7 percent fly ball rate but has been aided by 28.8 percent of those fly balls turning into home runs. His previous career-high HR/FB rate prior to 2017 was 16.8 percent in 2014, so while that rate is helped by him hitting more balls hard, I still see that number coming down a good amount. The current hard hit rate sets a higher floor for Ozuna's batting average but without more fly balls, I think the homers slow down over the last 100 games of the season. I like Ozuna fine as a hold right now, and he's definitely an every week play in your lineup, but if someone wanted to offer me a premium on him, I think I would pull the trigger on trading him at what I believe to be his peak value.

• After a tough April where he hit .245 with only three homers, Oakland's Ryon Healy has turned it up in a big way. Healy has six homers already in June and is second in all of baseball in RBI over the last month of the season. After a second half of the 2016 season where Healy hit .305 with 13 homers, he was a bit of an unknown coming into this season. He has backed up that excellent second half of 2016 with 15 homers over 64 games with a .282 average this year. Most impressively, he has significantly boosted his hard hit rate, moving from 30 percent in 2016 to 39.9 percent so far in 2017. On the negative side, Healy's strikeouts are up to 25.2 percent and he still doesn't walk at all with only nine free passes so far the season. I watch Healy a lot (not much else to watch on the dreadful A's, who had blown the lead four times already on Thursday night) and I think the power is absolutely legit, but with the strikeouts and walks the way they are, the average may come down a bit. However, if he can maintain the hard hit rate where it is now, the average fall will not be too harsh. I really like Healy's prospects for the remainder of the fantasy season.

• When Freddie Freeman went down with a fractured wrist in mid-May, the Braves seemingly had no one to even partially fill his shoes, until they made a trade with the Cardinals for Matt Adams. Adams, who seemingly was always squeezed out of regular playing time in St. Louis, has been exceptional for the Braves since the deal, hitting .289 in 24 games with Atlanta, slugging eights homers to go along with 21 RBI. Adams' batting average has been helped by a .337 babip, while his babip the last two seasons has been .285. Adams currently has a 39.3 percent hard hit rate, his highest mark since 2013 and he has dropped his infield fly ball rate to 4.4 percent. His fly ball rate is down to 42.1 percent as his ground balls have risen, and while that may limit his home run upside, if he keeps hitting the ball hard, it could help his batting average floor. Adams has been a nice fill-in in deeper leagues, but he's not someone for whom you really can trade, as he will lose significant at-bats once Freddie Freeman returns, likely at the end of July. He has been a godsend for people who added him after the trade to the Braves and should stay in any deep league lineup until Freddie returns.

• Brewers' Keon Broxton hit a massive homer on Thursday, a 489-foot moon shot that was his ninth of the year, but he has been struggling massively as of late. Prior to Thursday, Broxton was hitting .158 in June with two homers and zero stolen bases. After a 2016 where Broxton hit nine homers and stole 23 bases, Broxton really started to rise in drafts as he hit .317 with three homers in 22 games this spring. When push comes to shove, Broxton, while very talented, just strikes out too damn much. His obscene 36.1 percent strikeout rate in 2016 has actually gone up in 2017, sitting at a ridiculous 39.3 percent. For a guy who has so much speed and value on the bases, it's just nuts that he cannot find a way to make more contact and utilize that speed. Even more concerning in 2017 is that on those rare occasions that he does make contact, he's not hitting the ball as hard as he did last year. His hard hit rate has fallen from 43.3 percent in 2016 to 33.6 percent this year. I'm not in on Broxton at all right now and wouldn't trade for him even at a discount, as there is just no way his batting average can't be a drain striking out that much and his current .299 OBP is just killing his stolen base upside.
  

We are getting to the time of the year where teams are going to start calling up prospects, either to provide a boost to a team in the race or for struggling teams to inject some energy into their summer. Two of these prospects were called up this week and both of them could have an impact on fantasy leagues.

Matt Chapman: Chapman, one of the A's top prospects and a Top 100 prospect overall, was called up by the team on Friday. In order to make room for him, the A's designated Trevor Plouffe for assignment (to the huge relief of my Twitter followers tired of my Plouffe rants), a pretty obvious indication that Chapman is coming up to play third base almost every day. On the real baseball side of the coin, Chapman projects as an excellent defender, something the A's need badly, as they lead the league in errors, so his defense should keep him on the field. On the offensive side of the ball, Chapman carries a lot of power but he also brings a whole lot of swing and miss with that power. He has 16 homers in only 48 Triple-A games in 2017, but he also has a 31 percent strikeout rate and had a similar mark last season. Major league pitchers likely will expose those holes in his swing (Dellin Betances made him look silly on Thursday night), especially the first time around the league, but if you need power, he's one of the better power bats who will be called up this year, and coming up in June gives him three and half months to produce stats for you. He does walk, with a walk rate over 10 percent in his last three minor league seasons. He will have some slumps, but the high-level defense and very real pop should keep him in the lineup. I think he's an add in deeper leagues, assuming you can take on a bit of batting average risk. In a 12-team league, I'd only add him if I'm in need of power or a corner infielder.

Derek Fisher: Fisher, called up by the Astros earlier this week, presents an intriguing power/speed combo for fantasy owners. In 60 Triple-A games this season, Fisher has already 16 homers to go along with 13 steals. In 2016, in 129 games across Double and Triple-A, he managed 21 homers and 18 swipes. It should be noted that with his 13 steals, he also has been caught stealing 10 times. By all scouting reports, the speed is definitely real and going to play, and that's likely where his fantasy value lies for the rest of this season. The question on Fisher is whether he is going to stick in Houston once Josh Reddick is back from the concussion DL. That probably comes to what the Astros want to do with Norichika Aoki, as Reddick and George Springer are going to play every day, and Jake Marisnick works well as a backup outfielder. I really like the upside of Fisher in fantasy leagues, but while I'll be bidding, I'm going to temper it unless I hear news that they are keeping him up long-term. Of course, he homered in his first game up on Wednesday, so there's also a chance he could force A.J. Hinch's hand with a hot start to his MLB career. It's not easy to find a speed/power combo guy in FAAB, so closely monitor his weekend and any quotes from the team when deciding on your bid amount on Fisher.

Francisco Liriano: Blue Jays' Liriano is always an interesting, fascinating and frustrating guy to own in fantasy leagues. The talent and upside is clearly there, as are the strikeouts, but the walks often cause him serious ratio issues. When Liriano can limit the walks to at least a tolerable level, he has a lot of value as a fantasy pitcher as he showed in 2013 and 2015. So far this year, his walks have been a big issue at 5.56 BB/9. However, since he returned from the DL, he has limited the walks fairly well. In those three starts, he has only walked five batters total over 17 innings, good for a 2.65 BB/9 walk rate. He's scheduled for two road starts this week in Texas and Kansas City. While a start at Texas is never comfortable, the Rangers actually rank 28th in baseball in OPS against left-handed pitchers, and while Kansas City has started to hit a little bit better, they are still bottom 10 in OPS against lefties. With the two starts, the matchups and the better walk rate recently, I think I'm going to jump in this week where I need an arm. He doesn't come without risk, but the Jays offense is now healthy, which helps his win chances and he's likely to pile up some strikeouts if nothing else. I would bid fairly aggressively on him in a 15-teamer but probably try and sneak him through with a small to medium bid in a 12-teamer.

There wasn't a lot of movement in the closer market this week, and there are a lot of closers who are pitching well over the last month. As the summer begins and teams fall out of races, I thought I'd look at a couple of pitchers who are throwing well who might be good spec plays before the closer above them on the depth chart gets dealt as the trade deadline approaches.

Tommy Kahnle: Kahnle has been nothing short of an absolute beast this year for the White Sox, posting a 1.42 ERA over 25.1 innings. The most incredible stat in his profile is an absurd 15.53 K/9 strikeout rate while only walking six batters all year. His strikeout rate is supported by a 17.2 percent swinging strike rate, way up from his 10.8 percent rate last season. Kahnle has increased velocity on his fastball, slider and changeup this year, including more than three extra mph on the slider. While no one in the AL Central has run away with the division, the White Sox are in last place but only six games behind the first place Twins. With four teams ahead of them, if the White Sox don't make a move soon, they could find themselves sellers in July and finally trade their closer, David Robertson, who has been the subject of trade rumors all year. Robertson's contract is an issue, as he's scheduled to make $13 million in 2018, but one has to figure the White Sox will do everything they can to move him. The presumed setup man, Nate Jones, hasn't pitched since April with an elbow issue and had a recurrence of his symptoms earlier this week, clearing the path even more for Kahnle if Robertson was to get moved. The nice bonus with Kahnle is that if you do add him, with his massive strikeout rate, he can be used even as a setup guy in weeks where you don't like all your starting pitcher matchups.

Arodys Vizcaino: Anyone who has listened to the RotoWire Fantasy Baseball Podcast I do with Jeff Erickson (seriously, listen, it's fun!) knows how I feel about Jim Johnson (mostly stemming from his disastrous stint with my A's), but he has managed to lock down 13 saves with a 3.58 ERA while striking out more than one batter per inning. The Braves find themselves seven games under .500 and 10.5 games behind the Nationals and would love to move Johnson to a contender looking for another setup arm for the stretch run. Vizcaino struggled with walks and injuries last year but has been better this season and currently sports a 2.08 ERA while striking out 10.38 batters per nine. He has cut his walks in half to a much more manageable 3.12 walks per nine. While his strikeouts are down a bit, his swinging strike rate gives reason for optimism as it has bumped up to a career high 15 percent. With the Braves likely out of the race, even if they aren't able to trade Johnson, they may want to give Vizcaino a run at the closer job down the stretch to prepare him to take over the role next year so he might not even need a trade to get you some saves down the stretch. Vizcaino is available in a lot of leagues, and I'm watching him closely and will likely add him in leagues where I need saves as a spec play in the next few weeks.

Series of the Weekend

Cleveland at Minnesota. The Indians have suffered a bit of a World Series hangover so far this year and find themselves only one game over .500 in mid-June. The Twins lead the Tribe by two games, and the teams have a four-game series this weekend that could decide whether the Twins are a real contender in the division. The Twins are at home for this series, but surprisingly, they have struggled in Target Field with a 14-20 record, while sporting the second best road record in baseball at 20-9.

The Twins have managed to stay afloat despite a pitching staff that has the third worst ERA in the majors at 4.91 despite a fantastic start to the season from their ace Ervin Santana. Jose Berrios was called up and has been good in his seven starts, but the Twins have struggled to find any sort of starting pitcher help besides those two righties. Luckily for the Indians, Santana and Berrios threw the last two days so neither of them will toe the rubber this weekend. The Indians, to everyone's surprise, have struggled on offense finding themselves in the bottom 10 in runs scored in MLB. If they cannot get healthy against the bottom half of the Twins rotation this weekend, it might be time to start worrying about their offense.

The Twins offense has been solid so far this season, with a .759 team OPS that ranks 12th in baseball. The Twins have received some production for unlikely places (i.e., who would have thought Robbie Grossman would have an OPS over .800), but are led by their slugger Miguel Sano. Sano has 16 homers, 48 RBI and currently sports a massive .986 OPS, good for third in the American League. The Twins do miss Corey Kluber in this series but will face Carlos Carrasco on Friday night before getting the bottom of the Cleveland rotation in the doubleheader on Saturday. If this series is split, we probably don't learn much about the Central, but if either team can win three out of four, it could be a significant boost to the winning team heading into the summer months.