We've made it halfway there my friends. I can't help but feel sad that the baseball season will be over before we know it, because this has legitimately been the most fun I've had with fantasy baseball since I started playing at the tender age of 14. I still remember that first squad featuring Matt Holliday and Pat Burell. Nobody using waivers, people just going with the flow of the shitty teams they drafted. Innocent, care-free, low-stakes fantasy baseball.
Now the year is 2024 and data has made fantasy baseball a straight up war-zone. There's no mercy to be found in these parts, friend.. If you aint' on reddit, statcast, and fangraphs, you aint' winning shit. 57 year old boomer Jimmothy Whiteman isn't winning his league, that's for sure. We've had to hone our swords, measure them against each other on the daily, and become actual scouts. So to celebrate our big reddit brains and half a season of fun baseball, let's present the Waiver Wire All-Star Team. I put players with multi-position eligibility at positions I think they shine brightest, enjoy!
Add up your all-star points in memory of Smashmouth!
Starter = 3 points
Reserve = 2 points
Honorable Mention = 1 point
5 points = All-Star
10 points = All-All-Star
20 points = Shrek
Catcher
Logan O'Hoppe, Starter, Even after including O'Hoppe in several early weekly waiver pieces, I never made the move to grab him. I owned Adley, Smith, and Yainer at the time - all of whom I've traded away. Boy, would it be nice to have this guy now! O'hoppe has managed to just about everything you'd want from a position that historically just doesn't provide great value. Ratios? Check - .276 BA and .800 OPS. Counting stats? Check - 41 runs and 42 RBIs.. Peripherals? Check - elite percentiles including a 93rd sweet-spot percentile and 72nd barrel percentile. If you were to join a redraft league right now, O'Hoppe would be drafted as a top 10 catcher. Did you grab O'Hoppe off waivers? Three all-star points to you!
Patrick Bailey, Reserve Bailey has one of my favorite statcast profiles of any Catcher in baseball and I'm stoked to see exactly what he can accomplish in the second half. He hits the ball hard, rarely whiffs, and he finds the sweet-spot 45% of the time. His xBA is .283 and his BA is .283. His xwOBA is .352 and his OBP is .354. Let's just call Patrick Bailey a finely tuned machine at this point, because he's programmed to match his peripherals. Bailey continues to earn more and more playing time after recovering from a concussion earlier in the season and his second half should be even better than his first because of it. And don't discount the emergence of Heliot Ramos at the top of the order alongside OBP king LaMonte Wade. Bailey's counting stats could be up to 20% higher than they have been.
David Fry, Reserve If not for Fry's recent ice-cold stretch of baseball, he would have easily taken the starting role on the all-star squad. This man was legitimately one of the best hitters in baseball for a majority of the first half of the season, and we shouldn't discount the possbility of another run after the break. It's encouraging to see his sweet-spot is still high. Maybe all he needed was a short rest to get the power back?
Ryan Jeffers, Reserve Like Fry, Jeffers dominated for a large part of the early season. And like Fry, Jeffers has cooled sigfnicantly. Unlike Fry, I'm not as optimistic for a bounce back after the break. There's just not much to like here. Still, though, I have to give him credit for what he's accomplished thus far.
Connor Wong, Honorable Mention
I think Wong is headed for regression, but it's hard to deny he hasn't been a really good waiver pickup. His .810 OPS and .307 BA come nowhere close to any of his expected numbers, but they're still his numbers.
Tyler Stephenson, Honorable Mention
Tyler Stephenson is someone I really like and have owned several times throughout the year, but every time I've owned him, he wouldn't play or was bruised up. It's hard not to be intruiged by his power peripherals through the second half. Add him if you can.
First Base
Jose Miranda, Starter A .325 BA and an .888 OPS in a stacked Twins lineup. And yet this guy never made any of my waiver pieces as a featured player... yikes. Someone on reddit actually asked me about him, and why he wasn't on the waiver pieces when he started to really heat up, to which I replied that I simply didn't notice him. His statcast looked great and he would have been a featured player had he not flown under my radar. By that time, it was too late for me to include him - so my bad! But to all of you who managed to nab him, good fucking job. Three All-Star Points for you!
Michael Busch, Reserve Busch came out of the gate stronger than maybe any other waiver wire champion, and the entire community quickly hopped on the Busch train. Then he cooled down signifcantly, only to resurface over the past month as an absolute beast and must-own player. His 97th percentile sweet-spot % paired with a 79th percentile barrel rate will keep him relevant.
Mark Vientos, Reserve I owned Vientos several times last year expecting this kind of production, but it never materialized. For that reason, I remained skeptical of Vientos and didn't include him on the blog early. I did put a claim on him when he got called up (and lost), but I just didn't feel confident enough to recommend him to anyone else after last year's experience. He performed so well, so quickly, that I didn't bother to include him going forward - he's just a known commodity now. That was my mistake, and I apologize for not helping the Gerbil Sports faithful here when I could have. Vientos has been one of the best power hitters in all of baseball since getting called up with a near a .900 OPS and .300 BA. However, there's one thing that worries me about Vientos - he demolishes 4-seam fastballs and only 4-seam fastballs. Let's see how pitchers adjust through the second half!
Third Base
Josh Smith, Starter Josh Smith has done nothing if not fill in admirably for an injured Josh Jung. His .800 OPS against both sides remains an impressive feat, and it's cool to see he's very good at squaring up the ball on top of his elite contact skills, which seems to be a recurring theme for some of these successful players that don't have the strongest power peripherals. I unfortunately lost a claim on him earlier in the season, bummer. Hopefully I get Jung back soon, but it would have been fun to own Josh & Josh.
Luis Rengifo, Reserve Luis Rengifo continues to have some ugly power peripherals, yet there is one interesting twist here - he excels at the newly added squared-up %, something that was a bit annoying to look up in the bat tracking tool compared to now seeing it on the statcast page. His ability to square up on the ball comes in at a nice 72nd percentile while his K and whiff rates also remain strong. Rengifo may be a regression candidate by the power peripherals, but there's a bit more here under the hood than we previously knew of - unless people took the time to use the bat tracking tool.
Willi Castro, Reserve Castro has been a pleasant surprise for fantasy owners, though I'm not quite sold on his ROS value. Let's see if his solid sweet-spot and sprint speeds will continue to carry him going forward.
Matt Vierling, Honorable Mention
Don't sleep on Vierling right now. He's only 21 % rostered hitting in the middle of the Tigers order with a scorching hot Riley Greene. With a .264 BA, .438 xSLG, and a .752 OPS against RHP, now is the time to strike on this honorable mention.
Second Base Brice Turang, Starter Brice Turang is an OG waiver wire champ that I think was included on the very first hitters write-up...it almost feels nostalgic at this point. I recently traded Brice in a package for Correa, and I'll miss him dearly. Something to note is that the newly added squared-up percentage absolutely loves Turang, and like for a few other hitters, seemed to be the missing secret sauce on his statcast profile. With his blazing speed, fantastic contact ability, and elite ability to square up on the ball, Turang is a sure bet down the stretch.
David Hamilton, Reserve
Turang-lite.
Luis Garcia Jr., Reserve An OG much like Turang, Garcia seemed to disappear completely for a long stretch of time, but has recently forced himself back into relevancy. His .806 OPS against RHP should have him being a nice bench option down the stretch, but don't be surprised to see another cold streak - that's the Luis Garcia Jr. way.
Shortstop Jackson Merrill, Starter It's funny to think that about a month ago, Merrill hit a slump and was heavily dropped across the fantasy landscape, to the point where he reached 50% owned. Congratulations if you were able to snag him during the dip, because Merrill is looking like the toolsiest player with SS eligibility to be widely available across waivers in 2024. His strong .827 against RHP should have him seeing sustained success down the stretch in a nice Padres lineup. If he decides to steal more bases and maintains the hitting, he could wind up being a mid-round pick next season.
Ezequiel Tovar, Reserve There's not much to like here, but his acceptable 50th percentile barrel rate and strong sweet-spot % have been just enough to propel him to 14 HRs. I wouldn't feel comfortable owning him, but he's done well enough to earn a spot on the all-star team.
Zach Neto, Honorable Mention
Masyn Winn, Honorable Mention
Outfield Heliot Ramos, Starter I have nothing more to say about this man. This is my dude through thick and thin.
Brenton Doyle, Starter I dropped him right before his stretch of 7 HRs. I don't like to talk about it, as I stanned this man most of the year. I still don't believe the power profile is this prolific, despite previously noting his max EVs are near Stanton levels, and I dropped him purely because of his slowed stolen bases. But if he continues this kind of play, you're looking at a top 10 OF in all of baseball. Doyle rules!
Brent Rooker, Starter Trade him to the Phillies, please.
Jurickson Profar, Reserve I'm not sure if you knew this, but Jurickson Profar was once the #1 prospect.
Alec Burleson, Reserve Early in the season, I wrote off Alec Burleson. It's becoming more and more apparent I was wrong on this one, and it falls squarely on me for not looking him up on the bat tracking tool like I have for others - for, no pun intended, we have yet another squared-up god on our hands. Combined with his middling power and elite contact ability, Burleson had more under the hood than previously realized.
Joc Pederson, Reserve Joc came in with an extremely strong Gerbil Score back on the OF tier list, and it's not hard to see why. He's extremely prolific against RHP and is a fantastic bench bat, or injury replacement, for your squad.
Brandon Marsh, Honorable Mention
Stay loose and sexy. Marsh is still widely available and is primed to help you reach the playoffs. These peripherals indicate there could be some serious power on the way and he should be good for another 8-10 SBs.
Jesse Winker, Honorable Mention I've been on the fence about Winker this year despite being on the first waiver piece, but it's about time for me to accept he'll remain strong against RHP, thus a reliable bench piece for the remainder of the season. His incredible OBP will have him continuing to produce runs.
Wilyer Abreu, Honorable Mention His notably awful xBA of .223 is quite a bit lower than his BA of .265, but his strong power peripherals have thus far propelled him into a fairly strong season if you take it on a per AB basis. He missed quite a bit of time with injury, and he may or may not have gone through a slump had he been healthy, but thus far he's been a stud. Will he regress? Probably not. I honestly think his BA will decrease, but we'll see even more power going forward.
Players who just haven't played enough, are starting to heat up, or have potential. They could make the End Of Season Waiver Team. 1 Point Each, surprise!
Spencer Horwitz
Ben Rice
Rece Hinds
Angel Martinez
Matt Wallner
Colt Keith
Joey Ortiz
Jhonkensy Noel
Xavier Edwards ( hasn't been on a blog piece, awkward call up time or he would be)
Leo Jiminez ( Will be on the next piece, probably)
Daniel Schneeman
LaMonte Wade Jr.
I only come in at a score of 9 because of my abandonment of Doyle and trading of Turang. I'm no Shrek.
Comentarios