4 overall prospect. You can make a case for a number of players to go first overall in 2021 drafts, but were giving Acua a slight edge over Padres shortstop Fernando Tatis Jr. Heres the 23-year-olds per-162-game averages over the past two seasons: 45 homers, 37 steals, 105 RBIs and 139 runs with a .274/.374/.531 slash line. Given that there is no rulebook definition of "a throw where the player is trying hard," and many non-competitive lobs are captured, we have elected to take the average of the top portion of a player's throws. Realmuto, C, PhilliesKey stat: 46.7 percent caught stealing rate in 2019. The movement of a pitch is defined in inches, both in Harper wraps up the first tier. Max Kepler is someone I like at this spot. 17. Let's dive into the top 25 outfielders of the 2022 season. The culprit appears to be a career-high 30.8% strikeout rate and a wildly unlikely .259 BABIP. To reach the top tier of outfielders, Robert needs to improve his terrible plate discipline, as he struck out nearly four times as often as he walked last year. Despite his age and limited upper-minors experience, he didn't miss a beat in the majors, hitting .297/.339/.514 with 27 doubles, 19 home runs, 64 RBI, 75 runs scored and 20 steals in 22 attempts over 114 games. Fernando Tatis Jr., SS, PadresKey stat: 91.8 mph average max-effort arm strength in 2019. Just to put his excellence in context: His 165 OPS+ was higher than all the hitters in Tier 2. How hard, in miles per hour, a fielder throws the ball. Robles struggled in 2020, but he had 17 homers, 28 steals, 65 RBIs and 86 runs in '19 and has no competition for playing time this season. Cedric Mullins hit .225/.290/.342 with seven home runs and 10 steals in 115 games scattered across his first three big league seasons. After a terrific finish to the 2019 season with the Chicago Cubs, Nick Castellanos signed a four-year, $64 million contract with the Cincinnati Reds in free agency. In order to qualify for the The 28-year-old is capable of making a greater impact in half a season than most players can in a full 162 games, and he racked up 4.0 WAR and 44 extra-base hits in 92 games this year while earning his first All-Star selection. It is fantasy baseball season! A Bolt is any run where the Sprint Speed (defined as He also played a solid defensive center field in a 5.7 WAR season. His 2.3 BB/9 in 123.1 minor league innings is a good indication of his ability to throw strikes, so he just needs to settle in at the MLB level and avoid further arm issues. He failed to maintain a red-hot start in his first season with the team, but he put together the best year of his career in 2021, hitting .309/.362/.576 for a 136 OPS+ with 38 doubles, 34 home runs and 100 RBI for a career-high 3.2 WAR. His 6.4 WAR marked the sixth time in nine MLB seasons that he's been a 6-WAR player, and he finished fifth in NL MVP voting, one spot behind teammate Freddie Freeman. attempt. become a hit. Luis Robert didn't quite meet the massive and unfair expectations placed on him in his rookie season, but an above-average OPS and 20 combined home runs and steals showed his immense potential. Steven Kwan put together a 5.5-WAR debut season with an old school game built on contact ability, speed and defense. The 27-year-old is miscast as a center fielder (-14 DRS, -3.2 UZR/150) and that undercut his overall value a bit. velocity and launch angle. Myles Straw, Houston Astros/Cleveland Guardians. Another risky player with a small sample size is Trent Grisham. Tier Five 7. It's not all about arm strength, of course. A Jones 10. Unless you go with a starting. Jump is a Statcast metric that shows which players have Nothing really changed in his underlying statistics besides a slight increase in strikeout rate, however, so he is a strong bounce-back candidate. Nick Cammett/Diamond Images via Getty Images, Brandon Sloter/Icon Sportswire via Getty Images. Bez was responsible for five of the 31 tracked assists of at least 90 mph by infielders last season, the second most in MLB, and his average arm strength on max-effort throws (88.3 mph) was the third best among infielders. Merrifield led the league in steals twice from 2017-2018 but was held to just 20 steals in 2019, his first season after turning 30. How high/low, in degrees, a ball was hit by a batter. Last year was Teoscar Hernandez's breakout season, as he set a career-high in average by 60 points and improved his already good home run rate from one every 16 at-bats to one every 11.8 at-bats. Alex Verdugo is a player who is much more valuable in real life than in fantasy. This is not to say Santander is a bad player. He hit .271 with a .349 on-base percentage, tallying 34 extra-base hits, 30 steals and 3.2 WAR, and he was also a Gold Glove finalist in center field. In 2019, it was all about arm strength for Laureano. Read more about how arm strength is calculated on Tom Tango's blog here . The longtime utility man split his time between center field (93 games) and second base (47 games), and he posted a 107 OPS+ with 58 extra-base hits in a career-high 585 plate appearances. He was one of only two qualified hitters with a strikeout rate below 10 percent, and he also won Gold Glove honors thanks to his brilliant defensive metrics (21 DRS, 8.4 UZR/150) in left field. A .230/.305/.388 career hitter in 534 plate appearances entering the 2022 season, Ward was one of the year's biggest surprises. Target Wiemer as a free agent outfielder on the waiver wire. It was not his best all-around season by any stretch of the imagination, due in large part to the significant time he spent watching from the sidelines, but it was still good enough for a top-five ranking on this list. Red Sox. Anything below 88mph is considered 0. 2 spot in the lineup between NL batting title winner Jeff McNeil and the one-two punch of Francisco Lindor and Pete Alonso. So, here are the leaders in ARM over the past three years: Alfonso Soriano - +25.6 runs. In today's game, there are a million hitters you can get who can give you a cheap 20 home runs, and Rosario doesn't get on base enough, steal enough bases, hit for a high enough average, or play in a good enough offense to warrant anything more than a backup selection. The third tier is filled with enticing players, but its also rife with uncertainty. pitch. Tatis, of course, was a sensation in just about every way as a rookie in 2019, and his throwing ability was no exception. Yelich had a pitiful 2020 season, but upon closer look, there are signs that it might have been a short season fluke. O'Neill finished with a 150 OPS+ and 34 home runs while hitting alongside Paul Goldschmidt and Nolan Arenado in the middle of the lineup. The 25-year-old hit .298/.373/.400 with more walks (62) than strikeouts (60) while adding 89 runs scored and 19 steals. Ranking the Top 25 Outfielders of the 2022 MLB Season 2021 Fantasy Baseball Outfielder Rankings 2. The chief among them is J.D Martinez, the former best hitter in baseball who is now trying to recover from a disastrous 2020 season. Here are this years top fantasy outfielders, broken down into tiers. His 149 OPS+ ranked eighth among all qualified hitters and trailed only Aaron Judge (211) and Yordan lvarez (187) among outfielders. Once regarded as injury-prone, the 28-year-old has missed only 10 games over the past three years combined, averaging 36 homers, 107 RBIs, 105 runs and 16 steals per 162 games in that span. There is no official timetable for his return, but he will miss a handful of weeks. Look no further than Realmuto, the class of defenders behind home plate and the quickest gun in the Major Leagues. At this point, we know who Joey Gallo is: He'll hit home runs, hit some more home runs, and provide literally nothing else. One of the most well-rounded players in the sport, Kyle Tucker continued his rise as a bona fide superstar for the Houston Astros in 2022. The 26-year-old had 32 doubles, 20 home runs, 20 steals and 94 runs scored, and he was a Gold Glove finalist in left field. The 26-year-old made notable strides at the plate in 2020, posting the best chase rate (14.1%, second lowest in MLB), walk rate (15.6%), hard-hit rate (43.2%) and barrel rate (12.5%) of his career. Tier 2: Kyle Tucker, Luis Robert, Aaron Judge, George Springer, Marcell Ozuna, Starling Marte, Whit Merrifield. Now it's time to finalize those rankings while expanding the list to the 25 best at each position. Slowed by a variety of injuries in 2020, Bryant returned healthy and productive this year. Since there are three times as many outfielders as there are other positions on the diamond, it made sense to tack an honorable mention list of 25 guys onto our top 25 list. With all Marte went through last year on and off the field, it seems unfair to give him any serious evaluation of his 2020 performance. With 5.3 WAR, he joined Jason Heyward (6.4, 2010) and Dusty Baker (5.1, 1972) as the only rookie outfielders in Atlanta Braves history with a 5-WAR season, and he edged out teammate Spencer Strider for NL Rookie of the Year honors. Beware his positional eligibility, as he qualifies at DH/UTIL only in some formats. He was hitting .283/.394/.596 with 19 doubles, 24 home runs and 17 steals through 82 games at the time of the injury, good for a 3.6 WAR season. 53 games are too small a sample size to make any grand judgments, and his batted ball rates don't quite back up the standard numbers, but Mountcastle is a solid bet to hit in the high .200s with 20-25 home runs. The last time we saw Meadows play a full, healthy season, he was an All-Star, and at 26, his best baseball may be in front of him. -- Thomas Harrigan Previous picks: Michael Brantley (hit), Nelson Cruz (power), Trea Turner (run), Kevin Kiermaier (defense) He had an average max-effort arm strength of 94.1 mph, seventh-fastest among MLB outfielders (min. He also led the field with an average pop time of just 1.88 seconds on throws from home to second, and recorded eight of the 10 fastest caught stealing throws across MLB. For just $0.83/month, get an ad-free experience and access to RotoBaller's VIP Discord Chat Community, If you can't subscribe, please consider turning off your adblocker for RotoBaller.com, 2021 Fantasy Baseball Outfielder Rankings, Download Our Free News & Alerts Mobile App, Lost in the shuffle of more famous teammates. A solid comp to Kaiser would be current Seton Hall outfielder, Devin Hack out of Somerville High School, a 2019 grad. 14. Would anyone be surprised to see him reclaim the No. he Boston Red Sox outfield exceeded expectations in 2021. Tier 5: Anthony Santander, Victor Robles, Clint Frazier, Max Kepler, Kyle Schwarber, Jesse Winker, Trey Mancini, Andrew McCutchen, Jarred Kelenic, AJ Pollock, Andrew Benintendi, Mark Canha, Chris Taylor, Nick Solak, Mitch Haniger, Aaron Hicks, Brandon Nimmo, Lorenzo Cain, Joc Pederson, Garrett Hampson. He made more consistent contact while maintaining his usual elite average exit velocity and hard-hit rate metrics. He entered spring training far from assured of a spot on the Baltimore Orioles' Opening Day roster, but he won the starting center field job and went on to have the biggest breakout season of 2021. Also, make use of all our premium resources with our MLB Draft Kit. Martinez showed an obvious decline in back speed last year, as evident by his nearly 13o point drop in batting average on fastballs, but he is just two years removed from a .304/.383/.557 season, so it's hard to completely give up one. Expected Weighted On-base Average (xwOBA), 1B -- average of top 1% of throws -- minimum 100 throws to qualify, 2B/SS/3B -- average of top 5% of throws -- minimum 75 throws to qualify, OF -- average of top 10% of throws -- minimum 50 throws to qualify. The veteran has been a productive fantasy bat for several years, but his 2020 slash line (.322/.412/.515) was well above his performance from 2017-19 (.257/.363/.492). He might just be entering his throwing prime, making this the perfect time to claim his golden arm for my superplayer. Statcast Outfielder Jump Leaderboard | baseballsavant.com Once the No. With the amount of talent surrounding him in the Twins lineup, his floor is 30 home runs and 100 RBI, making one of the safest picks at this stage of the draft. Even with his question marks, Robert's speed and power combo as well as the talent surrounding him in the White Sox lineup makes him a top-15 outfielder. The 2021 MLB Draft Preview position rankings finally covers its last group of hitters today with a closer look at the outfielders. + Watch out for No. Signed to a four-year, $79 million deal during the offseason, Schwarber slugged an NL-leading 46 home runs in his first season with the Phillies. His playoff performance left a lot to be desired and we only saw two games of him last year, but the player we saw in 2019 was a Tier 1 player, so to get him in this spot is an absolute steal. thrown with. One of the tougher players to slot on this list, Buxton played in only 61 games while missing time with a hip strain and fractured hand. The fourth tier features OF3 candidates of every type. Grisham showcased his flashy tools during the shortened season, reaching double digits in both home runs and steals. His 10.6 WAR led all of baseball, as did his ridiculous 211 OPS+ meaning he was more than twice as productive as the average hitter. But that represents the bulk of the 26-year-olds big league experience. Then there are the players I don't love taking at this spot. It's scary to think that Betts might still be improving, as his well-rounded game (Projected .297 avg, 35 HR, 20 SB) already made him one of the safest picks in baseball. After back-to-back 20-plus-homer seasons in 2018 and 2019, Teoscar Hernandez showcased a more well-rounded offensive game last year, hitting .289/.340/.579 for a 146 OPS+ in 50 games to finish 11th in AL MVP voting and win a Silver Slugger Award. Join the Best Live Fantasy Chat Community! I want my superplayer to own a cannon and have shown time and time again that he can be accurate with it. as Active Spin. The No. Accuracy matters, too. has him drawing comparisons to Hall of Famer Ted Williams. window.". He was in the 66th percentile in exit velocity and 83rd percentile in hard-hit percentage, while Santander was just 45th and 38th respectively. How much time, in seconds, it takes a runner to get from He also once again took home Gold Glove honors in a 6.3 WAR season. He has never finished lower than third on the MLB pop time leaderboard since Statcast launched, and 2019 was his fastest season yet. Mullins didn't quite match the out-of-nowhere 30/30 season he put together in 2021, but he was still one of the game's better everyday center fielders. Castellanos and Blackmon, meanwhile, faded dramatically after blazing starts. Fantasy Baseball Outfield Draft Rankings for 2021 MLB season - Yahoo Sports Once the unanimous best fantasy player in baseball, Mike Trout has slipped a bit due to less aggressive baserunning (just one steal last year) and a "down" 2020 (career-low 162 WRC+). Bellinger has made some spectacular throws, like his 268-foot laser from right field to third base to bail the Dodgers out of a late-inning bases-loaded jam against the Mets last May 27 (his second outfield assist of that game). The former top prospect excelled in his rookie season, hitting .333 with a 140 OPS+. Previous picks: Mookie Betts (hit), Joey Gallo (power), Christian Yelich (run), Harrison Bader (defense), Cody Bellinger, CF, DodgersKey stat: 101.1 mph max arm strength. All rights reserved. Kyle Schwarber, Philadelphia Phillies. He also hits the ball much harder than Santander. A Rios And because it's just as. rHR - HR Saving Catch Runs. Kyle Tucker is the first big surprise on this list, as he makes a Tier 2 appearance after just 108 up-and-down career major league games. If Stanton stays on the field in 2021, his production could swing many fantasy leagues. Expect Bellinger to return to his MVP form this season. DRS | Sabermetrics Library
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