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19-03-2025
- Sport
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Fantasy Baseball: Bold predictions from Rotoworld staff for 2025 MLB season
In our last group article, we got a look under the hood at some of the players the Rotoworld Baseball staff has drafted the most going into the 2025 MLB season. It was an opportunity to see which players we're planting our flags on for this year. Now, it's time to take things one step further with our fantasy bold predictions for the season ahead. "Bold" is always a subjective term, so some of these might stand out more than others, but there's a kernel in each of these choices which separates itself from what you'll find in terms of each player's average draft position. Finding these players — and the value that comes along with them — are what often leads to fantasy championships. Pay close attention if you still have a draft ahead of you. MLB: Kansas City Royals-Media Day 2025 Fantasy Baseball Draft Prep: Rankings, strategy, sleepers, mock draft results Advertisement Your one-stop-shop for Rotoworld's preseason fantasy baseball content. Dylan Crews will steal 60 bases Crews, the second overall pick in the 2023 MLB Draft out of LSU, stole 12 bases in 31 games in his debut. The 23-year-old struggled at the plate hitting .218 with a .288 OBP. Entering 2024, Crews has been handed an everyday job at the top of the lineup. Sure, he could be sent down if he has a .288 OBP again, but what if he doesn't? If he gets on base at a reasonable clip, he's going to steal a lot of bases. Crews' sprint speed of 29.3 ft/s is in the 93rd percentile and the Nationals were the most aggressive team stealing bases last year, leading the league with 233 steals. - Nick Shlain Oneil Cruz returns first round value It's no secret that Cruz has some of the gaudiest raw power in the league. Last season, he was responsible for the four individual hardest hit balls, eight of the 11 hardest, and 15 of the 30 hardest across all batted ball events. He also hit 24 balls in play at least 115 MPH. Giancarlo Stanton had the next most with 17. Cruz also hit four and his 21 home runs further than 450 feet. Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani were the only players with more 450 ft blasts, and they combined for 112 total homers. Any minimal gains Cruz can make with his contact rate will put him squarely in position to exceed 30 or possibly 40 home runs. Moreover, Cruz became a much more willing base stealer over the second half last year as he swiped 15 bags without getting caught after only taking eight attempts before the All-Star break. He's already attempted seven steals this spring and seems primed to run more than his projections would indicate. It's not totally out of bounds to see him hit something like 35 HR with a .270 batting average and 30 stolen bases. That's a first round player. - James Schiano Emiliano Teodo will lead the Rangers in saves this season Let's go completely off the board. I'll give the Rangers a ton of credit for keeping this one close to the vest this spring, citing a desire to continue developing Teodo as a traditional starter in the upper minors as justification for leaving him off their season-opening roster. The 24-year-old prospect's triple-digit fastball velocity makes it easy to envision him excelling in the ninth inning down the road, like how the division-rival Athletics recently transformed top prospect Mason Miller from volatile starter to elite stopper. The Rangers haven't put a ton of roadblocks in his path to a high-leverage role by letting Kirby Yates leave in free agency and failing to re-sign David Robertson. They brought in longtime setup specialist Chris Martin to close, but he's battled shoulder issues for years and turns 39 in a couple months. I'm willing to roll the dice on the talent here and gamble that the Rangers eventually turn things over to the most talented arm in their relief mix. - George Bissell Jack Leiter delivers the most fantasy value of any AL rookie and also wins the AL Rookie of the Year Award This is a bit of a bold prediction since Leiter currently has the 6th-best odds to win AL Rookie of the Year, with guys like Jasson Dominguez, Jackson Jobe, and Coby Mayo, among others, all seen as better bets. I see a path where Leiter produces more fantasy value than all of them. His fastball has been electric this season, sitting at 98 mph in his outings. He also added a sinker to pound the strike zone with and modified his changeup into a kick-change that looks dynamic. I think he starts the season in the Rangers' rotation, which gives him to chance to cement his status for the remainder of the season. He made real strides at Triple-A last year, and the only thing holding him back as been inconsistent command. I think his mechanical tweaks can help him iron that out and he can take off in 2025. - Eric Samulski MLB: Spring Training-Texas Rangers at Los Angeles Dodgers Fantasy Baseball Rankings: Bobby Witt Jr., Shohei Othani lead Rotoworld's preseason Top 300 for 2025 Advertisement Another injury for Royce Lewis and David Bednar's struggles continue. Cristopher Sánchez will finish as a top-15 fantasy starting pitcher Sánchez has already displayed excellent run-suppression skills with his extreme ground ball rate while giving plenty of volume with an 181-inning season. The path to him propelling to the top of the pitcher ranks lies in his WHIP and strikeouts. The 28-year-old left-hander appears poised to make that leap. Sánchez has demonstrated outstanding control, walking just 5.8% of batters last season after producing a 4% walk rate in 2023. His 1.24 WHIP was mostly the product of an inflated .313 BABIP that's bound for regression. Still, generating more swing and miss would bode well for lowering his WHIP and getting more strikeouts. He's doing just that this spring with increased fastball velocity, striking out 17 batters over 11 2/3 innings across his four spring starts. If he can maintain his velocity gain into the regular season, he could flourish into a fantasy ace. - Jorge Montanez Jake Fraley combines for 50 home runs + stolen bases The dynamic 29-year-old struggled through injury, illness and a complete loss of power during the 2024 season, and he still managed to sock five dingers and steal 20 bases in 382 plate appearances. He'll be a fixture in the Reds' lineup against right-handed pitching and it would shock me if he managed to steal fewer than 30 bases if he avoids the injured list. I'm hoping for a small bounce back in power, so maybe a 15/35 season is in the cards, but 10/40 isn't out of the question either. It's baffling to me that he's still going right around pick 400 through the first 11 NFBC Main Event drafts. He has found his way onto the roster of every team that I have drafted so far. - David Shovein Austin Riley leads the NL in homers Shohei Ohtani is the obvious favorite to lead the NL in home runs again, yet he comes with some extra injury concerns this year as he returns to pitching and tries to accommodate his surgically repaired left (non-throwing) shoulder. So, if not Ohtani, why not Riley? The Braves third baseman hit 38 homers in 2022 and 37 in 2023. That he's currently penciled in as a No. 2 hitter for a team that hates giving regulars days off gives him a shot at reaching 700 plate appearances. Riley had a somewhat disappointing 2024 season that was brought to an early end by a broken hamate bone suffered on a HBP, but he was still hitting the ball as hard as ever. In fact, his 96th-percentile average exit velocity and hard-hit rates were career bests. Mostly, he just didn't pull his flyballs quite as often as usual. If he can get back to that, 40 homers should be in the cards and a run at 50 can't be ruled out. - Matthew Pouliot Dylan Crews will be a top-20 fantasy outfielder Obviously there's risk in believing a player that is entering his first full MLB season will have this much success, and it's worth pointing out that Crews wasn't great in his first taste of action at the highest level. That being said, this is a player who has the tools to hit for average, power and steal bases while getting a chance to play everyday and hit near the top of the lineup for the Nationals. You don't want to go too crazy with spring training stats, but the fact that Crews hit .324 and stole three bases over his first dozen games in the Grapefruit League doesn't hurt my confidence, either. I wouldn't draft Crews as my second outfielder, I'm just not going to be surprised at all when he finishes in that range. - Christopher Crawford
NBC Sports
19-03-2025
- Sport
- NBC Sports
Fantasy Baseball: Bold predictions from Rotoworld staff for 2025 MLB season
In our last group article, we got a look under the hood at some of the players the Rotoworld Baseball staff has drafted the most going into the 2025 MLB season. It was an opportunity to see which players we're planting our flags on for this year. Now, it's time to take things one step further with our fantasy bold predictions for the season ahead. 'Bold' is always a subjective term, so some of these might stand out more than others, but there's a kernel in each of these choices which separates itself from what you'll find in terms of each player's average draft position. Finding these players — and the value that comes along with them — are what often leads to fantasy championships. Pay close attention if you still have a draft ahead of you. Rotoworld Staff, Dylan Crews will steal 60 bases Crews, the second overall pick in the 2023 MLB Draft out of LSU, stole 12 bases in 31 games in his debut. The 23-year-old struggled at the plate hitting .218 with a .288 OBP. Entering 2024, Crews has been handed an everyday job at the top of the lineup. Sure, he could be sent down if he has a .288 OBP again, but what if he doesn't? If he gets on base at a reasonable clip, he's going to steal a lot of bases. Crews' sprint speed of 29.3 ft/s is in the 93rd percentile and the Nationals were the most aggressive team stealing bases last year, leading the league with 233 steals. - Nick Shlain Oneil Cruz returns first round value It's no secret that Cruz has some of the gaudiest raw power in the league. Last season, he was responsible for the four individual hardest hit balls, eight of the 11 hardest, and 15 of the 30 hardest across all batted ball events. He also hit 24 balls in play at least 115 MPH. Giancarlo Stanton had the next most with 17. Cruz also hit four and his 21 home runs further than 450 feet. Aaron Judge and Shohei Ohtani were the only players with more 450 ft blasts, and they combined for 112 total homers. Any minimal gains Cruz can make with his contact rate will put him squarely in position to exceed 30 or possibly 40 home runs. Moreover, Cruz became a much more willing base stealer over the second half last year as he swiped 15 bags without getting caught after only taking eight attempts before the All-Star break. He's already attempted seven steals this spring and seems primed to run more than his projections would indicate. It's not totally out of bounds to see him hit something like 35 HR with a .270 batting average and 30 stolen bases. That's a first round player. - James Schiano Emiliano Teodo will lead the Rangers in saves this season Let's go completely off the board. I'll give the Rangers a ton of credit for keeping this one close to the vest this spring, citing a desire to continue developing Teodo as a traditional starter in the upper minors as justification for leaving him off their season-opening roster. The 24-year-old prospect's triple-digit fastball velocity makes it easy to envision him excelling in the ninth inning down the road, like how the division-rival Athletics recently transformed top prospect Mason Miller from volatile starter to elite stopper. The Rangers haven't put a ton of roadblocks in his path to a high-leverage role by letting Kirby Yates leave in free agency and failing to re-sign David Robertson. They brought in longtime setup specialist Chris Martin to close, but he's battled shoulder issues for years and turns 39 in a couple months. I'm willing to roll the dice on the talent here and gamble that the Rangers eventually turn things over to the most talented arm in their relief mix. - George Bissell Jack Leiter delivers the most fantasy value of any AL rookie and also wins the AL Rookie of the Year Award This is a bit of a bold prediction since Leiter currently has the 6th-best odds to win AL Rookie of the Year, with guys like Jasson Dominguez, Jackson Jobe, and Coby Mayo, among others, all seen as better bets. I see a path where Leiter produces more fantasy value than all of them. His fastball has been electric this season, sitting at 98 mph in his outings. He also added a sinker to pound the strike zone with and modified his changeup into a kick-change that looks dynamic. I think he starts the season in the Rangers' rotation, which gives him to chance to cement his status for the remainder of the season. He made real strides at Triple-A last year, and the only thing holding him back as been inconsistent command. I think his mechanical tweaks can help him iron that out and he can take off in 2025. - Eric Samulski Matthew Pouliot, Cristopher Sánchez will finish as a top-15 fantasy starting pitcher Sánchez has already displayed excellent run-suppression skills with his extreme ground ball rate while giving plenty of volume with an 181-inning season. The path to him propelling to the top of the pitcher ranks lies in his WHIP and strikeouts. The 28-year-old left-hander appears poised to make that leap. Sánchez has demonstrated outstanding control, walking just 5.8% of batters last season after producing a 4% walk rate in 2023. His 1.24 WHIP was mostly the product of an inflated .313 BABIP that's bound for regression. Still, generating more swing and miss would bode well for lowering his WHIP and getting more strikeouts. He's doing just that this spring with increased fastball velocity, striking out 17 batters over 11 2/3 innings across his four spring starts. If he can maintain his velocity gain into the regular season, he could flourish into a fantasy ace. - Jorge Montanez Jake Fraley combines for 50 home runs + stolen bases The dynamic 29-year-old struggled through injury, illness and a complete loss of power during the 2024 season, and he still managed to sock five dingers and steal 20 bases in 382 plate appearances. He'll be a fixture in the Reds' lineup against right-handed pitching and it would shock me if he managed to steal fewer than 30 bases if he avoids the injured list. I'm hoping for a small bounce back in power, so maybe a 15/35 season is in the cards, but 10/40 isn't out of the question either. It's baffling to me that he's still going right around pick 400 through the first 11 NFBC Main Event drafts. He has found his way onto the roster of every team that I have drafted so far. - David Shovein Austin Riley leads the NL in homers Shohei Ohtani is the obvious favorite to lead the NL in home runs again, yet he comes with some extra injury concerns this year as he returns to pitching and tries to accommodate his surgically repaired left (non-throwing) shoulder. So, if not Ohtani, why not Riley? The Braves third baseman hit 38 homers in 2022 and 37 in 2023. That he's currently penciled in as a No. 2 hitter for a team that hates giving regulars days off gives him a shot at reaching 700 plate appearances. Riley had a somewhat disappointing 2024 season that was brought to an early end by a broken hamate bone suffered on a HBP, but he was still hitting the ball as hard as ever. In fact, his 96th-percentile average exit velocity and hard-hit rates were career bests. Mostly, he just didn't pull his flyballs quite as often as usual. If he can get back to that, 40 homers should be in the cards and a run at 50 can't be ruled out. - Matthew Pouliot Dylan Crews will be a top-20 fantasy outfielder Obviously there's risk in believing a player that is entering his first full MLB season will have this much success, and it's worth pointing out that Crews wasn't great in his first taste of action at the highest level. That being said, this is a player who has the tools to hit for average, power and steal bases while getting a chance to play everyday and hit near the top of the lineup for the Nationals. You don't want to go too crazy with spring training stats, but the fact that Crews hit .324 and stole three bases over his first dozen games in the Grapefruit League doesn't hurt my confidence, either. I wouldn't draft Crews as my second outfielder, I'm just not going to be surprised at all when he finishes in that range. - Christopher Crawford
Yahoo
02-03-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
2025 Fantasy Baseball Draft Prep: Rankings, strategy, sleepers, mock draft results
With spring training getting underway, fantasy baseball drafts won't be far behind. The Rotoworld Baseball staff is happy to help set you up for success, both on draft day and for the duration of the 2025 MLB season. That's why we've put together this page to have links to all of our preseason coverage in one place. Keep in mind that this is just the tip of the iceberg of the comprehensive content you'll see between now and Opening Day. Bookmark this page and check back often as we add our latest articles and rankings to this page. Happy drafting season! 2025 preseason Top 300 rankings for 5x5 mixed leagues 2025 fantasy baseball Top 500 dynasty rankings 2025 Top 150 starting pitchers 2025 Top 100 prospects 2025 Top 25 fantasy rookies Hitter dollar values for 2025 salary cap leagues Starting pitcher values for 2025 salary cap leagues Relief pitcher values for 2025 salary cap leagues 2025 STARTING PITCHER PREVIEW 2025 OUTFIELDER PREVIEW 2025 SHORTSTOPS PREVIEW 2025 FIRST BASE PREVIEW 2025 THIRD BASE PREVIEW One spring training X-factor to watch from all 30 MLB teams Fantasy baseball bullpen report: Top closers for 2025, sleepers, outlooks for each team MLB ballpark changes for 2025: Athletics, Rays, Orioles impacted 2025 hitter busts: Mark Vientos, Jackson Merrill among Rotoworld staff picks 2025 pitcher busts: Gerrit Cole, Luis Castillo, Chris Sale among Rotoworld staff picks Spring training notebook: Kevin Gausman, Griffin Canning show new pitches Starting pitcher breakouts: Reid Detmers, Matt Festa could be values Starting pitcher busts: Hunter Greene, Framber Valdez look like risky picks Fantasy baseball post-hype pitchers: Shane Baz, Gavin Williams could be ready for breakout Fantasy baseball post-hype hitters: Trevor Larnach, Jordan Walker among names to consider Fantasy baseball sleeper pitchers: Joe Ryan, Drew Rasmussen in February update Fantasy baseball sleeper hitters: Josh Lowe, Parker Meadows part of February update Fantasy baseball ADP movers for February: Willson Contreras, new closers surging Starting pitcher strategy: Finding this year's Garrett Crochet Fantasy baseball breakout candidates: Vinnie Pasquantino leads hitters entering their prime years Late-round starting pitcher targets: Dustin May, Jose Soriano could be draft values Fantasy baseball dynasty start-up mock draft (from late January) Early fantasy baseball mixed league (redraft format) mock draft - from late December
NBC Sports
28-02-2025
- Sport
- NBC Sports
2025 Fantasy Baseball Busts: Are Gerrit Cole's best days behind him?
The Rotoworld Baseball staff offered their early sleeper picks for hitters and pitchers earlier this month, but now it's time to look at the other end of the spectrum with our picks for 'busts.' Now, a quick word about 'busts.' What does it mean, exactly? Ultimately, it's a flashy word for a player who is deemed unlikely to live up to last year's performance and/or their ADP (average draft position) for this year. Call them 'busts' if you'd like, but 'overvalued' works just fine as well. Either way, don't say we didn't warn you. After unveiling our 'busts' among hitters earlier this week, you'll find our picks among starting pitchers below. Rotoworld Staff, 2025 FANTASY BASEBALL BUST STARTING PITCHERS Because the Mariners decided against trading him, Castillo is my No. 47 SP this season. In pretty much any stadium other than T-Mobile, I doubt he'd crack my top 70. That ballpark is covering up a pretty steep decline from the former Reds ace. Castillo's fastball velocity dropped 1.5 mph from 2022 to 2024, and he's now a slight flyball pitcher after spending years as one of the league's top groundball inducers. His 24.3% strikeout rate last season was still quite good, but that was largely ex-Safeco's doing. Mariners pitchers had a 27% strikeout rate at home and a 22% strikeout rate on the road last season. Castillo's was 27% at home and 20% on the road. Pitching in Seattle, he had a 3.15 ERA and a 5.9 K:BB. Elsewhere, he had a 4.25 ERA and a 2.3 K:BB. There's always the chance that Castillo will regain some arm strength and return to All-Star form at age 32. It just seems like a really bad idea to bet on it when he's being drafted as a top-25 SP. - Matthew Pouliot Crochet's talent is obvious, and there's loads of reasons to be excited about his chances of success in 2025 and beyond. There's also some reasons to believe that he's not worthy of being one of the first pitchers off the board this winter. In his 12 starts after the All-Star break, Crochet had an ERA of 5.19, and while that sample is only 38 2/3 innings, that's part of the concern as well as he was (justifiably) coddled during the final few months of the season. Yes, his ability to miss bats competes with any starter in the sport, and there's no denying that getting traded from the worst team in baseball to a potential playoff contender helps his odds. There's just too much volatility to trust Crochet as my best starting pitcher in 2025, and you will very likely have to draft him as such to procure his services. - Christopher Crawford Having Hunter Greene as a bust just really means I'm not a fan of him as a top-25 starting pitcher, which is where he's going in drafts right now. There's a narrative that Greene's strong 2024 season was due to his new splitter, but the pitch graded out poorly last year. It also had below-average zone rates, strike rates, and putaway rates to lefties with just a 22.7% CSW so the pitch didn't do much for him. His success was because he added extension on his four-seamer, improved his zone rate on it, and gave up significantly less hard contact. However, he also had a massive Hit Luck score and just a 7.2% HR/FB rate which are both surely to regress hard. When you add in the injury risk due to his high-end velocity, I don't believe Greene will hit that top-25 upside, and I have him as SP46 right now. - Eric Samulski Sale had an excellent season in 2024, earning himself Cy Young honors after previously finishing in the top five of Cy Young award voting six times. Unfortunately, he ended the season on a sour note as he was unavailable with the Braves' season on the line in the last game of the season. It's Sale's durability issues that give me pause with him this year. Prior to '24, the soon to be 36-year-old had thrown 102 ⅔, 5 ⅔, 42 ⅔ and zero innings in the previous four seasons. That's simply not what I'm looking for from my ace pitcher. Sale's NFBC ADP in February in the Online Championship is 34.15, making him the sixth pitcher off the board in most drafts. Drafting Sale just seems like an unnecessary risk to take at that point in drafts with pretty much every other pitcher still available. Corbin Burnes and George Kirby make sense as alternative options in that range as both eclipsed 180 innings and had a WHIP under 1.10 last year. - Nick Shlain A literal phenom, it's likely Sasaki grows into an ace behind his devastating splitter, near 100 MPH gas, and the Dodgers' support in his development. That being said, he needs time to get there and is being over-drafted as the 23rd starting pitcher off the board since February 1st given his current limitations. First off, his workload will be light this season. He threw just 111 IP, 91 IP, and his career-high 129 1/3 IP respectively over the last three seasons in the NPB and 130 IP seems like his absolute ceiling. There's either an injury – he missed time with arm issues last season and was recommended Tommy John surgery back in 2021 – or stays on schedule and only pitches a few innings per, which would kill his chance to earn wins. He would need to be highly dominant a la Paul Skenes or Tyler Glasnow to return meaningful value at his current cost and he's not that guy yet. His repertoire is shallow, as of now, and I question how much swing-and-miss his fastball will get off the jump. While its velocity is still elite, it lost significant vertical movement over the course of last season. I'm not sure how quickly he can rediscover his optimal fastball shape after a full season where it regressed plus the adjustment to a slightly larger ball in the US that's more difficult to grip than the one used in Japan. That pitch needs to be elite for him to be an immediate superstar since his command is middling and slider is inconsistent. The Dodgers' rotation (and team) are so stacked that they will not likely push him in the regular season since his development is so high-stakes. They will play the long game with him and that could mean headaches for fantasy managers. - James Schiano There's no doubt that Blake Snell has been one of the best pitchers on a per-inning basis over the last several seasons. The problem for the 32-year-old left-hander has been staying on the mound. And despite his move to one of the best teams in baseball with the Dodgers, the move to Los Angeles does nothing to quell the volume concerns as the team is notorious for limiting their starting pitchers. Snell has pitched more than 130 innings just twice in his career and is coming off a 104-inning season in San Francisco. Also, he has a career 2.69 ERA at home and a 3.74 ERA on the road. This is noteworthy considering the fact he's pitched in Tampa Bay, San Diego, and San Francisco, three prominent pitcher's parks. Meanwhile, Los Angeles has played as an extremely hitter-friendly park, something that gives me pause for a pitcher that issues high walk rates with fly ball tendencies. - Jorge Montanez Schwellenbach was an unexpected revelation last year for the Braves, rising from relative obscurity to establish himself as a potential front-of-the-rotation stalwart. The talent is undeniable, but fantasy managers should exercise extreme caution in re-draft formats since Schwellenbach remains extremely inexperienced for a pitcher being selected as a borderline top 100 overall pick in fantasy drafts. The 24-year-old spent the first two seasons of his collegiate career as a shortstop and didn't begin pitching until 2021 when he was a closer. The upper-echelon starter kit is there for Schwellenbach to blossom into an elite fantasy starter, but I'm not sure there's enough strikeout upside based on last year's results to justify his current draft day price tag. I'd much rather roll the dice several rounds later on a less expensive option like Shane Baz, Gavin Williams, Kumar Rocker, Jackson Jobe or Bubba Chandler. - George Bissell This one could wind up making me look silly at the end of the season as well, but I have a hard time justifying using a top 60 pick on Gerrit Cole heading into the 2025 season. Sure, he's healthy now and the injury concerns that hampered him in 2024, but we also saw genuine skill decline in his profile last season. His strikeout rate has dropped each of the last three seasons, with his 25.4 percent mark from 2024 registering as his worst output since his days with the Pirates back in 2017. The dip in strikeout rate coincided directly with a drop in velocity – all the way from 97.8 mph in 2022 to 95.9 mph in 2024, once again his lowest mark since 2017. Are we sure that he's just going to bounce back like nothing happened heading into his age-34 season? Sure, it's possible, but I'm definitely not taking that risk as my SP1 or SP2. - David Shovein
NBC Sports
24-02-2025
- Sport
- NBC Sports
2025 Fantasy Baseball Busts: Can Mark Vientos and Jackson Merrill duplicate last year's success?
The Rotoworld Baseball staff offered their early sleeper picks for hitters and pitchers earlier this month, but now it's time to look at the other end of the spectrum with our picks for 'busts.' Now, a quick word about 'busts.' What does it mean, exactly? Ultimately, it's a flashy word for a player who is deemed unlikely to live up to last year's performance and/or their ADP (average draft position) for this year. Call them 'busts' if you'd like, but 'overvalued' works just fine as well. Either way, don't say we didn't warn you. Stay tuned later this week for Rotoworld's picks for busts on the starting pitcher side of things. Rotoworld Staff, FANTASY BASEBALL BUST HITTERS FOR 2025 Willy Adames SS, Giants Adames has long been one of the better and more underrated infielders in baseball, but I'm not sure I love the fit for him in San Francisco from a fantasy perspective. He hasn't been a quality contributor in the average category for the last few years, and his swing path and willingness to hit in two-strike counts aren't likely to see him help in that regard. Oracle Park is also not friendly confines in terms of helping power hitters, and while Adames has been an excellent source of pop, he's now going to be playing in a home park that had the third-worst Park Factor for right-handed hitters in 2024. And while Adames did steal 21 bases last year, it's worth noting that he had never stolen more than eight bags in a year prior to 2024, and the Giants were dead last in stolen bases last year. Adames is a quality player, but I wouldn't feel comfortable with him being my starting shortstop to begin 2025; not with so many other solid options available with similar upside and higher floors. Mark Vientos 3B, Mets Vientos took over the third base job for the Mets in midseason and finished the 2024 season with a .266 average, 27 home runs and 71 RBI in 111 games. He also hit .327 with five home runs and 14 RBI in 13 playoff games for the Mets. Vientos is exactly the kind of trap fantasy players typically fall for. He's a good player on a popular team and his production in less than a full season is begging for his numbers to be extrapolated to what's possible for him in 150+ games. Unfortunately, the 25-year-old third baseman isn't without his drawbacks. Vientos strikes out a lot as evidenced by his 29.7 percent strikeouts percentage last year and he needed a .324 BABIP to hit just .266. Unless he cuts down on his strikeouts, there's a clear path to him hitting around .240 next year with normal regression. The BAT X projects Vientos to hit .232 with 27 home runs, 68 runs scored, 81 RBI and one stolen base. His NFBC ADP in February in the Online Championship is 97.69, well ahead of Jake Burger (121.77) and Matt Chapman (134.10) who project for the same or better production across the board at the same position. Vientos also won't gain first base eligibility during the season with the Mets bringing Pete Alonso back, while Burger is already eligible at first and third base. - Nick Shlain Xander Bogaerts SS/2B, Padres We may be seeing the decline of Xander Bogaerts. While he's always provided an excellent floor, his ceiling appears to be getting lower and lower. We've now seen his hard-hit rate decline for three consecutive seasons, down to a 33% rate in 2024. It likely played a factor in his career-low .264 batting average. While he appeared to bounce back after missing time with a shoulder injury, batting .299/.338/.432 over his final 263 plate appearances, it came with a 34.8% hard-hit rate and 3.9% barrel rate. According to Statcast, his expected batting average over that span was .259, indicating some fortunate batted-ball luck. Bogaerts may not exactly hurt fantasy teams, there just may be much more exciting options going later in drafts such as Masyn Winn, Jeremy Peña, Dansby Swanson, Willi Castro, and Carlos Correa. - Jorge Montanez Junior Caminero 3B, Rays It's difficult to pen perhaps the top overall prospect in all of baseball as a bust, but given his current draft price, I don't see any way that Junior Caminero returns a profit in 2025. Sure, he's the type of elite talent that could just take a major leap forward and take the world by storm in his sophomore campaign – especially playing his home games at Steinbrenner Field -- but the way I see it he's really a three-category player. I don't expect Caminero to hit for a positive batting average and I don't think he'll deliver more than a handful of stolen bases. I'm also a bit skeptical of his counting stats hitting in the middle of what looks to be an underwhelming Rays' lineup. I'd be willing to take a chance on the upside if he were in the pick 150-200 range, but he's already priced up at pick 75 by average draft position and the cost is only going to rise from there as we get closer to the season. I may wind up looking foolish on this one, but I'd rather have solid, stable production in the fifth or sixth round rather than hoping that Caminero hits the highest end of his range of outcomes right out of the gate. - David Shovein Matthew Pouliot, Jackson Merrill OF, Padres Bust may be too sharp a word here, as Merill is just being a bit over-drafted rather than someone who's possible to flame out as 'bust' may indicate. His high batting average projections are doing a lot to anchor him as a near-second round pick while there could be more downside there than indicated. He excelled as a rookie by being incredibly aggressive, making tons of contact, spraying the ball all over the field, and doing tons of damage. All great things, but at some point I expect pitchers to force him to be patient with more pitches out of the strike zone or in spots that he can't barrel up as easily. His bat control is outrageous though and maybe he can hit his way through anything. If not, his profile dampens a good bit with a .250 average versus a .280 average and that regression is totally reasonable. - James Schiano Rafael Devers 3B, Red Sox Here's an oversimplification: The vibes are not great at the outset of Red Sox camp with Devers recently scoffing at the idea of moving to DH to accommodate newly added free agent Alex Bregman, who is a vastly superior defender at the hot corner. With top prospect Kristian Campbell on the cusp of ascending to the majors, most likely at second base, it feels like Devers ends up being the odd man out. Shifting to DH likely keeps him healthier from a long-term physical perspective, which is critical considering he battled knee and shoulder issues throughout last season. The greater concern is how quickly he'll adjust to DH-ing on a permanent basis, which has proven to be a significant mental hurdle, even for some of the best hitters of their generation. It's a variable that's impossible to quantify from a numerical standpoint, but it's worth monitoring Devers' mindset and role throughout spring training as it figures to greatly impact his on-field performance at the dish. - George Bissell Ozzie Albies 2B, Braves Despite missing extensive time in three of the last five seasons, Albies is still being treated as a top-50 pick and the fourth second baseman off the board in most leagues. It's understandable why, given that his two healthy seasons have both seen him finish with 30 homers, 100 RBI and double digits in steals. Still, a healthy Albies wasn't that same player in the 90 games before he suffered a fractured wrist last year, hitting .258/.310/.407 with 10 homers. Never an exit-velocity king, Albies' strength has always been pulled flyball homers, which typically leaves him with middling batting averages, and given that he's topped a .310 OBP just once in five years, he doesn't rate a spot in the top two of this Braves lineup. Instead, he seems destined to bat fifth or sixth initially and probably one spot lower once Ronald Acuña Jr. returns. He's also slowing down some, with his 2024 sprint speed coming in a tad under the league average. I'd be tempted to reverse course here and roll the dice on Albies if he ever gave up switch-hitting and focused on his right-handed stroke. As mediocre as he tends to be against righties, he's rather overrated right now. - Matthew Pouliot Michael Toglia 1B, Rockies I was behind the early draft season idea of Michael Toglia as a solid late-round corner infield option, but he has now risen inside the top 200 picks and has gone as high as pick 150 in the last 15 NFBC Online Championship drafts. To me, that's leaning too much into the 'power hitter in Coors Field' narrative. Even in his strong second-half stretch, he struck out 33% of the time, and his season-long swinging strike rate of 15.7% is concerning. That led to just a 4th-percentile contact rate overall, so even though he hits the ball hard, he doesn't make contact enough for that to lead to consistent damage. As a switch-hitter, he's also worse against right-handed pitching with a .208/.293/.411 career slash line to go along with a 33% strikeout rate. The poor lineup around him will keep his counting stats down, so I think you're looking at 25 home runs with a .220 average and there are plenty of hitters later in the draft who can give you that. - Eric Samulski
