Despite the snow falling here in the upper midwest as I write this, we’re now a full month into the baseball season. Some of the metrics I like to reference are tightening up. We’re getting a firmer grasp on the 2019 fantasy landscape. It might even be time to start looking at your league standings and addressing deficiencies. Our first player was part of Eric Cross’s waiver wire piece a week ago and might address a deficiency on your team. Let’s take a look.
Fire – Hunter Dozier
If you had told me in March that I’d be writing about a Dozier in late April, I’d be unsurprised to be jotting down my thoughts on Brian Dozier. Replace the name Brian with Hunter, and my socks might have been blown right off my feet. I’m always wearing socks. Thankfully I’ve been paying attention to Hunter Dozier’s hot start, so when I pulled up his numbers on the year, my socks remained in place. Let’s look at what has fueled his .350/.442/.713 line early on.
Dozier came into the season with a career -0.9 fWAR over 110 games. It’s safe to say he was well off fantasy radars during draft season. He had 11 home runs over that span but has seven already over his first 23 games in 2019. He has also doubled his 2018 walk rate of 6.2% with a 13.7% mark while also slashing his strikeout rate from 28.1% to 18.9%. These numbers look like they are from two completely different players. Is 2019 Hunter Dozier indeed a different player?
First, let’s check out that fancy new-fangled plate discipline. It’s still early, but so far there is a lot to back up the K:BB results.
He has become far more patient at the plate. He’s laying off far more bad pitches outside of the strike zone while making 5.2% more contact on pitches inside of the zone. His swinging strike rate has been nearly chopped in half, from 13% in 2018 to 7.8% this year. While there is time for those numbers to regress, you can’t help but be encouraged by these early returns.
His batted ball profile looks a lot different as well.
He’s getting the ball in the air more often this year at 49.2%, which is the key to hitting for power. He’s also pulling the ball more at 44.4%, which is helping him hit the ball harder than ever. There’s a strong correlation between pulling the ball and HR/FB%, so it’s little surprise his HR/FB rate has surged to 22.6%.
While Dozier was a fastball hunter in 2018, he struggled against breaking pitches. He’s seeing more breaking balls this year as a result of that, but guess what? Hunter Dozier appears to have improved against breaking balls.
This is great news for Hunter Dozier’s consistency moving forward. Pitchers won’t be able to throw junk at him in the dirt to get him to chase. He also demolishes fastballs, so what’s a pitcher to do? Dozier’s 93.7 MPH average exit velocity currently puts him 16th, behind names such as Cody Bellinger, Gary Sanchez, and JD Martinez. The totality of his gains at the plate reminds me a lot of Max Muncy’s 2018 breakout season. He’s obviously not this good, but he’s got the power and on-base ability to be owned and started in all but the shallowest of formats.
Ice – Yasiel Puig
Whereas Hunter Dozier is making waves and getting picked up everywhere, Yasiel Puig has yet to adjust in his new home. He’s 24 games into his first season in Cincinnati, but so far is batting just .205/.217/.375. He has provided solid category juice so far with four homers and two steals. One look at his plate discipline numbers might have you more concerned about that low OBP sticking around like that clingy ex-girlfriend.
Puig has an above-average career walk rate at 8.9%. Walk rates aren’t a stat that typically fluctuates too wildly, which is why it’s disconcerting to see his 2019 walk rate at a meager 2.2%. That’s two walks in 92 plate appearances. Among qualified batters, only Tim Anderson has a mark that low, and none are lower. His strikeout rate is up as well, sitting at 25%. That’s up 5.4% from 2018.
His deeper discipline numbers explain some of what we’re seeing.
Perhaps he’s pressing at the plate, trying to do too much to impress the Cincinnati faithful. Whether it’s that, or trying to get more aggressive at the plate, or something else (Puig trying to be every pitcher’s friend?), we just don’t know. Regardless of the reason, he’s reaching out of the zone far more than ever before. He’s swinging at everything, really, with a 59.2% swing rate that is second in MLB to only Jonathan Schoop, a notoriously aggressive hitter. As a result of those bad hacks, Puig has a 15% swinging strike rate that is his highest since his rookie season.
Part of Yasiel Puig’s batting average struggle is simply due to a .222 BABIP. That’s down nearly a hundred points from his career .315 BABIP, but there is some reasoning behind the low BABIP. He’s hitting more balls in the air than ever at 47.8%. His career rate is just 35.2%. While we can appreciate that perhaps he’s trying to hit for more power by getting more balls into the air, it doesn’t help his cause that he’s pushing the ball rather than pulling it. His pull% is down from 41.9% in 2018 to 31.3% this year, by far his lowest pull rate ever.
As you can see, Puig gets his power from pulling the ball. Only a handful of his career homers have gone to the opposite field. If he can get around on more balls and pull them in the air, particularly at Great American [Small] Park, he will hit for a ton of power. We’ve seen a patient Puig for really the entirety of his career, and I’d expect him to settle in and get back to his old self. As the weather warms up, so too should Yasiel Puig. This presents a bit of a buy-low opportunity.
Nathan Dokken is a member of the FSWA and has had his work featured in numerous books and magazines. He has also appeared on many podcasts and radio shows and hosts the Nasty Cast and Fantrax Dynasty Baseball podcasts. His written work can be found exclusively at Fantrax HQ, and his personal thoughts and opinions can be found on Twitter @NathanDokken.
Fantrax was one of the fastest growing fantasy sites of 2018 and things are only getting better! With multi-team trades, designated commissioner/league managers, and drag/drop easy click methods, Fantrax is sure to excite the serious fantasy sports fan – sign up now for a free year at Fantrax.com.