The 2017 season has become the year of the breakout player. Some of these breakouts could have been predicted. Others not so much. Most fantasy baseball owners probably have at least one or two breakout players on their roster. And I bet you’ve thought “Should I sell high on these guys?” at least a few times this season. If you have either of the players below, that answer is yes.
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I’m actually a big fan of Sano. The guy has extraordinary raw power that few in the game can match. He’s putting that power on full display so far this season with 18 home runs in his first 238 at-bats. That’s a home run for every 13.2 at-bats. Not too shabby. I’ve always bought into his elite power potential, and probably always will. However, the area that just doesn’t seem right this season is his batting average.
We’re almost halfway through the season and Sano’s average is still hovering close to .300 at .286. By most standards, that’s not an overly high batting average, but when you look at Sano’s advanced metrics, it wreaks of heavy regression in the second half of the season.
Let’s start with his BABIP that currently sits at .410. To put that in context, the MLB average BABIP for hitters is usually in the .300 range. Good hitters will usually be 40 to 50 points higher than that, while lesser hitters will be 40 to 50 points in the other direction. Sano’s current mark is simply unsustainable.
If he had made gains in other areas, it might be more believable that he could keep his average near its current mark. However, that really hasn’t been the case. Sano has made minimal gains in is walk rate (up 3.4% from 2016) and his strikeout rate (down 1.6%) but neither of those support a near 60 point rise in batting average. He’s still striking out in 34.4% of his at-bats which is a sure fire way to limit your batting average.
If you have Sano on your roster, I wouldn’t be running to sell him off, but some regression seems to be coming. The power is legit and it wouldn’t be surprising to see him over 40 home runs at the end of the season, but that .286 average will fall. And not just fall slightly, dramatically.
Unlike Sano above, Alonso is a regression candidate for a totally different reason. His current power totals are what stick out like a sore thumb. Back when he was a youngster in the Cincinnati system, Alonso was a pretty promising prospect. However, it wasn’t for his power as much as his batting average potential.
There are a few stats that jump out when taking a look at Alonso. First is that he’s hitting fly balls much more frequently this year. In 2014, Alonso hit fly balls 38.5% of the time, which was his previous career high. That number has skyrocketed to 50.3% so far this season. A lot of that jump can be attested to an adjustment in his approach at the plate, but that’s a pretty big jump for a player on the wrong side of 30.
The second number is one that seems a lot flukier. Over his career, Alonso’s fly balls have turned into home runs 8.5% of the time. You can probably figure out where I’m going with this. Yep, that number has almost tripled this season to 22.1%. That monumental jump seems a lot less sustainable. If Alonso was making a lot more hard contact, his HR/FB rate and overall power surge would be a tad more believable. He is, but only 3.6% more than last year when he hit seven home runs in 482 at-bats.
Alonso’s home run pace has already started to slow down. After hitting 13 home runs in his first 117 at-bats, he’s only managed four in his last 86 at-bats and has just a single blast over the last two weeks.
The time to sell Alonso is now before other owners in your league realize his 2017 power binge isn’t for real. His value might never be higher than it is right now.
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Eric Cross is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Eric, check out his archive and follow him @EricCross04.
