Nearly four weeks into the 2018 fantasy baseball season and rookies are already having an enormous impact on leagues. Let’s talk about the ones most impacting fantasy teams at the moment.
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Miguel Andujar (3B – NYY)
If it weren’t for his teammate Didi “top five shortstop in baseball” Gregorius, then Andujar would be the hottest hitter on the planet right now. Before Tuesday night’s hitless performance the rookie third baseman had at least one extra-base hit in seven straight games. The only other Yankee hitters to do that before the age of 24 were Mickey Mantle and Joe DiMaggio.
While Andujar would be lucky to have half the career either of those two did, he can help your fantasy team right now. From April 13 through Monday he was batting an insane .571 with three homers and eight RBIs. Even after his slow start, he leads the American League with eight doubles. He will likely be streaky, but there’s a good chance he’ll be an impact player all season.
Gleyber Torres (2B – NYY)
Another Yankee?! This rebuild keeps paying dividends. Whereas as Andujar came out of nowhere, Torres was arguably the face of this rebuild.
The 21-year-old infielder had his season cut short last year due to Tommy John surgery. He had a cold Spring Training and began the year in Triple-A. However, once that service time date passed, it was always a matter of if not when he got called up.
Those lucky enough to snag Torres once the news broke should be ecstatic about his potential. After a hitless debut, Torres has gotten three hits over his past two games. He’ll mostly hit at the bottom of the order to start out, but that’s more than alright in a loaded New York lineup.
Shohei Ohtani (SP/DH – LAA)
And just like that, the hype has considerably cooled down. First, there was the blister issue in his start against the Red Sox. Then came another mediocre performance on Tuesday night versus Houston (5 1/3 innings, six hits, four runs, seven strikeouts).
Ohtani now has a 4.43 ERA through four starts. What this shows is that Japan’s Babe Ruth is human. Maybe the league is beginning to adjust to him, or perhaps he just happened to face two really good offenses and the blister was an actual problem. It’s going to take a much larger sample size to figure out how good of a pitcher Ohtani is, so fantasy owners shouldn’t be looking to sell low right now.
On the plus side, even though he hasn’t homered in a couple weeks, Ohtani is still hitting. For the year he’s batting .333 with a 174 OPS+. For comparison, Mike Trout entered Tuesday night with a 197 OPS+.
Walker Buehler (SP – LAD)
I wish Los Angeles would bring Buehler up for good. After pitching out of the bullpen late last season, the 23-year-old made his first big league start on Monday night versus the Marlins. Buehler was on a strict pitch count (as he will be all season), but managed to provide value for those who streamed him anyway.
Buehler finished the night with five strikeouts over five shutout innings. He was immediately sent back down to Triple-A, though the expectation is he will be back to pitch in Saturday’s doubleheader versus the Giants. He’s worth streaming in that matchup too.
He might not be up for good just yet, and you might always have to check in on him, but really Buehler will be worth streaming in most of the starts he receives this year. Even with the pitch counts and innings limit, he has the stuff to post good ratios.
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Brendan Tuma is a correspondent at FantasyPros. To read more from Brendan, check out his archive and follow him @toomuchtuma.
