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Anthony Rendon (3B – WSH)
After a solid first couple weeks to start the season, Rendon missed about two weeks with a foot injury. Since returning at the beginning of May he has yet to get going with any consistency, batting .239/.330/.489 with five homers, 13 RBIs, and nine runs scored. Rendon’s BABIP since the beginning of the season is just .274, which is a far cry from his typical .309, and there is good reason to believe his batting average will rise as his BABIP normalizes.
As he usually does, Rendon is walking at a rate of 11.3 percent with a corresponding strikeout rate of 15.5%, with both considered elite marks. Also, his contact rate of 88% represents a career high for him, so he is clearly seeing the ball well and adequately identifying pitches to hit. Given that he’s uncharacteristically chasing more pitches out of the zone, as seen in his chase rate (28.2% current versus 21.7% career), and getting an abnormal number of first-pitch strikes (63.1 percent current versus 59.3% career F-Strike%) there are no real impediments to keep his batting average down.
Rendon hit just one home run in the 62 plate appearances prior to his injury. Since returning, though, he’s clubbed five homers in 106 PA, so he’s apparently got his power stroke back. There is further good news in that his hard-hit rate is up to 37.4 percent, slightly higher than his career average of 36%.
He’s pulling the ball right at his career mark of 39% and his fly ball rate of 46.7% is an improvement over his 41% career average. There is every reason to think his .203 isolated power will continue to rise closer to last season’s .232 career high. The opportunity to get Rendon at a discount will be short-lived, so the time to strike is right now
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Cody Bellinger (1B/OF – LAD)
When Bellinger was called up by the Dodgers near the end of April last season, there were a lot of questions about whether his skill set would translate to the majors. It takes roughly 150 plate appearances for a batting average to stabilize. Once Bellinger reached that plateau around June 1, he put together a fantastic run of consistent production during which his batting average spent just two days at its low of .242, one day at its high of .277, and he finished the 2017 season at .267/.352/.581.
The primary reason for his success was his discipline at the plate. His strikeout rate of 26.6% was well above the league average (21.6%), and his walk rate (11.7%) was in elite territory and well above the league average (8.5%). There are only minor differences in Bellinger’s peripherals for this season, so it’s a bit baffling that his triple slash (.225/.298/.413) is so much lower. His current BABIP (.270) is only 10% lower than last season’s .299 and his contact rate (68.2%) is only slightly lower than last year’s 69.6%.
The biggest difference is in Bellinger’s power hitting; his isolated power has dropped to .188 from last year’s .315, his hard hit rate is down 6.5 percentage points to a still respectable 36.5 percent, and his fly ball rate is also down from 47.1% to 43.2%. None of these decreases are a big problem on their own, though. Even when you consider them collectively, they don’t really point to an insurmountable issue, but there is one other stat that defines the problem clearly in Bellinger’s case.
Bellinger’s infield pop up rate has nearly doubled from 8.4 percent to 16.4 percent. Indeed, his batting average on fly balls is down from .322 last season to a paltry .239 this year. In other words, Bellinger has fallen victim to the same problem that many veteran hitters have been afflicted with this season — pitchers have adjusted their pitch selection and are throwing fastballs higher in the zone to power hitters like Bellinger.
As a result, they are swinging under the pitches and popping them up. In addition, many of the pitches that are down lower in the hitting zone and in a power hitter’s wheelhouse are breaking balls that they end up swinging at and missing. So, there is some hope here that Bellinger can turn things around over the remaining four-plus months of the season. He needs to adjust and adapt to the new hitting environment that pitchers are presenting.
It may take a while longer for a relatively inexperienced player like Bellinger to adjust. He struggled to do so during the postseason last year in which he .219/.254/.393 over the three series, and that has carried into the new season. Right now, Bellinger’s value is about as low as it will get, so this is the perfect time to make an offer for him.
Sell
Scooter Gennett (2B/3B/OF – CIN)
Gennett is currently the best second baseman in MLB. Now there is a sentence I never thought I’d ever type. However, that’s the truth.
He’s been better than Brian Dozier and Whit Merrifield, and even Jose Altuve has been outhit by Gennett. In fact, since May 1, Gennett’s 2.0 wins above replacement is bested only by Mike Trout (2.3) and Jose Ramirez (2.1). During that time period, Gennett has batted .390/.414/.743 with 10 home runs, 27 RBIs, and 19 runs scored supported by a .425 BABIP.
Most of his peripherals are very much in line with what he gave us in 2017, the best season of his career to date. Despite the similarities, there is evidence that he’s playing over his head. His .389 BABIP for the season is 56 points higher than his career mark of .333, so some regression to the mean is in order, and we are likely to see his batting average drop because Gennett is not the speedy sort of player one needs to be to maintain such a high BABIP.
Over his career, Gennett’s hard-hit rate has averaged 30.6% and his batted ball profile indicates a player who hits equally to all fields with a groundball rate of around 43%. It is unlikely that Gennett can sustain his current 40.9 percent hard-hit rate, which is a full 33% higher than his career mark. He’s actually pulling the ball less and his fly ball rate is down almost 10% from last season.
All indications are that a power drop is in the cards. Many fantasy owners are undoubtedly looking at Gennett’s age (28) and thinking we are seeing a player at his peak. I think we saw Gennett at his ceiling last year and that it’s unlikely he can sustain his current production. Scooter is good, but not this good, and his overall fantasy value will never be higher.
Matt Kemp (OF – LAD)
The return of Kemp to the Dodgers organization is one of the nicer storylines of the 2018 season. After a couple of mediocre seasons with the Padres and Braves, Kemp is back in LA and tearing it up like he’s 23 instead of 33 years old. Since May 15, Kemp has batted .400/.415/.717 with four home runs, 16 RBIs, and 10 runs scored.
He currently leads the NL in batting average at .344, which is also good enough for second in MLB behind Mookie Betts (.359). He leads the Dodgers in most of the offensive categories for now. Kemp’s BABIP currently stands at .402, a dizzying height he hasn’t touched since way back in 2007 (.411), and way above his career mark (.340). Kemp was stealing bases like crazy as a young Dodger (oddly enough, not in 2007), but he no longer has that kind of speed skill, which makes his lofty BABIP almost impossible to sustain.
He’s also showing a significant spike in hard-hit percentage, which currently stands at 48.2%. This is well above his 35.7 percent career mark and would, by far, be the highest such mark of his career. Granted, he is pulling the ball more often this season (42.6%) and at his career average (42.1%), but his contact rate is lower than last year, and he’s swinging at a smaller percentage of pitches in the zone.
The disparities in the numbers point to both a fair amount of luck and some flukiness to the totals to date. It’s also worth mentioning that Kemp missed significant time with injuries last year and his history is dotted with several shortened seasons due to health. He’s another player whose fantasy value will never be higher than it is right now. Get out while the gettin’ is good.
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Tim McCullough is a featured writer at FantasyPros. For more from Tim, follow him @timstenz.
