This weekly waiver-wire watch column is designed to help you monitor and pick up players in the coming weeks. These are the players you’ll want to add now before becoming the hot waiver commodity in a week or two. Using underlying and advanced metrics, this “watchlist” will help you get ahead of the competition in your league and reap the rewards from your pickups later.
The players could be anyone from a prospect in an ideal situation close to the Majors, a reliever in a saves+holds league, or even a starter doing well with misleading surface-level stats like ERA. They might even be hitters with quality underlying stats. Or they could be none of those types of players and entirely different.
The point is that they’ll help you find success in your fantasy league while staying ahead of the curve against your league mates.
Fantasy Baseball Waiver Wire Watch List
Similar to Kolten Wong in last week’s column, d’Arnaud could, speculatively speaking, benefit from his team resting some starters more often down the stretch ahead of the playoffs. Atlanta has already started to do this to a degree, with Sean Murphy only playing in four of the team’s nine September games prior to Monday.
Currently with a 15-game lead in the National League East over the Phillies, Atlanta can certainly afford to rest players like Murphy. The former A’s stalwart has been excellent this season, hitting .267 with a .377 on-base percentage, 20 home runs and a .402 xwOBA, but d’Arnaud has enjoyed a quality season at the plate as well.
The 34-year-old is batting .239 with a .294 on-base percentage and 11 home runs in 226 plate appearances, though he’s been better than those surface-level numbers would indicate.
d’Arnaud’s .342 xwOBA is on track to be his best ever in a full season and is sixth among all catchers with at least 200 plate appearances this season, trailing only Will Smith, Adley Rutschman, Yanier Diaz, Willson Contreras and Murphy. Elsewhere, his .471 xSLG would also be a new personal best in a full season if the campaign ended today, while d’Arnaud’s 43.8% hard-hit rate would be his second-best ever in a full season.
It also doesn’t hurt that more starts mean more plate appearances hitting in baseball’s best lineup.
Entering play Monday, Atlanta had scored 26 more runs than the next closest team (the Dodgers). Basically, if you pick an offensive stat, there’s a pretty good chance that Atlanta leads the league in that metric – as of the beginning of play Monday at least.
Home runs? Yep, they lead the way there with 273. How about wOBA? That too with a .359 mark. wRC+? Top of the league again with a 125 number. Other league-leading totals include RBI (799) and on-base percentage (.344). And oh yeah, batting average (.276) too.
While not quite as elite, at least comparatively speaking, Atlanta also ranks in the top 10 in terms of stolen bases (ninth with 115) and has the fourth-lowest strikeout rate as a team at 20.6%.
All that should benefit d’Arnaud significantly down the stretch in his starts. It’s arguably the most fantasy-friendly lineup in the league and Atlanta’s veteran catcher could prove to be a league winner if Murphy is rested with a bit more regularity in the season’s final weeks.
On one hand, Aaron Bummer has a 6.88 ERA in 52.1 innings pitched this season. On the other hand, completely disregard the ERA because it’s been nowhere near as indicative of how effective Bummer has been this year.
The 29-year-old has logged a 3.70 FIP and a 3.63 xERA in those 52.1 innings. And while he is walking a career-worst 5.33 batters per nine frames, reasonably high walk numbers are nothing new for the reliever who has walked more than three batters per nine innings in each of his last three full seasons but has never logged a FIP north of 3.45 during that span.
Elsewhere in White Sox news, closer Gregory Santos owns a 7.71 ERA and a 4.83 FIP in his last seven innings dating back to August 16.
It’s by no means a guarantee that Santos will be removed from the closer role in Chicago. Or that the White Sox will have an overabundance of save chances down the stretch – as of the beginning of play on Monday, the American League Central club was tied with the Rockies and Padres for the second-fewest saves in the second half with just seven total.
Still, potential save production – even if it’s just for a save or two here and there – is worth watching for this time of year when one save could tip the scales in a weekly matchup. In that regard, Bummer is very much worth a look here for fantasy managers with deeper benches in the event that Chicago makes a change at closer.
The 29-year-old would, speculatively speaking, seem to be the next in line for closing duties. He’s second on the team in fWAR among relievers after Santos and paces all Chicago bullpen members in high-leverage appearances since the beginning of August with seven. Bryan Shaw is the only other reliever who has logged more than four during that span.
Dynasty Addition/Trade Target of the Week
Sticking with the White Sox, sometimes it’s the prospects you acquire ahead of time in dynasty leagues that can make a significant impact for you.
As of now, one prospect who could end up fitting the bill is White Sox infielder Colson Montgomery, who’s been decidedly above average at the plate everywhere he’s gone as a 21-year-old in the minors this season:
- Complex League: 45 plate appearances, .353 average, .511 on-base percentage, one home run, 24.4% walk rate, 11.1% strikeout rate, 173 wRC+
- Advanced-A: 82 plate appearances, .345 average, .537 on-base percentage, three home runs, 24.4% walk rate, 18.3% strikeout rate, 198 wRC+
- Double-A: 139 plate appearances, .217 average, .394 on-base percentage, three home runs, 15.8% walk rate, 24.5% strikeout rate, 122 wRC+
And while it’s certainly not advisable to gauge a prospect’s upside based on their minor league production, the fact that Montgomery is finding so much success while also walking at significantly high rates is certainly a positive, especially from a fantasy standpoint in leagues where on-base percentage is part of the scoring.
Overall, there’s plenty to like long-term at the plate with the infielder, who ranks as FanGraphs’ 13th-best overall prospect at the moment ahead of the likes of Ethan Salas, Wyatt Langford, Marcelo Mayer, Kyle Harrison, Curtis Mead and Pete Crow-Armstrong.
Back in December, FanGraphs’ Eric Longenhagen wrote the following about Montgomery following the 2022 season:
“His in-zone contact rate on the year (89%) is very impressive for someone who detractors feared would be raw upon his entry into pro ball, and Montgomery is already doing measurable damage (based on his barrel%, hard hit%, and other sourced metrics assessing impact contact) on par with a typical starting big league shortstop.
Watch him hit and you see the breaking ball recognition and low-ball power, as well as the flexibility in Montgomery’s lower half that should help him move the barrel around the zone. … He may not have the power of a typical big league third baseman yet, but as a strapping, 6-foot-4, it’s likely to come with time, physical maturity, and a good strength program. It might not be long before Montgomery’s bat is better than Yoan Moncada‘s so perhaps a proactive shift to third base is a good idea. This is another potential homegrown star for the Sox.”
After trading away Lucas Giolito, Reynaldo Lopez, Kendall Graveman, Joe Kelly, Lance Lynn, Jake Burger and Kenyan Middleton at the trade deadline, the White Sox seem likely to be mired in another year of rebuilding next season. Of course, that’s all entirely speculative, but in addition to those deals, Yasmani Grandal, Elvis Andrus and Shaw are scheduled to become free agents this offseason, per Spotrac. According to the same site, Liam Hendriks and Tim Anderson both have club options for the 2024 campaign while Mike Clevinger has a mutual option.
It obviously remains to be seen just what the White Sox will do ahead of the 2024 season, but considering how the last few months have gone, it’s entirely possible that a youth movement could be very much in full effect ahead of Opening Day 2024. Of course, that’s all entirely speculative, but if Chicago fields a much younger roster next year, it should only help Montgomery’s prospects of making his Major League debut next season.
Acquire him now in dynasty formats, especially as that debut could come reasonably early in the year given how well the infielder has done at Double-A this season.
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