Fantasy Baseball Draft Targets: Luis Rengifo, Alec Bohm, Lourdes Gurriel

Targeting players for batting average and on-base percentage (OBP) are two very different things in today’s game. Outside of the top few rounds, you often have players who are good at hitting for average or have very good on-base skills. We will be looking at a total of 10 players today outside the top 100 of fantasy baseball average draft position (APD) in drafts. Four will be players to target for batting average; four will be players to target in OBP formats. We finish off the list with two sleepers for deep leagues.

P.S. The most obvious name is Luis Arraez. I did not forget about him but decided not to include the most obvious name of the bunch. I guess you can count this as his mention for batting average assets. He would be the top asset in this category.

Fantasy Baseball Players to Target for Batting Average

Batting Average Assets

These are players who will be contact-first types who have a track record of good-to-great batting averages you can target if you fall behind in the category early on. But you will notice that these players often come with concerns in other stat categories, so be sure to build for them.

Luis Rengifo (2B – LAA)

After we saw back-to-back seasons of batting .264, Luis Rengifo hit .300 last year. Although .300 is not as likely to repeat, we now have a strong track record of him hitting at least .264 in three straight seasons.

Rengifo is a bit of a free swinger, but he does make a lot of contact and has plus speed. This combination allows for the batting average on balls in play (BABIP) to remain higher as we saw this past season. Health is the only real concern but the skills allow for a good floor for another solid batting average season.

Alec Bohm (3B – PHI)

There aren’t many players who have been more consistent than Alec Bohm over the last few seasons. Strong plate discipline, hits the ball hard and to all fields and has hit at least .274 in the past three seasons.

Bohm will play every day and bat toward the middle of the order more times than not. He is very boring but you know what you are getting with him and there is no reason to doubt his skills yet.

Lourdes Gurriel (OF – ARI)

Here is a guy who quietly does his thing annually. Lourdes Gurriel has hit under .270 just once in his career. He is a career .279 hitter and has batted at least .279 in two of the last three seasons. Boring can be beautiful if you build for it.