This is ‘The Watchlist.’ This column is designed to help you monitor and pick up fantasy baseball players in the coming weeks and months. Whether they’re waiver wire or trade targets, these are the players you’ll want to add now before becoming the hot waiver commodity or trade target.

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Using underlying and advanced metrics, ‘The Watchlist’ will help you get ahead of the competition in your league and reap the rewards later from your pickups.

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 a different kind of player entirely. The point is they’ll help you find success in your fantasy league while staying ahead of the curve against your league mates.

Bobby Dalbec (1B, 3B – CWS)

Bobby Dalbec is more of a deeper league waiver wire addition at the moment, but there’s some intriguing power potential if he can carve out a regular role this season in Chicago with the White Sox.

Of course, Chicago has struggled mightily to score runs this season. Entering play on Wednesday, only two teams had scored fewer runs than the American League Central club (70). Only two teams had a lower collective wRC+ (70).

Of course, the flip side to that coin is that there should be plenty of opportunity to see fantasy-friendly plate appearances at the top of or in the middle of the lineup, particularly at Dalbec’s positions.

Andrew Vaughn and Miguel Vargas, Chicago’s regular starters at both infield corners, have the fifth and sixth-lowest wRC+ numbers among qualified batters this year at 28 and 32, respectively.

Of course, those numbers will improve. Among qualified batters last year, the hitter with the lowest wRC+ was Kansas City’s Maikel Garcia at 69. Those types of low wRC+ numbers don’t continue for a full season.

But it does highlight the need for reinforcements in the top half of the lineup — Vargas (leadoff) and Vaughn (cleanup) both occupied key spots in Chicago’s Opening Day lineup.

Enter Dalbec, who has a double and a walk in his first four place appearances for the club. He previously hit .326 with a .354 on-base percentage (OBP), a .451 wOBA and a 166 wRC+ in 48 plate appearances at Triple-A to start the year, adding four home runs and a stolen base in the process.

Furthermore, Dalbec has made one appearance each at first base and third base, which shouldn’t hurt his fantasy ceiling in the slightest if he continues to see regular playing time between both positions.

Regular playing time. That’s the key here.

Because we’ve seen what Dalbec can do when given an extended look in the Majors.

During the 2021 season with the Boston Red Sox, the 30-year-old logged 453 plate appearances for the American League East franchise. He hit 25 home runs on 53 barrels and had a 20.2% barrel rate.

Among players with at least 400 plate appearances that season, only Shohei Ohtani and Fernando Tatis Jr. had a higher barrel rate.

Dalbec followed up that season with 12 home runs, 24 barrels and an 11.8% barrel rate in 353 plate appearances for Boston in 2022.

If he can log somewhere in the neighborhood of 400 plate appearances for Chicago the rest of he way, he could easily push for 20 home runs. If he hits well, there’s also a chance, speculatively speaking, that he could be traded to a contender and step into a regular role in a better lineup down the stretch. That’s all speculative on my part, however.

Jake Bloss (SP – TOR)

Jake Bloss struggled mightily last season for the Houston Astros in three starts, allowing 16 hits, nine earned runs, five home runs and three walks in 11.2 innings while striking out 11. Still, it’s a tiny sample size for the 24-year-old top prospect.

And while his 2025 Triple-A sample size is similarly small and unideal statistically (it features a 7.31 ERA and a 5.81 FIP in four starts and 16 innings), the Blue Jays are running low on rotation options at the moment, which could (speculatively speaking) force their hand a bit with Bloss.

Of course, that’s once again all entirely speculative, but the team isn’t in the best shape after their frontline starters. Chris Bassitt has been excellent and Kevin Gausman has enjoyed a solid campaign, but with Max Scherzer currently on the injured list (IL), it has left the Blue Jays with Jose Berrios, Bowden Francis and Easton Lucas filling out the rest of the rotation.

Berrios has an even 0.0 fWAR and a 4.72 FIP in five starts and 28.2 innings. While Francis has pitched to a 3.13 ERA in four starts (23 innings), he’s also sporting a 5.42 FIP. Lucas, meanwhile, was recently optioned to the Minors after logging a 7.41 ERA and a 6.20 FIP in 17 innings.

Bloss is only someone to add if you have a reasonably deep bench. While his recent track record in the Minors and Majors lowers the floor, it’s hard to find a starting pitcher with his ceiling via the waiver wire in most league formats.

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Ben Rosener is a fantasy baseball writer whose work has appeared on the digital pages of FantasyPros, Pitcher List and Bleacher Report. He also writes about fantasy baseball for his own Substack page, Ben Rosener’s Fantasy Baseball Help Substack. He only refers to himself in the third person for bios.