Major League Baseball has now played two of its 26 weeks this season, which means we have minimal stats to evaluate players for our fantasy baseball squads. With Opening Day past us and the dog days of summer ahead, who have been some of the more interesting risers and fallers?
In the aggregate, two weeks of production is not a lot of information to use when evaluating players for the rest of the season. That’s why it’s also important to look at usage, lineup placement, platoon splits, and other factors when trying to determine what to do with tough player choices.
This piece will look at some MLB fantasy assets that have seen their fantasy value rise and fall through the first two weeks of games. This will hopefully give us an idea of what to do with these players moving forward.
Roster percentages (from Yahoo) and stats include all games finished by April 8.
MLB Risers
Tyler Soderstrom (1B), Athletics
Anytime you are at the top of the homerun leaderboards – and tied with Aaron Judge – it’s time to put your name squarely on the “Risers” list. If you like looking at a lot of red at one time, just go peruse Tyler Soderstrom’s Statcast page to see how awesome his power is this year.
Compared to last season, his barrel rate, hard-hit rate, launch angle, and exit velocity are all way up, and he is hitting fly balls 38% of the time this season. That’s a recipe for power, and he has six early home runs to show for it.
There are some things like batting average on balls in play (BABIP) and home run per flyball rate working in his favor, but the under-the-hood metrics all say that this is legit power and won’t be disappearing unless there is injury or something fluky going on.
If you grabbed Soderstrom late in drafts (pick 280 in spring drafts) or off the waiver wire, congratulations. You have a 30-home-run hitter essentially for free.
Ben Rice (1B/DH), New York Yankees
Remind me why the Yankees gave Paul Goldschmidt a $12.5 million salary this season. Ben Rice, who has played plenty of first base in his four-year minor league stint in the Yankees’ system, has claimed a full-time role as the DH this season and is absolutely crushing it.
Rice is hitting .323/.447/.645 with two home runs, two steals, and an 18% walk rate through two weeks. His Statcast page looks like someone laid red ink pens horizontally across the middle of the screen. The power is legit through the first couple of weeks of his full-time audition, and if he can cut down on strikeouts, there may actually be room for improvement.
Just 26 years old, Rice is still improving and may be the long-term answer to first base the Yankees have been looking for since Mark Teixeira retired.
Hunter Greene (SP), Cincinnati Reds
If Major League Baseball handed out two-week Cy Young awards, the first winner this season would unanimously go to Hunter Greene. In his first three starts, Greene has compiled a 1.31 ERA, a 0.63 WHIP, and a 23:3 strikeout-to-walk ratio over 20.2 innings.
Greene has always had the potential for dominance because of his lightning fastball, but how he has harnessed his command early in the season, and he is keeping the ball in the ballpark (just one home run allowed). If Greene keeps up that kind of repertoire, we will be talking about Cy Youngs associated with his name again in about six months.
Going just around pick 100 in drafts this spring, Greene currently looks like the steal of the pitcher class in 2025. At just 25 years old and with a fastball sitting 99.4 miles per hour this season, Greene is firmly on the way up.
MLB Fallers
Mark Vientos (3B), New York Mets
The bottom 10 MLB hitters in OPS is an ugly list right now, and unfortunately, Mark Vientos finds himself on it. His .412 OPS through Wednesday is one of the worst numbers in the entire league, and reflects his poor batting average, power, and lack of run production through the first two weeks. Despite being drafted as a top-10 third baseman after a 27-homer season in 2024, Vientos has quickly crashed down to earth.
He is hitting .125/.239/.175 with no home runs and one RBI. His barrel rate, exit velocity, hard-hit rate, and strikeout rate are all worse so far in 2025. Could it be bad luck? It’s possible. His BABIP is very low at .161, but the swing and approach need to support better production, and right now they don’t.
Vientos has already been dropped from fifth in the batting order to sixth in four of the last six games. If he doesn’t improve soon, he might start to see some days off in his future.
Spencer Steer (1B/OF), Cincinnati Reds
After a 20-homer, 25-steal season in 2024, the hype was real for Spencer Steer coming into 2025. His low .225 batting average was dismissed due to a low BABIP. His walk rate and strikeout rate were sublime, and he was entering his prime age-27 season.
But through two weeks, Steer has looked anything like the player who made his way into the top 130 players in spring drafts. He is hitting .161/.235/.323 with one home run and no steals. He has been dropped to seventh in the Reds’ lineup in recent days. And as the primary DH, he is the easiest player in the lineup to replace or platoon.
Cincinnati doesn’t appear to be at that place yet with Steer, but his walk rate and strikeout rate are both going way in the wrong direction. He has a long way to go to live up to the preseason hype.
Carlos Rodon (SP), New York Yankees
Carlos Rodon is in the top 20 of innings pitched so far this season. That’s great news for the oft-injured starting pitcher, but it makes the fact that he has a 5.19 ERA sting that much worse. Despite averaging more than a strikeout per inning. Rodon has not been able to limit the men on base or the earned runs, and the beginning of the season is turning into a bit of a disaster.
Rodon has allowed 20 baserunners through three starts, resulting in 10 earned runs. It’s a shocking number when you consider his batting average against is just .186 and his WHIP is 1.15. But batters are either squaring him up or letting him deliver a free pass, and the men on base are coming back to haunt him.
Rodon crept into the top 140 of drafts by the end of the offseason, but now already has a pair of losses to go along with his high ERA. Right now, it looks like a velocity issue. His fastball is down two miles per hour from 202,4 and the slider is down 1.5. If he can ramp that back up, he should get back on track.
