The xFiles: Buyer Beware

Over my last two articles, I have given you hitters I think are draft bargains (read here) as well as pitchers I think are draft bargains (read here).

As we get closer to the end of the draft season I wanted to give you one final bit of drafting advice and offer you some players who I am avoiding due to the market being far more bullish on them than I am.  These players all have some underlying metrics that make me wary of their potential upside given their current price tag.

Here are a few of the more popular players I’m fading in 2025, buyer beware:

Julio Rodriguez, OF SEA – 16.79 ADP

I might be alone here but I think J-Rod is the most overrated player in fantasy baseball. Don’t get me wrong, he has the talent to be one of the absolute best players in the game, but unless you’re willing to give him a pass for his wildly disappointing 2024, there’s good reason to pass on him at anything close to his current ADP. For starters, he ranked 59th in xwOBA last season — far from elite. Also, despite playing a nearly full slate of games (143 GP), he hit just 20 home runs with RBI and Run totals both below 80. His stolen base total dropped as well, from 37 in 2023 to 24 last season. 

How is a player so gifted putting up those kinds of numbers? Well, it wasn’t poor luck; he had a .344 BABIP, which is quite lucky. It all really speaks to a poor hitting approach and weaker than expected contact skills. J-Rod is a free swinger who is susceptible to expanding the strike zone far too often. This leads to a lot of swings and misses — he had a 15.5 SwStr% (swinging strike percentage) last season, a decline from 14.4% the year before (ideally, he would be making progress in this area and getting the average closer to 10). His Z-Contact% (zone contact percentage) dropped as well, from 83.8% to 80.9% last season, meaning he was swinging and missing a lot of pitches in the zone as well — a bad sign. 

This propensity to chase, plus struggles to make contact even in the zone, are real red flags for J-Rod, who could and perhaps still will be a great hitter one day. I’m just not ready to bet on him based on what we saw last season, especially early in the second round. I need someone I can hang my hat on that early, and he just isn’t that guy for me. Yet. 

Freddie Freeman, 1B LAD – 26.3 ADP

Father Time is undefeated, and Freeman, at age 35, seems already in the midst of a battle with his own baseball mortality. He’s coming off arguably the worst statistical season of his career, not just in terms of his counting stats (.282 BA, 22 HR, 81 runs, 89 RBI, 9 SB) but advanced stats as well (.367 wOBA, 89.4 Exit Velocity, 9.1 Barrel%).  Even in decline, those numbers remain highly respectful. However, they don’t warrant a late second or early 3rd round pick, especially when it’s very easy to project more skill degradation with each passing year. Freeman is a big pass for me in the late second and early third rounds. He should remain steady, but the production is likely to be closer to average than borderline elite — which you should definitely want from a pick this early.

Jose Altuve, 2B HOU – 42.18 ADP

So—yeah. Remember what I just said about Freddie Freeman and Father Time? I think it’s coming for Altuve in 2025 as well. He was still really good last season, but his .316 xwOBA was one of the worst in his career, his ISO (isolated slugging percentage) went from .211 to .145, and it’s hard to shake the feeling that the move to left field, which hasn’t gone smoothly this spring, will have a negative impact on him this year. Father Time will tell.

Brent Rooker, OF ATH – 46.4 ADP

The Rooker breakout was a sight to behold in 2024. He consistently barreled the crap out of the ball (16.6 Barrel%) and posted one of the league’s best xwOBA (.380). He was especially great the last three months of the season and there’s no doubt he carried many a team into the playoffs and perhaps beyond. There’s an argument to be made that he was the fantasy MVP based on how cheaply he came in drafts and how much value he returned in season. Unfortunately, the days of getting Rooker at a bargain price are gone and it’s hard to shake the fact that while the power is likely legit his ability to hit for decent average probably is not. Rooker had a .362 BABIP last season. With regression likely and a K-rate near 30%, it’s best to draft Rooker with the expectation of an average closer to .240 than .300 — he hit .293 last season. What often comes with hitting .240 is some pretty massive ups and downs. While Rooker was able to evade a massive slump last season, I suspect he won’t be as fortunate in 2025. He’ll still be a good source of power, but one you wish you hadn’t taken in the 4th round.

James Wood, OF WSH – 52.98 ADP

I love Wood’s talent and he has looked amazing this spring. If you’re in a keeper or dynasty, completely disregard what I say below, because I do think Wood will eventually be a star. I’m just concerned with his current ability — or lack of ability — to lift the ball on a consistent basis. Wood had a 2.4 Launch Angle last season and a 55.6 GB%. This wasn’t a small sample size or league adjustment either. The numbers were eerily similar in AAA. The problem here isn’t that Wood can’t put good wood on the ball. He did and does hit the ball very hard, despite its trajectory. However, there is literally no precedent for an elite power hitter with numbers like that. If you look at all the elite power hitters in the sport, you’d be hard pressed to find one with a GB% above 46%, much less above 50%. In fact, among ALL hitters who qualified last season, the single highest GB% was 56.1%. That put Wood in elite territory, albeit for dubious reasons. His LA was also half that of some of the more respectable players with high GB%, like Yandy Diaz and William Contrares, who boult had LA above 5.

This is not to say Wood can’t and won’t start lifting the ball more. In fact, he’s been lifting much better this spring. But it makes me nervous, especially since you’ll likely have to draft Wood in the 4th or 5th round if you want to land him. That’s a bit rich for me given the fact I can get the likes of Wyatt Langford and Oneil Cruz in the same range, both of which offer similarly tremendous upside. Not saying Wood can’t or even won’t outperform those guys, but until he starts lifting I’ll take a pass and let others gamble on his upside, at least in redraft leagues where the runway for improvement is significantly shorter.

Michael Harris II, OF ATL – 59.89 ADP

Harris took the league by storm in his 2022 debut season, when at age 21 he hit 19 HR, stole 20 bases, and posted an impressive .853 OPS. At that point, the baseball world assumed a star was born. Those assumptions still persist a full three years later, and while Harris has been by no means awful since, he has yet to repeat the pace of his sizzling debut, much less exceed it. There’s no question Harris has talent and ability. He hits the ball hard and according to Statcast is still an above average runner. However, last season was his worst to date when he hit 16 HR and stole a relatively meager 10 bases in 110 games. The potential for Harris to be really good and even great is still there. However, until he reigns in his approach (39.4 O-Swing %), I do not see him reaching the upper echelon of his ceiling. Plate discipline is one of the hardest things to develop, and while Harris has solid contact skills, he’s gotta improve his selectivity to truly reach his star upside. That, and he’s gotta get smarter on the base paths. There’s no excuse for a player with a 75th percentile sprint speed to have a -1.3 BsR (base running runs above average according to Fangraphs). This is all to say that Harris still has some pretty significant flaws to shore up as a player and while he could certainly provide surplus value around pick 60, he could also leave you wanting more. Just as he has since his debut.

Pete Crow-Armstrong, OF CHC – 171.68 ADP

Real life PCA is awesome — a total defensive sensation with colorful hair and personality to boot. Fantasy league PCA is a different story. Yes, he hit 10 HR and stole 27 bases as a rookie last season. Yes, that is all valuable, especially in leagues that differentiate OF positions. However, what wasn’t awesome was his rate stats or the awful hitting approach that contributed greatly to those rate stat struggles. I don’t want to judge the kid strictly on his first big league look, but his approach during his first 400 AB was pretty unredeeming. Put simply, PCA swings at everything. His 59% swing rate was among the highest in baseball and his outside of the zone (41.3 O-Swing%) swing percentage was exceedingly high too, both of which are almost always harbingers for bad offensive outcomes, except in the most extreme and exceptional cases, of which PCA probably isn’t one. Again, approach is one of the hardest things for hitters to improve. PCA has a very, very, very long way to go in terms of developing even a passable big league approach. He’s a great defensive player and his defense will likely keep him in the lineup most days, but you are going to have to stomach a lot pain in terms of negative average, OBP, and OPS just get the stolen bases you’re likely picking him for. Is it worth it? Definitely not at pick 171.

Xavier Edwards, SS MIA – 175.64 ADP

I love players with Edwards’ profile — great approach, disruptive on the base paths, kind of a throwback. I want him to be really good, despite his nearly total lack of power. However, I worry that 2024 was as good as it’ll ever get for the young speed merchant. Sure, he’ll still steal a lot of bases and provide value, especially for managers strictly chasing speed. But, there’s no getting past the .398 BABIP and .296 xwOBA that he posted in 2024. Both speak to a much more fringy 2025 and perhaps beyond. Fast players can greatly exceed typical BABIP expectations, but nobody can sustain a BABIP near .400. That number will come crashing down for sure, and with it his elite average and many of his base stealing opportunities. He could still steal 40+ bags, but probably with closer to a league average AVG and very little in the way of power or RBI. It’s basically steals and empty calories – .280/.340/.370, 2 HR, 70 runs, 40 RBI, 45 SB. Maybe that’s worth it around pick 175 for you? Over PCA, sure. But for me, I think I’ll pass on yet another speedster here unless I’m really desperate to add stolen bases.