Way Too Early (Or Not?) Outfield Risers

Now that we are a week into the season, I have the total urge to make judgements on all my players and teams. On one hand, you do have to act quickly. If you wait for a batter to take like 5 good swings, you’re often too late. On the other hand, do you really want to use tons of precious FAAB on a career minor leaguer on a very small sample size major league heater? There are no correct answers. 

Having got that out of the way, I want to take a look at a handful of outfielders that have popped in a small sample size. Format matters of course, the top guys have little to no value in shallow leagues and the bottom ones are likely gobbled up most everywhere. Stats and the Razzball Player Rater ranks and values are through Saturday’s games. I will go in somewhat of a reverse order of availability (FAAB or a cheap trade)

Trent Grisham OF:8, $33.3 Earned Auction Value, .417, 3 homers, 8 runs, 7 RBI’s

Who saw this one coming? He entered the season looking like a part-time 4th outfielder with a few tools that make him valuable in a real baseball sense on a powerful team that would just spot him in at times. He has an above average OF glove, can take a walk (11.5% career BB%) and some pop (8.7% Barrel%, .174 ISO). He also carries .215 career BA, which makes him Jo Adell without as much speed or regular PT. Grisham simply does not swing the bat enough. He has a career 56.6% Z-Swing%. For context, the entirety of MLB had a 69.2% Z-Swing% in 2024. Now of course he will not keep this up. I mean here is his Statcast page so far

And that’s without using a Torpedo Bat, assuming his Yahoo page is correct. Of course, Grisham will regress, but I have to say I have more deep league interest here than I expected when I started this dive. He’s a rare lefty part-timer with reverse career splits (111 wRC+ vs. lefties, 89 vs. righties). The risks here are PT and his terrible batting average. As long as he hits like this, the Yankees have enough moving parts to get him regular at-bats. He can play in place of any of Paul Goldschmidt, Cody Bellinger, Jasson Dominguez or Ben Rice. “Old”Schmidt will get regular days off, Belli is currently nursing a back issue and the latter two have yet to prove themselves on the big league level.

Jake Mangum OF-25 $18.3 EAV, .474, 3 steals, 10% K%

Is his nickname “Mangum PI”? Am I dating myself with that reference? I’ll move on now.

The 29 year-old career minor leaguer resided on precisely no one’s radar ahead of the season. I do remember the Mets drafting him (and a bunch of other college seniors) in a year when they went way over slot to snag another player (Matt Allen) and they had to use the rest of their picks on easily signable guys. But I digress. Mangum profiled in the minors as a nice batting average asset with a hint of speed and an almost complete dearth of pop. He slashed .317/.357/.442 in Durham for the Rays AAA affiliate, with 6 homers and 20 steals in 426 PA’s. That’s all pretty typical as he’s hit at least .285 with 14-19 steals and 5-9 homers every minor league season back to 2021. He certainly deserves a look as in peak Rays fashion, he now plays most days, and often bats near the top of the order. He’s deep league viable only, in my humble opinion, and you can maybe ride it out until the Rays regularly start yanking him in and out of the lineup. Mangum seems to have supplanted Christopher Morel for now (not a terribly high bar). The Rays have a much better option as this sort of player in Chandler Simpson down in the minors, so it’s probably just a matter of how long they want to delay Simpson’s service time clock.

Kameron Misner OF-38, $12.2 EAV, 1 homer, .364

Yet another Peak Ray. Misner came in for the injured Josh Lowe on Opening Day and promptly hit a walkoff homer. He’s 27 and has a bit more pop than Mangum as he hit 248/.360/.442 with 21 homers and 30 steals in Durham. Misner probably has a better chance to stick in the Lowe spot if/when Simpson gets the nod as he has a less redundant skill set. Again though, keep expectations well in check. The optimistic case is that he gets strong-side platoon run with a modest power-speed combo and a bad Avg.

Harrison Bader OF-30, $16.7 EAV, 3 HR, 8 RBI

Once upon a time, Bader was a promising power-speed prospect in his own right with a terrific glove in Center. The glove remains excellent, but injuries and mediocre EVs and Barrel rates have kept the overall production on the meh side. Bader did pop 12 homers with 17 steals and a career high 51 RBIs in 2024 for the Mets in 437 PAs. Alas it came with a .236 Avg, basically in line with his career .242 mark. Yes, Bader has gotten off to a hot start and his glove will keep him in the lineup to a point. He has started most, but not all games, and has hit at or near the bottom of the order. That could change if he keeps up this production and/or the Twins sustain some injuries. And c’mon, it’s the Twins, they collectively make Bader look like a picture of health. I like Bader better than the above Rays as a deep league OF(5) or bench bat that you can spot in when he has favorable matchups (or when he’s on a heater like this).

Careful going too crazy for Bader though. His bat speed has increased slightly from a mediocre 71.2 mph to a slightly less mediocre 72.2. I need more data to tell me how much I should care about bat speed. Common sense says every hitter can swing faster, but can they do that without sacrificing quality contact? See Gallo, Joey. We had no public data during his prime, but I imagine Gallo was at or near tops in MLB in bat speed. Yada yada yada, Bader has a 40% HardHit% REALLY early, vs, 32.3% for his career, but his SwStr% of 12.9% is up from 10.8% overall. And we are only talking about him here because of those 3 homers. As I type this he has yet to take a walk, and he has a .211 Avg.

Gavin Sheets OF-33, $15.4 EAV, .381, 1 homer, 1 steal

The Padres have shown an ability in recent years to take veteran castoffs from around MLB, bring them to sunny San Diego, and watch them thrive in part-time roles. Sheets is this year’s promising project that has gotten off to a nice start. The corner OF/1B strong side platoon bat has shown a whiff of pop as he had double digit home runs in each of the past 4 seasons toiling for the White Sox. And it comes with a 20.7% K%, 10.1% SwStr% and 7.9% BB%, so decent plate skills. I have really tried to avoid pure platoon guys as much as possible this season, especially ones with no defensive value. Sheets embodies exactly that sort of player. He has dual 1B/OF eligibility, but fields neither well. He ranked in the 4th percentile in range and the 6th in fielding runs value last season. He will mostly DH in San Diego, but on the occasions he gets on the field he will lose PAs to late inning defensive replacements. Also is the definition of a strong-side platoon guy. Nearly 88% of his career PA’s have come vs. righties. And that is for good reason as he has a .162 Avg and .203 wOBA in his career vs. southpaws. He might have use at the end of a deep league bench as a guy you can spot in vs. righties. But expect massive frustration in an NFBC type format with half-weeks when you sit him and he hits 2 homers on your bench in his one start. I will pass here.

Wilyer Abreu OF-3, $42.3 EAV, .500, 3 homers, 9 runs, 8 RBI, 1 steal, 24.1% BB%, 6.9% K%

It’s only 29 PAs, but wow. It’s impossible to completely avoid platoon bats in deep formats. That is especially true for outfielders as the pool just does not have enough of them to go around. Abreu is one I like! I only drafted him once, but it was a Main Event so I will cross my fingers. Obviously, Abreu will not maintain his insane start. He has a career 27% K% and 12.5% SwStr%. I will buy that he can improve upon that as his K% was in the low 20’s in his last two seasons in the minors. But his early 2025 K% will obviously regress much higher. Still, he has some major skills, with an 11% Barrel% and 91.6 EV  .270 career Avg and a whiff of speed as he stole 8 bags last season. He does platoon and the Sox have Roman Anthony waiting in the wings to take an OF spot. But unlike Sheets, Abreu can field (89th percentile fielding run value last season). As it stands now, Cedanne Rafaella will get bumped for Anthony before Abreu does. Optimistically, Abreu can go 20 homers and 10 steals with a plus batting average hitting 5th to 7th in a potent Red Sox lineup. He will not be available in anything but a super shallow league, but in trading leagues if someone wants to cash in at a modestly elevated price, I would absolutely give it a look.

Victor Scott II OF-17, $22.5 EAV, 4 steals, .308, 1 HR, 5 runs, 5 RBI

I completely whiffed on VS2, mostly thanks to the bad taste of Scott completely whiffing in his limited 2024 opportunities. But he got the Cards CF job on the heels of a strong Spring, something I fully knew about and ignored. I don’t love rostering this profile, all speed, no power, and not even a batting average asset. Can he keep this up? He could easily swipe 50 bags, but early on he remains a very weak contact guy with 19th percentile HardHit%, 25th percentile Squared-Up%, and 8th percentile Bat Speed. A batter like that really needs above average contact skills to make up for a lack of pop. So far it’s unclear VS2 can do that as he has a 20% K%, right about where projection systems peg him for the season. His 83.7% Z-Contact% is also near league average. He could provide epic steals totals, but you need to make up for his lack of power via other roster spots. I needed steals in one of my Mains and got sniped mid-12th round for Tommy Edman and pivoted to Victor Robles, essentially just a better version of VS2 but 3-5 rounds earlier. In hindsight, I would have gone in a different direction with that pick and pushed up Scott on my board.