Champ or Chump: Niko Goodrum & Brandon Nimmo

There's a lot of fantasy analysis out there, and everybody has their own likes and dislikes when it comes to the numbers they look at. Personally, I can't stand Hard%. It was invented as a proxy to measure contact quality, but Statcast gives us specific numbers to measure the same thing much more precisely.

It's also taken out of context nearly all of the time. Raw Hard% is often cited as either a defense or refutation of a given player's HR/FB, but doing so is extremely problematic. Ground balls are never home runs no matter how hard they're hit, which is why Statcast separates grounders and airborne batted balls. The same split is available for Hard%, but I don't think I've ever seen it used. Likewise, Hard% does not trump foot speed or the shift as a predictor of a given player's BABIP.

All of that is a preamble to a fantasy analysis of Niko Goodrum and Brandon Nimmo. Contact quality is at the core of both of their profiles, but we won't be using Hard% to measure it.

The Fantasy Jury is Out

Niko Goodrum (OF/CIF/MIF, DET) - 10% Owned

Goodrum is putting up blah numbers (.246/.321/.466 with five HR and SB) for a blah team, taking the 26-year old off of the fantasy radar. However, a closer look reveals a good bit of upside here.

Let's begin with the power/speed combo Goodrum flashed on the farm. He hit .244/.332/.392 with five homers and 18 steals (four CS) in 238 PAs for Double-A Chattanooga in 2015. He walked a lot (11.8% BB%), a very positive sign for a guy who runs. His K% (21.4%) and BABIP (.299) were roughly average, suggesting a mediocre batting average to go with 20 HR and considerable SB potential.

Goodrum returned to Chattanooga in 2016, slashing .275/.357/.451 with six homers and eight steals (two CS) in 207 PAs. He struck out much more often (25.1% K%), but more than made up for it with an inflated BABIP (.352). He also continued to walk (10.6% BB%), maintaining the same general profile he had in his previous campaign.

Goodrum earned a shot at Triple-A Rochester in 2017, putting up his best season to date. He slashed .265/.309/.425 with 13 HR and 11 SB (and an unsightly seven CS) in 499 PAs. Both his K% (23.8%) and BB% (6%) declined relative to his Double-A performance, while his BABIP normalized somewhat to .326.

Double digit homers and steals automatically command fantasy attention, but environment makes Goodrum's performance look even better. Chattanooga is a hitter's park, inflating total runs scored (1.223), HR (1.110), and hits (1.110) from 2014-2016. Rochester did the exact opposite over the same time period, posting ballpark factors of 0.982, 0.905, and 0.979, respectively.

The Twins gave Goodrum a look in 2017, but he didn't play much at the MLB level until he joined the Tigers this season. His .308 BABIP might seem high, but his underlying peripherals suggest that he has been unfortunate so far this season.

First, Goodrum is only hitting .211 on grounders. He doesn't have a career baseline to compare it to, but his average exit velocity on ground balls is high (86mph) and he can run (28.7 ft./sec Statcast Sprint Speed). His 44.7% pull rate on grounders is way too low to care about the shift, so he should run BABIPs of at least .260 on the ground. Regression looks like his friend.

His 15.7% LD% is also on the low side. His rate bounced around in the minors, but generally landed around 19% or so. That's still below the league average, but even three additional percentage points would work wonders for his batting average considering his .769 BABIP on liners.

Baseball Savant's xStats metrics think that Goodrum should be hitting .257 with a .534 slugging percentage based on his launch angles and exit velocity, and the metric does not consider his plus speed at all. Throw in a couple of extra infield hits, and you're looking at a .265-.270 hitter. If you're concerned about his 26.7% K%, know that xStats are already calculated using a player's current rate.

That's more than playable in fantasy if he hits homers and steals bases. His 38.7% FB% is solid, giving him a floor of 15-20 HR before contact quality is considered. He's been hitting the ball with authority too, averaging 93.1mph on airborne batted balls with a borderline elite 13.3% rate of Brls/BBE. His 28.1% Pull% on fly balls is also above average, giving him the peripherals needed to support a 30 HR campaign at some point.

Goodrum has only been caught trying to steal once this season, so he appears to have figured out whatever hindered his success rate in the minors last year. The Tigers have bounced him all over their lineup, but he most often bats 5th. That could add some RBI to his reasonable batting average and HR/SB totals, making him a versatile fantasy asset who may qualify at every offensive position except catcher.

Verdict: Champ

 
Brandon Nimmo (OF, NYM) - 55% Owned

Nimmo got a chance to play with Yoenis Cespedes' latest trip to the DL, and he's taken advantage to the tune of a .280/.419/.568 line with seven homers and five steals (two CS) in 155 PAs. Nimmo's elite plate discipline (14.2% BB%, 22.2% chase rate this year) has never been questioned, but detractors have pointed to low FB% rates and SB totals as reasons to avoid him in fantasy.

It's true that Nimmo's never hit more than 12 HR or stolen more than 14 bases in a calendar year, but he's completely changed his approach in 2018. His 47.7% FB% towers over his 36.9% career mark, itself inflated by this season's 155 PAs. Last year, only 32.8% of Nimmo's batted balls were classified as flies. He's also pulling more fly balls than ever before (35.7% vs. 26% career and 12.8% last year).

His fly balls have additional oomph behind them as well. When Nimmo debuted in 2016, his average airborne exit velocity of 90mph was mediocre while his 1.9% rate of Brls/BBE was laughable. Last season, he accomplished league average marks in both metrics (92.7mph, 6.7% Brls/BBE) but lacked the volume of fly balls to do anything with them.

This season, his 96.8mph average airborne exit velocity ranks 33rd in MLB (minimum 50 batted balls). His 11.2% rate of Brls/BBE is also well above average. Nimmo's naysayers were right in that his profile before this year was never producing fantasy-relevant power numbers, but he's completely remade himself at the plate. This new version of Nimmo is well worth rostering.

That said, the new Nimmo is not a .280 hitter. Nimmo's fly ball approach has produced a startling number of pop-ups (19% IFFB% vs. 10.4% career and 5.1% last season), making his current .200 BABIP on fly balls impossible to sustain. His new approach also seems to have cost him a few line drives (20.5% LD%) relative to his career rate (24.2%).

Finally, his .286 BABIP on ground balls is higher than his career mark of .267 despite a running trend of lower exit velocities on ground balls (86.2mph in 2016, 85mph in 2017, 83.4mph this year). To be clear, his ground ball exit velocity is still above average. He can also run (28.4 ft./sec Statcast Sprint) and doesn't care about the shift with his 50% Pull% on ground balls.

Baseball Savant's xStats say that Nimmo deserved a .252 average so far this year. That probably goes up to .260 or so with a few extra speed-related hits, making him a slight drag on the average fantasy team. His BB% helps in this regard by lowering the total ABs he contributes to a team. After all, 0-for-2 with two walks hurts a lot less than 0-for-4.

Nimmo is currently leading off for the Mets, sapping some of the RBI potential that should accompany his power. While there is some risk that he reverts to his old ways, the new Nimmo deserves a home in the vast majority of leagues.

Verdict: Champ

More 2018 Player Outlooks