Later-Round Batting Average Targets for Fantasy Baseball - Luis Arraez, Alex Verdugo, Brendan Rodgers and More

Fantasy baseball is a beautiful game. There are so many ways to build a competitive roster given all of the different ways for a player to contribute.

There are various different ways for players to contribute to your fantasy season in category leagues. This post series will take you through each of the five standard categories (runs, homers, runs batted in, stolen bases, and batting average), and highlight some of the names that you can get late in the draft that will help you in each category.

The idea here is to know what names can catch you up in a category you fall behind in early in the draft. It's important to compete across the board, punting categories is never a good idea. We are starting with batting average, let's find you some cheap names to bring up your team's projected batting average.

Considerations

#1 Not All Batting Averages Are Created Equal

A hitter that hits .280 over 500 ABs will help your team's batting average significantly more than someone hitting .280 over 400 ABs. This is a simple fact of division. For example, right now Nick Madrigal is projected to hit .295, but his AB projection is falling short of 500 ABs. Bryan Reynolds is projected to hit a lower .282 but projected for 552 ABs.

Imagine a fantasy season where your team racks up 6,000 ABs and hits .260 (1,560 hits). Adding Nick Madrigal's 132 hits in 449 ABs to that brings your team's batting average up to .2622. Adding Bryan Reynolds' 157 hits in 552 ABs does pretty much exactly the same, bringing your team's average to .2621. Reynolds would make up a higher percentage of your team's total ABs, so the hits he adds to your teams affect your overall batting average more.

This is also true in the inverse, take Yasmani Grandal for example. The guy is projected to hit just .236, but his AB projection is low at 412. This is because of the rest days he gets as a catcher, but also because of how often he walks. He will more often go 0/2 with two walks than an 0/4, so while both of those batting averages are .000 for the day, one hurts less. Keep an eye on AB projections.

#2 Batting Average Is Often A Trade-Off

The way to hit for a high batting average is to put a ton of balls in play. The way to put a ton of balls in play is often to swing the bat slower. A slower swing does two things:

1. Gives a hitter more control of the bat
2. Keeps the bat in the hitting zone for longer

Because of this, what we often see are the highest batting average projections coming with very low home run projections. The elite guys can do both at the same time, but the further down the draft board you go, the more homers and RBI you have to give up to get batting average.

Visualizing AVG vs. ADP

Here is a scatter plot with every hitter in the top-450 by ADP. It plots their projected batting average against their ADP. The dots high up on the plot are the highest batting average projections, and the names to the right of the plot have increasingly lower ADPs. We will pick out some names from this plot.

Late Round Targets

Luis Arraez, Minnesota Twins (ADP 320)

The Twins' utility man has the fourth-highest batting average projection in the league. Since his MLB debut in 2019, he has had one of the game's best contact rates at 91.7%. That leads to an elite strikeout rate of just 9.1% and a career batting average of .313.

The bad news is that he is the classic example of this trade-off between batting average and power. He has hit just six homers in his 966 career plate appearances, this is a big problem for your team's power production, taking a number below five in homers hampers you quite a bit.

If you are interested in Spring Training narratives, Arraez says he focused on strength over the offseason and worked out with Nelson Cruz:

Take that as you will, personally I would not be putting any stock into it, but who knows! Arraez is best rostered in deep leagues where each player's homer output has a smaller effect on the total, starting Arraez every day as one of your 10 or so hitters is going to hurt in everything but batting average - so be wary there.

Alex Verdugo, Boston Red Sox (ADP 160)

Still not much power here, but we're getting closer. Verdugo hit 13 homers in a full season last year and also added six steals. It's still a hit on your team's power numbers, but it's one you can make up for. The ADP is much different here as well, but Verdugo is worth a pick if you start your team out without much batting average.

His career 15.8% strikeout rate gives him a great batting average floor, and he might even be able to luck into 15+ homers if he gets lucky with some pull balls down the line in Fenway where homers are easy to find. He is also a potential runs scored stud if he hits near the top of the lineup for the Sox all year long; there are plenty of reasons to want Verdugo on your fantasy squad.

Brendan Rodgers, Colorado Rockies (ADP 160)

Coors Field is always a nice place to go for batting average. The former top prospect infielder improved his strikeout rate drastically last year in 415 PAs, posting a very nice 20.2% K% after being above 30% in his first two short stints with the Rockies in 2019 and 2020. That resulted in a .284 batting average that I think there's room for improvement on still.

Another interesting thing with Rodgers is that he has hit pretty well on the road as well so far, batting .261 away from Coors in his short career. A mark of .260 is right about the league average at this point, so even in the games away from Coors, he's not hurting you. I think he could hit .320 or so at home if things break right, and there's some power potential with him as well (a non-terrible 6.2% barrel rate last year).

Nick Madrigal, Chicago Cubs (ADP 300)

This pick is dependent on how it seems the Cubs will use him. Madrigal was traded to the Cubs last year while injured and did not appear in a game for them. The Cubs' lineup is pretty lackluster this year, which could give Madrigal a shot at leading off. If he does lead off all year long, he will likely lead the league in hits. This guy almost never swings and misses at pitches in the strike zone (97.6% Z-Contact% career), and overall he makes contact on 92% of his swings. He also almost never strikes out (7.4%) or walks (4.6% BB%), so he's putting a ball in play in nearly 90% of his plate appearances.

If he's hitting near the bottom of the order, he's not someone you want to start because his batting average will be completely empty. However, if he does lead off, he could score enough runs and steal enough bases to make up for the lack of power (two homers in his 324 career PAs), making him a pretty interesting guy to make a speculative add on.

Others: Amed Rosario, Michael Brantley, Jean Segura, Gio Urshela

Earlier Round Targets

My overall strategy is to prioritize the batting average early on so I don't put myself in the situation of feeling pressure to add one of the names we mentioned above. Here are the best targets in the top-100 for setting yourself up for success in batting average.

Corey Seager, Texas Rangers (ADP 80)

Seager has shown an elite strikeout rate in his career (18.5%), and that has come with no trade-off in power production. He has bombed 104 homers in 2,710 career PAs, good for a better-than-average 26 PA/HR. That power production has been on a steep upward slope as well, as he posted an elite 15.8% barrel rate in 2020 and then another strong number of 12.4% in 2021. Texas is not the hitter's paradise it used to be, but Seager's batting average will be maintained and he might just hit you 30 bombs as well.

Ketel Marte, Arizona Diamondbacks (ADP 80)

It's been an interesting stretch for Marte. He broke out in 2019 with 32 homers and a .329 batting average, proving to be one of the most valuable fantasy hitters in the game. He had a power outage in the short 2020 season, hitting just two homers in 195 plate appearances. Then he missed a lot of time in 2021 but still hit .318 in 374 plate appearances, with a nice home run pace (14).

What we know for sure about Marte is that he does not strike out much (14.9% career), and he has outrageous bat speed (max velocity of 116 last year, and he's cleared 115 in each of the last four seasons). He posted an above-average 8.9% barrel rate last year as well. There is serious 30 homer potential here, and he's a guy with a .275 batting average floor. He's much too cheap right now, and you should be targeting him in your drafts.

Others: Bryan Reynolds, Wander Franco, Nick Castellanos, Justin Turner, DJ LeMahieu

Thanks for checking out the post, check back soon for more late-round category targets!

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