BUXTON CALLED BACK UP
Danny Santana has been placed on the DL with a hamstring injury, and a day after I wrote that Byron Buxton should be called up (see the Daily Trends piece) he was called up by the Twins (how is that for Oracle power?). We don’t know how much time that Santana will miss, but one has to think that the Twins called up Buxton with the purpose of playing him daily for the foreseeable future. Here’s what we know about Buxton.
1 – The Twins have a need for a youthful dynamo to re-energize their slumping offense. Buxton is that kind of player.
2 – Buxton is a top-5 prospect in baseball according to every reliable scouting agency in the land. He’s an elite talent.
3 – Buxton appeared in 29 games at Triple-A this season hitting .336 with a .403 OBP and .603 SLG leading to a better than 1.000 OPS. That’s elite level stuff. He also hit six homers with four steals in that time putting him on a season long pace of about 30 homers and 20 steals. In truth the top end for Buxton would be a reversal of those numbers when he reaches his peak level.
4 – Despite the success he flashed at Triple-A he still struck out 26 times which continues a troubling trend of the whiff. In 63 games with the Twins, this season and last, he has struck out 68 times. One can accept that level of strikeouts in this day and age, but it’s not heartening. In fact, his awful 36.4 percent strikeout rate has led to a terrible .195 average, .239 OBP and .316 SLG with the Twins. His performance in the big leagues has been awful to date.
Buxton is an elite talent. He’s got the ability to hit 15 homers while stealing 30 bases right now. Of course, he’s not reaching either number this season, not with all the time he missed. At the same time he could perform like guys such as Billy Burns, Rajai Davis or Angel Pagan right now. His talent is immense, and he was sure enjoying copious levels of success down on the farm.
10-team: Tough to add him here. As a bench add it’s ok to look Buxton’s way, but with such a shallow setup he’s by no means a “must add.” Add him to your bench if you have roster space but don’t drop established options to do so.
12-team: Has the talent to be an OF3 in this format, but should be rostered as an OF5 that you hope will perform like an OF4. That means he shouldn’t be on waivers. Hopefully he’s your OF6 though so that you build depth just in case of a flameout.
15-team: A must add if available, period.
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DUVALL – A MUST ADD?
Adam Duvall hit two homers Monday, and five in six games, and with those dual blasts I probably received 25 questions about his status Sunday evening on Twitter. I’ve written about Duvall before in this Daily Trends piece, but let’s revisit the issue of what he brings to the diamond.
Duvall has hit 13 homers, just two behind Yoenis Cespedes and Mark Trumbo for the outfield lead in baseball. He’s also tied with Khris Davis for the most homers in all of baseball in May with 11 big flies. As I’ve said many times before, Duvall is a 25 homer bat, he’s just never been given the chance to show it. Alas, it looks like he’s more than that now. Hard to think he is though. Currently, Duvall is carrying a 26 percent HR/FB ratio giving him a mark of 27 percent his last 219 at-bats. Pretty sure he’s not going to be able to hold on to that, so the homer pace will slow moving forward.
Duvall hits a ton of fly balls, 47 percent his last 73 games, and that has helped him to post all the homers. At the same time it’s also one of the reasons that he’s hit .256 in that time. Unfortunately, he’s that type of hitter. Odds are he is more likely to hit .240 than .270 this year by the way (he’s currently at .271). I say that for the following reasons. (1) All those fly balls damage his upside in average since they are the least likely batted ball to end up as a hit. (2) During the last two seasons his strikeout rate is an atrocious 31.2 percent (the league worse mark last season was 31.0 percent for Chris Davis). You don’t often hit .270 with that many whiffs. (3) He has a mere 5.1 percent walk rate in that time or 12 walks in 237 plate appearances. You know me, I hate that kind of approach, especially when it comes to helping anyone out in the batting average category.
Finally, all of those strikeouts and fly balls have limited Duvall to a poor, below league average, on-base percentage of .305 in that time. Because he simply never gets on base he doesn’t score runs. Over those 73 games he’s hit 18 homers while scoring 30 times. Yes, that means he’s scored 12 times in 73 games when he didn’t knock himself in. Yikes.
Duvall owns some “revere splits.” A right handed bat, he should crush lefties, right? Not so much. His work against lefties has resulted in a .218/.292/.368 slash line while his work against righties is much better at .249/.286/.576 (those are career numbers by the way).
Duvall has but one steal as a big leaguer, so he offers nothing there in the least.
Duvall can blast the ball but he never walks, never gets on base, and never steals a base. He’s a Khris Davis, Mike Napoli or Colby Rasmus type of hitter.
10-team: A very limited bat that brings one thing – power. In a league this shallow he should be paired with a team full of speedy guys – maybe like Ben Revere – to balance out a squad. He’s tough to look at as more than a 5th outfielder given his holes and the fact his average will likely dip, but we all have use for a potential 25-30 homer bat, don’t we?
12-team: I would still like to have Duvall as my fifth outfielder in this format. The limitations are obvious and have been stated throughout this write-up.
15-team: OK, let’s say he’s a fourth outfielder here. In a league this deep the limitations are somewhat muted. Just realize that with his approach, and far too high HR/FB rate, that he could soon become a .230 hitter with little pop the next month or whatever as things normalize for the Reds’ outfielder.
Matt Holliday is performing much better lately. Carlos Gonzalez is tearing it up during his amazing run. Ian Desmond has been really productive, but can it last? CHECK OUT THE VIDEO.
Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday, 7 PM EDT and Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 7 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).