Is Javier Báez a fantasy baseball draft steal?
In the Yahoo Fantasy baseball podcast, Scott Pianowski is joined by Rotowire's Scott Jenstad to examine the Cubs infielders draft stock ahead of the 2020 season
Video Transcript
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SCOTT PIANOWSKI: We talked earlier about Schwarber entering an age 27 season. That's the same thing for his teammate Javier Baez. And he's a guy I've always loved because he doesn't walk that much, and he doesn't have a great OBP. His career on-base percentage is .310. The last couple years, he's hit .281, .290, .273, but the on-base is, you know, barely over .300. But we don't play--
And we talked about on-base percentage being a plus for Biggio. In the case of Baez, you're getting his batting average. You're not-- It doesn't matter if he has a .316 on-base as long as he keeps that batting average around .280. He has the power. He has a little bit of speed. I mean, he could probably run more, but you would think maybe a full season about 10 stolen bases.
And what I love about guys when they don't walk if they can show that they can at least make enough contact and make enough hard contact that they're still getting on base. Remember, that means you get more impact. If you get a plus batting average from Baez, it helps you more than another player, because he's not walking. He's not throwing away at-bats on walks.
Again, walks can be good. But I think there's a disconnect a lot of times on what is Baez's real-life value and what his fantasy value is.
SCOTT JENSTAD: Yeah. And I think he's just one of those guys that-- you know, we look at numbers, and obviously I've cited a bunch of numbers. But he's a guy that you just-- if you watch him, you realize that he just-- he gets the [? bat on ?] the ball and hits the ball hard. And he's just one of those guys that's just a great baseball player. And I like guys that--
He wasn't injured. You know, he missed a little bit of time last year-- missed 20 games. But [? he's been ?] fine health-wise.
I love guys who are-- You know, the year before, he was-- 2019, he was a late first round pick, early second round pick. Has drifted into the third round. I like guys that, you know, as long as nothing's wrong and they're not-- they're still a pretty good age, and there was no serious injury last year. I love guys that fall like that and kind of slip through the cracks as the sexier guys move up. And you know, you want to give me mid-third-round Javier Baez, I'll take the 30 home runs.
You know, the stolen bases went down a little bit, but you're still gonna get double-digit stolen bases, a good batting average hitting in the middle of a really, you know, top end of a really good lineup. We mentioned that when we talked about Schwarber. I just think that he's-- I just think he's really good. I think he's in the middle infield position. You can, you know, play him there. Doesn't have the multi eligibility he did the year before, which you know, we-- we will miss.
But I think he's really good. I think people are discounting him and overlooking him a little bit. And in the third round, I'm all over a guy like that in a great lineup.
SCOTT PIANOWSKI: I love a player who I think has an excused absence, or a player who has been around long enough that there's just no more-- Kris Bryant is like this for me too. I mean, Kris Bryant has been an MVP, but Baez was the runner-up for MVP last year. So he took a step down. His down season was still, you know, [? .281-.316-.531 ?] with 29 home runs--
SCOTT JENSTAD: Yeah.
SCOTT PIANOWSKI: --and 11 stolen bases. You know, really good run production numbers. He did miss 24 games, so I mean, those numbers would be even better if he played a full season. And he's been fairly durable, so I'm not worried about that.
Again, I think you're getting a discount here for reasons that I can easily shrug off. I think there's very little risk to him--
SCOTT JENSTAD: Me too.
SCOTT PIANOWSKI: --and let's enjoy the discount while we can.
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