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Joshua Costello looks at fantasy baseball breakout hitters, risers, and potential sleepers for the rest of the season, written in Week 14. He looks into Statcast data to identify hitter breakouts.
Welcome RotoBallers to our fantasy baseball breakout hitters article for Week 14. As always, we are here to bring you a few MLB hitters whose advanced metrics are popping out.
My name is Joshua Costello and I will be giving you 3-5 hitter names that seem to have sustainable improved production this season. Most of these names will be young hitters because that is the nature of a breakout. There will be exceptions from time-to-time as well as I give you more well-known and well-established names that seem to have made a change to their profile this year.
For full transparency, I also track the picks every week, so you can go back and see who I picked. There will be some misses, but hopefully, we'll have enough hits to make this a worthwhile endeavor. I'll give you the tracker first, and then we'll get into the four names we're picking for this week.
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2023 Breakout Picks Tracker
| Week | Date | Breakout Picks |
| Week 3 | 4/12 | Logan O'Hoppe, Miguel Vargas, Nolan Gorman, Josh Lowe, Brandon Marsh |
| Week 4 | 4/19 | Jarred Kelenic, Ian Happ, Luis Garcia, Kerry Carpenter, Brent Rooker |
| Week 5 | 4/26 | Jack Suwinski, James Outman, Nico Hoerner, LaMonte Wade Jr., Cody Bellinger |
| Week 6 | 5/2 | Masataka Yoshida, Jarren Duran, Jonah Heim, Edward Olivares, Jorge Mateo |
| Week 7 | 5/9 | Ezequiel Duran, Triston Casas, Joey Gallo, Zach McKinstry, Ke'Bryan Hayes |
| Week 8 | 5/16 | Alex Kirilloff, Matt McLain, Zach Neto, Taylor Walls |
| Week 9 | 5/23 | Josh Jung, Brett Baty, Ryan Noda, Esteury Ruiz |
| Week 10 | 5/30 | Riley Greene, Leody Taveras, Seiya Suzuki |
| Week 11 | 6/8 | Luke Raley, Keibert Ruiz, Lane Thomas, Jake Burger |
| Week 12 | 6/15 | Evan Longoria, Tommy Pham, Anthony Rendon, Miguel Rojas |
| Week 13 | 6/22 | Max Kepler, Gunnar Henderson, Jeimer Candelario, Andy Ibanez |
Let's get to the picks for Week 14!
Jordan Walker, St Louis Cardinals
Jordan Walker is the Cardinals' top prospect and arguably the top prospect in baseball coming into the season. There was a significant buzz around him going into a draft season since it was announced that he would be on the opening d...ay roster. Following a hot start to the season, Walker saw his production fall off and was ultimately demoted back to Triple-A.
The main issues that plagued Walker were his ground ball rate and plate discipline. When the young prospect was sent down, his ground ball rate was around 60%, and it's hard for any player to be productive while putting the ball on the ground that often. In his minor league career, his ground ball rate was around 45% while maintaining a 25% line drive and 30% fly ball rate. Walker has since dropped his ground ball rate to 58%, so there is still work to do, but his plate discipline is the real story.
On April 23, Walker had a strikeout rate of 25.6% and a walk rate of 3.8%. Those percentages and his high ground ball rate were not a recipe for major league-level success. In Triple-A, the 21-year-old worked on his plate discipline, which has been paying dividends. Since returning, the young slugger lowered his strikeout rate to 22.3% and raised his walk rate to 7.6%.
The top prospect has been on fire lately, stringing together a 16-game hit streak. During this 16-game stretch, Walker has collected 21 hits, 14 strikeouts, and seven walks. Walker also collected four of his six home runs during that stretch. The slugger's batting average now sits at .303 with a .285 xBA, mainly due to his high GB% and BABIP. That said, his production is mostly sustainable, with the opportunity for improvement if he can put the ball in the air more.
The 21-year-old has the tools to be an exceptional talent in the majors, possessing 93rd percentile Max Exit Velocity, 96th percentile Arm Strength, and 80th percentile Sprint Speed. Walker's Average Exit Velocity and HardHit% would be among the best in the league if he had enough batted ball events to qualify. Walker is still very young, and as long as he keeps working on his launch angle, the sky is the limit.
Fantasy managers who roster Walker should be more than happy with his current production and excited to see if he can start hitting more fly balls. The Cardinals prospect has all the power he needs to clear the wall, and he needs to put it in the air. I'm holding onto him in all leagues and trying to buy high where I can because his ceiling is even higher.
Patrick Bailey, San Francisco Giants
San Francisco catcher Patrick Bailey has been all the Giants could hope he would be so far in his major league career. The 24-year-old rookie is slashing .320/.349/.534 with four home runs, eight doubles, and 23 RBI in 30 games. Bailey's expected stats also largely support his actual stats, sporting a .316 xBA and .511 xSLG.
The young catcher got his opportunity to play at the big league level in May when former top prospect Joey Bart was placed on the injured list with a groin strain. Among catchers with at least 50 batted ball events, Bailey would rank third in Brls/PA% and 12th in HardHit%. There are still areas for improvement, such as his walk rate, but Bailey has been one of the most productive catchers in baseball on offense and defense.
Fantasy managers needing help at the catcher position should pick up Bailey, as he is only 19% rostered in Yahoo and 5% rostered in ESPN leagues. Bailey was initially brought up to replace the injured Joey Bart. Still, Bart was recently activated from the injured list and optioned to Triple-A in favor of Bailey and Blake Sabol. This roster move should give fantasy managers more confidence in how the Giants organization feels about Bailey.
Mike Tauchman, Chicago Cubs
Tauchman is no spring chicken, but he has shown glimpses of production in the past. The 32-year-old outfielder had his best year in the juiced-ball season of 2019 with the New York Yankees. Since then, Tauchman spent 64 games with the San Francisco Giants before playing ball in Korea.
In 2023, Tauchman is back in the MLB and looking like the productive hitter he was with the Yankees. The Cubs outfielder has the highest xBA, xSLG, and xwOBA of his career through 32 games. Tauchman also has the highest walk rate and lowest strikeout rate of his career. His exit velocity and hard-hit numbers align with his previous seasons, but he has his highest line drive rate this year at 31.1%. Line drives turn into hits more often than ground balls and fly balls, so this number is significant.
Tauchman has had the opportunity to play nearly every day for the Cubs since late May and has taken full advantage. He has yet to contribute eye-popping numbers in the power department, with two home runs and four doubles, but Tauchman has been getting on base. He's batting .276 in June with 19 walks and 26 strikeouts, good for a .392 OBP. Fantasy managers in deep points and OBP leagues should have Tauchman on their radars because he's hitting as well as he ever has.
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