Champ or Chump: Elias Diaz

If you're reading this, your fantasy baseball roster is probably still playing for something. Congratulations! If a positive result hasn't been locked in yet, remember that your league's caps for games played and/or innings pitched should be seen as targets. At the end of the day, the fantasy manager who hits those caps enjoys a substantial advantage over one who does not.

One position where you're probably not close to hitting those caps is catcher because catchers stink and they all seem to get the same days off. If you need help with your catcher spot(s), Elias Diaz will mostly play at hitter-friendly Coors Field for the rest of the season and already has 18 homers and a .236/.305/.469 line in 341 PAs. He's only rostered in 17% of Yahoo! leagues, so he's probably available to you as well.

The 30-year-old Diaz isn't a household name but made his MLB debut in 2015 and has been a consistent big leaguer since 2017. Playing for bad Pittsburgh teams before a bad Rockies squad makes it tough to get your name out there, especially if you hit like a backup catcher. Still, he's doing enough this year to warrant more fantasy consideration. Let's talk about it!

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Popping the Cork

Diaz is on a 35 HR pace over a full season of PAs, so power is the primary reason to roster him. That sounds strange for a guy whose previous career-high in homers was just 10 back in 2018, but enough has changed in his profile to think at least some of the power explosion is real. First, Diaz has upped his FB% from 35% career to 41% this season. Hitting more fly balls is generally a good thing for players who run like catchers, especially if they also call Coors Field home. The improvement has also helped Diaz boost his rate of Brls/BBE from 2.4% in 2019 to 8.6% this season.

Second, Diaz is pulling 31.4% of his flies against a career mark of 24%. That may not sound like a huge increase, but remember that pulled flies usually have higher exit velocities and have less distance to travel before finding the cheap seats. Diaz is averaging 91.6 mph of airborne exit velocity and his max exit velocity is just 109.5 mph, so he doesn't hit the ball that hard. He needs every little advantage he can get to maintain his 17.1% HR/FB (10.2% career).

Notably, Diaz's contact quality hasn't really improved from previous seasons. His average airborne exit velocity was also 91.6 mph in 2018, and his max exit velocity was higher at 112.2 mph. Likewise, his max exit velocity was 113.9 mph in 2019 even though his average airborne exit velocity was lower at 89.3 mph. His grounders averaged nearly 90 mph of exit velocity in both '18 and '19, five full ticks better than his 2021 figure of 84.9. He didn't play enough last year to get a reasonable sample, but the trend is clear. Diaz doesn't have a ton of oomph but has changed his approach to make the most of what he has.

A Solid Plate Discipline Baseline

Adding power is interesting for Diaz because he already possessed solid plate discipline. He has a 15.8 K% and 8.5 BB% on the season, neither of which look out of line with his career marks of 7.2% and 16.7%, respectively. Furthermore, both his 32.7% chase rate and 11.4 SwStr% are a smidge better than the league average. None of this is new for Diaz, but the power gives fantasy managers a reason to care.

You would expect a 35 HR guy with solid plate discipline to put up a better average than Diaz is, especially since we're talking about a Rockies player. Unfortunately, Diaz isn't a great BABIP guy. Sure, his .231 BABIP can be expected to undergo positive regression, and Baseball Savant's xStats say that he should be hitting .248 instead of .236. However, Diaz's LD% has fallen to 18% from a career rate of 19.7%, and he's only hitting .171 on ground balls despite not caring about the shift (45.7 Pull% on the ground). When you run poorly and don't hit the ball that hard, balls in play are not your friend.

Can Diaz Help You?

All told, Diaz is the unquestioned starter for the Colorado Rockies. Nobody plays in a more hitter-friendly park, and the Rockies have nothing but home games before finishing their schedule with three in Arizona against the Diamondbacks. His xSLG of .430 may give some managers pause, but the metric doesn't even try to account for Denver's thin air and should be ignored for all Colorado players when they are at home. If you're desperate for a catcher with pop, Diaz could be the right fit.

That said, he probably won't hit for a great average despite the home games and usually hits seventh in Colorado's lineup: a position that doesn't lend itself to counting stats such as runs or RBI. If your league is coming down to something other than big flies, you may need to look elsewhere. Like everything else this time of year, whether Diaz is a Champ or a Chump boils down to your specific needs.

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