RADIO
When considering risers and fallers in fantasy baseball drafts, there are many reasons why a player could be moving up or down. Team injuries, context, performance in spring training, playing time concerns, and roster additions are all reasons to impact a player's ADP in fantasy baseball.
In this piece, before the season starts, we'll focus on the rise and fall in ADP to look at last-minute changes to a player's value in drafts and on the waiver wire. All ADP information has been taken from drafts in NFBC leagues since March 1.
We'll examine four players who saw their ADP jump and three players staring at a falling stock in fantasy drafts. What's the reason for their rise or fall over the past month? Should we target them regardless of whether the players are rising or falling? Sometimes, it's worth examining what the market has done and making our own decisions, especially if a player has fallen too far. The corollary to that is examining whether or not we should grab a player on the way because he could rise even more,
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Fantasy Baseball Risers
Pete Crow-Armstrong, OF, CHC
ADP up 34.6 spots
Though 32 plate appearances in spring training (not counting the Tokyo series), Pete Crow-Armstrong had a whopping 16 hits. While that’s impressive enough, he also has three home runs and 11 RBI. For context, PCA had 10 home runs in 410 plate appearances last season.
Is there power beginning to emerge from the 22-year-old phenom? It sure seems that way. If that's the case, the kid they call PCA is going to be drafted in the top 50-75 next year if he realizes the power and speed potential (27 steals last season).
Pete Crow-Armstrong this spring:
.522 BA
1.587 OPS
3 HR
10 RBIpic.twitter.com/BkFg6TKZHN— The Wrigley Wire (@TheWrigleyWire) March 8, 2025
Last season, PCA hit groundballs at a 38 percent rate, but just 19.9 percent were line drives. That needed to improve. This spring, he hit 27 percent of the balls on the ground and 41 percent of them as line drives, an incredible number.
Even if those line drives don’t turn into home runs during the regular season, it is a recipe for getting his batting average up over the .237 he produced in 2024. I’m drafting PCA wherever I can this spring. For me, it’s a clear matter of knowing you get the steals and hoping the home runs come along for the ride.
Rhys Hoskins, 1B, MIL
ADP up 21.1 spots
The 2024 season produced very up-and-down results for first baseman Rhys Hoskins after he missed the entire 2023 season with a devastating knee injury. He managed to hit 26 dingers and produced 82 RBI, but it came with a .214/.303/.419 slash and a way-too-high 29 percent strikeout rate. The hard-hit rate dropped from previous years. His exit velocity and walk rate were also affected.
The results did not match the draft capital. Some rust was expected after missing an entire year, but now the Brewers believe he is all the way back. As evidence, if his spring training stats this year are any indication, he definitely warrants this ADP bump.
Rhys Hoskins has slugged four homers in just 12 #SpringTraining at-bats 😳 pic.twitter.com/qxTlMfs1t2
— MLB (@MLB) March 8, 2025
Hoskins is first in all of baseball, with six home runs this spring, to go along with a .268/.388/.707 slash line that includes five walks in 51 plate appearances. It appears the power is back, as well as his timing, leading to better patience at the plate. The best news for Hoskins is that the loss of Willy Adames to the Giants means he is likely hitting fourth or fifth every day for Milwaukee.
Hitting right after on-base savants Jackson Chourio, Christian Yelich, and William Contreras should help Hoskins easily pay the return on investment around pick 246 in drafts. He is the perfect candidate for a utility or corner infield slot in your fantasy lineups.
Garrett Crochet, SP, BOS
ADP up 33.3 spots
Has there been a better pitcher in spring training than Garrett Crochet? I certainly can't find one. Across 15 2/3 innings, Crochet has allowed one earned run (0.57 ERA) and struck out 30 batters, with just a .228 batting average allowed. He has not allowed a home run and appears primed to be the Boston Red Sox ace in 2025.
It's no surprise, then, that his ADP (currently at 26.7) is up significantly over the last four weeks. Fantasy managers were intrigued by what he did with the White Sox in 2024 (209 strikeouts in 146 innings), but now they are downright giddy at the prospect of more innings and a competent offense behind him.
At just 26 years old, this is a pitcher entering his prime and appears to be a lock for double-digit wins and 200 strikeouts as long as he stays healthy. Is a draft spot at the beginning of the third round too high? If he reaches his potential, we might be drafting him at the Paul Skenes/Tarik Skubal level next year.
Clay Holmes, SP, NYM
ADP up 13.6 spots
Spring training injuries to Sean Manaea (oblique) and Frankie Montas (lat) have allowed Clay Holmes to not only claim a starting spot in this New York Mets rotation but to earn the Opening Day nod. He is starting to move up draft boards significantly because of this news, but he is still being selected around pick 200 because Holmes has not made a start in the major leagues since 2018. In fact, he has never pitched more than 70 innings in a season.
Clay Holmes is ready for his #OpeningDay start after striking out 8 over 5.1 scoreless innings!
He finishes up his #SpringTraining with:
0.93 ERA
0.78 WHIP
23 K pic.twitter.com/foSndZvDEH— MLB (@MLB) March 21, 2025
He moved to a reliever role initially, although his background was as a starter. When the Mets signed him this offseason for three years and $38 million, they told him they wanted him to start and began stretching him out to do so. This ended up being a wise decision because of the state of their starters as the season kicks off.
Holmes has four straight seasons with a K/9 rate over 9.2 and has an ERA of 3.60 or lower in each of those seasons. He never allows home runs (0.53 HR/9 for his career) and has a 66 percent ground-ball rate in his seven MLB seasons. That is certainly the path to becoming a legitimate starter, and as he gets stretched out this spring, it’s more important than ever that he give the Mets those kinds of quality innings.
Drafters are definitely starting to take notice. He has been selected as high as 126th in the last seven days of NFBC drafts.
Fantasy Baseball Fallers
Nolan Jones, OF, CLE
ADP down 10 spots
Nolan Jones certainly appears differently than this time a year ago. Jones was the fantasy darling of 2024, who was selected at pick No. 55 ahead of last season because of a 2023 campaign that saw him go 20/20 in just 106 games.
The injury bug struck in 2024, which sapped his power, his batted ball production, and his speed. In a bad way. Jones finished 2024 with just three home runs and five steals in 79 games. A .227/.321/.320 line with a 30 percent strikeout rate that removed all possibility of improvement.
All this has led to Nolan Jones being drafted a full 200 picks later this offseason. Now comes word that he was traded from the Colorado Rockies to the Cleveland Guardians for Tyler Freeman. This move likely relegates Jones to the bench in Cleveland as part of a platoon role. This kills any hope of a post-hype sleeper who could play half their games in Coors Field.
But with Jones fully healthy, he had something to prove this spring training. However, through 47 at-bats in spring, Jones is hitting .234 with a .578 OPS with no home runs or steals. We can’t read too much into this small sample, but if you had any hope of Jones returning to fantasy glory, this should put that to rest.
He will continue to be drafted around after pick 260, and it is likely to keep falling during the last few days of spring training.
Jasson Dominguez, OF, NYY
ADP down 14.1 spots
It's no secret that everyone WANTS Jasson Dominguez to be a fantasy superstar. The Yankees have much choice but to play him every day with all of the injuries that have invaded their camp, but prized rookie Dominguez is not making things easy for himself with the bat this spring. He has clobbered three home runs this spring, but the worrying thing is he has 16 strikeouts to just five walks.
Who will be the American League Rookie of the Year in 2025? Our staff picks...
Jasson Dominguez: @EricCrossMLB, @ThunderDanDFS, @A_Smith_FS, @sportz_nutt51, @Zeitheist1, @AAnianoFantasy, @deadeyejoshua
Jackson Jobe: @ElliottBaasBB, @ZT_Sports, @scotteTheKing, @BCamara30
Kristian… pic.twitter.com/E9KuyEsyds— RotoBaller MLB (@RotoBallerMLB) March 23, 2025
With Austin Wells likely to lead off, that pushes Dominguez down to seventh in the lineup in New York. Dominguez will be the Yankees’ primary left fielder this season, but he has some work to do to get to the 20/20 potential with a .250ish average that many projections systems have for Dominguez.
ATC is looking for a 16/21 season, and his three steals this spring are a good harbinger the speed is still there.
The problem has been with the groundballs during spring training. He has a 51.2 percent ground-ball rate after having a 62.2 percent ground-ball rate in 2024. That’s not enough improvement if Dominguez wants to be able to tap into 20-home run power.
I would say drafters are much more cautious right now around Dominguez, and the falling ADP of pick 136 reflects that.
Willy Adames, SS, SFG
ADP down 28.7 spots
If we could all be so good at our job when the time for performance reviews comes. Willy Adames produced a career year in 2024, and he was able to turn that into a seven-year, $182 million contract with the San Francisco Giants. What Adames has in store, however, is he is quickly going to learn that hitting in San Francisco is not at all like hitting in Milwaukee.
After setting career highs with 32 home runs and 21 stolen bases, Adames, still only 29 years old, is going to see steep declines in both categories, and that's what drafters are thinking about. Considering the home runs, according to Statcast, American Family Field was the sixth-friendliest for hitting home runs over the last three seasons.
Oracle Park, where the Giants call home, ranks last in that time for home runs, a full 22 percent below the league average, based on three years of data.
Willy Adames has homered in an #SFGiants uniform 🚨 pic.twitter.com/ZKHwN46Jzz
— SFGiants (@SFGiants) March 5, 2025
We also have to think about his steals from 2024. Looking past the fact that Adames never had more than eight steals in a season before he stole 21 last year, the Giants’ team strategy on running is not nearly the same as Milwaukee's.
The Brewers ranked second in the majors with 217 steals in 2024. The Giants were 29th, with just 68 all year. Only Minnesota had fewer. The park is going to knock out the power somewhat, and the team environment should mean the steals don’t repeat.
Drafters are not paying for Adames to repeat his 2024, as he has fallen outside the top 80 picks in drafts.
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