MLB Hitter Studs and Duds - Advanced Metrics Leaders for Barrel% (Week 19)

We're now three weeks removed from the All-Star break so there's enough data to glean something from one of the most prominent metrics that tells of power production - barrel rate.

The usual suspects are represented on the leaderboard but more than half of the top 20 second-half barrel% leaders will make you do a double-take. Several players who had miserable first halves seem to have suddenly woken up their bats. Let's see which players could be priority adds if you are searching for power on the waiver wire. The stats listed below only include games played since July 21.

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Second-Half Barrel% Leaderboard

Notable Barrel Rate Risers

Aaron Judge has 13 home runs in 21 games since the All-Star break, 46 on the season, and he's on pace to break Roger Maris' AL record. There's no actionable advice for fantasy here. Just, holy crap. Congrats if you drafted him.

J.D. Davis has been covered ad nauseam in this column throughout the season. His Statcast profile is still strong but his lack of consistent playing time renders it mostly meaningless. Since being traded to the Giants, possibly the most platoon-happy team in the league, he's seen all of 26 at-bats. He is an excellent DFS play against lefties but not worth your attention in weekly leagues.

Joey Gallo deserves his own full breakdown and possibly a Hallmark movie if he continues this second half. OK, it hasn't been that amazing but he is managing a .263 average and has gone deep twice in seven games since joining the Dodgers and, more importantly, leaving the Bronx. He won't be a full-time player nor will he reside in the top half of the batting order, so don't make too much of this.

Paul DeJong was exiled to the minors back on May 10 and didn't resurface until the final days of July. Needless to say, it's a shock to see how he's responded but clearly he got the message. In 48 AB, he is slashing .292/.375/.646 with four HR and 13 RBI. Strikeouts are still part of his game but he is making better contact (66.3%) and striking the ball at a 51.6% Hard%. DeJong is only rostered in a paltry 16% of Yahoo leagues so there's a great chance he can be added immediately for a power boost at MI.

Michael Massey is barreling in the most insignificant way, standing homerless after his first 12 major league games. He hit 21 homers at Single-A but didn't reach double-digits at either the Double or Triple-A levels. Massey is batting .325 with three extra-base hits and has provided a bit of pop but not enough to be fantasy-relevant outside of AL-only leagues.

Vaughn Grissom has all of 20 plate appearances in the big leagues but he has to be discussed. The Braves may have struck gold twice with their young prospects. After calling up Michael Harris from Double-A earlier in the year, they pushed Grissom through and he has been a revelation.

Vaughn Grissom, who is 21, just hit a 440-foot home run that had an exit velocity of 107.1 mph. pic.twitter.com/CB0zsMPTQZ

— Justin Toscano (@JustinCToscano) August 14, 2022

That's not a Doubter, folks, it's legit power.

In just five games with Atlanta, he's collected two homers, one double, and four RBI. Through that small sample, it gives him a 1.133 OPS along with a 20% Barrel%. The speed in which he's made such an impact might disguise the fact that he doesn't profile as a pure power hitter.

Fangraphs' scouting report gives him 50-grade game power, which it looks like he's living up to, but he may not be the next coming of Ozzie Albies necessarily. Grissom was at 11 HR in half a season of A+ ball and hit three more in 22 games at Double-A. That's all we know of his experience at advanced levels so far. Grissom will continue to hold down second base as long as Albies is out and he's absolutely worth picking up if available. As always, expectations should be tempered when a rookie has a hot debut because pitchers tend to adjust.

Apparently Nick Pratto got impatient with his lack of power and decided to sell out in the second half. In his 14 AB before the break, he hit for a solid .286 average and went deep once. Since the break, he's hitting .182 with two HR and four doubles but 27 strikeouts in 66 AB. This is the old Pratto from the minors before he made adjustments to his mechanics. The raw power is real and makes him enticing but until he figures things out, he should be left alone.

Who is Joey Meneses? Possibly this year's Frank Schwindel. He is a 30-year-old 1B/OF for the Nationals who gets to fill Josh Bell's shoes the rest of the way. He's done just fine for himself, slashing .400/.487/.829 with five HR in just 10 games (38 PA). A hot week doesn't always make for an extended hot stretch but we've seen lightning in a bottle before and you may want to attempt to capture it while you can.

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