When fantasy players prepare for their drafts, they often start by trying to identify which 2019 breakouts are for real (Fernando Tatis!) and which young players are ready to take the next step forward (Luis Robert!). Ummm, yeah... it's a hard pass from me on both of them.
Gambling on upside is fine, and in certain formats it's necessary in order to win, but in your standard home league with your buddies, let the guy across the table from you waste his fourth-round pick on the dude who hit zero home runs in 2018 and has never shown good plate discipline (that would be Luis Robert, by the way).
Instead, shift your focus to finding value. Because at the end of the day, it doesn't matter where your stats come from. It just matters that you get more than your friends. The good news is that your friends (and the market in general) systematically undervalue certain players, and I'm here to highlight who those players (and player types) are.
Even if you want to take a couple of shots on finding the next big thing, building a strong core around that upside is the surest way to a championship.
Methodology: I've selected a dozen hitters that my projection system, THE BAT, ranks higher than where they are being drafted in NFBC formats. They aren't listed in any particular order. I simply chose players I thought were interesting to write about and that spanned a wide range of positions, ADPs, league depths (not every player is appropriate for all leagues -- don't go trying to make Evan Longoria your starting 3B in an eight-team league), and reasons for being undervalued. There are plenty of other values out there, and I listed a dozen or so more additional players you should be looking at near the bottom of this article. Keep in mind that every league is different, and any player can be snatched off the table at any time, but these are the hitters who you can reasonably expect to get strong value on based on where they are being selected on average.