Drafting a successful fantasy team in any format often comes with a bit of luck. Let's face it, even if you leave your draft room with what you believe to be a strong squad, just weeks into the season a nightmare scenario can strike and suddenly you find yourself without the likes of Yordan Alvarez, Corey Kluber, Justin Verlander, Mike Soroka and Stephen Strasburg. These things can (and did) happen.
And, had the pandemic not delayed the start of the 2020 season by several months, fantasy managers were still likely to have been without a bevy of already injured players such as Aaron Judge, Giancarlo Stanton, Aaron Hicks and James Paxton -- and that's just counting players from the Bronx. Move along to Flushing and you can add in Noah Syndergaard and Yoenis Cespedes to the list of players whose lack of availability going forward became official only after many a league had already held their drafts.
Well, who says life is fair? Where is that written? Life isn't always fair. Fantasy managers can't blame themselves when a horrific spate of injuries decimates their roster. However, if it's simply the case that you blindly drafted a bunch of players way sooner than you should have and they end up dragging your team stats to the bottom of the pit of despair? Well, while you're at it, why don't you give yourself a nice paper cut and pour lemon juice on it?
To that end, here's a list of my 10 hitters to be wary of in points leagues for the 2021 season. Draft them at your own peril.
Charlie Blackmon, OF, Colorado Rockies: Last year was a roller-coaster ride for Blackmon, which epitomizes the dangers of paying too much attention to small sample sizes. After the first 17 games of the season, Blackmon was hitting an insane .500 with 20 RBIs. The rest of the way (42 games), he hit just .216 with 22 RBIs. In a full 162-game season, these ups and downs would probably not be as pronounced, but yet we can't seem to shake the fact that, overall, the outfielder had only a 9.5% HR/FB rate (down from 17.7%) and just a 30.8% hard-hit rate (after 40.3% in 2019). Entering his age-34 campaign, we're concerned.
Luke Voit, 1B, New York Yankees: In 2020, he hit more home runs (22) in 56 games than he had in 118 games (21) the year before. And, he did all of this while battling plantar fasciitis, which may lead some to believe that an injury-free 2021 will result in even greater numbers. I'm not so sure it matters. For one, it's not like Voit's stolen base count was impacted by the foot problems, as his next steal will be the first of his career. His walk rate plummeted last season to 7.3% (down from 13.9%) thanks to a huge increase in his swing percentage outside of the strike zone (up from 26.6% to 33.3%). That free-swinging tendency seems unlikely to change -- and especially in points leagues, that may be an issue.
Jose Altuve, 2B, Houston Astros: You can easily make the argument that Altuve's 2020 was not nearly as bad as the .219/.286/.344 line might have you believe. After all, the Astros went deep into the expanded playoffs. In those additional, high-pressure 13 games, Altuve shined, hitting .375 with five home runs. So, maybe there's a lot of self-correcting that would have taken place in regard to his full-season numbers had 2020 been a normal 162-game affair. I'm skeptical it would have been enough to prevent a career-worst season. Altuve had a career-high K-rate (18.6%) and a career-low .250 BABIP -- and this follows consistent batting average and OBP decline since his 2017 MVP season. He's still a solid fantasy option, but one who likely will end up just outside the top 100 in points-league play.
Gleyber Torres, SS, New York Yankees: After having hit 62 home runs over his first two seasons in the majors, last year was a disappointing one in the power department for Torres. Hampered by a strained left hamstring and ultimately playing in just 42 games, the middle infielder managed just 11 extra-base hits in 160 plate appearances. His HR/FB rate was a sad 7.1%, down from 21.5%, which was accompanied by a hard-hit rate that was down to 30.6% from 39.5% in 2019. You could blame the injury. You can point to the pair of home runs he hit in the playoffs and throw it into the small sample size argument and come out confident that last year was a mere fluke. You can also play it safe and take someone else as your SS1.
Max Muncy, 1B, Los Angeles Dodgers: It is always going to be a tough to truly assess the final 2020 numbers and compare them to previous seasons and use them confidently in a predictive sense. Still, there is very little reason to think Muncy could have had a third consecutive 35-HR season over 162 games given that his groundball rate soared to 44.1% and his line drive rate dropped to 13.8%. Muncy's altered swing is a big reason why his slugging crashed to .389 last season. Sure, the 14 postseason RBIs show that there are still a lot of reasons to stick with Muncy for fantasy -- but we're not convinced he will finish anywhere near a top-10 first baseman in points leagues.
Austin Meadows, OF, Tampa Bay Rays: First of all, we're looking at a player with a 32.9% K-rate and a 0.34 BB/K rate in 2020. If those free-swinging ways can be counterbalanced by a .922 OPS (as happened in 2019), then your points-league performance will not be damaged all that much. However, what if you're looking at a .667 OPS? No thanks. Meadows, even with a pair of postseason solo blasts, still struck out 18 times (with only two walks) to the tune of a .137 playoff batting average. For the season, his HR/FB rate dropped from 19.3% to 8.9%, with an increased FB rate that rose from 42.9% to 53.6%. That's a death knell for the fantasy value of a "three true outcomes" kind of player like this.
Aaron Judge, OF, New York Yankees: Prodigious. We all know how good Judge can be when he's on the field and healthy -- and so yes, I completely get the philosophy that you draft him for the games he will play (injuries can't be predicted) and hope this is the year he again plays 150 games. That said, he couldn't even play in half of 2020's truncated regular season and when he did see the field, his BB/K rate was down to 0.31 (from 0.45 in 2019) and his BABIP dropped from .360 to .283. His fly ball rate was up after a two-year decline to 40.6%, which only furthers cements Judge as achieving an "all-or-nothing" result in every at-bat. And if his health is not at 100%, he's always going to be closer to giving you nothing.
Kris Bryant, 3B, Chicago Cubs: He's certainly available from the Cubs in a deal, which is in some ways both surprising and not all that shocking. On the one hand, he's only 29! On the other hand, his BB/K rate last season was down to a career-low 0.30 and his slugging was at a career-worst .351. Beyond that, his fly ball rate ballooned to 45.1% while simultaneously, his HR/FB rate plummeted to a career-low 9.8%. Sure, there's still an argument to be made that Bryant's 2020 was an outlier, exacerbated by the strangeness of the start-and-stop nature of the season -- and that's why the Cubs are getting trade offers. Nevertheless, I'd let someone else take the chance on a turnaround here.
Josh Donaldson, 3B, Minnesota Twins: Donaldson himself will tell you that his 2020 was not good, and the stats back him up. In an injury-riddled campaign, Donaldson's BABIP dropped way down to .231 and his hard-hit percentage fell from 2019's 47.2% to 34.5%. I believe him when he says some of the reason for the decline was that there were no fans in the stadiums to help provide him with the adrenaline he needs when he's at the plate. Unfortunately, we have no idea when those seats will once again be filled and, quite frankly, we're talking about a player entering his age-35 season. Those nagging injuries only become harder to shake off. I'm actually rooting for Donaldson. It just won't be while having him on my fantasy roster.
Adam Eaton, OF, Chicago White Sox: Eaton's return to the Windy City comes after his fourth straight year with drops in his BB rate (now down to just 6.8%). Meanwhile, his K-rate is up to 18.2% and his hard-hit rate is down to 30.5%, the lowest it has been since 2015, during Eaton's first stint with the White Sox. This is a case where it looks like the long string of diminishing returns are no longer going to be able to be righted. Perhaps there's a chance that a return to familiar old stomping ground will result in an initial surge. I'm not taking the chance here, but if you do, don't hesitate to sell high if Eaton's April seems too good to be true.