It’s 20 games into the season and most fantasy players wait until now to make moves as they have a hold on how their team is performing and the competition in the league is putting out. So without further ado, I wanted to look into the top five fantasy baseball SURPRISES so far this season. Spoiler alert … Bryce Harper does not make the list …
Top Five Surprise Players
1. Joey Lucchesi – SP – Padres – Who? Yeah, all we know is that he plays for the Red Sox … Wait, that can’t be right, I mean the Padres. Yes, the team from San Diego. Lucchesi was projected to go 3-3 and 38 K in 54 innings pitched. Instead, he’s off to a 2-0 start with a 25 K in 21 innings pitched. Two of his four starts have been in the quality zone, only allowing four earned runs over those 21 innings pitched.
2. Jakob Junis – SP – Royals – Most have heard of this name as he near no hitted the Seattle Mariners on April 9th, just days after breezing through seven innings against the Tigers. He followed that up yesterday with another dominating start against Detroit, upping his stats to eight innings pitched with only two earned runs given up. He’s off to a 2.03 ERA with a 3-1 record to boot. His 0.75 whip is nothing to look around either.
3. Christian Villanueva – 3B – Padres – Who expected to see two Padres players on a top five list with 20 games into a season? No one. Villanueva has excelled to a .333 AVG with six long balls and 14 RBIs. Only downfall and reason to sell high? He’s struck out over 35% of the time.
4. Jed Lowrie – 2B – Oakland – Guess what? Lowrie was projected to hit six home runs on the year. Six. Guess where he’s at on April 21st? Six. Six HR, five doubles, and 22 RBIs have fantasy owners going crazy, relax, he’s not going to keep this up.
5. Ozzie Albies – 2b – Braves – Hard to overlook the start that Albies has produced, proclaimed the second coming of Jose Altuve … but possibly more pop in his bat with a natural lift. Ozzie has batted .313 after a slow start, with 20 runs scored, six HRs, and 12 RBIs. His only flaw so far is only one stolen base. But I bet fantasy owners are OK to settle with his production so far.