Typically, I try to include at least one hitter and at least one pitcher in each category, but this week is going to be a little different. Four of the hottest pitchers in baseball — Pittsburgh’s Mitch Keller, Texas’ Nathan Eovaldi, Seattle’s Bryce Miller and Detroit’s Eduardo Rodriguez — have already been highlighted in recent weeks. Instead, this week’s risers will include three hitters, all of whom are big-name players who struggled out of the gate but have looked like their old selves lately.
Here are this week’s fantasy baseball risers and fallers.
Three Up:
Chicago White Sox OF Luis Robert Jr. — Through April, Robert was slashing .213/.254/.407, a massive disappointment for a player who was expected to take a leap forward with a clean bill of health. Two weeks later, his season slash line is .275/.335/.562. He has recorded at least one base hit in 12 of 13 May games and has homered six times this month, including one in each of his last three games. Robert has already walked, homered, driven in and scored more this month than he did in April — in less than half the plate appearances. His league-leading 1.443 May OPS made him an easy choice for this week’s list.
St. Louis Cardinals 3B Nolan Arenado — The six-time top-10 MVP finisher found himself in last week’s fallers, and rightfully so; he had looked uncomfortable and the results backed that up. Since then, Arenado is 11-for-25 and has homered in four straight games. He has raised his season OPS by more than 100 points in that short span. On May 12 in Boston, he became just the fourth player in the Statcast era to record five batted balls with an exit velocity of at least 106 mph in one game in a 4-for-5 effort. I think he’s feeling better. What a difference a week can make.
San Diego Padres OF Juan Soto — Finally. Soto was hitting .202 through April with an uncharacteristically low .384 slugging percentage. He was still walking a ton, as he does, but his approach seemed like he was trying too hard to draw walks. So far in May, he is still walking at an elite rate, but he also can’t seem to stop hitting doubles. His nine two-baggers this month lead Major League Baseball, and his 1.141 OPS is giving us flashes of the Juan Soto we’re accustomed to seeing. I hope you didn’t try to sell low.
Three Down:
Baltimore Orioles SS Jorge Mateo — April was by far the best month of Mateo’s big league career; May has been the worst. He is slashing just .100/.143/.125 across his last 43 plate appearances and has quickly gone from a multi-category fantasy asset to droppable in all formats unless you’re in dire need of stolen bases. Typically, I wouldn’t have this quick of a hook, but his track record suggests that his May performance might be more indicative of the real Jorge Mateo than his flash-in-the-pan April.
Cincinnati Reds RHP Hunter Greene — The Reds’ fireballer has shown plenty of flashes of brilliance already in his young career but has still been unable to really put things together. His Stuff+ is up there with the likes of Shohei Ohtani, Spencer Strider, and Gerrit Cole, but Greene hasn’t quite figured out how to properly use it against big league hitters. In three May starts, Greene has allowed 13 earned runs in 15 innings, bringing his season ERA up to 4.60. There is still a ton of intrigue with the former second overall pick and likely will be for a while, especially when taking into account the strikeout upside, but he is not quite there yet.
Toronto Blue Jays RHP Alek Manoah — I included Manoah in my preseason “Overvalued Pitchers” piece, but his performance this season might deem that distinction a bit too gentle. After another poor outing on May 15 against the Yankees in which he walked seven batters in just four innings, his season ERA now sits at 5.40 with his FIP an even more unsightly 6.46. His velocity is still down almost a full tick across the board, which I noted before the season as a potential concern. So far in May, he’s allowed 13 runs (10 earned) in 13.2 innings, with 18 hits and 12 walks surrendered to just seven strikeouts. It’s been even worse than I anticipated.
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