Twins Byron Buxton showing signs of life: Waiver wire add?

Byron Buxton has come alive at the plate as of late for the Twins. But, is the enigmatic youngster worth a waiver wire add?

Stop me if you have heard this before, but Byron Buxton is teasing fantasy owners again. The perplexing Twins’ outfielder is one of the more discussed players in fantasy circles. After coming on late in 2016, many owners pegged him for a breakout season in 2017.

Unfortunately, that has not been the case. But, here we are again, as Buxton is heating up during the latter half of the season. Should fantasy owners fall for it again though?

Buxton was downright abysmal the first half of the season. He could only muster a .216/ 5 HR/16 RBI/16 SB/.594 OPS line. He had two months of sub-.200 AVG, and outside of his occasional SB flurries, he was useless fantasy wise.

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No one will argue his defensive wizardry in center, he is easily the best in the game, but the stick is still a mystery.  Outside of the K concerns, he had 87 K to only 27 BB in the first half, Buxton had an alarmingly high 30%+ IFFB rate.

Buxton can fly, but striking out and hitting infield pop ups is not going to work in his favor. Yet, once the calendar turned to July, Buxton caught fire. Over the month of July, he posted a .387/1 HR/2 RBI/.973 OPS line over 10 games.

Some were rightfully skeptical of the hot stretch, but he kept things going into August. Over the last 14 games, Buxton has posted a .317/1 HR/8 RBI/4 SB/6 R/.776 OPS line. A major part of his turn around is his LD rate climbing up to near 30%, while the pop ups have gone down near 15%.

The power would come if he could lift more pitches, but owners will take more gap splitting. His speed still plays, he has only been caught once this season. Speed is a rare find in the game today, so owners should add him while he continues to supply that at least.

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We saw this last season from Buxton, and now he is repeating it. Owners should be willing to take the plunge while he is hot. It would be better of course if he could ascend to the top of the lineup, but as long as he gets on base, he can be a game wrecker and rack up solid counting stats.

Give Buxton another look yet again.