Fantasy Baseball Fight Club: Yasiel Puig or A.J. Pollock?
By Gavin Tramps
Dodgers’ Yasiel Puig and Diamondbacks’ A.J. Pollock are two elite, yet frustrating players to own in fantasy baseball. Which one are you taking next season?
The NLDS pits division rivals the Los Angeles Dodgers against the Arizona Diamondbacks. Both teams have high-profile outfielders in Yasiel Puig and A.J. Pollock who have demonstrated erratic levels of production ranging from elite to disappointing.
In 2015, Pollock needed just one more stolen base to record a 20 home run and 40 stolen base season with a batting average over .310 while scoring 111 runs. He was one of the hottest players to own in fantasy baseball.
Puig burst onto the scene as a 22-year-old in 2013 and posted 159 wRC+ which was fourth-best in MLB behind Mike Trout, Miguel Cabrera and Chris Davis.
These seasons represented career-highs for both players, but despite subsequent years of failing to live up to expectations, both Puig and Pollock lure fantasy owners into believing they will deliver another stellar season.
The NLDS gives us the opportunity to see both players in opposition to help decide which one to draft next season.
Yasiel Puig (OF-LAD)
Dynamic, headstrong, frustrating, unconventional, game-changing, Whatever your chosen adjective, there is no denying that Yasiel Puig is compelling to watch.
In real life, the Cuban looks larger than his 6-foot-2 frame, and he plays the game with power and enthusiasm in equal measures.
Even his most committed supporters cannot dispute that he has failed to live up to the expectations after his first season in MLB in 2013. As a 22-year-old, he was the runner-up in NL Rookie of the Year voting with 19 home runs, 11 stolen bases and .319 batting average.
He was an All-Star the following year before slumping for two straight seasons. Injuries disrupted 2015 and then trade speculation and a 24-game demotion to the minors made 2016 his worst season ever.
Puig revitalized his career with the Dodgers by slashing .263/.346/.487 in 2017. You need to look beyond the stat line to appreciate the value he offers.
He had never previously hit 20 home runs in a season, so his total of 28 was an impressive jump, even considering the increase in homers across the game.
His 15 stolen bases also represented a career-high, establishing him as a true power/speed combo. Only nine other players hit at least 25 home runs while swiping 15 bags. This illustrious list includes first-rounders Mike Trout and Paul Goldschmidt.
Puig’s season started poorly with .706 OPS over his first 50 games, but after June 1, it improved by nearly 200 points to .903 OPS.
He still gets humiliated by left-handed pitchers, hitting just .183 with .592 OPS, and needs to be less reliant on pulling the ball but his skills at the plate are trending in the right direction. At 11.2%, Puig enjoyed the highest walk rate of his career while simultaneously lowering his strike rate to 17.5%.
A.J. Pollock (OF-ARI)
The Diamondbacks’ outfielder’s 2015 was the kind of season that fantasy baseball owners long for. He hit 20 home runs, swiped 39 bags, scored 111 runs and posted a .319 batting average.
He was a borderline first rounder going into the 2016 season but broke his elbow sliding headfirst into home plate during a Spring Training game.
It was difficult to rank Pollock coming into this season. Would he be the same player as before the injury? He was the 13th outfielder according to FantasyPros with an ADP inside the top-40.
There is no doubt that the 29-year-old failed to return top-40 value, slashing .266/.330/.471 with six home runs and 20 stolen bases.
Encouragingly, Pollock played 112 games (only the third time he has played more than 100 games in a season), but discouragingly he missed 44 games in the middle of the season with a groin strain and then a quadriceps injury he picked up in a rehab game.
He missed 79 games in 2014 with a fractured hand, 150 games in 2016 and now 44 games in 2017. If staying on the field is a skill, it is one in which Pollock does not excel.
Even when he was on the field this year, the former first-round pick from the 2009 draft frustrated owners with erratic production. He disappointed in May and August with .662 OPS and .613 OPS but was valuable in all formats in June and September with .973 OPS and .888 OPS.
He will again be one of the most difficult players to rank for 2018 drafts.
Fantasy Baseball Fight Club: The verdict
Puig’s approach at the plate is improving. He is swinging less, and when he does swing, he is making more contact, whether the pitch is inside or outside of the strike zone. Take his first two months out of the conversation, and we are talking about a .903 OPS player saddled with the lowest BABIP of his life. Everything points to 2018 being a very good year for the Cuban.
But how can you dismiss the potential that Pollock offers? In two-thirds of a season hampered by injury, he swiped 20 bags. The lack of home runs is concerning but slightly less so after watching him despatch Clayton Kershaw’s third-inning pitch into the stand in Game 1 of the NLDS.
I am a big Pollock fan, whether you are talking about the artist, the ballplayer or the fish but in this Fight Club, my concern over the continual injuries forces me to take Puig. I realize that Puig’s ceiling is not as a first-rounder but unless I need to swing for the fences in the draft room, the Cuban is my guy.