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Speaker 3Let's take a look at Chris's top 30 outfielders for 2027. Up next on Fantasy Baseball Today Express. Welcome to FPT Express on Friday the 13th. I am Frank Stample, joined by Chris Towers.
Speaker 4Fantasy Bruce Ball today.
Speaker 3The other day we gave you Scott's top 12 outfielders for 2027. Way too early rankings. And it turns out Chris has the same 12 names in his top 12. So we will pick it up from there, and we will go 13 through the next 20 or so. Getting us up to 32. But 13 through 17, Chris, you have O'Neal Cruz, Michael Harris, Bryce Harper, Kyle Tucker, and Randy Orozarena. I want to highlight O'Neal Cruz because I know that you have been a skeptic. Perhaps you remain a skeptic. Improvements against lefties here for O'Neal Cruz. Underlying numbers might not buy those improvements against lefties all that much. But it was a breakout season. The pace numbers were fantastic. You rank him 13th. Would you actually draft him here?
Speaker 4Probably not, no. It's kind of, look, I recognize the upside. I recognize the skill set. I recognize that even if he doesn't hit 280 again but hits 250, the power and speed combo there is just really impactful. And much of my concern last year was that I thought there was a chance he might lose playing time. Like this was a guy who wasn't a good defensive outfielder, couldn't hit lefties. I'm still not sure he's great at either. But I think. I think the chances of O'Neal Cruz really losing playing time are basically non-existent. He's going to give you a lot of power. He's going to give you a lot of speed. So I think this is the right range for him. But I will probably. But kind of with all these guys, I think I'm just kind of going to be looking at other parts of my team rather than outfield at that range of the draft because there's nobody here I feel really, really great about. I know Bryce Harper, there's some safety there. There's a long track record. But his age with Kyle Tucker. Obviously, how bad he was last season, there's just no guarantee he ever gets back to that level. Randy Rosarena had a phenomenal season, but that feels like a career year. It's just this doesn't feel like a super safe portion of the outfield rankings, at least.
Speaker 3Let's move on to 18 through 22 in your outfield rankings. You have Jack Caglione, Roman Anthony, Carson Benj, Seiya Suzuki, and Riley Green. Roman Anthony is someone who stands out. You're outfielder 19. Early ADP has him at outfielder 26. Scott has him in the 30s. So you rank him much higher. Obviously, comes with a lot of prospect pedigree, freakish tools. We know that if he could stay healthy, he does have a high ceiling that he could reach one day. But there's just so much we don't know and so much we're not going to learn in the offseason. It feels like a pretty tough ranking for Roman Anthony.
Speaker 4It's really hard to figure out where to rank him. I'll just say that I don't really think we learned anything new. About Roman Anthony last season and he's cheaper now. So I know it's a year later and the breakout didn't happen and all that matters, but we only got 55 games out of him. And a lot of them came either while he was dealing with an injury or after he came back from an injury and it was still clearly an issue. So I do think from a performance standpoint, it's easy to give him kind of a pass for that. The underlying skills still look really, really strong. He's still got a great approach at the plate. He still hits the ball really hard. Yeah, he's got to optimize the launch angles and all that stuff. But I just think the underlying skill set here still points to a really, really high ceiling where if Roman Anthony stays healthy, I kind of think you're looking at like a Riley Green outcome, not as a ceiling, but just as kind of a mid-range outcome. And the high, high-end outcomes you could be talking about, you know, it's a slightly, slightly different type of skill set, but the kind of four-category impact that someone like Jordan Alvarez has at a really high end. He has that kind of raw power. He has that kind of approach at the plate. He just needs to kind of refine it. So if we're talking about who's worth taking a chance on, Jack Caglione is someone who's going to get a lot of hype. And I think his price is only going to go up from where it is. I think Roman Anthony is kind of a nice pivot off of a kind of very similar skill set to Jack Caglione at what's likely to be a high end. It's going to be a cheaper cost this season.
Speaker 3Yeah, it's early ADP. There's only 27 NFBC drafts, but Roman Anthony, Roman Anthony currently going 50 picks after Jack Caglione. So interesting, better prospects,
Speaker 4similar skill set. I know Roman Anthony, I guess, hasn't done it, but I don't know. His 2025 wasn't exactly worse than Jack Caglione's 2026. It was a smaller sample size, but I don't know. I think there's there's a lot of profit to be found there.
Speaker 3All right, let's take a quick break and we'll be back. Back right after this.
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Speaker 3Welcome back. FBT Express. Take a look at Chris's way too early top 30 outfield rankings for next season and 23 through 27. We have Wyatt Lankford, Andy Paez, Jake Bowers, Tyler Soderstrom and Byron Buxton. Jake Bowers, Chris, he feels like a pretty tough one to rank as well. Obviously, awesome season. Some really incredible at bats during the postseason as well. But it's that one year mid-career breakout supported by some of the underlying stuff like his bat speed has jumped up tremendously the past two years. But will that translate on a new team and a new location in a new city? Does he go back to the Brewers? Again, he's another one where we kind of have to wait to see where he lands and to figure out what his value is going to be for next season.
Speaker 4Yeah. Given how the Brewers approach their team building, I think the odds of them signing a 31 year old with only one high level season under his belt. His belt are pretty low, so he's going to find somewhere else.
Speaker 3They did give him a qualifying offer, which was interesting.
Speaker 4Sure. And, you know, they'll get draft pick compensation if he leaves. If not, they'll take him for the, you know, 23 million or whatever it is. But I think it's a lot more likely he's playing somewhere else in 2027 and beyond. And, you know, he's only got the one season where he's truly played at this level. But it is worth noting that the breakout did start in 2025. He had a 354 expected Woba that season. You know, 91.7 mile per hour average exit velocity. He had already cut the strikeout rate that season. The walk rate was way up. Most of what he did in 2026 was already in place in 2025. It just didn't show up in the final numbers. But the underlying data suggested that there was a step forward. He took it. And then some, I think he gives some of that back. But we're talking about a guy who was like, what, a top 25 overall hitter in fantasy this season. You don't have to draft him anywhere close to that. I'm way ahead of ADP here. I'm about 10 spots in the outfield rankings. He's like eight out outfielder 37. I get the concerns, but this feels like a bet on a player who was always talented. I mean, he was a top prospect at one point who has the underlying numbers. Look, if the market's cool on him and the smart teams aren't in on Jake Bowers, maybe we reassess. But right now I feel pretty confident in what he did.
Speaker 3Yeah. Jake Bowers finished in the top 50. Yeah. player overall this past season. current early ADP is right around 150 so quite a bit of a difference a lot of room yeah yeah you
Speaker 4don't have to buy what he did last season to buy Jake Bowers 28
Speaker 3through 32 you have Cody Bellinger Jake McCarthy Luke Kieschel Chase DeLauder and Dillon Lyle Jake McCarthy is another one of those players who just broke out had a massive season he was a top 12 outfielder overall his ADP down around 125 so I never really know what to do with these players it's the the guy who broke out in the middle of his career reminds me a little bit of Geraldo Perdomo the difference is Perdomo was like a top 75 pick and now Jake McCarthy's early ADP is 125 so it's easier to jump in if you wanted
Speaker 4to yeah he did outperform his expected Woba by 28 points that's a lot on the other hand that's kind of what Rocky's players do in the StatCast era Rocky's players as a whole are outperforming their expected Woba by about 15 points and so sure he was ahead of that is there something in his skill set that might make that sustainable I think so because you're you're talking about a a guy who makes a lot of contact a guy who's got a ton of speed a guy who hits the ball to all fields those are three things that would make a a player's BABIP inflate and Coors Field inflates BABIP even further I just think it all adds up to a guy who what he did last season was more or less real maybe he takes a step back hits a few fewer homers maybe he hits 280 instead of 290 I think that's those that's all reasonable but unless he's traded this offseason I think it makes sense to buy the discount on Jake McCarthy because I still think he's going to be a good player that being said I think there is risk because of the trade possibility both in the offseason and then as next season goes on because the one place the Rockies do have some organizational is the corner outfield I'm not sure Jake McCarthy needs to be playing center field at this point in his career so you can see a world where he gets off to a great start plays like he did last season and still ends up being a disappointment because he's traded somewhere where he's a fourth outfielder or a platoon bat or just doesn't get the same numbers because he's not playing a Coors Field I think that's all possible so you do have to keep that in mind but I think there's enough of a discount here for a guy who was what a top 15 outfielder to get him outside of the top 30 or or later I think that's still worthwhile all right
Speaker 3for more extensive fantasy baseball coverage listen to our full-length podcast fantasy baseball today on Spotify Apple podcasts or anywhere else podcasts are found thanks for listening to FBT Express and we'll be back again next week bye
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