| | | | Tuesday, July 15, 2025 | | How much should your opinion on a player change in just three and a half months? How much can your opinion on a player change in that amount of time? | | On Monday's episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast, Scott White, Frank Stampfl, and I re-drafted the first two rounds for the rest of the season, and while most of the first-rounders from this preseason made it, Mookie Betts notably didn't. Betts was the No. 11 pick on average coming into the season, but he didn't make our top-24, and I'm not sure how much farther we would have had to go to get him in there. | | That's a mighty big fall for a guy who has been a top-24 pick basically as long as I've been writing about Fantasy baseball. But an early hot streak masked his decline last season, and he hasn't been able to turn it around so far in 2025, with his production and underlying performance metrics declining in baseball every way possible. He's not as fast as he once was, and he's lost a bit of bat speed, while putting up the worst underlying quality of contact metrics of his career. At 32, he might just be solidly in the decline phase of his career, and while I'd bet on him being better than a sub-.700 OPS bat the rest of the way, I'm not sure how confident I am that Betts is going to be a difference maker in Fantasy again. | | So, he didn't make our first two rounds for the rest of the season, but who did? Scott White wrote about his choices for the first two rounds here, and we discussed it and went into even further detail on last night's episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast, which you can watch here. | | And my picks are below. There's quite a bit of consensus at the top, as there should be, though you'll find plenty of disagreements in the second round, especially, even if most of the names are the same, ultimately. See something you disagree with? Send your thoughts to [email protected] about who you think we overlooked or who you think we're overrating, and we may discuss them on an upcoming episode of the podcast or here in this newsletter over the next few days. | | Below, my picks for the first two rounds, I've also got some second-half sleepers for you. If you want even more options to stash away as the second half starts to get going, I wrote about one for each position in my latest look at the waiver wire yesterday, which you can find here. | | | | Redrafting the first two rounds | | | | 1. Aaron Judge, OF, NYY – Judge is hitting .335/.459/.714 since the start of last season, and he's on pace for another 55-plus homer season. There's no question in my mind who the No. 1 pick should be the rest of the way – or in 2026. | | 2. Shohei Ohtani, DH, LAD – Ohtani has taken maybe a half-step back from where he was last season as a hitter, but the bigger reason a gap has opened between him and Judge is the fact that he has attempted just one steal since getting back on the pitching mound. I think you could make a case for Ohtani being even lower than No. 2 if you don't get points for his pitching, though I do expect him to run more than he has once he gets a bit more settled. | | 3. Ronald Acuna, OF, ATL – Acuna came out of the gates incredibly hot, but he has slowed down over the past few weeks, and doesn't have a steal in his past 16 games. If he can still be a 30-plus steal guy, he might be able to challenge Judge for the top spot, but I'm not sure where he's going to end up landing at this point. | | 4. Bobby Witt, SS, KC – Just as a hitter, Witt is probably a tier or two below the three names ahead of him. He's also the only one of them on pace for 40-plus steals. That helps close the gap a bit, but I also think he's closer to No. 5 than to the top three. | | 5. Jose Ramirez, 3B, CLE – Ramirez is just continuing to do what he does while every other player in the league gets more hype than him. He's showing no signs of slowing down as either a hitter or baserunner, and he's actually on pace for a career-high in steals. | | 6. Kyle Tucker, OF, CHC – The big step forward Tucker took in 2024 hasn't quite held up, though it's worth noting that might just be because he's actually underperforming his expected stats a tad – his expected slugging percentage is .531 compared to his actual .499 mark. Oh no, he's only on a 29-homer, 36-steal pace. How terrible. | | | | 7. Elly De La Cruz, SS, CIN – The way people react to Elly De La Cruz's seasons makes me wonder how those people handle rollercoasters. Do they assume every time the track goes up, they are going to launch into the sky and fly forever? On a dip, are they afraid the car is going to slam into the ground and burrow to the center of the Earth? He's a young player who is still developing, but people take every hot streak or cold spell as a sign that he is going to be that one thing forever, when in reality, De La Cruz is just a pretty volatile player at this point in his career. He's taken a step forward as a hitter but has been less aggressive as a basestealer, so it all comes out in the wash in the end, I guess. But if De La Cruz comes out looking more like a 50-steal guy in the second half, he could easily vault into the top-five discussion for 2026. | | 8. Tarik Skubal, SP, DET – Since the start of 2024, Skubal leads the majors in wins, strikeouts, ERA, and WHIP. I don't think anyone's going to make the mistake of picking another pitcher ahead of him this time. | | 9. Corbin Carroll, OF, ARI – I was a little worried Carroll rushed back from his fractured wrist, and a 34% strikeout rate and .167 average in eight games since didn't exactly assuage my concerns. It's a small sample size – and one that wouldn't really matter for 2026 purposes – but I am a tiny bit concerned about how he might hit in the second half, and the gaps separating players at this level at minuscule, so it's enough to drop him from No. 7 to here. | | 10. Juan Soto, OF, NYM – When a player with Juan Soto's track record, at Juan Soto's age, gets off to a slow start, I'm going to need everyone to refrain from freaking out. Is that too much to ask? Despite all the teeth gnashing, Soto is up to a .262/.396/.509 line for the season, with a 39-homer, 19-steal pace. And he's still underperforming his expected wOBA by the second-biggest margin of any hitter in baseball. | | 11. James Wood, OF, WAS – That all came together way more quickly than I expected. Wood is putting up premium exit velocities while improving his contact skills, and while the contact he makes still isn't totally optimized for power, he's such an outlier physically that he's still on pace for 40-plus homers and 20-plus steals. | | 12. Zack Wheeler, SP, PHI – Despite being deep into his 30s (and openly talking about retirement), Wheeler just keeps getting better. He has a career-high strikeout rate along with his typically excellent control and quality of contact metrics. Given his much longer track record of health and ace-level production, you can make a case that it's basically a coin flip between him and Skubal. | | | | 13. Fernando Tatis, OF, SD – I think this one might be controversial. It's definitely giving Tatis the benefit of the doubt that his .393 xwOBA is more representative of his true talent level than his .353 actual wOBA. Seeing as this is the third season in a row he has significantly underperformed, that benefit of the doubt may be unearned. On the other hand, he's only a few of each off a 30-homer, 40-steal pace, and we know he has that kind of ability. | | 14. Cal Raleigh, C, SEA – This might be too low. Based on what he's done so far, of course, it's way too low – he's been the second-most valuable player in Fantasy so far this season. I don't expect him to sustain a 60-homer pace, but even if Raleigh is just a 40-homer catcher, isn't this too low? It might be too low. | | 15. Ketel Marte, 2B, ARI – This is about as high as you can rank while being a true zero in stolen bases, and it's a testament to how devastatingly impactful Marte is as a hitter, especially at a position with few other true superstars. Despite missing nearly 30 games, Marte is tied for the lead among second basemen in homers, while ranking fourth in runs and ninth in RBI and hitting .290. He's a true four-category superstar. | | 16. Trea Turner, SS, PHI – Turner leaves you at a real detriment in power production for a player drafted this high, but his return to being an elite base-stealer this season more than helps make up for that. Not bad for a 32-year-old. | | 17. Pete Crow-Armstrong, OF, CHC – Did I tweak my ranking at the last minute to slow Crow-Armstrong ahead of Rodriguez so I wouldn't get yelled at? I'll never tell. Crow-Armstrong has been one of the defining stories in MLB this season, and he'd probably get my vote for NL MVP if the season ended today (and I had a vote). I don't think what he's doing is entirely sustainable, given Crow-Armstrong's truly terrible approach at the plate, but he might just be an elite bad-ball hitter who can make this kind of approach work. I'm skeptical, but that skepticism just keeps making me look dumb. | | 18. Francisco Lindor, SS, NYM – Lindor might have been a first-rounder if not for a tricky toe injury that has slowed him down over the past month-plus. He is hitting .224/.286/.396 with just five homers and four steals in 34 games since that injury. He showed signs of life over the past few weeks, so I'll still give him the benefit of the doubt here. | | 19. Paul Skenes, SP, PIT – It says something about Skenes' prodigious talents that a season with a 2.01 ERA, 0.93 WHIP, and 9.7 K/9 is rightly viewed as a disappointment. Partially, that's his teammates' fault – Skenes has a league-high five starts of six innings, one earned run or fewer, and no wins. Expand that to two runs and it jumps to eight of his 20 starts, which puts him in a tie for the league lead with … his teammate, Mitch Keller. The Pirates, ladies and gentlemen! | | 20. Julio Rodriguez, OF, SEA – It's another weirdly disjointed season from Rodriguez, who continues to struggle to generate power to the pull side, especially. On the other hand, Rodriguez is a notoriously slow starter whose numbers are significantly better in the second half, so I'm betting on another big kick to close it out. | | 21. Gunnar Henderson, SS, BAL – We need more power. Everything else is more or less where it's supposed to be for Henderson, and it's not like there's been some sudden loss in his ability to crush the baseball – Henderson's 93.0 mph average exit velocity is ever so slightly higher than last season's mark. He's lost a little in his barrel rate and added a bit to his groundball and pop-up rates, so some of that hard contact is just being wasted. He's just been a bit off. He's also still just 24 and still has elite tools, so yeah, I'm gonna bet on a big second half. This could look way too low in October. | | 22. Manny Machado, 3B, SD – Hall of Famers don't tend to age the same as everyone else, and Machado is showing that, with the best xwOBA of his career at the break. He still hits the ball incredibly hard, but he's doing it with improved plate discipline, and he's still happy to take a base if the pitcher isn't paying attention. | | 23. Garrett Crochet, SP, BOS – At some point, I'm going to have to just ignore that nagging voice in the back of my head saying, "Yeah, but what if he breaks down?" The Red Sox haven't put any limiters on Crochet, and he's responded with elite ratios while leading the majors in innings at the All-Star break. We're in totally uncharted territory for his workload, but he's showing no signs of slowing down, and I can't reasonably justify keeping him out of the first two rounds at this point. | | 24. Kyle Schwarber, DH, Phillies – Mookie Betts? Freddie Freeman ? Both look a lot more pedestrian than we've ever really seen from either in a long time, so I had to pivot. Vladimir Guerrero? We've seen how good he is when he locks in, but it's hard to justify a streaky hitter who doesn't steal any bases at this point. Bryce Harper was considered, as were Jazz Chisholm and Jackson Chourio. I ultimately landed with Schwarber and his truly elite HR, R, and RBI production; that he has nine steals and OF eligibility is a nice bonus! He won't be ranked this high for next season when he's back to being DH-only, but we'll take advantage of this while we have it. | | Second-half sleepers | | Finding sleepers at the beginning of the season is easy. Doing it mid-season is a lot harder. There are a lot fewer playing time questions right now, and a lot of the most interesting fringe-y talents have already established themselves one way or the other – as the interesting players we hoped they would become or the disappointments they turned out to be. | | But if we're taking the chance this week to do a little mid-season reset, we've gotta throw some second-half sleepers out there for you, don't we? So, here are seven players I think could be much more valuable in the second half of the 2025 season than you might think. | | Denzel Clarke, OF, Athletics – I like betting on elite defenders, and Clarke might already be the best defensive outfielder in baseball – according to BaseballSavant.com 's Fielding Run Value metric, he's been the third-best center fielder in baseball this season, saving 11 runs in just 360 innings, compared to Pete Crow-Armstrong's 16 runs saved in 847 innings. That's going to keep Clarke on the field, and while his current 40.3% strikeout rate is prohibitive, there are definitely some skills to work with at the plate, starting with his elite speed and 89th percentile max exit velocity. And for as much as he strikes out, Clarke doesn't chase much more than the league average, while his zone contact rate of 77.5% is below average, but not alarmingly so. Plus power and elite speed are a good toolset to build from. Let's see if Clarke can figure out how to put them into action a bit more often. | | Kyle Teel, C, White Sox – Teel has more than held his own in his first 25 MLB games, but holding your own doesn't get the job done at catcher anymore. You need to actually make an impact to matter, and he's fallen short so far, with no homers and just 15 combined runs and RBI to date. He's shown good patience at the plate and solid athleticism for a catcher, which is what we expected from his minor-league numbers. Now it's time for him to start driving the ball and tapping into some upside, and his underlying stats suggest that should be coming – his .375 expected wOBA is the third-best of any catcher right now. It has tended to take top prospects a month or two to really figure things out at the major-league level over the past few seasons, and Teel is right on schedule. He could still be a top-12 catcher in the second half. | | Christian Moore, 2B, Angels – Moore is dealing with a thumb injury that has him on the IL as the first half ended, but hopefully it won't be long before he's back once the second half starts. We saw brief flashes of his upside as a power hitter, along with a lot of swing and miss, which was to be expected. But he also showed a surprisingly patient and selective approach at the plate that could help mitigate the swing-and-miss in his game, and if he manages to hit something like .250 or .260, Moore could be a top-five second baseman with his 30-homer, 20-steal ceiling. | | Brice Matthews, SS, Astros – Will the Astros be willing to move Jose Altuve back to the outfield full time when Jeremy Pena is healthy? Would they give Matthews a look in the outfield? He's gonna have to hit to force those questions, and with Pena looking like he could be back before the end of the month, he just may not have time. But the team's first-round pick in 2023 has shown some awfully interesting skills in the minors, most recently hitting .283/.400/.476 with 10 homers and 25 steals in 73 games at Triple-A before his promotion. | | Zebby Matthews, SP, Twins – Matthews struggled before a shoulder injury landed him on the IL in early June, but it's still easy to see how he can be an effective pitcher when healthy. He struck out 30.1% of hitters in his four starts before the injury, which is a good place to start from – and, notably, his velocity looked fine and he struck out nine in four no-hit innings in his first rehab appearance over the weekend. He should be back in the Twins rotation before the end of the month, and the combination of elite control upside and better than a strikeout per inning (and potentially much more than that) makes him worth chasing in all formats as a stash. | | David Festa , SP, Twins – Festa's four-seam fastball is terrible. He throws it with roughly league-average velocity, and while he does a good job of getting behind it and generating good rise, it has proven incapable of either missing bats or generating weak contact. He's been a prime candidate to transition to a sinker, and we've seen that pitch featured more prominently of late – it also isn't a great pitch, but at least when it gets hit hard, it doesn't tend to get crushed into the outfield seats quite as often. The focus is on the fastballs because the rest of the arsenal here looks like it could be quite good – the changeup especially looks like it might be an elite pitch, while the slider already has an above-average whiff rate despite missing his spots too often. Leading with the changeup and sinker, saving the slider for two-strike counts to righties, and the four-seamer for two-strike counts could help Festa turn things around. The talent is there. | | Reid Detmers, RP, Angels – Are the Angels really going to try to make a playoff run? They're only two games under .500, so it's not inconceivable, but also … this isn't a good team, and they've got six teams between them and a playoff spot. Kenley Jansen should be on the move at the deadline, is what I'm saying, and Detmers looks well qualified to take over and potentially star as a closer. He got off to a rocky start and has an inflated 4.15 ERA as a result, but since the start of June, Detmers has a 1.35 ERA with 25 strikeouts to eight walks in 20 innings of work. I think he's going to lead the Angels in saves the rest of the way. | | Ronny Henriquez, RP, Marlins – For most of the season, it just didn't really matter who the Marlins' closer was. They were a bad team that didn't have many good options in the ninth inning, with a manager who was willing to play matchups when the situation called for it. Well, the Marlins look at least mediocre lately, and Henriquez looks like the clear best pitcher in this bullpen, with a 2.60 ERA backed up by a 3.35 xERA and an arsenal full of swing-and-miss pitches – all four of his primary pitches have an above-average whiff rate for their pitch type this season. Does that mean Henriquez is definitely going to be the closer the rest of the way? Not at all, but I think he has a chance to be, and he could be a very good one if he does. I hope they give him the chance. | | | | | | | | 24/7 Sports News | | WNBA | Hit every highlight with CBS Sports HQ, your free, 24/7 snapshot of all the sports that matter to you. Catch highlights, in-depth analysis & breaking news anywhere you are. Download the CBS Sports App to watch today.
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