Fantasy Focus: First Base Bargains

The first base position, which had been thinning out in recent years, saw an explosion of power last season.  13 players with 1B eligibility hit at least 30 HR's last year and 29 hit as least 20.  The problem with 1B in most fantasy formats is many teams will roster at least 2 and sometimes 3 or even 4 first basemen by putting them on IF and UT positions.  If you are in a 10 team league and wait on 1B until the end of the draft thinking you are sure to snag at least one of those 13 guys with 30 dingers, you might find yourself looking at Brandon Belt and his 18 as the best that's left(not that Belt is useless, especially in OBP leagues).

The problem for the fantasy baseball manager is how to tell which of those 30 dinger guys are likely to do it again and which ones were aberrations of the juiced ball or new launch angles or whatever caused the spike in power.  Will Joey Gallo build on his 41 HR season and is it worth his Mendoza Line BA?  Was Yonder Alonso's breakout sustainable.  Did pitches finally discover the holes in Cody Bellinger's swing by the time the postseason came around?

One first baseman who was sneaky good last year and who I think has a good chance to not only sustain it but build on it, is Josh Bell of the Pirates.  I've followed Bell ever since I saw some prospect video of him before the Pirates made him their second round selection in the 2011 draft.  A switch-hitter with a power stroke from both sides of the plate, Bell did not exactly shoot through the Pirates minor league system which led him to fall off a lot of people's radars.  While he maintained high BA's and excellent K and BB ratios coming up, the power lagged.  Last year was finally his first full major league season at age 24 and we finally started to see the power come:  .255/.334/.466, 26 2B, 6 3B, 26 HR, 10.6 BB%, 18.9 K%, 620 PA.  His BABIP, K and BB rates all look solid and his L-R split is negligable. Now at age 25, he appears to be in the midst of a steep upward career trajectory just as he enters his peak age years.  The one area of concern is a strong groundball tendency(51% GB rate), which may limit his opportunity to hit more dingers.  He'll have to learn to elevate more balls.  While he will likely never completely reverse his GB/FB ratio, it likely won't go any lower and even a modest increase in FB rate will likely bring a substantial increase in his HR's.

I would not let Josh Bell stand in the way of paying top dollar for a Paul Goldschmidt or Joey Votto, He's a guy you might want to nab mid-draft for a UT of IF spot before you draft, say, your catcher.