1. Albert Pujols (1B - Cardinals) - The homerun drought for Albert Pujols continues. His last homerun came on April 23rd, over 87 AB ago. This is from a guy who has a career AB/HR of 14.2 since 2001. I guess the good news for fantasy owners is that after having a slow April with a .257/.319/.475 despite his 7 HR's, he is slowly getting back on track with a .308/.387/.354 in May. I have no doubt that of all the top fantasy picks that are off to slow starts, Pujols is the guy who will turn it around. There has been no better time to try and buy Pujols at a low point.
2. Carlos Pena (1B - Cubs) - Carlos Pena is a frustrating fantasy case study this year. A terrible April brought his fantasy value way down to the point where fantasy owners in 12-team mixed leagues were outright dropping him to the waiver wire. But if you were able to grab him to start May, you would have captured tremendous value at a low cost. Believe it or not, Pena is hitting .327 in May with 5 HR, 12 RBI, and a .452 OBP. He has even cut down on the K's slightly, posting a K/BB of 14:12 during the month as well. Pena's zero home runs in April just didn't add up (literally!). Dating back to 2007, Pena has posted AB/HR of 10.7, 15.8, 12.1, and 17.3. This season, because of his April drought, he is at 22.4. So, there's still some time to capture upside, as a I highly doubt this is the year that Pena posts a 20+ AB/HR rate. Accordingly to ESPN, he is still unowned in about 35% of all leagues.
3. Andrew McCutchen (OF - Pirates) - Andrew McCutchen is well on his way to his first 20/20 season and if he can have a stellar second half, it may be more like 30/30. He hit his 8th HR of the season last night, bringing his AB/HR to 19.8. That's quite an increase from his previous two years of 36.1 and 35.6, but still expected as McCutchen's power was forecasted to reveal itself in 2011. With that increase in HR, we see a large jump in ISO from the .180's to .222. However, the power has come with a price as his overall production is down. His average is 40 points off his career rate and his BB/K is at 0.68 which is a drop from last year's 0.79. On to the speed, his success rate is really low, just 5-for-9 in stolen bases compared to 33-for-43 last year and 22-for-27 the year before. That will have to pick-up slightly if we want to see him return to the 0.70+ FPI days of the past two years. He's trending around 0.60 right now. McCutchen had a slow April, but he's picking it up in May. He's a superstar in the making and I see a huge second half out of him.
4. Jayson Werth (OF - Nationals) - Jayson Werth is another buy-low scenario that is worth taking a look at for fantasy owners looking to add an outfielder. Werth is hitting just .238 with a .331 OBP and an OPS of .749. Compare those figures to his 4-year averages with the Phillies that resulted in a .282 average, .380 OBP, and .885 OPS. His K%, while high at 22.8%, is no different than his previous 4-year rate of 23.4%. His BB% is the same as well, earning a walk for every 12.3% of plate appearances this season compared to his 4-year Phillies rate of 13.0.%. The glaring difference is his GB/FB rates of 0.62 in Philly compared to his 0.90 this year (for a GO/AO of 1.29). Simply put, he's not lifting the ball enough to get it out of the park, resulting in an AB/HR decline from 18.9 with the Phils to this year's rate of 25.2. Lineup protection certainly could play a big role in this decline, but I still think Werth has plenty of time to turn this around. There's some upside here and a potential buy-low opportunity.
5. Ryan Dempster (SP - Cubs) - This is why I dumped the Dempster this year. The inconsistency is something I can't weather for the long-haul. After a few decent starts that had fantasy owners believing again, Dempster got tagged for 5 ER and 8 hits in 5 IP with just 3 K's. His ERA creeps back up to 6.91 with a WHIP of 1.57. He is now just 3-for-10 in QS this year. The only saving grace is that his K totals are respectable, posting an 8.4 K/9 which is in-line with previous years. Other than that, in vanilla mixed leagues, I feel like I can do better on any given day on the waiver wire.
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