The best way to enhance your chances of having a great season, and winning your league, is to have those key breakout players. You want to have those players that give the most value from their draft position. The players that when other owners in your league look at your team, they say, he got that guy when? Of course having Mookie Betts or Freddie Freeman on your team is nice, and will help you win, but you had to pay a high price for those players and everyone saw it coming. The players that really help you win are the breakout players that you picked in the 10th or 12th round that give you second or third round value. My strategy is to load up on as many of these guys that I can and hope they hit their breakout potential. Where do you find these guys? I have a formula that I have figured out this last year and I am putting it to the test. This is only for offensive players not pitching. So far, it seems to be panning out quite well. It takes players profiles and their statistical trends and predicts when they will have their breakout season. I have gone back and looked at hundreds of players profiles over the last 40ish years and a lot of their profiles are similar. With that being said, here are the guys that I picked in the beginning of the year that fit the profile. All of these players have very similar profiles coming into this season. Can you figure out what it is?
National League
Josh Bell 1B
Michael Conforto OF
Kyle Schwarber OF
Trea Turner SS
Trevor Story SS
Ketel Marte OF/SS/2B
American League
Byron Buxton OF
Joey Gallo OF/1B
Max Kepler OF
Nomar Mazara OF
Domingo Santana OF
Alex Bregman 3B/SS
Tim Anderson SS
Matt Chapman 3B
Miguel Sano 3B/OF
Most of these players have broken out this year. There are are few factors that come into play here. Some of these players already had their breakout season, like Story, Bregman and Turner but they fit the profile so I targeted them in my leagues banking on the fact that they would have the best chance to duplicate their breakout season or have an even better season. The other thing that comes into play with this is injuries. Obviously a player won’t have their breakout season if they get injured. Every year their are players that will fit this profile. I will continue to try and target all the players that fit this profile in my drafts for years to come. In a later blog I will reveal the players that will fit this profile going into the 2020 season. I like to keep players in mind, especially in the second half, that I am interested in drafting in next years draft.