With the top 40 outfielders for 2024 fantasy baseball, we’ve finished all the hitter recaps. We meaning me, but I’ll include you. No, that’s not a cue to try to hold my hand. Why are you now patting my butt? Don’t muss my hair! The pitching recap will begin next. You can hardly wait. No, you! To recap, the end of the season rankings are based on our Fantasy Baseball Player Rater. I felt the easiest way to keep it objective would be to go this route. This way when I say a player finished 30th and I ranked them 23rd in the preseason, it carries more weight than Daniel Vogelbach. Anyway, here’s the top 40 outfielders for 2024 fantasy baseball and how they compare to where I originally ranked them:
21. Oneil Cruz – Already went over him in the top 20 shortstops for 2024 fantasy baseball.
22. Spencer Steer – Already went over him in the top 20 1st basemen for 2024 fantasy baseball.
23. Nick Castellanos – What’s cool about baseball (and incredibly infuriating) is you look at a guy like The Greek God of Hard Contact and see a 25/7/.260 hitter and he ends up that way, but from month to month you get a guy who is a 3-homer/.200 hitter and you want to kill someone, then he homers and gets hot and suddenly he’s a 6-homer/.310 hitter for a month. Then, he cools, and the ulcer begins again. In big picture: You know what to expect. In small picture: You have no idea. Preseason Rank #20, 2024 Projections: 77/27/89/.271/8 in 597 ABs, Final Numbers: 80/23/86/.254/6 in 606 ABs
24. Riley Greene – Have I mentioned this year I wrote a sleeper post for Greene? I did? Oh, I see. Pretty much nailed his projections and ranking, just missed on his speed. The Pitch Clock Twelve giveth, the Pitch Clock Twelve taketh away. If Greene stole 20 bags next year, would it shock you? Wouldn’t shock me. Steals are almost entirely contingent now on how much they want to steal. They being the player or the team. If anyone has any better way to project steals than saying “plus/minus 12,” I’m all ears like Alfred E. Neuman. Preseason Rank #27, 2024 Projections: 84/21/61/.274/12 in 533 ABs, Final Numbers: 82/24/74/.262/4 in 512 ABs
25. Alec Burleson – Already went over him in the top 20 1st basemen for 2024 fantasy baseball.
26. Lourdes Gurriel Jr. – Towards the end of the year, it felt like the DBags decided Lou-Gu-Ju was a vs. lefty-only bat, and looking at his numbers it backs that up. He only saw 30 ABs in September, as they went to Pavin Smith more, i.e., for Smith, they Gave-in. Get it? Like Pavin. No? Okay. Lou-Gu-Ju’s value takes a massive hit if he’s not playing every day, and even more if it’s not against righties. Preseason Rank #39, 2024 Projections: 72/22/86/.274/6 in 536 ABs, Final Numbers: 72/18/75/.279/7 in 513 ABs
27. Wyatt Langford – This ranking is 100% what I said for Castellanos again, and what I keep saying about speed and power. Was Wyatt a total shizzshow for most of the season? Yes, but if a guy can go 6/6 in a month, it’s gonna very hard for him not to be valuable. I’m not daft. I know, it was a Struggle Bus to roster Wyatt most of the year. He sure knew how to end his shizzshow: In September, 8/7/.300. Also, on the year with a ~20% K%? With a ~9% BB%? Yeah, it’s gonna be hard to not be in again. Also, I never would’ve guessed how much I nailed his preseason ranking and projections. Preseason Rank #26, 2024 Projections: 78/22/71/.278/20 in 511 ABs, Final Numbers: 74/16/74/.253/19 in 499 ABs
28. Cody Bellinger – Already went over him in the top 20 1st basemen for 2024 fantasy baseball.
29. Taylor Ward – We are at a crossroads with Ward. He’s now either an every other year, Saberhagenmetrics darling or he had a random off year in 2023 (when I called him a sleeper — oops!) and he’s just the player we saw in ’22 and ’24. That’s what it looks like. His ’23 down year looks like the outlier, but we won’t know until next year. The Angels sucking really did not help him either. If he had a 25/6/.250 season in a good lineup, he could be as high as a top 15 OF. See Ian Happ for more on that. Preseason Rank #55, 2024 Projections: 68/20/66/.271/6 in 471 ABs, Final Numbers: 73/25/75/.246/6 in 585 ABs
30. Colton Cowser – This guy is interesting in that when I drafted last November in my way-too-early draft, I took Cowser very early, then the further we got into the preseason, I pulled away from him. Shows that I am also susceptible to others. People were not drafting him, and I started doubting myself. In fairness, I doubted him too, because I saw why others were worried about his playing time. It appeared as if Cowser was about to be passed by a lot of other prospects. He held them off and held his own. Preseason Rank #121, 2024 Projections: 31/10/34/.249/7 in 236 ABs, Final Numbers: 77/24/69/.242/9 in 499 ABs
31. Adolis Garcia – This is why I use the Player Rater and don’t year-end recap based on vibes, because Adolis’s vibes are rancid. I like the guy, in general, but this season was a big letdown. In fact! The Big Letdown sounds like an EPMD song about Adolis. Surprised a bit that his peripherals look mostly the same as past years, but one huge difference that has killed him: Hard Contact% fell from 42.6% to barely 36%. He’s hitting a bunch of 88 MPH bloops into the left fielder’s mitt. Preseason Rank #10, 2024 Projections: 91/35/103/.247/12 in 571 ABs, Final Numbers: 68/25/85/.224/11 in 580 ABs
32. Tyler O’Neill – There’s a case (I’m about to make) that O’Neill is way more valuable than this ranking if you had him in a league where you could’ve easily swapped him out with a productive waiver wire add when he was injured. He’s like Ferdinand the Bull only instead of smelling flowers, he smells MRIs on his quad. Preseason Rank #44, 2024 Projections: 74/27/77/.246/7 in 466 ABs, Final Numbers: 74/31/61/.241/4 in 411 ABs
33. Cedric Mullins – Sometimes you see a hitter’s profile and it’s the totally wrong profile for a guy. It’s like Mr. Potato Head but the eyes are where the nose should be and the lips are on his ass. Mullins must’ve taken the Cedric HRtainer nickname serious because his profile should be on Schwarber. A near 50% fly ball rate and 21+ Launch Angle? Whatcha you doing, Mullins? You think you’re in a Home Run Derby? He’s slowly become dependable for 15-20 HRs, 27-35 SBs, .230-.245. Shame he thinks he’s a 45/5 player. Preseason Rank #36, 2024 Projections: 57/17/71/.229/24 in 531 ABs, Final Numbers: 69/18/54/.234/32 in 444 ABs
34. Lane Thomas – His trade showed as much as Matt Chapman that steals are completely about desire. Sounding like a creepy guy standing outside a peep show, “What do you desire, young man?” Thomas desired steals in Washington, then power in Cleveland. What he’s always shown now is that he’s a 20-ish homer guy with 30+ steal speed. If he so desires… Preseason Rank #22, 2024 Projections: 78/23/68/.254/20 in 576 ABs, Final Numbers: 65/15/63/.237/32 in 472 ABs
Never wrong, just early pic.twitter.com/ZahpQNoNpd
— Razzball (@Razzball) October 12, 2024
35. Ceddanne Rafaela – Already went over him in the top 20 shortstops for 2024 fantasy baseball.
36. Lawrence Butler – Wild thing about Butler is he just stands by the door waiting to open for strangers in our 800-square-foot house. There’s really no room for him. This Butler was a bad purchase. Oh, for fantasy? No, great purchase! 23-year-old with power and speed and a 23.9 K%? Not too shabby. More “not shabby at all” is his 130 wRC+, which would’ve been 25th in the league if he qualified, and same as Jackson Merrill. Top 30 in wOBA, and .228 ISO which would’ve been 17th, just above Lindor. Butler made some incredibly good contact, but why is he just standing by the door? No one’s coming! Unranked, Final Numbers: 63/22/.262/18 in 412 ABs
37. Steven Kwan – In my defense as far as rankings go, this guy was 42nd and him ending up here is a rounding error. Difference of five outfielders in the rankings is nothing. It’s more about my feelings for a player than anything, and here’s what I said on Kwan, “There might not be a more aight player who is not aight aight or aight aight aight. Kwan could wake up on Opening Day, go out and have an aight season without any prep. He’s Mr. Aight. Is he great? No, you are not following. He is not great. He’s aight! He’s so just aight, he gets a lot of his value from staying healthy and hitting leadoff. Lots of runs? That’s aight! Lots of power? No, that’s aight aight! He’s got aight speed too. Is he great at average? Should be and that’s just another aight category.” And that’s me aight’ing me! Preseason Rank #42, 2024 Projections: 96/5/51/.286/22 in 613 ABs, Final Numbers: 83/14/44/.292/12 in 480 ABs
38. Joc Pederson – Even during the year, I didn’t want Pederson, unless it was a daily league and I could platoon him as the DBacks were. That he’s ranked this high in the end-of-the-year recaps is concerning, because it shows how weak outfielders are when you need five of them in a league. A platoon-only outfielder shouldn’t be ranked this high, I say after calling into C-SPAN. Preseason Rank #111, 2024 Projections: 58/20/63/.237/2 in 389 ABs, Final Numbers: 62/23/64/.275/7 in 367 ABs
39. Jake McCarthy – A Saberhagenmetrics darling. Again, never wrong, just early. See: my 2023 sleeper on McCarthy for more. Also, some guys who didn’t make the cut that were good or bad interesting: Heliot Ramos was ranked 41. Guy had a helluva solid rookie year. Or, I guess, hella good, since it’s San Fran. Bit of a comedown in the 2nd half, but it was mostly in BABIP, ergo, henceforth, vis-a-vis, which leads us to the question: Is he a .370 BABIP guy or a .300 BABIP guy or somewhere in-between? .370 was his 1st half BABIP and .300 was his 2nd half. Funny thing is, in the minors he was a .370 BABIP guy one year and a .300 BABIP guy another year. Split the difference and he has a .335 BABIP, and that still gets us to a .250 average. This is a long way of saying Heliot looks real if 25/10/.250 is real. (Spoiler: It is.) Other names: 43. Randy Arozarena (surprisingly disappointing), 44. Jorge Soler (predictably disappointing), 45. Fernando Tatis Jr., 47. Kyle Tucker, and 62. Michael Harris II (all brutally disappointing) and 65. Jo Adell (next year, it is!) Preseason Unranked, Final Numbers: 54/22/72/.269/6 in 475 ABs Preseason Rank #105, 2024 Projections: 41/7/43/.248/20 in 318 ABs, Final Numbers: 66/8/56/.285/25 in 442 ABs
40. Willi Castro – Already went over him in the top 20 2nd basemen for 2024 fantasy baseball.
