In this article, we discuss the Week 12 Fantasy Baseball Surprise Players whose performances many fantasy owners may be missing if they are only reading the headlines from week to week. These are players that may be overachieving and may deserve more attention, or they could be players that are surprisingly underachieving. Fantasy owners are making moves every week and are always on the lookout for the free agent pickup that will carry them to the title. Additionally, fantasy owners may be overlooking players that are currently in their lineups, yet they are not producing.
Arctic
Michael Brantley, OF, Cleveland Indians
Following back to back solid seasons in 2012 and 2013 Brantley took his game to the next level in 2014 with 20 HR, 97 RBI, and 23 SB, while batting .327. Brantley’s 2014 results catapulted him to first round draft status in many fantasy baseball drafts. Unfortunately, for fantasy owners that invested in him for 2015, Brantley has not lived up to expectations. His power has all but disappeared as he only has four HR, and 37 RBI on the season. He has still been productive on the base paths, although he is trailing well behind last season’s pace with eight SB in 2015. On a positive note, Brantley has maintained a solid .293 AVG and continues to get on base with an 11.4% (career high) BB rate. Overall, he is on his way to another solid fantasy season, however with his power outage this year (zero HRs since May 14th), Brantley appears to be returning to his pre-2014 breakout form, and will likely not be delivering the return on his fantasy owner’s investment in 2015.
Adrian Gonzalez, 1B, Los Angeles Dodgers
The 33 year-old 1B certainly gave his owners plenty of reasons to smile at the start of the season. Gonzalez started 2015 on an absolute tear, clubbing eight HR and driving in 19 runs in April. Unfortunately for those same owners, Gonzalez has cooled off to a very frigid level since his amazing start. Over the combined months of May and June, Gonzalez has only managed five HRs. He has continued to drive in runs and maintain a strong batting average, although over the past 30 days he has been especially cold while batting only .225 with 13 RBI. On the year, Gonzalez has accumulated 13 HR, and 46 RBI with a .295 AVG which most fantasy owners would gladly take as a basis for a projection for the entirety of the season. It may be wise for fantasy owners to lower their expectations from the April onslaught that Gonzalez demonstrated, and look for him to finish the season very close to his 2014 statistics.
Main Photo
