Aledmys Diaz (SS, STL) - Diaz homered and doubled, finishing 2-4 and raising his line to .262/.296/.416 on the season. He's matched his stolen base total of four from 2016 (over 111 games) in 55 games, but everything else has been a huge disappointment so far. His walk rate has been cut nearly in half, dropping from 8.9% in 2016 to 4.7% this year, although his strikeouts have remained consistent. If you looked into his batted ball profile from 2016, you could see that he didn't deserve a .312 BABIP due to an abundance of fly balls, a pull-heavy approach, and a lot of pop-ups. His BABIP has corrected this year and his hard contact has also dropped to 25% to give him a .283 BABIP and a batting average nearly 40 points below what he posted last year. Thanks to a ridiculous 53% pull rate he will continue to show some power, but in this day and age where everyone can hit 20 home runs, Diaz is nothing special. He's droppable in standard mixed leagues.
Ian Happ (2B/OF, ChC) - Happ led off against the Rockies on Friday, as he has been doing of late, but went 0-4 with a walk and two strikeouts. After a robust start to his MLB career, Happ has cooled off immensely and is now hitting just .213/.315/.488. He has hit five home runs though, which is good for a cool .275 ISO. While batting Happ leadoff is clearly an indication from Joe Maddon that he has faith in the 22 year-old, some of his numbers say that confidence is misguided. He has been embarrassed by left-handed pitching so far, with a .273 wOBA and 56% strikeout rate, although that's in a tiny sample. He's still striking out 31% of the time against righties, and his overall 20% swinging strike rate and 62% contact rate lead me to wonder if he could be sent back to Triple-A at some point. If you're in a deep OBP league he's worth holding onto in hopes that he'll improve, but in any league shallower than 15 teams he can be considered waiver wire fodder.
Dee Gordon (2B, MIA) - The Marlins hung 12 runs on the Pirates, and Dee Gordon set the table for their offense as usual. He went 3-6 with two runs and one RBI, doubling twice and stealing his 21st base of the season. That ties him with Trea Turner for second place in MLB for steals, behind (of course) Billy Hamilton. With the lack of steals leaguewide this year, that alone makes him valuable in roto formats. He's also giving you more batting average than he did last year, besting 2016's .268 mark with a .282 average on a .332 BABIP that is not only sustainable for a blazer such as Gordon, but actually lower than his career .340 average. He has a shot to beat his career-high runs scored total of 92 if he can stay healthy, which is to say he's giving you all you could have hoped for if you drafted him this year, and he should continue this pace.
Juan Nicasio (RP, PIT) - Juan Nicasio is going to share closing duties with Felipe Rivero for the time being, according to Pirates manager Clint Hurdle. Tony Watson has been demoted after allowing two runs in consecutive outings and a 4.28 ERA over 27.1 innings. Nicasio has been terrific out of the bullpen this year, posting a 1.35 ERA over 26.2 innings with 25 strikeouts and 8 walks. Rivero has been the listed handcuff for a few weeks now and has also been dominant, so with Nicasio being a righty and Rivero a lefty it will be interesting to see if Hurdle does decide to go with matchups in the ninth inning. He hinted that Rivero could be used in a similar way to Andrew Miller in Cleveland however, which would leave the bulk of the saves for Nicasio. If you're in the hunt for saves you should be all over both closer candidates until this situation shakes out.
Aaron Altherr (OF, PHI) - Altherr doubled twice and tripled, finishing the game 3-4 with one RBI. He's hitting an impressive .298/.379/.554 over his first 190 plate appearances, and a lot of his numbers back up a legitimate offensive player. His 37% hard contact rate leaps out, and he has trimmed 6% off his strikeout rate from his 227 PA's last year. His 24% strikeout rate is manageable, but he's still whiffing a lot and making just 74% contact, so perhaps his strikeouts could tick back up a bit. However, if that trends up than his walks should too; his patient approach and ability to lay off pitches out of the zone is impressive, and it allows him to crush the pitches in the zone. He's only 3-6 in stolen base attempts, so that bears monitoring, but he appears poised to hit for power and average. If you scooped him up, he's definitely worth hanging on to.
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