Elly, Obviously

Some Thoughts on Thinking about Risk and Upside in Fantasy Sports

There’s a human element to wanting to see it first.

If there weren’t, there’d be no such thing as a breakout in fantasy sports. Average draft position would be far more efficient.

When discussing breakouts, we often refer to players undervalued by ADP or youngsters who might take “the leap” in the season you’re drafting them.

It’s the latter example worth focusing on today. Identifying a “leap” player is equally tricky (Reid Detmers last year!) and rewarding (Vlad Jr. in 2021). It’s precisely what I’m trying to do with my “No Matter What” selections each spring.

However, there’s another way to view breakout candidates: through the lens of “Am I early?” We’re comfortable with the perennial first-round players we have right now — names like Mookie Betts, Jose Ramírez, etc. Yet, their valuation was up for debate at one point in time.

Consider Elly’s 2024 ADP — which Fangraphs’ auction calculator has at 24.3. Regardless of which side of the Elly debate one might’ve been on, both sides likely agreed that the end of Round 2 wasn’t correct. He was either going to be a spectacular smash .. or flop immensely.

Those who took the plunge wanted an otherworldly outcome. The mindset was, “If Elly is going to become a perennial first-round pick, then this is the best buying opportunity — BEFORE he’s valued there.”

In other words, the market didn’t know where Elly should be ranked. He carried risk, but the draft price also came with opportunity.

Contrast this to Alex Bregman’s 95.2 ADP. While he doesn’t possess the same skill set as Elly, his range of outcomes was much tighter entering the year. Drafters knew what he represented, and the market told us the price. At that point in the draft, your roster either needed what Bregman provided, or you went in another direction. The price was fair, or “correct,” though.

Nobody knew what would happen with Elly, and his price would always be wrong. The market often doesn’t know what to do with young stars like this. Is it time to fully buy in? Or wait and see? My two cents? Hitting on an Elly-esque bet is what wins fantasy leagues.

Now that he hit, how should we assess the bet he represented? There’s a lesson to be learned, even if you’re carrying 0% Elly as 2024 comes to a close.

What Happened?

As detailed last November, De La Cruz stopped swinging throughout his time in the majors last season, and that selectivity has carried over into 2024:

Importantly, this has helped improve his batted-ball results.

• 2023: 53.9 GB%

• 2024: 45.8 GB%

His barrel rate is up from 8.5% as a rookie to 12.6% this season, which ranks in the 86th percentile.

Meanwhile, the chart below helps highlight Elly’s newfound consistency. After cooling off in May of this year, he’s mostly maintained above-average performances even when not at his best.

He’s been 20% better than the league average for the season, which is the same wRC+ as Alec Bohm and Isaac Paredes. Phrased that way, it sounds like he’s been a disappointment. It’s important to remember that he doesn’t turn 23 until January. What matters most is that he showed signs of improvement this year. For context, he had an 86 wRC+ in 2023.

Fantasy-wise, the impact has been felt more greatly. Elly’s 64 stolen bases lead MLB, and his 80 SB attempts are 25 more than second-place Jose Caballero with 55. The difference between Elly and Caballero is the same as Caballero and the player with the 25th-most attempts. Elly’s willingness to run is in full-on outlier territory.

Using Fangraphs’ auction calculator, De La Cruz has been the 7th-most valuable player in my 12-team roto league. That value comes mainly from the steals, though he also has the 11th-highest auction value for runs scored.

The above table does a good job of highlighting the different categories in which players provide value. This is the current top-15 leaderboard, so there isn’t a lot of red representing negative value. We see the degree to which boppers like Marcell Ozuna and Vlad Jr. hurt your SB total, and to a lesser extent, we see the negative return from Willy Adames’ batting average.

In 2024, De La Cruz was mainly unique because of thefts. His value-by-category is also a reminder of what his upside can be if he keeps getting better as a hitter. Recall the first chart that showed his monthly wRC+. If De La Cruz can make the “bad” months not so bad, it raises his floor. If he can once again improve at the plate as a 23-year-old, it increases his ceiling.

How to Play It

This March, I went into Dan Harris’ famous auction draft (mandatory live in person in New York City) and was more prepared than ever. Mike Maher and I discussed the league when I appeared on his FantasyPros podcast, and it’s a unique format with keepers and contracts mixed in, so there’s some nuance here that the reader might not understand.

What’s important to know is the format sets up the participant so that if there’s a player you believe in and you’re willing to bid up to a specific price, you can draft that player and lock them into a valuation before possibly handing out an extension.

It’s the exact format for rolling the dice on a young “breakout” bet that should be encouraged.

I spent many December days dreaming of my draft plan and how Elly needed to be central to it. The closer March approached, however, the “risk” started creeping into the back of my mind, and I settled for a shortstop approach based around Bo Bichette as a batting average anchor. Unfortunately, it wasn’t the sort of anchor I hoped for.

Elly and Bo each went for a modest $25, which isn’t a first-round price tag. Now we know Elly is a first-round player, and he’s locked in at this cost through at least 2025.

Players who have a wide range of outcomes are popular “bust” picks by fantasy analysts, and that’s because if things go wrong, there’s a chance things go really wrong.

Again, the market’s uncertainty over a player’s talent level also creates opportunity, so long as they aren’t priced at their ceiling.

Your parting thought isn’t to suggest you suddenly become a riskier fantasy player. It’s to take stock of where you’re at. Do you feel like you played it too safe at the end of a season? If so, consider leaning into market uncertainty. Just do your research ahead of time and understand the bet you’re making.

Or did you buy too heavily into the spring training buzz for rookies and other players being steamed up? Possibly, you even hit on a big breakout bet, only to find your league champion assembled a roster full of sturdy vets. In this case, consider being more selective with the number of high-risk players you’re taking.

Fantasy sports are a market-driven game. If Elly were being taken at the 1.01 entering 2024, it would’ve been impossible to recommend him there. He would've been an obvious smash if he had been going in the 8th round. The competitive advantage lies within the murky waters.

In Elly’s case, we should’ve defaulted to “What do you win when you win?”

This year, the answer was a first-round player — an outcome that now feels all too obvious.