A's are atop AL West, but have struggled to deliver fantasy baseball value — will that change?
Scott Pianowski audits the A's surprising start and if we can expect them to deliver more fantasy baseball juice going forward.
Let’s start with the conclusion first. I don’t know what to make of the Athletics these days. It’s a team in limbo, two years removed from Oakland, not really belonging to Sacramento, and hopefully on schedule for Las Vegas in two years.
The Athletics play in a glorious hitter park but they’re struggling to score runs, or put up fantasy baseball value. The club has a starting rotation that even most fantasy managers couldn’t pick out of a lineup. And yet the nomad Athletics are somehow in first place in the AL West.
Okay, it’s a 15-13 record, a modest start, but it still ranks ahead of everyone else. So let’s get out the audit tools and take the temperature of this oddball team. I thought the Athletics would score this year, for simple reasons.
The A’s were 12th in runs and eighth in OPS last year, and Sutter Health Park played as the best hitter park in the American League. This year, Sutter is actually the best scoring park in all of baseball , but the hometown offense hasn’t benefited. The Athletics currently rank 22nd in runs, 15th in OPS.
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