Opening day for the 2023 MLB season lies just one week away, so fantasy baseball draft season is upon us. Sporting News Fantasy has been hard at work compiling rankings for every position as well as the Top 300 overall, but today we'll be talking about sleepers, steals, and potential draft values at first base. If you're looking for undervalued sources of power, you've come to the right place.
The current state of the first base position is great. We saw four 1B-eligible players finish in the top 25 in 2022, and 10 percent of the top 150 were first basemen. It's not a hot take to say that first base is equally as deep, if not deeper, than shortstop in today's MLB. So, if you miss out on an elite, top-tier guy like Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Paul Goldschmidt, or Freddie Freeman, fret not! Plenty of value can be found later in the draft.
In fact, we find ourselves not springing for a first baseman until well after the eighth or ninth round in most mock drafts. Pete Alonso seems way too high at his second-round ADP simply because you can get a more well-rounded player at pick 19 or earlier. Matt Olson seems fine in the late-fourth or early-fifth round, but most of the time I'm seeing him go late third or early fourth. Then comes the ADP cliff, which we're happy to free-fall off of in search of better value and a more solid overall team.
2023 FANTASY RANKINGS & DOLLAR VALUES:
Cs | 1Bs | 2Bs | 3Bs | SSs | OFs | SPs | RPs | Top 300
Our definition of "sleeper," at least for these exercises is a player we value much higher than his ADP might otherwise tell you he's worth. Typically, this sort of player strikes us as a bounce-back candidate, a young under-the-radar riser, a veteran coming off an injury, or just a guy whose batted-ball data suggests he will enjoy some positive statistical regression.
2023 FANTASY SLEEPERS & VALUES:
Cs | 2Bs | 3Bs | SSs | OFs | SPs | RPs
You should by no means reach too high for these guys, but instead target them a round or two ahead of their ADP. Fantasy baseball championships aren't won on draft day — and they certainly aren't won in the first five rounds. The value and upside you collect in the middle-to-late rounds can make or break your team's chances of contending for the title.
Let's get right into our favorite sleepers at first base, with a brief explanation as to why we value them well above their ADP.
Fantasy Baseball 1B Sleepers 2023: Breakouts, values, draft-day steals
Position eligibility based on Yahoo's default settings. ADPs courtesy of Fantasy Pros.
Jose Abreu, Astros (Average Draft Position: 80.0)
Our top value at first happens to be a former MVP coming off a down year (for him). We don't typically recommend 36-year-old sluggers in the sixth round, but Abreu seems primed for a bounce-back campaign now that he's enjoyed a change of scenery and landed with the Astros. He will have studs batting all around him in the lineup and optimal conditions from opening day through October. Abreu's 2022 numbers suggest that positive home run regression will come — he ranked 10th in weighted on-base average (.373), eighth in hard-hit rate (51.7%), and second behind only Vlad Guerrero in total balls hit over 95 miles per hour (256). If Abreu can simply get back to the superb barrel rate numbers that we have come to expect from him, he should easily go back to at least 30 homers to go with his solid batting average around .300. He has already hit two bombs in spring training while maintaining an OPS of .907. Consider taking Abreu in the late-fifth or early-sixth round if you're hunting average and RBIs with power upside.
Andrew Vaughn, White Sox (ADP: 134)
Vaughn looks poised to finally break out for the South-siders, as he's finally back to his natural position at first and he's seeing the ball really well this spring. He has 10 hits and 16 total bases in just 11 games, good for hitting splits of .323/.364/.516. The most important factor: his strikeout rates continue to go down while his hard-hit rates steadily climb. The massive expectations around his 2021 rookie year are a distant memory at this point, and Vaughn can just settle down, be himself, and emerge as a slugger on his own terms. The best part: if he fails to reach his upside and instead gets you 15-20 homers and a .275 batting average, you didn't waste too valuable of a pick to land him and he's still a serviceable role player. We're bagging him in the 10th and 11th rounds of most drafts.
Darick Hall, Phillies (ADP: undrafted — as of now)
Now that Rhys Hoskins has suffered what looks to be a bad knee injury in spring training, Hall could see a massive boost in playing time and production. Hall hit nine home runs in just 142 plate appearances with the Phillies last year, while ranking in the 89th percentile in exit velocity. He also hit 28 bombs in Triple-A, and he's already smashed five out of the park while hitting .319 this preseason. The 27-year-old could be an x-factor for your squad once he's an everyday part of Philadelphia's lineup.
DJ LeMahieu, Yankees (ADP: 205)
Just because the guy had a rough 2022 on the injury front and you still can't spell his name on the first try doesn't mean he's the 205th-best player in fantasy baseball. C'mon, people — this ADP just seems ridiculous. Sure, the Yankees' lineup is stacked and LeMahieu will have plenty of days on the pine, but when healthy, he's still one of the better veteran hitters in the game. He's only a few years removed from leading the majors with a .364 batting average and posting an AL-best 1.011 OPS! He'll never do that again, of course, but he could easily flirt with another batting title if he stays off the IL. He's hitting .357 and slugging .500 this spring, so don't be a fool and pass on this Pinstriper before the 15th or 16th round.
Spencer Torkelson, Tigers (ADP: 293)
It wouldn't be a sleepers column without a deep flyer. And Torkelson has been flying them deep all spring! According to FantasyPros, the 23-year-old leads all Tigers this preseason with a 96.4 mph average exit velocity, a mark that ranks seventh in all of spring baseball among players with at least 100 pitches seen. The Human Tork never ignited in 2022 — he managed just eight round-trippers in 110 at-bats — but we like his chances of lighting it up in a bounce-back sophomore season.
