MLB Fantasy 2016: Five Breakout Candidates

Every fantasy baseball player wants to find that diamond in the rough. PointAfter found five breakout candidates to watch for the 2016 MLB season.

Any veteran fantasy player knows the feeling: It's late, and you're in round 14 of your 23-round draft. The excitement you felt as you made your first pick has quickly waned, and now you're seriously considering clicking auto-draft and calling it a night.

Ah, but this is no time to fall asleep at the wheel. Staying sharp in the later rounds is what separates good owners from great ones. With this in mind, we turn our attention to five breakout candidates for the 2016 season.

A player is considered a breakout candidate if he's currently going outside the top 100 in Yahoo fantasy drafts. Rookies were not eligible for this exercise, since they have yet to suit up in the big leagues. With those ground rules out of the way, let's take a look at five guys who could be in store for big things this year.

SP Raisel Iglesias, Cincinnati Reds

    Average draft position: 129.4

Last season, the Reds started a rookie pitcher in 110 games, including a Major League record 64 straight to end the season. Nine different rookies took the mound, and they combined for a 23-51 record with a 5.04 ERA.

Despite those unimpressive results, the group showed some promise, and perhaps no pitcher flashed as much potential as Raisel Iglesias. The 26-year-old Cuban signed a seven-year, $27 million deal with Cincinnati back in 2014 and made his debut last season. His 95.1 innings pitched were the most he's thrown in his professional career, and he used an effective sinker-slider combination that racked up strikeouts.

His 9.82 strikeouts per nine innings ranked 11th in the league among pitchers with at least 90 innings, better than the likes of Jacob deGrom, Madison Bumgarner and Jake Arrieta. If he replicates that production over a full season's worth of starts, he'll be a steal going outside the top 100.

3B Maikel Franco, Philadelphia Phillies

    Average draft position: 135.7

Before he suffered a broken left wrist in mid-August, Maikel Franco was living up to the über-prospect hype attached to him for the past two years. From June 2 to Aug. 11 of last season, Franco posted a .299/.365/.530 slash line, with 11 home runs in 61 games. He was especially hot in June, crushing eight home runs and eight doubles in 27 games, and was off to a good start in August before the injury.

Franco burst onto the scene as an elite prospect in 2013, when he hit .320/.356/.569 with 31 home runs during stints in Single-A and Double-A. His wrist is reportedly all healed up, and if his fast start to spring training is any indication, he's set to pick up right where he left off in 2016.

SP Taijuan Walker, Seattle Mariners

    Average draft position: 147.0

Last season was supposed to be Taijuan Walker's coming out party. Instead, owners who drafted him with high expectations were left pulling their hair out after watching him post a 6.18 ERA in his first 10 starts of the season. During that stretch, he walked 4.1 batters and allowed 1.4 home runs per nine innings, pitching more than six innings in just two starts.

From that point on, Walker suddenly morphed into a pitcher with pinpoint accuracy. He walked a miniscule 17 batters in his last 118.2 innings, with a 6.47 K/BB ratio. That increased control could be a result of Walker becoming more comfortable with his splitter, a pitch he first began throwing regularly in 2013.

During this strong stint, Walker still had issues with the long ball, allowing 17 home runs in his last 19 starts. He gave up 0.8 home runs per nine innings in his minor league career, and as he continues to hone his splitter and get more consistent keeping his curveball down in the zone, his home run rate should drop. Walker has ace potential, and he seems to be just a tweak or two away from fully realizing it.

C Travis d'Arnaud, New York Mets

    Average draft position: 150.5

If it feels like we've been waiting a while for Travis d'Arnaud to break out, that's because we have. The former 2007 first-round pick was ranked among Baseball America's top 100 prospects five straight years from 2010 to 2014, though he's yet to make a big splash in the big leagues.

After a solid yet unspectacular rookie season in 2014, in which he hit .242/.302/.416 with 13 home runs in 108 games, d'Arnaud's 2015 season got off to a false start. He missed seven weeks from mid-April to mid-June with a broken finger, then missed six weeks from June 21 to July 31 with a sprained elbow.

Upon returning to the lineup, d'Arnaud enjoyed his most successful stint as a big leaguer, hitting .256/.340/.464 with eight home runs in his last 48 games of the season. If he can maintain that level of production and stay on the field for at least 120 games, he'll be among the most productive starting catchers in fantasy baseball.

SP Luis Severino, New York Yankees

    Average draft position: 202.4

Entering the 2015 season, Luis Severino was ranked the No. 23 prospect in the game by MLB.com, this following an impressive 2014 minor league campaign in which he struck out 127 batters in 113 innings. He made his big league debut on Aug. 5 and became a consistent member of the rotation for the remainder of the season, allowing more than three earned runs in a start just once. Though the Yankees monitored his workload -- he hit the 100-pitch mark in only two starts -- he pitched at least six innings in eight of his 11 games.

Severino's final stats -- a 2.89 ERA with a 1.20 WHIP -- are slightly misleading. He allowed 1.3 home runs per nine innings and had an 87 percent strand rate, the latter number most likely the result of good fortune.

Of course, pitching in Yankee Stadium is no picnic, as it was the fourth-easiest stadium to hit a home run in last season. Severino's 50.9 percent ground ball rate is an encouraging sign that his rate of home runs allowed will decline. Of the 22 qualified pitchers last season with ground ball rates of at least 50 percent, only three allowed more than one home run per nine innings: Mike Leake (1.03 HR/9), Felix Hernandez (1.03) and Jon Niese (1.02).

Young pitchers tend to reduce their mistakes with more experience. If Severino can do the same, he'll prove himself well worth the late-round pickup in 2016 drafts or auctions.

 

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