2022 Fantasy Baseball Insertion Ranking - Chicago White Sox
Creating my 2022 fantasy baseball rankings one team at a time
Explanation & Other Team Links Here
Hitters to Rank
Luis Robert
Tim Anderson
Eloy Jimenez
Jose Abreu
Yasmani Grandal
Yoan Moncada
Andrew Vaughn
Luis Robert
He had a very unfortunate injury which led to him getting to only 296 PA, but he did a whole lot of damage in that time. He went .338/.378/.567 with 13 HR (22.7 PA/HR) and six steals. He spent some time in the bottom third of the order but mostly was the White Sox #2 hitter.
The most notable thing from Robert was probably how much he brought down the strikeouts. In his short rookie season, he went for a 32% K% in 227 PA. That kept his batting average down at .233. He seemed to change his approach in 2021 to swing more often (he went from a 57% Swing% to a 62% mark). He also made a lot more contact (61% to 74%).
That swing rate was third-highest in the league (behind just Hanser Alberto and Willians Astudillo. With a lot of swinging comes very few walks, and Robert proved that with his minuscule 4% walk rate last year.
His exit velocity numbers were elite with a max of 117.7, a 90th percentile of 104.9, and an average of 83.5. It’s pretty impressive that he made as much contact as he did swinging the bat that hard, but it really speaks to his talent. He’s a potential (and quite likely) super-stud, especially for fantasy purposes. This is especially true in leagues with batting average instead of OBP). If he stays healthy it’s going to be very hard to keep him under 35 homers and he should also be able to swipe 20 bags. A .300 batting average is also in the range of outcomes if he continues to make that much contact. I will not be surprised if he is the #1 fantasy bat in the league in 2022, and I will rank accordingly.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Ronald Acuna Jr., Mookie Betts
Tim Anderson
It was a bit of a step backward for Anderson in fantasy terms. He scored 94 runs but hit just 17 homers and swiped 18 bases. His power production came down a bit as well to a below-average homer rate (32 PA/HR). He hit .309 on a .372 BABIP, but sky-high BABIPs have become the norm for Anderson. He hits a ton of ground-balls and line drives which keeps the batting average and BABIP high - but does cost him some pop.
His exit velo has never stuck out, and he reached a max of just 110 last year. Anderson will score a bunch of runs, steal a good number of bases, and hit *some* homers, but all-in-all he’s probably a bit overrated for fantasy purposes. If his BABIP ever comes down (with bad luck or just a higher FB%), that would be a big hit to his fantasy value since so much of it comes from batting average. He also never walks, so he’s not a great pick in OBP leagues. I’ve never been a Tim Anderson guy and that isn’t changing now as his ADP remains inside the top 40.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Ketel Marte, Austin Meadows
Eloy Jimenez
Another one of the Sox many injured players last year, Jimenez saw just 231 PAs. He managed 10 homers (23 PA/HR) on a .249/.303/.457 slash line. That is far from great production in the fantasy game, but his RBI production was there - as his 37 RBI would extrapolate to around 100 RBI over a 600+ PA season.
Eloy has always been a very highly sought-after name in fantasy given his high-profile prospect status, but really he has an underwhelming fantasy profile. He does not steal bases nor draw many walks (around a 6% career walk rate), which keeps him as a guy hurting your team's SB and OBP, and his slow speed keeps his batting average down a touch. He is a league-average-ish strikeout guy (~25%), which is somewhat relieving, but that is more of a testament to a high swing rate (~53%) than a high contact rate (69%). This is pretty much a guy swinging often and swinging hard, which leads to a lot of boom-or-bust scenarios.
He is still quite young and has yet to be healthy over a full year in the bigs, so there’s all kinds of room for growth. You could see Eloy improving and having a 35+ bomb year with 110 RBI and a .290-ish batting average, which would be a smash, but for right now the floor and ceiling combination really doesn’t live up to where he gets drafted. It’s a fine pick for power production without giving up the farm in batting average, but overall I’m down on him.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Brandon Lowe, Max Muncy
Jose Abreu
He was a pretty easy fade last year after he ran crazy hot in 2020 (.317/.350/.617 in 262 PA on a .350 BABIP with a ridiculous HR and RBI rate). He still put together a big counting stat season (30 HR, 86 R, 117 RBI), but the homer rate predictably fell off (yet still a strong mark of 21 PA/HR), and the batting average came back down to closer to where it should be (.261).
He will be 35 years old this season, but man - last season looked almost exactly like 2016-2019 for Abreu (in terms of swing rate, contact rate, exit velo, etc.). I think it’s a bit foolish to be predicting decline here for Abreu given what he did last year and the ridiculous consistency this guy has put up throughout his career. That makes him a 25+ homer, 100+ RBI guy with a shot at a fine batting average - and you should be able to feel pretty good about getting 600+ PA’s out of him (although I hesitate to say that since I make a point to not predict health stuff). Anyways, I’ll slide him in right where he usually goes.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Gleyber Torres, Dansby Swanson
Yasmani Grandal
Guy just doesn’t swing the bat. Posted the lowest swing rate in the league for hitters with 100+ PA (31.8%). That led to a ton of walks (23% BB%). He had more walks than strikeouts, which you hardly ever see anybody do. An elite .420 OBP was the best result of that, but he also mashed quite a few homers (16.3 PA/HR leading to 23 bombs in his shortened season of 375 PA).
He made nine starts as a DH and five more as a 1B, keeping him on the field much more often than most catchers. No catcher beside Salvador Perez provided more fantasy production on a per-game basis than Grandal, although he was much (much much) more valuable in OBP leagues. His batting average was bad, as usual, at .240 - but the funny thing is that he walks so much that .240 doesn’t really mean .240 for your fantasy team. An 0/2 game with two walks is a .000 in batting average, but it doesn’t hurt your fantasy team nearly as much as an 0/4 game which is also a .000 batting average - it’s all about the denominators, baby!
Grandal’s homer pace will almost surely slow in 2022, but he’ll play a ton and be featured in a prominent spot in the White Sox lineup, and gives your team a huge boost in OBP leagues. That makes him a top catcher option for 2022.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Will Smith
Yoan Moncada
He played all season long (615 PA), and only hit 14 homers. That was really surprisingly low total (44 PA/HR). He even showed off some decent bat speed with a max exit velocity of 113.8 and a 90th percentile velo of 102.8. The power numbers weren’t there mostly because of a low fly-ball rate (20%). He hit a TON of line drives (31% - top 10 in the league). Line drives are great for batting average but do not often result in home runs.
That led to a high .350 BABIP, which I don’t see being repeated because I don’t think line drive rate is something that is so controllable by a hitter so as to escape a bunch of randomness. By that I mean I don’t think someone beating the league average in LD% by seven points is going to do so again the following season. And even with all this luck the guy only hit .263. He walked a ton (13.6%), which was nice in OBP leagues - but everything else in his fantasy profile was pretty bad.
I think he will probably hit more homers in 2022 (not saying much), and he could post a very nice OBP - but overall this doesn’t seem like that great of a fantasy player to invest in.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Gleyber Torres, Dansby Swanson
Andrew Vaughn
He showed a lot of the signs of a super young guy trying to figure it out in his rookie year. He had the opportunity to be an every-day player with all the injuries the Sox struggled through, but never really took the job and ran with it. He was also incredibly streaky:
I mean that’s a wild plot. He was quite good in July and August (.269/.333/.450), but putrid in September/October (.180/.273/.279). He mashed left-handed pitching (17% Brl%, 23% K%, 17.6 PA/HR), but struggled against righties (.221 average, 8.5% Brl%, 21% K%, 47 PA/HR).
The good news is a nice K-BB ratio (21.5% K%, 8.7% BB%) and a nice exit velocity profile (115 max, 103.8 90th percentile mark - both well above league average). I really like to see that in a young hitter, so I am going to be buying Vaughn this year and banking on him improving quickly. Remember this was a kid that was somewhat rushed to the big leagues. The 1B/OF eligibility is also quite useful for fantasy purposes. I’m excited for Vaughn this year.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Hunter Renfroe, Gleyber Torres
Pitchers to Rank
Lucas Giolito
Dylan Cease
Lance Lynn
Michael Kopech
Liam Hendriks
Craig Kimbrel
Lucas Giolito
He had some rough outings (including a one-inning, seven earned run game that started at 11 AM in Boston), but for the year his line was quite good once again. He went for a 3.53 ERA, a 1.10 WHIP, a 28% K% and a 7% BB%. Those aren’t Cy Young numbers, but they are good enough to be considered a top 10-15 fantasy pitcher pretty easily.
Here’s the stuff:
The changeup was sick, but the four-seamer got him in trouble quite a bit (10.6% Brl% is not good and the 27% CSW% is not where you want it). That slider is key, as he’s really just a three-pitch guy. It is really good to see that pitch being effective, giving Giolito another tool to fall back on.
I don’t see much reason to not rank him near the studs of the league, but an underwhelming fastball and a lack of depth in the arsenal does make him a bit more volatile than you want in a fantasy ace.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Luis Castillo, Robbie Ray
Dylan Cease
The end-of-year numbers (3.91 ERA, 1.25 WHIP) don’t quite do his 32% K%, 9.6% BB%, and 1.09 HR/9 justice. You would expect better marks than that given those inputs. However, his low ground-ball rate (35%) suggests that he may give up more homers in the future.
Anyways, you don’t find many pitchers with a 32% K%. and that number came up to 35% after July 1st. He also reached the elusive 30% CSW% mark (top 20 in the league).
He throws the four-seamer hard, but it often gets turned around even harder (13% Brl% is a YIKES), and the CSW% was not good there. The strong 10.6% SwStr% on the pitch suggests he just threw the pitch out of the strike zone quite often, which might not be that of a thing if he’s ahead in the count - but he did not have a great walk rate either so probably he just didn’t have great command of the pitch - not a great sign.
He made hay with an elite slider, which was really the difference for him last year. A 38% CSW% is just insane (third-best in the league among sliders thrown 500+ times behind Scherzer and Tanner Scott), and the 21% SwStr% was 9th best in the league.
His fastball numbers have a lot of room for improvement given how live the pitch is, but I just can’t really get past these high barrel rates and the high walk rate. Color me pretty skeptical about Cease for next season.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Joe Musgrove, Sonny Gray
Lance Lynn
Another great year for Lynn with a 2.69 ERA and a 1.07 WHIP. He did that on a 27.5% K% and a 7% BB%. He let a lot of balls get into the air (38% GB%), but survived with a 1.03 HR/9.
The arsenal remained quite deep:
Those are great marks on the four-seamer, no doubt aided by the cutter and sinker variations playing off of it. All three of those pitches were really effective in their own way (four-seamer and cutter are tunnel pitches that move differently and keep hitters on their toes, and the sinker draws a lot of contact but it’s usually weak and on the ground). Any pitcher with that three-some of fastballs that all look similar to hitters is going to have success, and that would seem to be a skill that a pitcher can maintain as they age.
Please ignore that “null” row, I will fix that later but don’t care to right now.
He doesn’t have much besides those three fastball types, but honestly, he doesn’t need much more. He’s very good, and even at the age of 34, I don’t see much changing in 2022.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Robbie Ray, Yu Darvish
Michael Kopech
He was sick in a long-relief role last year (69.1 IP, 3.50 ERA, 1.13 WHIP, 36% K%, 8.4% BB%, 1.17 HR/9). Right now it seems like he will be in the rotation, but we will have to wait to be sure about that.
Either way, the workload is going to be limited. He has had so much trouble staying healthy that the 69.1 innings he threw last year were the only innings he’s thrown at any level since 2018… there’s just no way he goes ahead and adds 100 innings to that.
This might actually lead to the White Sox just continuing his long-relief role, which would put an end to his fantasy value. If he is in the rotation, the per-start ceiling will be quite nice. His stuff was great:
Those are amazing marks on the four-seamer and slider, and strong stuff on the curveball as well. At this point, I think it’s best to just leave him for someone else because the absolute best-case scenario for Kopech would seem to be 120 innings or so and a bunch of 3-4 inning starts even if he does avoid the bullpen role.
Comps/Rank-Arounds: Cristian Javier
Liam Hendriks / Craig Kimbrel
Hendriks is a top-of-the-line closer, and Kimbrel will mix in for at least a handful of saves given how well he pitched last year. Kimbrel only notched one save in his two months with the Sox last year, making Hendriks the guy here.