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Most every week, Scott White will highlight some of the more notable changes to his rest-of-season rankings. You'll find said rankings here and are urged to bookmark them if you haven't already. There's no better resource for gauging player value throughout the long season.

How hot is Dalton Rushing? So hot that he actually displaced Shohei Ohtani in the Dodgers lineup for a day.

Of course, the official reason was to let Ohtani devote himself entirely to his pitching duties for once, but the move nonetheless suggests that manager Dave Roberts is looking for creative ways to get Rushing's bat in the lineup. All the 25-year-old did in his day at DH was go 2 for 4 with a home run. The performance actually lowered his batting average to .529 (9 for 17) while giving him a total of four home runs. Even for as loaded as catcher is, it's surely time to move him up in the rankings, right?

Eh, maybe a little. The problem is that Wednesday's start was only Rushing's fifth all season, and he has yet to appear off the bench. When he's homering every time he plays, he can make do with such sparse playing time, but you don't need me to tell you that his pace will eventually slow. Has he earned more playing time? Sure, but where is he going to get it? The Dodgers already have a perennial All-Star catcher in Will Smith, who's locked up through 2033, and they're obviously not going to sit Ohtani with any regularity. Rushing got some exposure to left field in the minors, but to this point, Robert has firmly denied that he's an option there. Unless (or until?) that changes, I don't see how Rushing is even a second catcher in 12-team leagues. He's only playing about a quarter of the time, after all.

So while he has moved up to 29th at the position for me, that's not enough for him to place among ...

The 10 biggest rankings moves for this week

  1. I'm ready to throw caution to the wind with Sal Stewart, who I loved as a prospect and hyped up as a sleeper, yet somehow he's still managed to blow away my expectations. He's up to seven home runs for the season, has walked as much as he's struck out, is showing the same willingness to run that he did in the minors, and is trending toward gaining eligibility at third and second base in addition to first. I'm not down on Vinnie Pasquantino, Tyler Soderstrom, or Michael Busch amid their slow starts. I just think Stewart is better -- not only capable of contributing in more ways but also presenting higher overall upside -- which is why he now ranks ahead of those three for me.
  2. Spencer Arrighetti made his season debut Wednesday and struck out 10 over six two-hit innings. Some qualifiers are needed. He was facing the Rockies lineup away from Coors Field, and for all the bats he missed, he issued four walks and hit two batters. Still, he offered a clear reminder of his strikeout upside so long as he's properly emphasizing his breaking balls, throwing his curveball a career-high 38 percent of the time in this one. He's the biggest starting pitcher riser for the week, going from unranked to 79th, which is just ahead of the boring-but-useful Michael Wacha and Jeffrey Springs types. The other big riser at starting pitcher is Mick Abel, who jumps about 20 spots, to 65th, after striking out 10 in seven shutout innings against the Red Sox.
  3. Despite allowing a combined seven earned runs in back-to-back ninth-inning appearances, Trevor Megill isn't officially out of the closer role, according to manager Pat Murphy, but he is facing new competition from Abner Uribe, who recorded a save Wednesday. That's enough to drop him behind other tenuous closer options like Jordan Romano, Paul Sewald, and Lucas Sewald, down to 23rd at the position. Conversely, the biggest risers among closers this week are Riley O'Brien (18th) and Jake Junis (25th).
  4. Fantasy Baseballers seemed to be close to giving up on Oneil Cruz, drafting him later in 2026 than at any other point since his rookie season, but all of a sudden, the 27-year-old with a reputation for hitting the ball harder than anybody else is showing his clearest signs yet of fulfilling his potential. His first 18 games have put him on a .310-45-144-126-63 pace. Meanwhile, his pull-air rate is about double what it normally is, which may be enough, along with his superlative contact quality, to overcome his usual high strikeout rate. He's back inside the top 20 for me, and one of the outfielders he's leapfrogging is Jarren Duran, who the Red Sox have already seen fit to sit three times this year.
  5. Mike Trout has not only managed to stay healthy so far but has also reversed a concerning strikeout trend to position himself as the No. 2 outfielder in Head-to-Head points leagues heading into Thursday's action. That's not to say he should rank anywhere close to that high rest of season -- history is not so easily overcome -- but I've moved him up from 30th to 26th at the position. That may not sound like much, but that stretch of the outfield rankings leaves little room for movement of any sort. Among the players Trout has leapfrogged are Andy Pages, who's still batting over .400 somehow, Jose Altuve, who's off to a nice start and has second base eligibility, and Luis Robert and Jo Adell, who may not have caught fire yet but are striking out much less than usual. Should they also move up? Well, then you get into the real stalwarts like Seiya Suzuki and Riley Greene, and April 16 still seems too early to make such massive changes.
  6. Rookie shortstops JJ Wetherholt and Kevin McGonigle have both looked incredible so far. Sure, Wetherholt's batting average could be higher, and McGonigle's home run and stolen base output is a bit lacking, but I've seen enough in the underlying data to trust that they're the real deal. In particular, their plate discipline is so good that I've gone ahead and moved them ahead of Konnor Griffin and Trevor Story in Head-to-Head points, which makes him 13th and 14th at the position. They're a couple spots lower in Rotisserie, but even there, I've moved them ahead of Willy Adames and Dansby Swanson. It helps that Wetherholt and McGonigle both also qualify at weaker positions (second base for the former and third base for the latter).
  7. I liked Ivan Herrera as a DH-only bat. Now that he's back to being eligible at catcher, I love him. How much, you ask? Well, my initial placement of him there is eighth in Rotisserie and seventh in Head-to-Head points, with the difference being that Agustin Ramirez's stolen base prowess slots him ahead of Herrera in the former. You may wonder why so aggressive when Herrera is batting .194, and to that, my sweet summer child, I say that batting average is practically meaningless this time of year. Herrera has walked nearly twice as much as he's struck out and is impacting the ball about as well as he did last year, which explains the .294 xBA and .453 xSLG. Between those numbers and the fact that he's started every single game so far, a rarity among catcher-eligible players, I'm wondering if my initial ranking is aggressive enough.
  8. I'm ready to eat crow on Jackson Merrill, whose rebound seemed like less than a foregone conclusion to me, for all the misfortunes he suffered last year. It's not that I couldn't imagine it. It's just that so many expected it that I didn't think enough downside risk was being factored into his cost. But whatever, he's looked great so far, and perhaps the most telling number is that he already has four stolen bases after having just one last year. If I could have counted on even just that one part of his game returning, I would have been far less skeptical coming in. Of course, his move up from 26th to 16th in my outfield rankings seems far less dramatic when you consider how bad so many of the players he's passing have been. 
  9. Two of the steadiest climbers among starting pitchers, Braxton Ashcraft and Jose Soriano, have continued their upward trend, rising another dozen spots or so to put them just outside the top 50 at the position. I could easily slide them up another 10 spots, given that most of the pitchers in the 40-50 range are injury stashes like Zack Wheeler, Carlos Rodon, Spencer Strider, and Gerrit Cole. Such cases never have a crystal clear ranking since their value is largely tied to league settings and personal risk tolerance, but the point is that Ashcraft and Soriano are close to entering the must-start range of the pitcher rankings -- and for good reason.
  10. Second base has seen a number of low-end options make their presence known over the past couple weeks. The one with the best chance of emerging as something more is prospect Sam Antonacci, who was just promoted to the White Sox Wednesday, but the highest I could justify ranking him to start out is 28th. That keeps him behind Brett Baty and the Athletics' Max Muncy, who have more job security and likely just as much upside. Antonacci's role is very much in question right now, and because he's lacking in over-the-fence power, he can't afford to be just an average on-base guy or base-stealer. The other newcomers I'm referring to are Angel Martinez, Ildemaro Vargas, and Jeremiah Jackson, who I've ranked 33rd, 35th, and 40th, respectively. Martinez is, naturally, the most interesting to me, delivering occasionally high exit velocities with a good pull-air rate and tiny strikeout rate, but the 24-year-old contributed so little over the course of his minor league career that I'm expecting him to come back down to earth. My ranking of him is intended to be open-minded, but cautious.