Fantasy Baseball Rankings Movers: Power surge sends Jackson Merrill soaring; Anthony Santander also gets bump

In this space, 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.

Rest-of-season rankings would be much easier if they were season-to-date rankings. The latter is what's already happened, which everyone can see. The former is what's going to happen, which no one can see. We tend to place our trust in the things we can see -- i.e., season-to-date rankings -- even when we know that the history doesn't support it.

But I don't keep season-to-date rankings. I keep rest-of-season rankings, and for those to mean anything, I have to resist the natural inclination of adhering to the here and now. A streak only matters to the degree it signifies growth.

So what am I to make of a rookie with a top prospect pedigree tripling his season home run total in the span of two weeks?

Outfield

• Yeah ... it's growth. That's not to say that Jackson Merrill will homer seven times over every two-week span henceforth, which would be insane, but it is to say that the 21-year-old has demonstrated stud hitting characteristics -- the low strikeout rate, the line-drive swing, the all-fields approach, the 95th percentile xBA -- from the get-go. An adjustment that leads to him lofting the ball more, allowing some of those line drives to sail over the fence, is hardly a stretch. Most of all, this surge has secured his spot in the Padres lineup after some fits and starts earlier this season. He's up from 50th to 34th in my outfield rankings, which might strike some as too cautious still, but I'm saying he's a starter even for three-outfielder leagues.
• Another Padres outfielder, Fernando Tatis, has been in the news for less jubilant reasons: He's on the IL with a femoral stress reaction. It's not a fracture exactly, but any injury to the femur sounds like a real ordeal. Tatis has said he's aiming to return after the All-Star break, but for all his optimism, I'm guessing it's a close call whether he or Mookie Betts makes it back first. And so I've dropped Tatis behind Betts (as well as Yordan Alvarez and Julio Rodriguez, of course).
• It's hard to trust in Steven Kwan's 15-homer pace given that he's not hitting the ball any harder than the past two seasons, and it's hard to trust in his .385 batting average given that such a mark is close to a mathematical impossibility in the modern game. But he's doing a much better job of elevating to his pull side this year, which might count for more than pure exit velocity readings, and even if he regresses to his .334 xBA, well, that's still pretty special. Altogether, it's not really a stretch to move Kwan into the top 12, ahead of underachievers like Adolis Garcia, Luis Robert and Cody Bellinger, and in Head-to-Head points leagues, where his low strikeout rate is worth something in and of itself, he's up to 11th.
• As Jarren Duran's batting average continues to climb, so does his ranking. He's now up to 16th in Rotisserie leagues, ahead of Bellinger and Steer, and 14th in Head-to-Head points, where his surplus of doubles and triples actually counts for something.
• With 12 home runs in June, Anthony Santander now finds himself on a better pace than the past two seasons, when he was of course must-start for Fantasy. I tend to write him off every year because he's about as one-dimensional as hitters get, but that one dimension is the best to have (power) and bolstered by a deep lineup. He's actually been among the best 12 outfielders so far, but I'm going to stop at 23, moving him ahead of mainstays like Bryan Reynolds and Seiya Suzuki.
• Clearly, I've been too sanguine about Mike Trout's recovery from meniscus surgery. I thought he'd make it back within two months, but we've arrived at that point without him even beginning a running program. He's of course closer to returning today than when he first had the surgery, which makes it a little awkward to move him down, but he's now outside of my top 25, forming the dividing line between the outfielders I trust to remain good and the ones I'm a little more skeptical of.
• An even bigger outfield riser than Merrill this week is Alec Burleson, who climbs from outside the top 75 to inside the top 50, ahead of other useful contributors like Brenton Doyle and Jesse Winker (though still behind Winker in points leagues). I've always been a believer in his tools. Like Merrill, he combines a low strikeout rate with a high line-drive rate -- and now he has an everyday job. I don't so much buy him as a base stealer (he has five so far) and wish he walked a little more.
  

Shortstop

• Jackson Merrill's climb at shortstop may seem less pronounced than in the outfield, but six spots at one is roughly equivalent to 18 at the other. Like in the outfield, the move puts Merrill at the threshold of the undroppables at the position. You might quibble with Luis Rengifo being one spot ahead, but beyond him are Carlos Correa, Bryson Stott, Brice Turang, Ha-seong Kim and Anthony Volpe. Ranking Merrill among that group would be demonstrating more certainty than I actually have.
• David Hamilton gets another bump this week, moving him into the top 20 for Rotisserie leagues (22nd for points leagues). He has nearly caught up to Jose Caballero in stolen bases even though he didn't become a regular part of the Red Sox lineup until mid-May, so it's pretty clear who needs to rank higher between those two pure base-stealers. But Nico Hoerner and Jeremy Pena have fallen off to such a degree that they don't deserve priority over Hamilton either (except, again, in points leagues, where their low strikeout rates give them an advantage).
• A fun addition to the top 35 this week is Daniel Schneemann, a 27-year-old who put together a .294/.428/.556 slash line at Triple-A Columbus only to have come up and done much the same in 17 big-league games. The playing time has been a bit sporadic but will only increase with continued excellence, and in addition to shortstop, he's started games at second base, third base, center field and right field. He's a long way from being added in all leagues but is worthy of acknowledgment.
  

Third base

• After a pitiful start to the season, Jeimer Candelario is finally delivering on those preseason power expectations in his first year in Cincinnati. His 14 home runs are tied for fifth at the position, so moving him into the top 20, alongside another 14-homer guy, Ryan McMahon, seems more than appropriate.
• Tyler Black is back in the majors and starting more regularly than not. It's still not clear that his power will play in the majors, but his speed is intriguing from a corner infield spot. He's up to 32nd in Rotisserie and 34th in Head-to-Head points (27th and 29th at first base, for what it's worth).
  

Second base

• Because he bats in the lower half of the Phillies lineup and isn't much of a power threat, batting average really needs to be a part of Bryson Stott's game, and he just isn't delivering on it right now. I suspect he'll get hot again eventually, but the case for ranking him ahead of Jordan Westburg and Brice Turang was always a tenuous one. I feel justified in dropping him behind those two.
• Jonathan India is getting a look in the leadoff spot again thanks to TJ Friedl's latest injury and has earned it with his performance in June, slashing .361/.448/.542 with seven doubles, two homers and three steals. He's back ahead of Davis Schneider and Zack Gelof in Rotisserie leagues and also Thairo Estrada and Nick Gonzales in points leagues.
  

First base

• We've reached the point where I think it's safe to drop Cody Bellinger behind Spencer Steer. It was always a long shot he'd be able to repeat last year's numbers, and while he hasn't been a disaster this year, he hasn't been as useful as Steer, particularly given the stolen base disparity.
• Rhys Hoskins has been pretty awful since returning from his IL stint for a hamstring strain and isn't exactly a Fantasy stud at his best. Still, his five-spot move down the rankings is less significant than it appears. He's basically gone from the top of a tier to the bottom, dropping behind Luis Arraez, Vinnie Pasquantino, Jake Cronenworth, Ryan Mountcastle and Jeimer Candelario.
  

Catcher

• Adley Rutschman was surpassed by William Contreras as my No. 1 catcher pretty early on, but Contreras has slumped badly in June, putting them on near equal footing statistically (with some give or take across the various categories). If they're back to even, I'm inclined to go with my original choice, moving Rutschman back ahead. I still think Contreras is great and will snap out of this funk sooner than later, but there's really nothing negative to say about Rutschman either. They might be the closest 1 and 2 at any position.
• You can keep waiting for Gabriel Moreno, Mitch Garver and Danny Jansen to get their act together, or you can just enjoy the production that Connor Wong and Patrick Bailey are already providing, which is what I've decided to do with this latest rankings update. Of the five, Moreno and Garver are still probably the most talented hitters, but at a position like catcher, where nobody rosters any more than they have to, a flighty approach is appropriate.
  

Starting pitcher

• I'm beginning to cool on the idea of Luis Castillo being an ace among aces. It's less about the modest ERA or upside-down win-loss record than the fact he barely has a strikeout per inning. Give me Cole Ragans, Aaron Nola or even Dylan Cease (whose recent struggles I think are a total misdirect) instead.
• Last week, I trumpeted Paul Skenes' move into the top 15. This week, he's gone top 12, climbing ahead of Shota Imanaga, who has begun to reveal the depths of his downside. I don't see a lot of downside for Skenes, other than some potential innings management, but the Pirates managed those innings so well on the front end that ... meh.
• I've basically flip-flopped Sonny Gray and Jared Jones in my rankings with Gray beginning to work deeper into games and Jones looking less sharp overall. The argument for having Jones ahead was upside, which is best represented by strikeouts, but Gray is the one averaging nearly 1.5 more K/9. When the "safe" play is also the one getting all the strikeouts, there's no more argument to be had.
• Jesus Luzardo drops another 30 spots, to 81st, after already dropping about 15 spots last week. It's not a total shock, of course, seeing as he's out with a stress reaction in his back, but with the Marlins opting to put him on the 60-day IL rather than the 15-day IL, I'm not sure he's even worth waiting for. He could technically be back in mid-August, but even in that best-case scenario, he'd have six weeks left to contribute. And it's not like you could trust him from the get-go, given how he was throwing before the injury.
  
• I made a huge mistake by moving Bailey Ober down as much as I did two weeks ago (68th) and have tried to correct it by moving him back into the top 50 now. Constantly shifting a player back and forth is about the worst way to manage these rankings, but Ober is a tough nut to crack. His workload fluctuates, his strikeouts fluctuate, and his fly-ball approach can yield vastly different outcomes depending on how the ball is carrying on a given day. Nevertheless, he's shown us the extent of his upside in his past couple starts, and it's quite high.
• Jacob deGrom's return from Tommy John surgery is still weeks away but inching closer (fingers crossed, anyway). The starting pitcher pool becomes much lower-impact in the 70-75 range, so you'll find several injury cases clustered there. The Rangers' eventual ace comes in at 78th, with Merrill Kelly (whose return from a shoulder strain has been delayed to mid-August) just behind.
• Jordan Montgomery hasn't come storming back yet, but judging by the Statcast data, the movement of his curveball has returned to 2023 levels in his past couple turns, which is enough for me to move him up 21 spots, from 97th to 76th.
• Other notable risers include Michael Wacha from 98th to 87th, Spencer Schwellenbach from 102nd to 90th, Shane Baez from 115th to 91st (with plenty of room to rise from there), and Jonathan Cannon and DJ Herz from unranked to 110th, and 11th, respectively.
  

Relief pitcher

• Jhoan Duran is neither throwing as hard nor missing as many bats this year, and he's been asked to work the eighth inning too often for comfort. It's enough for me to drop him three spots, behind Andres Munoz, Kirby Yates and Kyle Finnegan, who all have their own issues but are more trustworthy for Fantasy right now.
• The Red Sox's winning ways have allowed Kenley Jansen to pile up a bunch of saves over a short span, such that he's now only four behind Clay Holmes. The stat can be funny in that way. Meanwhile, Holmes' recent struggles (and less-than-studly outlook in general) have dropped him a few spots. Long story short, they've gone from being 15 spots apart in my rankings to only one, and if either is going to lose his job between now and the trade deadline, it's probably Holmes.