After my colleague Andrew Todd-Smith went over the infield fantasy rankings, I'll be taking over our outfield rankings starter with the Top 20 Outfielders today. Ultimately I'll be doing a total of 80 outfielders, with 20 dropping each day during the week. Outfield is a deep, and difficult, position, but it's where you can get some major production.
So we begin with our top-20 outfielders for the 2017 fantasy baseball season:
Tier 1: Really Really Ridiculously Good Looking
1. Mike Trout (Los Angeles Angels) - What a shock. I'm sure no one saw that coming. Mike Trout is likely the top player in any and everyone's drafts this year (though you could argue some other players ahead of him), and for good reason: The man contributes in every single category. Last year Trout his 29 HRs with 105 R, 104 RBIs, 30 SBs, and slashed .315/.441/.550, and what's crazy is, that was kind of a down year for him. Part of the reason for the drop in power was a drop in HR/FB rate, but I don't think there's any reason to be worried, especially considering his hard hit rate was a career high last year. Will Trout hit 40+ home runs again like he did in 2015? Probably not. But he'll likely hit around 35 or so home runs with another 25+ stolen bases, and a real shot at 30/30. Honestly though, if you told me that Trout ended up going 40/40 next year, I wouldn't be shocked. Do I think it'll happen? No, but the man has that much talent. In my opinion, he should be the number one overall pick in any draft.
JD Martinez also missed about 6 weeks of games in 2016. His Power dropoff wasn’t as significant as you make it seem. Hopefully a lot of people are scared away on draft day.
Eh, I mean I’m still expecting around 30 home runs for him, so I’m not expecting him to drop off all that much. But yes, I believe injury likely played a part in his 2016 stats.