There are still a few leagues out there that require a designated hitter (and not just a “normal” utility spot), so these rankings try to give some insight on how I rank those players who might qualify at that position.
Unlike the other ranks, I’ve used a 20-game minimum for eligibility as the leagues that still use the DH have higher-than-normal requirements, and also because enough players find their way into five starts at DH to make it more or less a repeat of my normal ranks. Additionally, I’ve excluded catcher-eligible players as you will always want to use those catchers as a catcher due to the low replacement level.
One word of advice for those who do find themselves needing a player who specifically qualifies at DH: it’s not as easy to replace as you might think. The talent pool at DH dries up fairly quickly, and players who are promoted from the minors rarely carry DH-eligibility with them. While the players on this list can all be found in the top 60 of my top 300, things start to get shaky in a hurry and before you know it, you’re looking at platoon players.
Try to draft multiple players who qualify at DH in these formats to ensure you have coverage, as it’s a lot easier to replace an outfielder or infielder than a DH (which sounds crazy, but as someone who plays in this format, it’s true.
Tier 1
1. Shohei Ohtani (DH, LAD) — Fun fact: Shohei Ohtani is the only player to finish in the top-five fantasy hitters in both 2023 and 2024. Little needs to be said here. In daily leagues where Ohtani is one player, he is in a tier of his own. This ranking is just for hitter Ohtani, technically, where I can see some sort of argument for one of the other two guys in this tier if you’re somehow worried about additional injury risk or something because he’ll be throwing (I am not worried about this at all, for what it’s worth). Those in OBP leagues might have a slightly tougher decision, as the gap between Ohtani and Judge in that format was pretty slim in 2024, but I’d probably still go with Ohtani.
The one somewhat plausible impact of pitching would be a possible decrease in stolen bases, as you might argue that they’ll be more timid about giving the green light to Ohtani if they need him to be a starter. That said, they seemed happy to give the green light while he was recovering from an injury. Stealing over 50 bases again is a long shot, but 30 or more should be more than feasible. He stole 20 or more twice on an Angels team that was among the most conservative in baseball, with 26 in 2021 before the rule changes, while also tossing 130.1 innings that season.
2. Aaron Judge (OF, NYY) — Judge is obviously a powerhouse, and I wouldn’t begrudge you if he was at the top of your personal rankings over Ohtani (even if I disagree). He had two rough slumps: one in April and another in the first half of September, and both were due to high groundball rates (and to a lesser extent, a lot of strikeouts) that were quickly corrected. Sure, they were ugly, but anyone who doubts Judge’s ability to correct course and be the best pure hitter in baseball for extended stretches is out of their mind.
Oh, and for what it’s worth, the loss of Soto might chop a handful of RBI off his totals, but after hitting 144 in 2024 he had plenty to spare without losing any real value. The Yankees offense should be quite good when all is said and done and Judge will be at the heart of it.
Tier 2
3. José Ramírez (3B, CLE) — To be honest, I had completely forgotten about J-Ram’s somewhat sluggish start, in part because he quickly corrected it by hitting 11 home runs in May. Despite posting the lowest season-long walk rate we’ve seen from him since 2016, J-Ram tied a career-high in home runs (39) while setting new career highs in runs (114) and stolen bases (41) and the second-best mark in RBI (118).
Ramírez’s pull-heavy profile with plenty of fly balls helps offset some of the fairly pedestrian numbers we see from Statcast, but it’s interesting to see that his production came with two big spikes: a home run spike in May (11) and a stolen base spike in August (14). Those were his best months for home runs and stolen bases in his long career (respectively) and expecting players to repeat bursts like that is something I tend to avoid.
Even if J-Ram doesn’t get to 80 combined home runs and steals, he should continue to be the safest bet at third base on the board. Since his breakout in 2017, Ramírez has finished as a top-three third baseman every year except for one (a somewhat injury-shortened 2019).
4. Yordan Alvarez (OF, HOU) — Make it four consecutive seasons with over 30 home runs and 85 RBI. The counting stats were a bit low for Yordan, though that’s largely due to the baffling lack of offense to start the year in 2024 (this dude had 30 hits and just four RBI in May). If we knew he’d play 150 games, I think he’d be at least three spots higher, if not more. He’s just that good when he’s on the field.
Fun fact: Yordan’s worst 50-game wRC+ of his career is 114, meaning at his absolute worst, he’s still 14% better than the MLB average.
5. Vladimir Guerrero Jr. (1B/3B, TOR) — I admit I thought Vlad Jr. was on the decline after watching that rolling chart point down through 2022 and 2023 and into the start of 2024, but Vladito turned it on in the second half and showed us a spike in power we hadn’t seen since his breakout in 2021. Guerrero always kept the bat-to-ball ability, but grounders were crushing his upside until he found a way to break their spell in the summer. A Vlad who puts the ball in the air (as in line drives plus fly balls) more than 60% of the time is an extremely dangerous hitter. Heck, possibly even a top-five hitter. The floor is quite high regardless, really, but that second half showed us that the 40-home run power in his 2021 campaign may not have been a fluke after all.
Tier 3
6. Brent Rooker (OF, ATH) — I was not silent regarding my skepticism towards Rooker coming into 2024. Rooker’s 30 home runs in 2023 was extremely streaky. It was largely fueled by two extremely hot stretches at the beginning and the end of the season, with a lot of red flags over in the summer plus a ton of strikeouts. The Rooker we saw in 2024, though, was incredibly consistent, posting a wRC+ over 100 in each month of the season and a wRC+ over 140 in four of the six months.
Rooker’s strikeout rate did spike a few times earlier in the season, but from July 1 to the end of the season, he struck out in just 23.6% of his plate appearances, and from that point on, he never had a 20-game strikeout rate above 30%. That’s quite remarkable, as he spent almost all of 2023 with a 20-game rolling strikeout rate above 30%, with many stretches over 40%.
While stronger decision-making certainly played a role in the improvement, our PLV metrics suggest the biggest change was to his contact ability, going from a player in the bottom 10% of the league in 2023 to a player with almost average contact ability. If Rooker continues to make contact at a mostly average clip, he should continue to be a very special hitter for the A’s.
Also, for those who haven’t heard, the move to Sacramento barely improves the offensive environment. Sacramento is a fairly pitcher-friendly park, though I believe the foul territory should be much friendlier (a notable thing for a pull hitter like Rooker).
7. Ketel Marte (2B, ARI) — Marte had the best season of his career in 2024 and set career highs in home runs, RBI, wRC+, average exit velocity, barrel rate, hard-hit rate, and a bunch of other stuff. He did this despite missing 26 games (mostly due to a sprained ankle in late August) and looked like a completely different hitter than the guy we saw in 2023 (who had looked completely different than the guy we saw in 2020-22).
The power surge appears to be tied to Marte pulling the ball a LOT more than in prior seasons (51.8% in 2024, never higher than 44.4% in any other season), which helped convert doubles and triples into home runs. It can be difficult to bring that kind of change into future seasons due to the fickle nature of batted ball direction in general, though it’s not necessarily random (see: Isaac Paredes). While I do think he can keep pulling the ball a bit more in general, I’m skeptical about pulling the ball quite this often as a lot of that came very suddenly and over a relatively short period of time (see chart below).
Even if the power regresses a bit (which I do expect to some degree), Marte’s bat-to-ball skills should keep him in the top 30-40 hitters thanks to strong ratios, plenty of counting stats, and at least 25-27 home runs. He’s particularly valuable in points leagues thanks to his sub-20% strikeout rate, double-digit walk rate, and hitting second behind Corbin Carroll every day.
8. Marcell Ozuna (DH, ATL) — Ozuna did a full repeat of his shocking 2023 season in 2024 and there’s little reason to doubt he can do something similar in 2025. Technically, Ozuna’s power faded a bit down the stretch compared to his early season fireworks display, but as the chart below shows, the “fade” merely brought him down to the 80th percentile. If that’s what a slump looks like, then sign me up.
9. Manny Machado (3B, SDP) — Don’t panic when Machado has an extended slump, as he’s had one in each of the last five full seasons. They look ugly and get pundits everywhere asking, “What’s wrong with Machado?” The answer, generally, is “nothing he can’t fix.” In both 2023 and 2024, Machado looked incredibly pedestrian for a full two months to start the season before turning it on and getting to his numbers (roughly 30 home runs and 90-100 RBI). Don’t mistake year-to-year consistency with month-to-month consistency. Machado is absolutely the former but not so much the latter. The takeaway, if nothing else, is that Machado is likely to keep being a rock at the hot corner for fantasy teams, even if, at times, it looks like he won’t be. Just keep the faith and you’ll be rewarded.
10. Kyle Schwarber (OF, PHI) — Schwarber is still Schwarber. 2024 was another season of solid decision-making, excellent power, and poor contact. He will strike out nearly 30% of the time due to his contact issues, but he’ll also walk about 15% of the time and hit around 40 home runs with roughly 100 runs and 100 RBI.
Schwarber should be considered a top 15-20 hitter in OBP formats, but in standard leagues, he has two things holding him back: his low batting average and extreme streakiness. Both result from his contact ability combined with his all-or-nothing approach, which focuses on pulling the ball and getting it in the air (both of which are good things, to be clear). The extremes in his profile lead to a rolling chart that looks like an EKG.
For roto players, this variance is fine because as long as you stick with it, the highs will balance out the lows. In head-to-head formats, it gets a little trickier as Schwarber will oscillate between a guy who is dragging your whole team for three matchups and then goes and goes and wins your next matchup almost entirely by himself. Some players don’t want this kind of headache in a weekly league, but for those who can handle the ups and downs, you’ll get an elite power source.
Tier 4
11. Anthony Santander (OF, TOR) — When you’re as strong as Santander, more fly balls will generally be a good thing. Santander kept his fly ball rate above 50% for the majority of the season, and that led the way to his 44 home runs. I don’t expect Santander to get quite that many home runs again in 2025, but 35 seems quite reasonable to go with what will likely be a boatload of counting stats wherever he ends up. Because Santander puts a lot of balls in play, hits from both sides, and plays in a lot of games, his floor is higher than some other power-hitting outfielders with similar profiles.
Santander ultimately signed with the Toronto Blue Jays and looks like he’ll bat right after Vlad Jr., which is a solid situation to be in for the slugger. The lineup he’s coming into isn’t as deep or exciting as the one he left, but Santander should be in a position to get into the triple digits in RBI for a second consecutive year.
This ranking of Santander is considerably higher than where he’s being drafted so far, which may be due to Baseball Savant’s less-than-stellar expected stats. Our Pitcher List expected stats are much more favorable towards Santander, particularly in the power department, and I think Santander is a fantastic value anywhere near his current ADP just before pick 100 (ADP from NFBC drafts as of January 22).
12. Wyatt Langford (OF, TEX) — At the end of May, Langford was slashing .222/.288/.286 with a single home run and a single stolen base. He showed life as the summer wore on, and thanks to a surge in late June through early July, Wyatt Langford was fantasy’s 149th-best hitter by the All-Star Break, an impressive feat after such a slow start.
Langford came into the season with massive expectations due to his pedigree, and while it took time to see the promise in his bat, Langford certainly showcased what he could do, particularly in September when he hit eight home runs, stole seven bases, and hit a cool .300/.386/.610 in 114 plate appearances. We’re still likely to see a lot of variance in Langford’s performance, considering he’s going into just his second full season and is barely 23 years old, but this is a player with the potential to put together 30 home runs and 30 steals if he can carry even a little bit of his September energy into 2025.
Tier 5
13. Bryan Reynolds (OF, PIT) — Reynolds, for some reason, remains a Pirate, and as such, he should continue to hit roughly 25 home runs and get somewhere between 80-90 RBI with a .270ish batting average.
Only two things might alter his value: a new team or a new position. The former has been rumored for years but has yet to materialize. The latter has been hinted at this offseason, as the Pirates have really no one on the current roster to cover first base, and also, Reynolds is one of the league’s worst defensive outfielders. I don’t think we can count on this positional eligibility in 2025, but if the Pirates still don’t have a first baseman by spring, this could start to get some legs.
14. Riley Greene (OF, DET) — Riley Greene has struggled to stay healthy in the majors, but I believe his 2024 indicates the type of power and contact we can expect in the big leagues. He finished just inside the top-60 hitters in 2024 despite the missed time, and Greene has done well to make adjustments so far in his career. Greene showed more of a propensity to steal in his first two seasons, but between keeping him healthy and his relatively average speed, I wouldn’t count on more than 10. That all being said, there’s definitely a top-50 bat in here, and I wouldn’t be shocked if he was inside the top 40 in short order with a hot start.
15. Seiya Suzuki (OF, CHC) — If Suzuki stays healthy and in Chicago, we could very well see him surpass his top-40 hitter finish from 2024. Suzuki is a consistent contributor when healthy, hitting .284/.361/.484 over the last two seasons while finally breaking into the double-digits in stolen bases in 2024 to go with 21 home runs.
Suzuki has yet to have a season where he gets to 600 plate appearances (though he’s been fairly close in each of the last two), but the consistent results from his times on the field leave me pretty certain that there could be more to his game hitting third behind newly-acquired Kyle Tucker in Chicago. Of course, Suzuki has been a popular name in trade talks, leaving some uncertainty to add to his mild-ish injury risk.
Those in OBP leagues can bump Suzuki up a little, but he’d still likely be in this tier for me.
The Next 10
Vinnie Pasquantino
Christian Yelich
Cody Bellinger
Jake Burger
Luis Arraez
Adolis García
Royce Lewis
Yandy Díaz
Jasson Domínguez
Kerry Carpenter
Photos by Icon Sportswire | Adapted by Doug Carlin