2019 FANTASY BASEBALL PLAYER ANALYZER: MITCH HANIGER OUTFIELDER SEATTLE MARINERS

                                                               

Finally we got some games!  The Cactus and Grapefruit Leagues get fully underway on Saturday but Friday night officially kicked things off when the Seattle Mariners took on the Oakland A's and it was in that game where the first newsbreaker performance from a name player took place as outfielder Mitch Haniger slugged a home run and scored two runs overall.  The outing was a reminder of just how good Haniger was in 2018 when he put up the following numbers that stamped him as a top 10-15 fantasy baseball outfielder:

.285

26 HR

93 RBI

90 R
8 SB

21.7 K/9

10.2 BB/9

.336 BABIP

Looking at the numbers above, Haniger contributed in all five standard ROTO categories and fulfilled the promise that made him a spring sleeper both prior to 2017 and last spring.  Injuries had derailed the progress on Haniger for awhile but he managed to avoid major health trouble which helped put forth the major breakout.  Now in looking ahead to 2019, we don't know yet if Haniger will bat leadoff again like he did during the second half of last season but if not, surely the second or third spot will be his which still means a ton of at-bats.  Then there are the numbers as Haniger is now in his prime and so a repeat of 2018's statistics is absolutely attainable and maybe even a slight improvement.  Now a .336 BABIP was well into lucky range which means the average could dip a bit but otherwise Haniger is looking like a five-tool outfielder who can be had as late as Round 4 or 5.  

2019 PROJECTION:  .280 27 HR 95 RBI 98 R 7 SB