Welcome to the steals report! I will be here every Wednesday to go over important stolen base trends so you can find more speed for your fantasy teams.
Stealing a base is as much about the opposing pitcher and catcher as it is the actual base runner themself. So, being able to spot which teams and pitchers specifically are being run on most frequently will help you to figure out who can swipe some bags over the next week.
Before we get to this week’s important trends, here is the stolen base leaderboard on the season so far.
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Full Season Stolen Base Leaders
Nasim Nuñez keeps running despite beginning to lose his grasp on an everyday role. Heading into play Wednesday, he’s sat in two of the Nationals’ last five games.
José Ramírez just will not stop running and has begun to heat up at the plate. He is eternal.
Last Seven Days Stolen Base Leaders
Josh Naylor and Juan Soto are running again. Each had a reason for the lack of stolen bases early on with Naylor badly slumping over the first chunk of the season and Soto needing a trip to the injured list for a calf strain, but it feels like both are out to prove their “speed” last season was not a mirage.
For Naylor specifically, he didn’t steal a single base over his first 21 games. Over his last 26, he’s stolen 12 and run himself right up there with the league-leaders.
Otto Lopez and the rest of the Marlins’ speedsters tormented the Rays this past weekend. More on that a little later.
Justin Crawford has quietly been a league average hitter so far and has stolen six bases in his last 21 games. Cheap speed and a fine batting average was always the hope for his rookie season and he’s delivering such.
Stolen Base Disappointments
The Rays are funny. Cedric Mullins has a .247 on-base percentage and 15 stolen base attempts. That’s fun baseball, we just hope he can be more efficient.
Zach Neto has only attempted one stolen base in his last 16 games.
Victor Scott II has lost his touch on the base paths so far this year despite peak efficiency last season (89.5% stolen base success rate).
Now, let’s go over the most important stolen base trends over the past week.
Fantasy Baseball Stolen Base Targets
Two teams allowed 10 stolen bases over the past week: the Rays and the Rockies.
Starting with the Rays, they’ve been featured in this column a handful of times this season and are one of the worst teams at defending the run game. They’ve allowed the second-most total stolen bases and have the third-worst caught stealing rate.
They were matched up with the Marlins – who lead the league in stolen bases - this past weekend and allowed six over three games. Funny enough, five of those came on Sunday when Drew Rasmussen was on the mound and Nick Fortes behind the plate.
For as great of a pitcher Rasmussen is, he’s routinely been poor at holding runners on. He allows some of the largest leads and jumps in the league and had one miserable inning in his start on Sunday where the Marlins stole three bags, which helped them push across two runs.
Also, neither Fortes nor his platoon partner Hunter Feduccia are great throwing out runners.
The Rays are consistently one of the best teams to target when seeking stolen bases and are scheduled to face the Yankees – Rasmussen gets them Saturday – and Orioles over the next week. Keep an eye on Anthony Volpe or Blaze Alexander (who starts against left-handed pitchers) if you need cheap steals.
Now for the Rockies, who watched the Diamondbacks run wild against them and total eight stolen bases in their weekend series. As a team that doesn’t steal a ton of bases, that accounted for 25% of all their steals on the season.
Hunter Goodman was behind the plate for most of them and is good rather than great against base stealers. Tomoyuki Sugano and Kyle Freeland were also on the mound for the bulk of those steals, but neither flash as having any trouble holding runners on. We’ll have to watch and see if teams continue their aggression on the bases against the Rockies.
