By Coleman Smith
Josh Naylor’s 5 season’s in the big leagues have been characterized by one major trait, his refusal to strikeout. If you remove a 40 game 2020 season, his K% has steadily improved each year, dropping to just 13.7% in 2023. The strikeout improvements have not come at the cost of power either, with his SLG rising each year from 2021-2023. Naylor would strikeout just 68 times last season paired with 31 doubles and 17 homers in 121 games. While strikeout rate itself isn’t a huge deal for most fantasy managers, in points leagues it is integral to player evaluation.
A lot of analysts use K/BB ratio to evaluate points hitters, but this sells Naylor a bit short. His K% was 12th lowest among hitters with 450 plate appearances last year, but the K/BB ratio comes in at 57th because of a lower walk rate. This ultimately means Naylor is putting the ball in play a ton, a profile more typical for smaller/faster players who try to use their speed to squeeze out hits. Naylor is in just the 16th percentile for speed, and at 250 pounds and 26 years old this likely won’t be improving. Naylor also doesn’t hit the ball exceptionally hard, with a barrel rate and hard hit rate right at league average. What his contact profile does allow him to do is spray balls at ideal launch angles to create lots of hits.
Naylor’s spray chart shows balls sent to all part of the field, but his power to the pull side. Without standout raw power, most of his homers are going to come on pulled fly balls that seem to not be his main focus. Naylor’s more old school hitting approach led him to hit .308 in 2023 after posting a mid .250s batting average the two seasons prior. xBA also backed this up, coming in at .293 after .254 and .257 in ’22 and ’21.
One reason for this jump in batting average was dramatically improved splits. Naylor hit under .200 against lefties in 2021 and 2022 with a K% well over 20% each year. He slashed this in 2023 to 10.2%, surpassing the 15.2% K% he posted vs RHP as well. The results of this were impressive, bringing the average up to .299 with a 72 point jump in wRC+ to boot.
With nearly 150 PA against lefties in 2023, I have confidence these changes can be brought into 2024. His biggest weakness against LHP was always breaking balls, with over a 40% whiff rate in the seasons he struggled. He cut this back to just 26.7% last season and immediately started producing. If he can remain a balanced R/L splits hitter in the future, I could see an average near .300 becoming the norm for Naylor. Not many hitters with his size and build have the ability to put the ball in play this often.
This profile also plays extremely well with runners on base. Naylor hit in an offense that ranked just 27th in runs scored in 2023, but he was able to drive in 97 runs. This is due to situational hitting, becoming an even better hitter when the bases are occupied in his favor. By putting the ball in play more often, Naylor allows himself to take advantage of RISP opportunities more than other hitters.
| AVG | wRC+ | |
| No runners on | .276 | 115 |
| With runners on | .336 | 140 |
| With RISP | .363 | 149 |
Before we dive into fantasy value and impact, I want to talk about Naylor’s energy on the field. The video below is from a 2022 game in which, when down to their last out in the 9th, Naylor hit a game tying grand slam. He then followed it with a go ahead 3 run homer in the 11th inning. This is a player that LOVES playing the game of baseball and is extremely passionate. Every team needs a guy like this that can set the tone and flip the script when behind late in the game.
Naylor is currently being drafted as the 81st hitter off the board on Yahoo and 79th on ESPN, despite Steamer and The BAT X projection systems having him ~50th in points scored. These projection systems are also factoring in a bit of regression, which can be expected. Both have him over 500 PA, but in the low to mid 80’s RBI (as well as just a .272 average on The BAT X). If he can cross the 500 plate appearance threshold, which he’s fallen just short of with 498 and 495 the past two seasons, I think it’s reasonable he could push 100 RBI once more. His ability to step up with runners on allows him to drive runs in despite a poor offense, which may be getting overlooked in projections. Even if he regresses a bit from his 2023, Naylor could return great value at 1B in the middle rounds.
Guys like Triston Casas, Cody Bellinger, Spencer Steer, and Alec Bohm are being drafted above Naylor, yet both projection systems listed above have Naylor finishing ahead of each of them. He’s not extremely flashy because he likely won’t chase 30 homers or more than 10-15 steals, but the strikeout rate provides an extremely high floor that is perfect for a later points league pick. There’s an old saying that fantasy leagues are won in the middle rounds, and Naylor is just the type of player that can separate your team from the rest.
Coleman Smith is a writer for and co-founder of Low Three Quarter Media. See more of his work and others’ work on the site through the links at the top of the page, or explore another recent article linked below.
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