Fantasy Baseball Player Outlook: Xander Bogaerts

Sports Illustrated’s fantasy baseball analysts Jaime Eisner and Shawn Childs joined Corey Parson to discuss Bogaert’s outlook for the 2020 fantasy baseball season.

A delayed season due to the coronavirus will prevent Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts from hitting over 100 RBIs for the third consecutive season. Bogaerts was dealing with an ankle injury during Spring Training but is now expected to be fully healthy whenever the MLB season gets underway.

According to the the latest ADP data, Bogaerts is coming off the board with the 32nd overall pick and the eighth selected.

Sports Illustrated’s fantasy baseball analysts Jaime Eisner and Shawn Childs joined Corey Parson to discuss Bogaert’s outlook for the 2020 fantasy baseball season. 

Read the full transcript from the interview:

Corey Parson: Major League Baseball could soon be returning. That means fantasy baseball could still be returning. A lot of you've already drafted, but some of you actually get a chance to draft again. I'm Corey Parson, the fancy executive here with SI.com. I want to spend a few minutes talking about Boston Red Sox shortstop Xander Bogaerts. To help me do it are fantasy and gambling analyst Shawn Childs and Jamie Eisner. Shawn, I'll start with you. Bogaerts is coming off a career year—hit over .300 with 33 home runs. What's your outlook for him this season? 

Shawn Childs: He went from a good player to a stud over the last two years, you know, tons of extra base hits. His approach is really good. He hits in a favorable part of the lineup in the Red Sox. Again, scores a lot of runs. I really like the top five hitters this year. The question for Bogaerts this year is is Devers improved enough to push Bogaerts to 5th in the batting order because I imagine Martinez will have back clean up. So there's a lot to like about Bogaerts. I think he's gonna keep pushing forward. I love his RBI chances. Twenty percent two years ago, 19 percent last year. So he ranks really high in that area. So he's going to be a top player. He slides a little bit in draft just because he doesn't get the stolen bases. But overall, he's a stud in the Boston Red Sox. Top of the five lineup will match most teams in Major League Baseball. 

Corey Parson: Jamie, Shawn touched on the stolen base, the lack of stolen base aspect of it. When you're going through your rankings and putting shortstop rankings together, where do you slot Bogaerts? 

Jaime Eisner: Right now he comes in as shortstop number nine for me—he's going about eight or nine, sometimes as high as seven depending on where you're looking. He's been slipping a little bit during this break before the new start of the MLB season, but still clearly a really strong player. He's going in around pick 40-41 right now. So about a half around lower than where he was going a few months ago. But I think that's appropriate. He's only gonna get you a handful of steals. He got four last year. I think he'd get five or six this year. I do have some concerns that that run total is going to come down at least under 95, especially if he ends up batting 5th in that order, especially with Mookie Betts out of that lineup as well. But he's still an absolute stud, 5th in the ALMVP voting last year, and is definitely somebody you can build around if those top shortstops are off the board for you in the first three rounds. 

Corey Parson: All right, there you go right there. Thanks a lot, Jamie. Thanks a lot, Shawn. For the latest in the fantasy baseball world, make sure you keep it locked right here at SI.com. 

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