2020 Fantasy Baseball Sleepers
First Base – Josh Bell, Pittsburgh Pirates (ADP 94)
Not all sleepers are created equal, and while many people know that Josh Bell is good, I’m not quite sure people realize how good.
In 2018, he hit more home runs (37) than Paul Goldschmidt (34), Anthony Rizzo (27), Matt Olson (36), Jose Abreu (33), DJ LeMahieu (26), and Max Muncy (35). Yet all of those guys are pre-ranked higher than than the Pirates slugger.
To complement the gaudy home run total, he plated 116 runs and scored another 94 himself. It’s not as though Bell’s .277 batting average was Joey Gallo-Esque either…
At 27 years old, Bell is approaching the prime of his career. Taking into account that he missed almost 20 games last year, saying that he could reach the 40 home run plateau this year isn’t a stretch.
One of the knocks against him may be the loss of Starling Marte to Arizona, but Bell did most of his damage with the likes of Jose Osuna and Francisco Cervelli protecting him. The loss of Marte may lower the RBI total, but the rest of Bell’s numbers have room to improve.
Seeing as how the aforementioned first basemen are sure to go off the board a few rounds earlier, I’d be more than happy to sit back and grab Bell a round or three later to be my primary first baseman.