With a reoccurring knee issue – among other injuries – limiting his playing time and hampering his ability to swipe bags, it appears increasingly unlikely that Buxton will ever become a force in fantasy.
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The odds are looking longer and longer that Byron Buxton will ever become the fantasy monster that many once believed he might become. As he approaches his age-30 season, he’s yet to play a full season in the majors despite reaching the show back in 2015. From 2014 through 2016, he was the #1 or #2 overall prospect in baseball for all three major prospect outlets – Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus, and MLB Pipeline. But injuries have sidelined him repeatedly, thereby reducing his fantasy impact. It was unfortunately much the same in 2023.
The Twins tried to play it cautiously with Buxton in 2023 as he returned from a cleanup procedure on his ailing right knee. He was brought along slowly in spring training and relegated to DH duties to begin the regular season. But he will not have OF eligibility in most fantasy leagues in 2024 because he never made it into the OF before his regular season ended on August 1 because of a hamstring strain. Although he made a pinch-hit appearance in the postseason, Buxton’s knee remained enough of an issue that he subsequently underwent arthroscopic surgery in an effort to alleviate irritation related to patellar tendinitis. The procedure was described as minor compared to that which he underwent last season and he’s hopeful that he’ll be able to man CF in 2024.
It remains to be seen what a fully healthy Buxton can do, but his performance in 2020-2022 suggests that he can still be an above-average contributor. In each of those seasons, he posted an above-average wRC+, with his 2021 campaign his most productive as he batted .306 with 19 homers, 32 RBI, 50 runs scored, and 9 stolen bases (in 10 attempts) across just 254 PA, with a wRC+ of 171. A high average, however, appears unlikely, as Buxton’s career line is .239 and his strikeout rate has climbed to north of 30% in the last two seasons after coming in at a more reasonable 24% in 2021. His average dipped to .224 in 2022 – thanks in part to a 30% strikeout rate – but he hit a career-best 28 homers on a career-best .340 ISO. He swiped just 6 bases, though, in only 6 attempts thanks to injuries.
While Buxton’s calling card in 2021-2022 was hard contact – his 43% hard-hit rate in 2021 was a career high and his 42% in 2022 was just behind it – that was not the case as his numbers slipped across the board in 2023. As his hard-hit rate dipped to just 34%, Buxton produced his first below-average wRC+ (98) since 2018 as he hit just .207 with 17 dingers, 42 RBI, 49 runs scored, and 9 thefts (in 9 tries). His barrel rate (15%) was still pretty good, but still down from 18% in 2021 and 16% in 2022. Again, his average exit velocity (91.5mph) was still pretty good, but also down from the 92+ that he posted each of the previous two seasons. His strikeout rate also climbed slightly from where it was in 2022 to 31%.
A climbing strikeout rate and a major dip in hard contact are concerning enough, but it’s clear that his litany of injuries – most recently that troublesome right knee – have limited his ability to capitalize on his once plus-plus speed. Buxton’s 2017 campaign was notable for multiple reasons, most significantly because it was his only big-league season in which he recorded more than 400 PA as well as because he posted a career-high 29 stolen bases (in 30 attempts), which is more than double the next-highest total he posted in a season (14 in 2019).
On the heels of yet another injury-marred season in 2023, Byron Buxton is increasingly looking like one of the biggest “what might have been?” guys in baseball history. When he reached the majors back in 2015, he possessed tremendous talent to become an across-the-board contributor in fantasy. But the injury bug derailed season after season and now he’ll enter the 2024 season at age 30. There’s a very real possibility that Buxton can be a fantasy contributor, stardom seems unlikely given his injury history, age, and recent track record on the basepaths. Power is his most likely path to fantasy relevance, with a .262 average representing his next-best season average outside of his .306 mark in 2021.
For 2024, then, Buxton, should be viewed as a late-round lottery ticket for fantasy. He’s certainly worth rostering because he produces when healthy, but beware that he will miss time. His 2023 peripherals are not encouraging overall, it’s possible that his latest offseason surgery helps him approach his level of production in 2021-2022. But that is not a given. Hence, he’s a lottery ticket. Pay little on draft day, expect nothing, and hope for something.
Photo credit: Keith Allison from Hanover, MD, USA, CC BY-SA 2.0 <https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0>, via Wikimedia Commons
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