Some notes…

Hot & Believable:

• Jose Reyes has a .384 OBP this month so far. Owners like the five steals, but love the four home runs. The Mets SS has gradually increased both his contact rate and walk rate — a very good sign. His stolen bases are really a matter of confidence after recuperating from injury. The only thing that might be a little flukish is the power. In the past 31 days, his groundball rate is actually over 50%. He won’t continue this power, but otherwise, seems a good bet to be pretty good at a thin position.
• CC Sabathia started the season by being good & very lucky. He then was bad & very unlucky. Only over the last three starts has he been both good & lucky. Although we don’t put that much into half-season splits, Sabathia has a track record for turning it on later in the season. In the last three years, he was virtually unhittable in the second half. Let’s hope that a K rate over 9 over the last three games compared to a K rate of 7.4 on the season is a trend.

Hot & Dismissible:

• Gaby Sanchez is hitting .344 this month. What’s more, in the last month, he has 3 HR and 3 SB. Sanchez makes an elite amount of contact that supports a good average, though not quite at batting champion level quite yet. Even more dismissible is the idea that he’ll be a power/speed option. He’ll chip in a few HRs here and there, but his power spike is largely attributable to facing James Shields on one tremendous day for him. His minor league ledger shows one season of 17 steals, but he was caught 8 times that year and doesn’t boast plus speed at all.
• Garrett Jones is hitting .328 this month with 4 HR and 3 SB. He’s certainly proven he’s an above average player, but also one who feasts off of right-handed pitchers. Add the fact that he’s faced more righties this month + a generous HR/FB rate + a nice BABIP and you’ve got your hot streak. There’s also nothing in Jones’ peripheral speed metrics that indicate he’ll continue to swipe at this pace.

Cold & Believable:

• Ian Stewart has hit .219 over the past 31 days. Can you believe that’s actually lucky? His BABIP was over 300 during that same time. Stewart continues to have a really tough time making contact with the ball. What’s more: Stewart has just 5 steals on the season; none this month. His fly-ball rate has gone down from 46% to 37% this year and he hasn’t been particularly unlucky anywhere. Colorado Rockies hitters have a reputation for heating up as the season goes along and now that Mora has 2B, he’s got some job security at 3B, but keep expectations in check.
• Alfonso Soriano is hitting 20 points below the Mendoza Line the last 31 days. Similar to Stewart, he has always had a problem striking out. Unlike Stewart, part of the blame can be pinned to an unfortunately low hit rate and bad luck HR/FB rate.  Soriano may be getting somewhat unlucky and he has made at least a few nice strides this season in boosting both his walk rate and fly ball rate, but he’s also 34 years old and injury-prone. He carries too much of a risk factor to be counted on.

Cold & Dismissible:

• Josh Willingham has gotten on base nearly 40% of the time this season, but less than 30% in the past week. He also only has 1 HR and 5 RBIs this month. His contact rate hasn’t changed, though. He’s still walking at a level that’s almost Albert Pujols. And he’s hitting fly balls more than half of the time. Those are solid skills. He’s not being rewarded for them in the past few weeks, but right now, he still looks very much like the breakout player that’s come on the scene in the past year.
• Andre Ethier has only hit .210 with a single HR since returning from the disabled list. Before that, he was batting close to .400 with 11 HR and a strong candidate for NL MVP. A closer look at the numbers reveals his strikeout rate has gone up in June, but so too has his fly ball rate. His hit rate is abnormally low. Meaning, Ethier could be showing some lingering effects from the finger injury, but is very likely to put it all together soon and continue mashing with a nice batting average.

Editor’s Note: We’re looking for a new contributor to take over this column. If you’re interested, please e-mail us at editor@fantasyballjunkie.com