Last Updated on June 27, 2025 6:57 am by Anthony Kates | Published: June 27, 2025

The All-Star break is usually considered by fans to be midpoint of the MLB season and a great time to take a step back and assess their squad’s flaws and needs. But in reality, the All-Star festivities are still two weeks away and by the time you read this, a handful of teams will have officially crossed the 81-games played threshold, marking the actual half-way mark. So why not get a head start on your competition by doing your team’s self-assessment now?

If you’re a keener like myself, perhaps you’ll also be able to get the jump on some of the names below who could be difference makers in your pursuit of a championship.

Jo Adell – OF – LAA – 34% Yahoo, 62% CBS

Last 14 Days: .261/.346/.543 – 4HR/1SB – .383 wOBA – .283 ISO – 148 wRC+

Is the long-awaited breakout finally upon us?

There’s few better feelings in fantasy baseball than staking your claim to a post-hype prospect, only to see them finally reach the level of production that had been expected of them. That’s the purest definition of a lottery ticket hitting, which naturally means it doesn’t happen all too often – but Adell is now well on his way to checking those boxes as a breakout with the ability to sustain his new-found performance.

Previously ranked as a top-10 prospect in the game due to his dual-threat potential for big power and big speed, strikeouts have long been the Achilles heel for Adell’s fantasy profile, with the Angels outfielder carrying a career strikeout rate of 35.4% (compared to just a 4.8% walk rate) through his first 178 games. In 2024, he showed signs of turning things around by getting that number down to a much more manageable rate of 27.9% across 130 games played, but even though he chipped in some solid counting stats (20 home runs / 15 steals), he slashed just .207/.280/.402 with a wRC+ that was 10-percent lower than league average. On the plus side, he underperformed his xBA by 17 points, with the expectation of a .224 average in actuality. Still low, but maybe just palatable enough to deal with the exciting power-speed skills he showcased.

In 2025, Adell is once again underperforming his expected stats but has significantly raised the baseline those numbers are, well, based off;

As you can see, not only has Adell seen his game rise a level compared to last year, he’s now showing us the potential of an additional level on top of that. His expected rates have skyrocketed mostly due to improvements in his contact quality, moreso than growing into additional power as his body matures, with his barrel rate jumping from 11.7% (79th-percentile) to 15.1% (91st) and his launch-angle sweet-spot rate rising from the bottom of the barrel at 30.5% (14th-percentile) to middle of the pack at 34.3% (49th-percentile). Not only that, he’s also seen his swing rate at pitches in the zone jump 2.2% while his rate of chasing pitches out of the zone (30.3%) is a career-low.

Though Adell is never going to be an OBP machine, his skillset is still worth buying in the majority of fantasy formats. Turns out his talent level is so high, even the Angels couldn’t (fully) bungle his development! 

Eric Lauer – SP – MIL – 20% Yahoo, 20% CBS

Last 14 Days: 10.1 IP – 1.74 ERA/2.98 FIP/1.26 WHIP – 13:4 K:BB – 1 HR

The number of pitchers who have gone to ply their trade overseas after several years in the majors and then returned is small, and the number of successful pitchers within that cohort is even smaller, but Lauer is making a strong case to join them.

Though he’s been quite limited by the Brewers when it comes to his pitch count, having only completed five innings twice in 11 outings, those performances came in his two most recent games. See, Lauer had largely been used as a bulk reliever to start the year, with six of his first eight appearances coming in relief, before being transitioned to the rotation for his three most recent outings.

For most pitchers, getting stretched back out to handle a starter’s workload usually means diminished stuff and lesser results than when you’re able to focus on the short bursts of action that come as a bullpen piece but Lauer has actually improved, nearly across the board;

More hitters are now chasing his pitches out of the zone, while also swinging and missing more frequently, which has led to a nice jump in strikeout rate for Lauer, putting him on the edge of the upper quartile of all qualified pitchers. But what caused this jump? Seemingly, a simple change in pitch mix;

You may think at first glance that Lauer is now leaning into a cutter that is providing strong results but counterintuitively, the cutter has graded out negatively (-0.2) as per Run Value over the past three games. On the other hand, his curveball, while thrown only slightly more than before, has been an absolute hammer for him, grading out with a score of +2.1 in those three appearances.

Even more interestingly, Lauer has also eschewed the commonly held belief that a pitcher will also lose velocity in their transition out of the bullpen, bumping the MPH on his fastball from 91.7mph to 92.2mph. Though the increase is notable, it’s still not enough to turn Lauer into a power pitcher, so he’ll likely have a few dud games mixed in throughout the remainder of the season but if you’re able to pick and choose your starts, he could provide a strong return on investment.

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Jeff Clowers

• Working The Waiver Wire: June 27th
• Working The Waiver Wire: June 20th
• "The Dynasty Diamond": June 17th