Greg Bird: Time to Fly High?
By Brad Kelly
As we enter into what is largely the last week of the fantasy regular season, owners with championship aspirations have to reassess their teams in order to see where upgrades can be made.
At this point in the season, the waiver wire is littered with under performing veterans, middling utility pieces or rookies. One rookie I have had my eyes on is, Greg Bird. Bird was asked to help stabilize the 1B position for New York, after Mark Teixeira’s great season was halted due to injury.
Bird has a done very solid job of stepping in, since the Yankees really didn’t have any alternatives. He was a 5th round pick in 2011, but really hasn’t made many waves on the top prospects lists. Yankees prospects have often been stigmatized as overrated and overvalued, so it isn’t rare for a prospect to not get their recognition. Bird’s ascent up the Yankees ranks really began in 2013, as he had his breakout while in A ball where hit 20 HR and 84 RBI.
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After that season he made his precipitous climb through the minors until 2015, where he of course has made his debut. In the minors this season, he had a .277/12 HR/52 RBI/.825 OPS line. On the surface it is not an awe inspiring line, but it just solidified Bird’s status as a solid prospect rather than the preferable budding superstar.
What I like about Bird from a fantasy perspective going forward, is that he has the ability and maybe even more importantly, the proper surroundings to really offer value down the stretch. Tex’s shin injury looks as though it will sideline him the rest of the regular season. The Yankees backup options behind Bird, are far worse offensive options than what the Yanks are looking for. Bird also, is their only other natural first basemen on the roster.
Over last seven games, Bird has a .304/2 HR/6 RBI/.955 OPS line, hopefully signaling that he has found somewhat of a groove at the plate. The Yankees offense is just a notch below the Blue Jays in terms of production, but it still serves as a source of a lot of potential.
Bird has been usually slotted in the lineup around the sixth spot. That slots him right behind the likes of Alex Rodriguez, Brian McCann and in front of the likes of Chase Headley and Didi Gregorius.
Clearly Run and RBI chances are aplenty, so Bird should be able to at worse offer decent counting stats. The upside will be if Bird can maintain a decent HR clip, which allows fantasy owners to feel comfortable putting him in their CI or UTIL slots.
Investing stock in Bird is a combination of being comfortable enough with Bird’s ability to maintain a decent offensive output and buying stock in the Yanks offense to continue their offensive onslaught. Both of these factors should remain in play and be actualities. I think Bird offers interesting upside down the stretch and efficient enough counting stats that owners should make the move to pick him up.
He is a capable CI or UTIL option and at this point of the season these low risk gambles can make a huge difference in deciding who comes out on top.