Ian Desmond has been a do-it-all star in his first season with the Rangers. He's sporting a .322/.375/.524 slash line with a .328 wOBA, 15 jacks and 15 steals.
Those numbers will get anyone excited, and they've made him the eighth-ranked player in Yahoo standard leagues.
Unfortunately, he's unlikely to keep producing at this pace.
| Splits | BABIP | HR/FB | FB% | Hard-Hit Rate |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2016 | .402 | 21.7% | 26.7% | 32.0% |
| Career Average | .329 | 13.8% | 31.8% | 29.2% |
Not only are Desmond's BABIP and home-run-to-fly-ball ratio significantly better than his career averages, but also they are both at career-best levels.
The combination of speed and power makes Desmond especially valuable, but both of those stats are doomed to come back to earth the rest of the way. Desmond isn't hitting as many fly-balls as he usually does, yet some good luck has led to him hitting the ball out of the park much more frequently, and when the BABIP regression comes, he won't get on base as often, which will give him fewer chances to steal bases.
Desmond won't be shortstop eligible after this season, making him an even bigger sell-high candidate in dynasty formats.
There are some tangible signs of improvement -- namely a drop in his strikeout rate from 29.2% to 24.5% -- but the rest of his numbers point to a second-half swoon.