Last week we discussed the prospects of a few pitchers who were underperforming but should show a nice profit on their newly diminished value.  Today I’ll highlight a few hitters who I feel will rebound from a slow start based on being unlucky or simply being slow starters.  While these rebounds are very easy to take advantage of in traditional, year-long fantasy leagues, the benefit to the daily league player is the depressed salary of the slow starting player.  You can literally buy low on a player with a beneficial matchup, park effect, and/or poor opposing pitcher.

Troy Tulowitzki (.262, 5 HR, 18 RBI, $3300 on Fanduel) – Every preseason projection had Tulo pegged as the best shortstop in fantasy baseball and rightfully so.  For people who took him though, they’re waiting for him to heat up.  Taking a look at his metrics his numbers aren’t all that bad.  His walk rate mirrors his career rates, and his strikeout rate is actually down by 50% from his career averages.  Let me repeat that, his strikeout rate is actually down by 50% from his career averages!  That’s a tremendous stat that would seem to trigger a massive improvement, but despite putting the ball in play more often, his BABIP is currently at .268 (league average is .295) which is almost fifty points down from his career average of .313.  All of his batted ball stats (Groundball to fly ball, line drive percentage, etc.) are consistent with his career splits so I think we can chalk this up to Tulo being somewhat unlucky thus far this season.  As the temperature rises in Denver, so does the scoring and with Tulo batting cleanup should provide many opportunities for the people who pick him for their daily games to get points far beyond his price point until it corrects to where it belongs.

Aramis Ramirez (.219, 3 HR, 22 RBI, $3200 on Fanduel) – Aramis is the poster child for slow starters.  Last year through April and May he had a total of two homeruns, amazingly he ended the year with twenty six.  The year before, he had four round trippers in April and May; once again he ended the year with twenty five home runs though he only played in 124 total games that year.  Right on cue, as we near the end of May, Aramis is sitting on three homeruns and his price is dropping daily on all the sites.  Through all the struggles early on this season, he’s maintained his spot in the middle of the Brewers order, hitting right behind Ryan Braun.  His walk rate is currently sitting above his career average but his strikeout rate has been pretty constant with his career numbers so he’s really improved his selectivity at the plate through the rough patch this season.  If Aramis can match his production from the past three Junes this year, he’s going to be a player you can project a lot of profit from in the next 30 days.

Jacoby Ellsbury (.192, 0 HR, 3 RBI, $3000 on Fanduel) – I’m going to go out on a limb with this one and predict that when Ellsbury comes off the DL in mid to late June he’s going to be a monster.  His salary has consistently dropped from $4800 at the beginning of the season to where it sits now (I’ll assume that it will be around $2600 when he’s activated).  Another month of missing action will force it even lower.  The downside is that with the shoulder injury he may not come back with as much power as he showed last season, but hitting for average with his speed and in the Red Sox lineup should be enough to post tremendous numbers and provide the largest profit/price point of any hitter on the list.

Honorable Mentions - Justin Upton ($3600), Rickie Weeks ($2800), Brandon Phillips ($2900)

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FanDuel handle: Al_Smizzle