Wyatt Langford's Late Surge in AL Rookie of the Year Race

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00:00Okay, let's get to one of the rookies in the American League, Wyatt Langford, who going

00:07into the season was the highly projected Rookie of the Year in the AL, and if you didn't take

00:11Langford you took, of course, Holliday, Jackson Holliday, and neither of those guys I don't

00:18think are going to win the Rookie of the Year.

00:20What do you make of the season for Langford?

00:21Well, I wouldn't quite put a pin in Wyatt Langford yet.

00:25Maybe Jackson Holliday, that's perfectly fine.

00:28But Langford is intriguing.

00:29I know you look at these overall numbers and they're not really exciting, but if you look

00:32at the last 55 at-bats for him, he's hitting .291 with a .350 OBP and a .473 slugging.

00:37Now, that is more exciting.

00:39He's also got five stolen bases, two home runs over that span.

00:42If you dial back to last year, around this time, Gunnar Henderson was the guy who actually

00:48ended up winning the American League Rookie of the Year.

00:51People wanted to drop him from their fantasy leagues in May.

00:54In the month of April he had $1.89.

00:56In the month of May he had a .213 batting average.

00:59His OPS never got over .750 in those two months.

01:03Then he turned it on the month of June, had terrific July, August, September, and that's

01:07all anyone remembers.

01:08And as Louis Heal has hit this inning's wall, Wyatt Langford is a really intriguing piece.

01:14He's so intriguing, Craig, if you look this morning, he is down to plus .600 for this

01:18award in a lot of markets.

01:19Now, that number two weeks ago when I talked about on FST was plus .2500.

01:24That is an enormous leap because I think the market's looking at it and saying, hey, everyday

01:28players have a better spot at this award, potentially.

01:30You're also talking about Heal maybe being sent down to become a three-inning pitcher,

01:34maybe going to the bullpen.

01:35Either of those scenarios are bad for him for this award.

01:38And we're prisoners of the moment.

01:39We end up paying attention a lot more to how players finish than how they started the year.

01:45And as great as Heal has been, he's been the favorite for this award, and rightfully so.

01:49What's happened here now with Wyatt Langford starting to get healthy, starting to get hot,

01:53if he maintains this pace and goes on a run like Henderson did last year, you could very

01:57well see this late-burning rookie of the year once again in the American League.

02:01So it's still a good value, plus .600 at $2,400, at $600 in two weeks.

02:05That's something to circle and realize that the market's starting to turn.