Elly

De La Cruz

De La Cruz put together one of the most impressive individual performances of the entire season on Monday evening at pitcher-friendly loanDepot park as he tallied with four extra-base hits on four batted ball events with stratospheric exit velocities over 108 mph. The 22-year-old fantasy superstar kicked off the scoring with a two-run homer off Marlins starter Roddery Muñoz before tacking on an eighth-inning solo shot to record his second multi-homer effort of the year. He’s up to 20 round-trippers to go along with a staggering 57 stolen bases. He has a legitimate shot at joining Braves superstar Ronald Acuña Jr., who accomplished the feat last year, as the only members of the 40-70 club in baseball history.

De La Cruz was the only one of the Reds’ top five hitters to get on base today, so he went without a run scored or an RBI in the 2-1 loss. Still, four steals made it a killer day for fantasy anyway. It’s the fourth four-steal game by a player this season, and he already had one of the first three. He’s 55-for-64 on the year.

Ronald Acuña Jr. had 23 homers and 49 steals through 101 games last year on his way to a 40/70 season. De La Cruz is at 18 homers and 51 steals through 101 games this year. He also has his average up to .262, which is the highest it’s been since May 21. He was down in the .230s for a time in June, but he’s come in at .336 in his last 26 games.

De La Cruz was at the epicenter of Cincinnati’s offensive production in this one, coming around to score on Jeimer Candelario’s first-inning sacrifice fly shortly after smacking a one-out triple off Braves starter Reynaldo López. He also delivered a two-out single and raced around the bases to score on Candelario’s third-inning double before drawing a walk and stealing his 49th base of the year a couple frames later. The 22-year-old speedster is the most electrifying hitter in the game at the moment and has a realistic shot at winding up somewhere in the neighborhood of 75 stolen bases.

The Reds’ offense was asleep for eight innings in this one before coming alive for four runs in the ninth inning to make the Nationals sweat. It’s still spectacular to see how high De La Cruz’s steal total can climb, as he’s now stolen 17 more bags than Brice Turang who is second in the league.

De La Cruz hit one of the six homers the Reds picked up against Miami on Saturday, with his solo blast to tie the game at 3-3 in the third inning. The 22-year-old wunderkind has homered 16 times to go with his whopping 46 stolen bases and 41 RBI over 357 at-bats.

It’s a routine day off for Elly and just his second of the season. Santiago Espinal will start in his place at shortstop. Since May 1st, Elly is hitting .238/.324/.418 in 63 games with a 31.4 percent strikeout rate. Of course, he also has 27 stolen bases and seven home runs to go along with it, which keeps him a must-start player in all fantasy leagues.

De La Cruz is now up to 45 steals on the season. He’s been one of the most electric players in fantasy baseball this year. De La Cruz is hitting .251 with an .813 OPS and 40 RBI on the season.

Freeman is one of six Dodgers to be named to the National League squad. Shohei Ohtani had already been named as the league’s starting designated hitter and Tyler Glasnow was named among the pitchers on Sunday. In addition, Teoscar Hernandez, Will Smith and Mookie Betts were named to the team with Freeman as reserves. Joining them as All-Star reserves announced on Sunday were Elly De La Cruz, CJ Abrams, Ryan McMahon, Jackson Merrill, Heliot Ramos, Bryan Reynolds, Marcell Ozuna, Luis Arraez and Pete Alonso.

The home run was a 425-foot shot for his 15th home run of the season. Elly also struck out twice and is hitting just .226 over his last 40 games while posting a strikeout rate of over 31 percent; however, his athleticism and raw power are so elite that he continues to produce fantasy goodness. If he ever made the plate discipline gains to make more consistent contact, he could be the best player in fantasy baseball.