Monday's recommended pickups lean a little deeper than ESPN standard, but even in our 10-team format, each has some appeal -- whether due to (soon-to-happen) position flexibility, streaming start opportunities or stolen bases.
Danny Santana, 1B, Boston Red Sox: That was quite a Red Sox debut weekend for this 30-year-old journeyman, as he hit homers in each of his first two games of 2021, chipping in a stolen base in the latter. In the process, he drew starts at first base (Friday) and in center field (Saturday and Sunday), the latter highlighting his position flexibility and another spot where he should become eligible in the near future, while leading off, batting fifth and second. Santana is a Swiss Army knife kind of player, capable of handling all four infield and all three outfield positions, switch hitting and contributing a decent amount of power and speed. He was the No. 48 player in fantasy just two short seasons ago, in 2019, before enduring a miserable 2020 that concluded with an internal brace repair in his right elbow in September, then suffering a foot infection that delayed his start to this season. Santana was 9-for-20 (.450 BA) with two home runs in five games for Triple-A Worcester before his recall, however.
Let's get to the drawbacks: Santana is a notorious free swinger, with a chase rate (swing rate at pitches outside the rulebook strike zone) annually hovering near 40%, and he has struck out in 30.9% of his trips to the plate since the beginning of 2018. Hitters like this tend to have significant peaks and valleys, so this might be a mirage of a hot spell that dries up quickly. Still, Santana did make his aggressive approach at the plate and on the base paths count in 2019, and the Red Sox should give him a fair number of at-bats in their increasingly mix-and-match offense.
Randy Dobnak, SP, Minnesota Twins: You'll probably remember him as the pitcher awarded a five-year, $9.25 million extension just three days before Opening Day, only to be shifted to the bullpen to start the season despite his eye-popping spring. It was a disastrous experiment for Dobnak and the Twins at the time, as he posted an 8.16 ERA in seven appearances as the team's long man, but he has since made a pair of strong starts out of three total for Triple-A St. Paul, followed by a solid spot start for the Twins this past Friday. With that, it seems the right-hander has recaptured his "sixth man in this five man rotation" role, though in a season where workloads are a concern for every team, that's not a bad thing to be. Dobnak is set to stick with the Twins now that Kenta Maeda is on the injured list, and he could lock down a permanent spot ahead of Matt Shoemaker even after Maeda's healthy return.
Here's what's to like about Dobnak's growth during the past calendar year: Previously an extreme pitch-to-contact hurler, he has whittled his pitch selection to largely his sinker and slider, the latter a bona fide swing-and-miss offering that helped him strike out 19 hitters in 15 2/3 spring frames. This isn't the same starter who struck out only 13.5% of the batters he faced in 10 starts in 2020, and while he's probably also not a pitcher who can be expected to double that rate, the adjustment to his pitches should give him a reasonable chance at shallow-mixed value.
Victor Reyes, OF, Detroit Tigers: If you're hurting in the stolen base category, Reyes might be someone who can help boost your categorical performance. Expected to capture the Tigers' center field role this spring, he fell into a part-time role to open the regular season, struggling to adapt and posting a completely uncharacteristic 27.7% strikeout rate in 65 trips to the plate. Reyes seemed to regain his former contact strike after a demotion to Triple-A Toledo, batting .391/.482/.543 with only eight strikeouts in 56 plate appearances, and that he was summoned as a direct roster replacement for JaCoby Jones suggests he might get a chance to play regularly once again. Reyes' sprint speed is generally in the 90th percentile or better, so between his ability to bat .270-plus and steal 20-plus bases if given regular playing time, he's worth a pickup in any league 15 mixed teams or deeper.
With the adds come the corresponding drops, and while some of these aren't necessarily natural transaction partners for the above names, you can feel free to let them go in standard 10-team ESPN leagues or smaller.
Cole Irvin, RP/SP, Oakland Athletics: He has done a fine job through nine-plus turns of the Athletics' rotation, placing 65th among starting pitchers on the Player Rater, but Irvin's problem is that he lacks the top-shelf skill set necessary to lock down a regular pitching spot in a mixed league. His 18.3% strikeout rate is the strongest such indicator, as it ranks seventh-worst among 66 ERA-qualified pitchers, and his 90.6 mph average four-seam fastball, along with well-below-average breaking pitches, suggest that it's not likely to improve much without a major change in approach. Irvin has now struggled against each of the lineups that have seen him multiple times -- Houston Astros and Tampa Bay Rays -- and he has served up .314/.386/.471 rates the third time through the lineup within his starts. In a mixed league, it'd be wiser to exploit the matchups with a higher-strikeout arm.
Evan Longoria, 3B, San Francisco Giants: He and his Giants lineup-mates generated a good amount of buzz with their April exploits, and the team does continue to sprinkle in high-octane offensive outbursts even during the past three weeks. Still, while Longoria's April was excellent, consider what he has done since: .183/.275/.268 rates, one home run and a 27.5% strikeout rate in his past 20 games. Any defense of his performance should center upon his elevated hard-contact rate -- 60.4%, per Statcast, and better-than-50% in May -- but Longoria's past injury history and rising strikeout rate cap his fantasy appeal in standard mixed leagues.