Second-Half Sleepers: Denzel Clarke among seven breakout value picks to target after the break

Finding sleepers at the beginning of the season is easy. Doing it mid-season is a lot harder. There are a lot fewer playing time questions right now, and a lot of the most interesting fringe-y talents have already established themselves one way or the other – as the interesting players we hoped they would become or the disappointments they turned out to be.

But if we're taking the chance this week to do a little mid-season reset, we've gotta throw some second-half sleepers out there for you, don't we? So, here are seven players I think could be much more valuable in the second half of the 2025 season than you might think. 

Second-half sleepers

Denzel Clarke, OF, Athletics – I like betting on elite defenders, and Clarke might already be the best defensive outfielder in baseball – according to BaseballSavant.com's Fielding Run Value metric, he's been the third-best center fielder in baseball this season, saving 11 runs in just 360 innings, compared to Pete Crow-Armstrong's 16 runs saved in 847 innings. That's going to keep Clarke on the field, and while his current 40.3% strikeout rate is prohibitive, there are definitely some skills to work with at the plate, starting with his elite speed and 89th percentile max exit velocity. And for as much as he strikes out, Clarke doesn't chase much more than the league average, while his zone contact rate of 77.5% is below average, but not alarmingly so. Plus power and elite speed are a good toolset to build from. Let's see if Clarke can figure out how to put them into action a bit more often. 

Kyle Teel, C, White Sox – Teel has more than held his own in his first 25 MLB games, but holding your own doesn't get the job done at catcher anymore. You need to actually make an impact to matter, and he's fallen short so far, with no homers and just 15 combined runs and RBI to date. He's shown good patience at the plate and solid athleticism for a catcher, which is what we expected from his minor-league numbers. Now it's time for him to start driving the ball and tapping into some upside, and his underlying stats suggest that should be coming – his .375 expected wOBA is the third-best of any catcher right now. It has tended to take top prospects a month or two to really figure things out at the major-league level over the past few seasons, and Teel is right on schedule. He could still be a top-12 catcher in the second half. 

Christian Moore, 2B, Angels – Moore is dealing with a thumb injury that has him on the IL as the first half ended, but hopefully it won't be long before he's back once the second half starts. We saw brief flashes of his upside as a power hitter, along with a lot of swing and miss, which was to be expected. But he also showed a surprisingly patient and selective approach at the plate that could help mitigate the swing-and-miss in his game, and if he manages to hit something like .250 or .260, Moore could be a top-five second baseman with his 30-homer, 20-steal ceiling. 

Brice Matthews, SS, Astros – Will the Astros be willing to move Jose Altuve back to the outfield full time when Jeremy Pena is healthy? Would they give Matthews a look in the outfield? He's gonna have to hit to force those questions, and with Pena looking like he could be back before the end of the month, he just may not have time. But the team's first-round pick in 2023 has shown some awfully interesting skills in the minors, most recently hitting .283/.400/.476 with 10 homers and 25 steals in 73 games at Triple-A before his promotion. 

Zebby Matthews, SP, Twins – Matthews struggled before a shoulder injury landed him on the IL in early June, but it's still easy to see how he can be an effective pitcher when healthy. He struck out 30.1% of hitters in his four starts before the injury, which is a good place to start from – and, notably, his velocity looked fine and he struck out nine in four no-hit innings in his first rehab appearance over the weekend. He should be back in the Twins rotation before the end of the month, and the combination of elite control upside and better than a strikeout per inning (and potentially much more than that) makes him worth chasing in all formats as a stash. 

David Festa, SP, Twins – Festa's four-seam fastball is terrible. He throws it with roughly league-average velocity, and while he does a good job of getting behind it and generating good rise, it has proven incapable of either missing bats or generating weak contact. He's been a prime candidate to transition to a sinker, and we've seen that pitch featured more prominently of late – it also isn't a great pitch, but at least when it gets hit hard, it doesn't tend to get crushed into the outfield seats quite as often. The focus is on the fastballs because the rest of the arsenal here looks like it could be quite good – the changeup especially looks like it might be an elite pitch, while the slider already has an above-average whiff rate despite missing his spots too often. Leading with the changeup and sinker, saving the slider for two-strike counts to righties, and the four-seamer for two-strike counts could help Festa turn things around. The talent is there. 

Reid Detmers, RP, Angels – Are the Angels really going to try to make a playoff run? They're only two games under .500, so it's not inconceivable, but also … this isn't a good team, and they've got six teams between them and a playoff spot. Kenley Jansen should be on the move at the deadline, is what I'm saying, and Detmers looks well qualified to take over and potentially star as a closer. He got off to a rocky start and has an inflated 4.15 ERA as a result, but since the start of June, Detmers has a 1.35 ERA with 25 strikeouts to eight walks in 20 innings of work. I think he's going to lead the Angels in saves the rest of the way. 

Ronny Henriquez, RP, Marlins – For most of the season, it just didn't really matter who the Marlins' closer was. They were a bad team that didn't have many good options in the ninth inning, with a manager who was willing to play matchups when the situation called for it. Well, the Marlins look at least mediocre lately, and Henriquez looks like the clear best pitcher in this bullpen, with a 2.60 ERA backed up by a 3.35 xERA and an arsenal full of swing-and-miss pitches – all four of his primary pitches have an above-average whiff rate for their pitch type this season. Does that mean Henriquez is definitely going to be the closer the rest of the way? Not at all, but I think he has a chance to be, and he could be a very good one if he does. I hope they give him the chance.