Will Citi Field Hurt Curtis Granderson’s Fantasy Numbers?

The following is a guest column from FanDuel.com:

The New York Mets have already made a decent amount of moves this offseason, with the biggest one being the signing of Curtis Granderson. The outfielder will be moving across the city to play, but the move could hurt his fantasy baseball 2014 numbers.

After another disastrous season, the New York Mets have been fairly aggressive on the open market. They locked up Granderson with a four-year, $60 million deal so that they could have some stability in the outfield. However, his splits these last few years show that he is a much different hitter when he is outside of Yankee Stadium.

Every left-handed hitter salivates when they see that short porch in right field at Yankee Stadium. When Granderson arrived in the Bronx, he made a conscious effort to pull the ball more to take advantage. His home run totals went up, but his average went down. Some of those home runs will be outs in Citi Field though, which would hurt his power and average numbers.

Another thing working against Granderson is that he will be switching leagues. This is not as big of a deal as it was in the past thanks to interleague play, but it is still something that could make a little bit of a difference. The American League East has better pitching than the National League East, but these are mostly different arms he will be seeing.

As he ages, Granderson is definitely going to notice the 15-25 foot difference in right field between Yankee and Citi. The 33-year old will also be running less and racking up extra base hits as well. Expect his fantasy baseball 2014 value to take a hit, especially if he doesn’t make any changes to his approach at the plate.