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Are Kyle Teel and Noah Cameron fantasy baseball sleepers, busts, or neither? Rick takes a deep dive into their 2025 fantasy baseball value.
There are two rules all fantasy managers quickly learn. First, you're never completely happy with your catcher(s). Second, you never have enough pitching. You'll spend a lot of time staring at both positions regardless of how you approach them on draft day.
Luckily, you might find decent options in both spots on your waiver wire. The White Sox summoned top prospect Kyle Teel to Chicago, adding a catcher with legitimate fantasy upside to the pool. Many are leery of Noah Cameron, but a deeper dive into his prospect pedigree and MiLB performance might make you feel more comfortable rostering him.
Let's take a closer look at two intriguing fantasy options!
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Kyle Teel (C, Chicago White Sox)
11% Rostered
Teel is off to a great start, slashing .375/.500/.375 in 10 plate appearances as a big leaguer. He isn't the toolsiest top prospect, but he rates well on prospect lists anyway, thanks to an advanced plate approach and defensive viability behind the plate. Here's his FanGraphs scouting report:
He can't run, and his hit tool remains a question, but there's pop with a solid arm and a chance to stick at catcher defensively. His write-up mentions that Teel is increasingly "power over hit," but this author doesn't get that at all. His MiLB.com scouting report offers a different perspective:
We have a plus hit tool with average catcher defense and power, a combination that most of the league would sign up for instantly. His write-up also notes that Teel "should hit for average while drawing plenty of walks and providing 15-20 homers," a projection in line with his performance on the farm.
Teel was drafted by the Red Sox and cracked the upper minor leagues with Double-A (Portland) in 2023. He looked great with a .323/.462/.484 line with a homer and two steals in 79 PAs, but a .474 BABIP did most of the heavy lifting. His 20.5 percent BB% was incredible, though his 28.2 percent K% was concerning.
Teel returned to Portland in 2024 and succeeded in a much larger sample, slashing .298/.390/.462 with 11 homers and nine steals across 382 PAs. Teel's .371 BABIP was again elevated, but his 12.6 percent BB%, 22.8 percent K%, and 11 percent SwStr% were all strong.
Teel's 11.8 percent HR/FB was only okay, but he still produced power with a 38.8 percent fly-ball rate. Don't get too excited about the steals, though; Teel was caught five times for a success rate of 64 percent.
Boston promoted Teel to Triple-A (Worcester) midseason, and he responded with a .255/.374/.343 line with two homers and three steals in 123 PAs. Teel's plate discipline remained outstanding with a 16.3 percent BB%, 23.6 percent K%, 11 percent SwStr%, and 21.1 percent chase rate. His .333 BABIP and 13.3 percent HR/FB also resembled his prior work.
The biggest change was Teel's FB%, which fell to 20.8 percent after being nearly double that at Double-A. Fly-ball rate marks that low cap a player's power ceiling, and Teel's HR/FB isn't high enough to automatically conclude he should lift more.
Boston included Teel as the headliner in the Garrett Crochet trade, and he began 2025 at Triple-A (Charlotte). He hit .295/.394/.492 with eight homers and seven steals in 213 PAs, with most of his peripherals repeating from 2024: 14.1 percent BB%, 25.4 percent K%, 11.9 percent SwStr%, 26.9 percent chase, .380 BABIP.
Teel's HR/FB spiked to 21.1 percent, but that might've been a byproduct of his environment more so than anything else. His 29.5 percent FB% wasn't high enough for a slugger, regardless, and increasing it would probably reduce his BABIP and cut his average.
This isn't a "power-over-hit" profile, but that doesn't mean it's a bad one. Teel was young for all of these levels and still performed with aplomb. His advanced plate approach should help him succeed in the majors immediately as a plus-average, plus-OBP bat with just enough pop to avoid being a zero in the power categories.
The roster fit isn't obvious with Edgar Quero also a well-regarded catcher prospect, but Teel is universally considered the better defender of the two. The White Sox used Teel at DH in his third MLB game, suggesting the team will try to give him full-time PAs. Playing your top prospect! Maybe other teams should try that!
Sarcasm aside, Teel hit sixth, fifth, and sixth in his first three games. That's fairly aggressive for a 23-year-old catcher making his big league debut, so he could capture an important lineup slot down the line.
Teel isn't fast and had a mediocre success rate when he tried to run more often, so fantasy managers shouldn't expect more than a handful of steals. His low FB% will limit his immediate power upside but increase his BABIP, helping him post a solid batting average and OBP. He might even log more PAs than most catchers if the White Sox DH him when Quero catches.
Teel is a Champ based on his upside at a scarce position, though ideally he's on a roster looking for average or OBP rather than power.
Noah Cameron (SP, Kansas City Royals)
51% Rostered
Cameron is 2-1 with a 0.85 ERA in 31 2/3 innings pitched, but his roster rate suggests fantasy managers aren't buying it. His .148 BABIP, 99.1 percent strand rate, and 5.1 percent HR/FB all scream negative regression, while his 16 percent K% and 8.4 percent BB% suggest an unrosterable pitcher. The resulting 3.20 xERA and 4.59 xFIP aren't great.
Throw in Cameron's average fastball velocity of 91.2 mph, and many fantasy managers dismiss Cameron as a nobody with incredibly good fortune. However, he has some prospect pedigree. Cameron made the FanGraphs top-100 Prospects List before the season started, and his scouting report is solid:
While Cameron lacks "star-level stuff," the write-up praises his "effortless, repeatable delivery" and notes that he "commands all four of his pitches," concluding that he has "basically no relief risk." MiLB.com didn't include Cameron in its top 100 but had him top-5 in Kansas City's organization:
Plus control, two MLB-average pitches, and two plus pitches are more than viable. His write-up notes that Cameron "understands how to use his pitches," suggesting that the whole is greater than the sum of its parts.
None of this means that Cameron will continue pitching to a 0.85 ERA, but his MiLB track record suggests significant strikeout upside. Cameron cracked the high minor leagues with Double-A (Northwest Arkansas) in 2023, posting a 6.10 ERA and 4.50 xFIP in 72 1/3 IP.
That didn't put him on the fantasy radar, though his .354 BABIP skewed his results. His 22.8 percent K% and 8.0 percent BB% weren't special, but that would change the next season.
Cameron returned to Northwest Arkansas in 2024 and fared much better, posting a 3.63 ERA and 3.37 xFIP in 74 1/3 IP. His .347 BABIP was still high, but his 27 percent K% and 7.8 percent BB% suggested a level of dominance rarely seen from a 91 mph heater.
The performance earned Cameron a promotion to Triple-A (Omaha), where he pitched even more effectively: 2.23 ERA and 3.57 xFIP in 54 1/3 IP. His 29 percent K% and 5.1 percent BB% were both improvements despite facing more advanced competition, and his BABIP even declined to .284.
Cameron began 2025 at Omaha and posted a 3.31 ERA, 3.34 xFIP, 28.6 percent K%, and 9.8 percent BB% over 32 2/3 IP. His .263 BABIP probably regressed too much, but the 25-year-old deserved a big league opportunity based on his MiLB resume. He isn't a nobody.
Why isn't Cameron getting strikeouts with the Royals? His fastball has been terrible with a 2.4 percent SwStr% and 53.2 percent Zone%, but the rest of his arsenal has strikeout upside. The vaunted changeup has disappointed so far with a 13.8 percent SwStr%, 43.8 percent Zone%, and 28.9 percent chase rate.
Fortunately, Cameron's other three pitches have been great. His new cutter has a 15.6 percent SwStr% and 63.6 percent Zone%, giving Cameron an elite "fastball." His curve's 11.8 percent SwStr% and 55.9 percent Zone% represent another way to get ahead in the count, while his slider flashes elite with a 17.9 percent SwStr% and 56.7 percent Zone%.
Cameron lacks a chase pitch, but the change probably serves that role if the scouting reports are right. He sometimes threw too many strikes on the farm and developed Gopheritis, but Kauffman Stadium's 82 HR factor (2023-2025) should mitigate that.
Likewise, Kansas City is tied for sixth with 11 Outs Above Average (OAA) this year. That should help Cameron sustain a low BABIP going forward.
Whether Cameron continues to get starts is another question. The Royals are currently using a six-man rotation, and they might want to continue doing so to limit Kris Bubic's innings. If they don't, Michael Lorenzen's 4.94 ERA and previous bullpen experience could leave him the odd man out instead of Cameron.
Cameron gets the Yankees tonight in Kansas City, which is a scary matchup. He projects to start at Texas on June 17, after that, which should be much easier. There's risk here, but Cameron's prospect pedigree, MiLB performance, and environment all suggest a Champ.
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