Success in baseball is not always just about talent. It is also about the ability to make the necessary adjustments throughout the season. Hitters and pitchers alike often need to tweak their approaches should they feel they are becoming too predictable and therefore ineffective against the opposition.

For fantasy baseball owners, the key is figuring out which players have successfully made those adjustments, as they should be the ones to carry a strong performance into and throughout the second half.

New York Yankees catcher Gary Sanchez is a prime example of someone who finally had the light bulb turn on. After a disastrous 2020, Sanchez opened up this season as ineffective as ever. We all know the guy has tremendous power at the plate, but pitchers were having little trouble throwing to him after identifying all the holes in his swing. He batted .190 in April and just .213 for the month of May. Back-up Kyle Higashioka started to see an increase in playing time because he was better defensively and, at this point, offensively as well.

But Sanchez finally made the necessary adjustments. He started to wait longer on pitches and began to hit the ball the other way. Though he is still predominately a pull-hitter, Sanchez went from pushing the ball the other way 14 percent of the time to 22.7 percent. It might not seem like a massive change, but the results speak for themselves — a .313 average, seven home runs and 16 RBIs in the month of June. If pitchers want him back to hitting .213, it’s their move.

Remember Akil Baddoo? The Tigers outfielder opened up the season white-hot for the first two weeks then vanished into thin air. He was batting .295 on April 22 then fell off a cliff, with his average plummeting to .195 by May 8. The young lefty-swinging outfielder was dropped by every fantasy owner and had been completely dismissed as a flash-in-the-pan.

Then Baddoo tweaked his mechanics at the plate, stopped mashing everything into the dirt and started banging line drives to the gaps in center again, just as he had done to open the season. He may not be hitting for much power right now, but a .380 June average is a major plus.

Identifying those players who are making positive adjustments is the key to your fantasy success in the second half. Carlos Correa is back on-track. Jonathan Schoop has become a beast at the plate. Even Charlie Morton and Luis Castillo have righted the ship. Find these players now, and you’ve got your warriors for a championship run.

Howard Bender is the VP of operations and head of content at FantasyAlarm.com. Follow him on Twitter @rotobuzzguy and catch him on the award-winning “Fantasy Alarm Radio Show” on the SiriusXM fantasy sports channel weekdays from 6-8 p.m. Go to FantasyAlarm.com for all your fantasy baseball advice.