BIG 4 Shortstops......

[hooligan1]

Have Jeter and Tejada dropped down a notch or two due to their injury/underperformance this season? For next year how many of you will move Furcal and Rentaria ahead of Jeter and Tejada? The former two have played MUCH better than the latter two this year and just may have supplanted them in the Big 4 with A-Rod and Nomar.....

What say you?

[Longshot]

Furcal - yes, renteria - no. Furcal is very young and very, he should only get better. Edgar is pretty young also, but he is entering his 8th year pro and none of his other 7 have been impressive. I would attribute his good year so far to Edmonds, Rollins, Pujohls and J.D. It's not too hard to have a good year when you have 4 studs batting in front of you, getting on base, forcing pitchers to give you looks and just making life way easier on you. Furcal may have the advantage of having some great hitters behind him, but as a lead off man he gets on base almost all the time, he has the speed to steal and turn singles into doubles regularly and he has the bat to more than occasionally knock one out of the park. In the leadoff spot, you are on your own to create something out of nothing and get rally's started, which is what Furcal does. All Edgar does is keep the rallys going occasionally once the 4 studs start them up.

[bleach168]

Neither. I don't think Renteria will keep it up and Furcal's 10 homers are the biggest fluke this side of Melvin Mora.

I think Tejada and Jeter will have solid if not spectacular second halves. If Renteria does keep it up and Tejada or Jeter scuffles all year, I will reconsider though. But Furcal will never be in the top 4 because of his lower ceiling.

[T Long]

love and agree with the comments bleach

[tjhksig]

I'm not so sure that Furcal can't keep it up, I mean, the guy is young, why is it hard to believe he is a fluke? He leads the NL in runs and hits, and is stealing bags too. I don't think Jeter is a better fantasy player than him. Renteria, I'm less sure about.....

[Uzi]

You guys haven't been paying attention to Renteria over the past few seasons. He is a stud and isn't even in his prime yet. 8th season and he just turned 27 years old.

Uzi

[point06]

I agree about Renteria, he is a definite great SS. The fact that he has Edmonds, Rolen, and Pujols batting in front of him is just an added bonus. This guy can hit, can steal some bases, and is just providing the Cards with the offense they need. He has skills, bottom line.

[quickfingerz]

Just based on anthropometrics alone, I'd take renteria. Furcal will probably never hit for power but I think it's possible that Renteria goes for 30-30 sometime in his career. Heck, I'd say next year would be a possibility.

You put a stronger Renteria in the middle of the lineup and he's easily a top-10 fantasy player among all positions.

[HYLRedSox]

I think ARod, Nomar are different types of players than particularly Furcal and Renteria. And with Aurillia's 37 homers a couple years ago clearly not for realy, I would say it leaves Renteria and Furcal up to battle it out as best NL SS.

[jdh]

I see ARod and Nomar as really the big two shortstops, with a huge dropoff below those two. I don't think that the big four shortstops really exists anymore, with Jeter and Tejada both falling far below the level of Nomar and ARod this year especially. Jeter never was really on the level of Nomar in my opinion, and Tejada only reached that level for one year, and might have peaked last year. I think at this point, Jeter, Tejada, Furcal and Renteria are all at about the same level but far below the big two.