by sinicalypse » Thu Feb 25, 2010 2:18 am
well i don't know about necessarily ranking them in order, but i'll certainly give some musings off the top of my head:
- elvis andrus - he started off too slow to be a consistent SS option on a fantasy team... granted in teh end he ended up with 30SB, i dont think they came quick enough to really warrant a spot... borbon was more of a threat towards the end there, and if they're going to bat borbon first as someone alluded to, that's two outs before andrus reaches the meat of that order. still, i don't know what borbon's staying power is... maybe as a backup or if you're desperate and there isn't another viable SS option
- yunel escobar - young kid, good organization and he's going to get the at-bats, but his numbers seem to be middling... in the end it looks like if he goes up to that .280/20/80 range with ~100 runs he'd be a solid shortstop, but this is fantasy baseball and as constituted his 15-20/~75ish power numbers, even with .280 and a fair amount of runs... again like andrus, whilst at the end it looks solid and ranks him near the top of shortstops, i mean, maybe i'm wrong but it just seems like he won't do much for you.
- stephen drew - his numbers ended up ranking him... #280 overall, middling to say the least... .280/15/66 if i'm not mistaken? erm no, .261/12/65 which fell off of his 2008 numbers (.280ish/21/67 with 44 doubles and a .520ish slugging %) and seeing as the guy is a first round 15th pick overall you figure the pedigree/upside is there, although he is going to be 27 years old by the time the season starts so basically you're hoping more than all else that the light goes on or he reaches a level of comfort because over the next 3-5 years typically one comes into the "prime" of their career, so i wouldn't count on him, realistically, to be more than a .280/20/75 type guy with the small (read <%33) chance of "breaking out" into 20+ and 80+ HR/RBi... and seeing as he doesn't steal bases, it seems like more of a reach.
- alexei ramirez - i'm in chicago and i can tell you that this guy has abysmal starts... i mean, the first season it was like he was overmatched early and he played sparingly, but eventually he got it and was .280/21/77/~20 i believe and then you figure well this was him getting acclimated to MLB and rah rah rah man we've got something here... then last year he has a worse prolonged start than even the year before when he was having his first few go-arounds in MLB and you scratch your head... with more playing time, read 62 at bats, he slugged almost 100 points less (.475 and .389 respectively) and saw his power numbers go down to 15/66 although the one positive is that he took significantly more walks whilst whiffing less per capita. to even get to those numbers took some pretty solid offense, so he's one of those guys who if you can get him as a backup at first to where you dont have to count on him and he starts hitting right out of the gate or you can afford him the time to have his seemingly-annual slow start, welp, if you have a better option at SS at first milk that and then turn around and deal your other SS and see what you can get... until then, i'd be weary of alexei.
- everth cabrera - i got him at the end of the year when he was stealing more bases and while his overall numbers don't bowl you over (juan pierresque power) he still ended up with ~30 steals... and as it has been pointed out he leads off. with the padres not being a gluttenous power team given their ballpark you figure if he can improve on his .250ish clip and progress more as a hitter and get those/that walks/OBP up then obviously the stolen bases will increase and barring injury or mental meltodwn or complete coaching lapses you could be sitting on a 40+ steals guy who would make he SS position productive seeing as you'd have a steals guy in a slot that would allow you to roto the outfield more, where there's far more abundant HR/RBI production en masse. as it stands, he had one good steals season although he came on late for most of them, and if he can pull a michael bourn and master the art of stealing first then you've got a proper steals guy.
- asdrubal cabrera - he's really young i believe (i wanna say he's born in 85) and seeing as we all expect the indians to be a suckfest you know he's going to get playing time. his overall numbers were solid, and there was a period of the season (i wanna say about 1/3 to 1/2way in) where it seemed like he was always on base and being productive batting behind sizemore . i think his upside is probably the best out of the group, although he's not going to have #s that bowl you over, maybe a darkhorse .280/20/70/20 type guy with 100+ runs depending on what, if anything, the indians can get going for power production in the middle of the lineup... maybe the addition of russell branyan will drive him home like a prom chaperone?
- alcides escobar hit the snot out of the ball in winter ball (i wanna say he was like .344 with a whole bunch of steals... like ~20 over the winterball time?) granted he's gotta come up into MLB and do the go-arounds there and start the endless waltz of adjustments from/to pitchers and himself to pitchers to himself to pitchers and himself. he seems to have all of the tools and i know from being near milwaukee and going to games that he's one of those touted prospects who can hit.. he's already ditched a crazy wife and a kid so i think he's got the star quality down, and it's not like moving earth and water to make way for him when you've gotta ship off the perennial disappointment (save a season and a half or maybe two full ones combined) that is jj hardy (tho i do feel bad for all of the chicks at brewers games who had their pink hardy jerseyshirts) he certainly seems to be the real deal... more of a steals guy than anything else, and you figure if he's their leadoff hitter and he can hit .280+ and walk at a decent clip he'll get driven in a whole bunch with braun/fielder/hart/etc. certainly an interesting candidate and clearly having the most upside out of the lot, that is unless you think drew's going to pull 30/100 out of his arse or alexei ramirez goes 30/20 or yunel escobar or asdrubal cabrera can do 20/80/10+ or something. he's got the best pedigree out of the lot of 'em here.
- miguel tejada - you never know when the wheels are going to fall off, and he ended up with a pretty good overall year where he hit over .300 and drove in ~80+ RBi i wanna say and baltimore shoud be a pretty decent offensive team with reimold and markakis and don't call me pacman jones and all, and i think someone pointed out that he'll be batting cleanup or thereabouts and whilst we clearly don't have the beast from his days in oakland still you could do a lot worse than him. he's obviously not going to steal any bases nor would i expect him to be driven in a remarkable amount of times.
- erick aybar - i wouldn't count on him being anything other than a warm body for fantasy baseball SS duties. sure he hit .300 last year but that ~5/58 or whatever it was is realistically all you're going to get out of him. i believe the term used to describe him is a slick fielding shortstop, which is what the angels wanted when they traded orlando cabrera to the whitesox a couple'a years ago... he was a bottom of the order guy also, and without chone figgins there at the top of the lineup, it makes you wonder if his overall runs scored is going to go down... i really have no idea what the angels are doing and fear what they might know about vlad seeing as they let vlad go and replaced him with the same kind of player in hideki matsui (aka, a proud man who wants to be an outfielder but is realistically a DH. note the expos logo... that all started because first and foremost i am a vlad guy)
- scott sizemore - ??????????? i dont think he's had a MLB at bat yet. total wildcard.
- jj hardy - mentioned b4... you know, maybe this is more of an endorsement for alcedes escobar than anything else, because hardy had two years of ~.280/25/75 roughly before falling off the face of the earth and going .229/11/45 last year in ~115 games and being shipped out of town. the truth is that while he produced offensively the brewers knew they had escobar coming and maybe jj was playing nervous knowing that his time was up? maybe he was hurt? seattle isn't a world reknown hitters park and i think the same kind of mentality i've mentioned with these other guys goes with him... i wouldn't depend on him, but if he ends up being that .280/25/75 type SS and you've got a top tier one in front of him and you see the season going on and trust in hardy, maybe you can then turn around and peddle that SS for something else and then milk hardy's .280/25/75... tho who knows, let's say he's that .280/25/75 guy again going to seattle i think the power #s would drop to ~20 and the RBIs might drop a lil too. i wouldn't bet on him
so i'd say out of the lot, alcedes escobar is prolly the #1 guy to go with... even tho there isn't a MLB track record yet, the kid has excelled at what he's done and has star quality written all over him. then i'd say, depending on if you want to go with for-sure prodcution your miguel tejada, otherwise if you're going for strictly upside you can flip a coin between yunel escobar and asdrubal cabera, followed by evereth cabera and jd drew (depending if you're trying to get SB or 20/80ish-potential-updide out of your SS position) and then alexei ramirez and elvis andrus are the next tier and then your mystery bag of scott sizemore and i wouldn't go with erick aybar personally so i'd put him last.
tl;dr massive up in the place!
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