Third Base Consensus Ranks for the Second Half
By now, you might have a favorite ranker among the four of us. That’s fine, we’re adults. We’ve gathered to give you four options for a reason. In fact, we’ve gathered these four guys in particular for a reason.
Jeff Zimmerman primarily uses ZiPs rest-of-season projections, with a few tweaks, and so he’s our Sober Suzy. ZiPs does use information from this year, weighted against information from past years, and it does include playing time projections, but it does not get caught up in the excitement of a player in a breakout. Zach Sanders has his own projections, which are more intuitive, and he uses his value calculator to stack the players up against each other. On the other end of the spectrum, you have me and Mike Podhorzer. We are more intuitive, and yet we have different ideas about the players and different levels of cynicism.
Taken as a whole, you should get a reasonable set of rankings that doesn’t get too caught up in a hot month, or too upset about a bad start. That’s the aim.
You’ll see that Zimmerman likes David Freese a little less than the rest of us, for example. And that he likes Chris Davis a little more. Interesting to find these two so close to each other. One has little power and should have a good batting average. The other has power and only power — and some years a good enough batting average to make it work. Both are flawed. And sandwiched in between them is a normally steady Eddie in a new park that loves righty power — Kevin Youkilis. That trio should inspire some conversation.
Add in your opinion (and your appraisal of your league’s opinions) and the puzzle should be complete. Good luck with the second half.
| FanGraphs Consensus Rankings: Third Base |
||||||
| New | Last | Player Name | Eno Sarris | Mike Podhorzer | Jeff Zimmerman | Zach Sanders |
| 1 | 1 | Miguel Cabrera | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
| 2 | 2 | Jose Bautista | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 |
| 3 | 3 | David Wright | 3 | 4 | 3 | 3 |
| 4 | 6 | Adrian Beltre | 6 | 5 | 6 | 6 |
| 5 | 4 | Hanley Ramirez | 4 | 3 | 5 | 11 |
| 6 | 5 | Brett Lawrie | 5 | 8 | 4 | 8 |
| 7 | 11 | Pablo Sandoval | 7 | 7 | 9 | 7 |
| 8 | 21 | Mark Trumbo | 9 | 11 | 7 | 4 |
| 9 | 15 | Edwin Encarnacion | 8 | 6 | 14 | 5 |
| 10 | 8 | Ryan Zimmerman | 10 | 10 | 12 | 9 |
| 11 | 14 | Mike Moustakas | 12 | 13 | 10 | 10 |
| 12 | 9 | Alex Rodriguez | 11 | 12 | 13 | 12 |
| 13 | 12 | Aramis Ramirez | 13 | 9 | 11 | 15 |
| 14 | 18 | Martin Prado | 15 | 15 | 15 | 14 |
| 15 | 7 | Michael Young | 16 | 14 | 16 | 21 |
| 16 | 10 | Evan Longoria | 14 | 23 | 8 | 25 |
| 17 | 16 | Chase Headley | 19 | 26 | 19 | 13 |
| 18 | 19 | Mark Reynolds | 20 | 16 | 17 | 30 |
| 19 | 13 | David Freese | 18 | 19 | 30 | 18 |
| 20 | 20 | Kevin Youkilis | 17 | 20 | 24 | 26 |
| 21 | 26 | Chris Davis | 21 | 17 | 18 | 31 |
| 22 | 47 | Trevor Plouffe | 22 | 24 | 25 | 19 |
| 23 | 17 | Emilio Bonifacio | 23 | 25 | 28 | 16 |
| 24 | 35 | Kyle Seager | 27 | 29 | 20 | 24 |
| 25 | 42 | Will Middlebrooks | 25 | 21 | 32 | 23 |
| 26 | 25 | Pedro Alvarez | 24 | 31 | 21 | 28 |
| 27 | 22 | Chipper Jones | 28 | 27 | 33 | 17 |
| 28 | 43 | Todd Frazier | 29 | 34 | 22 | 22 |
| 29 | 24 | Mike Aviles | 30 | 28 | 23 | 27 |
| 30 | 28 | Jed Lowrie | 26 | 18 | 46 | 20 |
| 31 | 23 | Daniel Murphy | 31 | 30 | 27 | 41 |
| 32 | 27 | Ryan Roberts | 34 | 38 | 31 | 32 |
| 33 | 36 | Casey McGehee | 33 | 40 | 37 | 29 |
| 34 | 40 | Alberto Callaspo | 32 | 41 | 35 | 33 |
| 35 | 37 | Chris Johnson | 37 | 36 | 29 | 40 |
| 36 | 30 | Placido Polanco | 38 | 32 | 38 | 36 |
| 37 | 44 | Stephen Lombardozzi | 37 | 43 | 36 | 34 |
| 38 | 34 | Sean Rodriguez | 42 | 33 | 42 | 37 |
| 39 | 41 | Wilson Betemit | 43 | 22 | 43 | 48 |
| 40 | 45 | Jordan Pacheco | 39 | 44 | 39 | 35 |
| 41 | 50 | Jose Lopez | 36 | 48 | 26 | 47 |
| 42 | 39 | Lonnie Chisenhall | 35 | 42 | 34 | 51 |
| 43 | 31 | Scott Rolen | 47 | 35 | 48 | 43 |
| 44 | 48 | Chris Nelson | 41 | 46 | 41 | 45 |
| 45 | 46 | Alex Liddi | 40 | 45 | 40 | 50 |
| 46 | 38 | Juan Uribe | 50 | 37 | 51 | 39 |
| 47 | 29 | Danny Valencia | 44 | 51 | 44 | 42 |
| 48 | 42 | Brandon Inge | 48 | 39 | 49 | 46 |
| 49 | 33 | Ian Stewart | 46 | 53 | 47 | 38 |
| 50 | 49 | Elian Herrera | 45 | 47 | 53 | 44 |
| 51 | 43 | Chone Figgins | 49 | 49 | 50 | 52 |
| 52 | 44 | Jimmy Paredes | 51 | 50 | 52 | 49 |
| 53 | 32 | Brent Morel | 52 | 52 | 45 | 53 |
Uribe should be SO MUCH higher. Come on guys, don’t you remember his 2010? Nobody even ranked Jerry Hairston Jr? Buuuuullshit!!!!!!
Pedro Alvarez is only one spot ahead of Placido Polanco according to one of you? Say what you will about Alvarez, but at worst, he’s a watered down version of Adam Dunn. At best, he continues to build on his hot past month (.294, 8HR, 26RBI, top-20 rank in fantasy) and blossoms into a star. Meanwhile, Polanco (.266, 2HR, 18 RBI for the season) continues to lose playing time for the flioundering Phillies, and offers almost no upside.
At worst? I think, at worst, Pedro Alvarez strikes out every other plate appearance and gets sent to the minors. At his worst he can be literally the worst hitter in baseball. And I’m not just being pedantic.
Pods has stated in many fantasy articles that he thinks many fantasy analysts underrate the impact of batting AVG when doing rankings, so I think this is a reflection of that.
I couldn’t give away Michael Young if I tied a $100 bill to his back.
No love for Plouffe, eh? Behind Reynolds, Crash Davis and Headley is pretty disrespectful for a guy who could hit .270/30 by the time all is said and done.
Love me some Plouffe too, but these rankings have to be conservative. I think his lack of track record is what has him so low. If he keeps it up, he’ll move up for sure.
But what about Adrian Gonzalez????
He stinks. I’ll take him!
If Tulow is down in the mid-20-somethings for SS, how can Longoria be mid-teens? Not sure he even makes it back this year… I see at least 5-6 guys ranked BELOW him, that I would gladly take. SELL MORTIMER, SELL! ZIPS (R) shows 242 PA’s — no way he gets to that number.
well the problem is (stop me if this sounds like a broken record) that JZ uses ZiPS ROS without adjusting for playing time, thus him ranking Longo at #8 for the position. This screws up the rankings quite a bit because of the averaging.
ENO – do you guys use a simple arithmetic mean to average the consensus rank?
He does some adjusting, and ZiPs does some adjusting too. I know where you’re headed, but I value ZiPs RoS enough (with JZ’s adjusting) to leave it as a simple average.
if he does adjusting, how does Longo still come in at #8 for the position when he’s not due back until August? And Tulo still at #11 at SS, with Lowrie down at #32? methinks he’s not adjusting enough.
ZiPS RoS does some PT adjustment but it’s basically weighted averages, it cannot operate with real world information (i.e., player X is expected to be out until this date). Projections systems are notoriously weak at projecting playing time, as it’s something that is often not predictable statistically and based on real world decisions by managers.
Take Lowrie for example — based on his past history of part time play mixed with injuries, and statistical projection is going to ding him heavily for playing time. But external factors have changed, he’s now a starting player and should easily blow past the 48 games played and 186 AB that ZiPS RoS projects. The impact on his counting stats will be huge if he plays 70 games instead of 48 in the second half.
I do think there’s value in the “dumb” projection as a statistical hedge against the subjective biases of human rankings, but sometimes you need to adjust when you have better information than the computer.
I should have Longo at #11 or one plus the number of teams in the league. He should be top 3 when he returns, so pick up a replacement level 3B for now and use him when he gets back.
Michael Young being as high as he is relative to Plouffe and Alavarez makes this list look a whole lot like a preseason ranking. It’s like big first halves were discounted entirely. There are several 3B in the top 15 that I wouldn’t touch with a flagpole.
Why is Encarnacion ranked above Trumbo in the first base rankings but below him in the third base rankings? Eno in particular has them switched in his ranks.
fixed thanks
Seager’s outdoing Lawrie in HR, RBI, and 2B while posting a BABIP of .272, 30 points lower than his mark from last year, which was in turn lower than everything he ever did in the minors. Plus eligibility at other IF positions… No love?
the question is who would you rather have GOING FORWARD. Seager’s been in a freefall for over a month. Plus Lawrie has literally a FIFTY point edge in AVG. Just look at their ZiPS RoS if you want a sense of the reason for the gap in the rankings. The big takeaway is that Lawrie is likely to be better going forward, whereas Seager is likely to be worse…
Seager’s “freefall” is due to a delightful .224 June BABIP, followed by a .182 mark in July, both spurred on by his LD% going through the floor. After having matched his 2011 BABIP numbers (~.305, nicely in line with league average) in both April and May, he was maimed by Safeco in June.
A .224 BABIP is almost never sustainable. Seager is likely to regress strongly back towards his April/May performance.
More irrational love for Hanley.
irrational? you are aware this is fantasy right? and that Hanley, even without the .300 AVG, is still a 4-category stud?
No, I’m not aware that he is a 4 category stud. Because he’s not.
He’s even worse in OBP & Ottt leageus.
OK, who’s the irrational one?
Hanley’s on pace for 90/20/80/25. What 3B below him on the list can match that production?
you guys should go back when all the final numbers are in at the end of the year and do a notgraphs piece on the most hilariously incorrect comments about the rankings
Zim, I’m with you on the E5 regression train.
PS Throw some fire on that green shading next to Freese’s name.
In what _possible_ universe is Kyle Seager ahead of Casey McGehee. Have you seen how McGehee is playing? Not to mention that you have the jobless Todd Frazier, the non-3B Aviles, the platooning Daniel Murphy, and the absolutely _abysmal_ Ryan Roberts ahead of the guy who’s been as hot as any 3B in baseball over the last 30-45 days. Are you guys serious with this?