$1 Third Base Option: Albert Callaspo

When the offseason opened up, most figured that the Angels would make a hard run at Adrian Beltre to fill the void at third base left by Chone Figgins last offseason. Well, the Angels did make a run at Beltre, but it wasn’t enough to lure him to Orange County, and now Mike Scioscia’s team will begin the season with the same mess of third basemen they had last year, namely Brandon Wood and Alberto Callaspo. Wood is looking more and more like a lost cause, but Callaspo has some fantasy value as a cheap option at the hot corner.

Although third base is traditionally a power spot, the position is rather shallow as our rankings showed this morning. Unless you grab one of the top five or six players, your looking at imperfect solutions. Your going to end up robbing Peter to pay Paul, meaning your performance in one or two categories will suffer in exchange for help elsewhere. It sucks, but it is what it is. The most common trade-off (at least in my opinion) is batting average and steals for power and RBI, but Callaspo gives you the opposite.

The Halos third baseman turns 28 in April, and enjoyed a break out year with Royals in 2009. Callaspo hit .300/.356/.457 with 11 homers and more walks (52) than strikeouts (51) in 634 PA that year, but in reality the breakout started the year before. After returning from an alcohol rehabilitation program in late-August, he hit .319/.371/.407 with ten walks and just five strikeouts in his final 125 PA. Callaspo wasn’t living up to his 2009 standard when Kansas City shipped him to Anaheim last summer (.275/.308/.410 in 373 PA), and he performed even worse after the trade (.249/.291/.315 in 228 PA).

Callaspo pretty much is what he is at this point. He’s a contact freak, swinging and missing just 3.7% of the time in his career. When he does make contact, it tends to result in a line drive (18.6% career) or a ground ball (43.9%), the two batted ball types most likely to result in hits. During his two breakout years with the Royals, Callaspo put together a .318 BABIP and a .302 AVG, but last year that fell to .269 and .265, respectively.

Here’s a look at the batted ball profile and BABIP shift over the last three years, including a weird little spike in the second half of last year…

For whatever reason, Callaspo became an extreme line drive/ground ball hitter in the middle of last season, resulting in an expected BABIP spike and mid-summer hot stretch that featured a .316/.358/.373 batting line in 230 PA. Perhaps it was just a statistical correction, since it didn’t last through the end of the season. xBABIP says Callaspo should have instead posted a .305 average on balls in play last year, which would have pushed his AVG to a much more respectable .298.

Callaspo doesn’t hit for power (.115 ISO), though he managed to post double digit homers with 600+ PA in each of the last two years. He definitely won’t steal any bases (just 10-for-17 in his entire career) either, so his entire fantasy worth stems from his batting average. Callaspo has the skill set – contact ability, lots of grounders – to post BABIP’s in the low-to-mid-.300’s, and if he does that he’ll approach if not exceed a .300 AVG on the year. If he sees a sudden spike after seeing a sudden drop last year, we could be talking about a potential .320 AVG or so.

The key with Callaspo is playing time. If the Angels are willing to turn the page on Wood, which they might not be since he’s just 26 (or will be in March), Callaspo could be in line for another 600+ PA. He’s a fine pick-up if you’re looking for a bench player or an injury replacement that won’t kill you in AVG and might even chip in the occasional homer. As an added bonus, Callaspo has 2B eligibility in just about all leagues as well, so he offers a little versatility as well.