Right-hander Marco Estrada was a popular sleeper for 2013, and I certainly championed that cause. After all, he was coming off a season in which he compiled a 3.35 FIP with more than a strikeout per inning and an ADP (average draft position) between 225-250. He represented solid value and legitimate upside in the later rounds.

Unfortunately, it didn’t work out. The 30-year-old hurler struggled with the long ball and owned a 5.32 ERA when he landed on the disabled list with a hamstring injury in early June. His peripheral numbers remained solid, but his home run rate of 1.82 HR/9 ranked among the worst in the league in the first half. It undermined any chance he had to post a respectable earned run average.

Most owners understandably dropped Estrada, especially when his hamstring injury lingered longer than expected and he missed 58 games in June and July. Since returning, though, the right-hander is reminding fantasy owners why analysts included him in so many sleeper lists prior to the season. It may be time to swipe him off the waiver wire, as he’s only owned in 14.1% of ESPN leagues.

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On average, Starlin Castro was the third shortstop selected on draft day, somewhere between the third and fourth rounds. He represented an intriguing power/speed option at an offensively-challenged position, and best of all, he only turned 23 in March so he was on the correct part of the age curve. No one can be blamed for buying high on the young man.

Yet, it’s August 23, and Castro is hitting .238/.274/.335 with seven home runs and eight stolen bases. His .270 wOBA ranks fourth-worst amongst qualified shortstops, and even Nick Franklin has provided more fantasy value on the season — despite not playing a big-league game until May 27. It’s frankly been a disastrous season across the board for Starlin Castro. Perhaps it’s best summed up by pointing out that he’s been worth almost four fewer wins than he was each of the previous two seasons. Four wins!

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In the age of prospect rankings and (thankfully) an increased coverage of the minor leagues, fantasy owners tend to covet the top prospects in baseball. They don’t want to miss out on the next Mike Trout, Bryce Harper or Yasiel Puig — and that fear of whiffing on these young phenoms obviously becomes amplified in dynasty leagues.

So this morning, when media outlets reported Xander Bogaerts had been promoted to Boston for the final month and a half of the season, owners immediately flocked to their respective waiver wires to see if Bogaerts was still available. If you’re just hearing the news and need help at shortstop, you would be wise to do the same.

That’s not to say Bogaerts is guaranteed to be a stud throughout the remainder of the season, though. In fact, it’s slightly unclear as to what his ultimate role with the Red Sox will be.

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Although he started the season in the Padres’ starting rotation, Tyson Ross wasn’t anyone fantasy owners should have had on their radar coming into the season. He posted a 6.50 ERA and 4.80 FIP with the Oakland Athletics last year, striking out only 5.65 batters per nine innings and showing a penchant for dishing out free passes.

That sentiment proved true when the Padres sent him to Triple-A Tucson in the middle of April, and when he returned, he was relegated to a low-leverage position in the Padres’ bullpen. He had little-to-no fantasy value.

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I recently wrote an article about Marco Scutaro and how his real-life value is far superior to his fantasy value. The on-the-field versus on-paper value disconnect has always been interesting to me since I started seriously playing fantasy baseball. Following up on the Scutaro article, I wanted to find an example of a starting pitcher who has been exceedingly effective on the mound, yet that effectiveness has not translated to fantasy value.

My immediate reaction was to focus on Hiroki Kuroda. He’s a guy who doesn’t strikeout many batters, yet consistently generates good results. However, he’s been the 11th-best starting pitcher in ESPN leagues this year. That knocks him out of the running for this article.

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If you’ve been experiencing a lack of production from the second base position in recent weeks, you’re likely not alone. Over the last 30 days, second basemen across the league are only hitting .237/.293/.346 with a .282 wOBA. That’s 26 points below the overall league-average during the same stretch.

With that depressing statistic in mind, we delve into the tiered rankings. Keep in mind, as always, these tiered rankings don’t include every single eligible second baseman. It is based off the ESPN eligibility requirements, so guys like Kyle Seager (tier two) will not be included in these rankings.

Let’s do this.

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It’s often said that almost anything can happen in a single month of a baseball season. We can list endless examples of unexpected hot streaks from replacement-level players to illustrate that point, and as fantasy owners, we often get cajoled into trusting those small sample sizes. We all want to admit we don’t attempt to “ride the hot streak,” but we all do it. For example, I owned Brian Dozier in June for a couple weeks because I was desperate up the middle.

Luckily, it worked out, as my team was simply trying to hold it together up the middle until Jose Reyes returned from the disabled list.

When looking at the “last 30 days” split on the leaderboards, though, some hot streaks don’t appear to be out of place. Mike Trout owns the highest wOBA (.477) in all of baseball over the last 30 days. No one should be surprised by that. The second-highest wOBA (.470) in the last 30 days belongs to third baseman Kyle Seager. Considering he’s been a four-win player already this year and has a .300/.363/.496 slash line, he also shouldn’t trigger any alarms.

Hold on a moment. Kyle Seager — the same guy who was the 14th-ranked fantasy third baseman last year — suddenly doesn’t appear out of place amongst the top hitters in the league? Well, that’s significant.

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While fantasy baseball doesn’t pretend to fully reflect on-the-field value for individual players, there’s always a strange disconnect when a player objectively compiles a quality season and it’s not captured in standard fantasy formats. Often, that difference can be ascribed to defensive value, which is not accounted for in fantasy, but occasionally, a player pops up who provides solid offensive value for their team yet is marginally useful in fantasy.

This year, Marco Scutaro of the San Francisco is a perfect example of the value disconnect.

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At this point, we’ve run out of superlatives to describe the season Mike Trout put together last year. He had the best age-20 season in the history of baseball, and many considered him to be the AL MVP. Reflect on that for a moment. Many people argued Mike Trout was the best player in baseball last season. He was 20 years old. That’s not normal. We all got swept up in Puig-mania this summer and have basked in the glory of Matt Harvey, but we all witnessed something truly special in 2012.

Trout’s supremacy wasn’t limited to the WAR stat, though. In ESPN leagues, he was the number-one fantasy player in all of baseball — and he didn’t even play a big-league game until April 28. The young man essentially gave the entire league a month’s head start and still finished the season in the number-one slot.

Naturally, fantasy owners were left wondering if lightning could strike twice. Considering his price tag on draft day, would it be wise for owners to invest so heavily into a 21-year-old outfielder who may suffer from the dreaded sophomore slump? Opposing teams had ample time to make adjustments this offseason. Would he make the counter-adjustments and replicate his magical rookie season, or would he experience a dramatic year-two decline like Jason Heyward in 2011?

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One of the biggest fantasy surprises this year has undoubtedly been left-hander Jeff Locke of the Pittsburgh Pirates. After getting shelled in his first 12 big-league appearances to the tune of a combined 5.82 ERA in 2011 and 2012, the southpaw has suddenly burst on the scene with a 2.15 ERA in 109.0 innings and has been a top-20 fantasy starter in most formats.

We can talk about Chris Davis and Yasiel Puig as fantasy surprises, but no coherent, reasonable person would have predicted Locke’s level of success prior to the season.

It took a while for Locke to gain the trust of fantasy owners. He’s only recently achieved 100% ownership in ESPN leagues. The uncertainty has centered around his 3.81 FIP, 4.56 SIERA and (mostly) his obscenely-low .228 BABIP. Locke is viewed as someone who’s merely riding an intense wave of good fortune, but he’s ultimately destined to crash and become the fringe back-end starter he’s always been perceived to be.

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