Author Archive: Paul Sporer

As we fire up the second half – albeit an inequitable one with teams averaging just 73 games left (three teams as high as 76) – we certainly feel like we know some new things. It certainly feels like the emergence of Manny Machado and Nolan Arenado is real. They’ve had the talent and pedigree while showing glimpses of this greatness at the big league level and this year they appear to have busted out. That said, it is still just some 80-odd games out of 377 for Machado and 329 for Arenado so they are hardly guaranteed to stay at this level.

We’re always looking for value and surplus in this game. During draft season, Arenado was being picked as a top 50 pick because many thought he could produce as a top 20 pick (he has). Machado was drafted as a top 120 pick with the idea that he could become a top 50 pick (how’s 7th overall?). We don’t have another draft season to shuffle the deck at the All-Star break which is why I’m more concerned with the other end today, the guys who are struggling relative to their established track record.

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While shortstop has been a wasteland, third base has been the infield oasis. Third base has turned out to be remarkably rich this year with some established guys taking another step forward and a strong core of young guys jumping a couple levels and arriving ahead of schedule.

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Continuing the positional rankings, we move over to shortstop. It’s been something of a barren wasteland this year. Thankfully, the unquestioned top two – Tulowitzki and Hanley – have been the unquestioned top two (with Hanley leading the way). but it’s been pretty jumbled from that point on. The landscape has really opened up with a lot of new names emerging as some former stalwarts have sunk further. I wasn’t even sure Correa would be called up in 2015 and now he’s looking like a game-changer at SS.

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Episode 252

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live!

In this episode, Paul Sporer is joined by special guest Todd Zola of FantasyAlarm.com, ESPN Insider, and Mastersball.com

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Not only are you getting the keystone rankings today, but the Catchers and First Basemen are also updated with the guys missed the first time around. So Carlos Santana and John Jaso are in with the catchers and guys like Todd Frazier have been fully ranked at 1B by our rankers.

Remember when I ranked Kinsler over Kipnis? That was rich. I’ll take my heat for being wrong there, but I still remain a touch skeptical on trusting Kipnis fully. This upcoming portion of the season – the second half – has long been a problem for Kipnis. He hasn’t been great at holding up in the dog days and delivering the frontline production we expect and have seen in previous first halves.

His career .683 OPS in the second half is well off the All-Star level .816 he’s amassed in the first half over the last four seasons. All that said, I’m still more in on Kipnis than I have been previously and ranked him quite highly, though still came in last among the quartet of rankers. Hilariously, despite feeling better about Kipnis as a player, he’s actually a spot lower than those May rankings where I had Kinsler ahead of him. Don’t worry, Kinsler is well behind him now (though still a starter in all formats). 

For this update, you will have the rankings from me, Zach Sanders, Jeff Zimmerman, and Dan Schwartz. Mike Podhorzer is currently on vacation.

Other positions:

• Catcher
• First Base

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Episode 251

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live!

In this episode, Paul Sporer is by himself discussing pitchers! More specifically, he has a list of pitchers he thinks are primed to be top ERA assets in the second half of the season. He has nine pitchers ranging from ace-level to waiver wire-fodder who could put up huge summers and lead your pitching to the promised land.

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We’re back at it again today with our midseason rankings. After covering Catchers yesterday, we jump to First Base today. I put my rankings in last and added some names that were forgotten on my initial list and the guys haven’t been able to update theirs to include these guys just yet. I’m sure you can expect some dissent on Frazier, but for now I left him in that two spot despite having just my ranking. I think of Frazier more as a 3B, but the incredible depth at the position means you could realistically have two of the superstuds over there at third, pushing Frazier to your 1B where he definitely still holds up.

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This is the worst time of the sports calendar year. With baseball off enjoying its All-Star break, there are no major professional sports being played right now. Worse yet is that the intriguing new Home Run Derby might not even get done because of weather. Thankfully, we here at Fangraphs have got you covered. Over on the front page, Dave Cameron is unveiling his Trade Value List which began with the honorable mentions so-to-speak and then numbers 50-41. Over here at Rotographs, we are rolling out our midseason rankings by position.

Today, we start behind the dish.

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Episode 250 – I said 249 on the episode accidentally!!

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live!

In this episode, Paul Sporer and Eno Sarris take a scattershot approach today with a bunch of topics sent in by y’all! We cover some second-half breakouts, offer some mea culpas, and decide that we still love Jorge Soler and Yasiel Puig quite a bit.

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Episode 249

The latest episode of “The Sleeper and the Bust” is live!

In this episode, Paul Sporer and Eno Sarris discuss several guys who could benefit when better players are traded away from their teams before diving into Eno’s piece about wide arsenals.

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