2015 was a wonderful year for rookies. In fact, it was the best offensive seasons in aggregate for the freshman class over the last five years:
And this year’s group looks like it may have introduced us to several future superstars. Amazingly, three of them play third base.
Mitch Moreland had a career year in 2015. He only matched his previous high in home runs (23), but his AVG, OBP, SLG, 2B, and RBI totals were all the best of his six-year career. He only needed 132 games to set a new high in AB with 471, but his 515 PA were actually only second-highest for him. Was it real? Can he repeat or even grow as he enters his age-30 season?
Eric Hosmer turned 26 this past Saturday. He completed his fifth season earlier this month and starts his second straight World Series tonight against the Mets. The 2015 season was his best yet, though that was due largely to the team around him as opposed to skills growth within his game.
His .297/.363/.459 line looks a lot like his 2011 (.293/.344/.465) and 2013 (.302/.353/.448) lines, but the 93 RBI and 98 R were easily career highs. Previous highs of 79 RBI and 86 R were both set in that 2013 season. Every other part of his game looked like something we’ve already seen.
In the majority of fantasy leagues, Jonathan Lucroy was likely valued as a top five catcher. His strong batting average, respectable power, and best of all, consistently high plate appearance totals, made him a top option at the position. But as the books closed on the 2015 season, Lucroy finished just 12th, the last man to accrue any value in 12-team mixed leagues that start just one backstop. We’re used to catchers disappointing, which is why many fantasy owners choose to “punt” the position and just go cheap, refusing to pay the market rates for the elite. So let’s find out what went wrong.
We’re passing out awards this week at RG (we’re also delivering demerits, but not in this piece) and I’m looking at the Deep League MVP today. I share Eno’s position of what this award should be as he discussed in the Deep League Cy Young. What that means in a nutshell is that A.J. Pollock isn’t winning this one.
He had an undeniably fantastic season, rising up from a 104 hitter ADP to end up as the fourth-best hitter in baseball, but even factoring in pitchers only jumps his ADP 54 spots meaning he wasn’t exactly cheap despite being a tremendous return on the investment. Kendrys Morales was less expensive as the 226th hitter off the board, but he was drafted enough to log a real ADP on four of the six sites FantasyPros uses so he’s out, too, despite the incredible season.
I was a little lighter on my playing time requirements for consideration as we saw some guys do amazing things in fewer than 100 games this year, so I was looking for at least 400 PA. You can probably think of some of the top candidates immediately, especially if you won a league as the beneficiary of these free agent finds. The booming rookie class paid major dividends via the wire in large part because the arrival of several was well ahead of schedule, let alone the fact that they performed immediately.