Over the last three years, Adam Jones has hit between .280 and .287, launched between 25 and 33 homers, and stolen between 12 and 16 bases. Considering the way team performances vary from year to year, the fact that he’s managed between 152 and 208 runs and RBI combined is pretty steady as well. But before we pencil him in for more of the same, we should probably give him a workup. After all, he’ll turn 29 next season, and age comes for us all.

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Alex Rios and I have a bit of a close, personal relationship.

By that, of course, I mean he has absolutely no idea who I am, but I have some tangential connection to him as a fan-turned-wannabe-analyst.

That connection comes from Rios being the first prospect I was ever enamored with. As a Toronto Blue Jays fan, Rios’ 2003 – a .924 OPS with 11 home runs and 11 steals in 127 games at Double-A – was something to get excited about, and was really the first time I found myself keeping tabs on the minor leagues with regularity.

And from there, frustration.
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As we move into the outfielders this week and look at Zach Sanders’ end of season rankings, there’s no better place for me to start than at the top. Why? Because let’s face it, writing a piece about Mike Trout is probably the easiest thing in the world to do. This poor guy (and I say that very tongue in cheek) has been dissected and analyzed by almost every writer and/or sabermetrician out there over the last two-plus years and all of them have come to the exact same conclusion: Wow. This guy’s pretty good. They’ve looked at his raw stats, his rate stats, his splits, his swing, his defensive ability, you name it. This diamond has been looked at under every gem loop of every level of magnification there is. With very little argument from most, the assessment is that he is the best, most well-rounded outfielder in the game right now. So what more is left to say? Well, I’ll tell you. Read the rest of this entry »

Ranked as the fourth best prospect in the Minnesota Twins system this preseason, Oswaldo Arcia was promoted to the big club on three separate occasions (well, technically four, one of which was only for a day) during his rookie season. The 22-year-old left-hander showed some promising signs, but as usual with the majority of youngsters, has work to do to reach his potential.

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The rumor on the street is that Domonic Brown had a breakout season in 2013. But can we trust that to be a sign of things to come?

Brown was once (briefly) the top prospect in all of baseball. However, his first three tries against big league competition went poorly. From 2010-2012, Brown revealed poor defense, league average power, and indifferent baserunning skills. Fantasy owners who thought they were drafting a five category stud were disappointed. Most owners cut bait and left him undrafted in 2013. Yahoo! owners drafted him 241st overall.

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Everyone trying to predict this game gets things wrong. Take for example, me. I took a look at Shin-Soo Choo on the Indians and thought he’d be a perfect guy to sell high before his eroding athleticism became more obvious. Ooops? Let’s check more closely, though. We do know he went from a pitcher’s park to a hitter’s one, and that can go a long way towards covering up a continued decline.

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Chris Carter has been on fantasy radars for several seasons, getting plenty of helium after launching an impressive 39 home runs in 2008 with Oakland’s High-A affiliate. He followed that banner season with 28 and 34 homers in 2009 and 2010, respectively, before bouncing between Triple-A and the majors for a couple years.

Fantasy owners have long desired to see what he could accomplish with 500+ plate appearances in a season, but defensive limitations and a penchant for striking out had previously kept him from getting regular playing time. That is, until the Houston Astros committed to him as a full-time player, splitting time between first base, left field and DH.

In his first full-season stint in the big leagues, Carter epitomized the three-true outcome approach. He struck out in more than a third of his plate appearances, posted a 12.0% walk rate and finished with 29 long balls. While only hitting .223 on the season, his power/patience approach still allowed him to remain an above-average contributor at the plate. He had a 113 wRC+ and 112 OPS+.

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We have arrived at outfield week and that means another day of reviewing my Pod’s Picks at the position. With so many busts, it shall be interesting to see how my rankings stacked up. With so many players being ranked at the position, it allows for much more disagreement, unlike some of the other positions where sometimes my choices below were just two or three ranks different, which isn’t all that meaningful.

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The 2013 fantasy baseball season has come to a close, so it is time to look back at the season past and determine which players were the most valuable at each position. This week focuses on outfielders.

The players were ranked based on their 2013 production, using the evaluation system explained and updated on this site some time ago. To keep things manageable and avoid skewing the numbers, players were only considered if they amassed 400 plate appearances over the course of the year. The replacement level was also adjusted to account for players eligible at multiples positions. The valuations are built for $260 budgets and traditional 5×5 roto fantasy leagues, where only one catcher is started.

One important thing to note is the premium (or lack thereof) placed on the position a player occupies in your lineup. For example, while a first baseman may be able to accumulate superior overall numbers, the availability of such production lower in the rankings severely dampers the amount the player was worth.

These rankings are meant to reflect a player’s value should he have occupied this spot in your lineup for the entire year. So, a player who missed time due to injury but put up great numbers during his time on the field would be worth less.

With all this in mind, here are your rankings. Read the rest of this entry »

The 2013 Hickory Crawdads were undoubtedly one of the most star-studded low-minors teams of the past decade. The Rangers’ Low-A affiliate, they had Joey Gallo, who became the first teenager in half a century to hit 40 homers in a season…and did it in just 113 games. For much of the season, though, Gallo trailed teammate Ryan Rua in the minor league home run chase (Rua finished with 32, 29 of them coming in 104 games with Hickory). They had Jorge Alfaro, who many consider one of baseball’s top catching prospects. They had Nomar Mazara, who holds the record for the highest signing bonus by a Latin American amateur, at $4.95 million. They had 2012 first-rounder Lewis Brinson, second Dominican bonus baby Ronald Guzman, and for much of the year, had pitcher C.J. Edwards, the headline prospect in July’s Matt Garza trade.

While all of those players (and relievers Alex Claudio and Jose Leclerc) hold considerable intrigue on their own, there was no 2013 Crawdad who left a stronger positive impression on me than outfielder Nick Williams.

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