As a resident of the city of Dallas and a Rangers fan when they’re not playing the Astros, it was my impression that Rougned Odor improved as the year went on. Part of that was just the assumption that he gradually acclimated to the big leagues over the course of 400+ PA, and part of that was my perception based on the regrettably occasional Ranger game I watched this year.

But his monthly splits don’t necessarily tell the tale of a guy who improved with more seasoning. Yes, his best month according to wRC+ was September (128), but his next best months were May and June, his first two months in the majors this year. Of course wRC+ is a result-oriented statistic and can be misleading in a small sample size, like a single month, for example. If he was truly acclimating well, we’d expect to see him swinging more at good pitches and less at bad pitches, making more contact, and squaring the ball up more as the year went on. So did he do any of that? Read the rest of this entry »

And onward we move, this week to recapping the second basemen. It was a pretty crazy year, as the preseason consensus top choice finished 14th in value, while a player we didn’t even rank at all finished third. Let’s find out how I did with my Pod’s Picks.

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The 2014 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. Moving around the infield, we’re looking at second baseman this week.

The players were ranked based on their 2014 production, using the evaluation system explained and updated on this site some time ago. The valuations are built for $260 budgets and standard 5×5 roto fantasy leagues, where only one catcher is started. Players are listed only at their primary positions from 2014.

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. A player who missed time due to injury but put up great numbers during his time on the field would be worth less.

This year, I’ve added in RotoGraphs’ preseason consensus rankings so you can see what we thought of each player coming into the year. This ranking can be found in the “Pre” column. “EOS” of course stands for End Of Season, and the rest should be self explanatory.

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

Two second basemen hit 23 home runs this year. One was Minnesota’s Brian Dozier and the other was Pittsburgh’s Neil Walker. Walker does not have the speed Dozier possesses, but his power did make him a top-10 fantasy second baseman this year.
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Start spreading the news. Martin Prado has truly woken up in the city that never sleeps. I wrote a few paragraphs about Prado last month, explaining why I’d rather have him than Dustin Pedroia rest-of-season. Now I feel compelled to study him a bit deeper, since he’s continued raking, despite battling a nagging hamstring issue that kept him out for a few games, but sure hasn’t slowed down his production.

Since being traded to the Yankees, Prado has snapped out of a year-and-a-half long slumber to put up some of the best numbers of his career. Since moving to the Bronx, Prado has been the No. 4 fantasy second baseman, hitting for both power and average. Just a quick look at his season stats, split between the two clubs, is jaw-dropping:

• w/ARI (436 PA) – .270/.317/.370, 5 HR, .099 ISO
• w/NYY (133 PA) – .310/.331/.543, 7 HR, .233 ISO

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2014 has been a lousy year for Jason Kipnis and his fantasy owners. After back-to-back campaigns as a top-five fantasy second baseman — No. 5 in 2012, No. 3 in 2013 — he is the No. 21 second baseman in standard formats this year. He has provided less fantasy production than Brock Holt.

On Wednesday, Kipnis attempted to explain his disappointing season in a rather bizarre interview with MLB.com. He mostly pointed to his new contract as an excuse, saying that it forced him to try to do too much early in the season. The problem with this explanation is that April was easily his best month of the season, as his .766 on-base plus slugging was a full 100 points higher than in his best month since. It’s now mid-September and Kipnis still hasn’t broken out of his season-long slump.

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At this time of year, it’s easy to find a number of September call ups to write about. The trick is to find those who might actually garner enough playing time to earn some actual fantasy value. Here are two of those fine gentlemen.

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I have always been a bit fond of Luis Valbuena, mainly because I love guys with high walk rates and some pop. This year he is finally producing enough to be usable in fantasy, specifically recently as he has hit four home runs in his past 12 games and has hit 16 for the season. If you are struggling at second base or third base and need some power down the stretch, you could do worse than Valbuena.
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Normally, I produce tiered second-base rankings for my first piece of each month. Now that it’s September and trade deadlines have passed in 99.9% of fantasy leagues, it’s not very useful for me to fill this space with my thoughts on players that owners cannot acquire. Therefore, I scoured waiver wires to find three lightly owned middle infielders who could help fantasy owners over the season’s crucial final weeks.

Joe Panik (15% Yahoo, 20.8% ESPN, 26% CBS)
194 PA – .318/.366/.397, 23 R, 1 HR, 15 RBI, 0 SB

Despite providing consistent production that has him at No. 7 among fantasy 2B over the last month, Panik’s ownership rates are far from widespread. Eno Sarris wrote a great piece yesterday in which he interviewed Panik about his approach at the plate, so I’m not going to get too long-winded here, but we should definitely still take a moment to discuss his fantasy value.

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Monday wasn’t just Labor Day, it was an exciting time for fantasy leaguers and baseball fans alike. It was roster expansion day! Yesterday, Eno discussed a whole bunch of names that were recalled, but concluded that none of them were very intriguing for this year given playing time concerns. However, two players called up before Monday are of interest.

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