Last week, I examined unlikely minor league stolen base leader Micah Johnson, whose 58 swipes in the Low-A South Atlantic League have propelled him past some better-known base thieves (Billy Hamilton, Rico Noel, Byron Buxton, Roman Quinn, and Delino DeShields Jr., just to name a few) to a double-digit lead in the category. By now, Johnson–ranked among Chicago’s top 30 prospects by Baseball America entering the season and also sporting a hefty batting line–has started to gain publicity. It is less known, however, that the SAL also houses the current minor league home run leader: Hickory’s Ryan Rua, who has amassed 24 blasts, one ahead of highly-touted teammate Joey Gallo and well-traveled minor league slugger Mauro Gomez.

As with Johnson, Rua’s ascent to the top of the homer leaderboard was tough to foresee. He was a 17th-round pick in 2011 out of Division II Lake Erie College, where he had 27 homers in a three-year career. In 126 career professional games before 2013, all at short-season levels, he had just eleven homers. He had a very good .191 Isolated Power in rookie ball and a more pedestrian .136 in short-season-A play.

That lack of a track record, as well as Rua’s somewhat advanced age (he’s 23), may lead some to dismiss him as irrelevant for prospecting purposes, let alone fantasy ones, if not for one very important fact.

He plays second base.

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When second baseman Brian Dozier lit up High-A and Double-A with a .320/.399/.491 slash line and 24 stolen bases in 2011, he started to rise up the Minnesota Twins’ organizational depth chart. Baseball America ranked him as the Twins’ 10th-best prospect coming into the 2012 season, and beginning the year in Triple-A, he was largely considered Plan B at the shortstop position. Unfortunately, he was unable to make anything but a negative impact at the big-league level in 2012, only compiling a .265 wOBA in 340 plate appearances and providing below-average defense at short.

This season, however, the Twins transitioned Dozier to second base and have essentially handed him the everyday role at the position. His overall numbers haven’t improved much, but he’s enjoying a torrid stretch at the plate. In fact, he’s performing so well that some fantasy owners have decided to jump on the bandwagon. His ownership is up to 20% in ESPN leagues.

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Entering the 2013 season, it was seemingly a foregone conclusion that Billy Hamilton would lead the minors in steals for a third straight season, assuming he was healthy and was not promoted to the big leagues. After all, Hamilton swiped 27 more bags than any other minor leaguer in 2011 and 64 (!) more than the second-place finisher (Delino Deshields Jr., who himself had 101) last year.

Hamilton has indeed stayed healthy and played the entire year in the minors, but his stolen base throne has surprisingly been usurped; his still-whopping 42 steals in 67 games ranks third in the minors (fourth if you count the Mexican League), a full dozen behind White Sox second base prospect Micah Johnson, who has blazed his way to 54 thefts in 66 contests.

Anybody who produces that sort of stolen base volume will pique the interest of deep keeper fantasy owners, especially when the player in question is a middle infielder with a robust .339/.422/.525 triple-slash. But how much of Johnson’s production is true substance?

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In ESPN leagues, the top three performers at second base shouldn’t surprise anyone. Dustin Pedroia, Jason Kipnis and Robinson Cano were expected to be the top three or four fantasy options at the position, and although each of them have experienced some hiccups in different ways, they’re still producing better than their counterparts.

Who’s fourth, though?

Despite his .383 wOBA and 148 wRC+, it’s not Matt Carpenter. Despite his double-digit home runs and 56 RBI, it’s not Brandon Phillips. The fourth-best fantasy second baseman this year has been 29-year-old Howie Kendrick.

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Martin Prado was a fantasy darling in 2012. His positional flexibility has traditionally made him a popular late-round pick, but he provided much more than that. His .345 wOBA ranked fourth amongst qualified second basemen, eighth amongst qualified third basemen, and even top-35 amongst qualified outfielders. Not only was he providing premium positional flexibility, but he was also providing extreme value — especially at second base.

His successful season in 2012 led to a massive uptick in his average draft position (ADP). For the ’12 season, his ADP was 194. That jumped to 100 this year. Fantasy owners paid for a high batting average, double-digit home runs and even double-digit stolen bases.

This year, though, Prado has been nothing short of a disappointment. He’s hitting .248/.297/.340 with four home runs and just one stolen base. His .280 wOBA ranks 16th amongst qualified second basemen, and his 69 wRC+ is the worst of his eight-year career. According to ESPN, he’s been the 22nd-best fantasy option at second base — which ranks worse than Brian Dozier and Daniel Descalso.

Looking at his .267 BABIP this season, it’s easy to explain away his struggles as merely bad luck. Or as the narrative suggests, perhaps it’s a result of pressing at the plate, trying to replace Justin Upton in the Diamondbacks’ lineup. Whatever the reason, it’s disconcerting to glance at his 2011 numbers because they very closely mirrors his poor performance in 2013.

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If a show can find a way to shoe-horn Mark Paul-Gosselaar, Beau Bridges, Heather Locklear and Malcom McDowell into the same office, I can find a way to relate Nick Franklin to Yasiel Puig. Hey, they’re both hot young things that deserve a thorough brief directed at those in redraft or shallow keeper leagues. Done!

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With two months under our collective belts in the fantasy baseball season, guys are really starting to move in the rankings. Some slow beginnings have lingered longer than expected, and some scorching starts have surprisingly possessed staying power. As with most rankings lists, there will be some (read: a lot) of disagreement, so without any further ado, here are the tiers:

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Howard Bender wrote on May eighth that Jedd Gyorko could help you on the waiver wire, and apparently all of you have not listened. Well, maybe those of you who read it have, but he is only owned in 51% of Yahoo! leagues so apparently not enough people are reading RotoGraphs.
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Aw come on. I thought that was one of the better and more appropriate puns/play on words we could have used for Jurickson Profar, the latest rookie sensation to make a splash in the big leagues this season. Would you have preferred “Profar, So Good”? How about “Profar Away”? “A Bridge Profar”? Well how about “I Went To The Jurickson Store And They Were All Out of You”? I could probably continue this for a few more paragraphs, but all I’m really trying to do is distract you to the point where your enthusiasm for Profar’s arrival is tempered. Why? Because this isn’t going to last, people. Rein it in. As excited as you are to have Profar finally arrive, you need to relax because he is more than likely to be gone as quickly as he came. Read the rest of this entry »

It’s deep league waiver wire day, which is obviously the best day of the week. Apologies to my NL-Only league friends, only American Leaguers today.

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