With Rafael Furcal (oblique) back on the DL for the Dodgers and Oakland’s Mark Ellis leaving Monday night’s game with a right hamstring injury, a pair of top middle infield prospects are primed to get plenty of big league playing time over the next few weeks, and possibly much longer.

Shortstop Dee Gordon made his debut for L.A. last night as a pinch-runner. Manager Don Mattingly intends to start him most nights as the increasingly fragile Furcal heals, according to a Tweet by Dylan Hernandez of the Los Angeles Times. Second baseman Jemile Weeks hasn’t officially gotten the call to the majors yet, but the move is expected with Ellis possibly landing on the DL. Here’s a quick look at what to expect from Weeks and Gordon.

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I’m ready.

It took me ~230 plate appearances, but I’m ready. Like most of you I was skeptical in the beginning. That’s evident in the lack of articles written about Cabrera’s amazing start. There’s only been one and it was written 12 days into the season, and it wasn’t on RotoGraphs. That’s my fault. I cover shortstops for this site, but up until now I wasn’t sure how to properly address the situation.

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Today we’ll continue our look at Pick Six values by looking at middle infield and outfield.  You can see our discussion of catcher and corner infield values here.  As a reminder, the production numbers you see below (FP/PA = Fangraphs Points per Plate Appearance) are weighted averages of THT’s Oliver and BPro’s PECOTA.  I didn’t include ZiPS, but feel free to click the players and look up those numbers as well.

Middle Infield

Elite Three (they cost a fortune, but they’re worth it):

Troy Tulowitzki, 1.57 FP/PA, $56.75
Hanley Ramirez, 1.53 FP/PA, $51.50
Robinson Cano, 1.40 FP/PA, $46.75

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At 24-17, the Florida Marlins are in the thick of the NL East race. The Fish sit just a game and a half back of the division-leading Phillies, thanks to middle-of-the-pack pitching and hitting and superb defense. Florida’s staff collectively ranks sixth in the NL in xFIP, its offense is sixth in runs scored, and Marlins fielders pace the Senior Circuit in runs saved, according to Ultimate Zone Rating.

The Marlins’ offense would no doubt rank toward the top of the league if Hanley Ramirez weren’t mired in a season-long batting slump during which his power production has been downright Ecksteinian. The perennial first-round pick, projected by ZiPS to hit .309/.388/.512 in 2011, has instead slogged his way to a .211/.294/.309 triple-slash through 170 plate appearances.

Some unlucky bounces have played a part in Ramirez’s anemic start — his batting average on balls in play is .242, compared to a .329 expected BABIP and a career .341 BABIP. But there’s no doubt that Hanley hasn’t been his usual, powerful self at the plate. Projected for a .203 Isolated Power by ZiPS, Ramirez has a .099 ISO in 2011 that trails the mark posted by slap-hitting teammate Emilio Bonifacio. What in the name of ottoneu is going on here?

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A good story and a good leadoff hitter (for a bad offense)…

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There’s really no need to be embarrassed.  It’s a very common problem.  In fact, I hear that it happens to a lot of fantasy owners.  I, myself, have been known to experience it from time to time.  No, no…I’m not just saying it to make you feel better.  It happens to everyone.  Believe it or not, even to girls. Read the rest of this entry »

Join us this week on Bottom of the Barrel Scrapers as we look at a stopgap infielder with multi-position eligibility and a former playoff hero who just might have found his stroke in 2011.  They may not be the tastiest treats on the fantasy dessert buffet, but hey…they’ve each got a World Series ring.  That’s something, right? Read the rest of this entry »

Your Monday morning waiver wire features a shortstop and a starting pitcher, so let’s dive in…

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Going into the season I noted just how shallow the shortstop position was. Behind Tulowitzki and Ramirez, the cupboard was barely stocked with anything useful.  Over the past two weeks we’ve seen some surprise players start to hit far above expectations and make a name for themselves. Is their success sustainable? Probably not in most cases, but in the fantasy world we ride hot streaks as far as we can. At the same time there have been more heralded shortstops who have struggled to get things going. For the first time this season lets take a look at the Risers and Fallers at shortstop

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It’s been over a month since we debuted the shortstop player rankings. We’re only a little over a week into the season so it’s too early to make any significant changes to the rankings, but there have been many surprises among the position. Let’s take a look at a few of the more interesting players that have emerged thus far:

Willie Bloomquist

If I gave you 100 guesses at naming the third ranked overall player so far according to Yahoo! I’m betting no one would guess its Willie Bloomquist. The usually light hitting shortstop, who has never ended a season in which he gathered 100+ PA’s with an OPS over .700, is tearing the cover off of the ball. Originally filling in for the injured Stephen Drew, Bloomquist’s triple slash line of .394/.429/.524 with six stolen bases looks like a misprint. Now that Drew is back, Diamondbacks Manager Kirk Gibson has tried to find ways to keep Bloomquist’s bat in the lineup, playing him in left field the past two games. There’s zero reason to believe he’ll keep hitting anywhere close to this pace. His K% is only 6.1 so far, down from 17.5% for his career. The reduced strikouts are resulting in more line drives falling for hits; his LD% is up ~9% from last season. His ownership numbers are jumping by the day, but if you want to ride a hot hitter who will pick you up some cheap steals at a weak position there are worse options than Bloomquist. That’s a sentence I never thought I’d type.

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