On Tuesday, I let slip a little secret I’ve been nursing for a few months – namely that replacement level middle infielders appear to be one WAR players. The incongruity of that statement – that replacement level equals one – has led to some public misadventures in player analysis. That’s a real world problem.

From a fantasy perspective, my conclusion was simple: don’t go out of your way to draft middle infielders. For somebody completely new to fantasy baseball, that seems like a big ol’ DUH! However, for most of my life, fantasy gospel stated that middle infield is scarce and therefore production up the middle is worth more than the same production at another position. Now it has flipped, although not enough to bother over-drafting other positions.

My advice for 2019: draft the best statistical fits for your roster. Don’t worry about position. And for Ruth’s sake, don’t worry about catchers. Now, let’s peek at replacement level for catcher, first base, and third base.

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For fantasy junkies like me – and probably you – deep keeper and dynasty leagues are the zenith of modern civilization. I’m not here to extol their virtues. It suffices to say that they scratch a certain itch – the one you had as a kid when you were daydreaming about running your own major league club.

These deep formats also have something in common. No matter what, somebody is eventually going to make a horrific-looking trade. However, the way a trade looks on paper can be deceptive. Yesterday, the Cardinals traded a lot for Paul Goldschmidt. Some (ahem, me) might say they dealt too much. They also unmistakably improved their 2019 roster in a way that only minimally weakens their future chances at winning. It’s important to consider how a deal affects competition.

Another consideration is that apparently lopsided trades still work out in the “losing” owner’s favor pretty frequently. I’m going to make up some numbers now. Based on all the trades I’ve seen that are widely panned as unfair but also aren’t clearly unconscionable, I estimate somewhere between 35 to 40 percent of them ultimately favor the loser. From my perspective, the crowds aren’t very wise. So, even though your rival probably gotten more in a sketchy looking swap, it doesn’t mean they’re totally screwed. This is akin to winning a hand of Texas Hold ‘Em after being behind on the flop. It happens all the time.

So, the lede is thoroughly buried. Now why are we here again? To talk about unconscionable trades and the immediate steps a good commissioner should take. While the design of a league should encourage trading – negotiations are half the fun! – too many terrible trades can be ruinous.

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Yesterday, I got into a bit of a Twitter tiff about the relative values of Jean Segura and Carlos Santana. My position was that they were secretly much closer in value than people realized. And to make that argument, it was necessary to unveil one of my secrets.

In short, the major league replacement level for shortstops is either 1 WAR (Freddy Galvis, Miguel Rojas, and Jordy Mercer) or 0.5 WAR over half a season (Ehire Adrianza, J.T. Riddle, and Adeiny Hechavarria). So basically, scrubby shortstops produce at a one win pace.

The same analysis for second baseman reveals a comparable one win pace as replacement level. This is further reinforced by the release of Cory Spangenberg by the Padres. He produced 0.6 WAR over 329 plate appearances, yet San Diego clearly believed he had neither a place on their roster nor enough trade value to waste time on the phones. Sounds like he got the replacement level treatment.

Surely this has fantasy implications too.

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Back in December of 2013, in one of my earliest appearances on this site, I pontificated about how to value your last roster spot. I spent… oh my… 1,482 words on a topic that is indisputably of marginal importance. For most fantasy formats, the last player on your roster is incredibly fluid and has a minimal effect. Let’s critique this old behemoth of a post.

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We have a somewhat controversial topic on the docket for today’s Fantasy Baseball Strategy 204 session: is it better to have an accurate or unique approach to player valuation? If you read the title, you’ll notice I’ve already led with the lede. I regularly advocate for taking the path least traveled by your rivals. Whether that requires a zig, a zag, or some other three-letter nonsense, it’s so much easier to create value when you aren’t competing for the same resources in the same way.

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The Process is done. After months of writing and disagreements, the fantasy baseball guide I wrote with Tanner Bell is for sale. Simply, we researched and created the guide we would want. It’s not going to contain player capsules or positional rankings. Dozens of sources provide them. Instead, it’s going to give the reader the ability to create their own and the 2017 NFBC Main Event Champion and my podcast mate, Rob Silver wasn’t happy about the end results as he states in his intro.

Jeff Zimmerman and Tanner Bell are both awful people.

Thanks Rob. Before Rob gets to explain himself, here is the general flow of he book.

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A while back, I ranked hitters if all their 2018 stats were prorated to 600 plate appearances. It’s now time for the pitchers. In all fairness, the rankings are a huge disappointment with no surprises coming through.

I adjusted the rankings for 180 innings for starters and 60 innings for relievers and no one seemed out of place. With the hitters, Raul Mondesi at the top was an attention-getter. Looking over both sets of top-25 pitchers, the biggest surprise was Joshua James and he’s not really a surprise since he dominated at the season’s end. Time to get bored.

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It’s rankings time so the comments are open for everyone to go batshit crazy about how a computer program and I are wrong.  We are both ready for everyone’s best shot as neither one of us gives a flying  f***.

As part of my soon to be released e-book, The Process, the Standing Gain Points formulas will be included for several league types. I took the one for The Great Fantasy Baseball Invitational, merge it with Steamer projections, and created some overall rankings.

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Mitch Haniger surprised about everyone this season with top-25 production when his average draft position was over 200 in NFBC leagues. In all fairness, he should have made several sleeper lists but the industry failed to pick up on his productive but ignored 2017 season.  He’s the type of hitter owners need to focus on rostering, late-round injured hitters.

His stats speak volumes. Here are some of Haniger’s projections and results over the past two seasons.

His projection coming into 2017 was decent with a 20 HR and 8 SB profile when prorating to 600 PA. The season started out great until he went on the DL with an oblique injury which lasted for over a month. He came back from the DL, struggled, got hurt a coup of times (finger and face), and finally turned it on over the last month. This profile screams sleeper and everyone slept on him.

By just prorating his 2017 season to 600 PA, he would be at 23 dingers and 7 bags with an acceptable .282 AVG. His results were similar to another pre-season unknown, Marwin Gonzalez (23 HR, 8 SB, .303 AVG). Gonzalez’s average ADP was 123, about 100 picks before Haniger went off the board.

As for Haniger’s 2018 season, he showed the value of a well-rounded player. A near .300 batting average, over 20 homers, and about 10 stolen bases placed him as a  top-25 overall batter. Unexciting stats can still be good.

Going forward, owners can take several lessons from this failure. First, dig into hitters after pick 100 who struggled with injuries but showed positive production when healthy. Most owners are going to hope the top names like Kris Bryant and Jose Altuve will rebound. They aren’t going to surprise anyone. Instead, players like Kyle Seager (toe), Steven Souza Jr.(pec), and Jorge Soler (rib) might be acquired for nothing and end up being a top-50 player.

Another item is to prorate each player’s previous season to 600 plate appearances to see if anyone pops up if given more playing time. With Haniger’s nearly identical pro-rated 2017 and 2018 seasons, his 2017 season would have stood out and owners could have taken notice. Instead, he was relegated to the reserve rounds.

Missing on Haniger’s points to some obvious projects for me later in the offseason. Until then, let me know of any players who the industry missed on and there was no obvious cause.

When I hear or read about a hitter playing through an injury my interest perks up and he becomes an immediate draft target. Standard projections have no idea these players played hurt and the lower production keeps down future estimations. Savvy owners can give these players a small talent bump and reap some nice rewards. My current request to create a detailed list of hitters playing through injuries for 2019 preseason research and to test after next season.

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