Fantasy Hitters Ranked Using Steamer Projections

by
November 9, 2018

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.

Today, I’ll start with hitters. The 13, 15-team leagues used 14 hitters, standard 5×5 scoring (AVG), 1 catcher, and 2 utility players per team. I’ll post the top 52 here (I want to talk about #52 is the reason for the oddish number) but anyone with at least one projected plate appearance can be found here. I’ll add some unsolicited comments at the end along with these 52 hitters in a head-to-head ranking poll.

Top-52 Fantasy Hitters According to Steamer Projections
RANK NAME PA AVG R HR RBI SB SGP
1 Mike Trout 662 .299 117 39 106 20 28.5
2 Mookie Betts 677 .301 114 29 91 26 27.3
3 Trea Turner 667 .286 94 17 69 41 25.0
4 Francisco Lindor 676 .286 103 30 90 21 24.6
5 J.D. Martinez 639 .296 98 38 114 4 23.9
6 Jose Ramirez 641 .285 91 26 94 23 23.7
7 Ronald Acuna Jr. 665 .278 93 28 80 25 23.2
8 Starling Marte 653 .281 84 18 74 35 23.1
9 Christian Yelich 661 .296 97 27 87 16 22.9
10 Adalberto Mondesi 597 .252 72 21 71 42 22.2
11 Manny Machado 640 .287 92 33 96 9 22.0
12 Trevor Story 615 .270 83 30 95 19 21.9
13 Nolan Arenado 649 .285 95 36 107 3 21.9
14 Jose Altuve 656 .302 89 17 82 18 21.4
15 Bryce Harper 634 .267 95 34 92 11 21.2
16 Charlie Blackmon 679 .286 100 26 77 13 21.1
17 Giancarlo Stanton 575 .266 91 42 102 3 21.0
18 Anthony Rizzo 650 .280 94 30 95 7 20.7
19 Andrew Benintendi 654 .285 95 18 80 17 20.4
20 Shohei Ohtani 589 .272 83 31 90 12 20.2
21 Javier Baez 609 .268 77 28 89 17 20.2
22 Paul Goldschmidt 652 .277 91 27 88 11 20.1
23 Freddie Freeman 653 .286 89 27 90 8 20.1
24 Alex Bregman 645 .278 94 25 87 11 20.0
25 Juan Soto 620 .290 87 28 90 7 20.0
26 Aaron Judge 648 .250 98 36 93 8 20.0
27 Kris Bryant 659 .274 99 29 88 7 19.9
28 Whit Merrifield 671 .274 82 12 60 31 19.7
29 Nelson Cruz 619 .271 82 35 99 1 18.9
30 George Springer 683 .263 100 28 79 9 18.9
31 Lorenzo Cain 649 .283 83 15 64 21 18.9
32 Jonathan Villar 628 .250 73 16 61 34 18.8
33 Dee Gordon 656 .275 73 5 51 37 18.7
34 Rhys Hoskins 650 .249 91 35 90 6 18.6
35 Xander Bogaerts 635 .285 84 19 85 10 18.5
36 Eddie Rosario 628 .276 78 25 85 9 18.3
37 Victor Robles 586 .273 70 13 62 28 18.3
38 Ozzie Albies 652 .273 82 20 72 16 18.2
39 Marcell Ozuna 617 .288 77 27 93 2 18.2
40 Anthony Rendon 632 .287 83 23 86 5 18.1
41 A.J. Pollock 629 .258 78 22 76 18 18.1
42 Khris Davis 636 .239 86 39 102 1 18.0
43 Jose Abreu 633 .280 80 28 92 2 18.0
44 Corey Seager 651 .283 92 24 78 4 17.9
45 Vladimir Guerrero Jr. 550 .306 75 22 77 6 17.9
46 Michael Brantley 641 .287 83 18 73 11 17.9
47 David Dahl 598 .270 75 24 81 12 17.9
48 Jean Segura 671 .278 80 12 64 21 17.8
49 Justin Turner 648 .285 88 22 83 4 17.8
50 Rougned Odor 615 .248 76 27 82 15 17.8
51 Joey Gallo 602 .224 84 39 93 7 17.8
52 Miguel Cabrera 649 .282 83 25 88 2 17.6

Thoughts

  • I need to find and scold the FanGraphs playtime projection monkey. Or at least get it off its meds. Stanton at only 575 PA? Miggy at 649 PA? Ohtani at 589? Not everyone is perfect.
  • A common thread most owners will need to come to grips with over the offseason is young, unproven players high in the rankings. Acuna and Mondesi in the top-10. Soto in the top-25. Robles top-40. Vlad in the top-50.
  • After the first two points sink in, diving back into the list brings out some interesting players. I’ll start with Starling Marte ranked as #8. Going back to the first bullet, 653 PA would be a career high so the number should be brought down. Otherwise, nothing else really looks out of place.  In the #2EarlyMocks, he went 33rd overall or the 26th hitter. Owners should be elated to find possible first-round value in the 3rd round or later.
  • I did not expect to see Story over Arenado. Steals are just becoming so valuable that even a handful can make a huge difference in the rankings.
  • Hitters from #14 to #18 (Altuve, Harper, Blackmon, Stanton, and Rizzo) are the old guard moving down. They are still great 2nd to 3rd round values.
  • Down at #22 and #23 are two accumulating first baseman, Goldschmidt and Freeman. Everything is middling here. I could see both pushing themselves 10 spots higher in other rankings
  • Bregman at #24. Oh, the humanity. What evil force has Kevin way down here? I’m sure his ranking will spawn off a half dozen comment threads.
  • Judge drops to #26. The main reason for his drop is the sub-40 HR total and just the second hitter projected for a sub-.260 batting average.

I could go on and on but for now, it just a nice list to soak in and find those spots of personal contention. Or just completely freakout.

Additionally, I’ve put all 52 names into a polling service with spits out two names and a person can pick the one they prefer. Feel free to vote once or a few hundred times. It’s never-ending.





 

Jeff, one of the authors of the fantasy baseball guide,The Process, writes for RotoGraphs, The Hardball Times, Rotowire, Baseball America, and BaseballHQ. He has been nominated for two SABR Analytics Research Award for Contemporary Analysis and won it in 2013 in tandem with Bill Petti. He has won four FSWA Awards including on for his Mining the News series. He's won Tout Wars three times, LABR twice, and got his first NFBC Main Event win in 2021. Follow him on Twitter @jeffwzimmerman.

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Baseball Randymember
5 years ago

Aaron Judge should be higher.

0
J.D. Martinmember
5 years ago
Reply to  Baseball Randy

Steamer heavily regresses his BABIP and HR/FB, resulting in the low average. Generally the smart thing to do but I think Judge has proven enough to show he’ll be an outlier in those areas moving forward

1