Manny Machado, Marked Down?

If it doesn’t seem all that long ago that Manny Machado was the darling of prospect hounds and fantasy dreamers, well, that’s because it hasn’t been; the 2010 first round draft pick made his debut just two seasons ago, broke out as an all-star last year and was barely drinking age on opening day back in April.

Of course, he’s also had two seasons cut short by major knee operations, the first one to repair a full tear of his medial patellofemoral ligament in his left knee last year, and the second to fix a partial tear of the same ligament in his right knee back in August. Both injuries bookended what was a limited 2014 campaign for Machado, who played in just 82 games, and cost him dearly in Zach Sanders’ end-of-the-year rankings, where he finished 28th among hot-cornermen.

In the roughly three-and-a-half months in which he did play, however, a glance at his final numbers might suggest Machado didn’t take all that much of a step forward from his breakout 2013 season:

The home runs are there, sure, but they benefited from a 15% HR/FB rate that doesn’t seem justified by the meager increase in his batted ball distance. Moreover, his GB/FB rate increased, as did his strikeout rate, while his slash line stayed mostly flat.

But if we split up Machado’s season just a little bit — in this case, removing his terrible first month back, which we’ll blame on him being cold and coming off major surgery — we see that he did, in fact, put together a prolonged period of positive production:

Now that’s more like it!

In May, Machado was simply overpowered by major league fastballs, producing a puny .059 ISO against them. That coincided with a surge in his ground balls and a pop-up rate of nearly 20 percent. For nearly the next two and a half months, however, a warmed-up Machado began crushing hard stuff to the tune of a .221 ISO. Once he was able to get around on the heaters, the rest of his batted ball distribution, not surprisingly, clicked back into place, as he began hitting line drives at a healthy clip and the fly balls — and fly ball distance, the key ingredient behind his 16.9% HR/FB rate during this span — fell back into line.

To be fair, these are small sample sizes with which we’re dealing, but still, a more than two-month hot streak to conclude his year doesn’t deserve to be dismissed out of hand. Those positive indicators are especially pertinent when discussing a player like Machado, who, after all, is still just a pup who won’t turn 23 until next July; as Dave Cameron pointed out, he’s six months younger than Kris Bryant and 10 months younger than Gregory Polanco. Depending on one’s point of view, that’s either a good thing or a bad thing; he has several more years to go before he reaches his presumable prime, or, considering the taste he’s already given fantasy owners, he may have several more all-star-quality seasons in him before he really begins to make good on his potential.

The hold-up, of course, is the injury risk. I’m not a doctor or a soothsayer, and even if I were, it’s premature to speculate on how Machado will be feeling five months from now. What we can say is that Machado reported having full range of motion in his right knee earlier this month, and, for what it’s worth, was able to play every day after returning from his left knee injury, which was more severe than August’s breakdown.

The better question, perhaps, is how much fantasy owners will be scared off by the perception of an injury-prone Machado, and whether some might be disappointed that he hasn’t displayed the instant fantasy magic along the likes of Mike Trout or Yasiel Puig. Let’s hope so, because as it stands right now, Machado is projected to be fully available for spring training, and until we hear otherwise, might as well be considered good to go for 2015.

At full price, Machado, a former top prospect who a) had a strong finish in 2014, b) plays a position that’s felt awfully shallow lately and c) has the capability of finishing among the top five third basemen would still deserve to be considered a draft day bargain. At a likely discount, however, it’s not too early for savvy owners to already mark him down as a top target come March.