The All-Value Team: Hitters

Value is nebulous term in fantasy sports. In fact, some (namely colleague and friend Todd Zola of Fantasy Alarm) don’t even like the term anymore as it can be often misused. I believe Zola has some good points against using the word so often, but nevertheless we’ll push forward with it as it conveys the idea I’m going for today. Who delivered the most bang for their buck? For this particular piece, I’ll be looking at those who were drafted regularly.

Determining who was drafted “regularly” will come via the excellent FantasyPros data on average draft positions (ADP) across six different sites. I used a 350 ADP as the cutoff, that covers 10- and 12-team leagues easily (23-man roster plus reserves) and gets pretty deep into 15-team leagues. Here is the overall ranking and then you can click by each position. I’m looking at this by position and comparing a player’s draft slot at his position to where he stands now.

To qualify as the best value, they must be in the top 12 at their position per the FantasyPros Player Rater. It’s great that Adam Lind is 32 spots higher than his draft spot at 1B, but he’s still only 17th at the position. Mark Teixeira is similar in that he’s 26 spots better than his draft slot, but sits just 20th at the position (due in part to an injury shortening his season, obviously).

CATCHER

Stephen Vogt [OAK – Draft: 23rd at C, 315th Overall; 2015: 6th at C]

Vogt was one of the hottest players in all of baseball for the first two months of the season with a .322/.411/.611 line including 11 HR, 38 RBI, and 25 R in 180 PA. He slowed in June (as expected) due in large part to a power outage as the .264 AVG and .361 OBP parts of his triple slash in June were fine, but paired with an ugly .385 SLG (2 HR). Nobody could’ve predicting the utter collapse that was Vogt’s July.

He completely fell off the map with an impossibly bad .163/.193/.225 line in 83 PA, though a late-June elbow injury may have played a significant role. He rebounded in August (.867 OPS, 4 HR) before falling apart again in September, this time likely due to a groin injury. Roto players aren’t as concerned with the up-and-down nature of his production, but H2H players have to be bummed by the sputter to the finish line.

We have two injuries that at least partially explain his down periods, but he’s going to be 31 years old next year and over-30 catchers don’t usually get healthier as their careers grow longer. I think we’ve seen a skill set we can trust, dating back to his 84 games last year, but the injury risk remains substantial and must be factored in when assessing Vogt for 2016.

FIRST BASE

Kendrys Morales [KC – Draft: 56th at 1B, 327th OV; 2015: 11th at 1B]

Morales was left for dead after a qualifying offer tanked his free agent value and left him on the market as no one wanted to give up a pick to sign the 31-year old DH/1B. When he finally signed in June, it was clear the time off impacted his hitting. He posted a paltry .584 OPS with Minnesota before they shipped him back to Seattle (the team he rejected the QO from) where he was only slightly better with a .632 OPS.

The Royals signed him to a 2-year, $17-million dollar deal with virtually zero fanfare. He was signed as a Billy Butler replacement, but his 2014 left many wondering if he could even replicate Butler’s below average performance (.702 OPS) let alone exceed it. He has recaptured most of his peak Angels form, save some of the power. He averaged .290-33-106 per 162 games in 2009-12 with LA and he’s at .291-22-106 in 154 games with KC.

It’s really hard to scale the 1B ranks when you start on the lower end. The position is just so deep and usually requires top-flight power to be among the very best. Morales has made up for his relative lack of power (16th in HR at 1B) with a big batting average (7th) and a ton of runs batted in (tied for 2nd-most with Edwin Encarnacion and Paul Goldschmidt).

SECOND BASE

Brandon Phillips [CIN – Draft: 25th at 2B, 273rd OV; 2015: 7th at 2B]

Phillips picked the perfect season for a speed revitalization. He stole 22 bases combined from 2012-14 including a whopping two last year before exploding with 21 this season. His timing was great because speed has been tough to come by this year if you didn’t draft it. He has also seen his batting average jump to .290, a four-year high, and all of a sudden he’s a top 10 option at the keystone. The FantasyPros rater lists him 8th, but Mookie Betts isn’t an all-formats 2B so I bumped Phillips up.

SHORTSTOP

Jung-Ho Kang [PIT – Draft: 26th at SS, 304th OV; 2015: 6th at SS]

This one stings because it reminds that we’re without Kang after a takeout slide earlier this month. As with second base, there are a few guys included in the FP rater that aren’t SS-eligible everywhere so they weren’t counted for this exercise. Manny Machado has just six games at short this year and Matt Duffy has just three games. Even if you wanted to count them and bumped Kang to 8th, he would still be the selection over Brandon Crawford, who was drafted as the 23rd SS and sits 7th for the year.

Kang struggled for playing time in April and managed just a .656 OPS in 29 PA. Things opened up for him in May and he excelled before falling again in June, but the summer months saw injuries ravage the teams’ depth and gave Kang a wide open shot at playing time during which he was able to play through the June swoon (.596 in 87 PA). He got hot in July and was playing some of his best baseball when the injury ended his season. From July 1st on, Kang hit .308/.367/.530 with 11 HR, 33 RBI, and 40 R in 256 PA.

Unfortunately this injury is expected to bleed into next season (6-8 months for an injury that occurred September 17th) which curbs his keeper value and will likely make him an afterthought in most drafts. Of course he was basically a zero in April this year and still became a star at the position so his 2016 isn’t necessarily shot if he doesn’t start playing until early-May.

THIRD BASE

Alex Rodriguez [NYY – Draft: 28th at 3B, 275th OV; 2015: 9th at 3B]

Nobody knew what to expect from A-Rod this year. Even the most aggressive predictions only saw him reaching 20 HR. Collette and I took him in LABR Mixed because why not? We were among those who figured maybe 20 homers with a passable average. He has far exceeded expectations and been one of the best players at what became a remarkably deep position.

Rodriguez has hit 32 HR this year, just two shy of the 34 he combined to hit in his last two fullish season (2011-12, 221 games played). Nobody really cares about the .250 AVG when you’re hitting 32 homers, especially with 85 RBI and 81 R. He even has 4 SB which is definitely four more than we all expected.

He looked like he might slog his way to the finish line and leave a bad impression after such a strong four months, but he’s rebounded from the .532 OPS in August with a .780 in September, fueled by 6 HR as he still has an ugly .217 AVG and .298 OBP, but at least he’s doing something down the stretch for fantasy teams.

OUTFIELD

A.J. Pollock [ARI – Draft: 52nd at OF, 168th OV; 2015: 2nd at OF]

I saved the best for last, but only because I went in the conventional order of listing the positions. Pollock is not only the All-Value outfielder, but he’s the All-Value Player of the Year, rising 164 spots from his ADP to be the 4th-best hitter in all of baseball (he’s actually 1st at ESPN). Pollock jumped 50 spots to claim #2 among outfielders, behind only Bryce Harper.

Pollock had a great 2014 season, but he played just three months thanks to a fractured hand that cost him June, July, and August. It’s always dangerous to extrapolate half a season and that proved true with Pollock… because it sold him short. His 2014 paced out to .302, 16 HR, 52 RBI, 89 R, and 31 SB over a full season – an excellent season by any measure (well, maybe not any measure because if you just used RBI, it wouldn’t be that impressive) – but his 2015 with a few games remaining has him at .317, 19, 75, 107, and 37.

He won’t sneak up on anyone next year. He was being drafted in about the 14th round of a 12-team league this year. He should jump at least 10 rounds next spring and he’ll be higher in many leagues as his biggest proponents will likely be comfortable taking him in the 2nd or 3rd round.

Today was just about how good these guys have been and giving them their due for excellent seasons at a low cost. Perhaps sometime during the winter, we’ll deep-dive some or all of these six guys to assess how much of their 2015 performance is “real” as it relates to their 2016 draft position.





Paul is the Editor of Rotographs and Content Director for OOTP Perfect Team. Follow Paul on Twitter @sporer and on Twitch at sporer.

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Anon
8 years ago

ARod is sitting on 4 games in the field at 3B this year so he’s going to need to squeeze one more in there (at least for Yahoo) to have 3B eligibility next year.

I had Pollock early in the year and waived him not once, but twice. I was concerned because early in the year it seemed like the DBacks were going to have a tough time finding regular playing time for their 5 OF (POllock, Peralta, Inciarte, TOmas and Trumbo). I went to pick him up for the 3rd time and another guy in my league had grabbed him like an hour before me. Whoops. . . .Trumbo traded and POllock basically made it impossible to sit him down. It’s the only move I made this year that I truly regret. I made other moves that didn’t work out but that is one that I really wish I could have over again.