The Most Undervalued at Every Position: A Review

On Monday, I reviewed the hitters who I calculated to be the most overvalued at each position (sans catcher) in the pre-season. Today I will recap those who I figured to be the most undervalued at those positions. And surprise, we actually have a catcher this time. I will begrudgingly use the Yahoo rankings again and hopefully no position eligibility drama will ensue this time around. Just to repeat what I said in the comments of the overvalued article, I base my own valuations/rankings on 20 games played last year and 10 this year. So to keep things consistent, I have to apply the same rules on the Yahoo final season rankings to accurately compare.

C: Ryan Doumit
ADP Rank- 17
My Rank- 10
Yahoo Rank- 10

Nailed the exact ranking! This was an easy argument to make as Doumit was penciled in to be the Twins everyday designated hitter. It didn’t exactly turn out that way all season, but he did set a new career high in at-bats. My #10 ranking was based on a projection of 450 at-bats, which would have been enough for a career best, but his 484 mark led to career highs in home runs and RBIs as well. 1 for 1

1B: Ike Davis
ADP Rank- 20
My Rank- 13
Yahoo Rank- 21

The crowd basically nailed this one. But, his power was fantastic and it really just came down to a BABIP, and resulting batting average, issue. With a solid line drive rat eof 21.1% and an IFFB% just a bit above the league average, Davis’ .246 BABIP appears to be a complete fluke. Potential for improved contact could offset any decline in HR/FB ratio, so at worst he should be fairly valued next season. 1 for 2

2B: Jose Altuve
ADP Rank- 17
My Rank- 9
Yahoo Rank- 10

Altuve performed exactly as should have been expected. But since the Astros figured to be a weak offense and he was somewhat of an unknown, fantasy owners were obviously cautious. There was nothing flukey about his performance, so he should be good for at least the same counting numbers next season. 2 for 3

SS: Marco Scutaro
ADP Rank- 19
My Rank- 15
Yahoo Rank- 9

Four ranks of undervaluedness isn’t a whole lot, so it appears that shortstop as a whole was reasonably valued in the pre-season. Who knew that Scutaro would earn even more than my optimistic valuation?! Scutaro was okay enough over the first four months, hitting .276, but went nuts after joining the Giants by hitting a robust .357. Overall, he basically did what he did last year with the Red Sox, but receiving over 200 additional at-bats. He’s short on upside, but he’s basically what Placido Polanco was back in his heyday (if he ever had one). 3 for 4

3B: Pablo Sandoval
ADP Rank- 9
My Rank- 4
Yahoo Rank- 24

Sucks when injuries prevent us from determining whether our predictions were correct. This is the second season in a row that Sandoval failed to reach 430 at-bats. Sandoval’s performance metrics have really jumped around in his career, as his HR/FB ratio has ranged from a low of 7.0% to last year’s high of 16.0%. It’s anyone’s guess what type of power he’ll show next season and what injury he goes down with this time. 3 for 5

OF: Delmon Young
ADP Rank- 65
My Rank- 39
Yahoo Rank- 70

I shared my exact projections on Young in the pre-season and noted that I was a bit more bullish than the projection systems because they didn’t/couldn’t know that Young was slated to hit fifth behind Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder. I expected that set up to provide Young with a boatload of RBI opportunities. Unfortunately, Young OPS’ed just .702 with runners in scoring position, hitting only 3 homers in 150 at-bats and posted an even worse .680 OPS with runners on. Of course, those marks are pretty similar to his seasonal OPS, but I expected that number to be better to begin with. The home runs did rebound though, which provides some optimism that he could be undervalued next year with the assumption his RBI+R numbers increase. 3 for 6