The Positional Scarcity Sea Change

From the day I started playing fantasy baseball, I have placed a premium on players eligible at shortstop because all of the analysis I read and performed myself suggested that the replacement level at shortstop was less productive than the replacement level at other positions. Even in the shortstop boom of the late 90s that featured exceptional fantasy shortstops like Alex Rodriguez, Nomar Garciaparra, Derek Jeter, and Barry Larkin, the cliff to non-productive replacement options happened much sooner at shortstop than other positions.

Over the last two seasons, we have entered another shortstop boom as elite prospects like Carlos Correa and Francisco Lindor have made their way to the majors. You can check out the Last 365 Days split on the leaderboards to get a taste of their fantasy potential. Over that time frame, Correa has 29 home runs and 22 steals. Lindor has 15 and 21. Xander Bogaerts has hit .335 with 14 steals, and he has projectable power growth ahead of him. Even though players like Mike Trout and Paul Goldschmidt have been projected to have better fantasy statistics, I was prepared to thrust the likes of Correa and Lindor to their rankings neighborhood because I believed that positional scarcity would bridge the gap in their production. I no longer believe that is true.

There are so many good, young shortstops entering the majors right now that I believe it will disrupt the positional scarcity status quo. So far, I haven’t even mentioned Corey Seager or Addison Russell. J.P. Crawford, Trea Turner, and Orlando Arcia could all be up this season and be immediate stolen-base threats. Alex Bregman could be up this season in Houston, although either he or Correa would need to move off of shortstop. This isn’t a boom like the late 90s; this is a boom that will reach deep enough to raise the replacement level of the position in fantasy.

The influx of young talent has not yet had major ramifications on the fantasy value of shortstop relative to the other positions. The following chart shows cumulative Standing Points Gained (SPG) at each position—this season’s numbers are pro-rated to 162 games—with each player assigned to the position he played the most each of the last five seasons. If you are unfamiliar with Standing Points Gained, I recommend checking out Jeff Zimmerman’s series of articles (Parts 1, 2, and 3) on the subject from 2014. I borrowed his formula for Hitter SPG from the middle article because it is a good way to value players’ fantasy contributions in a single number that appropriately weights the value of each rotisserie stat. Meanwhile, I was a bit unsure how to handle outfielders since they encompass three positions, so I divided their SPG by three to put them on a similar scale to the other positions.

It’s a bit crowded with six positions on one chart, but if you trace each position from left to right, you’ll see that the relative production each position has provided has been pretty consistent over the last five seasons, and shortstop has consistently been the second-worst position ahead of only catcher. So, again, shortstop has not improved with the new, young talent. However, beneath the surface, there is a clear changing trend at the position. Check out the same chart, but limited to players 27 years old or older.

The production of veteran shortstops has declined precipitously over the last two seasons such that the gap between them and veteran catchers is practically as big as the gap between catchers and first basemen, the most productive veteran position. More importantly, check out the increase in SPG that young shortstops have made since 2014.

Since their trough in 2014, shortstops have nearly doubled their production from 94 SPG to 167. Not only that, shortstops now provide more fantasy value than any other position among players under 27 years old. Third base has seen a similar rise in young productivity while first base and catcher have provided the counterbalancing decline. I believe those trends suggest that first basemen have gained value relative to shortstops and third basemen because of a change in the positional scarcity of each position.

Because of its place at the top of the defensive spectrum, shortstop will eventually lose some of these productive young hitters to other positions, but over the next five years, that should not be a major concern. Bogaerts is the oldest of the players I’ve mentioned in this article at 23 years old, and Correa is only one of them with poor defensive numbers this season. All of these shortstops should continue to be fantasy assets because of their excellent production, but I advise a more conservative adjustment to their rankings based on a perceived position scarcity at shortstop. I’m just not sure it exists any longer.