Updated Consensus Ranks: First Base

You can read all the books and blogs you want, but once you start the (wonderful, frightening) process of being a parent, most of it goes out the window. It’s immediately triage: HOW DO I GET THIS BABY TO STOP CRYING.

You can read all the books and blogs you want, but once you start the (wonderful, frightening) process of being a fantasy manger, most of it goes out the window. It’s immediately triage: HOW DO I FIELD A COMPETENT LINEUP WITH ALL THESE DUDES ON THE DL.

So it’s been a month of triage. Let’s look at the first base consensus rankings and see what happened. Then we’ll head down the line and update all the positions.

Amazingly, the top of our first base rankings did not change. That isn’t to say that they’ve all been playing wonderfully. It’s to say that they will be better later, we still have confidence in them, and as a group they’ve either done exactly what they were supposed to or fallen short of our expectations. No time to sell on those guys, unless you get full value and don’t think they’re worth that anymore. Going forward, though, their rest-of-season projections haven’t budged too much.

A couple injuries paved the way for a few modest rises in the mid-tier guys. Well, a few injuries and Ike Davis. Fittingly, the Mets guy is the hardest on his own dude. I’ll just say that I never loved that hitch in his swing, and that the swinging strike numbers are worrisome. The batting average may look pretty putrid this year. Amazingly, his fellow Met Lucas Duda is still lining up behind him — that’s something I don’t agree with. Perhaps my Dudaffection has gone too far, but I like what I see in his peripherals better. Somehow Duda didn’t budge in our rankings. Very strange.

Expect articles about that red tier ahead of Carlos Pena. That’s a minefield. I’ll just say that as a guy that’s older than you think, Gaby Sanchez has a lower ceiling than the guys in his mini-tier of destruction. On the other hand, given the playing time issues that can plague the guys he’s fighting, he probably also has the highest floor.

There I am, still plucking that Brandon Belt chicken.

Remember, in this game of triage, any of these guys might fit the right puzzle. Whatever works. But hopefully these rankings will help you get a sense of the rest-of-season value at the position. Expect the rest this week.