Updated Consensus Ranks: Outfield

by
May 17, 2013

If you’re in a league that designates outfielder slots, this isn’t quite true, but in most leagues: outfielders are the pitchers of the lineup. Not that they hit like pitchers — I wouldn’t wish that on anyone — it’s that they are just ‘outfielders’ and it doesn’t matter if they play center or left or right. That simple fact alone means that there will always be more outfielders. While you have to populate ‘second basemen’ and ‘third basemen,’ you’ll always have this one big pool of outfielders, and you just have to get three of them. You could get three plodding old man outfielders, as long as you got your speed on the infield! And the outfield is the last (okay, second-to-last) resort for bats with no glove.

In any case, there’s some offensive talent here. So much we couldn’t even decide who was number one. (I’m personally not worried about Bud Selig and the papers from that clinic, not with the power of the MLBPA, but Mike Trout is too sexy.) I might be worried about Matt Kemp‘s shoulder, and Jason Heyward‘s insides and maybe Giancarlo Stanton’s everything?

But, judging mostly on the color coding, it looks like the outfield has mostly been a profitable enterprise.

Carlos Gonzalez is Carlos Gonzalez again. Bryce Harper took another step forward. Shin-Soo Choo loves hitting in a hitter’s ball park. Carlos Gomez is proving it wasn’t a fluke, and Starling Marte looks good. In the top 40, you have a few injury concerns, a couple speedsters regressing with the rest of the league’s running game, Melky Cabrera and B.J. Upton. In general, once you correct for the size of the position, it seems like it’s a little less volatile than the rest.

Who do you like better than we did?

With the color-coding we hope to highlight the biggest movers. That definition changes as you follow the ranks down the list — players had to move more to register a color change as you near the bottom of the list. These are rest-of-season rankings for 5×5 roto.

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RG   JZ ES MP ZS
1 Mike Trout 1 1 2 2
1 Ryan Braun 2 2 1 1
3 Carlos Gonzalez 3 3 3 3
4 Andrew McCutchen 4 4 4 4
5 Justin Upton 5 5 6 5
6 Bryce Harper 6 6 11 6
7 Adam Jones 7 7 9 7
8 Jose Bautista 18 8 5 9
9 Shin-Soo Choo 8 12 16 11
10 Matt Holliday 14 13 8 12
11 Adrian Gonzalez 9 11 19 10
12 Jacoby Ellsbury 19 9 15 8
13 Matt Kemp 23 10 7 14
14 Yoenis Cespedes 15 14 10 17
15 Jason Heyward 17 15 12 15
16 Alex Rios 12 18 14 16
17 Alex Gordon 16 16 24 22
18 Jay Bruce 22 31 13 24
19 Giancarlo Stanton 24 21 20 31
20 Carlos Gomez 40 17 30 13
21 Austin Jackson 21 30 32 19
22 Desmond Jennings 20 24 29 30
23 Josh Hamilton 45 23 18 18
24 Michael Bourn 10 19 43 35
25 Starling Marte 11 20 35 41
26 Chris Davis 48 22 22 20
27 Shane Victorino 25 28 28 34
28 Mark Trumbo 32 27 36 21
29 Allen Craig 37 32 21 27
30 Ben Zobrist 28 36 25 28
31 B.J. Upton 13 46 26 38
32 Hunter Pence 33 33 34 26
33 Curtis Granderson 44 29 17 37
34 Carlos Beltran 50 26 31 25
35 Carl Crawford 47 25 27 36
36 Angel Pagan 26 38 42 32
37 Norichika Aoki 30 35 33 42
38 Nelson Cruz 43 43 23 39
39 Melky Cabrera 29 44 56 23
40 Nick Markakis 46 42 37 33
41 Martin Prado 42 45 44 29
42 Dexter Fowler 35 39 50 40
43 Alejandro De Aza 36 40 49 54
44 Michael Cuddyer 39 34 51 56
45 Coco Crisp 34 37 55 61
46 Jayson Werth 59 47 39 46
47 Ichiro Suzuki 27 59 46 62
48 Torii Hunter 41 52 58 45
49 Ben Revere 38 51 65 44
50 Lorenzo Cain 62 48 40 51
51 Nick Swisher 53 50 48 52
52 Josh Willingham 58 55 47 53
53 Andre Ethier 65 49 41 59
54 Brett Gardner 55 41 45 77
55 Todd Frazier 60 56 52 50
56 Adam Eaton 31 75 59 72
57 Garrett Jones 54 54 84 48
58 Alfonso Soriano 56 62 54 75
59 Juan Pierre 49 53 64 90
60 Gerardo Parra 61 63 75 58
61 Justin Ruggiano 67 86 38 67
62 Michael Brantley 51 73 72 66
63 Michael Saunders 79 70 73 43
64 Michael Morse 77 57 53 79
65 Dayan Viciedo 64 64 63 76
66 David Murphy 73 71 70 55
67 Matt Joyce 75 74 78 47
68 Jon Jay 52 76 71 78
69 Denard Span 69 65 79 68
70 Josh Reddick 66 85 67 63
71 Jason Kubel 68 66 57 91
72 Cody Ross 76 60 82 65
73 Nate McLouth 106 68 60 49
74 Corey Hart 71 67 61 85
75 Domonic Brown 81 58 69 82
76 Lucas Duda 94 72 66 71
77 Adam Dunn 84 69 88 64
78 Andy Dirks 89 77 86 57
79 Will Venable 57 84 87 88
80 Vernon Wells 110 81 62 70
81 Cameron Maybin 63 94 68 101
82 Carlos Quentin 100 78 77 81
83 Drew Stubbs 74 96 76 102
84 David DeJesus 83 97 93 80
85 Brandon Moss 92 92 89 84
86 Peter Bourjos 85 110 96 69
87 Chris Carter 70 87 83 121
88 Matt Carpenter 115 61 103 83
89 Aaron Hicks 88 88 94 93
90 Delmon Young 80 93 92 99
91 Oswaldo Arcia 91 98 85 98
92 Kelly Johnson 103 104 106 60
93 Leonys Martin 107 80 74 113
94 Marcell Ozuna 72 79 111 121
95 Nate Schierholtz 109 91 95 89
96 Colby Rasmus 78 112 81 114
97 Logan Morrison 95 89 120 86
98 Nolan Reimold 121 83 80 112
99 Trevor Plouffe 98 99 107 92
100 Wil Myers 121 82 121 74
101 Daniel Nava 121 95 90 96
102 Chris Young 96 108 102 104
103 Seth Smith 114 103 101 95
104 Ryan Ludwick 82 109 121 103
105 Ryan Doumit 112 101 100 108
106 Chris Denorfia 99 121 116 87
107 Rajai Davis 90 111 104 121
108 Tyler Colvin 97 90 121 121
109 Eric Young 101 121 112 97
110 Emilio Bonifacio 113 102 113 105
111 J.D. Martinez 105 113 108 110
112 Jeff Francoeur 93 120 110 121
113 Jose Tabata 104 100 121 121
114 Darin Mastroianni 87 121 118 121
115 Chris Parmelee 121 105 105 118
116 John Mayberry 121 115 117 100
117 Justin Maxwell 121 106 119 109
118 Franklin Gutierrez 121 116 114 107
119 Gregor Blanco 121 107 121 116
120 Jarrod Dyson 119 119 109 121
121 Scott Hairston 120 114 121 117
122 Mike Carp 117 118 121 121
123 Xavier Paul 121 121 115 120

These players showed up on one ranker’s list: Craig Gentry, Jordany Valdespin, Brandon Guyer, Ezequiel Carrera, A.J. Pollock, Brennan Boesch, Alex Presley, Steve Lombardozzi, Collin Cowgill, Dave Sappelt, Chris Heisey, Alexi Amarista, Donovan Solano, Jonny Gomes, Brett Jackson and Kyle Blanks.





 

With a phone full of pictures of pitchers' fingers, strange beers, and his two toddler sons, Eno Sarris can be found at the ballpark or a brewery most days. Read him here, writing about the A's or Giants at The Athletic, or about beer at October. Follow him on Twitter @enosarris if you can handle the sandwiches and inanity.

54 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Alex
13 years ago

for all of these rankings, what is the point to JZ’s contribution? It seems like all he ever does is take an over-simplified historical view of every single player which only results in skewing the rankings rather than providing a true consensus? Carlos Gomez 40 – right. Josh Hamilton 45 – uh huh. When one ranker is SOOO far removed from everyone else it kind of ruins the credibility.

Also – at what point do Jason Heyward, BJ Upton, Matt Kemp, and to a lesser extent, Yoenis Cespedes get docked for disappointing performance (and trends)? Heyward started off the year crappy, got injured, hasn’t been great on his rehab, Upton has been flat out BAD all year, Kemp has been BAD going back to 2nd half 2012, and Cespedes has been injured (a concern coming in with him), and hitting ‘just okay’ since…plus does not seem to be anywhere close to on track to achieving projected SB totals, let alone BA. Why do Carlos Gomez and Chris Davis still get held down but these guys get given a pass?

4
David
13 years ago
Reply to  Alex

JZ is using the rote projections from ZIPS and Steamer, if I’m not mistaken. And, for what that’s worth, only 40 games into the season prior year performance is still a pretty significant factor.

2
Alex
13 years ago
Reply to  David

seems like in Carlos Gomez’s case at least, it’s using ostrich syndrom re: his entire 2nd half 2012 then. He essentially has 3/4 of a season under his belt at close-ish to his current performance level.

-2
Eno SarrisMember since 2020
13 years ago
Reply to  David

David is right. Jeff Zimmerman’s rankings are based on 1/2 Steamer, 1/2 ZiPs. As much as I like/don’t like players, I’m very happy to see what the projection systems think before I rank my players.

0
Jonathan
13 years ago
Reply to  David

Yeah, but JZ’s never present in these comment sections to defend his rankings either. I appreciate the fact that Eno visits the comments section of these articles and responds. As another poster mentioned down below, what’s the point of using 1/2 + 1/2 of two different projection systems if you don’t make necessary adjustments for playing time, injury, etc.

The rankings for Carlos Gomez and Chris Davis are crazily low in JZ’s ranks and Michael Bourn, BJ Upton, and Ichiro Suzuki (Really??) are way too high. This is pretty much a total cop-out on his part. I like JZ’s articles typically, but his rankings are worthless here.

2
Eno SarrisMember since 2020
13 years ago
Reply to  David

Jeff is using Zips and STeamer updates which do have in-season adjustments. Humans will always be a little ahead on that front, but I really like having the numbers-based column to keep us reined in.

1
Matthew Murphy
13 years ago
Reply to  Alex

The point is that you have four different people with their own opinions to give you an idea of how certain players are valued differently. Carlos Gomez has a wide range of rankings here, and I think that reflects the kind of risk/upside that he offers. I don’t see how that “ruins the credibility” in any way.

1
shibboleth
13 years ago
Reply to  Alex

JZ’s take is interesting but hardly to be taken outside the bigger picture — lookit Marte, Eaton for example

0
kdm628496
13 years ago
Reply to  Alex

it’s in table format. it’s not difficult to copy it out to excel and perform your own analysis and remove JZ’s rankings if you think they’re worthless.

also, how about a “thanks for the free content” every once in a while?

7
Brandon
13 years ago
Reply to  Alex

You disagree with his rankings, yet are willing to downgrade heyward over 50 plate appearances, of which his struggles were mostly babip driven. And his ‘injury’ proves nothing.

0
Gregory
13 years ago

No confidence in Travis Snider?

0
Nelson S.
13 years ago

Eno, Please explain why you have Ells so high. What makes him much different than other speed-only guys?

0
dragnalus
13 years ago
Reply to  Nelson S.

I imagine the belief that 2011 wasn’t a fluke + hitting atop a pretty potent offense.

0
shibboleth
13 years ago

BJ Upton… I feel like I should trade him for a sandwhich. Split the difference between ZIPS and Steamer RoS and you get 60R, 16HR, 54RBI, 21SB.

Anyone that optimistic?

0
Cuck city
13 years ago
Reply to  shibboleth

might as well hold on to him. bench him and wait for it to get better cause It cant get much worse

0
Fedee_
13 years ago
Reply to  Cuck city

Just traded for Upton. As good a time as any really.

0
Tony TuTone
13 years ago
Reply to  shibboleth

He’s been looking absolutely terrible at the plate. The odd thing is that he’s late swinging on the fastballs despite having his typical excellent bat speed. Not sure if he’s changing his approach to look off-speed then react to the fastball or if there is just something very wrong with his overall timing. Regardless, his problems look deeply rooted enough that it might be weeks before we see any real production from him.

1
ALLEN G SARVINAS
13 years ago
Reply to  Tony TuTone

BJ Upton has a 20% hit rate and a career high BB%. This is a perfect example of buying low on the law of averages. He did the same last year and the year before. He has an extremely quick bat, but it does not stay in the zone like his brothers, so prolonged slumps are apart and will always be apart of his game. I bought BJ Upton for Corbin/Arcia as an example of trade value.
Now, if you look at his heat maps, he has an extremely high ISwStr% which is troubling and proves, “he is struggling at the plate”, but he’s been below the league avg in that department and bc of the swing. Also, there’s proven data that shows players heading to a larger market have slow starts. I am a stat guy, but I also know the mental side of sports is 100% real.

0
jcxy
13 years ago

Interesting to see such disagreement on Bruce.

0
rzt101
13 years ago

whats the point of these consensus ranking if some just rank based on whatever steamer and zips says? dont get me wrong, very useful tools, but should be a means to end and not an end onto itself.

dont get how aoki went down. he may have not set the mlb on fire, but he has given enough to show that last year was no fluke. plus he bats leadoff in one of the better offenses..

2
Andy
13 years ago
Reply to  rzt101

Looks like ZS thinks that Melky is about 20 ranks better than Aoki. Don’t understand that at all unless ZS thinks that last year was a true reflection of Melky’s talent.

0
Wobatus
13 years ago
Reply to  rzt101

I think it’s great to have 3 guys’ intuition leavened with a bit of straightforward formulaic projection. And frankly I don’t know where else you’d get them ranked by these projections for roto purposes.

It’s kind of like if you have a portfolio, made up of funds picked by individual stock pickers and some percentage of an indexed fund.

2
batpig
13 years ago
Reply to  Wobatus

Nailed it Wobatus.

You have one of the four inputs set as a purely objective system, it essentially acts as a built-in hedge to the other more subjective assessments.

1
SF Giants
13 years ago

Asking again here because it did not get answered in the SS thread:

Where would Marco Scutaro rank in the SS ranks? He appears to have been left out despite carrying SS elgibility in most leagues.

-4
gouis
13 years ago
Reply to  SF Giants

Well it’ll definitely be answered in the OF rankings thread then!

2
Bennie and the Jets
13 years ago

Quick question: I currently have Jayson Werth on the DL, he’s about to come off, should I drop Dee Gordon, Angel Pagan, or Dominic Brown? I was thinking Brown. Thanks

2
Sgt Hulka
13 years ago
Reply to  Bennie and the Jets

I agree. I’d drop Brown.

0
fei
13 years ago

Hello unfornately got Matt Kemp and looking to unload him ASAP what kinda OF should I be shooting for? I’m thinking straight up for Marte.

0
Sgt Hulka
13 years ago
Reply to  fei

I would aim higher, but I don’t know what your league is like. I’d aim at Holliday or Rios.

1
kid
13 years ago

You guys are out of your minds on Heyward. I’d happily trade him away for Gordon, Bruce, Rios, Chris Davis, Craig, Granderson, Beltran and Crawford, to name a few.

0
davelamb9000
13 years ago

I am surprised Nelson Cruz did not move up at all in the rankings. He’s off to a great start, and ISO is up 50 points over last year, but at a level that he sustained in 2009-2011. His BABIP and batted ball rates don’t look askew from previous years…..

2
novaether
13 years ago
Reply to  davelamb9000

Yeah, his BABIP looks low, if anything. He’s not going to steal double digits bases anymore, and if he does – barely. However, he looks primed for a 30 HR season with plenty of runs and RBIs. The only concern is his constant injury risk. His health and success so far this year should have still moved him up a few ranks, at least.

0
Nick
13 years ago
Reply to  davelamb9000

And he’s gotta get paid

0
D
13 years ago

Heyward’s BABIP is under 100 despite a career high LD and fly ball pct. I watched his first 2 weeks, he was just very unlucky, then his appendix happened. If you want to overreact to 2 weeks worth of results, I’m sure you will find some takers.

1
Tony TuTone
13 years ago

Might be time to give David DeJesus a closer look in deeper leagues. His .290 BA comes with a BABIP that is slightly below his career average. Couple this with good run production, 15+ HR and 10+ SB capability and he has a good shot at ending up a top 50 outfielder.

0
Justin
13 years ago

Adrian Gonzalez at 11?!?! Please explain, he has no speed, his power has been zapped for a few years now there is no way hes going to hit 350 the rest of the way and it is not like the Dogers are an offensive powerhouse at this point. He is currently the 35th best OF in yahoo and I dont see how things change for him to be any better than he has been so far.

3
cs3
13 years ago
Reply to  Justin

Gonzalez is one of the few hitters who I think CAN actually hit .350 the rest of the way.
True, hes only going to hit ~18 HR rest of the season, but his RBI total should fine and he will score enough runs.

That said I also think 11 is a bit too high, but i dont see how you can keep him out of the top 20. 15 or so seems about right.

0
Trevor
13 years ago

Obligatory Michael Morse is awfully low for someone with the 21st best OPS among qualified outfielders comment.

0
MentholMember since 2014
13 years ago
Reply to  Trevor

I agree.

0
wily mo
13 years ago
Reply to  Trevor

yeah. i own both morse in ichiro, in a league with salaries where morse is making 4x more $ than ichiro is, and i’m still way happier about having morse on my roster than ichiro at this point. even though my team has more than enough power and not much speed. so seeing ichiro ranked like 20 slots ahead of morse makes me blink in confusion.

everybody in both fantasy and real life spent the entire offseason kind of hating on morse for reasons i never really understood. then he tore up the spring and the first week of the season. then he broke his pinky and kept playing and slumped for a few weeks. this appears to be all people who were expecting him to suck needed to confirm their expectations. but, come on. he’s hitting with a broken finger. he’s a really good hitter and everybody’s being weird

0
wily mo
13 years ago
Reply to  wily mo

all of that is without even bringing up the fact that ichiro might be a glorified fourth outfielder now that granderson’s back

0
batpig
13 years ago

Isn’t Starling Marte just a younger Desmond Jennings with a better AVG? I assume he’ll move up soon if he keeps this up but Jennings has a .247 career AVG in over 1000 PA, I think Marte is already an obviously superior fantasy option.

0
Brian
13 years ago

It looks like Zimmerman used the ZiPS/Steamer projections but didn’t fix the playing time portion to account for new roles and whatnot. Our maybe even used the preseason values and paying time. That’s a lot of new and easily quantifiable (via the new depth charts page) information to ignore. I redid my player values yesterday with this info for ROS and from memory it was a LOT different than his rankings. Carlos Gomez was the most improved player based on both projection systems yet he has him as the #40 OF, which is way off. I agree with the idea that an objective ranking is a great hedge but those are far from the best objective rankings available on this very site.

0
Jonathan Sher
13 years ago

Three out of four ranked Aaron Hicks above Oswaldo Arcia. Interesting. I think you’d be hard press to find three Twins fans among the millions who expect Hicks to outperform Arcia.

Arcia has been 15% above average at producing runs while Hicks has been 59% below average — essentially, Arcia as a batter has been about three times as valuable per plate appearance.

1
cs3
13 years ago

Just wanted to say thanks for combining AL and NL into the same article.
Much more useful this way!

Also thank you Eno for taking the time to respond to comments. Thats one of my favorite things about your articles – I know you always follow up. Much appreciated.

2
lee
13 years ago

shopping gallardo in my league, any suggestions on who i should go after? need runs and SB, league uses obp not avg.

0
The Sicilian
13 years ago

Like most experts, you guys still seem a little low on Alex Gordon (though not nearly as bad as I have seen from some). He’s off to a really strong start (currently #10 OF in standard 5×5) and he hasn’t even started to steal bases yet; that seems to suggest that 2012 was the outlier, while his 2011 season (when he finished #8 OF) might be a more realistic comparison, even if never actually exceeds those numbers.

Anyway, I’d certainly want him over Heyward/Cespedes, or even Holliday or AGone at this point in their careers. Vive la difference …

0
Andrew
13 years ago

I need to bench one of Carpenter, Kendrick, or Heyward. I’m leaning towards Kendrick. anybody with an opinion?

0
Mike Biemer
13 years ago

14 team nonkeeper roto should I add Nava for 5th OF spot? currently have Venable

1
fei
13 years ago

14 team roto nonkeeper who are your top 3 OF, I need to add 2 I start 5 OF

W. Venable
D. Dejesus
D. Nava
J. Shaefer
E. Bonifacio
R. Ibanez
M. Joyce
L. Martin

0
mike
13 years ago
Reply to  fei

I’m not a big believer in Ibanez

0
Jonathan Sher
13 years ago
Reply to  fei

Depends upon which categories you need the most help. That said I think Martin has adjusted after a rough start and could post good SB and a solid BA the rest of the way. Uf you need power yo are looking at Joyce or Ibanez, noting you can stream the former and use someone else when the Rays face lefties.

0
Tancook
13 years ago

Jorge Soler or Cristian Yelich for a dynasty league?

0
Chad
12 years ago
Reply to  Tancook

Cristian Yelich

0