Today's guest author is Scotty Allen. He's a staff writer for one of the other sites I write for, The Outside Corner. - Charlie

It’s that time of year, computers flicker on and flock to Yahoo.  They browse to one of two places, fantasy baseball drafts and advice, or NCAA brackets.  At the same time, marriages go south and our relationships with our kids deteriorate to the point where we are no longer acknowledged as parents, but simply that person that sits in front of the TV with a laptop and mutters things like “There goes my bracket” or “Hurry up and pick!”.  It also happens to be the time of year when I’m reminded that Brad Evans (AKA The Noise) and I are star-crossed lovers and mortal enemies.  Every Spring I awaken from a three-month long slumber with a new set of strategies and man-crushes for fantasy baseball.  Every year I’m determined to outfox the Yahoo expert, and every year I find he’s developed the same unhealthy man-love for the same players as I.

The last in the series of my ranks this season. I'm going to skip the DH's because I'm specifically not for targeting them. I don't want a guy on my team who's official position is "UTIL". Jesus Montero is the lone exception to this rule since he is going to gain catcher eligibility at some point this season...so there. I just ranked the DH's in this article too.

DH Ranks

1. Jesus Montero
2. David Ortiz if you are desperate and he falls far enough in the draft.

That's it.

On to the relief pitcher ranks. For the most part everyone on my list is a current closer, however there are a few guys who come up here that are setup men or middle relievers. They could be ranked because they are either strikeout machines, next in line for the closer role if the guy ahead falters, or in the case of two of them, both.

Complete ranks can be found on my Google Spreadsheet here. Player notes after the "read more"...

Back in October, I started to put together my projections, which were to be accompanied by player notes. However, as my real-world job started to accelerate, I found myself with far less time to dedicate to such a project. So, instead of letting all of that work just sit in my personal files, I decided to just release what I had done, even if it's incomplete.

Below are 171 player notes, all of which are offensive players and mostly ones from the AL East and AL Central. Bear in mind that some of these notes were made many months ago and are in need of updating. I've done a quick "eyeball" update, but there still might be some old info.

Enjoy (link to spreadsheet after the jump)!

Key Stats: I rejoiced in the off season after the 2010 season when it was announced the Red Sox traded for Adrian Gonzalez. One of the best power hitters in the game leaving Petco was awesome. I immediately tagged him as the 3rd ranked 1B going into 2011. Gonzalez certainly delivered last year, but not the way we expected. I was looking for a .280 AVG, 40 HR, 90 Runs, 110 RBI. He sorta came through. He exceeded my runs and RBI expectations, missed the mark on the HR's... 27 is disappointing, but I'm not gonna complain since he traded that for a .338 AVG. What happened? He hit almost a career high in liners and set a career low for fly balls. With the monster in Fenway, A-Gone nearly set a career high with 45 doubles, 1 shy of his 2007 total. Too bad we don't score doubles in most leagues.

Almost done! Sorry this is getting out so late in the draft season. Hopefully a lot of you will still find this info somewhat useful.

Complete ranks are found here. 

On to the cliff notes version of the spreadsheet...

no comments

The guys over at The Great Mambino Blog asked me for my two cents on pretty much any fantasy topic I wanted. Given that McMillen and I have been writing about peer comparisons for the last couple of months I decided to focus on the rankings that I thought were wrong. Here's a snipet:

"A-Rod is old and getting worse, but Pablo Sandoval has no right to go ahead of him in drafts. You’ve got a guy with the anti-midus touch and a guy with the Nutty Professor touch off the field, but disregard that for a sec. Kung Fu Panda has never driven in more than 90 runs, hit more than 25 home runs, or scored more than 80 runs in a season. A-Rod did it for 12 years in a row before last year. CBS, ESPN, Yahoo all seem to think that Sandoval is better anyway. Look, I know he’s old, you don’t like him, and you don’t want him on your team. All I’m saying is don’t pick Kung Fu Panda over him."

For the complete story go to The Great Mambino. 

Key Stats: Prince Fielder took his talents to the Motor City after a fifth consecutive season with over 30 home runs. Only Ryan Howard has more home runs since 2007, but Fielder has an OPS that is more than 50 points higher than Howard during that stretch. Fielder is one of only a handful of hitters in the league that have hit 50 home runs in a season and could do it this season.

Skeptics Say: Fielder had a home OPS that was .227 points better at home than it was away from Miller Park last year. In 6 games at Comerica Park he is a .174 hitter. It’s a small sample size, but concerning nonetheless. Last season, Comerica was actually one spot ahead of Miller Park (9^th and 10^th) according to the metrics at ESPN Park Factors. Oh and let’s not forget the possibility for a total lack of motivation after getting paid.

Peer Comparison: Albert Pujols stole most of the headlines away from Fielder’s departure, but what player will benefit most from the lineup around him? The easy answer is to say that it’s Fielder because of Miguel Cabrera’s presence. Yet if we add the totals for the 8 starters on each team from last season, the Angels actually have 7 more home runs (including Mark Trumbo and not Kendrys Morales). Obviously this ignores the number of at-bats a player like Andy Dirks had or the fact that Chris Iannetta wasn’t on the Angels last year. The Tigers lineup did have more runs from their other eight hitters and more RBI. no comments

Thank you all for taking a look at the next installment of my position ranks. The top 10 I have here shouldn't surprise anyone, but after that I'm either gonna take some heat from people or reassure some. I value players that provide power and speed above anything else, so keep that in mind as you peruse the list.

My complete position rankings in handy google doc format is available here.

On to the list...starting outside the top 10...those guys need no explanation...