Investing & Maybe Fantasy Baseball

Welcome to the position tiered rankings for 2015. The tiers are broken out into five tiers with five being the highest and one being the lowest. Five star players are players that will be taken in the first couple of rounds or will go for $30-plus. Four star players will have $20-plus. Three stars $10-plus, two stars $5-plus and the one star are players you want to avoid or players to stash on your bench.

The statistics for each player are my semi-final projections. The projections are going to change going forward, but if you follow me on Twitter @MattCommins I will tweet out when my projections are updated and posted on MattCommins.com. If I was a reader I would focus on the tiering of players and the overall idea of the projections. For example, if I project a player for 28 home runs that means I think he’ll hit for a lot of power.

Links the other position previews:

• Catcher
• First Base
• Second Base
• Third Base
• Shortstop
• Outfield
• Relief Pitcher/Closer
  
• Starting Pitcher

What you will find below are the fantasy tiers for shortstops. When you look at the projections for Troy Tulowitzki and Hanley Ramirez I haven’t baked in the replacement level statistics yet. So in essence you’re looking at the exact numbers I think they’ll provide. This is the position where you want to get your stolen bases. If you got your stolen bases elsewhere you may be able to draft home run first players like J.J. Hardy, Jhonny Peralta, Xander Bogaerts and Wilmer Flores on the cheap.

Five Star

Five-Star Value Pick: Ian Desmond

Ian Desmond has posted three consecutive seasons of 20/20 production so I’m not going on much of a limb here.

Four Star

Four-Star Value Pick: Jose Reyes

Jose Reyes has a lower floor and higher ceiling while Alexei Ramirez has a higher floor and lower ceiling. When you’re drafting it’s all about preference.

Three Star

Three-Star Value Pick: Xander Bogaerts

When evaluating any young player who struggled in his rookie season I always fall back on the tool set when projecting him the following year. Just one year ago Xander Bogaerts was a consensus top five prospect and when I read his scouting reports it’s hard to believe he struggled as much as he did last year. This year the shortstop job is and he’s not going to be moved to another position during the season.

Two Star

Two-Star Value Pick: Chris Owings

Of the four players Chris Owings has the widest range of possibilities. He could be 15/15 player with a .290-plus batting average or he could be a 9/9 player with a sub-.260 batting average. When you’re picking this low in your draft it depends on what you need, but in a vacuum Owings is the only player who has the ability to provide production in all five categories.

One Star

One-Star Value Pick: Wilmer Flores

If you got speed at other positions in the draft and you need power than look no further than Wilmer Flores. There are major question marks whether he can stay at the shortstop position, but there are little to no questions about his ability to hit a baseball. I’m projecting 16 home runs but I wouldn’t be surprised if he hits 20-plus if given a full year of playing time.

Welcome to the position tiered rankings for 2015. The tiers are broken out into five tiers with five being the highest and one being the lowest. Five star players are players that will be taken in the first couple of rounds or will go for $30-plus. Four star players will have $20-plus. Three stars $10-plus, two stars $5-plus and the one star are players you want to avoid or players to stash on your bench.

The statistics for each player are my semi-final projections. The projections are going to change going forward, but if you follow me on Twitter @MattCommins I will tweet out when my projections are updated and posted on MattCommins.com. If I was a reader I would focus on the tiering of players and the overall idea of the projections. For example, if I project a player for 28 home runs that means I think he’ll hit for a lot of power.

Links the other position previews:

• Catcher
• First Base
• Second Base
• Third Base
• Shortstop
• Outfield
• Relief Pitcher/Closer
  
• Starting Pitcher

What you will find below are the fantasy tiers for second basemen. This is becoming a younger position, which means there are a lot of players with upside. I wouldn’t be surprised if a player in the one star ends the year as a four star player. If you play with a middle infield slot you want to make sure you fill that spot with a second baseman because the shortstop position is very shallow. Unlike first base you do not necessarily need to draft one of the five elite players because there are many players who will either provide solid production and/or provide high upside.

Four Star

Four-Star Value Pick: Jason Kipnis

I love buying low on players who had a down season but has shown consistent performance before the down season. Therefore, you should not be surprised I’m buying Jason Kipnis. Anthony Rendon is getting a lot of hype and rightfully so, but Kipnis has similar upside and a longer track record.

Three Star

Three-Star Value Pick: Kolten Wong

In a shortened season Kolten Wong, very quietly, hit 12 home runs and stole 20 bases. What’s even more impressive is he hit those 12 home runs after he called back up in the middle of May.

Two Star

Two-Star Value Pick: Bret Lawrie

All Bret Lawrie needs to do is to stay healthy for 140-plus games. Moving away from artificial turf and a change scenery should increase the likelihood of him staying healthy. If he can stay healthy he could provide production in five categories. I wouldn’t be surprised if he’s a 15/15 player.

One Star

One-Star Value Pick: Arismendy Alcantara

Arismendy Alcantara is not a lock to begin the year in the majors, but if he does, he is one of the rare players who could provide production in every category. If Alcantara isn’t on the major league roster then Aaron Hill would be my value pick. Hill’s seasons in the majors have been bi-polar but I wouldn’t be surprised if he hits 20-plus home runs.

If you like what you’re reading then you will like my 2015 Fantasy Baseball Guide! Last year’s fantasy guide was more than 150,000 words and had 440 player profiles (of hitters and pitchers). My approach to player evaluation is to ask questions about what the player has done in the past and what he may do in the future. I certainly provide a narrative on how I feel a player will perform, but I also ask a lot of open ended questions that I hope will get you thinking about the information I’ve provided.

When trying to evaluate James Shields I don’t know how to evaluate him. For his entire career he’s played in pitcher’s parks and behind really good defenses. Those two things are big pluses for him because he throws a lot of strikes and his strikeout rate has decreased year-over-year for the past two seasons.

Shields’ greatest fantasy asset is stability and I expect that to continue after signing with the Padres. The past two years he had ERAs well below his FIP and xFIP, which was aided greatly by how good the Royals’ defense was. Royals ballpark is a really good pitcher’s park, but he performed much better on the road than at home (table below).

Even though he’s going to a great ballpark I have big questions about the Padres defense. Much has been talked about the outfield defense and I’ll admit that it’s going to be bad. However, no one is talking about how bad the infield defense is. Alexi Amarista is maybe an average defender; Jedd Gyorko is below average; I love Derek Norris but at best he’s an average defender; Will Middlebrooks would be the only above average defender, but it looks like Yangervis Solarte will be the everyday third baseman and he’s below average too. Essentially he’s going to be pitching behind a defense full of below average defenders, which means any gains he got from moving to the NL and to Petco have been negated by the Padres defense.

The year over year strikeout rate decline the past two seasons is not a positive, but even at a low strikeout rate he was still able to have 180 strikeouts. Moving to the NL adds additional 10-20 strikeouts, which means he could still strikeout 200 hitters. The biggest question is how many wins will he have by the end of the year? After all the moves the Padres are going to be better, but I still see them as 80-85 win team, which means I don’t know if Shields will have more than 12-13 wins next year.

My 2015 projection for Shields is 210 IP, 195 Ks, 13 wins, 3.45 ERA and 1.18 WHIP.