RADIO
There are those who will try to convince you SS is amazingly deep this year. Don't buy it. In reality, it is just littered with guys that have ridiculously inflated ADPs based on unsustainable performances in small sample sizes. My best advice on the position is to wait to fill it, kind of like catcher. Ketel Marte, Jean Segura, Wilmer Flores and Alcides Escobar should all approximate the value of the guys below, and all of them have ADPs over 200.
Part of that prediction is liking those guys above, but it is mostly about how much I hate the guys listed below. Regression is foreshadowed by many signs, and I'm pretty sure every single one of them applies to at least one of them. Obviously no champs today, so lets look at some chumps.
Editor's note: Be sure to also check out our 2016 fantasy baseball rankings dashboard. Our rankings assistant tool combines all our staff's ranks in one place. You can easily filter and export all sorts of rankings and tiers - mixed leagues, points leagues, AL/NL only, top prospects, dynasty ranks, keeper values, and more.
Champ or Chump: Shortstop
Corey Seager (SS, LAD, ADP: 64)
Hello .337/.425/.561 triple slash line, with four homers and two steals in 113 MLB PAs. Hello, unsustainable .387 BABIP. Goodbye, .337/.425/.561 triple slash line with four homers and two steals in 113 MLB PAs.
Kidding aside, if there was ever a poster child for BABIP regression, this is it. Seager's .387 overall BABIP is not inflated by a potentially sustainable LD%, as it stood at just 20.3% last season. He is also not anyone's definition of a speed burner, as evidenced by 10 SBs in 2013 representing his professional best. Yet he somehow managed a .310 BABIP on grounders (average is only .236) and enjoyed an .813 mark on line drives. No way either number repeats.
That would be bad enough for Seager's batting average, but evidence suggests that more strikeouts are coming as well. Seager's excellent 16.8% K% last season was not supported by either a strong SwStr% (11.2%) or elite Contact% (78%). As a result, a K% slightly above the MLB average of 20.4% should be expected going forward. Seager's excellent 12.4% BB% was actually supported by a 29.9% O-Swing%, but his minor league history (6.9% BB% at Triple-A) suggests that this was more luck than skill.
His MLB pace in 2015 suggests the possibility of a 20 HR campaign in 2016. His minor league history could even be seen to support this, as he hit 18 minor league homers last year, 21 in 2014 and 18 in 2013. However, if you dig a little deeper you discover that most of the homers prior to last year came in the low minors, which generally do a poor job of forecasting future performance. Of his 18 minor league dingers last season, 13 came for Oklahoma City in the Pacific Coast League, a league notorious for inflating offensive statistics. His minor league history is therefore inconclusive.
Using his MLB numbers, his 26.6% FB% is nowhere near enough to sustain plus power output. His 19% HR/FB also seems high for a 21 year old middle infielder. At such a tender age, a breakout is certainly possible. However, even some of the greats had to wait a little longer to figure everything out.
With a professional best of just 10 SBs (against four CS), you know Seager should not be expected to be an asset on the basepaths. Blind faith in his age is literally the only reason to believe a huge season is coming, and I do not have enough faith in that to pick him in the sixth round of a standard 12-team draft.
Verdict: Chump
Francisco Lindor (SS, CLE, ADP: 73.4)
In many ways Lindor performed better than AL Rookie of the Year Carlos Correa in his 438 PA sample last season, but he failed to win the hardware because nearly everyone expects significant regression. His ADP indicates that most fantasy owners are not expecting enough, however.
Lindor's .313/.353/.482 line was buoyed by a .348 overall BABIP, a number that seems normal only because we looked at Seager first. Once again, Lindor's LD% of 20.6% had nothing to do with the elevated figure. Once again, his .337 BABIP on ground balls doesn't seem sustainable for a player that is not a speed burner.
Wait - isn't he supposed to be a speed guy? While his 12 SB (and two CS) look good in his limited MLB sample, the minor league history tells a different story. He went just 9 for 16 before his callup at Triple-A last year, 3 for 10 in a 180 PA trial at that level in 2014, 25 for 34 at Double-A before that, and an absolutely dreadful 2 for 7 at Rookie ball to start last year. If Lindor performs this poorly in 2016, the Indians will have no choice but to give him a red light.
Lindor's 12 dingers last year seem promising, but once again his minor league history suggests that he just can't deliver consistent power. He connected for only 14 big flies across three levels in 2014, and managed only two in 464 PAs back in 2013. Even in Rookie ball, he hit just six in 567 PAs. If you lack pop in Rookie ball, you're not the 20 HR threat some fantasy owners think Lindor can be.
Using MLB metrics, Lindor's 28.7% FB% does not support a power profile. His 13% HR/FB could be sustainable, but it was almost certainly lower in the minor leagues. Ten homers could very well represent Lindor's 2016 ceiling, with a floor of Ben Revere.
While Lindor's two slot in the order puts him in a favorable position for counting stats, he is not established enough to be able to keep it regardless of performance. He was generally no better than a .280 hitter in the upper minors, has almost no power and can't steal a base. Defensive specialists usually hit ninth in AL orders and provide no fantasy value, and this is the most likely outcome for Lindor in 2016.
Verdict: Chump
Addison Russell (2B/SS, CHC, ADP: 138.4)
From one defensive specialist to another, Russell's final line of .242/.307/.389 with 13 HR and four swipes does not look nearly as impressive as the first two players on this list. As a result, his ADP is much later - but still not late enough.
The first problem is a 28.5% K%, a number that is entirely too high to ever post a reasonable batting average. This number is completely supported by a very high 13.7% SwStr% (average is 9.9%) and subpar 71.4% Contact%. His minor league history is better than this (in limited samples), but the adjustment to the majors is the hardest one. Clearly, Russell has some work to do.
Perhaps more troubling is the .324 overall BABIP Russell posted in 2015, indicating that he may have been lucky to hit .242. The biggest outlier in his batted ball profile is a .286 BABIP on ground balls. Russell is not especially fast, but more importantly is extremely prone to pulling his grounders. Last season, he pulled 60.2% of his grounders while sending just 12.8% to the opposite field. This makes him shift bait, and shift bait does not hit .286 on ground balls. Just ask Mark Teixeira. His .193 BABIP on flies also seems unsustainable against the league average of .129.
Fantasy owners could live with the warts if Russell offered strong numbers in the power categories, but he can't be relied on for that either. While his 40.7% FB% indicates that he was trying to hit for power, his 9.8% HR/FB was significantly shy of a power hitter's production. He hit 15 homers over 330 PAs across four levels in 2014, giving him some power upside but also suggesting that 20 would be his high water mark. That might not be enough to overcome his average.
Russell usually hit ninth last year, and Chicago's improvements in the offseason do not figure to give him a better slot in 2016. Not only will the limited PAs hurt his counting stats, he's also dependent on the pitcher's spot doing something to generate R and RBI chances. A 20 HR campaign may fail to break 70 RBI.
Oddly, lefties limited this right-handed bat to just a .156/.233/.294 triple slash line in 2015. Outside of a 21 SB explosion in 2013, speed has never been part of Russell's game. I'm not sure why Russell is being drafted at all, to be honest. He has a lot to prove before he's fantasy relevant.
Verdict: Chump
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