2018 Positional Power Rankings: Shortstop
Hello! This is a post in the series called “Positional Power Rankings,” which started on Monday with Jeff Sullivan’s introduction and continues today with my thoughts on the league’s shortstops. If you’d prefer to read other people’s thoughts on other positions, you can navigate to those thoughts using the widget above.
We’ve been talking about a golden age of shortstops for a few years now. Scanning through this list, I don’t see any particular reason to stop the chatter. Some players are fading a little, but Manny Machado is a shortstop again this year, after spending much of his big-league career at third; J.P. Crawford and Gleyber Torres are emerging, and the guys at the top of the list are projected to be just as good or better than they were last year. This is a special time to care about the middle of the infield, and the folks ranked in the middle of this list this year could easily have ranked near the top a decade ago. In some cases, like Troy Tulowitzki’s, they literally did. Anyway, here’s the chart you’ve been looking for:
I see five tiers here, though you might see something different. There’s the first four guys, who are superstars even outside of their positions. Then there’s the next five guys, who are very,very good and who almost any team in baseball would have been thrilled to have manning the position a few years ago. Then there’s a group of guys who aren’t quite that good, but who are perfectly solid and might manage to bump up into the second tier if things break right, then a group of folks who aren’t that good now and probably won’t be that good later, either, and then the Royals and the Marlins.
I’m not going to tell you where I think the third group ends and the fourth group starts because some of you will just get mad at me, and also because it’s a fluid line and these are just projections, anyway. They’re going to be wrong, and they’re not really tuned to distinguish that well between a 1.5-win guy and a 2.5-win guy. Anyway. Enough of the preamble. On to the list!
Rian Watt is a contributor to FanGraphs based in Seattle. His work has appeared at Vice, Baseball Prospectus, The Athletic, FiveThirtyEight, and some other places too. By day, he works with communities around the world to end homelessness.
It is genuinely inconceivable to me that another team projects worse than the Royals here.
It’s quite conceivable to me that *if* it was anyone, it could only have been the Marlins.
It looks like if you just switch the Marlins guys’ playing times, they would edge out the Royals.
You could say it’s some kind of Riddle.
Arcia at 25,just listened to power alley on MLB radio.
The GMs love him.
They toss this list in the circular file.
Lindor needs to get back to using all fields and using his speed. That version with a bit more pop mixed in COULD challenge Correa if defense remains ++
I think there is considerable room for debate for any of those three guys listed after Correa to be the best short stop in baseball (taking nothing away from Correa who is amazing). Seager is the same age as Correa and has the same career wRC+. He also had more WAR in 2016 and 2017. Lindor is one year older, but was actually the short stop with the most WAR last year, and the most in the AL in 2016. And Machado is 2 years older, but he has three 6+ WAR seasons and Correa has zero. There is ample reason to believe last year was a fluke for him.
Again, not taking anything away from Correa. There are 26 GMs that would consider chopping off a finger to get their (now somewhat bloody) hands on Correa, but they’d do the same for these other three guys, too.
The room for debate but the fact that you used 3 different arguments for 3 different players makes it more clear that Correa at this point has the least flaws among the 4. Also his biggest weakness in terms of all these WAR projections, defense, is one that as many writers here noted, is becoming less and less of an issue.
> Seager is the same age as Correa and has the same career wRC+.
Seager’s OPS+ the last 3 years 174, 134, 125
Correa OPS+ the last 3 years 135, 124, 158
So the discussion is whether one believes in trends or not. If people weight recent performance more so, and clearly most people and projections do, then one would assume Correa looks better going forward.
FWIW, 2017 Postseason (small sample size but then both are young and all sample sizes are small) Correa .886 OPS Seager .743 OPS. And before you say Seager was injured, his past postseasons were worse (career overall .648 OPS compared to Correa’s overall .891 OPS).
> Lindor is one year older, but was actually the short stop with the most WAR last year, and the most in the AL in 2016.
Lindor definitely has a case. And projections have him only 0.3 WAR behind Correa also believes this. If you want a tie-breaker, postseason performance wise, again, Correa has the edge overall and in this past seasons.
> And Machado is 2 years older, but he has three 6+ WAR seasons and Correa has zero.
Well, that’s pretty arbitrary cutoff line. I can counter that by saying Machado has had 2 sub-3 WAR years and Correa had 0 of them, even in his rookie year with 2/3 of a season playing time. Machado has shown to be capable of having bad years, whether injury or bad performance. Correa has not shown to be anything other than a great hitter, with last season showing he’s among the best hitters in baseball, no position adjustment needed.
I am reminded that there are no wrong answers, but some better answers.
Ben Lindbergh did an analysis of this around the World Series with assist from ZIPS, and the answer was that ZIPS thought Correa was the best going forward (and the 2nd-best overall value in MLB going forward, after Trout), with Seager the 5th-best overall value in MLB going forward, and both Seager and Correa’s -mean career projection- being for HOF-caliber careers.
The main danger for Correa is that he’s consistently rated as the worst of the 3 (not including Machado, who hasn’t been playing SS) by defensive metrics, and so there’s a possibility he has to move off SS to 3B several seasons before Seager or Lindor do; if that’s the case, his long-term value is much more similar to Seager’s.
Coming up, Seager was expected to move to 3b almost immediately, and Correa viewed as the stronger, more athletic defender, but Seager’s been above average every season of his career, and Correa’s defensive metrics all trend in the wrong direction.
If Correa swaps positions with Bregman in the next couple years, his long-term career value and Seager’s are pretty similar, presuming Seager continues at SS into his late-20s before switching over.
But they’re both great, legitimately potential HOF caliber players if their careers aren’t derailed.
And Mike Trout is ridiculous, because he’s still more valuable despite being 4 years older.
I don’t understand your first point at all. You could also say that there are many ways to slice things without Correa coming out on top. He’s still clearly only the best if you project (which is fair). I’d really honestly just flip a coin for who among these four will be better this year. Correa has more of a (slight) advantage to me if you’re talking next 5 years.
If you believe that projections are the totality of all the different ways to slice things, then Correa being the top projection would imply that he has the best overall case. Whereas you pointing out individual things is just that, individual things. That’s basically my point. Perhaps a bit wordy so this is the simple version.
Fwiw the projections were bullish on Correa last year and they were right. On a per game basis he was heads and shoulders above everyone else and that was evident in the playoffs.
I don’t believe projections, especially one projection, is the totality of all the ways to slice things. To keep it simple, Correa is not the most valuable short stop this past season, the past 2 seasons, the past 3 seasons, or the last any seasons. I get the reasons to be super excited, but crowning guys based on projections did give us tons of really bad Harper/Trout takes, in retrospect. My only point is that it’s far from clear. You seem to be trying to infer a bolder claim from that. But there is not a bolder claim. I’m just saying it is very close among those four and there are reasons to believe in each of them more than the rest.
I think if you’re looking at who the best shortstop over the next year is going to be, any of those four could be the guy. Over their career, I’m thinking it’s probably not Machado (simply because of age).
If you were to start a franchise tomorrow, and each one had similar team control, which one would you go for? I wonder how much of Seager’s amazing defensive numbers are because of the Dodgers’ superior defensive positioning but I think he’s a much better bet to stick at shortstop than Correa. And I wonder how much of Lindor’s transcendental defensive talent will provide diminishing returns as more and more teams adjust defensively.
I don’t have a really good answer either but it’s fun to think about. I think I’d go with Seager since I think he’s got some real offensive upside and will be on par with Correa, but will provide more defensive value…but ask me tomorrow and I might think differentlhy.
I get what you’re saying re: Machado, but in terms of career value, Manny may be two years older, but he has also banked 12 more WAR than any of the other three. That’s a large enough gap to cover the age difference, I think. Because Manny feels more likely to struggle with offensive inconsistency, I’d take Corey or Correa as likeliest to lead the field, whichever one has better health over the next decade. Actually, Lindor probably has an edge on predicted healthiness, given the last year. Take him.
I will take the over on Story this season. But just barely.
“If something bad does indeed happen, that 550-ish PA projection for Tulowitzki is going to start looking pretty bad, and the Jays will likely fall farther down this list.”
Just FYI – Tulo hasn’t played at all this Spring and is set to begin the season on the 60-day DL with no clear return date. Something bad has happened.
Thanks for flagging this! I’ve updated the text, and the projections will likely be adjusted correspondingly as well.
Yes. Tulo came down with a bad case of age.
What’s the difference between “Fld” and other defensive metrics? Or, how is “Fld” different from “Def” on player pages?
Pretty sure Fld is pure defensive value, without adjusting for position. So every position has an average of 0. A Fld of 0 at SS is more valuable than the same at LF.
DeJong had a little bit of power? He led the team in HRs despite spending 6 weeks in AAA
I mean, he’s not Stanton, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he outhomers Ozuna in 2018
I sort of assumed the author was joking when he described DeJong as having “a little bit of power,” since DeJong had the best HR-per-plate appearance rate of any MLB shortstop (1 every 18 PA’s), and totaled 38 bombs on the year.
That, or he just doesn’t pay much attention to St. Louis players. Seems like he’s generally rather tired of them, based on his remarks.
Actually, now that I look again, he also stated that DeJong “just doesn’t hit the ball that hard.” Which is a weird thing to say about a player with a .247 isolated slugging and a .349 BABIP. These darn kids with their exit velocity data. (I must assume that’s what he’s talking about.)
All of that said, the author’s prognosis is likely accurate. No young St. Louis prospect at any position has arrived at the majors and become a consistent offensive performer since John Mabry took over as hitting coach in 2013. Don’t know why things would change now, so I expect a massive DeCline from DeJong in 2018.
Yeah, it was meant to be a bit of sarcasm, but apparently didn’t translate especially well 🙂
pegging Marwin for .3 WAR at SS in 49 PA seems…aggressive
that’s 4.0 WAR/650PA
This one was hard to get through. A lot of sing-songy writing and fairly banal commentary written in an overly complicated manner. I.e.:
“This year, it’s not like there’s no uncertainty about who the best shortstop in baseball is, but I think there’s a bit less.”
…and the whole Cozart thing.
And DeJong? Not funny.
Jeff Sullivan does this well. Whoever wrote the 2B did this kind of thing well. BPro used to do it well. Sorry, I really enjoy Fangraph’s (free!) commentary, but I think this brings it down. I would engage in debate about the analysis, but there isn’t any.
Sorry it wasn’t to your taste. I agree Jeff does this well. Here’s his comment from last year on Jordy Mercer:
“It’s just the nature of this beast that you can be moving along, plugging away, and then before you know it you have to try to come up with something to say about Jordy Mercer. I don’t have anything good to say about Jordy Mercer. I don’t have anything bad to say about Jordy Mercer. I just don’t have anything to say about Jordy Mercer at all, and I can’t imagine what it would be like to have a strong opinion. Jordy Mercer has been a player in the major leagues for some time now, which requires skill and dedication. His full name is Jordy Joe Mercer, so I might start calling him Jordy Joe now. Did you know that, in his career, Jordy Mercer is 8-for-13 against Aroldis Chapman, with three home runs? No, you didn’t, because I just made that up.”
I guess my point is that with 30 names there are some caps in which you write about the baseball and some caps in which you write about something else.
As a regular reader of the comments, it always bugs me that people reading for free complain about the content.
Hey, I said I was sorry, and I mentioned that the site was free in my comments!
My assumption would be that the writers on this site (or any writer) would prefer honest engagement with their writing over condescending pats on the head because the content is free. I’ve read other work by this writer, and it’s been good. I read the 2B piece yesterday and it was good and I said so.
I’m in academia, largely writing for free in journals (well, the journals cost a lot, but we get a pittance), and the (anonymous) criticism I get is 100x worse than what’s above. And then I write better.
I empathize with the author’s decision to change up the caps everyone once and a while; it just seemed a bit too heavy on the flippant and the cavalier over analysis. My apologies if it came off as too critical.
i am also in academia (40 years) and I agree that academic reviewers can be much worse (and have a larger impact on your career), However, my criticism stands – if you are consuming for free, temper your criticism of the flavor of the free ice cream.
Fair enough. The tone of the criticism could have been tempered, but I don’t quite agree with giving writing a pass simply because it’s free. If I get really bad ice cream at a free event, I’m still gonna complain!
Semien hasnt been close to that bad defensively since Wash came and sorted him out, he should be projected as a scratch to +1 defensive player since thats where he has lived in both of the last two seasons.
Nice writeup, but I feel like it seemed pretty clear that you had an axe to grind with Machado and I am not sure why.
I understand that this isn’t fantasy baseball, but the general trend lately has been with Correa slipping a bit and Machado moving up.
The Correa hype preseason was something I just couldn’t get my head around. I get it, he had a great offensive season at a very young age, something very few shortshops have done. He posted a very high babip last year with a very pedestrian line drive rate. He is a career .288 hitter with a .326 babip. That sounds about right. He is much more a .290 w 27 hrs and 5 stolen bases than whatever madness the people who draft him in the first round are expecting.
What makes someone a good fantasy asset is very different from what makes someone a good real baseball team asset.
Obviously just about everyone would be happy to have Machado in either fantasy or real baseball. But for fantasy, what matters is that he’s about to gain positional eligibility at shortstop (while keeping 3B eligibility), and it doesn’t matter what his defense looks like. If you actually have a baseball team, though, sliding him over to shortstop means that you’re losing a great defensive third baseman, and gaining a who-knows-maybe-he’s-great-maybe-not defensive shortstop.
In real baseball, also, better defense has a big effect on your pitching staff. Getting even 2% more outs will help the stats and will also keep the pitchers from having to face as many batters. In fantasy, most of the time your starting pitcher is pitching for a different team, so you need to root for Machado to get hits but for Jordy Mercer to make plays in the field for your pitcher.
I would take any fantasy trends like those with a pillar of salt.
Except I largely disagreed with the offensive part of the equation, not the defense part.
This was very amusing to read.
I think people forget how young Arcia is. His power is still developing and you could see it last year as he started to drive the ball a lot more later in the season. He is going to be a 20+ HR guy at some point. Maybe not in 2018 but before he is 26 which is still 3 years away.
Moving up in the lineup would certainly help since his PA are a bit limited batting 7th or 8th.
“I can hear some of you raising your eyebrows” love it gonna use it.
Sounds like everybody’s good. The ones that aren’t good, its ok and still good. Which SSs do you think are poorly measured by defensive statistics?