Overreacting to 2020—Fantasy Baseball Strategies at Third Base
Baseball fans know that last season was the most unusual season of our lifetimes due to a global pandemic. There was the initial spring training, followed by a long layoff, then a second spring training. The season was shortened to 60 games, with teams only playing teams in the same region of the country. Rosters were expanded, double-headers featured seven inning games, there was a universal DH, and extra-innings started with a runner on second. Two teams, the Marlins and Cardinals, had significant off time because of Covid breakouts, which also affected the schedules of numerous other teams.
With that in mind, the consensus during the offseason has been that we should not put too much emphasis on a 60-game season played during a pandemic. Players who outperformed expectations did so in a two-month season, which led to three qualifying pitchers with ERAs under 2.00 (Shane Bieber, Trevor Bauer, Dallas Keuchel). That last time that happened was 1972. On the other hand, some very good hitters performed well below expectations over the two-month season, including Nolan Arenado, J.D. Martinez, and Jose Altuve.
The thing is, we’re human. As much as we tell ourselves not to overreact to the results of a two-month season, we can’t seem help it. We have more vivid memories of the 2020 season than 2019 and recency bias creeps in. Rookies who debuted and performed well above expectations are like the shiny new toy that we get on our birthday.
One way this manifests itself is in the fantasy baseball world, where players coming off terrific seasons are likely being drafted higher than they should be and players who slumped in 2020 are dropping too far on draft boards. To analyze this, we can compare a player’s average draft position (ADP) in 2021 to their ADP in previous years to determine who has risen up the ranks and who has fallen out of favor based in large part on last year’s shortened schedule.
I compiled ADP data from the National Fantasy Baseball Championships website based on drafts from March 1 through March 14. I then compared this year’s ADP to previous years and sorted by position to get an idea of how fantasy baseball owners are valuing players.
This is the third base version of a series of posts on different position groups. You can check out the others here:
HELIUM GUYS
Ke’Bryan Hayes, Pittsburgh Pirates
- 2018 ADP: n/a (minor leagues)
- 2019 ADP: 728 (minor leagues)
- 2020 ADP: 624 (95 PA, .464 wOBA)
- 2021 ADP: 134
- ADP movement: up 490 spots
- 2021 ATC projection: 573 PA, 73 R, 17 HR, 67 RBI, 8 SB, .276/.345/.454, .344 wOBA
Ke’Bryan Hayes first appeared on top-100 prospects lists before the 2019 season. By now, he’s all the way up to the #7 prospect in the game by Baseball Prospectus, #9 by MLB Pipeline, and #15 by Baseball America. Despite these rankings, the Pittsburgh Pirates started last season with Hayes at their alternate site and Colin Moran in their lineup at third base.
In the midst of an ugly season, the Pirates brought Hayes up at the beginning of September. He was 2-for-5 with a double, a homer, 3 runs scored, and 2 RBI in his debut, then had eight more multi-hit games that month. Over the final two days of the season, Hayes was 7-for-9 with 4 runs scored and 3 RBI. He finished the abbreviated season with a .376/.442/.682 batting line in 95 plate appearances.
That performance and pedigree has Hayes with a 134 ADP, which is the 9th round of a 15-team league. He’s being taken 12 picks after Kris Bryant and 31 picks ahead of Gio Urshela. I like the Pirates and I like Ke’Bryan Hayes. Heck, he’s one of the few exciting players on a team that is projected to be among the worst in baseball. But the “shiny new toy” affect is front-and-center with the young third baseman.
Considering that Hayes has never slugged higher than .444 in any minor league season, his .682 slugging percentage last year was ridiculous. In five minor league seasons, Hayes has a .279/.354/.399 career batting line. One of the things that made him such a highly-regarded prospect is superlative defense at third base, which doesn’t matter in fantasy baseball. Again, I like Hayes, but I wouldn’t take him where he’s been going in drafts.
Gio Urshela, New York Yankees
- 2018 ADP: 749 (46 PA, .270 wOBA)
- 2019 ADP: 748 (476 PA, .369 wOBA)
- 2020 ADP: 231 (174 PA, .365 wOBA)
- 2021 ADP: 165
- ADP movement: up 66 spots
- 2021 ATC projection: 541 PA, 68 R, 19 HR, 74 RBI, 2 SB, .276/.331/.448, .334 wOBA
Gio Urshela is one of those random New York Yankees acquisitions (like Luke Voit) that writer Joe Posnanski loves to hate. Where do the Yankees find these guys? Urshela hit .225/.274/.315 (.261 wOBA) in 499 plate appearances across the first three seasons of his career with Cleveland and Toronto. Then he joined the Yankees and crushed back-to-back seasons with .369 and .365 wOBAs.
Fantasy players weren’t ready to dive right in on Urshela after the 2019 season. His ADP heading into last year was 231, in-between Brian Anderson and Yandy Diaz. After another strong season in 2020, they’re taking him 66 spots sooner, on average, but still 31 picks behind Ke’Bryan Hayes, who has a significantly shorter track record in the major leagues.
ANVIL GUYS
Josh Donaldson, Minnesota Twins
- 2018 ADP: 32 (219 PA, .345 wOBA)
- 2019 ADP: 103 (659 PA, .377 wOBA)
- 2020 ADP: 93 (102 PA, .362 wOBA)
- 2021 ADP: 189
- ADP movement: down 96 spots
- 2021 ATC projection: 540 PA, 75 R, 27 HR, 71 RBI, 2 SB, .243/.363/.475, .360 wOBA
Donaldson has glided down the ADP charts thanks to an injury-shortened 2020 season (28 games, 102 plate appearances) and being 35 years old. I get that, but even in his abbreviated season he still got on base at a great clip and hit for power. His six home runs in 102 plate appearances pro-rates to 32 dingers in 550 plate appearances.
The question is whether Donaldson will have 550 or more plate appearances. During his four-year peak from ages 27 to 30, he had an average of 694 plate appearances. Then he had two injury-marred seasons before bouncing back with 659 plate appearances with Atlanta in 2019. His old calf injury resurfaced last year and limited him to about a month’s worth of playing time.
Twins manager Rocco Baldelli and Donaldson have discussed Donaldson’s health issues and agreed he’s not likely to be the 155-game workhorse at third base he was in the past, but even 550 plate appearances from Donaldson is worth more than his 188 ADP.
Kris Bryant, Chicago Cubs
- 2015 ADP: 85 (650 PA, .371 wOBA)
- 2016 ADP: 13 (699 PA, .396 wOBA)
- 2017 ADP: 5 (665 PA, .399 wOBA)
- 2018 ADP: 15 (467 PA, .359 wOBA)
- 2019 ADP: 33 (634 PA, .379 wOBA)
- 2020 ADP: 56 (147 PA, .285 wOBA)
- 2021 ADP: 122
- ADP movement: down 66 spots
- 2021 ATC projection: 620 PA, 90 R, 25 HR, 74 RBI, 2 SB, .260/.355/.464, .349 wOBA
Kris Bryant is the ultimate “what have you done for me lately” player in 2021. He was a great hitter for five straight years before stinking up the friendly confines in 147 plate appearances last year and fantasy owners have responded by dropping his ADP 66 spots. Before the 2020 season, his ADP was two picks ahead of Manny Machado. Now they’re separated by 102 spots.
Yes, Bryant was really bad in 2020, hitting .206/.293/.351. He walked less than he ever has and had his second-highest strikeout rate ever. His Statcast numbers were equally ugly, with a 10th percentile xwOBA, 11th percentile Exit Velocity, and 18th percentile Hard Hit percentage. As bad as his .285 wOBA was, his .282 xwOBA was even worse.
He also had a .264 BABIP that was 75 points below his career mark of .339. This was the first time he had a BABIP below .331 and it’s hard to imagine this will be his new normal. More than anything, it seems like 2020 was a lost season for Bryant as he dealt with assorted injuries, including an oblique strain that ended his season early.
As bad as Bryant was, we have to remember that it was just 34 games, a little more than a month’s worth of games, really. He’s had two similarly bad stretches in the past. In his rookie year, he came out of the gate with wOBAs of .389, .377, and .351 in April, May, and June. Then, in July, he had a wOBA of .280, which is worse than his 2020 season. He bounced back with a .443 wOBA in August and a .389 wOBA in September/October.
In 2016, Bryant had arguably the most productive season of his career, hitting .292/.385/.554, with 121 runs, 39 HR, and 102 RBI. His individual months were mostly glorious: .377 wOBA in April, .370 in May, .425 in June, .400 in July, and .501 in August. Then came September and an ugly .221/.296/.375 batting line that produced a .293 wOBA. Despite those struggles, he was back to his old self in the playoffs, helping lead the Cubs to their first World Series title since 1908. Now he’s a pending free agent playing in his age-29 season who could add outfield eligibility and he’s dropped 66 spots in ADP. That’s an overreaction if I ever saw one.
This Guy or That Guy?
Let’s wrap-up this look at risers and fallers with a good, old-fashioned game of This Guy or That Guy for players with similar ADPs in 2021 at third base.
Kris Bryant—122 ADP in 2021 (56 ADP in 2020)
Ke’Bryan Hayes—134 ADP in 2021 (624 ADP in 2020)
620 PA, 90 R, 25 HR, 74 RBI, 2 SB, .260/.355/.464, .349 wOBA—Bryant (ATC projection)
573 PA, 73 R, 17 HR, 67 RBI, 8 SB, .276/.345/.454, .344 wOBA—Hayes (ATC projection)
My take: Bryant was the sixth third baseman drafted in 2020 who has now dropped to 10th at the position, just one spot and 12 picks ahead of a still rookie-eligible player in a bad lineup who had the hottest month of his life last September. Bryant has fallen too far and Hayes is being drafted too high based on less than 100 plate appearances in his rookie year. There should be more than one round of difference between these two given Bryant’s long history of excellent hitting at the major league level.
Note #1: I refer to Weighted On-Base Average (wOBA) above. It is a rate statistic that credits a hitter for the value of each outcome rather than treat all hits or times on base equally. It is on the same scale as On-Base Percentage (OBP) and is a better representation of offensive value than batting average, RBI, or OPS. I realize wOBA is not a fantasy baseball stat, but in general the top hitters in wOBA will be the top hitters in fantasy baseball, with the caveat that there are plenty of bad hitters who primarily provide value in fantasy baseball through stealing bases.
wOBA Scale:
- Excellent–.400 or above
- Great–.370
- Above Average–.340
- Average–.320
- Below Average–.310
- Poor–.300
- Awful–.290 or below
Note #2: I reference ATC projections above. These are composite projections created by Ariel T. Cohen using a “wisdom of the crowds” approach and are available at FanGraphs.
