Fantasy Baseball Today - 2024 Shortstop Recap! Top Performers & Early 2025 Rankings! (10/31 Fantasy Baseball Podcast)

Episode Date: October 31, 2024

Happy Halloween! Let's take a look back at shortstop ADP from the preseason (4:19). ... Bobby Witt Jr. was a top three player in every format (7:49)! ... Elly De La Cruz is electric but still has his flaws (10:50). ... Gunnar Henderson continues to improve (17:50). ... Francisco Lindor might be playing the best ball of his career (20:16). ... Willy Adames had a monster year in a contract year (22:54). ... Trea Turner bounced back in year two with the Phillies (27:45). ... Zach Neto was one of 10 players to go 20-30 (30:20). ... Should you bet on CJ Abrams in 2025 (36:38)? ... Mookie Betts missed a chunk of time with a fractured hand (41:44). ... Oneil Cruz is still waiting for that breakout season (46:16). ... What's the top Halloween candy (50:54)? ... Who are the Top 6 shortstops heading into 2025 (55:30)? ... What about Top 12 (57:14)? Fantasy Baseball Today is available for free on the Audacy app as well as Apple Podcasts, Spotify and wherever else you listen to podcasts.  Subscribe to our YouTube channel: youtube.com/FantasyBaseballToday Download and Follow Fantasy Baseball Today on Spotify: https://sptfy.com/QiKv Get awesome Fantasy Baseball Today merch here: http://bit.ly/3y8dUqi Follow FBT on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@fbtpod?_t=8WyMkPdKOJ1&_r=1 Follow our FBT team on Twitter: @FBTPod, @CTowersCBS, @CBSScottWhite, @Roto_Frank Join our Facebook group at https://www.facebook.com/groups/fantasybaseballtoday Sign up for the FBT Newsletter at https://www.cbssports.com/newsletters/fantasy-baseball-today/ For more fantasy baseball coverage from CBS Sports, visit https://www.cbssports.com/fantasy/baseball/ To hear more from the CBS Sports Podcast Network, visit https://www.cbssports.com/podcasts/ You can listen to Fantasy Baseball Today on your smart speakers! Simply say "Alexa, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast" or "Hey Google, play the latest episode of the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast." To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to the Fantasy Baseball Today podcast from CBS Sports. Got a fantasy question? Email Fantasy Baseball at CBSI.com. Get ready to win your league. Well, fantasy. Now here's Frank, Scott, and Chris. All right, let's finally talk about an awesome position. Shortstop.

Welcome into Fantasy Baseball today, a spooky edition here on Halloween. October 31st, I am Frank Stamphle, joined by Scott White and Chris Towers. Today on the show, we are recapping the top performers at shortstop from this past season and taking an early look at 2025 rankings. For those watching, you see how ridiculous I look. I mean, I look ridiculous all the time, but I look especially ridiculous right now on Halloween. For those listening, you guys want to help them out? Maybe give a little hint as to what's going on here?

you are Bobby do you not remember his name I have no idea what that like I love Stranger Things I really enjoy it every season comes out like four four years after the most recent one I forget I have no memory of what happened

I know Metallica was involved somehow Those kids could be they are old enough to be their own parents at this point I believe they're going to have to do a time jump into the 2040s to to make this work in the new season. But you are the fellow with braces from the guy who's missing his teeth. Yeah. Dustin. Dustin, that's his name.

He's great. We all love Dustin. We love Dustin. Yeah, I dressed up like him a couple of years ago for Halloween. I figured, we got a show coming out on Halloween. Why not throw it on? Have a little bit of fun. Anywho, let's go, let's jump in.

Let's get, uh, I'm wearing a costume. What do you got, Chris? What is it? It's just a baseball player. Technically, I am my, I am dressed as my grandfather. Because there's a picture of my grand. My grandfather was a singer in Cuba in the 1940s and 50s, like a fairly well-known one. And we found a picture of him performing on Cuban television wearing, it's the Alamandaris Alacranes, which I think is like a scorpion or something.

I don't know. And he's wearing this uniform. So I bought that. And I'm, yeah, I'm dressed up as a Cedro camera famously. We all know him. So can you serenade us with a Spanish song before the end of the podcast? He is on Spotify. There are a couple of songs.

And he has like a beautiful haunting voice. And I cannot do that voice. Fair enough. Let's get things started with ADP review. The top 10 shortstop being drafted this past season, Mookie Betts, Bobby Wood Jr. Trey Turner, Francisco Linder, Corey Seeger. Ellie Dela Cruz, Gunner Henderson, Bobichette, CJ Abrams, and Nico Horner, like many of the other positions.

Six out of 10 were correct, and Shortstop is losing some names. In terms of eligibility, Jackson Merrill, Nico Horner, Bryce Harang, Jackson Holiday, Bryson Stott, Tommy Edmund. Mookie Betts is not losing shortstop, right? I was about to say Mookie Betts, but he's not. Yeah, he is shortstop. He played shortstop more than anywhere else this past year. Fair enough. All right, Scott.

We finally got a good one. Give me one word to describe shortstop. Wowza is the word. And I say that in part because we just did our first mock draft for 2025. It was roto. So you go deeper into all the infield positions. You got that extra middle infield spot to fill, the extra corner infield spot to fill.

And my takeaway from that first mock draft is, like you almost have to coordinate to make sure all the short stops are drafted. There was one noticeable omission in our 12 team draft with middle infield spots. A shortstop who I think really should have been drafted and wasn't. And we'll get into who that. I'm sure it'll come up at some point in the show here.

But that's even with like a lot of us taking short stops as utility players like Xavier Edwards is my utility player in that league. So it is one position. I suppose if you play a deep enough league like a 15-team roto at some point it'll run out but if if and i think most people listening if you want to if you go into a draft thinking okay where where is there a lot of depth where can i afford to wait i hesitate to put it that way because the high-end short stops are really really good and i don't want to pass up on them in the name of uh position surplus but

but there's a lot of good short stops is my point and i think part of the reason this is you brought it up with Mookie Betz. So some of these players we've highlighted is losing eligibility at other positions are retaining it at shortstop. Mookie Betts being won, Gunner Henderson, Ellie De La Cruz, Xavier Edwards, who I mentioned,

Tyler Fitzgerald, Matt McLean. Matt McLean, who we've been assuming will pick up second base eligibility early on, but there's a report that they're going to at least experiment with him in center field. so maybe it'll end up being outfield instead of second base for Matt McLean. But right now he starts out as shortstop only.

A lot of these guys shortstop only. And that makes for a severe imbalance on the infield. Just so much talent being concentrated at shortstop. And Scott mentioned that mock draft that we just did tonight, our first 2025 mock draft, which, look, I realize the World Series, as of now, when we're recording this on Tuesday night. It's not even over yet, and we're already doing mock draft. So everyone's kind of flying blind.

It was a lot of fun, and we will recap that on a podcast next week. So keep a look out on that one. As we do with each position, let's take a closer look at the top 10 finishers at shortstop this past year. Won't spend too much time on each player, but a quick thought on maybe what they did and what it looks like moving forward. But the number one shortstop in both Roto, Categories, leagues, head to head points, whatever format you want to look at, Bobby Witt, Jr.

He was actually the third overall player in Roto this year, the third best hitter overall in head to head points per game at 4.2. He continues to improve. He won the AL batting title. He led all of baseball with a 332 batting average, also had 32 home runs, 125 run scored, 109 RBI, 31 steals, and a 977 OPS. Chris, Bobby Witt should be a top three pick next year, regardless of format. I guess the only knock is that the skill set is changing.

Like the batting average has gone up. The counting sets have gone up. But the stolen bases came back from 49 all the way down to 31. And it was mostly in the second half. He only had nine stolen bases after the All Star break. And I'm not sure what to make of that. He just hit better in the second half. He had a 1054 OPS.

He hit 345 in the second half. So maybe it's just that he didn't have a lot of stolen base. opportunities because he was hitting so many doubles and triples and and home runs in the second half. But I think your expectation should be something like 30, 30. You know, I think there's, I think there's really room for like 35 homers, you know, if he keeps growing. It might be asking a lot, even though he's only 24, just given how good he is overall to

take another step forward there. but I kind of think the floor is 30-30. And while we've talked a lot about Casey is a tough place to hit for power, it's a great place to hit overall. Whatever guys see the ball well there, it's a big outfield. It gives a lot of opportunity for a guy like Bobby Witt, especially to rack up hit.

So it's about as strong a skill set as you can have without like realistic 40 homer. upside. And Bobby Wood Jr. hit so well at home, some ding-dongs on Twitter actually started accusing him of cheating. That's how well he hit at home, which was obviously ridiculous. Go ahead, Scott. I mean, he's just improved so much as a hitter since his rookie season and has gotten better every year. You say the floor is 30-30, and I think that's a good way of putting it. It might be with a 330 batting average, too. And that's, it was 3-32 this year. He's like, batting average has gone from being Bobby Wood's biggest live. to arguably his biggest strength in the three years he's been in the majors. And I think Floor is a good way to put it for the for the home runs and stolen bases because he remains the fastest player in baseball. And I don't think it should shock anyone if he were to bounce back with 50 steals next year, especially given the stolen base environment we're in now. But you can expect at least 30. The number two shortstop this past season was Ellie Dela Cruz.

He averaged 3.5 fantasy points per game that was fifth at the position behind Whit, Lindor, Betts, and Gunner Henderson. Does take a bit of a hit in that format because he strikes out quite a bit. But one of the most electric players in baseball, he finished seventh overall in Roto as just a 22-year-old. He led baseball with 67 seals. He added 25 homers and 105 run scored. Still has his warts, of course. Very bad plate discipline. he's awful against lefties.

I just saw today for the first time that he's really awesome against fastballs but not really good against anything else. You know, Scott, I don't want to be too harsh. It sounds like I'm being harsh. I kind of am. But again, he was the seventh overall player in fantasy and it's not impossible for him to improve.

So where are you out on L.A. It's not impossible for him to improve. It's also not impossible for him to get worse. And I just feel like, and look, I wore my red shirt today kind of in honor of Ellie De La Cruz because I knew he was going to be a player. We talked about a lot. People are going to be excited to hear about.

But I think that enthusiasm is kind of blinding people from the downside risk here. And I'm not even sure downside risk is the best way of putting it. L.A. de la Cruz has a profile of extremes. If you draft him in the first round of a Roto League, you are committing to a certain builds. You're kind of boxing yourself in with your future picks. And obviously stolen bases, he's number one in baseball at doing that, presumably. Presumably he'll remain so.

But by first round standards, clearly a liability and batting average. 259 might be the higher end of what you should expect from him. What do you actually hit? Not a great source of RBI. Runs will be fine. Home runs by first round standards. Again, maybe he improved. he certainly hits the ball hard enough, but 25 was all he hit.

Most first rounders are going to get you more than that. So you're sacrificing in several categories to get that huge production in the one. And again, my experience from the first mock draft is kind of how my feeling going through it was even beyond what I thought it be in terms of feeling a story. stolen base surplus throughout the draft. I feel like when you get into the later rounds filling out your lineup, a lot of the choices there are better at stolen bases than anything else. You get your Tommy Edmund types. You get your Pete Crow Armstrong types.

And my feeling was, gee, I'm glad I didn't load up on stolen bases early because that's all that's there now. And I don't know if people are prepared for that. Maybe it would play differently in a 15 team league. the scarcity's kind of change. But I don't think it makes a ton of sense to sell out so heavily for stolen bases in round one with Ellie de la Cruz,

just looking at the distribution of that stat throughout the draft. Now it's possible. Ellie de la Cruz just improves in every way next year. He strikes out less, he elevates more, he becomes the best player in fantasy. That's within the realm of possibility. But I don't think it's the most likely scenario. and again, I think you're committing to a certain build

by taking him as high as I've seen him taking in round one. I totally felt what you were just talking about. Throughout the draft, looking through the positions, you know, in the middle rounds was like, where's the power? There is never a point where you can't find speed.

Yeah. Yeah, that was the thing. I was like, this guy could provide speed, this guy too, but not power. I'm like, there's no 25 plus home run hitters left.

So yeah, That was one of my, I guess, early takeaways there. And in that same mock draft, the person who took L.A. Dela Cruz sixth overall wound up with Vlad Guerrero in the second round, which is something we talked about. And that feels like a pretty good combination if you're just looking at the first two rounds there. But what if what if Vlad Guerrero, what, let's see, what pick was that? That was right in the middle. What if Vlad Guerrero was already gone and Trey Turner was the obvious choice instead?

Or yeah, like the next two picks. The next two picks for Sharon, Rayn, Trey Turner, or you'd have to reach for Freddie Freeman or Raphael Devers. And I do think there's, you know, a little bit of a drop off there. And I'm not saying L.A. de la Cruz isn't a first rounder. Of course he is. It just seems like people are eager to take him ahead of Jose Ramirez. For studly or pick, like Jose Ramirez, exactly.

I see L.A. De La Cruz is more of a back end first rounder when people want to move him to the front end. I think just because of the sizzle factor, frankly. Yep. Before we hit our first break, just a heads up that, again, we are recording this on Tuesday night, and it's being published on Halloween. So we have no idea what's happened in Game 5 of the World Series. So that's why we're obviously not reacting to it one way or another.

And just one more reminder, download and follow our five-minute podcast, Fantasy Baseball Today and Five. We have a bonus podcast coming out every Saturday of the off-season. Let's take our first break. When we return back into shortstop recap, we'll do that right after this. Welcome back in the top two short stops in Roto this season, Bobby Witt, Jr. and Ellie Dela Cruz. Number three was Gunner Henderson, who averaged 3.7 fantasy points per game. He actually leapfrogs Ellie Dela Cruz in this format. He was tied for second in points per game and took another huge step forward, hit 281, 37 homers, 118 run scored, and 21 steals.

he improved the plate discipline he was much better against lefties he did trail off in the second half there but chris it feels like gunner henderson should be a top six pick no later than that uh in any format really in 2025 and and even any concerns you might have about a relatively like he had a 799 o ps in the second half he had a 922 ops in september so i i don't really even know how much i want to worry about that i think this is a guy who i feel pretty i feel pretty confident is going to be at worst, like an 870 OPS bat, the underlying stats, all perfectly aligned with what he did last season. He's a plus athlete.

He hits the ball incredibly hard. Like, you could poke some holes, but really, there's nothing there. I think at least for the next half decade, Gunner Henderson is in the first round discussion for fantasy. And I don't really think there's, there's, point in overthinking it or really investigating it much that there doesn't seem to be any kind of case for him maybe the overall 99th percent outcome is not as high as gunner as ellie de la cruz and if that's what you want to shoot for that's fine i i think ranking gunner henderson ahead of elie dela cruz is also perfectly perfectly defensible is that what you do gunner henderson over uh it's

been a minute since I looked. I don't think so. I think I do have Ellie ahead though. Yes, I do. In Roto. I have Gunner head. So I'm on the other side. I think I would put Gunner ahead as well. I haven't gotten to rankings yet, not up to where you guys are at yet in the offseason. But we said he could have improved the steals heading into last year this past season. And he did exactly that. He went from 10 to 21. He's 88th percentile sprint speed. Is there another level in terms of speed? I'm not going to rule it out. I don't think it's. crazy for him to get up to like 25, maybe even 30 steals as like, again, that 99th percentile outcome for Gunner Henderson. The number four shortstop was Francisco Lindor also had 3.7

fantasy points per game that was tied for second with the aforementioned Gunner Henderson. And for Lindor, past two seasons have been equally awesome. Finishes a top 12 player in each narrowly missed going 30, 30 this year, 33 homers, 29 steals. He missed some games towards the end of the season with a back injury. but obviously played in the postseason and played quite well. Best quality of contact of his career, great expected stats. You know, Scott, it feels weird to say this about a soon-to-be-31-year-old, but this might be the best version of Francisco Lindor that we've seen for fantasy.

Well, as a base dealer, it is. And that's part of the reason why I view Lindor as more like a late first rounder now when last year I had him as a late second rounder. And I liked him as a value in late in the second round. I drafted a lot of Francisco Lindor now. Sorry, my mind is getting out of sync with my mouth. I drafted a lot of Francisco Lindor there late in the second round. But now he's proven again that he can be a 30 steel guy.

Okay, he 29 is what he finished with. He fell one short. Very easily, if not for that back issue, probably would have been a 30 steel guy, a 30-30 guy for the same. second straight season. And so I think you can just assume that's the, that's the baseline for Francisco Lindor. Now, we've seen him be a 30 homer guy going back to his Cleveland days. So that's not, that's not anything out of character. I do wish the batting average was a little higher. He seems to settle, have settled into being like a 270, 275 guy pretty consistently. But that's,

because he provides so much in the other four categories with runs and RBI and of, of course, power speed we talked about. I think Francisco Lindor, you don't want to sleep on him as a really solid, safe choice if you happen to pick in the back half of round one. I don't rank it this way, but I think you can make a case for Francisco Lindor ahead of Mukki Betts. I think the gap between really two and five at shortstop is very, very small. And I think you can absolutely make a case for Francis Gullendor.

I don't think anybody would make the case for him being number two. And I don't think you have to. But if he's the shortstop you settle for among the first tier, I think you're very happy about that. All right. The number five shortstop this past season was Willie Adomas. He averaged 3.2 fantasy points per game that was tied for ninth at the position. He had a career year in a contract year.

So hopefully getting a big payday this off. season. We'll see if he does return to the Milwaukee Brewers, but he hit 251, had 32 home runs, 112 RBI, 21 steals. Felt like he hit a million three run home runs throughout the course of the season. Whenever there was people on base,

Willie Damos was doing damage. And Chris, I think he'll be a useful player again, but I think we just have to be cautious that we don't overpay based on this career year that he just had. Yeah, I mean, I think a big part of it is one, like you mentioned, you have 13-3-round home runs.

that's the Major League record. He's not going to do that again. So right off the bat, right? Like he had 32 homers and 112 RBI. In 2022, he had 31 homers and 98 RBI. I think you could very easily drop 10 to 15 RBI from Willie Adamas's output. And he's the same guy. So that is one way in which what he did this season is unsustainable and you shouldn't chase.

The other one is the stolen basis. He went from a career high of eight and a career high attempts of 11. 221 on 25 attempts. And that, look, maybe that'll just be what he does moving forward. But that is where I think you really feel the contract year of it all. And, you know, playing for a brewer's team that ran a lot was very, very aggressive. Like everybody but Jackson Churio was running like to their 90th percentile. Like Jake Bowers, I think had 12 steals for the Brewers last season.

It was weird. So maybe he returns to Milwaukee and it's a great place to hit and it's a pretty good lineup and he just can run it back. But I think paying for anything like what Willie Adamas did last season is probably not what you want to be doing. Honestly, honestly, the reaction to Willie Adamas's season and how people are treating it is the most baffling thing to me because it just, it does not seem. it doesn't seem logical. People aren't following their usual logic when a player has a career year like this. It's not like this was

Willie Adomas's first go in Milwaukee. He played three and a half years there. And he never did anything close to what he did this year. Part of that was the stolen bases. And maybe it was a contract year thing. Maybe it was a team philosophy thing. Maybe it's just there was a delay in him

learning to take advantage of the new league rules and this will be the norm. 20 steals. will be common for Willie Adomis going forward. But I don't think we can expect that because he happened to do that this one year. And then as a hitter, like everything was better than we've seen it. Like, career high in home runs. His best batting average in his three years in Milwaukee by far, career low strikeout rate.

And yet, if you look at the underlying data in terms of how hard he hits the ball and launch angle and all that, That was basically unchanged. So I don't feel like skills-wise, there's support for Adam as having as productive of a season as he did. And yet people are just treating it, treating his 20-24 performance at face value. Like, I guess this is who Willie Adamas is now. He went 31st overall in our mock draft. He might have gone 100 picks later than that coming into this year. And I don't rank him 100.

I don't rank him 131st. I rank of 56th, but even that, I kind of cringe a little at it because that's not the that's not where we're used to seeing Willie Adomis draft at 56. And like I said, he went 30 first. Yeah. I think if we're just projecting based on what he's done mostly in his Brewer's career, 240 to 250 batting average, close to 30 home runs and eight to 10 steals. That's a good player. Awesome player. Yeah. That's like a top 75 player, but it's not someone who should be going in the third round. And again, that's just based on whatever my conservative projections. Maybe he blows those out of the water again. But my guess is he'll probably regress closer to something like that. And again,

more like a top 70ish player. So someone that should go and maybe like the fifth, sixth or seventh round as opposed to like the third round we saw in this first mock draft. He went ahead of Austin Riley in this draft. That's that's putting a lot of faith on the stolen basis especially. Because yeah, that's like Riley. Riley's a good bet. for everything else. Yeah. Let's skip over Jackson Merrill, who's actually next up on this list.

We'll talk about him on our outfield recap. He no longer has shortstop eligibility. But the number six shortstop was Tray Turner. He dealt with a bad hamstring strain, but did have a bounce back season overall with the Phillies. He hit 295, 21 homers, 19 steals in 121 games. He improved some of those underlying plate discipline metrics, which I think we definitely wanted to see.

They were causing some concern. in previous years. And he also ran a bunch before the hamstring injury, had 10 steals in 33 games, and then barely ran after it. He only had nine steals in 88 games after returning. So, Scott, what is your expectation for Trey Turner at this point? I think Trey Turner is who he's been, basically, the past couple.

We haven't seen him be a huge base dealer since leaving Washington. So I think we can rule that out. being kind of a league leader type in that category. Will he give you 25 to 30 steals? Probably. I think he could get to 40. He could. I mean,

obviously he could, but we haven't seen that since, we haven't even seen that kind of pace since 2019. I would have loved to see the season play out if he didn't hurt his handshing. Because he was on a 50 steel pace before the injury. Yeah. Yeah,

but particularly with Stolen, basis. We don't see that. We tend not to pace evenly over the course of the season. Yeah. And I think he kind of just would have defaulted to who he is. I think, I think,

Trey Turner is, um, a likely 25, 25 guy with good batting characteristics. Like he's probably going to be useful in batting average. He's, he feels like kind of a low risk second round pick. I don't see.

him as having first round upside anymore but i've seen him fall to like i think i think of one of those early 15 team mocks that was making the rounds on social media him and freddie freeman went at the turn i think yeah in round four in a oh i didn't see that one i thought he was a second second third turn i think it was a two three turn in a 15 teamer but even that scott would be like pick 30 i thought it was closer to 60 but in any case uh i i i don't think you should do that but but i i i don't think you should do that. But I think toward the back half of round two, part of the

case I just made for not taking Ellie de la Cruz in the first half of round one is Trey Turner looks like one of the more attractive picks on the way back. So yeah, that's pretty much my take on him. All right. Let's move on to the number seven shortstop this season. Someone who had a pretty big breakout

season. Zach Netto, 20 home runs, 30 steals, one of 10 players to go 2030. Does take a bit of a hit in headside points. because the plate discipline is not, it's bad in terms of like he's aggressive and doesn't walk. It's not like he strikes out a crazy amount,

but the plate discipline in general is not great. It's not outstanding for Zach Netto, average 2.7 fantasy points per game. Wanted to point out that the, his splits were insane. He destroyed left-handed pitching, 374 with a 1021 OPS, but against righties,

218 with a 697. The majority of the pitcher, he's going to see are still right-handed pitch here. So yeah, it's just something that stood out to me. Obviously, still awesome year 2030. Chris, how do you feel about Zach Netto coming off this breakout season? Yeah, I hadn't seen that split. And the underlying numbers actually mostly back it up.

You had a 303-X-Waba against Ritey as compared to a 305. So that's something to keep in mind. I don't know. My thought on Zach Netto is, I think enough people write him off. as because he was drafted by the Angels 1, and I think people just don't take them seriously. Fair. And two, they just,

they seem to have focused on fast-moving college bats who are inherently viewed as lower upside. And I think that's also fair. That I think most people aren't really going to take what Zach Meadow did last year at face value. And so even if you're skeptical, there's still a lot to like here.

He's probably going to bat in the top two of that lineup. He's probably going to hit 20 homers. The 30 steals, that was really nice to see how aggressive he was after not really running much as a rookie. And I think with Ron Washington there, that seems likely to continue. So not a superstar. I don't know if he needs to be drafted that much later. Like a couple of rounds later than Zach Netto or Willie Adamas makes sense. But in the one we did, in the one we did.

Willie Adamas went in the middle of the third round. Zach Nto was the last pick of the eighth round. To me, I'd rather take, yeah, I'd rather take Netto there every time. Yeah. And even if it was fifth round for Adamas and eighth round for Netto, I still think I'd rather take Adama or Netto because I just, I think he's a really, a solid five category guy. He's not going to be good in every category, but he's probably not going to kill you.

and I think he's a solid low-end starting option in Roto. In head-to-head points, he's probably not a starter. But in Roto, I think he's a very solid starting option. So I was going to make that same comparison with Adamas for Zach Netto, because if you just look at, you look at every number but the stolen bases. He hit 249 this year. He hit 23 home runs. He had a 761 OPS.

That sounds like that. like a normal Willie Adama's season. More power from Adamas, I think, but yeah. The past couple years, Adomis didn't even hit as high as 249. So I think if you're just looking at pure hitting, what they do with the bat, what the most likely scenario is for Netto and Adomis. Maybe Adomis has a better high-end scenario, but the most likely scenario, I think it's pretty similar.

And then you get to the stolen bases. Netto just stole 30. Adomas stole, what was it, 21? And we think that's kind of a stretch for it because he'd never done anything close to that before. And 30 might be a stretch for Netto. Like we have no track record one way or the other. Maybe, but Washington does like to run a lot. Everybody was running on that team.

So I don't think it's at all a stretch to think Netto could actually be better than Adomis for fantasy. this next year. I will I would take Adamas ahead of Netto but again the gap there like you were pointing out Chris is maybe too much. I was contemplating taking Zach Netto at the 6-7 turn and then he came back to me at the 8-9 turn so I was like

yes please I will take Zach Netto at that point. Let's take our final break when we return we will finish up our shortstop recap and then look at some early rankings. We'll do that right after this. Welcome back in continuing on with our shortstop recap. The top seven we've already talked

about Bobby Witt Jr., Ellie Dela Cruz, Gunner, Henderson, Francisco Lindor, Willie Adomis, Trey Turner, and Zach Netto. The number eight shortstop was C.J. Abrams, who was pretty consistent production over the past two years, if you just kind of compare everything across the board,

except for stolen bases, which dropped from 47 all the way down to 31, which is a very big deal for Abrams' skillset. He did improve drastically against lefties, something I love to see for a young hitter. But he also had an awful second half,

586 OPS, and he got sent down to the miners after staying out all night in a casino. So I don't know. It kind of feels like we're a bit all over the place here with C.J. Abrams. Go ahead, Chris. One thing I want to point out is the stolen bases. He went from 47

to 31, 13 fewer games. That clearly doesn't explain all of it unless he was going to steal a base and a half per game over his final 13 games or whatever it was. He had 43 attempts. in 2024 and 138 games compared to 51 in 2023. That gap is a lot closer.

He was just less efficient. And stolen base efficiency is an incredibly noisy stat that has very little predictive value from one year to the next. So while I don't know if I would expect 47 stolen bases from CJ Abrams again, I didn't expect that anyway. He wasn't going to keep stealing bases

at what a 96% clip or whatever it was in 2020. So I do think the expectation is more like 35 to 40 for Abrams, despite the down year in 2024. That's all I wanted to say on that. And based on team context, the nationals should continue to run wild because they were first in baseball as a team in slow and bases this past season. Scott, where are you at on CJ Abrams? A bit frustrated. I mean, I'm sure the national organization is frustrated based on what happens. in the final weekend of the year.

It seems like if nothing else, there is some maturity issues. And you wonder how deep that goes, if that might have helped explain why he was so bad in the second half. If you want to do the full season numbers are more predictive than the partial season numbers thing with him, I guess that's how I rank him.

Just kind of, okay, let's put the first second half splits aside. And C.J. Abrams is, you know, probably like a 250 hitter, 20 homers, 35 steals. And maybe that's, maybe that's all you should reasonably expect from him. I do think there is if, if he can, if he can put it all together and he's just turned 24, so still very young. I do think there's like Francisco Lindor type upside here from C.J. Abrams. but I don't have any confidence in him taking that next step next year. So I rank him fairly conservatively.

I took him with the third pick of the fourth round in today's draft or the draft we did on Tuesday night. I kind of wish I hadn't just so I could see where he fell because I don't know. He might not have fallen much further than that. I don't know if you guys would have considered taking him there or what. But I mean, particularly seeing the way shortstop plays. laid out probably not, but that's with 2020 hindsight. But like, Corey Seeger went one spot ahead of him.

I was going to take Corey Seeger. So once he was gone, I pivoted to Abrams. But yeah, it's a, it's an interesting one. I think if he doesn't grow at all, then you,

what you're looking at is a mediocre to bad batting average, but like kind of a B plus version of L.A. De La Cruz otherwise, right? Like probably a little less. a little less speed, but not a sea change difference in their production. So how many steals are you expecting from him? Because I think that's where I raise an eyebrow. 40 is the expectation.

And obviously we expect more from Ellie Delacruz. Yeah, but I don't know what I because I thought he was going to after the second half he had in 2023. Actually, the second half was a good half for CJ Abrams in 2023. I was thinking like, oh, maybe he could get to 60. and he got half that. And stolen base is particularly for players who don't have a clear track record are really difficult to predict. And I would be worried about expecting too much in the stolen base department.

Again, I do think he's capable of 40, certainly. But I just don't feel confident in what he's going to. I don't feel confident in him giving more than 30 at this point. point as possible as it is. I think it's, I don't know. I think the most likely scenario for Abrams is going to be not so different from Netto. Again, like I'm ranking him ahead of Netto, but is he really going to outperform him by that much?

I'm not so confident. All right. The number nine shortstop was Muky Betts, who had a bit of a down season, but he'd missed a good amount of time due to a fractured left hand. He hit 289 with 19 home runs, 16 steals, and $100. 16 games. 150 game pace, 24 homers, 20 steals. So obviously we were expecting more for Mookiee Betts than that.

But just the year prior, he was like one of the top players in fantasy. So I don't know. This kind of feels like I'm nitpicking a little bit too much. And Chris, I think we all pretty confidently have Mookie Betts as a first round pick again next year. Yeah, I think it's a question of like, is he an early first round pick or a late first round pick? I think it's more like a late first round pick for me. the biggest thing is remember he had five home runs in the first eight games of the season even before the hand injury he went on the iL after getting hit by a pitch on june 16th

he had five home runs in his next 64 games so the power outage happened way before the injury and i don't quite know what to make of that but it it is worth noting i think just because when you look at the quality of contact being down and the power production and being down, you might look at it and say, well, the injury explains it, but that happened before the injury. He was not hitting the ball as well, even before the injury. And look, it was the first 60, 72 games of the season. He might have just gotten hot after that and it would have been fine. But, you know, we're talking about a 32 year old. I think it's fair to wonder if he's more like a high 800s OPS bat. And given that I don't think he's a standout and stolen bases anymore,

I think it's fair to be a little lower on him relative to the other guys at the position. So you can make a lot of the quality of contact being down. Here is Mookie Betts's average X's of Velocity by year going back to 2020. 90.7, 90.3, 90.5, 92.4, 89.9.9.9. So it was more that it was up in 2023 than that it was down in 2024. Yeah, 2024 was his lowest. average exit velocity since 2017, but it was more within the range we're used to seeing for mooky bats.

But I think that's that's worth, that's worth noting as well on the downside because 2023 is also the clear outlier for mooky bats as a hitter in those last five. And yet usually he hits more than 30 homers. Oh, he's, he's awesome. He's a great player. I just, it's like in 2022, he had 35 homers with 40 steals. He was incredible as a power hitter. the overall production, you know, he hit 269 in a way that felt like, okay, maybe he has to sell out for power a little more.

And that's fine. We'll take that because he's in the Dodgers lineup and he's going to get up, you know, 220 combined runs in RBI if he's healthy. Yeah. Then 2023 comes around. It's like, oh, he might be a top three player in fantasy again. He put it all together. He hit for power, but he didn't have to sacrifice batting average for it. Yeah.

But I don't think anybody was really approaching him that way going into this year. He wasn't drafted like a top three player. Where was he drafted? I'm pretty sure the ADP had him. He was fourth. Yeah, he was 4.56, like clearly ahead of Corbyn Carroll. It wasn't like he was an obvious number four pick, though. He may have averaged out to number four.

He was a clear top five. Like, I don't think he slipped out of the top five in like any drafts. I mean, I just. I look at Mookie Betts' whole career, and it's like, I feel like we've done this so many times before with him. He's had a stretch where his power wasn't as high. He's had a stretch where his batting average wasn't as high. He's had a stretch where a stolen base weren't as high. He actually kind of reversed that this past year.

It's the first time he paced toward 20 steals in a long time. But he's Mooky Betz, and... Yeah, he's great. He's still in his early 30s. He's in an amazing lineup. I actually rank him, and maybe I'll chicken out on this, but I actually rank him ahead of not just Ellie De La Cruz, but Gunner Henderson as well,

because he never misses. He does things a little differently, but he never misses when it comes to delivering first round numbers. I think the one time where he maybe fell a little short was when he was dealing with that hip injury, but that's obviously far behind him now. The number 10 shortstop was O'Neill Cruz, who had a very solid season,

but we're still waiting for that huge breakout. Maybe it'll never come. Who knows? But he hit 259, 21 home runs, 22 steals, one of 19 players to go 2020 this past season. Freak athlete, there's obviously talent, like we said with most players today. I mean, you know, just kind of this mold,

like L.A. Dela Cruz, C.J. Abrams. Very streaky. There are warts. There's bad plate discipline. He's really bad against left-handed pitching as well. Worth noting that he's going to likely play mostly outfield heading into next season, but he does have shortstop eligibility. Scott, is this kind of like the baseline, like 2020, 250 to 260?

And if we get that breakout season, so be it. Like anything after that is gravy or how are you approaching? I guess you could look at it that way. I rank O'Neill Cruz ahead of C.J. Abrams and Willie Adamas and Zach Nett. So I am factoring in some unmet upside in my ranking there. The fact he's dual eligible with Outfield probably influences that ranking too. Outfield being a little weaker than shortstop, though still strong overall. It was kind of the most disappointing 2020 season in history because it feels like O'Neill Cruz did not live up to the hype and yet 2020 season.

The strikeout rate is still too high. The ground ball rate is still too high. And there's room for improvement there, I think especially with the ground ball. rate and I do think it's still possible given that I think the only player you that's in the conversation for how hard he I will say nobody hits the ball harder than O'Neill Cruz because he has the highest max exit velocity maybe John Carlos Stanton's exit velocities are up there more consistently but like that the technically speaking nobody hits the ball as hard as O'Neill Cruz and that speaks to how much power upside he has if he can get the ball off

the ground a little more and I'm not ready to condemn him to never being able to do that at age 25 after you know having a lot of disruptions early in his career I believe I could be wrong but I did look this up the other day I think he is the only player besides John Carlos Stan in the stat cast era with multiple batted balls over 120 miles per hour like just to to highlight that point even further. He had the hardest hit ball. In baseball this season, he was third in average exit velocity if you just take batted balls, the 50% of the hardest hit balls by any player. He was only behind Stanton and Judge. Yeah, he has five batted balls over 120 miles per hour. John Carlos Stanton has 16. The majors combined besides those two players.

has three. So he has more than every player in the majors combined, except for drunk Carlos Stanton. So yeah, if it clicks, you are legitimately talking about a player with the physical tools to be a 40 Homer player. And honestly,

probably has the physical tools to be a 40 steel guy. He was 88% on sprint speed. So if we're talking about O'Neill Cruz is the first round pick this time next year, I wouldn't be surprised. We said the same thing last year. And so, yeah, I think the way Frank put it, expect 2020 with a bad batting average, draft him for that, and hope you get more.

I have him one spot lower than Scott does, but it's just I like CJA Abrams more clearly. I do wonder if he is a player that would benefit from maybe not trying to hit the ball so hard. I mean, it just feels like there are so clearly holes in his swing, right? Like his own contact is terrible. It's sub 80%. I just wonder if maybe if he was a little bit more conscious of making contact, even if he had to sacrifice his exit velocity, went from 95 to 92 or 93,

but he struck out 25% of the time. Like, he might just be a more complete player if he did something like that. But I just, I don't know if that's in the cards or if anything that, like, O'Neill Cruz is thinking about. So, but just something I've thought about randomly. Probably easier said than done.

Yeah, I think that that's probably right. All right. Once again, happy Halloween. Are you guys dressing up? You going out? You doing anything? Getting some candy? What's going on?

I'll be at first pitch Arizona. Oh, that's right. So I don't know if people are going to be dressing up. Love candy though. Candy's the best. What's the go-to? Like best drink or trade candy? The individually wrapped Reese's cups,

the ones that are wrapped in foil and have the little paper cup. Those are by far S-T or number one candy, best candy of all tons. So the problem is there's like your ones are wrapped in foil. There's the miniature, miniature ones that aren't wrapped. And then there's those. I prefer the ones that are wrapped that have like the gross chalky peanut butter. You know what I'm talking about?

Those are those are my favorite. Yeah, that that peanut is chalky, right? That that's always been the turn off for me. I love a love a sweet tart as well. Sweet tart is number two, I think. Reese's is supposed to be the 1A candy, just consensus. I'm not a big fan of the recess

peanut butter plus chocolate is goaded for me as the kids say Butterfinger is number one for me so it's it's got that combination of flavors I just I think the flavors are better and I like the texture

Do you remember when they released like a Butterfinger peanut butter cup Yes Those were unbelievable Oh my God You get the little like Because you don't like Because it gets like stuck in your teeth

The classic, that's my problem. It still had that kind of like brittle, that flaky butterfinger quality kind of infused within the peanut butter. But it was a creamy. And it had a creamier peanut butter. So it had the creamier peanut butter with like flaky little butterfinger pieces in it. It was fantastic. Also a butterfinger bea. I love those.

Whatever you guys were just talking about sounds amazing. Like I think they've discontinued them. I haven't seen them in a while. but they were trust me they were they were great maybe they just got sued by Reese's i don't know i typically don't like chocolate and peanut butter combinations often i think reases are still amazing though um i bought a bunch of take fives to give out to like two kids very good i mean take fives are are pretty amazing as well but yeah i'm with you scottifers are awesome it's just like it took me 40 years to decide on what my favorite candy bar is but i think i'm ready to commit the

butter finger yeah it's just there's So much work involved. Like I feel like you have to have like 20 toothpicks right next to you. I don't. On the whole, I don't love a candy bar. Forever. I prefer like candy to a candy bar if that makes sense. Like I love like sweetarts and starbursts and any like fruit flavored candy or gummy.

Gummy worms are amazing. I prefer those. Most candy bars on. Honestly, like most chocolate bars mid. Milky way. Well, Milky weighs too much. I'll grant you. But this is an observation I just had last year because my in-laws are those amazing sort of people who give out full-size candy bars on Halloween.

And they just bought too much. And they aren't going to eat it. So they gave it to me. They gave me a box of full-sized candy bars. And I hadn't had a full-sized candy bar in years. the full-sized candy bars are so much better than the fun-sized ones

and I don't know why it's the chocolate to filling ratio they're just proportioned better like I'm thinking like a crunch bar specifically it is great it is so thin compared to the miniature one and but the miniature one's a little too hard to eat yeah all of them were like that

they just get the proportions better and it's it elevates the experience in a way I would not have it matched And I did share the candy bars, by the way. I wasn't eating all of them, but I ate most of them because the kids had the kids had their trick or treating candy to eat. One more thought.

Risa's fast break. Amazing. Incredible candy bar. One of my favorites, which I don't know how many people I've heard of it or not, it's made by Reese's The Nut Rages. Amazing. If you ever see it, it's just like, I don't know. I've never really heard anyone else

talk about it, but it is so, so good. So highly recommend the Nutrage's. Sounds like we need to have like some kind of candy or chocolate bar draft at some point because I didn't realize you guys were so into it. But now I'm a disgusting trash monster. So, yeah, so I love candy. You don't remember my candy coaching video with my kids from a couple years ago? That's true. That's true.

That is a thing. Everyone go check it out on Twitter. I have to show that again. Yeah, you're going to have to retweet that Scott. All right. Let's wrap up some early 2025 shortstop rankings comparing Scott and Chris. Honestly, not lots of differences here. Lots of the same names, maybe slightly different order.

Scott's top six, he has Bobby Witt Jr., Mookie Betts, Gunner Henderson, Ellie Dealer Cruz, Francisco Lindor, and Trey Turner, and Chris's top six, Bobby Witt Jr., Ellie Diller Cruz, Gunner Henderson, Mookie Betts, Francisco Lendor, and Trey Turner. So same top six, slightly different order. Scott has Mookie Betts at two, Chris has Ellie Dealer Cruz at two. I feel like it's pretty straightforward

unless you guys want to defend your ranking. I mean, I can already tell I'm not comfortable having bets too because I don't think anyone else is. And I'm probably going to cave on it. I don't want to cave on it. But what I'm afraid is going to happen is I'm going to get a fifth, sixth, seventh pick over and over again and just always take mooky bets and have way too many shares of mokey bets because that's where I rank them and nobody else ranks him that way. So, you know, anytime I pick in that five through nine range, let's say, I'm always going to take boogie bets. And I don't want that to happen. So I may lower him just for that reason, which I understand makes some people mad.

But survival, man, I got to do what I got to do. I will say he should be number two in points. I will grant you that. Here's the other thing that we haven't brought up. He's very likely to pick up second base eligibility at some point. next year and second base is dreadful and you know maybe that's another reason to elevate bets too all right seven through 12 for scott we have corey seger o'neill cruz c j abrams willie adams damis zack netto and bobbashette and for chris we have corey segar cj abrams o'neal cruz

willie adams zack netto and also bobbichette so the same exact top 12 again slightly different order let's talk about corey seeger someone we haven't mentioned yet it was a downseason forum got off to a a slow start as he was recovering from sports hernia surgery, but still wound up hitting 30 homers in 864 OPS in just 123 games. Guess what? His season ended with yet another sports hernia that he had. I don't know how many of those you can actually have before it's like a real problem, but two seems like a lot of sports hernias to have.

Weird Al song about that living with the hernia. You may not be familiar with the common types of hernias you can get, but there's a lot. Yeah. Chris. Seeger's like an expert. Yeah, he certainly is. Chris, I still think Corey Seeger is awesome, but you almost have to anticipate that he's going to miss at least 20 to 30 games throughout the season. Yeah, I would think so. I mean, look, you don't have to go that far to get to a season where Corey Seeger played almost every game. It's just it was his worst season as a hitter ever in 2022 when he played 151 games. Still had 33 homers, still 83 RBI, 91 runs, bad, bad.

average. I think I think Corey Seeger is probably the best hitter among short stops. Just what he does at the plate and nothing else. I think he's the best at the position. Obviously, Bobby Witt

is very close to him as a hitter and will steal 30 to 40 basis. So clearly he's the better player for fantasy. But I think Corey Seeger is one of the, I don't know, 10 best hitters.

In baseball, I think he has legitimate 40 Homer upside if he stays healthy while hitting 300 plus. I think the Rangers lineup takes a big step forward this year. And I will pretty happily take any discount on Corey Sigitt that there is. I mentioned in that mock draft we did. We're probably going to mention that one about 8,000 times between now and whenever we do our next one. I would have gladly taken him at the beginning of the fourth round. I think even there is a discount. And I'm, if you have to take an injured player, shortstop's the one where it's easiest to find a replacement, which helps.

I should point out, because I used to, I used to phrase it the same way for Corey Seeger. I called him kind of a Freddie Freeman of shortstop and thought the best was yet to come. he's a 280 hitter in his ranger's career after being a 297 hitter in his dodgers career and it's not just it's not just me looking at the batting average and saying okay that's the way like that the line drive rate has tapered off for seeker over the years and so i think i have lower expectations for him in batting average than i used to I think 280, 275, 280. You can probably pencil a limit for that.

There is a chance of 300, but I used to think of that as like the baseline for Seeger, and I don't anymore. And he's the first shortstop we've mentioned, who is in no way a base dealer. And I mean, pretty much him and Carlos Correa are the only two. At the entire position,

you've got to get to like Ezekiel Tovar otherwise. So, you know, it affects the way you build your team taking Corey Seeger in a real league. The last name on this list is Bo Bichette, who you both have ranked 12th at the position and how the mighty have fallen. He is coming off an awful injury-riddled season and is now entering a contract year. He hit 225 with four home runs, five steals of 598 OPS in just 81 games. He dealt with a recurring right castrain. and something I noticed looking up his injury, you know, just injury history,

he has dealt with a lot of issues with his right leg in particular. He has been on the aisle twice because of a right knee injury. He also went on the aisle with the right quad train. And now this past year, the quad was, I mean, the calf was hurting him all season. So I just wonder if, like, is his right leg compromise somehow? I don't know, but maybe it's just like a lot of injuries have added up over the years. He's entering a contract year.

and he's 26. That's the thing I keep coming back to is like, I almost want to just throw last year out entirely. Like it just, I don't want to say he wasn't healthy because he got hurt at some point. Like he was bad and then got hurt. This was not a situation where he was hurt the whole year. But it was such an outlier.

Like he had been at least an 800 OPS every season in his career prior to this. He's 26 years old. There's no. real reason to think that he's just lost it. It would be really weird if he has. So like I don't know if I expect more than 10 stolen bases. I don't know if I expect more than 20 homers for him. But I think a bounce back season is still very much likely for Boba Shet.

And honestly, it's probably going to come somewhere besides Toronto. And that might not be a bad thing. It does feel like a trade is inevitable. And where to? Your scenery might not be a bad thing. If you search his name, search his name on Google, the first thing that keeps popping up, the Brewers. Yeah, I have a different prediction. Yeah.

I think he's going to have a tomahawk across his chest before the offseason is done. Wow. I mean, the Braves, you know, I'm doing this, my state of the position. And part of that is I'm doing like, who needs an upgrade most? and the Braves are right there. Yeah. I think the Tigers, Guardians, Braves, Braves, and Diamondbacks could all make sense as Boba Shet landing spots. I think it became clear this past year.

Orlando RC is not a starting caliber shortstop. And as like I don't think they want to even flirt with the possibility of having a disappointing offense again. I don't think they will even if they don't upgrade shortstop. but I think they're going to look to upgrade wherever they can and shortstop is the most logical place and just given where Bo Bichette's stock is right now and where he is, this is a contract year heading into 2025, it'll be a contract year for him.

I think it makes sense for a lot of reasons. But yeah, I mean, overall, just regardless of where Bichet ends up, my take is similar to yours. And I'm going to be even more generous with injuries because, yeah, he was struggling before the end up. before the injuries, most of the league was failing for the first two months. And that calf injury was like nonstop. It put him on the IL twice.

And then he broke a finger too later on. He was on the aisle three different times. So it was just a loss season for Bichette. He's kind of made some weird choices as a hitter too. I've talked before about him and Matt Chapman working on driving the ball to the other field. And he just doesn't hit the ball hard. He doesn't have the power for it. So that's why I think a change of scenery would help him.

I think there's a good chance this. We look back on Bo Bichette's career and we just think of the 2024 season as a blip. Maybe even as he's being voted into Cooperstown. It seems pretty unlikely that the Blue Jays would pay both Vlad Jr. and Bo Bichette, right? And look, if you have the option, you're clearly going to pay Vlad Jr., right? So. Yep. I think there's a chance they don't pay either of them.

But yeah, they're both three agents at the end of this season. And yeah, I mean, the Braves would be a really fun landing spot for him. I think Cleveland would make a lot of sense. They got good defense from the shortstop position. And Brian Rokia had some big hits in the postseason. But that's a clear area of need. And then if the tigers are willing to just eat Javier Bayes' contract, either keep them around as a utility place,

or just let him go. That is obviously, I think they had the worst shortstop production in baseball. That would probably be the worst landing spot for his fantasy value, though. It wouldn't be great, but like it's an improving lineup. I wouldn't. It wouldn't be great, certainly. But I think it would be fine. All right.

We are going to wrap there for Scott and Chris. I am Frank. Thanks as always for tuning in some fantasy baseball today. please make sure to follow and leave a five-star rating on Apple or Spotify, and we will be back again next week. Bye-bye. Paramount Podcasts.