I’ve always had better luck in Strat-O-Matic than in fantasy leagues, because there are always value considerations in fantasy that I will never understand as well as Eric Karabell or Tristan Cockcroft or Matthew Berry do. But I always like to peruse ESPN’s player rankings to spot opportunity and try to find the spots where a player might be ranked too high or too low based on what I’ve heard from evaluators.
I’m working with the advantage of the calendar: The rankings were released three weeks ago, and in the interim, Max Scherzer figured out a way to pitch without full use of the ring finger on his pitching hand, Adam Jones owned the WBC and hundreds of exhibition games were played. Aaron Sanchez developed a blister, the concern over Bryce Harper was eased by his spring showing and the Giants’ worry over Matt Cain has probably climbed.
So with the benefit of three more weeks of gathered intelligence, here are some of the respectful disagreements I have with the Top 300 rankings.
1. Greg Bird, 1B, New York Yankees — No. 228 in head-to-head categories leagues: Way too low