Kuzul

Third base is one of the toughest positions to predict as we head into 2011.  Even at the top of the rankings there are a ton of questions, but as you get into the middle of the pack you really just don’t know what to expect.  Let’s take a look at how things currently look, but it is almost a certainty that these will get shuffled as the offseason progresses:

1. Evan Longoria – Tampa Bay Rays
2. Alex Rodriguez – New York Yankees
3. Ryan Zimmerman – Washington Nationals
4. David Wright – New York Mets
5. Michael Young – Texas Rangers
6. Jose Bautista – Toronto Blue Jays
7. Aramis Ramirez – Chicago Cubs
8. Adrian Beltre – Boston Red Sox
9. Pedro Alvarez – Pittsburgh Pirates
10. Martin Prado – Atlanta Braves
11. Pablo Sandoval – San Francisco Giants
12. Mark Reynolds – Arizona Diamondbacks
13. Casey McGehee – Milwaukee Brewers
14. Scott Rolen – Cincinnati Reds
15. Ian Stewart – Colorado Rockies

Thoughts:

• A shallow position got a lot shallower in 2010, with people like Kevin Youkilis and Chone Figgins losing eligibility.
• Can Jose Bautista possibly replicate his 2010 success?  It certainly appears to be highly unlikely at this point.  I’ll really dig into my thoughts on him as we get closer to drafts, but I have a huge fear that he could go “homer happy”, given his 54.5% fly ball rate in 2010.  With the tremendous number of strikeouts, if the ball starts to fall short, his average is going to suffer.  It was a magical year, but with there being a good chance he falls to the 35 HR range, and the potential for him to struggle with his average, he’s not a Top 5 option for me.
• Can Alex Rodriguez stay healthy?  That’s the big question, though we know he’s going to produce even in limited at bats (125 RBI in 522 AB in ‘10).  He’s getting older at age 35, so his days as one of the top 3B are probably limited.  Still, with his upside, it’s hard to argue selecting him for one year.  If he’s healthy he could be the top third baseman in the league, but he hasn’t played in more then 138 games in the past three years.  Still, it’s hard to pick against him.
• You can almost jumble No. 7 through 12 any way you want depending on your risk tolerance.  Can Pablo Sandoval and Mark Reynolds rebound?  Will Adrian Beltre repeat his success?  Will Pedro Alvarez take the next step?  There are certainly a lot of question marks.
• I gave my projection of Michael Young recently, supporting why he’s a Top 5 option.  Make sure you read it for yourself by clicking here.
• If Ryan Zimmerman had stayed healthy in 2010, we could be talking about his second consecutive 30/100/100 season.  That probably would change your opinion on him, wouldn’t it?  Of course, the potential loss of Adam Dunn has to be taken into account, bringing down his value slightly.  The debate between him, Rodriguez and David Wright is going to be one that goes on all offseason.  We will surely revisit this in the coming weeks, but Zimmerman definitely has the potential to leapfrog Rodriguez in these rankings.  In keeper leagues, it’s an easy call.

What are your thoughts on these rankings?  Whose too high?  Whose too low?

Make sure to check out our early 2011 rankings:

• Top 15 Catchers
• Top 15 First Basemen
• Top 15 Second Basemen
• 2011 Fantasy Draft First Round Breakdown

THIS ARTICLE IS ALSO FEATURED ON WWW.ROTOPROFESSOR.COM

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As a diehard Rays fan, last night’s Game 5 loss hurt especially hard.  Yes, it was an elimination game that ended what I thought would be a season ending with the World Series coming to Tampa.  

But it also means the likely end to 1B Carlos Pena, LF Carlos Crawford and closer Rafael Soriano.

Crawford—the heart and face of the franchise for the past nine seasons, will likely (and rightfully so) seek greener pastures next season.  But contrary to popular belief, the Rays will be just fine come next season. 

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The ALDS series between the Tampa Bay Rays and the Texas Rangers started when the Rangers Cliff Lee outdueled the Rays David Price.  Twenty-four hours later, the Rays fell again behind James Shields to the Rangers and C.J. Wilson.  In fact, the Rays only had one run in the first two games at Tropicana Field, via Ben Zobrist‘s solo homer in Game 1. 

Then, the series went off to Arlington, Texas.  The Rangers wanted to close out the series in front of the home crowd.  Colby Lewis tried to advance the Rangers, while Matt Garza tried to save the Rays season.  Garza prevailed, pushing a Game 4.  Tommy Hunter tried again to win in Texas, but Wade Davis pitched a gem to defeat the Rangers 5-2. 

Now, the Rangers are feeling the pressure.  The Rays have momentum, and the advantage of the home crowd for Game 5.  The pitching matchup is a rematch of the Game 1 starters, Cliff Lee vs David Price.  Lee won the first match, but David Price is a Cy Young candidate, and will most likely bounce back. 

The Rangers’ bullpen has been real busy in Games 3 and 4, while the Rays have total depth in the pen.  If Cliff Lee gets into any trouble, the Rangers have a tired bullpen, while the Rays are well-rested and have plenty more arms.  Lefty Derek Holland probably won’t be seen out on the mound tomorrow, as he pitched 4.2 innings combined in Games 3 and 4, four of those innings in Game 4. 

The Rays lineup looked lackluster in Games 1 and 2, while the Rangers offense was surging.  However, this completely turned around in Games 3 and 4.  The Rays offense went on a tear, including Evan Longoria going 3-4 with a homer, and B.J. Upton, Carlos Pena, and Ben Zobrist all collecting two hits.

The Rays have offensive momentum, and have field flexibility.  Several players, including Reid Brignac, Ben Zobrist, and Sean Rodriguez being able to play several positions.  The Rays have offensive depth, and a smart manager in Joe Maddon.

Is home field advantage good or bad for the Rays?  The Rays offense was sluggish in Games 1 and 2 home at the Trop, but they picked up at Texas.  The Rangers were dominant at the Trop, but fell in Texas.  Will the road team win yet again?  Or will the home team win the series for their crowd?

Overall, I’d have to give the Game 5 edge to the Rays.  The Rays have all the momentum, which probably won’t disappear at home.  The Rays offense is going good for them, and David Price is ready to rebound.  The Rays offense will have a tough time versus Cliff Lee, and the game will probably end up being a pitchers duel.  I believe that David Price will come out on top this time.

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The playoffs are here yet again boys and girls and that means raucous crowds, high pressure situations, and games that start after my bedtime.

The divisional series crank up Wednesday night with three exciting games on tap to fill your hearts with joy.

So sit back, relax, and let the wave of playoff baseball rush over you, here is what you can expect in terms of each match-up in the divisional round of these 2010 playoffs.

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As the Tampa Bay Rays prepare to begin their 2010 post-season quest, they are not wide eyed, or star glazed.  This isn’t their first rodeo.  Their first postseason experience opened their eyes. 

They are ready.  They are hungry for more.  Last time they made it to the big dance.  This time they want to be the last ones standing.

If the Rays are to get as far as they did in 2008, they will need to ride the coattails of third year star third baseman Evan Longoria.  Here are 10 reasons why Longoria will lead his team back to the promised land.

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The playoffs are when legends are made. You can be a great player in the regular season, but if you fail in the playoffs, then you will be served a cold dish of doubt and ridicule.

Nobody wants to be Mr. May.

Just ask Alex Rodriguez. Until last year he was considered Mr. Regular Season, a choke artist, a joke, and overpaid. He still may be overpaid, but he has a ring on his finger to keep him happy.

Every year there are a new crop of players with something to prove, either to themselves or to the baseball world in order to solidify their stance in the history of the game.

Here are the players with the most to prove in this postseason.

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National pundits are piling on the Tampa Bay Rays after two of its star players, Evan Longoria and David Price, expressed displeasure at the team attracting only 12,446 fans to their Monday night game against the Baltimore Orioles, a possible playoff-clincher.

That’s pretty much the typical Baltimore Orioles game on a school-year Monday night at home. If the Rays were still a bad team, they’d be lucky to draw 9,000 on that day against that team.

But the so-called attendance woes of the Rays are really not as bad as they look. While average attendance is down 77 people per game (yes, that’s individual people; the percentage loss is about 0.3%), they still upped their rank in the AL to 9th out of 14 teams. That’s up from their 11th-place attendance finish in 2009. Even in 2008 they finished 12th out of 14.

The Rays haven’t ranked this high since their inaugural season, when they ranked 7th.

And just because people are not attending games as much as the national pundits claim they should, doesn’t mean fans don’t care.

This summer, an article from the Sports Business Journal showed the Rays at 7th among all 30 MLB teams in both radio and TV ratings at the 2010 All-Star Break, with a 14.4% increase in radio and a 70.9% increase in TV. In terms of total numbers of households watching games, the Rays were 8th overall with just short of 100,000 households tuning in on average.

Plus, give the numbers some historical context. Just 40 years ago, owners would kill for the 22,900 per game the Rays are drawing in 2010. Only one team drew more than that in 1970: the New York Mets, who drew 32,000 per game coming off their miracle World Series season.

In 1960, only two teams drew more than the Rays did in 2010. And the Yankees and Red Sox weren’t among them.

The reason why the Rays’ numbers look so bad now is because of the economics of sports today. With players’ salaries sky high, it takes selling out the stadium every single game just to pay their salaries. The situation would only be made worse if a new stadium were added to the mix, since that would put a premium on ticket prices.

Some pundits are even bringing up the draconian solution of relocation. And relocation, as in out of Tampa Bay, not merely to Tampa.

The problem with that is, relocation to where? Such a move would require three years’ lead time because nobody has an MLB-class stadium that doesn’t already have an MLB team. And Tampa Bay is among the largest media markets in America. Who can give the Rays a better situation at this current time?

There are two fixes to this, and they’re really quite simple.

First, the Rays need to run a string of consecutive playoff appearances.

What made the Atlanta Braves a power in the 1990s was the fact that they were a virtual lock for the playoffs every single year for 14 straight seasons.

Atlanta is really not much bigger than the Tampa Bay area. In 1990, the last of the “Rotten Years”, they drew only 12,000 per game. In 1991, it doubled to 26,000. That was followed by consecutive year-over-year increases of 10,000 per game in 1992 and 1993.

One of the reasons that didn’t happen in Tampa Bay is a perfect storm of bad economics (the housing bubble hit Florida particularly hard) and not making the playoffs in 2009. If the Rays can build a winning tradition, which will be difficult in the American League East, it will attract permanent business. 

Second, the team needs to move to Tampa.

The fact of the matter is, the biggest problem with the Rays is the location of their stadium, Tropicana Field. That was a big issue with the MLB’s expansion plans.  Although many claim they hate Tropicana Field (which has really improved in appearance considerably under Stuart Sternberg’s ownership), the biggest problem is its location.

The unique geography of Tampa Bay makes getting around very difficult. It’s 20 miles from downtown Tampa to downtown St. Petersburg, where Tropicana Field is. And downtown Tampa is the closest place to its side of the Howard Frankland Bridge, the main link between the two.

If you’re from the larger population bases north and east of Tampa, it’s an additional 10+ miles. People who live on the other side of the bay are faced with a 45-minute drive. This is complicated by the traffic bottleneck on the Tampa side of the bridge. A fix is expected to be opened in 2011.

To the pundits who say the drive doesn’t matter, I challenge them this: You try driving through Tampa at 5:30 PM on a weekday.

The best place for the Rays to be is on the Tampa side of the metro area. This goes against what I said about a new stadium being a problem, but cutting 30 minutes each way–and a minimum of two gallons of gas–out of the drive to the stadium will attract a large bump in attendance by itself, bringing more fans from Tampa and Orlando.

Add a retractable roof, and people will be even more likely to come. The Minnesota Twins got an attendance bump of over 11,000 per game at their new open-air stadium, Target Field, a bump that will likely stick with the team’s new-found success. This is also the bump the Florida Marlins are hoping for when they open their new stadium in 2012.

The smell of real grass will do that.

The Tampa Bay Rays do have fans. They are just unable or unwilling to make the sacrifices that are necessary given the reality of the team’s location. This had been compounded by the fact that the previous ownership spent their first 10 seasons not investing in a team worthy of the fans’ commitment.

But when the team is good, the fans do come. The Rays’ situation is a far cry from being the worst in the sport anymore. And if 2008 proved anything, it’s that the fans will come when the title is at stake.

It will take time, and perhaps a little help, but Tampa Bay can and will support baseball.

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The Philadelphia Phillies are the hottest playoff team in baseball right now, sporting the MLB’s best record at 94-63. They are 8-2 in their last 10 games and recently had an 11-game winning streak. They are playing outstanding baseball and look to be in postseason form, and have also clinched their fourth consecutive NL East title.

With the Phillies playing this well, can they be stopped? They have been to the past two World Series, and won it all in 2008. It will take a lot for a team to stop the Phillies once the postseason starts.

The Phillies look like they will coast through the playoffs to another World Series. It is very possible that the World Series will be their first true challenge. With that being the case, lets look at 10 reasons the Tampa Bay Rays currently are the biggest threat to the Phillies.

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The rain knocked A.J. Burnett out of the game and the Yankees B-squad bullpen let them down as they lost at home 7-2 to the Tampa Bay Rays to drop to just 1.5 games up in first place.

Here are some highlights:

• Because of the rain, Burnett pitched just three innings and allowed only one run and got credit for the loss.
• The Yankees were fortunate that the rain knocked Wade Davis out of the game after he held them hitless over 2.1 innings, but they couldn’t take advantage it though as they scored just 2 runs in 6.2 innings off the bullpen.
• Derek Jeter and Lance Berkman lead the offense with 2 hits apiece. Berkman hit his 1st homer as a Yankee.
• The Yankees came within one-run of the lead twice, when it was 2-1 in the fifth and then when it was 3-2 in the sixth.
• David Robertson was unavailable last night because of back pains. MRI’s came back negative.
• Joe Girardi loves Chad Gaudin and Gaudin cost the Yankees yet again as he allowed back-to-back home runs to Carl Crawford and Evan Longoria in the seventh. The Yankees were trailing 3-2 at that point.

This is a game where the Yankees probably could have won, but Girardi went to the B-squad relievers in order to avoid burning out the big guys he’s going to have to lean on in the playoffs. It’s hard to watch these games, but it’s hard to argue with that tactic since it appears the Yankees will easily make the playoffs.

Their magic number to clinch a playoff spot is down to three. They can clinch as early as tomorrow against the Red Sox.

Related Stories

• August 30, 2010 — Yankees: Worst Rotation, Best Bullpen Last 30 Days
• September 12, 2010 — Yet Another Walk-Off
• August 30, 2010 — Yankees Notes: A-Rod, Burnett, Berkman, and Matchups
• August 28, 2010 — Yankees Notes: Burnett, Pettitte, Aceves, Berkman, and Nova

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