2018 Fantasy Baseball Draft Prep: Adrian Beltre is - somehow - the most underrated player in Fantasy
Adrian Beltre's Fantasy appeal has taken a hit over the last year, and rightly so. The 38-year-old is deservedly being dinged for his age, because by this point most players have long since passed the point of Fantasy relevance.
He's also being dinged for his injury-plagued 2017, and rightly so. After playing at least 143 games in five straight seasons, soft-muscle injuries to his calf and hamstring limited him to just 94 games. At his age, Beltre is going to be a perpetual injury risk, and the Rangers are already talking about getting him more time at DH to manage that.
Beltre carries more than his share of red flags. And, after being drafted in the fourth-through-sixth round range a year ago, it makes sense that we would discount him given those red flags. But the Fantasy community has gone too far, overcorrecting to the point where, despite those red flags, Beltre is a bargain at his current price.
That price is somewhere in the 12th round, on average, in a 12-team league. Scott White called Beltre one of the 12 best Draft Day values in a column last week, but I want to highlight him, to really drive the point home. Beltre is currently being taken as the 19th third baseman off the board on average based on consensus ADP , and even if you account for players who might be used at other positions thanks to multi-eligibility, he still peaks at 15th.
Beltre is risky, yes, but we actually haven't seen much of a decline in his skill set. As this chart of Beltre's triple-slash batting lines since leaving Seattle shows, he was basically the same guy he has always been in 2017:
If you project his 2017 production out to 150 games, he would have finished with 27 homers, 113 RBI, and 75 runs scored, pretty much in line with where he's been the last few years. When he was on the field, Adrian Beltre was still Adrian Beltre, and the underlying batted ball and contact numbers back that up, too.
Which is to say, he was one of the best hitters in baseball yet again. Only six third basemen had a higher OPS than Beltre in 2017, and his 150-game pace of 188 RBI+R would have been good for fourth at the position. His age gives him some risk of the bottom just falling out, but we haven't seen any sign of a decline in his skill set, and I'm not going to project a gigantic dropoff yet either.
However, even if we acknowledge that Beltre carries a large amount of risk due to his age and last season's injuries, he isn't exactly alone in that regard. In fact, from his No. 19 spot in ADP at the position to the No. 9 spot, I would say nearly every player carries significant red flags:
No. 19: Beltre -- Injuries, age
No. 18: Jake Lamb -- Platoon issues, second-half struggles, Humidor
No. 17: Marwin Gonzalez -- Limited track record
No. 16: Kyle Seager -- Limited upside
No. 15: Mike Moustakas -- Bad lineup, limited track record
No. 14: Joey Gallo -- Limited track record, strikeout rate
No. 13: Nick Castellanos -- Bad lineup, limited track record
No. 12: Miguel Sano -- Injuries, off-field concerns, strikeout rate
No. 11: Rafael Devers -- Limited track record
No. 10: Travis Shaw -- Limited track record
No. 9: Justin Turner -- Age, injuries, limited track record
Some of these concerns are smaller than others, to be sure. For instance, Travis Shaw's limited track record isn't much of a red flag to me given his home park and lineup; Kyle Seager's upside may not be as limited as the Fantasy community seems to think -- he hit .278-89-30-99-3 in 2016.
But the key here is, of these players, only Turner was better than Beltre on a per-game basis in 2017. And none of them has a track record over the last decade that even comes close to Beltre's. His red flags have to carry a lot of weight to drop him this low at the position, and once you start going through the players individually, it doesn't make much sense.
Are Miguel Sano and Rafael Devers really that much more likely to be better hitters than Adrian Beltre in 2018? I suppose it's possible, but the smart money -- and projection systems -- are on Beltre's side here. And are they really that much less risky? Sano has played more than 129 games as a professional once, had offseason surgery, and came into camp reportedly overweight. Devers is an elite talent but is just 21, with one minor-league campaign with an OPS over an .800 OPS in 100-plus games. A sophomore slump is entirely possible.
All of this is to say, Beltre carries just as much upside -- and just as much risk -- as guys being drafted six rounds ahead of him at the same position. Let people be scared off him. It'll be their loss, because Beltre looks like the best value on the board right now.
Draft him everywhere. I know I am.