The theme of this edition of my corner infielder rankings is simple: everyone’s amazing. In short, I felt compelled to move a number of players up, not down, which meant a lot of meaningful contributors that I would be happy to roster fell off or down the list. But my overall feeling about the corner infielder positions is a positive one. In other words, they’re so deep that they’re spilling over with talent.

That also made ranking players quite difficult. For instance, I’m super excited about the resurgence of Joey Votto, and I think I buy the changes he has made more than Kyle Seager‘s (more on them below). But weighing my expectations against their year-to-date performance — where Seager has outshined Votto — was difficult. Ultimately, I put Seager six spots ahead of Votto, but I still haven’t fully convinced myself that he’s better. That’s just one example, but it goes to show that you should be happy rostering a lot of guys in the 30s and 40s and, in some cases, they could easily leapfrog those currently ranking above them in my next set of rankings.

Ranking players is particularly difficult in a 60-game season. Typically, I avoid playing the hot hand, instead choosing to stick with my stars. If I bench Pete Alonso for Jesús Aguilar, and then Alonso ends his rut by hitting two homers that night, I would feel foolish.

I’m not implying that, by any means, I prefer Aguilar to Alonso. But hot and cold streaks are real and, in such a short season, we have to take advantage of them to be successful.

As a result, I decided to shake things up in this edition of my corner infielder rankings.