Dynasty Draft Guide: Rankings Omnibus for 2021 Fantasy Baseball

I’ve been looking forward to this post for a while.

The shut down threw the content-creation world one hell of a curveball. Many outlets have been using the dead time to catch up on unfinished 2020 organizational prospect rankings, but I completed Razzball’s back in January, so I moved on to another large project I didn’t have the winter minutes to complete but spun it forward to next season, ranking just about everyone across each position from a long-term perspective. 

Got some push back early. “So we’re just skipping to next season? smdh”

But I kept riding through the Wild West of dynasty baseball’s future, mapping middle-aged aces alongside yet-to-be-drafted youngsters. This led to wonderful conversations with Razzball’s brilliant readers, who helped me build a set of rankings I hope we can all use to find fantasy fun and glory in the seasons to come. 

I’m proud of this project, thrilled to be working with so many smart fantasy players, and eager to distill the past few months of work into this one post. Can’t wait to keep chatting and building with you all! Happy scrolling!

CATCHER

Easy enough to keep pace behind the plate on late draft picks and hustle in the framing era, but winds of change seem imminent as the robots creep. No matter who or what is calling balls and strikes, catchers seem unlikely to steal bases or play huge game slates. We’re probably safe to continue fading the position.

FIRST BASE

First base seems wide open to me. Some are paying a premium for perceived safety in a landscape that can look barren from a desert-at-sunset angle. I tend to just tread water in whatever low-rent oasis I can find. For example, I traded for Edwin Encarnacion and Joc Pederson in separate leagues this winter. It’s not a great example. The Pederson deal happened in a 30-team, orphan scenario. Orphan means I took over an abandoned team. Zero humans were left parent-less in the process.

SECOND BASE

Luiz Arraez.

Not a typo. I really wanted to just leave it like that. But this position is loaded. The days of taking whatever Lemke you can find are long gone. Get speed here or go the way of the Lemmer.

THIRD BASE

I might have Jose Ramirez too low. I might have Austin Martin too low. Tommy Edman, too. And Jeff McNeil. Third base feels weird to me. I got lambasted for my Alex Bregman ranking. Might deserve it if they ever play baseball again, especially now that he seems unlikely to be the face of baseball evil in a world that’s just happy to have baseball. I wonder if Manfred would actually drop the hammer on anyone caught cheating after this current brush with existence? Sorry, drifting. Third base. Very deep. A lot of corner infielders will come from first base, which makes this perhaps the easiest position to competitively fill in even the deepest leagues.

SHORTSTOP

Your minor league squad should have lots of shortstops. Ideally shortstops with functional speed.

So should your big league squad. Money is everywhere at the six. I might rank Tatis 2nd in my overalls.

Sorry, that’s overall dynasty rankings, auction edition.

That’ll be a fun Sunday.

OUTFIELDERS

Your minor league squad should be stacked up with outfielders. I adopted one orphaned team in a league where one team had almost all of the speed/power/hit outfielders. My team didn’t have any. Supply and demand is a powerful thing, and stolen bases are not in abundant supply.

STARTING PITCHERS

You can’t just fade all pitching prospects and win, but also, you absolutely can. Almost. Nothing’s as simple as the overarching principle. TINSTAAP is not a mandate. It’s just a reminder that pitching is a craft, so while prospects do gain value when they succeed, they’re up against a league full of world-class athletes who are just one or two skill-gains or slight tweaks away from being elite. It’s good to keep in mind something like There’s No Such Thing As A Pitching Prospect because it reminds us that pedigree or velocity do not determine the ultimate score at this position, which means reading and watching and researching and believing our findings can reward us as fantasy players in pretty extreme ways. Gotta hustle and take leaps of faith like you wouldn’t anywhere else. One example is trading pitching that creates a momentary weakness because you’re trusting you’ll find more.

RELIEF PITCHERS

I’m not sure what the right number of relief pitcher add/drops in a standard roto dynasty leagues, but I know it’s a lot. It matters who the players are of course, but it matters more that we keep spots open for relief pitcher speculation plays. Closers come from crazy places.

Thanks for reading!

Stay safe out there.

I’m @theprospectitch on Twitter and reddit.