I always remember one line from The Shawshank Redemption when Andy said: “How can you be so obtuse?” In fantasy baseball, we often have implicit bias and cling to old biases, name value, or even general consensus when we value players. We even sometimes stubbornly refuse to see it when it’s staring us in the face. I am guilty. Most of us are guilty. What is value anyway?
Value is the amount of worth or utility something provides versus the price paid to acquire it. Warren Buffett said, “Price is what you pay. Value is what you get”. We can take this simple definition a step further to illustrate how “obtuse” it can be. Philip Fisher, who Buffett studied, said “The market is filled with individuals who know the price of everything but the value of nothing”. While this relates to the stock market, it easily translates to fantasy sports. Value is relative to something else and a perception that becomes much more concrete when we use data to quantify it. We will use the Razzball Player Rater as our guide.
I’m going to play a valuation game with you to show value or lack thereof. Stay with me. I will list random players without revealing names, provide their respective stats and other info, and then show player ratings. You can play along by: not cheating (don’t go to the Player Rater yet), reading what I wrote, and guessing the random player(s). I will show ADPs to tie it together. You can find player names at the end of the article or just go to the Player Rater if you’re brimming with excitement! Here we go…
A Few Notes
Stats shown are through August 28. I pulled the player ratings on August 29 for 12-team standard format leagues. ADP is based on an average of 6 platforms (Yahoo, CBS, RTS, NFBC, FT and ESPN).
Are You Serious Clark
Player A is in his age-27 season, which is generally considered the sabermetric peak. Grey recommended him as a player to target. Did any of you listen? Unfortunately, I did not. He had a career OPS of .742 coming into this year with a .268 career BA and 48 big-league HRs over 414 games played (1541 PAs). He is posting a career-high EV and hard-hit rate. His BA is in line with last year, so it did not come out of nowhere. He is leading the league in doubles and is second in RBIs on top of his other exceptional stats.
Player B is a future hall-of-famer and is currently fourth on the active career home run list. He is a two-time MVP, a perennial top 50 pick, and recently moved back to the outfield. I probably gave it away already. No surprise where he is ranked.
Player C is a true wildcard. I’ll borrow a Clark Griswold line and say “If I woke up tomorrow with my head sewn to the carpet, I wouldn’t be more surprised.” Coming into this season he had a career OPS of .672 and a 29% K rate with 58 career HRs in almost 2000 PAs over 6 seasons. I am guilty of not appreciating what he has done. I still don’t believe it. I dismissed it and did not think it would continue, and neither did THE BAT X or ATC projections that I used to develop my ROS rankings. His wOBA is .386 vs an xwOBA of .374. His Statcast chart is mostly red. He is posting a career-high EV and has a 22% HR/FB rate. He’s having a career year and will be a free agent after this season.
Hint: All three of these guys qualify at 1B/OF.
Holy Shnikes
Player A is finally getting playing time with a new team. He once had 26 SBs in 99 games played and has reached at least 25 SBs three times in his career with his 99th percentile sprint speed. He never hit more than 8 HRs until this year and only played 100 or more games in a season twice in his 6-year career. He plays in one of the most hitter-friendly environments in baseball (.877 home OPS). He is just 77% owned in Yahoo, which is a travesty. Maybe his former team and manager should have let him face LHP (reverse splits this season) and given him more playing time. Perhaps they wouldn’t have had to trade for an OF if they kept him.
Player B does not turn 25 until September. He is nearly a 6-WAR player in 2026 and has shown some power growth. He already has matched his career high in HRs with about one month to play. He is tied for second in the majors in doubles (32) and plays in a favorable park (top 10 in park factor over the last 3 years). He is a converted infielder who has already won a Gold Glove and was selected to his first All-Star game this season.
Player C just turned 26 years old and is in his fourth big-league season if we exclude a cup of coffee from a few years ago. He is electric on the field. While he isn’t performing poorly, I think it’s fair to say we all expected more from him this year. He is a triples machine and a former ROY winner, a 3-time All-Star who swiped over 50 bags in a season. He has a 25/50, a 20/30 and a 30/30 season on his resume.
Rrreally
Player A is in his fifth year in the league. He is a former ROY winner. After playing only 110 games in 2024 due to injury and hitting only .249 in 2025, he is back on track this year and has hit a career high in HRs with a little under 30 games remaining. His SBs are down this year versus 2025, but he is a former 20/20 player. Not that sprint speed is everything, but it’s been trending the wrong way from a high of 95% down to 55% this year. He is only 25 years old, so this is somewhat concerning to me.
Player B just set his career high in HRs (23) as I am typing my write up; it is not reflected in the table above. His splits have improved considerably against left-handed pitching (reverse splits this year). As a two-time Gold Glove winner, he currently leads the league in outfield assists after leading the league in that category in 2025. He also plays in a favorable home park that has historically been in the top 10 in park factor.
Player C is 23 years old and is in the top 10 in average exit velocity. He had a pretty rough start to the year but has been much better after the calendar flipped to June. Since June 1 he has hit .315 with 18 HRs and 55 RBIs with a 155 wRC+ and also reduced his strikeout rate from 30.8% to 22.9% over the same period (70 games). The arrow is pointing up. The one glaring drawback is his supporting cast, which beyond one superstar is a mixed bag of upside and disappointment and includes a fair share of nimrods.
I Don’t Believe You
Player A is a rookie who will likely receive some ROY votes. Vegas has him 3rd. He’s 23 years old and was a first-round pick in 2024 (19th overall). He is on pace for a 20/23 season. The former two-way player in college has 9 outfield assists (4th in MLB). It’s kind of amazing that his organization somehow drafted him, he actually turned out to be good, or they haven’t traded him away before he became a good player.
Player B is in his second season and became relevant last year over the second half. He is 23 years old and is building on a productive initial campaign. He won player of the month last year in Sep when he hit .391 with 6 HRs and a 1.212 OPS. He plays on a young team that is leading the league in runs scored. He was a sleeper of Grey’s. While his BA and OBP are down this year, he has hit 10 of his 18 HRs since July 1 (50 games) and is really starting to warm up.
Player C is an elite fantasy player known for slow starts. He is a superstar, but has never put together a full season of elite production although the numbers are usually there at the end. He is only 25 years old, a 3-time All-Star, a ROY winner, and has two 20/20 and two 30/30 seasons under his belt. This one is self-explanatory. The final two months of the year have historically been his most productive ones. Prior to this season, his career OPS in Aug and Sep/Oct was .926 and .917. His OPS in Aug is .681 this year. He is behind schedule and has his work cut out for him if he’s going to come close to his usual lofty numbers.
Mother Of God
Player A is on track to put together one of the statistically worst 20/20 seasons that you will ever see. He’s been moved down to the 7th or 8th spot in the order. Just looking at his stats is a dead giveaway to me, but that’s because I drafted this lump. I sure can pick them. Not sure why I drafted him. I was looking for some steals and thought he could rebound after a down season in 2025 following a career year in 2024. To his credit, he picked it up a little in the second half, but the bar was extremely low after hitting an abysmal .194 in the first half.
Player B is not a star. He lacks name value and power, and gets dinged for his park, but he’s been more productive than you think. His home park hurts him, but he has a .823 OPS on the road. He’s not going to hit a ton of HRs, but BA is a category and he can provide that along with some counting stats and is fine as a 5th OF.
Player C is probably not a surprise either. Sorry for not building the excitement with this one, but it’s depressing to watch and talk about. Yes, I have this guy too in a dynasty format. He is a 4-time All-Star and was nearly a 30/30 player two times. He has eclipsed 100 RBIs twice in his big-league career. He is 29 years old and should be in his prime. He was projected to hit in the middle of what looked like a loaded lineup. Barring an injury, what could possibly go wrong? I can think of sixty million reasons why I never will want to draft him in redraft format again.
Surely You Can’t Be Serious…
Now we finally get to the big reveal. I am sure many of you guessed a good chunk of these. Some of you probably didn’t read anything and just jumped to the bottom, and that’s okay too. I realize that I’m writing about fantasy baseball when everybody and their mother is reading about fantasy football, so others probably saw this column and punted. ‘Tis the season.
Are You Serious Clark: A = Alec Burleson, B = Bryce Harper, C = Jake Bauers
Holy Shnikes: A = Jake McCarthy, B = Ceddanne Rafaela, C = Corbin Carroll
Rrreally: A = Michael Harris II, B = Wilyer Abreu, C = Jac Caglianone
I Don’t Believe You: A = Carson Benge, B = Daylen Lile, C = Julio Rodriguez
Mother Of God: A = Jarren Duran, B = Jung Hoo Lee, C = Kyle Tucker
Thanks for playing. You can find me on X at @Toolsy3.
