This will be the last installment of this column for 2015. We've officially entered the Catastrophic Countdown phase of the season, so some of you may need to throw caution to the wind and get even more granular. At this point, names and track records don't really matter. Take production anywhere you can find it.

Editor’s Note: to read about even more waiver wire options for first base and third base, be sure to check out our famous waiver wire pickups list which is a running list that is updated daily.

First Base / Third Base Waiver Wire for Week 26

Trevor Plouffe (1B/3B, MIN) - 38 percent owned

Plouffe has run hot and cold all season, with 200+ point swings in his OPS each month. Fortunately for owners looking for a bat to stream, he's on the hot side of the pendulum these days. Over the last two weeks, Plouffe has hit three homers while accruing 17 R+RBI to go along with an excellent .307/.368/.558 line. His potent bat has helped the Twins stay alive in the race for the second AL wild card spot, and it can do the same for your fantasy squad. That is, providing you're in one of the nearly two-thirds of Yahoo leagues in which Plouffe is still sitting on the wire.

Marcus Semien (2B/3B/SS, OAK) - 28 percent

A brutal early-summer swoon has dragged down Semien's overall numbers, but he's still proven useful to those in deeper and AL-only leagues. After all, he can be plugged in at three infield spots (including both MI positions) and has managed double-digit homers and steals. Semien has also recovered nicely from that aforementioned rough patch, with an .819 OPS since August 1. We've talked before about how useful multi-position players can be down the stretch - here's a textbook example.

Steve Pearce (1B/2B/OF, BAL) - 25 percent

And here's another. Pearce's breakout last season had some fantasy owners betting on a repeat performance this time around. I wasn't among them, and Pearce struggled enough in the first two months that he was played sparingly even before suffering an oblique injury. In recent days, however, he's flashed that elusive 2014 form. Over the past two weeks, he sports a .268/.348/.659 line with four homers and 18 R+RBI. The Orioles may not have anything to play for, but nobody seems to have told this guy.

Travis Shaw (1B, BOS) - 9 percent

A rare bright spot in what's been a challenging season for the Red Sox, Shaw has hit .288/.354/.522 with 11 homers in 184 at-bats since being promoted to the Show. He's knocked in 10 runs in the last two weeks while posting a .943 OPS. A degree of skepticism is understandable given his unspectacular minor league numbers, but the guy's tearing it up right now. There's no reason he should still be floating around the waiver wire in over 90 percent of leagues. Any team still playing can use numbers like that.

Justin Bour (1B, MIA) - 7 percent

A lot of the paragraph above can be applied to Bour. He's another guy with a Quad-A profile whose solid year is an outlier on a disappointing team. Bour has totaled eight homers and 25 RBI in the past month of action, and half of those bombs were hit in the last nine games. He's emerged as a potential solution for the Marlins' persistent black hole at first base.

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