March 10, 2018

RotoBaller's updated third base rankings, tiers and auction values for the 2018 fantasy baseball season. Our final preseason mixed league draft rankings for 3B.

With the regular season blessedly just a few weeks away, it's time for the RotoBaller staff to update our rankings one last time. We continue our review of the March update with a look at the third base position.

There's a ton of talent at the hot corner this season, with the usual elites at the top and several intriguing players in the lower tiers. You can find my analysis below, breaking down each tier of our staff's consensus third base rankings.

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2018 Fantasy Baseball Tiered Rankings: Third Base (March)

Tier 1

Nolan Arenado is the undisputed king here, and there's a strong argument for taking him third overall after Mike Trout and Jose Altuve. Peep his average line over the last three years: 159 games, .297 AVG, 40 HR, 104 R, 131 RBI. Kris Bryant is amazing; he simply lags slightly behind Arenado in all of the standard cats besides stolen bases, and the 8 – 10 swipes you’re likely to get from the Cubs’ superstar can’t make up those gaps. Freddie Freeman missed seven weeks with a broken wrist but still ranked in the top 10 at the position last year. Finally, Manny Machado hit 33 homers and drove in 95 runs in a down year, and projections expect him to bounce back in 2018. 

Tier 2

The second tier is hardly a step down from the first, as it's composed of Jose Ramirez and Josh Donaldson. Ramirez followed up his breakout 2016 with an even better performance last year, hitting well above .300 again while nearly tripling his home run total and increasing his run production. Some regression in the power department may be on the horizon, but he’s still a five-category monster at age 25. Donaldson was a stone-cold stud in the two seasons prior to 2017, and even last year he hit 33 HR in only 113 games despite an early-season injury and a major slump in the middle portion of the season.

Tier 3

Throwing out the injury-truncated 2015 campaign, Rendon has produced a .286-22-94-89-12 average line since breaking out in 2014. He was one of only five hitters to walk more often than he struck out last year. The others: Trout, Joey Votto, Anthony Rizzo, and another guy in this group, Justin Turner. For as easy as power is to come by these days, Turner belongs to another rather exclusive group; he’s one of just 13 players who’s hit 40 homers or more while also batting at least .295 over the last two seasons. Alex Bregman was excellent in his first full season and will hit second in a stacked Astros lineup, plus he's got shortstop eligibility. I liked Travis Shaw coming into last season as a value play, and he exceeded those expectations. In his first year with Milwaukee, Shaw was one of just 11 players to produce a 30 HR/10 SB season. He also finished 17th in baseball with 101 RBI

Tier 4

This tier is bookended by the oldest third baseman in the league (Adrian Beltre) and the youngest (Rafael Devers). Beltre remains awesome at 39, and though he managed only 94 games last season, he was his typically excellent self in those contests. Devers ought to be higher in this tier, but Jeff Kahntroff hates him for some reason. Consider that Devers hit .284/.338/.482 as a 20-year-old rookie who hadn’t had a single at-bat above A-ball coming into 2017. The rest of this group all carries some variety of concern: Mike Moustakas' lousy team, Miguel Sano's impending suspension, the impact of the Chase Field humidor on Jake Lamb, Matt Carpenter's shoulder being held together by toothpicks and chewing gum, or Kyle Seager probably being mad that he isn't the best baseball player in his own family now.

Tier 5

A quartet of extremely interesting options, plus Evan Longoria. In the fifth tier! Third base is crazy deep, folks. Nick Castellanos' profile features a lot to like, but the Tigers lineup is probably going to be awful, especially if Miguel Cabrera doesn't rebound. Joey Gallo will take your batting average into a dark alley and brutally murder it, but he's also going to help a lot in HR and run production while chipping in a handful of steals. Eugenio Suarez was almost as good as Lamb and better than Seager a year ago; he's a great value buy this season. Marwin Gonzalez made significant changes to both his swing mechanics and his plate approach last year, the culmination of years of gradual growth and development. He’s probably not going to put up a .900 OPS again, but he may not fall off all that much. He's also valuable thanks to being eligible everywhere but catcher. Longoria is boring but fine.

Tier 6

This seems low for a guy  who can play multiple positions and has hit .299 with 28 homers and 64 steals over the last two seasons, but here's where you'll find Eduardo Nunez. Scooter Gennett initially captured fantasy owners’ attention with a four-homer game in June, but he hit well enough all season to finish with a .295 average, 27 homers, 80 runs, and 97 RBI. Elsewhere in this group, you'll find a couple of low-average sluggers (Todd Frazier, Matt Chapman), an unknown quantity (Ryan McMahon), a kid entering a make-or-break season (Maikel Franco), and Ryon Healy (Ryon Healy).

Tier 7

The middling vets and top prospects tier. The most interesting name here is Nick Senzel, particularly since he's being getting reps at shortstop this spring. The former first-round pick has quickly risen through the Reds system and should be in the majors for good before too long. Most everyone else in this group shouldn't be more than a bench bat on your fantasy roster unless your league runs deep.

Tier 8

#FreeWilmerFlores

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