Fantasy baseball corner infielders

In Mixed Leagues, it has become clear to me that first base is, by far, the deepest position in fantasy baseball this year. It is not absurd to assume that by the end of the season, the three best fantasy hitters are all 1B (Paul Goldschmidt, Miguel Cabrera and Jose Abreu). If these three finish with 600 plate appearances, a line of .310/35/100/100 is likely.

The position becomes trickier to predict in the early to late teens, where I placed Mark Trumbo (OF eligible), Prince Fielder, Joey Votto and Chris Davis. Each of these four players missed a varying amount of time in 2014, but all could finish as top seven 1B by the end of this year, if healthy.

Toward the end of the top 20, Lucas Duda and Adam LaRoche stand out as sneaky .260/30/100 guys. No one thinks of them as top 10 1B, but with plenty of injury concerns ahead of them, both could quietly be major steals.

Adam Lind and Brandon Belt are two names outside of ESPN’s top 20 who I think could definitely put up big numbers. Lind had a line of .288/23/67/67 in 2013 and hit .321 in 96 games for Toronto last year. Belt was a popular fantasy pick in 2014, but he finished with just 235 plate appearances due to a serious concussion. He has fallen off some people’s radars, but he’s just 26, and a .280/20/75/75 line seems accurate.

In terms of a deep sleeper, I like Chris Colabello on Toronto. Justin Smoak is expected to start at 1B, but he has had endless opportunities to produce in full-time roles and never has. I see Colabello, who hit 24 HRs in 89 games in 2013 for the Twins AAA affiliate, as the leading Blue Jay 1B in ABs this year.

The hot corner is much lighter on talent this year, so unlike 1B, where you can wait and still find potential studs, grabbing one of the top six or seven at 3B is the strategy I will be implementing. I see the top fantasy third basemen (in order) as, Adrian Beltre, Anthony Rendon (also 2B eligible), Josh Donaldson, Evan Longoria, Kyle Seager and Todd Frazier.

The D’Backs new Cuban import, Yasmany Tomas, is said to have a lot of power and is playing in a great hitter’s park with two mashers batting near him in the lineup. He could be a dark horse to lead the position in HRs in 2015.

Pablo Sandoval will be a popular pick because he is hitting in a stronger lineup in a great HR park, but NL hitters going to the AL tend to struggle for the first few months (see Miguel Cabrera, Adrian Beltre, Adam Dunn and countless others). I won’t be drafting Sandoval at his ADP, but if he has a rough April and May, I will be actively trying to trade for him before he heats up.

The Cubs’ Kris Bryant is the clear-cut favorite for NL Rookie of the Year, but when will he be called-up? Bryant finished with a line of 43/118/110 in AA and AAA last season and has the potential to be a top 5 3B after the All-Star break.

In terms of buy-low candidates, I am quite high on Pedro Alvarez, the 23rd ranked 3B on ESPN (2014 stats: .231/18/46/56). He hit 30-plus HRs in 2012 and 2013 and has proven to be a very streaky player, so I would draft him as a mid-teens 1B/3B and hope 2014 was the outlier.

Potential Steals: Trevor Plouffe, Maikel Franco, Will Middlebrooks, Martin Prado, Xander Bogaerts and Alex Rodriguez.

Potential Busts: Josh Harrison (unsustainably high BABIP of .353 in 2014), David Wright, Ryan Zimmerman, Chase Headley, Mike Moustakas and Manny Machado.