I’ve been writing here at Pitcher List since 2019 and have taken over the reins as Manager of the Dynasty team. One of my goals was to move away from team-centric Top 50 lists and more to an overall list. A couple of weeks ago, the great LaMar Gibson released his Top 500 OBP list, which you should check out! But don’t fret if you play in an AVG league; I’ve got ranks to make your AVG above average! Hopefully you will take a glance at my methodology of putting this list together before digging into the list but if not, that’s cool. You do you.
Methodology
Making lists is hard. You will never be satisfied with them. However, one of the best parts of making a list is how much research you do on players to form your opinion. While compiling this list, I tried to be as general as I could be. Basically, I ranked players how I view them, with zero team context (win-now vs rebuild) and a basic 5×5 Roto-style game. If you are going for all the marbles or a massive re-build, your list will look different than mine, but I still hope you find it useful.
“So why are you even putting a list together?”
That is a great question. Putting together an overall general list, I’m (hopefully) giving you a general rank which you can tweak for your teams situation.
“How do handle ranking the young, super fun prospect against the wily, older veteran?”
This is the fun part of list making. For me, I look at each player and see what he can do for my team now. Honestly, that is why guys like Adam Wainwright are still on the list. I also factor in the ceiling on younger prospects along with my perceived trade value.
“What data/stats did you look at?”
I used FanGraphs and Baseball Savant for the basics. For more in-depth stats, especially with prospects, I used MiLB HITS Dashboard and Stat Line Scouting. I also have read many prospect blurbs from sites like Baseball America, Prospects Live, among others.
Dynasty Leagues Are Fluid
Every manager will have their own plan of attack when it comes to Dynasty, and along with your league’s rules, every single league is unique. One of my favorite aspects of Dynasty is how fluid player production is.
“Fluid? How fluid can player production be? I thought studs were studs?”
Well … let’s just look at some numbers! Here are the hitters and pitchers who were at the top of their game in 2017, and then comparing that to just four short seasons later, you will see only two players (Goldschmidt and Scherzer), that produced the same level of production, according to Razzball’s Player Rater.
Keep in mind, Goldy’s 2021 season was out of the ordinary as he had been in steady decline since 2017.
So what does this mean? To me, looking at this data, elite player production is is volatile and those first-round studs only produce at that level for just a few years.
“So maybe I should just load up on prospects?”
Not so fast, my friend! Even with some of the veterans’ production greatly diminished since 2017, they (outside of Kluber and Strasburg) still contributed to your team. Let’s take a look at the top five prospects from 2017 and see what their dollar value has been since then. These were the top five prospects according to Razzball and their dollar value since then.
Pretty interesting, right? I will have to say, the more years I’ve played dynasty, I find myself leaning towards the older player and these numbers seem to bear that out. Alright, without further delay, here are my top 500 players for AVG leagues!
Love this list, Shelly, and not just because you’re high on a lot of the guys already on my dynasty team! Tell me more about Corey Seager though. Fantastic hitter with excellent bat-to-ball skills, but no speed, light lineup, tough park and a bit of an injury history. Sell me on #21 overall. Thank you!
So this is Shelly’s list? Byline says Nick, though I believe he was writing for the site a little earlier than 2019 ;)
Love the list, very minor thing, but Julio Rodriguez is 21 – not 24