See my review of the elites at the shortstop position (Bogaerts, Correa, Lindor, Seager) in Daily Trends.

Asdrubal Cabrera is batting .280 with a .335 OBP for the Mets. His career marks are .268 and .329. Same as always really. The reason no one is looking his way is that he’s had a rather vacuous two homers, 11 RBI, 12 runs scored and not a single theft. Just not much going on there. Still, he’s got a track record that suggests the counting categories will certainly improve given that he’s hit at least 14 homers with 58 RBI and 66 runs scored each of the last five seasons.

Aledmys Diaz has seen his batting average dip .108 points in May. His OBP has fallen .114 points in May. His SLG has fallen .195 points in May. Just shows you how amazing he was in April given that his May numbers are still bonkers good at .315/.339/.537. I’ve been saying this since early April (see his Player Profile), but Diaz just isn’t this guy. I’m not trying to be bombastic here, just honest. It’s certainly possible that his June numbers go down as much as his loss was from April to May. When that happens you won’t want any part of Diaz who could start to lose playing time if Kolten Wong keeps hitting (hits in 6-straight contests) and Jhonny Peralta returns by the end of the month.

Brock Holt hit .265 in April with a .747 OPS and for some reason people were excited. He’s hitting .200 with a .534 OPS in May and now people are running from him, or at least wondering what is wrong with him? Easy answer folks – he’s just not a very good offensive player. This is now the fifth season he’s been in the bigs and he’s a .272 hitter with a .701 OPS. Add in nine homers and 23 steals over 320 games and we have… just a guy. The positional flexibility is nice, but that’s all he has to offer in mixed leagues.

Jose Iglesias hit .303 in 2013. He missed 2014 with lower leg issues. He returned in 2015 to hit .300. He’s batting just .233 this season and is the midst of a dreadful slump. With seven career homers and just 62 RBI in 300 games he had better be stealing bases and producing a batting average. He’s doing neither. Jose has three steals this season and that batting average has caved as his .340 BABIP the last two seasons is down to a mere .265. The average figures to come up, but this is still not a skill set that screams .300 to me and without it he’s not rosterable in anything other than an AL-only league.

Jed Lowrie is on the DL for the 173rd time in his career (I checked). He hopes to return from his shin issue next week (May 25th). Public Service Announcement: Lowrie will end up on the DL again. He’s also not going to hit .302, his career mark is .259, and he’s hit a total of 15 homers with one steal his last 237 games played. I’ve never understood the fascination with him. He’ll have a great month here and there, but the game/health combo is severely lacking.

Jimmy Nelson has been solid under the radar. Nathan Eovaldi has been very productive this season. Be very careful with Justin Verlander. See the video.

Ketel Marte is hitting a decent .272, but that’s all he has going for him. His .299 OBP is terrible. He has one home run. He’s only stolen three bases. There’s nothing happening here. An intriguing speed talent, Marte has stolen just 11 bases in 94 career games. Add in three homers, 30 RBI and 43 runs scored and you’ve got a mixed league injury fill-in, nothing more.

Chris Owings qualifies at second base and shortstop though he’s appeared in the infield only four times this season as he’s been playing centerfield for the D’backs. He’s only hit one homer while being on pace for 50 RBI, but he is batting .285 with a nearly 25 steal pace. He did swipe 16 bags last season, so a run to 20 is possible, but with 11 homers in 296 games there is no power coming. Also pretty sure he’s no .285 hitter as his batting average right now is greatly buoyed by his .354 BABIP which is .045 points above the mark he posted the last two years.

Joe Panik hit. 305 as a rookie and followed that up with a .312 mark last season. Even with his .234 batting average this year he’s still a .295 career hitter. Why the dip this season? Panik posted a .336 BABIP his first two big league seasons. This year the mark is down to .237. That’s particularly odd given that his walk rate is up 20 percent this season while his K-rate is only up eight percent. The result is a 0.84 BB/K ratio this season compared to 0.90 last season. Not much change there. His 1.15 GB/FB ratio isn’t that far off the 1.28 mark he posted last season either. At least he’s hit five homers after just nine his first 173 big league games. Expect the power to slow and the average to increase. He’s a really solid hitter.

Brandon Phillips was hot for a while, but the real Phillips is coming out now. His average is down to .263 and his OBP to .299 as well. That level of performance pretty much what should be expected moving forward (a bit more in OBP wouldn’t be a shock). However, I’m not buying the 20+ homer pace given that he hit only 20 homers the last two seasons and that he last hit 20 in 2009. He’s also stolen a mere three bags, on seven attempts (yikes), a year after he miraculously swiped 23 bases (he stole seven basses in 2013-14). He’s kinda just a guy, despite an impressive three week run earlier in the year.

Jonathan Schoop… some folks seem to love. Really don’t get it. He’s hitting .256, slightly above his .240 career mark. He could sustain that level, especially if he keeps down his K-rate which at 21 percent would be a career best, but we’re still talking about the upside being a league average batting average. He’s still not getting on base at all with a .286 OBP, his career mark is .272, so he’s only scored seven times in 38 games in which he didn’t knock himself in with a homer. Speaking of the big fly, it’s been there as he’s hit seven homers giving him 22 over his last 124 games. He could certainly reach that total this season but with a poor batting average, no speed component at all (four career steals) and likely a completely middling runs scored mark because he never gets on base he’s really limited.

 

Ray Flowers can be heard Monday through Friday, 7 PM EDT and Friday on SiriusXM Fantasy Sports Radio (Sirius 210, XM 87). You can also hear Ray Sunday nights at 6 PM on the channel talking fantasy sports. Follow Ray’s work at Fantasy Alarm and on Twitter (@baseballguys).