Rankings Debate: Shortstops
George Bissell and Dave Shovein square off on their fantasy rankings for shortstops Masyn Winn and Xavier Edwards.
If you’re a new subscriber here at The Buzz, welcome aboard. We’re excited to have you with us on this brand-new venture as we count down to the official launch of our daily fantasy baseball newsletter once spring training kicks off. Over the next few weeks we’ll be rolling through the remainder of our positional preview series to get fantasy managers fully prepared heading into draft day.
The idea for a series of heated rankings debates at each positional group came together after we began to notice several differences of opinion from a projections standpoint on certain players during the process of compiling our positional rankings. Differences of opinion are healthy. This exercise is designed to give fantasy managers a peek behind the curtain at our internal thought process and help us clearly explain the rationale behind out statistical forecast and outlook. In case you’ve missed it, here are the earlier installments in the series:
The Buzz — 2025 Fantasy Baseball Preview — Rankings Debates
Catchers: Willson Contreras, Logan O’Hoppe and Joey Bart
First Base: Freddie Freeman, Michael Busch and Christian Encarnacion-Strand
Second Base: Jordan Westburg, Brandon Lowe and Jackson Holliday
Third Base: Royce Lewis, Junior Caminero, Isaac Paredes and Eugenio Suárez
This week’s installment features a pair of shortstop options that we disagreed on during the process of compiling our Top 40 Shortstop Rankings for 2025 in Masyn Winn and Xavier Edwards. Without further delay, let’s dive into the debates.
Masyn Winn, Cardinals
2025 Rankings: The Buzz (18) Bissell: (16) Shovein: (22)
A historic NL Rookie of the Year class headlined by potential generational superstars Paul Skenes, Jackson Merrill and Jackson Chourio managed to overshadow Masyn Winn during his impressive full-season debut, but fantasy managers shouldn’t overlook his potent power-speed combination on the heels of a strong 15-homer, 11-steal rookie campaign. The 22-year-old spark plug is projected to bat atop St. Louis’ lineup next season, which should lead to a boatload of runs scored (somewhere in the 80-90 range) and he also boasts realistic 20-homer, 20-steal potential. The 22-year-old former top prospect started to hit for more over-the-fence pop during the second half last year when he belted 10 round-trippers over his final 62 contests but lacks the underlying batted ball metrics to forecast a massive breakthrough there. His contact-oriented offensive profile, which is headlined by above-average whiff and strikeout percentages, make it easy to envision some additional offensive growth, especially in the batting average department. He’s fast enough to take advantage of the current stolen base environment and easily reach double-digit thefts moving forward, especially if he remains in the Cardinals’ leadoff spot. He feels like a near-lock to outperform his current average draft position as the 18th shortstop off the board (168 overall) in early NFBC drafts. — George Bissell
I’m not really down on Masyn Winn heading into the 2025 campaign, I’m just not quite as high on him relative to some of the other options at the position. The 22-year-old exceeded all expectations offensively in his rookie campaign and delivered a terrific season across the board, as George noted. One concern that I have is how much he’s going to run in 2025. While he showed more expertise on the basepaths in the minor leagues, he was successful on just 11 of his 16 stolen base attempts last season. It’s a small sample size, sure, but that 69 percent success rate could have Cardinals manager Oli Marmol putting on the brakes. That played out a bit in the second half of the season as he swiped just two bases (in four attempts) over his final 71 contests. I also have concerns about the overall quality and depth of the Cardinals’ lineup. They’ve already lost Paul Goldschmidt from a season ago and seem poised to deal Nolan Arenado away as well. It’s not crazy to think that his runs scored could be docked a bit with those two sluggers gone. I’m also not convinced that the bottom third of the Cardinals’ lineup will get on base enough to set up RBI chances for Winn, making him a liability in that category. I’ve got him for 16 homers and 14 stolen bases with a neutral (.263) batting average, it’s the counting stats that drop him down the list a bit for me. — Dave Shovein
Xavier Edwards, Marlins
2025 Rankings: The Buzz (12) Bissell: (15) Shovein: (8)
Xavier Edwards finally got his opportunity last year with the rebuilding Marlins following an early-June promotion after the club released veteran Tim Anderson, and made some serious noise for fantasy managers, batting .332 (85-for-256) with one homer and 31 steals in his final 67 contests. I’m a firm believer in the emerging speedster from a long-term standpoint since his sublime contact skills, plus speed and baserunning savvy lock in his status as a batting average and steals source for years to come. I’m confident projecting Edwards for at least 40 steals and a .285 batting average next season. A quick peek at last year’s underlying batted ball data, which include an almost non-existent 1.8 percent barrel rate and microscopic 24.3 percent hard hit rate, make it impossible to forecast any type of impact in the power department. Simply put, I’d rather roll the dice on getting a mostly healthy season from Bo Bichette, take a shot on Ezequiel Tovar and Anthony Volpe making further progress in refining their offensive approaches, or gamble that the second-half results from a post-shoulder injury Xander Bogaerts weren’t a total mirage. I’m an Edwards believer, but his one-dimensional fantasy impact creates some issues from a roster construction standpoint, especially in a snake draft as opposed to an auction. I simply prefer some of the power-oriented slugging shortstops in his territory with the belief that I can find my speed elsewhere later with a steals source like Dylan Moore, José Caballero or even Jordan Lawlar. — George Bissell
It’s hard to argue with George on this one. As I noted in this week’s Early ADP Analysis article, while Edwards stands out as perhaps the biggest overall value on my board, he isn’t necessarily a player that I’m going to be targeting. The numbers are what they are though. I’ve got Edwards projected for a .296 batting average, 93 runs scored and 44 stolen bases — numbers that he could easily wind up exceeding. Even if I give him just three homers and 52 RBI — virtually nothing in the power department — he still grades out as the eighth best shortstop overall, ahead of early-round stalwarts like Oneil Cruz, CJ Abrams and Corey Seager. The problem with Edwards is how he derives that value. If you’re going to draft him, you have to plan your entire draft around doing so. If you already have average team speed, adding him and his 40-50 stolen bases aren’t going to give you the bang for your buck that you’re going to need. If you’re shooting to finish in the top 80-90 percent in the stolen base category, blowing past that number by 20 stolen bases is going to crush you in homers and RBI. On the right team build, he can be an absolute game-changer and I have zero doubts that he’s going to return a significant profit from his current draft spot (ADP 160). You just have to plan your draft around getting him, and if that’s the case you need to target him much earlier. — Dave Shovein