Fantasy Baseball 2011: 2011 Closer Rankings

Today I post the last of the rankings for 2011, but will more than likely take another stab at them in February. Here are the 2011 Closer Rankings. I will post just my rankings without much verbiage. I think the closer position is a bit thin this year with Billy Wagner retiring, Jonathan Broxton and Jonathan Papelbon struggling in 2010, and some unreliable closers still hoiding down their job. This is just another way of saying, I am not confident in too many closers in 2011.

1. Heath Bell, SD

2. Brian Wilson, SFG

3. Joakim Soria, KC

4. Mariano Rivera, NYY

5. Rafael Soriano, TBD

6. Neftali Feliz, TEX

7. Carlos Marmol, CHC

8. Francisco Rodriguez, NYM

9. Jose Valverde, DET

10. Jonathan Papelbon, BOS

11. Jonathan Broxton, LAD

12. Joe Nathan, MIN

13. Andrew Bailey, OAK

14. J.J. Putz, ARI

15. John Axford, MIL

These rankings will probably change in February, but I wanted to get the rankings out. A couple guys who could make their way onto this list should they win their closer's job are: Craig Kimbrel, ATL, Jonny Venters, ATL, Hong-Chih Kuo, LAD, Kenley Jansen, LAD, and Matt Capps, MIN.

Guys like Marmol, Kimbrel, Pirates reliever Joel Hanrahan and Brian Wilson have excellent value in 5 x 5 leagues as well as they accumulate plenty of strikeouts.