Equivalent Fantasy Average: Third Basemen

With home runs, RBI, stolen bases, you can produce an absolute ranking. No matter what, 22 home runs is more than 21. On the other hand, with catch-all metrics like WAR and, yes, Equivalent Fantasy Average, it's more of a lumping tool.

In other words, compilation tools are tier-makers. A guy with a 5.8 WAR is probably better than a guy with a 5.4; he's definitely better than a guy with a 2.4. The simple truth is that there's almost always enough of a margin of error in the metrics that coming to a definitive conclusion on small gaps is foolish.

Rarely do you see this more illustrated than in the EFA at third base from our 2014 projections.

Like I said, these metrics are tier-makers. (I don't mean to say EFA is necessarily as thorough or efficient as WAR; just that the takeaway is similar.) And third base might be the most tiered position in fantasy right now.

The top tier is a single person: Miguel Cabrera. He's pretty obviously the best third baseman, and perhaps the best overall fantasy player, and his projected 2014 EFA (based on the numbers provided by the guys at Rotobanter) reflects that. Not only is his projected EFA of .308 the only one at the position over .300, it's the only one over .290. That pretty nicely illustrates Cabrera's status as the true top guy at the position.

After that, we look to the .280s. The next tier of players includes Adrian Beltre, Evan Longoria, Ryan Zimmerman, Josh Donaldson, and David Wright. In the .270s are Matt Carpenter, Pedro Alvarez, Kyle Seager, Manny Machado, Martin Prado, and Pablo Sandoval. (No, there's nothing special about the delineation between Wright at .280 and Carpenter at .279, but for these purposes it's a nice arbitrary line.)

You can do this at any position, really, but the ease with which third base EFA divides itself into groups is nice and handy for sorting. (Also, avoid Luis Valbuena.)

Anyway, here are the projected 2014 EFAs for fantasy's third basemen:

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