2012 Fantasy Baseball: Third Base Rankings

Opening Day is just a few weeks away and Athlon Sports has all the fantasy baseball rankings you need to get you ready for the upcoming season.

Athlon Sports has combined nine fantasy baseball big boards from around the web to compile an updated consensus Top 200 as well as positional breakdowns.

Jose Bautista still leads the way at third base, that is until Miguel Cabrera gains position eligibility at the hot corner.

Hanley Ramirez is also making the switch to third, and for what it's worth, he would come in behind Evan Longoria in these rankings. Neither he nor Cabrera appear below because they have not gained third-base eligibility at this point.

David Wright is someone to keep an eye on these next few weeks as he is dealing with a torn abdominal muscle in his left side. It's the same injury that fellow third baseman Ryan Zimmerman suffered during spring training last season.

Zimmerman originally tried to play it through, but was put on the DL shortly after the start of the season and ended up having surgery in early May. He finally returned in the middle of June, but it took him a few weeks to get going and he finished the season with career lows in both home runs (12) and RBIs (49).

Wright is trying to let his abdominal muscle heal with rest and treatment in hopes of avoiding surgery, but it's a situation that definitely bears watching.

Brett Lawrie has been tearing the cover off of the ball during spring training, which probably is part of the reason for his slight rise in the Top 200 and passing Michael Young in the third base rankings.

The biggest risers at third in the rankings are Martin Prado (No. 140 overall, up from No. 157) and David Freese (No. 166, up from No. 198).

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Rank – Position ranking
OVR – Overall ranking on The Big Board
LR — Last Ranked, where player was ranked on The Big Board that was published on Feb. 20, 2012
NR — Not Ranked, means player did not appear on The Big Board that was published on Feb. 20, 2012

AS – Athlon Sports (updated 3/19/12)
CBS – CBSSportsline.com (as of 3/16/12)
ESPN – (updated 3/13/12)
FOX – FOXSports.com (updated 3/7/12)
MLB – MLB.com (as of 3/15/12)
RC – RotoChamp.com (updated 3/18/12)
RS – RotoSummit.com (updated 2/27/12)
USA — USAToday.com (updated 2/13/12)
Y! – Yahoo! Sports (updated 2/24/12)*

*Yahoo! ranked only 120 players on their list, while Athlon's Big Board contains 200. The aggregated scores of the other eight big boards were used to extrapolate Yahoo!’s rankings to 200 players.

Athlon Sports Fantasy Rankings**: Big Board | C | 1B | 2B | 3B | SS | OF | SP | RP

**Positional rankings will be updated throughout the week

Other names to consider (in alphabetical order): Lonnie Chisenhall (CLE, 3B), Chris Davis (BAL, 1B/3B), Macier Izturis (LAA, 2B/SS/3B), Chipper Jones (ATL, 3B), Jed Lowrie (HOU, SS/3B), Daniel Murphy (NYM, 1B/2B/3B), Placido Polanco (PHI, 3B), Sean Rodriguez (TB, 2B/SS/3B), Scott Sizemore (OAK, 2B/3B), Ian Stewart (CHC, 3B), Danny Valencia (MIN, 3B), Ty Wigginton (PHI, 1B/3B/OF)

— By Mark Ross, updated on March 21, 2012

Other Fantasy Baseball Content:

2012 Fantasy Baseball: First Base Rankings
2012 Fantasy Baseball: Second Base Rankings
2012 Fantasy Baseball: Shortstop Rankings
2012 Fantasy Baseball: Third Base Rankings
2012 Fantasy Baseball: Outfield Rankings
2012 Fantasy Baseball: Catcher Rankings
2012 Fantasy Baseball: Starting Pitcher Rankings
2012 Fantasy Baseball: Relief Pitcher Rankings
2012 MLB Fantasy Closer Grid
2012 Fantasy Baseball Sleepers and Busts: Infield
2012 Fantasy Baseball Sleepers and Busts: Outfield
2012 Fantasy Baseball Sleepers and Busts: Starting Pitching
2012 Fantasy Baseball Sleepers and Busts: Closers
Fantasy Baseball Studs to Avoid in 2012
2012 Fantasy Baseball Deep Sleepers

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