Lindor Versus Correa Versus Bogaerts: Battle of the Elite Shortstops

Comparing the top young shortstops of the game is daring, but the winner is clear

Lindor, Correa, and Bogaerts via Keith Allison/Flickr

There’s quite the disparity between the best three shortstops in the AL and the rest of the shortstops in the league. In 2016, Francisco Lindor was worth 6.3 fWAR, Carlos Correa was worth 4.9 fWAR and Xander Bogaerts was worth 4.7 fWAR — then the next closest AL SS was Troy Tulowitzki, worth only 2.8 fWAR. That’s quite the gap between tier one and tier two for AL shortstops.

But who’s the best among tier one? It’s not as easy as throwing WAR or wRC+ out there — a definitive answer won’t be found with a single statistics. The best way to figure out who is the better player is to break them down in terms of their skills.

Getting on Base

All three players have roughly equal OBPs — in the past 2 years, Lindor leads the pack with a .356 OBP, followed by Bogaerts with .355, and then, in a distant third, Correa brings up the rear with a .354 OBP. Lindor and Bogaerts are near equals in terms of BA (.306 and .307 respectively), but outpace Correa significantly (.276) — Correa, however, is able to make up the difference by drawing far more walks than the other two.

Correa is a patient hitter at the plate, and as a result, doesn’t put the ball in play as often as Lindor or Bogaerts. But the ability to draw walks is a huge tool — look at 1B Joey Votto, who is consistently among the league leaders in OBP because he draws walks and gets hits so effectively. That’s why I’m giving the edge to Correa — the ability to draw walks is a huge tool, and Correa isn’t a slouch with the bat either.

Edge: Correa