St. Louis Cardinals: Paul Goldschmidt ranked number one by MLB Network

In MLB Network’s yearly ‘Top 10 Right Now’ rankings, St. Louis Cardinals first baseman Paul Goldschmidt was ranked first at his position.

The St. Louis Cardinals have still made the biggest acquisition of any team this offseason. No, they may not be making the most acquisitions or trade, but they have no doubt made the highest quality one. Paul Goldschmidt is your first baseman for at least 2019, and I don’t think we all truly realize one, how good he is and two, how good he makes this team.

MLB Network has been doing their yearly ‘Top 10 Right Now’ series and this week, they looked at the first base position. The way that MLB Network ranks players is they allow the hosts of the show to display, argue and defend their own list at that position while allowing their computer program, ‘the Shredder’ to provide the real rankings. The Shredder compiles all the advanced statistics and classic ones to provide a very holistic ranking of these players.

I have been watching these rankings since they started doing them, and as whole, I usually agree with what the Shredder decides. The strange thing this year that I have seen with the lists is that some of the experts on the show have started ranking players who have not played a major league inning in the top ten at the position. I disagree with that completely on principle, regardless of how good players like Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Eloy Jimenez are likely to be.

Back to the point, the Shredder gave Paul Goldschmidt some pretty high praise.

I am not sure exactly where I expected Goldschmidt to be ranked, but this is a huge compliment to how good of a player he really is. Just let this resonate for a minute: the number one first baseman in the entire world is going to be playing with your favorite uniform on for at least the 2019 season.

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This is the reason why people like Tony La Russa said that Goldschmidt was just like Albert Pujols. The last time the Cardinals had a player of Goldschmidt’s caliber on the team let alone at first base was when Albert was mashing homers over there. While I am unequivocally in the group that hopes Goldy stays long-term, even if it is only for 2019, get excited!

Goldy is ranked as the number one first baseman even after starting the year similar to how Matt Carpenter did. After batting poorly compared to his career in March/April, Goldschmidt bat just .144 in May. From May to the end of the year, he earned his spot at the top, hitting 26 homers in the latter four months of the season while accumulating a 5.4 WAR on the year. There is nothing here not to be excited about.

The other thing to note about this list is how many players from the NL Central are on this list. Every other NL Central’s first baseman except for the basement dwelling Pirates is on this list. That speaks again at how good this division is going to be this year. Cardinals’ fans can brag about that for now.

Hopefully MLB Network’s ranking of Goldschmidt helps all of us realize how good he really is. Some people will surely disagree with how the Shredder has ranked this position as well as others, but regardless, it’s a notch on Goldschmidt’s belt that I am sure, as a guy with no social media, he doesn’t pay attention to. The Cardinals have been well represented on the Top 10 Right Now lists and look to be in contention in what will be a wild NL Central this year.