Fantasy Baseball 2015: Prince Fielder is no longer Royalty

May 11, 2014; Arlington, TX, USA; Texas Rangers first baseman Prince Fielder (84) follows through for a single against the Boston Red Sox during the fourth inning of a baseball game at Globe Life Park in Arlington. Mandatory Credit: Jim Cowsert-USA TODAY Sports

From 2006-2013, Prince Fielder was a fantasy baseball stalwart.  He could bat his weight and crush home runs in the process.  He never played less than 157 games in a season.  In fact, he even played a full 162 in 2009 and 2011-2013.

Beyond his remarkable ability to stay healthy despite concerns about his mass, Prince was an elite fantasy player in every single year from 2006-2013.  In those eight seasons, Prince Fielder hit between 25-50 home runs, scored between 82-109 runs, and drove in between 81-141 runs.

Along with those excellent counting stats, Prince Fielder managed to bat between .261 and .313 with a career batting average of .285.  He could flat out hit everything.

Fielder was a no-doubt four category stud year in and year out.  He was the definition of a safe pick, which is exactly what I want in the first few rounds of my fantasy baseball draft.

However, the 2014 campaign spelled Prince Fielder’s first unsuccessful season in Major League Baseball.  Before succumbing to a neck injury that led to season-ending surgery, Fielder only managed three home runs in 42 games in the hitter-friendly Ballpark in Arlington.  However, the entire Texas Rangers team has floundered this season.

Neck surgery is very serious because not everyone will physically be the same after the surgery.  Hopefully, Prince can be handle his neck surgery like Peyton Manning did, but that sort of revival seems unlikely.

Even if you assume that Prince Fielder recovers 100% from his neck surgery and is physically unaffected by it, players decline in their 30’s.  Fielder will turn 31 early into the 2015 fantasy baseball season.  Even more bad news is that heavier players decline quicker than the average player.

In order to back up my previous statement, I decided do a quick Google search and found a FanGraphs article that confirmed what I heard and believed.  In fact, this article was about how Prince Fielder would age.

The article was written after the 2011 season, so its prediction of Prince’s decline was a little premature, but some of the points still stand.  Fielder is more likely than the average player to suffer a decline in his 30’s due to his weight.  Even if Prince suffers a decline, then he will still be a very good ballplayer, but he may no longer warrant a very high draft pick.

While some of Fielder’s draft position will ultimately be determined by the site your league plays on, I do not really see myself taking him in the top 50 players in 2015.  I try to build a steady core of players in the first three or four rounds, and I think Prince has too much risk next year.

It really is crazy to consider Prince Fielder a risky investment nowadays because he used to be Mr. Consistent.  Then again, maybe Fielder can buck the trend of aging heavy players and slug the ball in Texas next season.