Los Angeles Dodgers shortstop and the 2016 unanimous National League Rookie of the Year selection Corey Seager was ranked the No. 2 shortstop in baseball by ESPN’s Buster Olney.
Seager placed behind Cleveland’s Francisco Lindor, but finished ahead of Houston’s Carlos Correa, San Francisco’s Brandon Crawford and Boston’s Xander Bogaerts, among others.
The Dodgers called up their then-top prospect in September 2015, and Seager met lofty expectations. He batted .337/.425/.561 with eight doubles, four home runs, 17 RBI and a 174 OPS+ in 27 games.
Seager supplanted Jimmy Rollins as the Dodgers’ starting shortstop, and became the youngest position player in franchise history to start a playoff game. He went into the 2016 season as the unquestioned starter up the middle and once again surpassed projections.
The 22-year-old hit .308/.365/.512 with a 137 OPS+, .372 wOBA and 137 wRC+ over a career-high 157 games. Seager led qualified Dodgers in batting average, on-base percentage, total hits (193), doubles (40), triples (five) and was second in home runs (26).
Seager led qualified NL shortstops in doubles, home runs, batting average, slugging, wOBA, wRC+, was second in OBP and third in RBI. He broke the Los Angeles franchise record for most hits in a single season by a rookie, which previously held by Steve Sax (180 hits in 1982).
Seager also set a Dodgers franchise record for most home runs by a shortstop in a season, broke Eric Karros’ rookie record for most doubles (30), and with 321 total bases broke Mike Piazza’s rookie record (307).
The young shortstop received 11 second-place votes, 10 third-place selections and 240 total points to finish third in NL MVP voting. Along with carrying the Dodgers offense through prolonged stretches of the season, Seager played steady and at times, stellar, defense.
