Fantasy Baseball: Position Scarcity

ESPN.com recently released their preliminary starting rosters (here's an NL version). Going through, I was struck by something:

The outfield is the scarcest position in fantasy next year. It's not catcher (guys like Kenji Johjima and Michael Barrett are sliding down early draft boards). It's not second base (there's a surprising amount of forgotten talent in guys like Mark Loretta, Robinson Cano, and Tad Iguchi, not to mention the burgeoning stars of Rickie Weeks, Chase Utley and Jorge Cantu) . It's the outfield.

Yes, that fantasy wasteland of Manny Ramirez, Vlad Guerrero, Carlos Beltran, Ichiro and Left Field, SF.

I'm currently working on my rankings, so I cannot provide solid numbers for you right now. (I certainly will have them at a later date.) But making a very rough draft of the top starting fantasy players at each position (enough to fill a 12 team league's starting rosters), the outfield comes up the shortest. Fortunately or unfortunately, there are quite a bit more sleepers in the OF this year. So I guess the conclusion is:

Scout out a handful of sleepers in the OF, but make sure you have your starters set by about mid-draft.