2011 Fantasy Baseball Rankings: Catcher

As pitchers and catchers start showing up to Florida and Arizona, with position players joining or right on their heals, its time to dive into 2011 Fantasy Baseball rankings. These rankings reflect standard 5x5 categories (AVG, R, HR, SB, RBI).

Let's start behind the plate. Here are my top 20 catchers for 2011 (with ADP courtesy of Mock Draft Central in parenthesis).

1. Joe Mauer (20.5)
   
2. Victor Martinez (30.19)
   
3. Brian McCann (31.19)
   
4. Buster Posey (45.44)
5. Carlos Santana (118.24)
6. Geovany Soto (100.2)
7. Mike Napoli (115.58)
8. Matt Wieters (164.09)
9. Miguel Montero (125.6)
10. Jorge Posada (154.74)
11. Kurt Suzuki (180.03)
12. Chris Iannetta (398.49)
    
13. Carlos Ruiz (222.73)
14. John Buck (230.6)
15. Yadier Molina (213.95)
16. Miguel Olivo (249.1)
17. AJ Pierzynski (336.78)
18. Russell Martin (362.04)
19. JP Arencibia (448.12)
20. Ryan Doumit (297.4)

Catcher looks to be pretty deep this year with the addition of Buster Posey and Carlos Santana for a full major league season. Each could potentially see some time at first base through out the season as well. Posey still has first base eligibility in most leagues and Santana potentially could as well as the Indians decide how to handle him.

Posada and Iannetta jump out to me. Jorge is slated to be the primary DH in an older but still potent NYY lineup. That could and should bump his at bats up to the 500+ mark for only the second time since 2003. Iannetta isn't being drafted in a lot of leagues which baffles me. He is the starting catcher in Colorado and should have no problem getting back to his 2008 form and potentially belting 20 home runs.

Unless you are set on getting one of the top-5, you should be just fine waiting until the tail end of your draft to pick up a catcher and using the 4/5th round draft pick on someone like Uggla, Bautista, or McCutchen.