Ethan Miller/Getty Images Before considering what a player will do in the future, the first step is considering what he's done in the past.
For each of the 25 players ahead, the first order of business will be looking at the numbers they averaged over the 2015 and 2016 seasons. A larger sample size would be better, but two seasons make for a good enough snapshot of a player's current abilities.
Besides, a handful of players on this list have only played in two seasons. And three of them—Francisco Lindor, Corey Seager and Carlos Correa—only have a season and change under their belts. To account for that, their specific two-year averages are scaled to 162 games.
From here, there are any number of projection systems to consult for a well-calculated prediction of a player's future performance. The choice here is ZiPS, developed by ESPN's Dan Szymborski. As summarized by MLB.com, here's how it works:
The system uses statistics from the previous four years for players from ages 24-38, and it weights more recent seasons heavier. For younger or older players, it uses weighted statistics from only the previous three years. The system also factors velocities, injury data and play-by-play data into its equations.
From 2015-16 performance and ZiPS projections, you can get a clear enough picture of the talent that each player is bringing into 2017. The only thing left to do is weigh its merits.
That's where I come in. While keeping the above information in mind, I dove into each player's individual abilities—specifically hitting abilities for position players—as well as durability red flags and any relevant league-wide trends.
In all, I basically looked for reasons to raise, lower or do nothing with the expectations inspired by the 2015-2016 numbers and/or ZiPS projections. The end result is projections that aren't scientific by any means but do have a human touch that would otherwise be missing.
(And speaking of human touch, any ties in WAR projections were settled with a judgment call.)