Fantasy Sleepers: Zack Cozart

I'm a day behind, so I owe you 2 fantasy sleepers today. Since I'm doing the infield, I'll stick with that. So far, we looked at C Rob Brantly and 2B Matt Carpenter. Today we look at shortstop and my pick will be Cincinnati Reds SS Zack Cozart. I looked around the league trying to find a sleeper SS for this blog and came across the fact that SS had returned from being the desert it was 2 seasons ago. Outside of a few horrible situations (Brian Dozier for Minnesota), huge question marks (Nakajima moving to MLB from Japan  - Oakland), the usual suspects (Jeter, Andrus, A. Cabrera, Tulowitzki) and the breakouts (Desmond, Simmons, A. Escobar) there weren't too many to choose from, but let's see some upsides with Cozart:

1. He's got a lock on the job - Cozart looked at times to be very replaceable for Dusty Baker, but that's changed. Uber-prospect Billy Hamilton is being moved to CF, both since the acquired Shin-Soo Choo is an FA at the end of the year (that Ludwick extension's looking bad now, huh?) and Cozart at SS. Didi Gregorius, another option, was traded to Arizona in the said Choo trade. Cozart's not going anywhere.
2. He's moving out of the leadoff spot - Baker tried numerous players at leadoff last year: Cozart, Brandon Phillips, the since traded Drew Stubbs - a mess. With Choo acquired, Cozart can move down in the line-up. Personally, I think it's smart to move Cozart down to the bottom half and split lefty-righty: Choo/Phillips/Votto/Frazier/Bruce/Ludwick/Cozart/Hanigan/P is my choice. Cozart can thrive with the mashers in front of him.
3. Patience - Baker stuck with him. Cozart is as streaky as it can get in the MLB. Batting avg. comparisons: April/May: .271/.208; June/July: .274/.213. Cozart evened it out in August and September at .267/.275. If he can be solid like his teammates Votto, Choo and Phillips, he can sustain a solid .275 batting average the whole year.

Cozart's stat-line does leave a little to be desired. .247/.288/.399 with an OPS of .687 is not pretty at all. He only walked 31 times over the entire year. Cozart needs to improve his on-base percentage and strive to work towards getting around 50 walks this year. He has shown the ability in the minors to not only work walks, but steal bases and hit around 15 HR's a year. Cozart should benefit from a year of maturity and a steep line-up. An optimistic projection of .270/15 HR/65 RBI with a OPS of .750 will keep Cozart in your SS Role or at least a middle-infield pick.