Continuing my pre-season romp through Established Win Shares Levels (explained here), using the new age adjustments set out here, I've assembled the top 15 players in baseball entering 2006 as ranked by age-adjusted EWSL, as well as by raw (non-adjusted) EWSL. First, the age-adjusted top 15, plus the tops at each position not represented in the top 15 (EWSL totals are rounded off).

In short, these are likely the best players in baseball as we enter 2006; with the injuries and age of Barry Bonds, I feel quite comfortable with the EWSL ranking of Pujols as baseball's best by a comfortable margin, although the age adjustment may overstate just a bit how far he stands ahead of the pack. I'm a little more skeptical of the ratings of Furcal and Crawford, but Furcal is obviously rated on his glove and Crawford is a solid established player just entering his prime years and likely to develop more patience and ability to drive the ball (he finished 2005 with a blazing September). Wright and Mauer are ranked only on 2004-05, so their ranking is a little inflated here in terms of what he has actually proven (the raw rankings are all three-year rankings). Note that the only team with two players in the top 15 is the Red Sox with Manny and Ortiz.

Now, the same list, except ranked by raw EWSL - in other words, the guys with the most real accomplishments entering the season, regardless of age. I went out to 16 here to avoid dropping a player solely on a rounding difference:

No surprises here, especially not the fact that when you remove age from the picture you get a lot more guys on a handful of the same teams, and more Yankees in particular.