Player Profile: Jacoby Ellsbury

It was a tale of two seasons for Ellsbury in '08. In the months of April, May and September he hit .302/.381/.456 in 261 AB with 6 HR, 26 RBI, 61 R and 33 SB. He also had 31 BB to 27 SO. Yet in the months of June, July and August he hit .259/.293/.340 in 289 AB with 3 HR, 21 RBI, 37 R and 17 SB. His BB/SO rate was an abysmal 17/52.

So which Jacoby are we going to see in '09? During his 3 month reign of terror, in which he seemed absolutely lost at the plate, it was very difficult to expect a strong finish. But he shook it off, made some adjustments and finished very strong in September posting a .889 OPS and .340 BA. He still struck out twice as much as he walked (8 to 4) but his 32 hits in 94 at bats showed he was still capable of making good contact.

This is a pretty common thing for young players. After the first two months pitchers started to make adjustments to his approach at the plate and were able to take advantage of his inexperience. This is when the quality youngsters separate themselves from the upstarts. He stuck with it, worked on his game, made the necessary adjustments and finished strong. He still hits at the top of an excellent lineup and it showed that the coaches and management had faith in him by not taking him out of the lineup when he went into his slump. That speaks volumes to me.

This spring hasn't been anything special. He's only had 3 hits in 12 at bats with no SB attempts. But he's only struck out once. So although the hits aren't coming yet, at least he's making contact on his outs. Bill James has this line for '09: 559 ABs with a .302 AVG, 9 HR, 100 R, 53 RBI and 52 SB. Which is an IMPROVEMENT across the board for Ellsbury. And most importantly he has him with a 45:71 BB/SO rate, a great improvement over his '08 line of 41:80.

It's hard to say if he will be consistently good in '09 or have a huge peak and valley like '08. But honestly, in roto, it doesn't matter. I totally agree with James on this one. Here are my numbers: 571 AB, .295 BA, 11 HR, 103 R, 48 RBI and 49 SB. His ADP is 57th well behind Matt Kemp, so in that respect he's a steal as I'm much higher on Jacoby than I am on Kemp. 10/50 guys don't exactly fall out of the sky and other than Reyes, Rollins and possibly Kemp (though I don't think he'll come anywhere near 50 SB) he's the only other guy capable of it. On a final note, he might be the only player in all of baseball to finish with a 10/50/.300 line by the end of '09. Which makes him the "New, Old Carl Crawford", who by the way, was a perennial top 20 pick there for a couple years with nearly the exact same type of production.

Where do I sign?

Roto Wizard