Cornbread Maxwell wrote:I also want to mention that he has been discussed quite a lot here, and a search for his name should bring up multiple threads.
The most common mistake I see regarding Beltre is people taking his past stats into consideration without the proper context. Beltre was fighting life threatening illneses over the last few years - that had a much much larger impact than the "contract yr theory"
Seriously though - look at this article written by a reputable fantasy source. Its an article trying to argue both for and against Beltre repeating - but clearly the author is clueless about Beltre's past injury history - he doesnt mention it even once - doesnt even allude to it. The guy lost someothing like 30 pounds as a 23yo because of a botched stomach surgery and the author doesnt even mention it.
Hopefully the link works, but again, its only to show the fact that most people - even so called "experts" dont understand why Beltre "broke out" and still repeat the contract yr theory which may have contributed for a part of it, but not nearly as much as being relatively healthy for the first time in 2 years.
injury aside, how many years has he been in the league? are you saying that this injury has affected him all these years? it just doesn't seem to me that he tries very hard, but that could be just me i think last year was "show me the money" and this year he will once again have lower numbers than the top 3bs.
So just remember that when you talk about "all the years" that Beltre was playing--well, a lot of other guys were playing in college or going against so-so minor league pitching while Beltre has been going against major league heat since he was just 19 years old.
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free wrote:injury aside, how many years has he been in the league? are you saying that this injury has affected him all these years? it just doesn't seem to me that he tries very hard, but that could be just me i think last year was "show me the money" and this year he will once again have lower numbers than the top 3bs.
no - he was relatively injury free as a 19-21 yo. His injury yrs were 22-24 range. When he came into the league as a 19 yo he was projected to be one of the greatest 3B prospects to come around in over a decade. He obviously developed slowly (he speant almost no time in the minors where players normally develop their swing). He was actually beginning to break out at the end of his 2nd yr before his injury hit. I think the combination of age, lack of minor league development, and injury caused the situation you see now - where all 3 factors merged at the same time, thus having such a slingshot into what looks like a fluke yr when statistic heavy weighting is the main judge - when a more fundamental approach is used, it isnt really that shocking of a breakout.
Nothing points to him regressing. Maybe the BA goes down a little because he was in such a groove last year but he may lead the league in RBI. I also see him grabbing a few more SB this year. Before he was sick he grabbed 18 as a 19yr old.
The guy is younger than one of last year's ROY and only a few months older than the other. If Jason Bay put up those numbers last year everyone would be all over him as the next Bonds or Pujols.
Another thing to consider is how uniformly excellent his stats were last year, month to month. He actually IMPROVED as the year went on. Hard to believe the great numbers would not have continued if the season went on.
He'll be in a much stronger line-up in Seattle. Even if his BA and HR totals drop off a bit, his value should remain sky-high because of the extra RBI and run opportunities.
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Well, he won't match last years HR and AVG, because those are huge and 48 is a rather flukey number, plus Safeco is a worse HR park. But I see no reason why his runs and RBI should go down.
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by free » Mon Mar 07, 2005 2:02 pm 
i think last year was "show me the money" and this year he will once again have lower numbers than the top 3bs.
