Take Jose Reyes

By Dalton Del Don – Senior Writer

There seems to be a pretty clear cut top-8 this year, featuring Albert Pujols, Johan Santana, Jose Reyes, Chase Utley, Alex Rodriguez, Carl Crawford, Ryan Howard and Alfonso Soriano. Now, the talent doesn’t fall off a cliff after that, but it does seem to get a bit more muddled. This article, however, is focusing on if you possess an earlier pick in the first round.

Chase Utley is an excellent early option, as there isn’t a bigger discrepancy among positions this year than Utley and the rest of the 2nd base options. He’s clearly in a class all to himself there. I don’t think you can let A-Rod slip too far, and Pujols is the obvious favorite to be chosen first overall. There’s really no way to argue against Pujols going No. 1, as he’s currently baseball’s best hitter, and there’s even a chance he’s yet to post his best statistical season. I also like Santana in the top-3, as he’s similar to Utley in being head and shoulders above the rest of his position. I’ve also previously advocated taking SPs early, although this year once you get past Santana, it looks like you can afford to wait on pitching.

And then there’s Jose Reyes, arguably fantasy baseball’s most valuable player. First and foremost, steals is the toughest and therefore most valuable statistic. Very few players offer more than 50 in that category, and most of the ones that do will be a negative in HRs and RBI. Players that do run that much, however, can influence a single rotisserie category more so than any other. That is to say: 60 steals will often gain you more points in the standings than 30 HRs and 50 RBI. Incidentally, Reyes isn’t a negative in the HR and RBI cats, and in fact, for a middle infielder, he’s actually quite a positive.

After the All-Star break last season, Reyes clubbed 11 homers in 277 at-bats, slugging .495 in the process. His solid K/BB ratio also indicates a repeat in a .300 average is more than doable. Hitting atop a fine Mets’ lineup also affords him plenty of opportunities, as he saw exactly 700 plate appearances last year. The most promising aspect of all, however, is that Reyes is 23 years old. 23! If he improves half or even a quarter as much this year as he did from 2005-2006, literally the sky is the limit.

I’m not imploring you to take Reyes over Pujols and/or Santana, but I am suggesting you consider it. Don’t even think about letting him slip past the No. 3 pick.


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8 responses to “Take Jose Reyes”

  1. Keith Avatar
    Keith

    It’s tough to argue with Reyes as a top-3 pick. It’s tough to tell how much better he’s going to get offensively, as he shows flashes of potentially being a 20-25 HR guy, which would just be sick, but I think if he starts trying to be that guy, it’s going to hurt is AVG, OBP and runs. If he starts to take more walks too, he’s going to be an absolute monster. I like Crawford for the same reasons, though he’ll score fewer runs and has lesser value as an OF’er, but I still think he’s going to have a breakout year offensively. Despite his performance last year, I have a hard time trusting Soriano to repeat again, and don’t think Howard is going to hit 50+ bombs again (but his walks might double).

  2.  Avatar
    Anonymous

    You want to be me.

  3. RotoScoop Avatar
    RotoScoop

    Keith – Good point about Reyes’ ability to take a walk. Last year he doubled his 2005 BB total, while keeping his K rate in tact. Hopefully that trend continues this year. Personally, I’m with you on Soriano and to a lesser extent Howard. Even if Soriano slipped to me in the 8-9 range, I probably wouldn’t pull the trigger on him, but I assume he will go at least that early in most drafts. Despite upgrading his lineup and ballpark, I simply don’t trust him either. Howard is going to lose at least .20 points on his batting average with that high strikeout rate.

  4. RotoScoop Avatar
    RotoScoop

    Anonymous – You get breaks.

  5. sir boss hog outlaw III Avatar
    sir boss hog outlaw III

    im gonna ball this year sir!!

  6. Lister Avatar
    Lister

    reyes will never work walks like the prototypical lead off hitter

    willie has done nothing but encourage him to use his athlete in all phases of the game; and they have never encouraged him to be a player than he isn’t already

    it’s been wildly successful as a strategy thus far

    dode projects to fill out more though and increase raw power over the next few years, probably at the expense of SBs

    not out of the realm of possibility that he could have a 30-50 year sometime sooner than later. i don’t think you can have a guy with his XBH gap to gap and raw pole to pole power leading off for more than another year or so…

  7. RotoScoop Avatar
    RotoScoop

    Also, the ability to walk sometimes HURTS fantasy value. Look at Jason Giambi. His OBP is great and all, but for fantasy purposes, he certainly leaves some RBI on the table by refusing to look outside the strike zone.

  8. Lister Avatar
    Lister

    raw-b eats diaphragm

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