I was listening to the ESPN Fantasy Focus podcast with Matthew Berry and Nate Ravitz yesterday and they were discussing which outfielder should be ranked third behind Ryan Braun and Matt Kemp for 2010 fantasy rankings-Justin Upton or Carl Crawford?
Fantasy Baseball: Who Would You Rather Have-Justin Upton or Carl Crawford??
I suggest Upton should be the third outfielder taken in mixed league, and NL-only league, drafts as he can put up solid performance in 5 categories, while Crawford is more like 3.5 categories. Upton went 26-86-84-20-.300-.366-.532 in just 138 games in 2009, while Crawford went 15-68-96-60-.305-.364-.452 in 2009. If you project Upton out another 10-15 games, he could have approached 30-100 in just his 2nd year in the majors.
For 2010, Bill James projects Crawford to go 12-62-82-41-.295-.346-.439, while he projects Upton to go 28-90-93-19-.293-.371-.534. Crawford’s SBs would be hard to pass up in the second round, but I think Upton is ready to break out in a big way in 2010. I can easily see him hitting 30-35 HRs with 100+ RBI and 20 SBs this year.
This year may be the last year that Justin Upton is still available after the first round in mixed league drafts. The sky is the limit for this 22 year old outfielder, and as long as he stays healthy, he could unseat Braun and Kemp as the top fantasy outfielder for years to come.
Who would you rather draft?
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