Every year around this time, Keith Law publishes his breakout player forecast article, focusing on guys who “were drafted high in their respective drafts where the emphasis is on athletic ability and long term projection rather than immediate performance”. Last year he wrote about Justin Upton, Clayton Kershaw and Adam Lind to name a few.
Fantasy Baseball: Keith Law’s Breakout Players for 2010
Here are his list for 2010, with a few excerpts:
Colby Rasmus
Jay Bruce
Travis Snider
David Price
Ian Stewart
Matt Harrison
Brett Anderson
Gordon Beckham
Chase Headley
Cameron Maybin
Matt Wieters
Here is what he said about Marlins outfielder Cameron Maybin:
Maybin might be the poor man's Matt Kemp, a tooled-up centerfielder who swings and misses often but makes hard enough contact when he doesn't miss that he can sustain a reasonable batting average. And Maybin has shown signs of reducing his great weakness, the breaking ball.
Law has been on the Colby Rasmus bus since he was drafted, and here is an excerpt on Rasmus’ writeup:
I have seen Rasmus as a future star for some time now, and I think he’s on the cusp of a huge step in that direction. It might come over two years instead of one, but Rasmus’ approach at the plate at the end of last season was better than that of many veterans with five or six years of experience on him.Law likes White Sox infielder Gordon Beckham so much that he thinks he can play SS:
The position-player analogue to Anderson, in that I’m not telling you much you don’t already know, but would be remiss if I didn’t mention the guy. I like his chances to improve his rate stats over their 2009 levels, and I think he’ll be a plus defender at second ... but I wish they’d give him a crack at the shortstop job, as he’s one of the best instinctive fielders there I’ve seen.His reference to Anderson in the Beckham writeup is A’s pitcher Brett Anderson.
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