Sell High: Tampa Bay Rays Carl Crawford
by faketeams on May 20, 2009 12:00 PM EDT
in Baseball
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PrintMost have heard that Tampa Bay Rays' LF Carl Crawford switched to training on grass rather than turf in the off-season. That switch has been credited with his phenomenal 25-25 start with SBs. It has impressed so much that Matthew Berry of ESPN.com has gone so far as to rank Crawford as the 6th best fantasy player for the rest of the season.
To me, outside of the 25-25, Crawford is still worrisome given his three-year decline in HRs and the occurrence of hamstring problems. Regardless, that isn't enough to disbelieve the new found ex-ante Top 10 ranking. (25-25 in SBs is a very valuable indicator despite my seeming dismissal in the opening sentence of this paragraph.)
A look at his career numbers clearly shows the drop in power. As a matter of fact, the 18 HR season of 2006 looks like a career-high given it is double book-ended by HR/F rates in the 6.6% to 8.3% range. This season Crawford looks like he is continuing the downtrended from that peak 12.5% season. A 2.4% HR/F screams it!
| Year | PA | HR | PA/XBH | SB | BB | K | LD% | GB% | IF/F | HR/F % | BA/BIP |
| 2004 | 672 | 11 | 12.0 | 59 | 35 | 81 | 0.199 | 0.473 | N/A | 0.066 | 0.322 |
| 2005 | 687 | 15 | 10.9 | 46 | 27 | 84 | 0.201 | 0.45 | 0.133 | 0.083 | 0.325 |
| 2006 | 653 | 18 | 12.1 | 58 | 37 | 85 | 0.183 | 0.522 | 0.093 | 0.125 | 0.331 |
| 2007 | 627 | 11 | 11.0 | 50 | 32 | 112 | 0.201 | 0.478 | 0.046 | 0.071 | 0.374 |
| 2008 | 482 | 8 | 16.1 | 25 | 30 | 60 | 0.209 | 0.486 | 0.068 | 0.068 | 0.297 |
| 2009 | 180 | 1 | 12.9 | 25 | 13 | 31 | 0.211 | 0.474 | 0.167 | 0.024 | 0.398 |
All is not bad in the overall power department though. His 2009 SLG and Plate Appearances per Extra Base Hit remain within his career norms. Which brings me to the decision whether Crawford is a Top 10 player.
He is not. All speed players in fantasy baseball need some power and position scarcity in their favor to be Top 10. Crawford looks like he is lacks both characteristics.
Given his current profile, I'd equate Crawford's fantasy value to Jacoby Ellsbury of the Boston Red Sox. This assumes the off-season training for the 27-year-old has permanently banished the re-occurence of hamstring problems that would rob Crawford of his ability to steal bases.
I'm not betting on that outcome. Sell high on Crawford to whoever gave you a player/package better than Ellsbury's 4th/5th round value.
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I don't know.
The comparison is adequate considering both players skill sets are so similar. But to me, the key is track record. Ellsbury has one full season in him. Crawford has 6, despite only being 2 years older. The ship on Crawford developing 25 HR power has sailed, but I still think mid-high teens is sustainable. After all, he isn’t even into his prime with 6 years experience. That’s more than I can say for Ellsbury because we don’t have enough data on him to really make a concrete judgement.
Ellsbury is NOT the equal of C.C.
While Berry’s rankings admittedly inflate Crawford’s value a tad (by about a round or so), your attempt to equate him to Ellsbury just doesn’t hold any weight.
Homerun potential aside, Crawford will drive in close to twice as many runs as Ellsbury (or approximately 30-50 more RBI), while posting career highs in runs, steals, BB, and AVG. Crawford should top 110 runs, 85 RBI, and 60 steals fairly easily, with 600+ at bats with a .310+ BA. Throw in the fact that he’s likely to hit 5-10 taters along the way, and you can see why he’s coveted throughout fantasysports as a 2nd rounder.
The difference between him and Ellsbury is roughly the same as the difference between Ryan Howard and Adam Dunn—-10-15 points of AVG, 30-40 RBI, 5-10 longballs, plus a handful of steals and some AllStar pedigree.
That makes no sense
“What is carl crawfords value?”
“Less than Ellsbury if Ellsbury is significantly cheaper” Well if Ellsbury is cheaper, then by definition of the word value, how can Crawford possibly be less valuable than somebody cheaper than him?
ellipse
“in a keeper league” was the heart of that quote before it was Dowd-ified.
I.e. $10 Jacoby Ellsbury or $38 Carl Crawford in a $260 AL-Only keeper league.
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