Fantasy Baseball: SB Nation's Jeff Sullivan on Mike Stanton

Jeff Sullivan writes for SB Nation's Mariners site and is also the Editor for SB Nation's MLB site. Every Friday he posts an article on five intriguing statistics that most baseball fans would not know. In this week's article he talks about Stephen Strasburg's tremendous contact rate in AAA and in his first major league start, Ben Sheet's ERA after discovering he was tipping pitches, Derek Jeter's very high ground ball percentage and Mike Stanton's power.

Here is what he said about Stanton's power:

No, I'm just here to point out what I find to be perhaps the most amazing of Stanton's statistical exploits.

It isn't the 1.167 OPS or the 21 homers he hit in AA Jacksonville. No, it's the 39 homers he hit in single-A Greensboro in 2008, at the tender age of 18.

18. Jason Heyward was in the same league in the same year, and he was also 18. Heyward hit 11 balls out of the park. 18 year old Matt Dominguez hit 18. So did 18 year old Freddie Freeman. Jesus Montero hit 17. Mike Stanton finished with a 13-homer lead over second place Cody Johnson, who was a year older.

When Miguel Cabrera was 18, he played in A-ball. He hit seven homers. Adrian Beltre was one of the best teenage prospects baseball had ever seen, and when he was 18, he hit 26. Albert Pujols only hit 19 after being drafted at 20. And so on and so forth.

When Mike Stanton was 18, he hit 39 home runs. 

When compared to the likes of Heyward, Cabrera and Beltre, Stanton could be something special. I had a similar conversation about Stanton a few weeks ago with another owner in one of my NL-only keeper leagues and compared Stanton to Cabrera. I was surprised at how Stanton hit for much more power than Miggy did in the minors.

Check out the complete article over at SBNation.com/MLB here.