I was planning on writing about Nationals third baseman Ryan Zimmerman even before I saw some banter going back and forth in the comments section of one of my prior posts. Zimmerman had a breakout season of sorts in 2009, and was second among all third baseman in HRs and RBIs. Meanwhile, most experts and roto/fantasy players may look to draft Rays third baseman Evan Longoria ahead of Zimmerman. I say, not so fast.
Let's take a look at their 2009 stats courtesy of www.fangraphs.com:
| Name | AB | H | 2B |
|
R | RBI | BB | SO | SB | AVG | OBP | SLG | OPS | |
| Ryan Zimmerman | 610 | 178 | 37 | 33 | 110 | 106 | 72 | 119 | 2 | 0.292 | 0.364 | 0.525 | 0.888 | |
| Evan Longoria | 584 | 164 | 44 | 33 | 100 | 113 | 72 | 140 | 9 | 0.281 | 0.364 | 0.526 | 0.889 |
Their 2009 stats couldn't be more identical!! What separates them is 10 runs scored, 7 RBI, 7 SBs, and .011 in AVG. Rather amazing. Yet, even with all the acolades Longoria gets among the fantasy experts, I think Zimmerman deserves a second look. Zimmerman will be hitting in a pretty decent lineup in Washington in 2010 that actually scored more runs than the Cubs, Mets, Astros and Reds in 2009.