I was listening to the ESPN Fantasy Focus podcast with Matthew Berry and Nate Ravitz and they were discussing which outfielder is ranked third behind Ryan Braun and Matt Kemp for 2010-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.
Bill James projects Crawford to go 12-62-82-41-.295-.346-.439 in 2010, while he projects Upton to go 28-90-93-19-.293-.371-.534 in 2010. Crawford's SBs would be hard to pass up, 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.
Who would you rather draft?