Today ESPN's Jayson Stark produced his underrated starters in Major League Baseball for 2010. Stark has been a baseball writer with ESPN since 2000 and was with the Philadelphia Inquirer prior to joining ESPN. He is personally one of my favorite sport writers and one of the reasons I decided to start this blog. His articles are usually fantastic and very interesting, and this one fit the bill as well, except I didn't agree with most of the players he picked. Except for Michael Cuddyer, Carlos Ruiz, and Mike Adams, I feel like all the players he chose are widely known in the baseball community and respected at their positions. I also feel that Starlin Castro is not underrated since he is only a rookie and has not even played a full MLB season yet. So with all these disagreements with Stark, I decided to make my own "All-Underrated Team."
First Base: Aubrey Huff
Aubrey Huff is a ten year veteran that has had a good year basically every year he's given at least 400 at bats, which he has gotten every year since 2001. In fact, since '01, Huff has these averages for batting average, homers, RBIs, and OPS: .281, 23, 82, .815. He has been somewhat of a journeyman despite these numbers though, playing on five teams, Tampa Bay, Houston, Baltimore, Detroit, and San Francisco. Coming off his second best year in 2008, he had kind of a down year in 2009, but that did not dissuade the San Fran Giants from signing him. They needed a big bat and they knew he could potentially give it to them, and he delivered. Huff batted .290 with 26 bombs, 86 RBIs, and an OPS of .891 as a key component to the Giants winning their first World Series since the move from New York. I don't know about you, but I certainly would not have predicted Aubrey Huff as the first baseman to lead his team to a World Series title last year. Oh and by the way, Huff has never been selected for an All Star team.
Second Base: Orlando Hudson
Orlando Hudson is an eight year veteran who has also moved around a lot. He played 3 years for Toronto and then Arizona followed by one year stops in Los Angeles and Minnesota. He has also put up good numbers since his first full season in 2004. He has a good bat for a second baseman hitting double digit homers, or close to it, in every season since '04 except this past year when he was hitting in spacious Target Field. He also boasts a career average of .280 and an OPS of .770. He is rock solid on the defensive side as well making only 82 errors in 1121 games, good for a .986 fielding percentage. Having made 2 All Star teams, he is not as underrated as Huff, but still underrated nonetheless. He has been on a playoff team 3 out of the last 4 seasons, each with a different team, and yet he has had to settle for short term contracts the past three offseasons. This past offseason he only received a two-year deal from the Padres, and another new team will make it 5 teams in 9 years. When an All Star second baseman whose good both offensively and defensively goes through 5 teams in less than 10 years, you know he's underrated.
Shortstop: Stephen Drew
Stephen Drew is relatively young having only been in the majors since 2006, but he has made quite the impact at the shortstop position. Unfortunately, there is a logjam at the shortstop position currently and so Drew is largely overlooked. I was browsing through some final fantasy rankings for 2010 on various sites and Drew was always in the Top 10. It's good to see he's getting some fantasy love, but that's about all he's getting. According to ESPN, Drew's seasonal averages have some eye-popping numbers coming out of the shortstop position, including 12 triples (even though he has stolen no more than 10 bags in a season), and 16 homers. Over the last three seasons he has hit no less than 11 triples per year and he has almost as many career triples as he does home runs, 46 to 65. He was one of four players to have double digit triples and homers in 2010, but the other three stole at least 30 bags compared to Drew's 10. That shows that Drew drove the ball well enough to get a triple rather than use his speed to stretch hits into triples. One reason Drew may be overlooked is his low hit and runs scored totals. Drew also showed that he is clutch when it matters in his only Postseason hitting .387 with 2 homers in 7 games in 2007. To cap off how much underrated he is, he has never been selected to an All Star game.
Third Base: Casey Blake
Casey Blake might just be the most underrated baseball player out of all active players. His baseball career started in 1999, but he nobody gave him a chance until Cleveland in 2003. From 1999-2002, Blake was a member of three teams and got a total of 112 at bats. During this span, he literally hit a homer every other year. Since 2003, Blake has not hit anything less than 17 homers a year. Blake's numbers are not eye-popping, but they are decent. I don't think the Dodgers sell him short though. Remember that Indians catcher who made his MLB debut in 2010, he goes by the name Carlos Santana, and his debut was pretty impressive. Well he was not always an Indian, he was traded from the Dodgers to the Indians, along with another player, for Casey Blake in 2008. Blake was 35 years old back then. The Dodgers traded a top notch catching prospect for a 35-year old journeyman third baseman. The Dodgers knew what they were doing though because Blake has put up fairly consistent numbers as a Dodger. Blake has also not been picky about what position he plays as he has played every position besides center field and catcher throughout his career.
Right Fielder: Michael Cuddyer
I have no quarrels with Stark's pick of Cuddyer. I have always liked Cuddyer and thought that nobody really gives him the credit he deserves.
Center Field: Marlon Byrd
Marlon Byrd is the Casey Blake of center field. He got very few shots until the Rangers started him in 2007. In fact, he's only reached 400 bats or greater fives times in his eight year career. But during those five seasons he had batting averages of .303, .307, .298, ..283, and .293. He has also hit double digit homers every year since 2007. He also has only 20 errors in the 5 seasons he's started as well. He is also well traveled, playing in Philadephia, Washington, and now Chicago besides playing in Texas. He has been noticed more recently though as he was an All Star this past season. With only 5 somewhat full seasons under his belt and only being age 33, Byrd still has a lot of baseball left. Hopefully he will get to start a lot more seasons to come.
Left Field: Josh Willingham
Josh Willingham has seen regular time in left field for 5 seasons now and he done quite well as a regular. During the three seasons of the five in which he got 400 or more at bats, he slugged out 26, 21, and 24 homers. His career average is only .265, but that should go help since he is playing in a larger stadium after he was traded to Oakland in December. His homer numbers will probably decrease in Oakland, but the A's still picked up a good player.With only 16 errors in left field in his career, he also has a good defensive player. While he had a couple All Star-worthy seasons, he has never been selected to an All Star Game.
Catcher: Carlos Ruiz
I also agree with Carlos Ruiz's selection to this list. When I read Stark's reasons why he was chosen I was completely shocked. Ruiz is really good at his position, and no know really knows it.
Starting Pitcher: Jered Weaver
Jered Weaver burst onto the pitching scene in 2006 going 11-2 with a 2.56 ERA. Despite such success in his rookie season, he finished 5th in the 2006 AL Rookie of the Year race. Since then he has only had 1 one season with an ERA over 4, which was 2008 when it was 4.33. This past season he struck out 233 batters, the most of all pitchers this season. He pitched 224 and third innings, good for 8th most in the majors. His ERA was 3.01, 16th highest of all qualifying pitchers. With walk total of 54 was tied for 21st lowest among qualifying pitchers as well. He did make the All Star game in 2010, but that was an imperative since he had such a high strikeout out total. He finished 5th in the
Closer: J.J. Putz
J.J. Putz was one of the premiere closers in 2006 and 2007 for Seattle, saving 76 games and blowing only 9. The Mariners then lost confidence in him in 2008 because he blew 8 saves and saved only 15. He then signed with the Mets as a set up man because he could not get a closer job. That did not work out and he had his worst year so far in his career. But he rebounded last year while pitching for the White Sox. Now he has the closer gig in Arizona, and I personally think he will flourish there. Teams need to be patient with him, even Mariano had a year that wasn't amazing.
Set-Up Man: Mike Adams
I did not even know this guy existed until I read Stark's article. That's how underrated he is.
To conclude, I picked started that are underrated that contribute to a team. Stark I think chose stat stars that continue to fly under-the-radar even though they put up great numbers. My problem with that is that if you are a stats star, then you are at least known by the baseball stats junkies. I chose players that a team needs but are overlooked because they do not put up crazy, eye-popping numbers each year. I feel I chose the truly underrated players of baseball.
References:
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/columns/story?columnist=stark_jayson&id=6044419
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jayson_Stark
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=4479
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=5029&context=fielding
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=6298&context=batting
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=4149
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=5033&context=batting
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=6024&context=batting
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=6479
http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/players/stats?playerId=5640
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