Rob Neyer is a jerk... don't get me wrong, I usually enjoy his writing and he's one of the smartest sports writers out there... he also has apparently written more words for [ESPN.com] than anybody (from his ESPN bio), but he's still overwhelmingly unsavory at times.  He nitpicks more than most, and often pigeonholes players into specific cliche characterizations that are typically unfair and/or inappropriate.  Most of his tactics can be written off as tools of the trade, so I don't often dwell too much on the more negative aspects of what he says... until recently when he openly questioned one of our own.

In his March 15th blog entry entitled Thoughts on Ellsbury's power, Neyer criticized Red Sox GM Theo Epstein's assertion that Jacoby Ellsbury will eventually "have more power than people give him credit for," a seemingly reasonable statement given the fact that he's projected to hit just 6 homers next season according to Bill James.  While he sees Ellsbury developing into a solid everyday centerfielder, Neyer does not share Red Sox Nation's enthusiasm that Jacoby is a star in the making.  Specifically, Neyer says, "That is not a knock on Ellsbury, who's going to be a fine player.  But he was 23 last season and posted a .298/.360/.380 line in the International League, and that's not typically the profile of a future superstar outfielder."  I agree that a player whose MLB career mirrors Jacoby's 2007 minor league line likely wouldn't get voted into the Hall, but his overall minor league averages of .314/.390/.426 look much more attractive and would garner superstar buzz... funny Neyer left those out...  And, granted, it's a much smaller sample at about 1/4 the amount of his 07 minor league ABs, but for some reason - perhaps because it goes a long way to disproving his argument - Robby overlooks Jacoby's 116 ABs at the Major League level in which he posted a .353/.394/.509 line. 

I know what you're thinking... and no, I am NOT one of those ardent, blindly idealistic fans that thinks everyone in the lineup is going to hit .400 with 50 homers for the year... I'll be the first to admit Jacoby's not likely to sustain the type of production we saw last year in the Majors over the course of an entire season (especially that .509 slugging percentage, which was higher than Manny's mark of .493), but who's to say he can't finish with a .310/.370/.420 line?  Throw in 10 homers, 40 SBs, 100+ runs and 70 or so RBIs (all of which appear to be a possibility for Jacoby) and you could be looking at the next Carl Crawford or Ichiro Suzuki, or perhaps a Johnny-Damon-in-his-prime type of player.  I'm not saying he'll match the stats of Crawford or Ichiro next year (or ever in his career, for that matter), but he certainly looks capable of entering into the echelon of elite outfielders within the next three. 

For the sake of the argument initiated by Neyer, let's take a look at some single season minor league lines of a few former Sox outfielders and compare them to their MLB career totals:


So who are these bums?  A few no-names that never quite panned out?  Career minor leaguers whose stats are so insignificant that statisticians decided it wasn't important to figure out two of the three's minor league OBPs?  Actually, they happen to be three of the most revered players in Red Sox history... I can make All Stars and potential Hall of Famers look like scrubs, too, if I only show you a small sampling of their minor league games.  Anyway, Player 1 is Dwight "Dewey" Evans, Player 2 is Freddy Lynn and Player 3 is Jim "JimEd" Rice.  All 3 are members of the Boston Red Sox Hall of Fame and Rice narrowly missed being elected into The Baseball Hall of Fame the last go-round.  And now, their MLB career totals:


Now, I'll admit that Jacoby is a totally different type of player than Dewey, Freddy and JimEd, with his speed and defensive prowess being perhaps his two greatest attributes, so this isn't a perfect comparison.  However, this exercise does illustrate my ultimate point: a single minor league season does not a Major League career make.  Another thing Neyer overlooks that goes a long way toward proving my point, as pointed out by Boston Sports Buzz contributor You A Bad Mang, is the fact that the Sox typically don't focus on overall stats when cultivating young talent in the farm system; rather, they tend to try to focus on improving specific aspects of the player's game at each particular level.  As such, Jacoby spent much of his time working on his leadoff hitting skills, i.e. getting on base, working the count and bunting, last season at the AAA level to prepare for what will be his likely role in the Majors. 

So what does all this mean?...  Well, it means that even with 250 minor league games and 116 Major League ABs to draw from, we still probably don't know the limits of this kid's potential, making Neyer's assertion that Jacoby will end up being no more than a fine player both premature and moot.  Let's give him a full MLB season or two - or at least more than 116 ABs over 33 games - before we categorize him as a fine player as opposed to a future superstar, something he has shown he may very well become, at least in my humble opinion.

Stats courtesy of Baseball-Reference and The Baseball Cube.