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Young agrees to contract extension with Diamondbacks


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http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?i...ce=MLBHeadlines

Chris Young and the Arizona Diamondbacks have agreed to a five-year contract extension through 2013, the East Valley Tribune reported Monday.

 

The contract is near the six-year, $31 million extension shortstop Troy Tulowitzki signed with the Colorado Rockies on Jan. 23, a league source told the Tribune. Young's contract buys out all of his arbitration years and includes a team option on a year of free agency, the Tribune reported.

 

The Diamondbacks have already locked up several of their young players, including starters Brandon Webb and Dan Haren, outfielder Eric Byrnes and catcher Chris Snyder, who are all under contract through 2010.

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Chris Young pitched a pretty good game today against the Twins.

 

Seriously though, now the organization is completely past this now and we even have Carlos Quentin who might even be as good as Young offensively. We actually have a surplus of outfielders.

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QUOTE (Greg The Bull Luzinski @ Apr 7, 2008 -> 05:52 PM)
Can we just close this thread before the same people come and rehash the same arguments. It's over, let it go.

 

Its a message board, why cant we talk about ex-sox or in this case a past top prospect? But like someone else said, I think that Quentin makes the loss of Young hurt a lot less. That being said, I still kind of wish we kept him, losing Anderson obviously but still making the trade for Vazquez. And Im an Anderson fan btw too lol.

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Yeah I have no idea how Young is a leadoff hitter... he has never hit for a high average at any level of professional baseball, ever, and his OBP in the majors is nearly Uribe-esque. He has quite a bit of power obviously, and he could be a 30-30 guy, but as a prototypical leadoff hitter he's useless. It'd be like putting Danny Richar up there.

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He's had one full season in the bigs and he was a leadoff hitter then too and I don't understand how then or now, even though his OBP was below .300. If he jumps up 100 points in OBP in one season that would be completely miraculous - in the minors the closest he got to that is .377 and it's unrealistic to expect him to jump sky-high like that. He is kind of like a faster Josh Fields - he strikes out a lot and he doesn't walk very much.

 

If anything it seems like he should be hitting at the bottom of the order until he can get enough contact ability to be a heart of the order guy with speed... but not a leadoff hitter.

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QUOTE (lostfan @ Apr 7, 2008 -> 04:53 PM)
Yeah I have no idea how Young is a leadoff hitter... he has never hit for a high average at any level of professional baseball, ever, and his OBP in the majors is nearly Uribe-esque. He has quite a bit of power obviously, and he could be a 30-30 guy, but as a prototypical leadoff hitter he's useless. It'd be like putting Danny Richar up there.

Well, looking at the stats, I think that the minor league numbers for both suggest that either could develop in to a guy who could easily hit in the leadoff spot. Young may not have pulled off a high BA last year, but he still took 43 walks as a rookie, which isn't bad...and if you look at his other yearly numbers, he's been good for 60-70 walks at each level on his way up. He also has a ridiculously high stolen base success rate, clocking in at 82% in the big leagues last year. His batting average in the minors has been in the .270 range. If his numbers hold, he could easily put up a .350 OBP, with a .270 average, 30 home runs, and an 80% stolen base clip. While he does strike out more than you'd like as a leadoff hitter, I think you'll get used to it for the rest of those numbers. The key is to cut down on the k's a little bit for him, and that'll turn him in to a much better leadoff hitter.

 

Richar is similar in a couple ways...he takes a decent number of walks (52 and 55 his last couple years, including his time in the big leagues), has some pop, and has put up a better BA. The big difference is that while Richar doesn't have the Speed young has, he also doesn't strike out nearly as often, and that lets him get his BA higher and thus pushes up his OBP.

 

Neither one of them are classical leadoff hitters, I kinda like Swisher there for our team, but if their minor league numbers carry over and show up in their big league performances, neither one of them would be a bad option at leadoff.

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See that's what raises my eyebrows, the words "suggest that either could develop." Meaning there is no way in hell that I'd be putting them into an important spot like that before they're ready, OBP is the most important thing and you need it now, not eventually. It takes time to adjust to the MLB level unless your name is Griffey Jr. Maybe Chris (or hell, Danny, which would be f***ing sweet) will develop into a bona fide MLB leadoff hitter but that looks to be a ways off.

 

I just can't see Chris Young suddenly becoming Curtis Granderson this year.

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QUOTE (Tony82087 @ Apr 7, 2008 -> 07:42 PM)
It's all risk/reward. Young shatters his knee without a deal, he is f***ed. I love what Tulo and him have done. Lock yourself with some very nice cash, and when if they play like they should for the next few years, they are going to be up for a huge pay day right in their prime years.

I think it's a totally logical move if you're a 2nd or 3rd year player years away from FA. You've got what, 4 years at least before you can cash in, at the most you'd be looking at $15-$20 million through the arbitration years if you could stay healthy. Instead, you give the team some cost certainty, and you guarantee yourself a big payday without the injury risk.

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