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Scutaro is a better player than he gets credit for. For some reason his season has completely flown by my radar. Its somewhat similar to the Brayan situation where you have a guy that was labeled early on and never got to establish himself as a regular.
Scutaro has always been averagish defensively at SS and has had a decent enough bat at the position. Thats more than enough to start this league...
Whats interesting though is that BOTH RZR and UZR have Scutaro's GLOVE improving in 2008 and thats continued in 2009. Bill James had Scutaro at +12 in 2008 and PMR had him as THE best SS in baseball in 2008 with a 110.16 rating. Scutaro obviously isn't going to get better tools-wise, but I wonder if hes starting to do a better job of positioning at the MLB level? It would be interesting to hear the Blue Jays fans' opinion on this. The advanced stats are all saying he suddenly turned into a GG caliber guy in '08.
Scutaro is also doing better in '09 with the bat and its not all a fluke. The CT% is at 94.4% and his O-Swing% is at 11.8%. BOTH are career high marks and are very impressive. He makes more contact Ichiro and is patient at the plate like Olerud. Both marks COULD regress, but this does look like an older player that is improving his eye at the plate.
The power is another question and something that I think is more likely to regress a little at Safeco. Scutaro's raw power hasn't improved and his higher IsoP is driven from a higher FB% and its mostly been more doubles. At Safeco the power is probably going to calm down to that .110-20 IsoP range.
Even so, that a better bat than it looks like on the surface. I'd take .270/.360/.385 with above-average D at SS in a heart-beat at Safeco. Thats a nice little player. Think Mark McLemore at the plate circa '01-'02 with a better ability to make contact (similar hitter type).
Fangraphs has Scutaro at 3.5 WAR this season which is Ichiro/Gutierrez territory. Hes not THAT good, but sometimes a player gets in a groove and has a career year. I wouldn't mind benefiting from that career year in 2nd half and then collecting those draft picks. I'm sold on Scutaro. He looks like one of those guys whose using a much smarter approach to the game as he ages (like McLemore).
Actually the more I look at Scutaro, the more I start thinking that hes a late bloomer that started breaking out in 2008 like Russell Branyan. The fact that the Red Sox and Mariners (arguably the two best run franchises in the game today) are after him makes me wonder whether or not this guy is severly underrated. If Scutaro keeps up the improved approach at the plate and if his improved glove is for real...that is quietly an impact-level player, not just a Jack Wilson type stop-gap.