Elly needs to drop the switch hitting

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(06-11-2025, 09:44 AM)ochocincos Wrote: Staying around the bigs wasn't a problem for BH.
He played 11 years in the majors, although he really didn't do much after 2019.

As long as EDLC can stay at .250+ BA to go along with that pop and speed, he'll stick around for a long time.
But I remember there being such a hype around BH that he was going to be that missing piece to get the 2010's Reds over the hump, getting on base and scoring runs out the wazoo with his speed. He just couldn't get on base enough.
But for EDLC, I think there's even more of the hype because not only can he run fast like BH, but he's more.
There has been an expectation after last year that he would blossom into the next franchise player the team would build around, being the next equivalent of Joey Votto.
Obviously, EDLC is not going to be anywhere close to the career .294 BA or .409 OBP that Votto had, but many are ok with him being down closer to .250-.270 BA and around .350 OBP if he can keep stealing and flying around the bases.

It's probably best to go by service time for a guy that goes up-and-down between minors and majors like Hamilton did later. Being on a team for a week or two and then getting DFA'd isn't really the same as playing a year. 

Doesn't reduce your point at all as he still had 8 years and change of service time in the majors which is a heck of a full career, but Zack Cozart was in MLB for 9 years so it would seem like Hamilton lasted 2 more years if you just went like that, but Cozart also had the same 8 years and change of service time because he never became a DFA/AAAA type guy at the end of his career.

Crazy thing about Billy Hamilton was that he was so good defensively and on the bases that he really didn't even need to be a league average hitter. If he could have just been like 10-15% below league average with a bat, he would have been a perennial All-Star. Just a shame he couldn't even manage that and was more like 25-45% below average.

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Weirdly enough, EDLC is barely being productive from a SB/CS angle this season. It's generally considered that you need 3 SB for every 1 CS to be providing positive value in attempting it. He was well above that last year at 4.2:1 despite leading in CS... this year he's at 3.3:1. Granted he also was picked off a ton last year and I think he's only been picked off 2 times this year, so that might be the cause of it as not all POs are CS so that could have changed some numbers on both years, but he's really close to not actually providing value on SB attempts (one more CS without a success and he's below the 3:1 threshold). 

Still obviously providing positive value on his ability to go 1st to 3rd or 2nd to home, though.