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Imagine begin so good at 20 that your downside was Cesar Cedeno. Holy snot. Junior and Trout.
For you young 'uns, Cedeno was a terrific player.
In '72 and '73, he basically had back to back .320-.380-.537 seasons.......in the Astrodome......as a 21 and 22 year old.
Sheeesh. Oh....he played CF.....and, Oh, he won GG's in both seasons. Double sheeeeesh. 69 and 62 extra-base hits. 55 and 56 steals.
And get this, he finished 6th and 11th in the MVP voting those years. What does a guy have to do?
He then followed that up with being a consistent 130 OPS+ player for the next 8 seasons.
Cedeno was something. B-R has him as the 140th greatest hitter ever. Trailing Dale Murphy by one and Dick Allen by three. He's two spots ahead of Mattingly and three ahead of Olerud.
So assuming that we can apply the James' Junior comment to Trout, his worst-case career is the equivalent of Allen, Murphy, Cedeno, Mattingly and Olerud.
Uh....that's pretty good.
You youngsters check out Cedeno, a guy that Doc and G and I cut our baseball teeth on.
It's hard to remember when you watch Trout that he is only 20 years old. Junior, Mantle, Mays......that's rarefied air. Mays came up at 20 and was real good (not as good as Trout)....but missed all of his age 22 season and most of the previous to military service. Then he hit the 12 year run that Doc spoke of. His worst BA, worst OBP, and 2nd worst Slg% during that streak came during his "slump" year of '56. His slump? .296-.369-.557!
Is that Trout? Will be way fun to watch.
And every good steelhead fly fisherman, like me, has got to love a guy with that surname.
moe