There are a couple of fantasy baseball deep sleepers each year that can make the difference for your team. The following 2012 profile of Jason Bourgeois will analyze the chances that he might be one of the next big sleepers. He was selected based on my simple selection process which is detailed in this introductory post.
ADP as of this posting: 232.60 (Round 20 in 12-team league)
Projected 2012 Role: Competing for OF spot
2011 Production: .294 AVG, 1 HR, 30 R, 16 RBI, 31 SB in 256 PA
My 2012 Prediction: .290 AVG, 3 HR, 75 R, 35 RBI, 35 SB if he plays full-time
Late round speedsters can provide huge value for roto teams. Jason Bourgeois might just be a good one to grab for 2012. He had a ridiculous 31 SB in 256 PA last year for Houston. That tells the whole story right there, right? It’ll be 60 SB playing full-time in 2012! Hey, whoa…wait, wait… not so fast there, tiger.
He’s 30 years old, just getting his first crack at the majors and the Astros are in full-fledged rebuilding mode. So, the chances for him to start all year are slim. Instead, the Astros are leaning towards an outfield of Jordan Schafer, J.D. Martinez and Brian Bogusevic. While it’s hard to say any of those three guys will be more productive than Bourgeois would be, they are all significantly younger than him. For a rebuilding team, that’s likely more important. As a result, Bourgeois will play more of a utility role (can also play 2B) and will pinch run a lot too.
Bourgeois shares a lot of qualities with a younger Juan Pierre. He has the chance to flirt with a .300 AVG with a pretty low walk rate and a chance to steal a ton of bases while scoring a lot of runs. However, he does strike out a bit more than you’d like out of that type of player which limits his effectiveness. Bourgeois stole 256 bases in the minors (caught stealing 81 times) which sounds pretty good. But those numbers date back over 10 years and if you prorate his steals then it seems like he’d project for about 35 SB over a full season as opposed to a huge 60 SB number or something along those lines.
While it’s always good to find speed late in drafts, Bourgeois does not seem to be in a place at this point in his career where he’ll be able to deliver for your fantasy team on a consistent basis. If the time comes where the Astros need to rely on him full-time for any point of the season then his value will certainly increase significantly.
Sleeper Verdict: Yawn. If he can wow everyone in Spring Training and lock down a starting job, his value would change. But, he seems to be stuck in a situation where he’s going to be doing a lot of things for Astros aside from being their full-time outfielder. If he’s not starting for the Astros then should he be starting for your fantasy team?
