Should I trade Jacoby Ellsbury and Nick Markakis for Jose Reyes and Joey Votto?

Question

The league I am in is a keeper league, and we keep all of our players each year. The batting stats are runs, hits, homeruns, rbis, steals, walks, and average. My batting roster looks like this:

C Jorge Posada

1B Adrian Gonzalez

2B Jose Lopez

3B Ryan Zimmerman

SS Yunel Escobar

LF Jacoby Ellsbury

CF Alex Rios

RF Nick Markakis

Util Jack Cust

Util Mark Reynolds

BN Jim Thome

BN Elijah Dukes

BN Mike Jacobs

BN Billy Butler

BN Jarrod Saltalamacchia

I like to start Jack Cust because he is third in the league in walks and has decent power. Also keep in mind Yunel Escobar has 2B eligibility so I could drop Lopez, move Escobar to second base and plug Reyes in at SS.

If I did the trade my batting would look like this:

C Jorge Posada

1B Adrian Gonzalez

2B Yunel Escobar

3B Ryan Zimmerman

SS Jose Reyes

LF Joey Votto

CF Alex Rios

RF Jack Cust

Util Mark Reynolds

Util Mike Jacobs

BN Jim Thome

BN Elijah Dukes

BN Billy Butler

BN Jarrod Saltalamacchia

Answer 1

I'd definitely do that trade, but you're going to have to make your outfield a bit stronger. It still is pretty solid the way you have it after the trade though.

Answer 2

Wow, interesting trade. I love Ellsbury, but I still would make the trade. You are stronger because you don't have Jose Lopez.

Don't overlook what Dukes has been doing. You may want to play him over Jacobs.

Good luck. Have fun.

Answer 3

This is a toughy because getting Jose Reyes in a dynasty league is invaluable. However, Jacoby Ellsbury isn't like 35. I think he's even younger. And these 2 guys present the same set of skills but Ellsbury does play a lesser position.

Markakis is way better than Votto though. Markakis is very young but is a proven (at least to me) a 30-20 fantasy player that'll gett he runs and RBIs plus a .300 average. That's top 40 fantasy player. Votto is really a corner infielder at best because he really does not have a lot of upside.

I would actually NOT do this because I like your lineup more with Ellsbury and Markakis and I think the gap between Markakis and Votto exceeds that of Reyes and Ellsbury (Ellsbury could be the next carl crawford. If you replace him with Crawford, I wouldn't even consider it so just leave your team as is).