2011 Fantasy Projections, No. 43: Is Brian McCann Finally Free of Eye Injury?

Our 2011 fantasy baseball projections will be released one-by-one until the top 100 players have been revealed. These rankings consider past achievements, current performance and expected future results based on standard five-by-five H2H settings.

Question: Who’s the only catcher to have hit 20-plus HRs in each of the last three seasons?

Answer: Brian McCann.

The scariest part?

McCann is entering his age-27 season and will bat in a lineup featuring Martin Prado, Jason Heyward, Chipper Jones and newly-acquired Dan Uggla.

The downside?

McCann’s batting average (.301, .281, .269) and contact rate (85.5, 82.3, 80.1) have decreased each of the last three seasons as he’s battled a lingering vision problem that two Lasik eye surgeries couldn’t fix. He did, however, start wearing glasses again last May. His batting average with the glasses (.274) was much better than his batting average before (.243).

So what should we expect in 2011?

Everything points to McCann bouncing back from a career-low .269 batting average last season, and there’s nothing to suggest he won’t hit 20 HRs again in 2011. In fact, given the possibility of Prado, Heyward and Jones batting in front of him, McCann could be in for his first 100-RBI season.

	PA	R	HR	RBI	SB	AVG
2010 stats	566	63	21	77	5	.269
3-year average	563	65	22	86	5	.284
2011 FBI Forecast	575	70	23	95	5	.282

ORIGINAL ARTICLE: FANTASY BASEBALL INSIDERS

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