Edwin Encarnación

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Edwin Encarnación (born January 7, 1983 in La Romana, Dominican Republic), is a third baseman in Major League Baseball who plays for the Cincinnati Reds. Listed at 6'-1", 195-pound, Encarnación bats and throws right-handed. Although born in the Dominican Republic, he spent much of his youth in Puerto Rico and attended Manuel Toro High School in Caguas. He is not related to outfielder Juan Encarnación.

Encarnación was drafted by the Texas Rangers in the ninth round of the 2000 amateur draft and signed with them. On June 15, 2001, he was traded along Rubén Mateo to the Cincinnati Reds in exchange for pitcher Rob Bell. He made his big league debut on June 24, 2005 and saw action in 69 games. He finished with a .232 batting average and nine home runs.

Many baseball pundits and Reds fans alike believe that Encarnación has the ability to become a potent offensive third baseman, but needs to overcome fielding deficiencies — as evidenced by his 25 errors during the 2006 season. The general consensus is that Encarnación makes the difficult plays, but botches too many routine ones and makes ill-advised or errant throws. However, it is often pointed out that possible Hall of Fame Reds shortstop Barry Larkin also had a similar reputation as an erratic fielder early in his career, but later became a three-time Gold Glove Award winner.

[edit] Career stats

Yr   Ag Tm  Lg G   AB  R  H   2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB K    AVG  OBP  SLG TB  SF SH IBB HBP GIDP
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
2005 22 CIN NL 69  211 25 49  16 0  9  31  3  0  20 60  .232 .308 .436 92  0  0   2  3    8
2006 23 CIN NL 117 406 60 112 33 1  15 72  6  3  41 78  .276 .359 .473 192 3  0   3  13   9
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
TOTALS         186 617 85 161 49 1  24 103 9  3  61 138 .261 .341 .460 284 3  0   5  16   17
2 Seasons