The Decade’s Best: No. 9 Gordon Beckham

Gordon Beckham
Y-D 2007
Shortstop
Georgia

You probably couldn’t call Gordon Beckham the best power-hitting shortstop of the decade. He’s got stiff competition there. You couldn’t really call him the best hitter in his Cape League class, either, and by the time the next year’s draft rolled around, you couldn’t even call him the best prospect from his Cape League team.

But in the summer of 2007, Gordon Beckham was the best player on the best team we’ve seen in a long time.

And you can stack up what he did against pretty much anybody.

Beckham was the ringleader for the 2007 Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox, who hit a .278 as a team and steamrolled to their second consecutive league championship. In a lineup that featured four players who would become first-round picks, Beckham was the biggest power threat and the biggest run producer. Of all the great hitters on that team — Posey, Castro, Green — I think you’d want to steer clear of Beckham more than anybody else.

He came to the Cape after his sophomore season at Georgia, where he hit .307 with 15 home runs. It was a good year, but in the summer, Beckham took a leap — and he started his jump right away. In his first game, he had a double and an RBI. In his second game, he went 3-for-4 with a homer and three RBI. Pretty quickly, he became one of the big early stories in the league, and he never really faded.

Beckham finished the summer with a .284 average, a league-best nine home runs, nine doubles and 35 RBI, which tied him for the league lead. In the playoffs, Beckham helped Y-D secure its title with a home run and four RBI in four games.

After the Cape

If Beckham’s summer was huge, his next college season was enormous. He hit .411 with 28 home runs and 77 RBI en route to SEC Player of the Year honors. He was selected by the White Sox with the eighth overall pick in 2008, and he’s already made his Major League debut. He hit .270 for Chicago in 2009 with 14 home runs.

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