Compared frequently to Mike Piazza and Frank Thomas, Montero tore up Double-A in 2009 with Trenton. Elevated from Single-A Tampa halfway through the season after posting .356/8/37 and .406/.583/.989 numbers in 180 at bats, Jesus continued to excel after his promotion. Though his numbers dipped slightly, his marks of .317/9/33 and .370/.539/.909 show tangible evidence that the player definitely possesses the bat to achieve at the major league level and fits the Yankee profile of sabermetric productivity.
Is Montero the next Mickey Mantle or the Ron Bloomberg? The next Joe DiMaggio or Hensley Meulens? In reality, he's probably somewhere in between. And yet even with that ridiculously safe prediction, one can never be sure that, despite his immense talent and endorsements by all the various prospect ranking commentators, Montero won't go the way of Dale Murray or Danny Tartabull and last forever in Yankee infamy as a massive disappointment (an inevitability for some with high expectations and standards). A fate that may be worse than the usual "fade into forgotten oblivion" organizational busts in other cities are afforded.
Watching Montero at the plate though, he definitely doesn't look like Danny Tartabull.
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