One of my favorite features of baseball-reference is the similarity scores it assigns to each player. It finds other players with similar stats playing the same position at the players age.
For Sanchez, there's not a lot of good ones, with the only ones I knew immediately being Robinson Cano, Alex Cintron, and Johnny Estrada. Funny though that many people know Cano, despite his rather awful 2008, and so few still know Sanchez.
For Markakis though, the list is far more interesting. The direct comparisons include current players Juan Riveria, Andre Ethier, Kevin Youkilis, Rocco Baldelli (who the guest kid announcer on NESN called Baldy last week), and Cliff Lee. What? On further inspection, the Cliff Lee mentioned is not the reigning Cy Young Winner, it is actually a ballplayer from 1920's.
On Markakis's similar through age 24, he's got some good career prospects, as it lists the likes of Vernon Wells, Ellis Burks (one of my personal favorites), and Carlos Beltran. If he can pull off the production of any one of them, you'd have to want him on your team long-term.
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