1 of 1- forsberg_us
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MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Law's vote this year was for NL Manager of the Year, so he doesn't have a say in any of these races, but I thought we could kick around his picks and logic. Starting with MVP:
AL MVP
1. Josh Hamilton
2. Evan Longoria
3. Jose Bautista
4. Miguel Cabrera
5. Robinson Cano
6. Felix Hernandez
7. Shin-Soo Choo
8. Adrian Beltre
9. Cliff Lee
10. Joe Mauer
Hamilton's season ended early, and that's the only reason there's any debate about who should win this award, but he was so productive in his 132 games that no one else could quite catch up to him even with more bulk playing time. I could see reasonable arguments for the next three names, although I can't say I've heard any real sentiment for Longoria, who is only the best player on the team with the best record in the AL, usually a recipe for an MVP candidacy. I thought Buster Olney made a good point about the various defensive numbers, including UZR (ultimate zone rating), which go into WAR (wins above replacement) and any other stats that attempt to roll offense and defense together: Those defensive numbers are great because they help measure something that previously went unmeasured, but their accuracy is not that of the comparable offensive statistics. I used FanGraphs' WAR figures when putting together these ballots, but with an eye on the components, not just the raw totals, so I could mentally adjust them (slightly) where appropriate.
NL MVP
1. Joey Votto
2. Albert Pujols
3. Roy Halladay
4. Ryan Zimmerman
5. Adam Wainwright
6. Troy Tulowitzki
7. Matt Holliday
8. Carlos Gonzalez
9. Ubaldo Jimenez
10. Josh Johnson
Any of the top three guys could be No. 1 here -- Votto and Pujols are in a virtual statistical tie by fWAR and adjusted batting runs, once you factor in the benefit Votto gets from his home park, and both are excellent defensive first basemen. Halladay's season has been relatively historic (more on that in a moment). In a year when there is no clear position-player candidate, he'd have a chance to win, but I'm realistic about a pitcher's odds in the MVP voting. Carlos Gonzalez got a ton of press when he was hot in August and trying to force his way into the Triple Crown race, but once you take Coors Field into account -- and Gonzalez seems to get a disproportionate boost from playing at altitude; note the .380 home, .289 away averages -- his season just isn't on par with the guys above him.
- forsberg_us
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
His Cy Young thoughts:
AL Cy Young Award
1. Felix Hernandez
2. Cliff Lee
3. Francisco Liriano
4. Justin Verlander
5. David Price
I've gone over Hernandez's case multiple times (most recently here), and he has been outstanding by many measures while shouldering a Halladay-esque workload and dominating several of the league's best offenses. But I think you could make reasonable cases for Lee and Liriano. Price might be the candidate who could best satisfy the pitcher-win crowd with a strong argument using advanced metrics, and he should get some boost for who he faces in the AL East. The next two names would be Jered Weaver and CC Sabathia. Weaver led the American League in strikeouts, but as a severe fly-ball pitcher, he gets a huge benefit from his home park; he had a 4.14 road ERA this year that's right in line with his career line). Sabathia is a favorite of win partisans who had to rapidly cobble together a "pitching under pressure" argument to defend a pitcher who had a fantastic year but just wasn't the best pitcher in the league by any rational measure. (And, by the way, pitching where giving up a single run might cost your team the game, as Hernandez did so often, is real pressure, too.) And Jon Lester had a pretty fantastic season in the relative obscurity of Boston ... wait, what?
NL Cy Young Award
1. Roy Halladay
2. Adam Wainwright
3. Ubaldo Jimenez
4. Josh Johnson
5. Tim Lincecum
Halladay works in a hitters' park in the NL's toughest division and was still far and away the best pitcher in the league this year. He became the first starter since 1923 to throw 250 innings while walking 30 or fewer men, and his ERA was 2.44. Since 2000 only Randy Johnson has gone that many innings with a lower ERA. The last starter in either league to go 250 innings in 33 or fewer starts was Charles Nagy in 1992. Halladay is a throwback, but also an extremely effective throwback, one who has remade himself more than once in his career already, and I won't be surprised if he does it in his late 30s. Johnson fell short when he was shut down in early September; Ubaldo's second half couldn't come close to his first (and I'm not talking about his win total); only Wainwright has a compelling case, very close to Doc in ERA and the various adjusted versions out there (like FIP and SIERA), but Doc's 20-inning advantage puts him over the top.
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Thread Starter- forsberg_us
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
And Rookie of the Year:
AL Rookie of the Year
1. Brian Matusz
2. Danny Valencia
3. Austin Jackson
There just is no great candidate in the AL this year, but Matusz's year came while pitching in front of a bad defense versus the four strong offenses in the AL East, and his strong finish pumped up his values to the point where he's a reasonable choice. (As far as I can tell, he's the top AL rookie in Baseball-Reference's WAR, and I believe he's third in FanGraph's version, 0.1 behind Valencia, which in practical terms is no difference.) Jackson's argument is one strictly of bulk, as he played every day from Opening Day and led off enough to get over 670 PA, but what he did in those PAs wasn't so impressive that we can gift him the award just on the raw totals. (Fun with arbitrary endpoints: Jackson went 5-for-5 on April 30, then hit .282/.333/.384 from May 1 through Saturday.)
Combine Matusz's performance, the caliber of his competition, and the fact that he holds more promise than those other candidates, and he is my choice for AL Rookie of the Year. As for the most likely winner, Neftali Feliz, I don't worship at the altar of the save stat, and while Feliz was excellent, he threw just 69 innings this year; I love his upside if the Rangers put him back in the rotation, but that's just not enough value to put him ahead of a quality starter or two everyday players.
NL Rookie of the Year
1. Jason Heyward
2. Buster Posey
3. Jaime Garcia
This was an unbelievable rookie crop, and both of the top two guys deserve the honor, but Heyward has the bulk advantage and a minuscule edge in rate stats while also performing in that tough NL East -- and does all of this at age 20, or what would have been his junior year of college. Heyward's walk total is the third-best ever for a player 20 or younger, and his OBP is the eighth-best ever for a player in that age group with at least 400 PAs. None of this is meant as a slight to Posey, whom I argued last offseason should have been the Giants' regular catcher on Opening Day, and whose contributions at the plate and behind it were just as critical to the Giants' playoff hopes as Heyward's performance was to Atlanta's. When two players are as close in per-game performance as these two are, Heyward's bulk totals, his tougher competition and his youth all point to him over Posey -- for me, at least, since I expect a fairly split ballot with those two garnering all the No. 1 votes between them.
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Thread Starter- tkihshbt
- Scott Rolen
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Can't really disagree with any of those. Of course, I think Pujols should be MVP, but it could go either way.
- artie_fufkin
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Keith Law doesn't really understand baseball. I don't care what Felix Hernandez's WAR or VORP or DORK is, he won 13 games for a team that was out of its division race by Memorial Day. Cliff Lee? A 12-game winner? Seriously? Cliff Lee?!?
The rest of it is fine. I don't understand how you rate Cliff Lee ahead Price, Sabathia or Lester, or any one of a half-dozen other American League pitchers. Law is trying to impress people with his use of these alphabet soup stats, and all he's doing is revealing his ignorance.
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- Scott Rolen
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
It's not really ignorant...Felix Hernandez was the best pitcher in the American League. It's not even particularly close, either. Obviously Price was good, but he was not even close to being as dominant as the King.
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- Scott Rolen
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Also, I'll add that it's silly to punish Hernandez for pitching with the worst offense in the past 39 years.
- artie_fufkin
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
tkihshbt wrote:
It's not really ignorant...Felix Hernandez was the best pitcher in the American League. It's not even particularly close, either. Obviously Price was good, but he was not even close to being as dominant as the King.
TK, he was 13-12. There were 17 pitchers in the American League who won more games. This isn't Steve Carlton winning 27 games for the Phillies. I'll never understand the argument that wins are a meaningless stat. Isn't winning the game the objective?
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- Scott Rolen
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Sure, but what we're talking about a guy who lost games because he would give up a Cement-head-esque two runs in eight innings.
- artie_fufkin
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Sure, but what we're talking about a guy who lost games because he would give up a Cement-head-esque two runs in eight innings.
So what? There's something to be said about giving up one less run than the other guy, whether the score is 1-0 or 8-7. Some people would even say that's what pitching is all about.
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- Scott Rolen
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Not when the win is dependent on 24 other guys. I'm not sure what the BBWA is supposed to say: "sorry, Felix Hernandez, even though you pitched 250 innings and your ERA was 2.20, you're being penalized because your offense was one of the worst of all-time and you didn't pitch enough complete game shutouts"?
- APIAD
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
I dont think any of the awards other than ROY should go to a player on a team that didnt make the playoffs. So I dont believe Pujols should win the MVP. I wouldnt be disappointed if he did though.
- artie_fufkin
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Not when the win is dependent on 24 other guys. I'm not sure what the BBWA is supposed to say: "sorry, Felix Hernandez, even though you pitched 250 innings and your ERA was 2.20, you're being penalized because your offense was one of the worst of all-time and you didn't pitch enough complete game shutouts"?
No. You say "The Mariners probably could have finished in the same spot in the standings without your historic 13-win season."
- artie_fufkin
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
I dont think any of the awards other than ROY should go to a player on a team that didnt make the playoffs. So I dont believe Pujols should win the MVP. I wouldnt be disappointed if he did though.
The numbers between the top three (It's ridiculous not to have Gonzalez in that discussion) are almost equal, and in that instance the tiebreaker is which team made the playoffs. So I'd vote Votto, Pujols and Gonzalez in that order.
- forsberg_us
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Setting aside the arguments pro/con for Hernandez, how do you get Cliff Lee #2? He didn't pitch 250 innings, his ERA wasn't under 3, and he spent half the season playing for a team that finished first in its division while racking up a 4-6 record for said first place team.
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Thread Starter- artie_fufkin
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
Setting aside the arguments pro/con for Hernandez, how do you get Cliff Lee #2? He didn't pitch 250 innings, his ERA wasn't under 3, and he spent half the season playing for a team that finished first in its division while racking up a 4-6 record for said first place team.
Not to blast my own horn here, but I wrote this last night:
"Cliff Lee? A 12-game winner? Seriously? Cliff Lee?!?"
- APIAD
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
I am with Darth here. Winning games makes you a CY. What is the lowest win total a pitcher has had and won.
- artie_fufkin
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Re: MVP? Cy Young? Rookie of the Year? Shutout according to Keith Law
I am with Darth here. Winning games makes you a CY. What is the lowest win total a pitcher has had and won.
I think it was Lincecum last year. At least among starting pitchers. Hernandez winning this year might end up being a good thing in the long term. The sabregeeks had a hard enough time justifying Greinke and Lincecum last year, and if they pick a 13-game winner this year, the BBWAA might be a little bit more judicious about who gets ballots, so the Keith Laws and Jeff Passans of the world don't keep embarrassing the real reporters who understand the game, and, ultimately, embarrass the sport.