SethSpeaks.net Stan Musial Award Ballot
American League MVP
The Baseball Bloggers Alliance
has now named its first awards of the season, and just one is yet to be
announced. First, the Connie Mack Awards
for top manager went to Ron Washington
and Bud Black. Then Neftali Feliz and Buster Posey won the Willie
Mays Awards for each league’s top rookies. The Goose
Gossage Awards for top relievers went to Rafael Soriano and Brian Wilson. Yesterday, the Walter
Johnson Awards, given to each league’s top pitcher, were handed out to Felix Hernandez and Roy Halladay.
That leaves just one more award to give, the
Stan Musial Award which is akin to the Most Valuable Player Awards. I have one
of two Twins Blogger ballots for this award. The other was from “Fetch” at
Twinkie Talk, which you can see here.
And here is my vote:
STAN
MUSIAL AWARD BALLOT
This was a really difficult vote. Before
doing the research, I jotted down who I thought would be my Top 5, and to be
honest, after doing the research, the top four were pretty easy choices, but it
was difficult to determine what order they should be in. From four through ten,
it was more difficult.
But first, my thoughts on the MVP award. It
seems that everybody has a different definition of “value” and what an MVP
should be. And that’s why it’s great, because it creates a ton of discussion.
And that’s why it’s frustrating, because it can be difficult to determine the
differences in value between two or more players. I do not believe that an MVP
has to be from a playoff team. I do believe that an MVP should be from a team
that was competitive through most of the season. In other words, that means
that guys like Luke Scott, Billy Butler and Shin-Soo Choo tend to be overlooked despite some very strong
seasons. I believe that a pitcher can get votes, but in order to finish in the
top ten, a pitcher needs to be beyond dominant. I believe that no one statistic
is the right measure for an MVP. I also believe that you need to look at a
multitude of stats to really make a decision. I think those stats should be a
combination of counting stats and rate stats along with some of the advanced
metrics. I believe that there were a lot of very good players in 2010 in the
American League, and just because a player does not finish in the Top 10 does
not mean they didn’t have a good year or somehow was disappointing. I also
believe that salary and expectations should play no factor in the vote. I also believe there is room for intangibles
in the vote and yet, that should be used in a tie-breaking type of situation. I
mean, if someone like Derek Jeter and Milton Bradley put identical numbers up,
I have no problem with giving the edge to the “leadership” of Jeter. But I can’t
reiterate enough that ‘intangibles’ are not a big percentage at all in any MVP
discussion.
So what numbers did I look at? As you know,
some of the MVP candidates missed some time, and I do believe that has to be
noted. So I looked at games played and plate appearances. I took a glance at
extra base hits and home runs. I know RBI are a
product of having runners on in front of them, but someone has to drive in
runs. I looked at the triple slash numbers (BA/OBP/SLG) and OPS. I also looked
at Runs Created, and RC27. I looked a wOBA. I wanted
to look at positional variation, so I reviewed WAR (Wins Above
Replacement) and VORP (Value Over Replacement Player). I looked at Win
Probability Added to determine “clutchness”
throughout the season. I also looked a little bit at defense by looking at UZR.
Like I said, I don’t want any formula based on these things, but wanted to be
able to compare and contrast.
Finally, I contacted a few bloggers from some
of the teams of players that I had some questions about, and all
of that put together helped me to come up with my Stan Musial Ballot. We
were asked to vote for the top ten (which is the same thing that the Baseball
Writers do when they vote for MVP). Here is my ballot:
#10 –
Joe Mauer – Minnesota Twins - .327/.402/.469
Yes, the home run
numbers dropped from his 2009 MVP season, but contrary to popular belief, Mauer had another very good 2010 season. His VORP was at
50.5 which is in the top eight in the league. He
creates runs. He is clutch with a WPA of 2.45 which is top ten in the league.
He also does a very good job behind the plate. Was it a down year from a
remarkable 2009 season? Sure. Does that mean it was a bad year? Not at all.
#9 – Nick Swisher – New York Yankees - .288/.359/.511
People wondered what
the personality of Swisher would do in New York. He struggled some in 2009, but
in 2010, he put together his best season. It was also his most consistent
season. That was important to the Yankees since Derek Jeter had a down year,
and A-Rod and Mark Teixeira each had struggles and injuries throughout the
season.
#8 –
Evan Longoria – Tampa Bay Rays - .294/.372/.507
The Rays were the
top team in the league and they were really carried by two players on offense.
Longoria provided the power with 46 doubles and 22 home run.
He created a lot of runs. He was clutch, and he played a terrific 3B
defensively. Despite his youth, Longoria turned into a real leader on the 2010
Rays roster.
#7 –
Adrian Beltre – Boston Red Sox - .321/.365/.553
Beltre was a free agent last offseason and signed a
make-good deal with the Red Sox. Beltre made good, to
be sure. First, he remained one of baseball’s best defensive 3B. However, he
also led the league with 49 doubles while added 28 home runs.
#6 –
Paul Konerko – Chicago White Sox - .312/.393/.584
I know, he plays for
the White Sox, but he seems like a good guy. And he had a tremendous 2010
season, arguably the best of his career. Konerko hit
39 home runs and drove in 111 runs. He was in the top five in the league in
WPA, and despite playing the hitter-friendly 1B, he
had a VORP of 64.2. If he played another position, he would rank higher with
these numbers. Of course, he’s not a great first baseman defensively, with a
-13.4 UZR. But the end of the day, Konerko was again
the best hitter and the leader of the White Sox.
#5 – Robinson
Cano – New York Yankees - .319/.381/.534
Of course, the
Yankees were only one game behind the Rays as the best team in the league, and
Cano was clearly the best player on the Yankees roster. The second baseman hit
41 doubles, hit 29 home runs and drove in 109 runs. He was clutch, and he was
consistent. His defense improved, although his UZR was still slightly below 0
(-0.6).
#4 – Jose
Bautista – Toronto Blue Jays - .260/.378/.617
I think we were all
assuming that Bautista’s dream season would eventually end with him waking up
and reality setting in, but it never did. 35 doubles and 54 home runs later, he
ended the season as the Blue Jays all-time single season home run leader. He
was third in the league in OPS. He was second in the league in runs created. He
was in the top three in Win Probability added. Now, his defense
in right field and at 3B were both slightly sub-par, but when you’re
providing this kind of offense, adequate defense is way more than adequate! The
softball-swinging Jays may have finished fourth in the AL East, but they had a
record above .500 and must of the credit for that is Bautista.
#3 – Carl
Crawford – Tampa Bay Rays - .307/.356/.495
Crawford is just a
solid all-around player, and he put together a great season for the Rays. He
hit 30 doubles, 13 triples and 19 home runs. He drove in 90 runs. He stole 47
bases. He was very clutch. And defensively, his 18.5
UZR is far and away the best of anyone who could even be considered an MVP
candidate. Since the Rays were the best team in the league, the “Best Player on
the Best Team” argument would push us to Crawford.
#2 –
Miguel Cabrera – Detroit Tigers - .328/.420/.622
If the Detroit
Tigers had been in contention into September, Cabrera would probably be
considered a front runner, but like our #1, Cabrera’s season ended a little
early too. But Cabrera put together another incredible season of offensive
numbers. He had 45 doubles, 38 homers and led the league with 126 RBI. He led
the league in Runs Created at 133.3. His 6.93 WPA was second in the league as
was his .429 wOBA and 79 VORP. After a disappointing
end to his 2009 season, Cabrera came back with another great season, even if
his 1B defense is pretty bad.
#1 –
Josh Hamilton – Texas Rangers - .359/.411/.633
I thought missing
much of September would hurt Hamilton’s case in my head, but a review of all of
the things I mentioned told me that he was still, far-and-away the league’s top
player and most valuable player. Despite the missed time, Hamilton’s 40
doubles, 32 home runs and 100 RBI were still among league leaders. He led the
league in batting average (.359), slugging percentage (.633), OPS (1.044), RC27
(9.59), wOBA (.447), WAR (8.0), WPA (9.31) and VORP
(80.5). And he plays a very good defense with a 7.9 UZR. The Rangers were a
semi-surprise team in 2010 in that the Angels had really dominated the AL West
in recent years. Hamilton led the Rangers to an easy win in the division.
Feel free to Discuss and Comment here.
AFL
UPDATE
·
On Monday, the
Peoria Saguaros won 5-4. Chris Parmelee went 2-4 with two doubles and four RBI. Ben Revere was 1-4 to drop his batting
average to .395. Joe Benson was used
as a pinch runner and scored a run. Kyle
Waldrop gave up one run in 1.2 innings.