Major League Baseball: 2005 Awards?

Cafe Society
1

So who are your award pix?

I choose…

American League

MVP - In a close vote, I gotta go with A-Rod.

Cy Young - Regrettably, there aren’t any good candidates, since Roy Halladay broke his leg. I guess I’d go with Mariano Rivera, who’s been legitimately dominating enough to make up for the lack of innings.

Rookie of the Year - I guess Tad Iguchi is a popular candidate, but Gustavo Chacin would be just as good a pick, so I’ll go with the real rookie and take Chacin.
National League

MVP - Andruw Jones, if he does win, would be one of the worst picks ever; I mean, he’s hit a lot of homers but there are a LOT of better hitters. It’s a close call between Albert Pujols - huh huh huh… Poo Holes - and Derrek Lee, but Pujols is about as good in a slightly tougher park to hit, and his team won, so he’s my man.

Cy Young - Roger Clemens was going to make this tough, but he helpfully blew his ERA up a little, so I don’t feel as bad picking Dontrelle Willis. Willias finishes slightly ahead in Win Shares, as Clemens didn’t really help his team win many games and Willis pitched more innings.

Rookie of the Year - to be honest I keep forgetting who’s a rookie and who isn’t.

2

AL MVP: I’m gonna go with A-Rod too. If you look up “clutch” in the dictionary, there’s a picture of Ortiz, and if you look up “whiner,” there’s a picture of A-Rod. But A-Rod means just as much to the Yankees as Ortiz does to the Red Sox, and he also plays very good defense at third.

AL Cy Young: I’m gonna once again agree with RickJay and pick Rivera. There just aren’t many good candidates. The White Sox starters collapsed down the stretch, and Colon has too high an ERA to really deserve the win. Maybe Santana, since he was once again stellar in the second half. But in the end, Rivera has had an incredible season, and no one else really stands out.

AL ROY: I really don’t know. Don’t pay enough attention to the AL rookies to care.

AL Manager of the Year: If Cleveland had made the playoffs, Eric Wedge without a doubt. He may still deserve it, but if it’s not him, perhaps Ozzie Guillen.

NL MVP: I disagree that there are a lot of hitters that are better than Andruw. But despite leading the league in two triple crown categories, his rate stats are just too poor, and his defensive abilities don’t make up for the large gap between him and Pujols. As much as it pains me to say Andruw doesn’t deserve it, I’m gonna go with Pujols (sorry Derek Lee).

NL Cy Young: Carpenter, if only because I hate Roger Clemens.

NL ROY: I’m gonna be a bit of a homer and go with Jeff Francouer. I think it winds up being between him and Ryan Howard, but their numbers are fairly similar, and Jeff’s defense is spectacular.

NL Manager of the Year: No doubt about it, Bobby Cox. This is easily his finest managing job. The only competition would be whatsisface with the Astros.

3

AL MVP: A-Rod, even though I’ve never liked him

AL Cy Young: I’d almost always prefer a starter, but no starter was dominant… so I go with Mariano Rivera

AL Manager of the Year: Nobody did a spectacular job, but I’ll go with Mike Sciosia

NL MVP: I’d like to pick Derek Lee, but I’ll let my bias toward playoff teams sway me to Luis Pujols.

NL Cy Young: Well, Roger Clemens won last year despite Randy Johnson having a better ERA. So this year, it’s Roger’s turned to get screwed because of his team’s lousy hitting. I’ll vote for Chris Carpenter… though I wouldn’t scream bloody murder if Dontrelle Willis won it.

NL Manager oif the Year: Bobby Cox, again

4

Don’t have time for explanations right now, but I’m going to give two categories:

Will win: A-Rod, Colon, Iguchi, Guillen (AL); Pujols, Carpenter, Taveras, Cox (NL)

Should win: Ortiz, Rivera, Chacin, Wedge (AL); Lee, Willis, Francouer, Cox (NL)

All of them except for NL Manager are basically toss-ups that I wouldn’t mind seeing go either way, though.

5

AL MVP - Alex Rodriguez. Can’t really argue against it. Offensive dynamo and one of the best defensive third basemen in the League. Total package. The bastard.

Give me a freaking break. Relievers shouldn’t get the award unless they are stunningly good and the starters are stunningly bad.

Sorry, but you’ve got an AL starter who’s thrown 225 innings with a 2.92 ERA. He’s got a K/9 of 9.17 and a K/BB of 5.33. If Johan Santana doesn’t get the Cy Young this year in favor of a freaking reliever, it’ll be a travesty.

Meh. Iguchi was OK, not much better than Cano. Chacin would be better. Blanton would be best. Pitched more innings with a lower ERA.

NL MVP - Pujols ought to get it, but Jones got more pub so he probably will.

NL Cy Young - Lots of deserving candidates. Honestly, I can’t complain if Clemens, Pettitte, Oswalt, Carpenter, Willis or Martinez won. I’m inclined to give it to Clemens, although I hate myself for it.

NL RoY - Meh. The guys who really deserve it are Francouer, Howard and Church, but none of them got much more than 300 ABs. I’m still inclined to give it to Howard.

6

I really don’t get the love affair with Mariano Rivera as the Cy Young winner this year. He only comes in if there’s a save situation and only pitches about 1.1 innings per appearance.

Granted, he’s pretty much money when he takes the mound in the 9th, but if your reason for not giving Ortiz MVP consideration is the fact that he doesn’t play defense, then you really should consider not giving the Mo the Cy Young nod because he doesn’t pitch enough.

Colon averaged over 6 innings per appearance and went 21-8.

7

He was very good- I think the real shoo-in is Schuerholz for Executive of the Year, not that people pay much attention to that award. For Atlanta to have that many quality, ready-to-play rookies is insane.

He did win last year. I think it’ll be hard for him to win it again when he wasn’t generally as good as he was last season.

There certainly are, but the critical issue is that he kept his team afloat the way he did. Lee did something similar for a time; Pujols didn’t have to.

8

Blanton didn’t pitch more innings than Chacin. Blanton pitched 201 innings, Chacin 203.

Given the difference in home parks, I am inclined to think Chacin’s 3.72 is actually a hair better than Blanton’s 3.53.

Their K/W rations are essentially the same. I still think Chacin is just a hair more deserving. But it’s a margin of almost no significance.

9

There is absolutely no way that Rivera should get the Cy. He’s been good, but not nearly as dominating as closers of the recent past were. If he’d have had a Smoltz/Gagne type season where he chased records, I might buy it. But his ERA wasn’t off the charts good by stud closer standards. No doubt he had a great year, but he’d better be ridiculous to get the award over 2 top notch starters like Colon and Santana.

One more thing, Santana pitched 100 innings after the All-Star break to Rivera’s 78 all season, and had numbers which matched or topped every one of big Mo’s.

The AL Cy should be Santana. Since when do all the awards have to go to post-season teams? That’s just silly. I could listen to an argument for MVP based on that rationale, but not a pitcher.

The NL Cy should probably be Dontrelle. I could handle an argument for Carpenter since the two guys have very similar numbers, but I think that Dontrelle feels a little more right. I like Pettite’s resume better than Clemens, even if it’s a little unfair you need to win games. If Clemens had been pushing 300 Ks then I’d feel different, but ERA aside 13-8 just doesn’t get it done. If you argue for Clemens to win it in the NL you should be arguing for Millwood to get the AL Cy.

I’ve already made a pretty specific argument for the AL MVP here. It’s A-Rod, any rationale for Big Papi is sentimental at best.

The NL MVP is probably Pujols. It’s not Andruw for sure, his HR numbers and RBI numbers are only a bit ahead of Lee and Pujols and his rate numbers are WAY behind. The Cubs fan in me wants it to be D-Lee, but in this case when the opposition with almost identical numbers is the hub of the best team in baseball, well what can you do…

As far as the Rookies, I honestly haven’t watched the canidates enough to have an opinion. In the NL I was pretty impressed with Francoeur.

The AL Managers should be either Wedge or Guillen. I’m inclined to side with Ozzie since he is the one who made the playoffs and I think he did so with a little less raw talent and more coaching savvy. Wedge’s impressive surge can be largely attributed to young talent coming on, Ozzie turned the Sox around primarily by motivating the same talent they had last year and by changing the style of play.

In the NL I find it hard to argue against Bobby Cox, that’s just impressive. Though you could say Schuerholz should get at least as much credit, if not more. Garner did well, but I think Oswalt, Clemens, Pettite and Lidge get the lions share of the credit, they didn’t need much coaching up. Can we give Dusty Baker the award for worst manager?

10

AL Cy Young: Bartolo Colon, the forgotten man. 21-8 with a 3.48 ERA on a team that really needed him to get by the A’s.

AL MVP: A-Rod. He’s got better numbers and the Yanks had to come from behind this year to get to the playoffs.

AL Manager of the Year: Guillen. His team was projected to do worse than the Indians at the beginning of the year and shocked everyone.

AL Rookie of the Year: Iguchi. I don’t see anyone else that great. Perhaps Blanton, but not good enough.

NL Cy Young: Dontrelle Willis. He pitched wonderfully on team that was fighting for the playoff spot, but missed, not of his fault. Carpenter would be deserving as well. Clemens has too few wins (not his fault really, but I don’t see a 13 win Cy Young winner).

NL MVP: Pujols. Look at the stats. 'Nuff said.

NL Manager of the Year: Bobby Cox. Had to do a very difficult job and handled it.

NL Rookie of the Year: Ryan Howard. This one got easy in the last few weeks of the season.

11

I don’t have a real opinion, other than that the Rookie of the Year should never go to somebody who has already played pro ball at a level comparable to MLB. Since this is generally players coming out of Japan, I’d say that a player that has played in the Central or Pacific Leagues should not be eligible, while a player for the Eastern and Western leagues should be. I just think that the Rookie of the Year should be a real rookie, having come out of the minors in either country.

12

AL MVP: Alex Rodriguez
AL Cy Young: Colon
AL ROY: Iguchi
Manager: Guillen

NL MVP: Pujols
NL Cy Young: Chris Carpenter
NL Roy: Ryan Howard
Manager: Cox

13

Well, I think that your theory might be flawed, but I admittedly can’t say with authority. It seems to me based on the small number of Japan players who have come over to the MLB with any level of success, it could be argued that they are no better than a quality AAA ball club.

What would you say if a guy spent 5 years putting up good numbers at AAA Iowa but was held down due to some roster congestion at his position. AAA Iowa puts about 2 players into the lague each year which seems to be more than what Japan contributes. It’s not like the Japanese are substantially more talented as rookies than the typical AAA guy.

Matsui and Ichiro were off the charts when playing in their original league. Granted they were held over there longer than typical since the international movement was barely under way, but these days the young guys pulled from Japan are rarely any more seasoned or skilled than a good rookie from a AAA squad.

I also don’t suppose you’d voice the same opinion about a guy that’s been playing ball in Cuba until the age of 25 like Contreras. How would be be different than Otsuka? If we want to make a age limit on rookie of the year honors to keep it to relatively unseasoned guys, I can live with that. But to presume that the JPL is on par with the MLB is ridiculous.

14

ESPN has Chacin at 195.1 and Blanton at 201.1.

15

ESPN is wrong; they have apparently not updated, or you need to refresh your browser. Chacin pitched, and won, the last game of the season, so he’s at 203. Having reviewed all the rookies, I’m also convinced he’s the right choice.

Even if you want to vote for Japanese players, Chacin strikes me as being more valuable than Iguchi. What’s more valuable, a starter who pitches 203 really good innings, or a second baseman who played 135 games with an average OPS?

16

Apparently they didn’t update. They still have him at 195, but I just checked CBS and they have him at 203. I still think Blanton is the better choice, BP has him ahead of Chacin in both VORP and Support Neutral Stats.

17

Another stat in Colon’s favor is that he is 10-2 after an Angels loss. I am not a big awards fan anyway…Santan/Colon/Rivera all had great seasons, all vitally important to their teams n their own way, why is it so important to split hairs and award one of them at all?

18

That can be a deceiving stat, though;

  1. Ace starters usually start right after the team’s WORST starter, losers and castoffs and kids up from AAA. It would be unusual for an ace starter to NOT start after a loss most of the time, so an ace with a gaudy W-L record will almost invariably have a gaudy W-L record “after a loss.” There’s little that stat tells you that Colon’s overall W-L didn’t already tell us.

  2. Winning a game after a win is just as important as winning one after a loss.

I agree that awards don’t really mean a lot, but they’re fun to argue over.

19

Don’t see the AL enough to really feel comfortable commenting on those awards, but here’s my NL picks:

MVP - Albert Pujols. Jones had a good season, but Albert’s was better. Derrek Lee was hurt by playing for the Cubs and by a bit of a dropoff in the second half.

Cy Young - I would give it to Chris Carpenter, just because Clemens didn’t win enough games and I’m not sure Dontrelle Willis was that much better.

Rookie of the Year - I would lean towards Francoeur, but I can see the arguments for giving it to Ryan Howard.

Manager of the Year - Why don’t they just name this the Bobby Cox Award already?

20

I respectfully disagree with this assessment. Mathematically, yeah sure, but I personally think that there is something to be said about helping ot end a losing skid.