Awards Season Explanations, Part 3

So, I didn’t quite get this up before the MVPs were announced, but I still want to explain my voting. And so I shall. Let’s jump right in. (The first two explanation articles can be found here and here.)

AL MVP-1. Jose Bautista

2. Jacoby Ellsbury - This was the hard part, really. The two were more or less equal, with each one bettering the other in different categories. Ellsbury was the better fielder (at a harder position), Bautista was the better hitter (while playing multiple positions). Ellsbury led the AL in fWAR (9.4 to 8.3), while Bautista led in bWAR (8.5 to 7.2). In both of those cases, they were 1-2 (with Verlander tying Baustista in bWAR; however, I trust fWAR for pitchers a little more, and I have already explained my reasons for not voting for him repeatedly).

In the end, I went with Bautista for 2 reasons: first, a lot of Ellsbury’s value came from his fielding, which was suddenly improved. Fielding stats are both less certain than hitting stats and more prone to random fluke fluctuation, meaning that we can be much more certain of Bautista’s value. Second, Bautista played about two dozen games at third base. While Ellsbury did play the harder position (center field is definitely harder to play than right, although it’s similar in difficulty to third base), WAR (both versions) accounts for position difficulty; it does not account for versatility. So, I felt comfortable using that as a sort of tiebreaker. Really, though, both were fine choices, and would have made fine MVPs (the next five players or so would also be decent choices, although I don’t think any of them had as good a claim to the trophy as these two).

The Great 2011 Awards Cheat Sheet

Well, Award Season has more or less wrapped up. So, for some reason, I decided to create a giant summary of the winners, listed by awards and voting block. No, I don’t understand how my mind works either.

In any case, the results in question are from myself, the General Chapter voting of the Baseball Bloggers Alliance, the full Baseball Bloggers Alliance, and the Baseball Writers Association of America (aka, “The Official Awards”). As an added bonus, I’ll throw in some commentary on the results, because what good is an awards summary without remarks containing varying degrees of sarcasm?

Pitching Triple Crowns: Where Do Verlander and Kershaw Rank?

So, first off, congratulations to recently-named Cy Young winners Clayton Kershaw and Justin Verlander. Both were deserving winners, and this piece is not meant to disparage their seasons in any way (because I know that, if enough people read this, at least one person will think that it is). Rather, it more sprung from my curiosity about pitchers and the MVP.

After comparing Verlander’s Triple Crown season to the previous few, I decided that I might want to take a more in-depth look at how his season compared to other Triple Crown winners (and yes, this is partly related to why I’m not a big fan of Verlander winning the MVP). I figured the best way was to do a straight up comparison bewtween his season and the seven other Pitching Triple Crown seasons that have followed Dwight Gooden’s 1985 (and yes, it is now seven, with Kershaw’s PTC).

Awards Season Explanations, Part 2

With MLB wrapping up the major awards over the next week, I was planning on finishing explaining my ballots. (Part 1 of my explanations can be found here.) I figured that it should be quick; after all, the first part I did had five awards, and I wrote that reasonable quick. But the MVP ballots are long, and I could either delay the NL Cy Young until after the award is announced, or break up the series further. So, my thinking on my NL Cy Young ballot, plus a public service announcement about something exciting coming up.

NL Cy Young-1. Roy Halladay

2. Clayton Kershaw

3. Cliff Lee-I feel like these three more or less had to be the top three; it was merely a matter of arranging them. Both Baseball-Reference WAR and Fangraphs WAR agreed that the order was Halladay-Kershaw-Lee. But Kershaw did win the pitching triple crown (which is one thing I hope to write more about, hopefully by next week). So, I was somewhat pre-disposed to put him first. But, everything I looked at seemed to indicate that Halladay was the better pitcher by a slight margin. Halladay made one fewer start than Kershaw, but threw one third of an inning more. Kershaw had 248 strikeouts to Lee’s 238 and Halladay’s 220 (first, second, and tied for third, respectively), and a 9.57 K/9 Innings (to Lee’s 9.21 and Halladay’s 8.47). But Halladay has both of them topped in BB/9 innings, with 1.35 to Kershaw’s 2.08 and Lee’s 1.62. Halladay also led the group in HR/9 innings, .39 to .58 (Kershaw) and .70 (Lee), despite the fact that Kershaw played in a better pitcher’s park. Their ERA’s were close as well, with Kershaw leading Halladay and Lee 2.28 to 2.35 and 2.40. But playing in a pitcher’s park hurt him; ERA+ put him second (163) to Halladay (164), with Lee and incredibly close third (161). Really, they were all incredible, but it seemed like Halladay consistently edged out Kershaw while playing in a better hitter’s park, leading to this order.

4. Ian Kennedy

5. Cole Hamels-Again, my down-ballot spots are less rigid. Kennedy seemed like a good fourth place, and I was split on whether to try and slide Carpenter into the fifth slot. In the end, I went against it, which is totally the opposite of what I did on my AL Rookie of the Year ballot. So yes, my philosophy on the final ballot spots fluctuates quite easily.


Now, for an announcement. The project for this site that is currently taking up my time is this Baseball Past and Present idea. Basically, it’s just what it sounds like (if you clicked the link, then came back); Who are the 50 Best Players who currently aren’t in the Hall of Fame? My ballot currently stands at 42 players, with 12 more fighting for the last 8 spaces (and I actually am being very deliberate with these final picks). I feel like this may lead to numerous future updates; there will be at least one, to be sure. Keep your eyes open.

Awards Season Explanations, Part 1

So, this being awards week, I would finally like to go over some of my picks that I made a while ago for the Baseball Bloggers Alliance voting.

First, the Rookie of the Year Awards.

AL-1. Dustin Ackley-The rookie leader in fWAR in the AL was actually second place Michael Pineda, at 3.4, followed by a 3-way tie between Ackley, Brett Lawrie, and Ivan Nova (Desmond Jennings was also pretty close). However, Pineda and Nova played full seasons, while Lawrie played in only 43 games, and Ackley played in 90 games. 43 games didn’t seem like enough, but 90 games is just over half the season. Ackley’s WAR seems surprising, but he did it in a number of ways; about .9 WAR came from his batting 117 wRC+, meaning he was about 17% better than the league average hitter (going off of wOBA). About .1 WAR came from his base running and .2 from his fielding, meaning the rest came from the fact that he did all of that while playing second base. In any case, I decided his 2.7 fWAR in 90 games was impressive enough in a large enough portion of the season.

2. Michael Pineda-See above

3. Zach Britton-he was pretty close with 2.5 fWAR, and I wanted to vote for an Oriole.

A Post in Which I Try and Emulate Ken Tremendous

There are several articles I’ve been meaning to analyze. One’s older, but it’s about the MVP races. Those are coming up, so I think it’s still relevant. The other covers the recent World Series, but it’s fairly new, so I’m also calling that one relevant.

We’ll start this week with the one that will become irrelevant sooner, and if I get time, go on to the MVP one later (or something else awards related; I’ll play it by ear). Bill Madden of the New York Daily News thinks there are too many teams in MLB right now, and the 2011 World Series showed why.

Are the Cardinals Worthy Champions?

The Cardinals surprised everyone (myself included) when they made the playoffs after a late-season run for the Wild Card. Everyone (except for me, this time) continued to pick against them when they faced the number 1 and 2 seeds in the the National League, the 102-win Phillies and the 96-win Brewers, and even when they reached the World Series. And yet, here we are; the 90-win Cardinals have knocked off all of them, and now stand as the 2011 Champions.

But is it really bad that this team won the World Series? I guess if you have a problem with Wild Cards winning the World Series in general, then yes. But I feel like thinking of them as a just-okay team that snuck in on the last day isn’t entirely representative either. For example, Bill at the Platoon Advantage said they would probably be among the eight worst World Series winners back on Tuesday (or, at least, he insinuated that they would be). Are they really?

World Series, Game 6

The Platoon Advantage has an interesting piece on the worst World Series winners, and speculates that the Cardinals (if they win) could find their way onto the list. Granted, I can see them going on the list, but somewhere towards the bottom; I've been meaning to write an article defending them, and it will come, but I've been very busy lately (yes, still).

Let me just say, though, that I hope the Cardinals win tonight on a walk-off, preferably in extra innings. Not only because I'm a Cardinals fan, but also because 1) I think a Game 7 will cement the 2011 World Series' place among the greatest; and 2) Every one of the first six games will be great in different ways. Game 1 saw a classic back-and-forth game with pinch-hit heroics. Game 2 saw an even better pitchers' duel capped off with an amazing comeback. Game 3 saw a high-offense game with an incredible hitting performance from Albert Pujols. Game 4 saw an amazing pitching performance from Derek Holland. Game 5 saw a close strategic match-up between the managers (granted, that one was lackluster as far as strategic match-ups go, but it still brought a different dimension to the Series).

The only problem is, if Game 6 is in fact a walk-off or extra innings win, what does that leave for Game 7?

Some Observations

I've been very busy as of late, at least partly due to the World Series. I do have several things planned, though.

I would just like to point out that in Game 5, there were five intentional walks. It's been fairly well established that intentional walks are, in general, bad; they put runners on for the other team, which is kind of what they're trying to do.

The team that issued four of them escaped unscathed every time. The other walk was followed by a ground ball that was deflected rather than turning into a double play, and led to two runs scoring, as if the baseball gods realized that the Universal Law of Intentional Walks had been defiled too many times in one game, and they had to make an example of someone before it was too late.

I'm not sure if Tony La Russa saw Ron Washington's moves and mistook them for strategic brilliance or what, but that seems like bad luck.

I have always believed that La Russa over-manages though, and the Cardinals are worse off for it. He also added evidence to that, with poorly called steals and hit-and-runs (maybe he over-values Allen Craig's speed?). On top of that, there were the three sac bunts (and again, one of them was Allen Craig-maybe he doesn't like him?). With all of the Cardinals wasted opportunities and bad moves, this is possibly the first game in the series where it feels like one team lost the game, rather than the other one team won it (so to speak).

All in all, this World Series has been amazing (even if my team is down a game now). If the Cardinals can force a Game 7, though, it may become one for the ages.

(On a side note, at the start of the playoffs, I was planning on writing Retired Number pieces for the pennant winners. Conveniently, though, I've already covered the Rangers and the Cardinals.)

More Trivia!

And, with the stunning conclusion of the NLCS, I now have all the data necessary to publish another quiz. This one is on World Series match-ups throughout history. I'm trying to think of ways to combat the scrolling needed to see all of the answers, but otherwise, it should be playable.

World Series Match Ups

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Also, some notes on the game:

Albert Pujols and David Freese both had an incredible NLCS. I would have given the NLCS MVP to Pujols up until game 6 probably. But Freese definitely ended stronger. Either one would have been a great story; the legend adds to his growing legacy, or the local newcomer makes a name for himself. In the end, I think they made the right choice (.545/.600/1.091 vs .478/.556/.913).

And hey, the third baseman won it!
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MLB.com ran a headline about a blown call that cost the Brewers a rally. Several issues with this, really. I'm all for more replay, but don't make a story out of nothing. First, the Brewers were already down by six runs (five after the play); so, they went from being down by five runs with one on and no out to no on and one out. That really isn't that big of a difference, win probability-wise. Also, Prince Fielder kind of grounded out right to the second baseman on the next play.

Even more important though; if you want to yell about the Brewers losing a runner to a blown call (as some of the commenters on MLB.com are already doing), you have to at least mention that a blown call in the first cost the Cardinals a run. (Also, if I recall, one of the TBS announcers mentioned that the umpire made a great call on that second play, even though he conceded that it wasn't right, as if that was just a small technicality).

(Also, I realize that most people wouldn't blame the whole game on this. But, for posterity's sake, I just wanted to point out that the Cardinals actually had a bigger missed call against them in the game-that would have put them up 2-0, and we didn't necessarily know at the time that David Freese would follow it up with a home run. I just have no idea why MLB.com is trying to make this call in particular into a story.)
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Also, while I'm linking to Baseball Nation, I may as well mention that I found this Grant Brisbee game update especially hilarious, for some reason.
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The other two Sporcle games that I created can be found here (ALCS) and here (NLCS).
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Also, I would like to point out that blatant homerism is apparently a great method for picking a World Series winner.

Postseason Trivia and Belated Predictions

I’m something of a trivia fan, and as such, I spend a lot of time on Sporcle.com. I’ve been meaning to make some quizzes about the postseason for a while, and I finally got time. So, for the last few days, I’ve been compiling quizzes on the ALCS and NLCS match-ups throughout history. Feel free to try them out!

ALCS
NLCS

Quick Thoughts: Hank Aaron Award and NLCS Game 2

A few quick things.

First, remember when I wrote about the Hank Aaron Award a few weeks ago? Well, the preliminary ballot was released the other day. First, a little bit more on the process; as the article says, each team gets a nominee. The winner is chosen through a combination of a fan vote and Hall of Fame player vote. That alone shows that it's substantially different than the MVP.

Re-Run: Okay, Bud Selig, It's Not Funny Anymore: More Instant Replay, Please

I've been busy lately with several things (some of which actually relate to this site!). So, here's a rerun of a piece I wrote during the playoffs last year about baseball's need for instant replay. I still stand by the claim, although it's much more sarcastic than I remembered.

Give A-Rod a Break

As a quick note, a lot of people have apparently been booing Alex Rodriguez with his recent struggles. It's About the Money, Stupid has a good intro to the piece, and covers most of what I would say. I want to throw out some extra thoughts, though.

Baseball Bloggers Alliance Awards: Final Six Ballots

Here is the second and final part of my awards ballot. Part 1 can be found here. Again, I will explain my ballots during the actual awards season; for now, I'm just submitting my vote.