I polled the Generals to get their votes on the postseason awards, and tallied them up. To start here is the Generals’ vote for AL MVP.
This was a down year in the AL, as there are five or six guys better than the best AL player over in the Senior Circuit. Below are the votes of the various Generals. I only included the top three for each General, and scored them on a 5-3-1 basis. The envelope please:
Alex Rodriguez-15
Grady Sizemore-11
Dustin Pedroia-8
Joe Mauer-6
Cliff Lee-5
Carlos Quentin-3
Milton Bradley-3
Josh Hamilton-2
Francisco Rodriguez-1
Patrick DiCaprio:
1. Dustin Pedroia-only third in VORP in the AL, but a scant three behind number one A-Rod.
2. Alex Rodriguez-A down year compared to 2007 but fully worthy of the award.
3. Joe Mauer-playing a premium defensive position and is a far more worthy candidate than Morneau.
4. Aubrey Huff-While his team floundered, Huff was fourth on the VORP list and absolutely deserves some votes.
5. Cliff Lee.
Kevin Orris:
AL MVP
1) Alex Rodriguez
2) Milton Bradley
3) Josh Hamilton
4) Joe Mauer
5) Dustin Pedroia
Rob McQuown:
AL MVP: Cliff Lee, Grady Sizemore, A-Rod, Dustin Pedroia, Roy Halladay.
Rhett Oldham:
MVP AL
1. Grady Sizemore- just a few home runs and RBI shy of 40-40 and did it without much protection in that lineup.
2. Dustin Pedroia/Kevin Youklis-hard to separate these two Red Sox that had phenomenal seasons. [ed. Note-I gave the votes to Pedroia]
3. K-Rod- I don’t care what anyone says, 62 saves is MVP worthy.
Honorable Mention: Josh Hamilton/Ian Kinsler. Both were hurt in the second half but both were sheer monsters in the first half.
Andrew Cleary
MVP - AL
1. Alex Rodriguez
2. Carlos Quentin
3. Josh Hamilton
It’s hard. A-Rod got less attention than the other leaders for a large part of the season. But he’s still that good.
Mike Podhorzer
MVP:
1. Joe Mauer
2. Grady Sizemore
3. Alex Rodriguez
4. Dustin Pedroia
5. Carlos Quentin
9 responses so far ↓
1 rob // Oct 13, 2008 at 3:09 pm
Offensively, for fantasy purposes, playertrack ranks the AL guys as follows:
1) Arod
Damon
2) Josh Hamilton
3) Pedoria
4) Kinsler
5) Abreu
6) Markakis
7) Huff
9) Quentin
10) Youkilis
So, I think Sizemore (because of his stinking batting average, 79% contact rate, and 130 Ks) is a bit overvalued by you guys, and more love needs to be shown to Mr. Hamilton.
I also think Roy Halladay was a better overall fantasy pitcher than Cliff Lee, but just barely.
And, I’d choose Morneau over Mauer, too, position scarcity notwithstanding, but neither deserves a mention in the Top 10, IMHO. Mauer’s single digit HRs look so naked next to Morneau’s stats.
2 Patrick DiCaprio // Oct 13, 2008 at 6:58 pm
Just goes to show you what Playertrack knows….
3 Rhett Oldham // Oct 14, 2008 at 5:53 am
634 101 33 90 98 130 38 0.2681
Rob, can’t disagree with your assessment of the bad batting average, .268 is a little rough, but over 100 runs scored, 33 HRs, 98 RBI, and 38 steals in that lineup was extraordinary.
Abreu has a 295 average and doesn’t exceed Sizemore in any catagory. Damon 17-71-29-95 runs is top 10 due to his 300 plus BA. Markakis’ average and runs are higher but 20-87-10 is nothing to get exciting about as a top 10 player.
Seems like player track really weighted batting average pretty heavily. All mentioned are great players but it is not everyday that a player is pushing a 40-40 season. Batting average notwithstanding, Sizemore’s season is MVP worthy.
4 Patrick DiCaprio // Oct 14, 2008 at 6:52 am
Rhett if I am not mistaken I think playertrack is a fantasy system not a “real” baseball system, and that makes a big difference since Sizemore actually hurts you in a category.
5 rob // Oct 15, 2008 at 12:40 pm
Wait a minute… isn’t “fantasy” the same as “real” baseball?
6 Mike Podhorzer // Nov 3, 2008 at 2:02 pm
Damn I’m good. I just came across another new metric attempting to quantify all on-field contributions to determine a composite rating for every player. The top 4 mirrored my top 4 AL MVP picks above, in the exact same order. I only differed with Quentin, who was ranked 7th, rather than 5th. My point? I have none, just a chance to gloat!
Full results could be found here.
7 Had Mills // Nov 20, 2008 at 11:31 pm
To all you Grady Sizemore ass kissers…GRADY SIZEMORE….he hit .216 on the road…MVP? sorry….
Grady Sizemore road stats .216/.321/.378 MVP? omg
Let’s dig deeper, my friends…late and close…ie. 7th inning, behind by a run, tied, or at least the tying run in the on deck circle…the results…
…GRADY SIZEMORE late and close 11 hits…74 at bats or a robust .149 batting average…MVP?
MVP Grady Sizemore stats late and close .149/.357/.324 …thats right, Sizemore OPS was not even .700…MVP?
LET’S DIG DEEPER ….against the the four (4) AL playoff teams,lets look at your MVP:
MVP Sizemore versus: ANA…9/41 .220/.304/.415
CHI…16/76 .211/.294/.382
BOS…4/23 .174/.345/.217 omg
TBR….6/23 .261/.370/.435
Again pathetic.. Sizemore choked
clearly Sizemore should just play Home Games…he is Jason Varitek on the road…
Had
8 Rhett Oldham // Nov 21, 2008 at 7:27 am
Had Mills, great stats! Definitely would rethink my position concerning Sizemore if I had those stats available at the time of vote.
With all that being said, 33 knocks and 38 steals is still EXTRA-ordinary and just does not happen that often in baseball.
But based on the voting the writers did agree with you.
Ironically, my ballot of Pedroria and Youklis being hard to seperate turned out to be true. I just don’t see 17-75 as MVP. If he played in Kansas City DP would not even been top 10.
Like I said, great breakdown of stats.
9 Patrick DiCaprio // Nov 21, 2008 at 11:12 am
Here is the problem with the logic of splits like those, and I say this as a guy who didnt have Sizemore in the top five;
1. they are small samples and they are not reliable as a result. in his career he is .267/.352/.469 on the road and would prorate to a 25 HR 25 SB average so this year looks like a fluke.
2. if he is bad on the road, that also implies that he was disproportionately good at home. the purpose of MVP, IMO, is not to adjust but say given what he actually did, how valuable was he. One can not say for example, he only hit 7 home runs on the road but ignore that it implies 26 home runs at home.
3. Being good or bad late has the same problem. The fact is that games are usually decided long before the late innings, most teams win over 90% of games where they have a lead in the seventh and some are far better. These situations have aesthetic value, but in terms of actual impact they are not as important as most think.
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