I am starting to clog up the world chat a bit so I thought I should bring it here.
First the MVP Awards.
I have no problem with any of the three Baltimore guys to choose from. All three have great hitting lines and should be up for the voting.
Einar DeJesus really has had a very nice season. Personally I don't value stolen bases that much but for those that do he has 85 of them. He also the best hitting CF in the AL this season but I think that is more of a lack or CF talent then his abilities. He has played very good defense too and it you think defense and stolen base is your type of MVP this is your guy.
Cesar Gabriel is having his best hitting season ever. After playing In CF in Montreal he moved over to right and he has played very well there. He also has played 346 innings at third this season and has done great in those games with 9 plus plays to go along with his 8 in right. He has batted in the one whole all season getting things started for one of the best offense in the game. He will get my vote due to my policy of always voting for Mighty Millers. If he falls out of the race I will pick Albert The Noodle" Gonzalez.
Over in the NL My current Vote Goes to Jordan "Wimpy" Weiss. His combination of hitting and fielding are just too goof to overlook. Oh and maybe this is not noticed by everyone around the world but he is .003 batting average point away from a Traditional Triple Crown( I wish I could look up historic league leaders and see if its been done before if you know I would love to have that information).
David Gomez would be my second pick. He is the current Modern Triple Crown leader. I would normally instantly pick a player with that accomplishment but there is just something nostalgic about the Traditional one.
After the top two you have Davey "The Lady"Fick is having his worst offensive season since season 14. I didn't but should have look at park factors with his new team. Jim "Not" White does nothing for me. Felix"No Shame" Torrealba rounds it out and he would be a solid third this season. No shame in that those other two guys are playing great.
Voting snubs! WiS has a formula in place that picks who you can vote for for Season awards. The Formula is about the same one used to pick all stars. So if you get pissed every season about getting screwed out of All Stars the same thing will happen at the end of the season. WiS says this is how it is figured;
For batting awards, players must average 3.1 plate appearances per team game or more in order to qualify. Pitchers must average one inning pitched per team game. Position players must appear in 50% of their team's innings played to qualify for fielding awards.
Cy Young: Innings Pitched, Earned Runs, Strikeouts, Saves, Shutouts, Wins, Losses, Team Records and Park Factor.
MVP: Runs Created, Good Plays, Poor Plays, Fielding percentage, Park Factor, Position Played (difficulty), Passed Balls (catchers only)
Fireman of the Year: Saves, Wins, Losses, and Blown Saves
Gold Glove: Fielding percentage, good plays, poor plays, Errors, and Range Factor
Silver Slugger: Runs created and park factor
Rookie of the Year: Closely mimics the formula used for MVPs for position players and Cy Young for Pitchers. In order to be eligible for the ROY or NOY, a player must not have more than 150 career AB or 50 IP at the current level. For instance, if a player had 87 at-bats at the big league level in season 1 and 90 at-bats at the big league level in season 2, then he will not be eligible for the award in season 3 and beyond.
In each case, there are weights assigned to the individual components for the award calculation. While real life awards are decided by writers using the core raw stats and their personal opinion of how good/valuable players are (despite numerous objections by other esteemed writers across the land), HBD can use more appropriate statistics and accuracy to determine the best of the best.
If you think you have a player that should be up for an award but he isn't listed, be sure to evaluate all the component pieces and compare them to the players ranked ahead of them. It's hard to take sometime (like when you have a player with 55 HR, 150 RBI and a .340 AVG not in the top then), but there are always reasons why they are ranked where they are. They could be playing 1B while those ahead are SS & CF. They could be playing half their games in a hitter's park while those ahead play in pitcher's parks. Many reasons, all put together, and the best are at the top of the pack.
Lets go over this now shall we. For the Cy Young(last I checked the best pitcher in the league).
- They look at innings pitcher. OK sure you need to pitch innings to win. Sounds fair so far I guess but how many? Oh I see 1 per game played. Well fine than don't have a real standard. So a team with a five man staff can have a pitcher go 5 innings every time and qualify. Well that is the bottom number I guess moving along.
- Earned Runs... really you are going to take a stat based on the abilities of the pitchers defense behind him. I have see many times in this game where a pitcher will give up 4 unearned in an inning. Should a Cy Young winning Pitcher be able to get out of that inning with less damage. I believe so.
- Strikeouts are sexy for sure. I love them and you love them but does striking a guy out really mean that your the best pitcher. If you have a bunch of innings and an average strikeout abilities you are going to have more strikeouts of course. Why not just use the K/9 ratio that you already have calculated.
- Saves... what the fuck! Why on earth put saves in any sort of award. Saves are the most worthless statistic in baseball all together. It has created a thought process that you need to have you best bullpen arm in the game in the ninth inning alone. That thought process is not good for a winning team. Why would you not put your best bullpen arm in the most important game situation like a tie game in the seventh with a runner on second and no outs. Why put your second or third best relief pitching in the game when you could have your best. The Save stat is worthless trust me folks I really could go on and on about it. Oh and how the hell are you going to get the innings in that are required when you are trying to build up saves. Bullpen guys should not be able to receive this award they have their own to win.
- Shutouts. I love it sounds good to me but why not include complete games too.
- Wins and losses... I have as much venom for this stat as I do saves. To win a baseball game many many things need to go right. First and for most you need to have more runs than the other team. Now a starting pitcher has some influence in this but we already talked about earned runs right. What if your team around you sucks. The Pitcher can go out pitch brilliantly and lose. A pitcher can go out get shelled and win. It is a stat that the pitcher does not have enough influence with for me to add that to the Cy Young award.
- Team Record!!!! Am I really looking for the best pitcher here. Now not only do I have to worry about the times the ace takes the hill I have to think about the other four guys and how they can screw/help a guy win an award. For me I just want the best pitcher not the best pitcher on a winning team only.
- Park Factor should play into the outcome.
My Cy Young formula would be K/BB, K/9 OPS against, WHIP, Complete games and shutouts, Innings would have to play into it somehow and maybe just one inning a game is enough. Done with rant number one.
Now the MVP rant.
- Runs Created I am fine with. I think that what is put into this formula is what I like to see from a MVP player.
- Good plays/Poor Plays could be useful but there is such a huge issue in in this game for me. I could play a below average hitting shortstop at first and watch him get 30 plus plays. Or I could see an average second baseman that hits the cover off the ball and he could be 4/4. I will take the second baseman that crush over the sexy gloved first baseman any day. Fielding should absolutely count don't get me wrong but it has to be reasonable.
- Fielding % should not be a factor. There are way too many different position in baseball that require different skill sets to allow this to matter here. I could have a guy playing short with 68 range and 99 glove. Yes his fielding % will be great but is he a better SS than an 85/85 guy. I do not believe that to be a true statement. I would rather have a guy get a few errors and get to the ball then a guy the doesn't get the ball but really picks up the easy ones well.
- Park Factors again sure sounds fair.
- Position played... What the fuck. In this game you can play any player anywhere anytime you want to. If the guy plays his position better then most and crushes the ball that is all that should matter. I would rather have the 7th best RF that hits like crazy then the best CF that hits 7th best for his position but fields the best. I love defense as you can see on my team and in my predictions. But it gets a little crazy here.
- Passed balls for the catcher. Why hate on the catchers!
I think MVP should go by the Traditional Triple Crown stats(Home runs, RBI, Average), the Modern Triple Crown stats(AVG, OBP, SLG), Runs created, OPS and a playable fielding ability. *I know some stats are repeated thanks for your input.
OK I am done for now it just really pisses me off that I can't vote for Russell "The Phylloxera" Reitz
