Player Profile: Adam Dunn

“Any list of the biggest failures in 2011 has to start with Adam Dunn (.159-11-42 in 496 at-bats. I still can’t believe he was that atrocious). However, a teammate of Dunn’s also has to be in the top-10 [Alex Rios]…” That was my opening to my Alex Rios Player Profile from back in November of 2011. Today I’ll complete that thought by discussing the most pathetic performer of 2011 – Mr. Adam Dunn.

Some history.

From 2004-2010 Dunn hit at least 38 homers each year. Only one man in history has a run of more than 7-straight years of hitting 38 or more homers each season. It’s not Babe Ruth who tied with Dunn at seven (1926-32), or Barry Bonds who never did it more than five years in a row (2000-04). The answer to this riddle is actually Rafael Palmeiro (1995-2003).

From 2004-10 Dunn had at least 92 RBI each year. That’s well short of the record of 13-straight such seasons held by Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx and Alex Rodriguez. Still, only five men were able to hit that total each year from 2004-10: Albert Pujols, Arod, Mark Teixeira, Miguel Cabrera and Dunn.

From 2004-10 Dunn scored at least 79 runs each season. Only six others joined Dunn in that group: Bobby Abreu, Teixeira, Pujols, Cabrera, Derek Jeter and Johnny Damon.

All told, how many big leaguer posted a line of 38 homers, 92 RBI and 79 runs scored each year from 2004-10? The answer is one – Adam Dunn.

So what the hell happened in 2011 to the then 32 year old slugger? Some thoughts.

Maybe he wasn’t totally comfortable in his new home in Chicago?

Maybe the pressure of a big money deal got to him (4-years, $56 million)?

Maybe he lost confidence when he struggled?

Maybe health woes, like his appendicitis, ruined his timing?

Maybe he didn’t like being the DH? He hit mere .176 with a. 621 OPS in 81 such games (to be honest though, those numbers were better than his overall totals of .159 and .569).

Let’s get past the maybe’s and look at the raw data.

As I’ve laid out, there wasn’t a more consistent power hitter in the game than Dunn. At 32 years of age, in a ballpark that benefits hitters, there was zero reason to expect a collapse in 2011. In fact, you’d be hard pressed to roll the calendar back 12 months and find anyone who had a bad thing to say about Dunn as most expected the move to Chicago to lead to at least, at the very worst, a replication, of his 2010 effort (.260-38-103-85). What happened then?

Did he walk less than normal? Nope. His 15.1 percent walk rate was pretty much a match for his 16.2 percent career rate.

Did he strike out more than normal? Heck yes he did. A career 27.6 K rate is terrible, but last season that number grew to epic proportions as it ended up at 35.7 percent. That was only the second time in his career that the mark was over 29 percent.

Did his hit type change? Not if you judge him by his GB/FB rate which was 0.68, a near identical match to his career rate of 0.71 percent. As for his line drive rate it was 20.0 percent. Not only was that mark his third best since 2003, it was also above his 19.6 career rate. So he hit as many grounders, liners and fly balls as normal. Wait, what? I know, it makes no sense does it? Dunn was pretty much the same hitter as always in terms of these three categories. The real issue though was two-fold. (1) His BABIP shrunk to a career worst .240 (career .292). 2011 was only the second time since 2004 that his BABIP mark was under .276. Given a career norm in the line drive category, that dip in BABIP really isn’t explainable, at least not simply (a loss of bat speed, bad luck, etc.). (2) For each season from 2003-10, Dunn had produced a HR/F ratio of 20.8 percent. In 2011 that number dropped to 9.6 percent. To state is another way, Dunn went from being elite to league average overnight. That just doesn’t happen.

Given the totality of his career, his age, and his home ballpark, I find it nearly impossible to predict another outage in 2012. The question is, how much will Dunn bounce back? Admittedly I’m a big fan of the Big Donkey, but I think the data leads to that point of view. If I had to put a floor on his production I’d think 2002 (.249-26-71-84). However, I’m not ruling out a return to 35-90-90 levels because I really cannot explain what the hell went wrong in 2011. Maybe he ticked off a practitioner of the dark arts who put a whammy on him. I’m not going to draft Dunn as my starter at first base, but if falls out of the top-20 at first base, like he’s currently ranked at Fleaflicker, then sign up Mr. Dunn for my squad.

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: January 25th, 2012

YouTube has been a disaster today – really, ever since they merged with Google things haven’t worked right, at least for me. Eventually, there will be a video discussing the below topics – that is if I can ever get my video loaded up on YouTube.

(1) Prince Fielder to the Tigers. What are the implications for him and Miguel Cabrera?

(2) Wilson Betemit to the Orioles.

(3) Bartolo Colon to the A’s.

(4) Yoenis Cespedes ready to find a team.

(5) Edwin Jackson and Roy Oswalt searching for teams.

By Ray Flowers

Win Shares: 2011 Leaders

I know that no one reads anymore. In fact, I’m positive about that fact. I cannot tell you how many times a day the following occurs at the Baseball Guys’ Twitter Page.

I post a tweet. Example. “Albert Pujols is being paid $250 million over the next three years. Is he worth it? www. Pujols-Making…” So my sentence describes what I’m talking about, and then the link takes readers to the full story. Should be pretty simple, right? Someone then replies to me ‘will Pujols’ new home in California hurt his homer output?’ Why is that question a problem?

Because it clearly points out that the person didn’t bother to click on the link which, for three paragraphs, describes the impact that the Angels park could have on Pujols’ power. You think this is me just being me and bitching about something that rarely occurs? Not at all. This happens to me at least 3-5 times every single day. At least. People just don’t read anymore.

So why do I bring that up the fact that people hate to read? Because I’m going to trust that if you’ve gotten this far that you are one of those rare people that actually understands the value of reading something and not just scanning over it for 10 seconds (plus I just had to vent, sorry about that). I wrote about Wins Shares last year in Win Shares: 2010 Leaders, I’m merely going to quote myself in what follows for the description of what Wins Shares is (I know that’s lazy, but I did such a spectacular job last year, why mess with perfection?). Do I need a citation for my own words? Jeez, it’s been a while since college.

WHAT ARE WIN SHARES?

Win Shares attempts to measure how many wins a hitter or pitcher has personally notched for his team in the standings. Win Shares puts all players on one continuum meaning hitters and pitchers are all lumped together.

Win Shares are handed out based on a players impact at helping his team win games. Unlike other new-school stats, Win Shares look quite explicitly at the standings. The team’s number of Win Shares is equal to its win total times three. Eighty team wins gives 240 win shares to be spread amongst people on that team. Therefore, it doesn’t matter if a player is on a team that wins 95 or 75 games – they should still be rewarded in an equitable manner.

Win Shares is complicated to figure out, and has negatives. Bill James, the creator, realized some limitations in Win Shares and later invented “Loss Shares” because Wins Shares are only positive. Win Shares has also been replaced in most people’s minds by a measure like WAR (Wins Above Replacement level), but Win Shares was the first systematic attempt to put all aspects of baseball performance into one number that really caught on (James wrote about it in Win Shares, a massive 728 page book that was published in 2002).

To put the numbers you are about to review in context, here is a brief key for seasonal performance.

All-Star: 20+ Win Shares

MVP Level: 30+

Historic level: 40+

With that brief lead in, here are the 2011 leaders according to Win Shares.

2011 LEADERS – HITTERS

38 – Miguel Cabrera
37 – Ryan Braun, Matt Kemp
36 – Jose Bautista
34 – Jacoby Ellsbury
33- Prince Fielder, Joey Votto,
30 – Lance Berkman, Robinson Cano
29 – Miguel Montero
28 – Ben Zobrist and Andrew McCutchen

2011 LEADERS – PITCHERS

27 – Justin Verlander
24 – Jered Weaver
23 – Clayton Kershaw
22 – Roy Halladay, Cliff Lee
20 – James Shields, Ricky Romero, C.J. Wilson, Ian Kennedy
19 – CC Sabathia
18 – Dan Haren, Doug Fister
17 – Craig Kimbrel, Cole Hamels

By Ray Flowers

2011 Positional Review – First Base

You remember back to March when I gave away all my position player rankings for free, right? For those of you who want to revisit my greatest hits, here’s where you would go to get all my rankings for hitters – 2011: BBGuys Hitter Capsules.

I’m nothing if not accountable, so I’ll review my top-10 predictions at each position as well as point out my biggest “hit” outside of the top-10 and my biggest “bust.” This should be fun.

CATCHERS

2011 FIRST BASE Top-10
1 Albert Pujols
2 Joey Votto
3 Mark Teixeira
4 Miguel Cabrera
5 Prince Fielder
6 Adrian Gonzalez
7 Kevin Youkilis
8 Adam Dunn
9 Ryan Howard
10 Paul Konerko

Pujols‘ run at history, which I wrote about in On the Cusp, fell just short as he ended the year with a .299 batting average, 37 homers, 99 RBI and 105 runs scored. An impressive season for a mortal, but a disappointing effort for Pujols.

Votto wasn’t as good as he was during his MVP effort but it was pretty damn close. He posted a .324-37-113-106-16 line in 2010 and followed it up with .309-29-103-101-8 this season.

Teixeira blasted 39 homers and drove in 111 runs for the Yankees giving them the power they expected.   Unfortunately he scored “only” 90 runs, and for the second straight season he hit under .260 as he limped home to a career worst .248 mark.

Cabrera was as he always is, fantastic. I admit it, my concerns over his drinking issues were apparently unfounded. I touched on that in Braun: Best of the Bunch.

Fielder was second in the NL in homers (38), RBI (120) and OBP (.415) while he was third in OPS (.994). Someone is going to get awfully rich this offseason.

Gonzalez proved me half right, and half wrong. You can learn more by reading Player Profiles: 2011 Review.

Youkilis was limited all year by injury and his final line looks pretty bad (.258-17-80-68-3). Still, he was on pace to hit more than 20 homers with 100 RBI while his OBP was .373, not bad for a down season. He should be at full health next season.

Dunn fell off more than virtually any player in recent memory (Andruw Jones was close a few years back). Dunn was unquestionably the biggest failure in the game in 2011 as he hit .159 with 11 homers over 415 at-bats. I literally felt a sickness in my stomach well up writing that sentence.

Howard hit his 33 homers and had 116 RBI, but he also hit a mere .253 and scored just 81 runs. He could easily miss the start of the 2012 season as well since he ruptured his Achilles tendon on the final play of the season for the Phillies.

Konerko was strong yet again hitting .300 with 31 homers and 105 RBI. He has no speed, it’s almost surprising that he stole a base, and despite playing 149 games with a .388 OBP he scored only 69 runs for the White Sox.

Hit: Freddie Freeman #25
Freeman took a while to get going, if we remove his .225 April he hit .293 the rest of the way, an in the end he batted .282 with 21 homers and 76 RBI for the Braves. Hey, it’s first base where everyone can hit. It was hard to find a guy who really stood out past the top-15.

Bust: Dunn
U-n-b-e-l-i-e-v-a-b-l-e.

By Ray Flowers

Braun: Best of the Bunch

On March 16th, I know most of you can’t remember as far back as September 16th, but trust me on March 16th I wrote a piece that I titled Who is #3? At the time there was a pretty general consensus that Albert Pujols and Hanley Ramirez were the top-2 options in the fantasy game. Proving yet again that this is far from an exact science, Pujols had a solid but unspectacular season for him (.299-37-99-105-9), whereas Ramirez struggled mightily before finally succumbing to shoulder surgery (.243-10-45-55-20 in 92 games).

Since there was no consensus as to who should have been drafted #3 overall I went through a bunch of names up for consideration at that spot in the above linked piece before I settled on Ryan Braun. Before I get to Braun and what was obviously a spectacular call by me (I’m so modest), let me list the reasons why I was concerned with the other options, and then give the figures to back up what I thought.

“Some think it should be Miguel Cabrera. He worries me because of his off the field issues.”
Looks like the boozing just isn’t an issue after all. He hit a robust .344, and though he hit 30 homers with 105 RBI the homer total was a five year low while his RBI total was the worst he’s ever had in eight full seasons.

Troy Tulowitzki: “…I’m troubled by the fact that he has played less than 125 games in two of the past three years .“
He played more games than I thought he might, 143, but injuries limited him to three year lows in runs scored (81), steals (nine), OBP (.372) and SLG (.544). He still had a great year though.

Carlos Gonzalez: “…hit .289 with eight homers on the road last year and he’s only had one season of significance in the big leagues.”
He was even worse in 2011 on the road hitting .252 with a .757 OPS. He still had a great year considering he played in 127 games (.295-26-92-92-20), but everything predictably regressed.

Evan Longoria: “ I think he’s the top third baseman this year, but I don’t think third base is as shallow as some think.”
50/50 here. Third base was even more shallow than we thought as everyone was injured at one point or another. With a late season power surge he finished the year with 31 homers and 99 RBI to place himself amongst the best at the position, but he also hit a career worst .244 and stole a career low three bags.

“What about Joey Votto or Robinson Cano? Nope.”
Both players had great efforts, no if’s, and’s or but’s about it, but neither rose to the level of being the #3 selection.

Votto: .309-29-103-101-8 with a .947 OPS
Cano: .302-28-118-104-8 with a .882 OPS

“Roy Halladay? Don’t get crazy on me. “
Halladay was typically grand, but he may not have even been the best pitcher on his own team (Cliff Lee posted virtually identical numbers).

All of that leads to Ryan Braun. Here are the points I made with Braun (you can get more detail from the initial piece).

(1) Consistency/Across the board production.
For the 5th straight year he hit better than .285 with more than 25 homers, 97 RBI,  91 runs and 14 steals. He produced a 5×5 line of .332-33-111-109-33 in what was his best season of a stupendous career.

(2) Health.
The previous three seasons Braun had appeared in 151 or more games. He missed out in 2011, but I’ll take the 150 total he played in every year.

(3) Upside.
I mentioned in the previous piece that if you took the career bests for Braun in the main five fantasy categories you’d end up with a season of .324-37-114-113-20. How did he do in 2011? He bettered the average at .332. He fell just short in the homer, RBI and runs scored categories with 33, 111 and 109. Still, that’s pretty damn close ain’t it? The kicker is that he went for 33 steals, just one less than he posted in 2009 and 2010.

Braun wasn’t just the best choice as the #3 selection this year, he actually ended the year as the second best fantasy performer behind only Matt Kemp (.324-39-126-115-40). And you wanted to drafted Troy Tulowitzki…

By Ray Flowers

Around the Horn: August30, 2011

(1) Andrew McCutchen one steal from joining the 20/20 club.

(2) Miguel Cabrera is simply phenomenal yet again.

(3) Carlos Lee on fire of late, RBI streak continues.

(4) Mark Buehrle is boring, but the guy is really good.

(5) Luke Hochevar pitching very well in the second half.

(6) Nick Swisher on fire, six homers in seven games. Has he lived up to my expectations? See 2011 Player Profile: Nick Swisher.

(7) Jose Reyes back from injury while Nelson Cruz is out yet again.

By Ray Flowers

Who is #3?

Photo by Benjamin Kabek

There is pretty much a consensus this year that Albert Pujols should go off the board first overall, and Hanley Ramirez seems to be locked in as the #2 selection in most peoples minds. After that, let the games begin.

Some think it should be Miguel Cabrera. He worries me because of his off the field issues.

Some think it should be Troy Tulowitzki because of his massive production from a scarce position (shortstop). I’m troubled by the fact that he has played less than 125 games in two of the past three years.

Some say Carlos Gonzalez. The guy hit .289 with eight homers on the road last year and he’s only had one season of significance in the big leagues.

Some say Evan Longoria. I think he’s the top third baseman this year, but I don’t think third base is as shallow as some think (not if guys like Mark Reynolds and Pablo Sandoval are still on the board after 125 names have been called out).

What about Joey Votto or Robinson Cano? Nope.

Roy Halladay? Don’t get crazy on me.

I think the clear option at #3 overall is Ryan Braun, a guy who has an ADP of about nine. Here is my argument for why Braun should be #3 (in fact, I’ll go you one further and say that I think Carl Crawford should be taken  4th overall – see the Top-300 for 2011).

THE CASE FOR BRAUN

(1) Consistency
In four big league seasons, Braun has never hit less than .285.
He has never hit fewer than 25 homers.
He has never had fewer than 97 RBI.
He has never scored less than 91 runs.
He has never stolen less than 14 bases.

That means in four seasons in the majors Braun has never produced a batting line of less than .285-25-97-91-14. Last year there were only four men in all of baseball who hit all of the marks (Braun, Pujols, Votto and CarGo), and those are the four year lows for Braun.

(2) Across the Board production
I went through the numbers above but just so it registers like it should…

Over the past four years there have been only 16 seasons of .285-25-97-91-14. Braun has fully a quarter of them meaning every other player in baseball has a grand total of 12 such seasons, or on average just three a year. Moreover, only three other men in the game have had two such seasons the past four years: Albert Pujols, Alex Rodriguez and David Wright.

(3) Health
Braun played only 113 games as a rookie, but that was because he was called up during the season from the minors. The past three years he has dealt with a myriad of bumps and bruises, but each of those years he has appeared in at least 151 games. The last three years only 12 players have appeared in at least 151 games each campaign. It doesn’t matter how great you are, if you aren’t on the field your overall production just won’t stack up the elites of the game.

(4) Upside
Braun has just under four full seasons in the big leagues and he is only 27 years old. I don’t buy into the “27 year old breakout” hype, but the fact is that Braun could easily still have more to give at the dish. That is particularly intriguing given that his best 5×5 numbers thus far would result in a 5×5 effort of .324-37-114-113-20. Do you know how many such seasons have been produced in the 20th century? The answer is none. Moreover, over the last twenty years those five marks have only been reached in one season on three occasions: Ellis Burks (1996), Larry Walker (1997) and Barry Bonds (1993).

You could raise arguments such as position scarcity and the fact that Braun has seen his ground ball rate rise substantially the past two years as reasons to pass on Braun at the number three overall spot, but to me it’s pretty clear that he would seem to have the least risk of any of the players who are consistently going in the top-10 after Pujols and Hanley are off the board. In my mind that is a huge factor that should be taken into consideration when you think about who you are going to take if you have the #3 spot on draft day.

By Ray Flowers

Biding My Time

I’m sitting here staring out the window. We’re all kind of in no-man’s land right now. Playoff football is ongoing, but fantasy football is basically over for most people (those playoff leagues just don’t do it for me). I’m one of the few people who actually plays fantasy hockey, and likewise there is a small but dedicated group that plays fantasy basketball, but we are in the minority. So where does that leave most fantasy sports addicts? It leaves you begging for the fantasy baseball season to begin. It’s about a month until pitchers and catchers report, and February is usually when the heavy lifting really starts with fantasy baseball, though to be honest, I’ve literally been writing about the 2011 fantasy baseball season since October. I know, I have a disease don’t I?

I’ll also be attending the FSTA Trade Association meeting in Las Vegas this weekend, so if you’re gonna be there let me know and we’ll grab a beer (or a fruity drink with an umbrella in it).

PLAYER RATINGS

Over at ESPN they have a whole section devoted to different player rating systems: Inside Edge, The Baseball Encyclopedia, ESPN Rating and Elias. Here are a few things that jumped out at me from those rankings.

Miguel Cabrera was the top player in 2010 according to two of the systems (ESPN and Elias). The man widely regarded as the best player in baseball – Albert Pujols – was second on the ESPN scale and came in at 6th in the Elias Rankings.

According to Inside Edge, the best player in baseball last year was Josh Johnson. I don’t know what the formula is for this measure, but when your top-5 includes Johnson, Cliff Lee and Paul Konerko, consider me dubious as to it’s value.

The top-3 performers according to the Baseball Encyclopedia were Troy Tulowitzki, Pujols and Robinson Cano. How could a guy who appeared in only 122 games last season be the best player in baseball?

You can check out the rankings for yourself at the link above, but here is their top-10 based on the average ranking of the four systems:

1- Albert Pujols
2- Miguel Cabrera
3- Roy Halladay
4- Joey Votto
5- Felix Hernandez
6- Jose Bautista (seriously)
7- Paul Konerko (gulp)
8- Ubaldo Jimenez
9- Adam Wainwright
10- Josh Hamilton

PLAYER PROFILE – LANCE BERKMAN

I wrote about the new Cardinals outfielder in Breaking Down: Lance Berkman. Here is a brief synopsis of what I said there.

“Currently sporting an ADP in the 300′s, it would seem that Berkman is in a good position to far surpass the value he is currently being assigned. It would be wise to avoid expecting a return to the salad days for Berkman, but if he slips far enough in drafts he is well worth taking a shot on as a mutli-position guy who will hit behind, arguably, the two best right-handed hitters in the National League.”

PAVANO STAYS WITH TWINS
After flirting with signing a big money, 1-year deal with the Yankees (how desperate are the Bronx Bombers when you realize they contemplated bringing back a guy who won nine games over four years with the club back in 2005-08?), Pavano decided he liked where he was signing a 2-year, $16.5 million deal to remain with the Twins. I predicted back on December 6th, 2010 that Pavano would hit it big as the second best starting pitcher on the market in Around the Horn: Hot Stove, Dec.6, 2010. I missed on that one. I’m surprised that in this market, where middle relievers were getting 3-year deals at more than $4 million a season, that Pavano was only able to lock down a two year deal.

JUST BECAUSE…

One of the greatest set of lines in movie history thanks to Ron Burgundy.

By Ray Flowers

ADP Riser: Adrian Gonzalez

I get it. A big bat gets paid bazillions of dollars, leaves the worst hitting park in baseball, and that transforms the player into a dynamic offensive weapon. I certainly buy that to a point with Adrian Gonzalez, but it seems like most of my fantasy brethren have been hitting the hookah pipe a bit too frequently when it comes to estimating Gonzalez’s fantasy value in 2011.

Over at Fanball in a well written article by Greg Ambrosius entitled NFBC: The Rise of A-Gone, Gregg points out how voters are loving them some Adrian Gonzalez because of the move out of Petco and to Fenway Park. Greg gives the data simply: before the Trade Gonzalez went 27th or 29th in the 15 team mixed league drafts for the NFBC. After the trade to Boston that number jumped to 20, 18, 16, 14 and 11.

Does that meteoric rise make any sense? Greg does a great job in the piece laying out the statistical reasons that seem to be behind the rise in Adrian’s ADP numbers. Greg also points out a rather interesting number that some may not be aware of – in each of the past four seasons Gonzalez has gone deep at least 20 times on the road (he never hit more than 14 at home). Does this mean he is a lock for 40 homers? I think “lock” is too strong a term for a guy who has hit 40 homers only once in his career. Why? I think it will surprise many people to learn that Fenway wasn’t exactly a homer heaven for left-handed batters last season. Seriously. Here are the Park Indices number for left-handed hitting batters, in the homer category, for 2011 for Petco and Fenway (100 is neutral, under 100 favors pitchers, over 100 favors hitters).

Petco: 64, 16th in the NL
Fenway: 86, 9th in the AL

The truth of the matter is that Fenway really doesn’t boost the power numbers of left-handed batters at all with a mark of 88 the past three years, 12th in the American League. Shocked aren’t you?

Beyond that, there are two major issues that concern me.

First of all, Gonzalez had shoulder surgery and while everyone believes he will be at or near 100 percent this season it’s quite possible that he will not be allowed to swing a bat until March. Do you really want to spend a first round pick on a guy who will only have a month of hacks under his belt before games count?

Second, what about the wealth of talent at first base in 2011? If you look at the Fanball Staff Rankings you will notice that I’m the lowest of the ranking members in terms of my placement of Gonzalez as I have him at 9th at the position. Is that too low? I’ll freely admit that it might be, by a lot. Still, I’d take Albert Pujols, Miguel Cabrera, Joey Votto, Mark Teixeira and Ryan Howard ahead of him with no problem. I think you have to also toss Prince Fielder into that mix even with some of his struggles last season since he still had 32 bombs and posted a .401 OBP (Gonzalez was at 31 and .393 by the way). Kevin Youkilis is also coming back from surgery but I might be convinced to move him behind the Red Sox new first baseman. Finally, the move of Adam Dunn to the White Sox would appear to give him a legit shot at 45 homers if not more. After all, U.S. Cellular Field in Chitown is first in Park Indices for homers the past three years, and fourth for left-handed batters.

Add all of that up and I’m gonna let someone else take Gonzalez with the 16th pick. I’ll happily wait 20 selections to roster Adam Dunn.

And finally, in the I told you so file…

Edgar Renteria was disrespected, or whatever he said, when the Giants offered him a 1-year deal for $1 million. Guess he had a right to feel that way. It looks like he got a deal from the Reds for $3 million. I don’t know if that makes him seem smart, or if that means the Reds are just lost?

By Ray Flowers

Who Needs September?

Josh Hamilton won the AL MVP on Tuesday despite the fact that he played all of five games after August 31st. Was that honor deserved? Let’s explore this and other issues surrounding the 2010 AL MVP Vote.

Back in early October, I wrote a piece entitled Who is the AL MVP? I chose Miguel Cabrera as the winner of the award, over Hamilton, and here is the most germane point to my belief that Hamilton should not have been the winner. Hamilton became the first player to appear in fewer than 15 games in September to win an MVP award since 1960 (Dick Groat). Think about that. Hamilton played the fewest September games of any MVP in half a century. Given that Cabrera was virtually the same performer over the course of the year, and that he did “it” over 27 more games, it seems obvious to me that he should have been the selection. Apparently, I’m in the minority as people seem to still cling to the belief that the winner of the award should come from a playoff bound team if everything else is basically equal. Apparently “equal” is achieved when a guy plays a full month less of the season than someone else.

Some more facts.

(1) This marked the sixth time a Ranger won the award: Juan Gonzalez (1996, 98), Jeff Burroughs (1974), Ivan Rodriguez (1999) and Alex Rodriguez (2003).

(2) Hamilton was the 10th CF ever to win the award in the American League (a CF has won the award five times in the NL).

Now on to the rest of the voting.

27 first place votes went to Hamilton and Cabrera. Where did the last one go? It went to major league home run leader Jose Bautista who came in 4th overall. The one man to vote for Jose Bautista as the winner was Shi Davidi from Toronto.

Carl Crawford came in 7th in the voting with 98 points as he was left off seven ballots. He could have earned a $700,000 bonus if all seven of those empty ballots had placed him 7th or higher. Another Ray, Evan Longoria, cam in 6th in the voting with 100 points.

Delmon Young finished 10th in the voting. I admit the .298-21-112 line is mighty solid, but do you really think Delmon was the 10th most valuable player in the AL in 2010 when he posted a .333 OBP an a .826 OPS? I certainly don’t, not when the AL average for OBP was .327 or when you realize that his OPS was merely 20th amongst qualifiers.

Twins’ teammate Jim Thome finished with more MVP points (two), than guys like Mark Teixeira (one) and Joakim Soria (one). Thome was terrific this season hitting an impressive .283/.412/.627, but he was limited to only 25 homers because of just 276 at-bats. How he got any AL MVP love is totally beyond me.

As for hurlers, the highest ranking pitcher on the list was another Ray – Rafael Soriano – who finished with 21 points. I think he did a wonderful job, but I still find it odd that he was the top pitcher in the voting. To further build on the voting madness with pitchers, AL Cy Young winner Felix Hernandez received six points, runner up David Price zero, and third place finisher CC Sabathia got 13. If you don’t understand that join the fricken club.

By Ray Flowers