AL mvp....

[cumberlandreds]

Originally Posted by membengal

Seeing a triple crown in my lifetime is awesome. Born in 1970, so this is the first.

Have no problems if he were to win the MVP, and in bizarro world where I have a vote, that's who I vote for #1 on my ballot.

I have been a baseball fan for over 40 years and had not witnessed a Triple Crown. For a Triple Crown to have not occurred in 45 years it has to be a significant accomplishment. It makes even better that he lead his team, to come from behind in the last month of the season ,to get into the playoffs. He would easily get my vote for MVP.

[RedsManRick]

Fangraphs just posted an article looking solely at offensive performance. Guess who's #1?

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index...text-included/

The Triple Crown is an absolutely awesome achievement. But it's an incomplete measure of offensive performance, let alone an incomplete measure of total value. It turns out that hitting in to a ton of double plays actually hurts your team. Equating Triple Crown with an automatic MVP is, in my opinion, just plain lazy.

Rare accomplishments are fun and deserve both praise and attention. But Miguel Cabrera doesn't automatically deserve an MVP because one combination of his stats has a label on it.

The last player to hit for the Triple Crown did it 45 years ago. It has been done 16 times, but many of us weren't alive the last time it happened.

The last player to hit .320 with 30 HR and 45 SB was nobody. Mike Trout is the first player in major league history to do that. Nobody has ever seen it happen until this year.

[bucksfan2]

Originally Posted by RedsManRick

The last player to hit .320 with 30 HR and 45 SB was nobody. Mike Trout is the first player in major league history to do that. Nobody has ever seen it happen until this year.

I hate these type of stats. They are more scoreboard stumperish than anything else. Why not hitting .325? or 31 HR's? or 48 SB's?

I wonder how many player in history have gone .330/.393/.606 OPS .999 with 4 SB's after switching from 1b to 3b in the off season?

[Bumstead]

Originally Posted by RedsManRick

Fangraphs just posted an article looking solely at offensive performance. Guess who's #1?

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index...text-included/

The Triple Crown is an absolutely awesome achievement. But it's an incomplete measure of offensive performance, let alone an incomplete measure of total value. It turns out that hitting in to a ton of double plays actually hurts your team. Equating Triple Crown with an automatic MVP is, in my opinion, just plain lazy.

Rare accomplishments are fun and deserve both praise and attention. But Miguel Cabrera doesn't automatically deserve an MVP because one combination of his stats has a label on it.

The last player to hit for the Triple Crown did it 45 years ago. It has been done 16 times, but many of us weren't alive the last time it happened.

The last player to hit .320 with 30 HR and 45 SB was nobody. Mike Trout is the first player in major league history to do that. Nobody has ever seen it happen until this year.

.277 27HR's 80SB
.293 37HR's 50SB

Red's fans have seen it in consecutive seasons...really, there isn't much difference. You are quoting AVG? I thought AVG didn't mean anything to metric guys? We can combine stats from 100's of players into combinations that have never been duplicated. It doesn't mean we haven't seen it before...it means we haven't seen it exactly but we have seen it in the same range 100's of times.

Bum

[Bumstead]

Originally Posted by bucksfan2

I wonder how many player in history have gone .330/.393/.606 OPS .999 with 4 SB's after switching from 1b to 3b in the off season?

Just happened for the 1st time in 2012 baby!

[dougdirt]

Originally Posted by bucksfan2

I hate these type of stats. They are more scoreboard stumperish than anything else.

I wonder how many player in history have gone .330/.393/.606 OPS .999 with 4 SB's after switching from 1b to 3b in the off season?

Isn't that kind of the thing though? Take out the position move and that line has been done 73 times. Pujols has done that 5 times. Overall it has been done 17 times since 1992.

[RedsManRick]

Originally Posted by bucksfan2

I hate these type of stats. They are more scoreboard stumperish than anything else. Why not hitting .325? or 31 HR's? or 48 SB's?

I wonder how many player in history have gone .330/.393/.606 OPS .999 with 4 SB's after switching from 1b to 3b in the off season?

Originally Posted by Bumstead

.277 27HR's 80SB
.293 37HR's 50SB

Red's fans have seen it in consecutive seasons...really, there isn't much difference. You are quoting AVG? I thought AVG didn't mean anything to metric guys? We can combine stats from 100's of players into combinations that have never been duplicated. It doesn't mean we haven't seen it before...it means we haven't seen it exactly but we have seen it in the same range 100's of times.

Bum

Thank you both for reinforcing my point. A small selection of stats that don't capture many aspects of value is arbitrary. You have to look at the bigger picture. You have to weight certain aspects of excellence. When you just look at a few stats, particularly a set of stats that omits huge chunks of a player's job, you can come up with just about any answer you want. Cabrera shouldn't be given extra credit because his combination a few excellent stats has a name given to it while Trout's doesn't.

If the Triple Crown wasn't called anything, how would you defend the selection of choosing those three stats in particular? You'd essentially be picking the only 3 stats out of all the stats out there where Cabrera was better than Trout. It would be obvious cherry picking. But because that combo has a name, it feels more important.

[bucksfan2]

Originally Posted by dougdirt

Isn't that kind of the thing though? Take out the position move and that line has been done 73 times. Pujols has done that 5 times. Overall it has been done 17 times since 1992.

But part of the argument is AVG which has been railed upon by many of the WAR fans as useless. Trout had a great season, but when players have great seasons you begin to add together their feats and say Player X is the first person in history to have a X AVG, X HR's, X RBI's, X SB's and X 2b's.

[defender]

MVP is subjective. It includes clubhouse value, leadership and getting your team into the playoffs. MVP can be different from best player.

Voters might lean toward giving Cabrera the MVP, just because they know Trout will get rookie of the year. In the minds of people like Marty, Cabrera embodies their idea of an MVP. The triple crown is just icing on the cake.

Right or wrong, a lot of MVP votes are going to be based on the voter's idea that they know an MVP when they see one. More feeling than analysis. That is the nature of the award.

[westofyou]

Derek Jeter is the oldest player to lead the league in hits, he will probably get some votes.

Awards are flawed, awards are opinion, awards are noise

[RedsManRick]

Originally Posted by defender

Right or wrong, a lot of MVP votes are going to be based on the voter's idea that they know an MVP when they see one. More feeling than analysis. That is the nature of the award.

I think this is obviously true. RBI in particular seem to carry a ton of weight in people's MVP votes historically.

But if a person wants to vote for Cabrera because he just feels like an MVP to them, just come out and say that. And if they want to vote for him because they think the 3 triple crown stats actually are the best measure of value from an analytical perspective, come out and say that and be willing to defend it against other analysts.

Just don't try to make the "well, the Triple Crown is rare" case and then get upset when a different combination of stats that is just as defensible (or indefensible as the case may be) shows that Trout has done something even rarer. Don't cite Cabrera's intangibles while completely ignoring the intangibles of Trout (or any other candidate). Don't tell me that he added value to his team by being willing to be a poor defender (Ask Justin Verlander how he liked have Cabrera at 3B -- it may cost him a 2nd Cy Young). You get the point.

I know people will disagree with the set of criteria I use. I just want them to be honest and consistent about theirs.

[Bumstead]

To be fair (to me ) I never used the Triple Crown as my reason for Cabrera being my choice for MVP. And, I'm not going to go over it again. You make valid points but I just have a different opinion and it's not based on just a "feeling."

Bum

[dougdirt]

Originally Posted by bucksfan2

But part of the argument is AVG which has been railed upon by many of the WAR fans as useless.

I think you misunderstand what what is being said about average. It isn't that it is useless, it is that it isn't nearly as useful as OBP. Average is valuable. Hits are clearly of value and having a higher rate of hits than someone else, well, that is a very good thing. But OBP takes into account those hits as well as the walks. OBP is, generically speaking, mostly made up of average (outliers like Adam Dunn, or at least the former version of Dunn, who have very low AVG but walk 100+ times break that, but players of this ilk are rare). So it is certainly getting its due when "we" talk about OBP.

[bucksfan2]

Originally Posted by dougdirt

I think you misunderstand what what is being said about average. It isn't that it is useless, it is that it isn't nearly as useful as OBP. Average is valuable. Hits are clearly of value and having a higher rate of hits than someone else, well, that is a very good thing. But OBP takes into account those hits as well as the walks. OBP is, generically speaking, mostly made up of average (outliers like Adam Dunn, or at least the former version of Dunn, who have very low AVG but walk 100+ times break that, but players of this ilk are rare). So it is certainly getting its due when "we" talk about OBP.

Come on Doug you don't think I know that. I just find it ironic that a defense from the New Age guys for Trout is that he is the first player in history to have X AVG + X HR + X SB. Don't you find that ironic?

[dougdirt]

Originally Posted by bucksfan2

Come on Doug you don't think I know that. I just find it ironic that a defense from the New Age guys for Trout is that he is the first player in history to have X AVG + X HR + X SB. Don't you find that ironic?

It is only a defense to counteract the idea that because Cabrera won the triple crown, thus it is rare, thus he is the MVP. The new age guys reason for Trout deserving the MVP is that his offense (including base running) + his defense is better than the same package that Cabrera brings to the table.