The meaning(lessness) of it all?
Posted on November 7th, 2008 – 11:41 AMBy Howard
It’s award season in baseball and that means another round of skeptics responding to the awards by telling the rest of us that the voters don’t know what they’re talking about. You can read some of those comments on Joe C’s blog item that announced Joe Mauer as the winner of the AL Gold Glove award for catchers.
The Gold Gloves are voted on by managers, who can’t vote for their own players and long have been criticized for rewarding the same players year after year. It was hard for some Twins fans to remember Torii Hunter as a Gold Glover in 2006 after his ill-advised playoff dive and harder, maybe, to see him win his eighth straight this season with the Angels. Our frame of reference for this one was a catch he didn’t make against the Twins late in the season and some poor play in the postseason.
At the same time, I don’t exactly see Gardy and Jim Leyland poring over stats and having the internal debate over which version of zone rating to use in filling out their ballots. “That effin’ Ichiro always kills us, dammit.”
The other major postseason awards — MVP, Cy Young, Rookie and Manager of the Year — are meaningless to some because they are voted on by baseball writers who clearly have no idea what they’re talking and writing and blogging about. That’s despite the fact that most of them watch more baseball than any three of us combined — and have access to learned opinions, both inside and outside the game, in making their choices.
The same goes for Hall of Fame voting, with the added wrinkle of the now-elaborate committee structure and process for getting “veterans” into the Hall of Fame. Don’t ask me to cite chapter and verse of this ever-changing process. Instead, go here.
And, of course, the All-Star Game voting is without merit because fans have such a big say in the process, complete with the Chicago-style voting that encourages people to vote 25 times (then delete the cookies on their PC and vote some more) . And the mockery continues with the recently added fan voting for the final spot on the team, right?
This whole award thing is an area where I’d simply advise that people chill and understand that the whole operation is set up for the fans’ benefit.
Yes, some of the decisions and decision-makers are flawed. Later this month, you won’t be able to see Justin Morneau’s MVP vote total without thinking about the September slump that should knock him out of the running. And come the winter, we’ll wonder if the writers will finally get religion and induct Bert into the Hall of Fame — and then we can ask what took ‘em all so long. And we can debate whether Carlos Pena really played a better defensive first base than Kevin Youkilis (or Morneau) to win his Glove. (Yes, Mauer was the right choice at catcher.)
There’s no such thing as a perfect process and we shouldn’t pretend otherwise. Instead, we should appreciate the debate brought about by these awards — and then keep arguing with each about who should have really won ‘em.
27 Responses to "The meaning(lessness) of it all?"
I hate winter. Bring on spring training!
Another great blog entry.
Joe Mauer is a STUD!
Rob Neyer has an interesting post on ESPN on the AL awards. He claims that Jose Molina could be more deserving than Mauer. I find that ludacris and an exact reason why numbers geeks don’t get a full feel for a player and the game.
That said, I think Carlos Gomez could have won a Gold Glove this year. I guess since he’s young, he’ll have more chances.
What kills me about the gold glove award is how, for whatever reason, each players’ hitting stats come into play. If someone can explain that to me, I’d like to hear it. That continues to baffle me.
The Gold Glove awards are really the one award that I give the least amount of legitimacy to. I can only conclude that the managers simply don’t care enough to think hard about their votes.
I do have to agree with you, Howard, that no matter WHO does the voting for an award, it apparently isn’t “right”. It would be interesting to know who all the critics think SHOULD be voters for all of these awards (from AS game on through the post season awards and the HoF).
As far as the post season writer’s awards go, at least it is nice to see that some of them (e.g. Joe C) are looking into meaningful statistics and not raw numbers of wins, hits, era, hr and rbi.
Regardless, it looks like Cliff Lee will win the AL Cy Young, while at least 3 other starters (Josh Beckett, Roy Halladay, Ervin Santana) had better numbers than him, if you exclude wins or ERA and look at things that really tell the value of a pitcher, such as WHIP, K/BB and K/9. Same thing with the NL. Billingsley will probably win, regardless the fact that there are at least 10 NL starters ahead of him in those categories…
The HOF voting is more of a beauty context and I have not seen more of a primadonaish group than those writers who vote for the HOF. I understand that it is not as simple as looking at high scores in a video game, but if a player has better numbers than the ones already in, he should be in.
thrylos, I agree with your assessment of the AL Cy Young. I personally think Roy Halladay was the best pitcher in the AL. I love the complete games and overall innings pitched. good stuff there.
In the NL, I disagree only with your guess. I don’t think Billingsly will win. I have a feeling Webb might win it. If it is Billingsley, he doesn’t deserve it, like you said. I would give it to Lincecum. He was probably the best pitcher in all of baseball, and I have a hard time knocking him because his team wouldn’t score him runs.
NL Gold Glove pitcher - Greg Maddux. He is legitimately very good. However, are you telling me that he is better than Johan Santana defensively? I can’t imagine that to be the case.
And Mike Mussina? it’s a popularity contest. Managers don’t care. I’m actually a little surprised Mauer topped Pudge.
And yes, Carlos Pena is a better defensive first baseman than Kevin Youklis. That’s actually a pretty good pick by them.
The only thing that gives me pause about Mauer’s GG is his willingness to take the collision at home plate.
No, this isn’t a macho thing. I just prefer for GG’ers to go all-out.
But really, when you look at the competition, it’s easy to see why Mauer should’ve won it. You can’t keep giving it to Pudge and I’m pretty sure if you asked any AL manager to pick one catcher, they’d take our guy Joe (which is why he won the award, duh!). I would throw an honorable mention in for AJ, but he simply is not good at throwing runners out, so he can’t be considered.
Maddux had a better plus-minus rating that Santana this year and for a while now
http://www.billjamesonline.net/fieldingbible/2008-plus-minus-leaders.asp
All you need to do to make Gold Gloves more legitimate is to make it possible for multiple GGs to be awarded at the same position. You wouldn’t have to give more than one, but if there are two or more players at the position that really deserve it, give it to both or all of them.
Either that or tie it to some statitistical interpretation. This shouldn’t be like gymnastics or figure skating.
thrylos
I would bet half my life saving that Billingsley doesn’t win the NL Cy Young. He really shouldn’t even finish in the top 5. Webb, Santana, Sabathia, and Lincecum all should finish higher than him. Are people actually talking like Billingsley is going to win?
Sorry folks, mea culpa I meant Lincicum.
Even if you take Sabathia out of the equation, Haren, Nolasco and Harden have better combined WHIP, K/9 and K/BB numbers. In my book, Haren should be the Cy Young winner, his numbers (in those 3 categories) were above and beyond any other starter’s in the majors. For the AL, Halladay should get it.
This is what I love about baseball, there are no true “bests” it is all always up for debate.
P.S I completely agree with thrylos98…
And I disagree with Thrylos. And you are right, that is what is good about baseball.
Good post, Howard. I do think that one of the reasons the gold glove is greeted with so much skepticism is that it is by far the most arbitrary of the awards and is often given based mostly on reputation. While having a solid track record can help a player win the MVP or CY, players who are in decline or have had an off year don’t get consideration for these awards based on their past performance.
You can delete cookies on your computer?!? Cool!
its hard to to argue with wins. that is what gets you to the post season. whip is under rated and ERA is simple but VERY telling
ERA is actually not very telling because it has a lot to do with the bullpen and defense that work with the pitcher.
WHIP is also effected by defense.
I guess that’s why you have so many people do the voting. There are many different opinions on what stats are the most important.
WHIP is also effected by defense.
Not much. BBs are unaffected. One could argue that hits might be effected by defense (i.e. if the defenders have better range one might have less hits) but they are also affected equally by managing (i.e. bringing the infield in and someone pops a Texas league single over 3B)
All I have to say about the integrity of the gold glove award is that Rafael Palmeiro won one in 1999 despite playing about 35 games at 1b that year and all the rest of his games as DH.
“One could argue that hits might be effected by defense (i.e. if the defenders have better range one might have less hits) but they are also affected equally by managing (i.e. bringing the infield in and someone pops a Texas league single over 3B)”
I think you are understating the effects of defense and overstating the effects of management. Either way, my point was that WHIP is not immune to factors that are beyond a pitcher’s control.
I think I was disillusioned by the GG award in 2005. Hunter won it, after being out 1/3 of the year with a broken ankle.
understating the effects of defense
Defense has 2 factors:
a. accuracy - reflected by Errors. Errors do not count on WHIP, so that is out.
b. range - let’s use the plus minus system for this to understand the impact:
in 2008 the best defender in baseball as far as plus-minus goes was Chace Utley with a total score of 49 (i.e. he made 49 plays the average player does not make). He made a total of 803 plays (340 POs and 463 assists) even if we assume that all those +49 plays took a hit away (which is a stretch, because some of those were to get the lead runner in a double play or fielder’s choice, both of which do not take hits away from a pitcher’s WHIP).
49 is 6.1% of his total plays. If you divide that by 5 starting pitchers you get 1.2%.
So the best defender in baseball saved 1.2% of the hits for a particular starting pitcher (stretch). If you take the MLB average for 2008 pitchers 0.37 BB/Hits, 0.37 of a pitcher’s WHIP is a factor of BB and 0.73 a factor of hits. So the difference that the best ranging defender can potentially make on a pitcher’s WHIP is 0.88%
With examples:
Perkins’ WHIP in 2008 was 1.470, in that theoretical best case scenario would have been 1.457
Let’s go more extreme: here are the best plus minus numbers per position in 2008 (2B was Utley): 1B +24, 3B + 32, SS +23, LF +23, CF +32, P +16.
If you build a team with those people as defenders, the 0.88% difference above due to just Utley would become 3.6%
In other words, Perkins with the best defense in the MLB Universe of 2008 would have a WHIP of 1.417 instead of 1.457 (even with the best case scenario that all plus plays take hits away).
Not much difference
Can I get a “You were right” post from the writers at the Star Tribune, a Common Man “I’m Sorry” type article regarding the Coin Flip controversy?
http://www.startribune.com/sports/twins/34051374.html?elr=KArksi8cyaiUqCP:iUiD3aPc:_Yyc:aUU
After the Twins were eliminated by the White Sox, fans everywhere began to gripe about the coin flip that forced the Twins to play the White Sox in Chicago - even though the Twins won the season series 10-8. Every writer and broadcaster told the fans to shove-it, stop whining, “that’s the system and it won’t change because…etc. etc.”
Well, it seems the fans had a point - the coin flip needs to go.
no doubt lincicum should have gotten the NL cy young.
