Mike Trout needs his own thread

niiiice. he had a nice play going back to the wall last night too

Yeah, and hit a 3-run homer off Felix the other night. As an M's fan it's nice for once to see him do cool shit and not wipe out their barely visible playoff hopes.

lou brock played 18 seasons, had 3023 hits, stole 938 bases

trout has passed him in WAR

smh

You're going to wear yourself out making note of every guy he passes in WAR.

but do be sure to let me know when he catches current surname trout war leader dizzy trout (50.6 fWAR)

Most WAR since 2001:

1 Albert Pujols
2 Alex Rodriguez
3 Adrian Beltre
4 Miguel Cabrera
5 Carlos Beltran
6 Chase Utley
7 Ichiro Suzuki
8 Barry Bonds
9 Lance Berkman
10 David Wright
11 Chipper Jones
12 Matt Holliday
13 Scott Rolen
14 Jimmy Rollins
15 Derek Jeter
16 David Ortiz
17 Evan Longoria
18 Robinson Cano
19 Joe Mauer
20 Mike Trout

Obviously, position players. Sabathia, Greinke, Kershaw, Felix, Hamels, and Verlander would be on a pitchers-included list if you use Baseball Reference. (Not meant as a slight to Trout.)

My takeaway from that list: Bonds retired ten years ago and he's still 8th???

really a surprise? those last years were y'know

yeah whoops I forgot to mention no pitchers

trout is hitting .302/.356/.583 in 104 PAs that have reached 0-2 this season

MLB is collectively hitting .150/.158/.222 in those situations

dang dog

yeah he's an insane 2 strike hitter, he has no fear

it's practically boggsian!

http://www.baseballspast.com/samplepage_files/11094_master_%202_strike_hitting.pdf

They were talking about the AL MVP vote on one of the local call-in shows. Assuming it's a five-way race (Trout, Altuve, Donaldson, Betts, and Machado--you could add Ortiz, I suppose), I think Trout's going to benefit this time from all the closely-matched candidates on contending teams. Voters who only pick players from contending teams as their #1 will still have Trout third or fourth at worst, maybe even second; he'll get #1 or, at worst, #2 votes from more sabermetric-minded voters. Meanwhile, all the other #1s will be scattered between four or five players.

i think if the season ended today the final order would be betts/altuve/donaldson/trout/ortiz/machado

whoa

http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/17437855/mike-trout-los-angeles-angels-uninjured-serious-highway-crash

up to 9.3 WAR

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-case-for-mike-trout-for-american-league-mvp/

they're doing these pieces for all the contenders, but trout really is the only choice. a month ago that wasn't the case tho!

xpost only 8.2 by fWAR, but still way more than the runner-up (donaldson, 7.0 fWAR)

why does this guy sit so many games now :(

because the angels are anything but

he's up to 10.0 rWAR now

i don't know why i chose these particular players, but trout appears to be keeping pace

http://i.imgur.com/OIeBQ6L.png

he's got an outside shot at an 11-win season, at least by baseball-reference. and he probably won't win MVP

in more ways than one, this is sort of albert pujols' fault

albert pujols turned into mid-decline phase ryan howard so quickly

pujols has the same WAR (bbr) as Ichiro this season.

and he probably won't win MVP

You think Betts will win, I take it. I'll stick with what I said a month ago (awards thread)--I think Altuve and Donaldson will cut into Betts' support enough that Trout will win. Trout has sabermetric voters to himself; even if that's still a smaller part of the pool than traditional-stat voters, the latter will split its vote.

Cameron:

Betts is clearly a fantastic defensive player, and he deserves credit for his all around game, but the reality is that the argument that Betts and Trout have had similar 2016 seasons is an argument for accepting the validity of single-season DRS at face value. We’ve probably done more to advocate for the acceptance of stats like UZR and DRS as anyone, but even I wouldn’t look at Betts’ 2016 defensive numbers and argue that we should accept that he was the best defender in baseball this year, and far more valuable defensively than Trout, who still plays the more demanding defensive position.

And unlike single-season defensive metrics, which continue to have some noise influencing their results, we can very easily identify the offensive difference between Trout and Betts. It wasn’t just “some walks”; it was 86 outs made. And those 86 outs are why, with all due respect to Betts as a great player who had a great season, it isn’t really all that close this year.

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-actual-difference-between-mike-trout-and-mookie-betts/

i'm not sensing a lot of betts momentum compared to previous dudes who have won, it feels like a lot of people are saying trout deserves it.

I think that Cameron article makes it clear why Trout will win. You've got the old-school traditional guy (Luddite, if you prefer) who's going to vote for Betts--but even he's putting Trout second. You've got a second guy who's about halfway; prefers the MVP to play for a contender, but doesn't treat that as an absolute--and he's voting for Trout. So if Trout gets some of the halfway voters, plus all of the sabermetric voters, and then you get people like Heyman putting Trout second (or at worst third), I'm sure that'll put him comfortably ahead of a Betts/Altuve/Donaldson/Machado traffic jam.

still think ortiz will siphon off some betts votes too

Definitely, should have mentioned Ortiz--lots of sentimental support, Triple Crown stats, vote-splitting on the same team, etc.

if i understand correctly how bbref's MVP shares works, a trout win would put him 16th all time. after 5 seasons

@BNightengale
The three finalists voted on by the players for their Player of Year Award: Jose Altuve, Mookie Betts and David Ortiz

the trees do not understand the forest

the trees like narrative, which i guess isn't too surprising

maybe he's a real jerk

he doesn't seem like a lot of fun tbh

from everything i've read his makeup and general likablity are beyond reproach, the issue really is just the angels sucking

there is literally no rational reason for not voting for trout this year btw. he leads in every category. leverage-based, situational, etc he's helped his team win more than anyone else

http://mlb.mlb.com/images/9/7/0/95680970/092014_laa_trout_pats_beltre_twitter_pz1uno3t.gif

so likable Beltre doesn't even punch him here

there is literally no rational reason for not voting for trout this year btw. he leads in every category. leverage-based, situational, etc he's helped his team win more than anyone else

― k3vin k., Friday, September 30, 2016 6:14 PM (fifty-three minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

didn't get his team to the playoffs

like i get what you're saying but all that stuff doesn't matter to the voters if the issue is no playoffs = team wins don't matter

they shd give the MVP to a team then

*throws up hands, throws up*

this is the players' vote. no one should expect the players to care about leverage-based or situational or basically any stats. when trout hits 40 homers as a 41yo DH i'm sure he'll win it then

ugh awards are the worst

trout is so good

What I've been saying:

http://www.usatoday.com/story/sports/mlb/2016/09/30/mike-trout-al-mvp-chances/91314092/

there is literally no rational reason for not voting for trout this year btw.

I think that's a bit of an overstatement when you're looking at two guys separated by one WAR on Baseball Reference (if you take the halfway average with the other WAR, it's 1.3). Betts closes the gap defensively, though, and I'm not the person to make the argument for him there.