2018 awards thread

have Bader's golden locks made him a matinee idol?

Paul DeJong much foxier imho

Tyler O'Neill plays the Mozart

https://www.instagram.com/p/bAsnWWza3v/

I think this is less surprising in a *Canadian* weightlifter.

i want bader's locks to go full-on colby rasmus. let them flow, and let the people see them flow!

ok, i just tried to do a rough simulation and it came out looking like jaso, so nevermind

https://i.imgur.com/QWtvjmG.jpg

also i don't know how hair works.

bader just looks like a stereotypical '80s movie preppie asshole, especially when he rocks this look

no idea on AL Cy now. I had typed out a ranking will Snell at the top, but I'm not sure. His IP numbers are pretty low, and Kluber has been coming on very strong and might get to 20 wins (as could Snell, admittedly.) bWAR has Kluber 3rd in the AL behind Sale and Snell, and fWAR has him 5th behind Sale, Bauer, Cole, and Verlander (with Snell down in 9th behind Severino, Carrasco, and Clevinger.)

Sale would have to come back and really put up some numbers to move back up to the top i think, and while I'm sure he will perform well I'm not sure Boston will ride him very hard at the end with things getting increasingly locked up.

Verlander finished great last year, as did Kluber.

Gonna be a close one!!!

Sale's clearly the best pitcher in the league, so too bad that he probably won't win now. I'd say that Kluber's the default choice, but except for IP, Snell's line is awesome.

Sale currently still leads both versions of WAR among AL pitchers. A starter might well win a Cy with < 162 IP soon. Sale's at 146 and presumably will make a start or two this month.

You'll be able to spot the most sabermetric NL MVP voters because they will have some combo of Scherzer, deGrom and Nola at the top of their ballots. (Because those are almost certainly the best players in the league.)

also, it's not clear Kluber has been the best pitcher on the Indians.

yeah obv that rotation is an embarrassment of riches, Kluber's probably the best pitcher overall but as far as which one of those guys has been having the best 2018, it's another story.

Boston's method of handling Sale the rest of the way seems to indicate he may only get up to 5 IP per start for his final outing, which is pretty wise but i think it really does bring down his Cy chances, only bc of voter perception. i agree w/you on principle, assuming you believe he *should* win as it stands right now.

wasn't it a pretty tight race before sale went out?

A starter might well win a Cy with < 162 IP soon.

This technically already happened in 1984 with Rick Sutcliffe :) But seriously, I think you're right and it'll happen within the next five years or so.

Kluber has been great, but not as great as in his two Cy Young winning seasons, so it becomes mostly about those extra IP. Expect to see arguments like "if Sale pitched another 50 innings with a 7.50 ERA, then his ERA+ and WAR would equal Kluber's, so how could that possibly strengthen his case for the CY?"

Weird to see so many pitchers already over 200 K and only one of them within a solid quality start of getting to 200 IP.

NL Cy still a toss-up (combined WAR):

Scherzer - 16.3
deGrom - 15.8
Nola - 14.4

Scherzer's total is a little inflated because he's having a good year with the bat; in terms of just pitching, deGrom's a little ahead.

I mentioned this piece here or on another thread: Joe Posnanski looking at the two versions of WAR via Pedro Martinez's 1999 and 2000 seasons, and basically concluding that a combination of the two works best:

http://joeposnanski.com/at-war-with-pedro/

Jaffe on behalf of Sale:

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/chris-sales-abridged-cy-young-case/

Mets bumped deGrom bcz it looked like there could be rain delays yesterday. Might rain all day today; it there's a postponement tonight, it might eventually cost him a start.

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/defense-contact-quality-and-the-nl-cy-young

A WPA argument for Goldschmidt:

http://www.mlb.com/news/paul-goldschmidt-making-strong-run-at-mvp/c-293875428

(Haven't read it yet, so I don't know if they're including pitchers in there.)

mets are indeed postponed

Being pushed back -- by rain -- from Sunday to Tuesday will probably cost Jacob deGrom a start. Possible solutions:

--an Oct. 1 makeup game, if the Mets end up with one of those
--deGrom starting on short rest for the season finale Sept. 30

— Tim Healey (@timbhealey) September 10, 2018

feels like no one's talking about it but both betts and scherzer have an outside shot at an 11 rWAR season

just this minute i can't remember what rWAR is.

it's what baseball-reference WAR was called before everyone seemed to switch to bWAR

Being pushed back -- by rain -- from Sunday to Tuesday will probably cost Jacob deGrom a start. Possible solutions:

--an Oct. 1 makeup game, if the Mets end up with one of those
--deGrom starting on short rest for the season finale Sept. 30
— Tim Healey (@timbhealey) September 10, 2018

I heard there's a double header on Wednesday now?

yes. it's a 4-game series, thru Thursday.

To bWAR or rWAR, that is the question.

Kluber wound up not doing his part tonight. Verlander is pitching extremely well though.

Eye on the prize, Kluber will skip a start:

Francona said probables for Fri-Sun will be Tomlin, Clevinger, Bieber (in that order). It pushes Kluber back in order to align him better for playoffs.

— Jordan Bastian (@MLBastian) September 11, 2018

DeGrom's now sporting a losing record... could be interesting for the old-timer voter.

he struck out 9 and ERA swelled to 1.71

Price is pitching so well now (never mind that it's the Jays)--I haven't looked past the obvious three or four best, but I wouldn't be surprised if he sneaks into the Top 10 for AL Cy.

Jeff Sullivan wrote that DeGrom's W-L record is so absurd that it's come full circle and is helping his Cy Young case because it's getting so much attention. If he was 14-10 people would be talking about him less.

Scherzer is going to surpass the numbers he put up in his last two Cy Young winning years, maybe by a lot.

yeah, he's exceeded his highest bWAR of 6.9 (2015) by 2.

Nola took a hit last night: loss, 4 ER in 5 IP.

WILLLLLBONNNNN

“If (deGrom) goes 8-11 and wins the Cy Young, then all the people voting for the Cy Young should be dismissed” - @RealMikeWilbon

I’m triggered pic.twitter.com/gTNYOgyDzk

— Andrew Claudio (@Claudio_GSN) September 12, 2018

NL MVP could come down to two Brewers outfielders, nice

holy pedro tho

After yesterday, Blake Snell is 5 strikeouts away from the 23rd 200/200 season in MLB history.

That's a season with 200+ Ks and an ERA+ over 200, a club that's already added Chris Sale and Jacob deGrom this year https://t.co/ZYqbRGQNG5 pic.twitter.com/f5ZYPJcZkK

— Baseball Reference (@baseball_ref) September 13, 2018

Scherzer was hammered tonight. Definitely deGrom's to lose now.

https://www.mlb.com/news/jd-martinez-should-be-american-league-mvp

After 148 games last season, the Red Sox had a record of 85-63 -- and led the Yankees by three games in the American League East. A year later, after the same number of games, the Red Sox enter Saturday's games with a record of 101-47, and stand 9 1/2 games ahead of the Yankees. There was one significant addition to the team between then and now: J.D. Martinez. He is not only the Most Valuable Player in the AL this season, he is the MVP of the entire sport.

mookie betts is a better hitter, in addition to being one of the best defenders players in the game at a premium defensive position

the triple crown is a hell of a drug

Sale's the best pitcher in the AL, no argument really, and probably the best period. But I can't see Snell not winning the Cy at this point (unless he blows up in one of his last two starts). The voting is more and more sabermetric every year, but I don't think they're quite at the point where they don't give the Cy to a guy who's 20-5 with a sub-2.00 ERA and pitching for a third-place team. You can't find anything in his line that's not excellent; his FIP is around 3.00, so I guess he's been a little lucky.

Still think Cy Young voters care about wins? In an informal poll of MLB dot com BBWAA writers, deGrom took 30 of 33 first-place votes:https://t.co/zG0ylHMyBI

— Anthony DiComo (@AnthonyDiComo) September 19, 2018

the last couple of weeks will be interesting for the AL MVP race if trout continues the utterly ridiculous tear he’s been on.

I also think ohtani has a really solid case for ROY

Only 0.1 bWAR separating Sale and Snell. If Snell was on a 200 IP pace then he'd be the frontrunner, but he isn't. The win total is nice, but you have to be lucky to win that many with so few IP, and his FIP partly reflects that. He might set a record for the fewest IP by a 20 game winner ... I think Jared Weaver set that record a few years ago?

ohtani should run away with ROY actually now that I look at the numbers

Yeah, when I look at Snell's IP, he really isn't that far ahead of Sale, even with the injury (169-150)--I was assuming he was at least 30 or 40 innings ahead. In those extra 19 innings, Snell has given up 13 extra hits, 25 extra walks, 6 extra HR, and struck out 22 fewer batters. Hard to make a case for him. He probably will rank as one of the great runner-up seasons.

Snell is 26th overall in run support, 4.55 runs per start; Sale is actually a little higher at 4.96. (No surprise: Happ is second at 5.83.) Two pitchers are getting worse support than DeGrom's 3.53 runs per start: Andrew Cashner (hardly matters with an ERA over 5.00) and Cole Hamels.

http://www.espn.com/mlb/stats/pitching/_/sort/runSupportPerStart/type/expanded-2/order/false

for AL MVP, yeah Trout has been insane of late. In Sept: .380/.508/.680. He's a very good few games away from passing Betts in bWAR. He's already passed him in fWAR.

Ramirez has really slowed down, and Lindor was never going to gain much traction w/Ramirez as his teammate. Betts in Sept is hitting .261/.407/.348. Martinez has similarly cooled off a bit.

i can see Snell being the pick for those who like wins, but he's also not really an exciting pick; Sale should get it. I thought maybe Verlander would sneak in, but I suspect he'll finish more like #3, ahead of Kluber and Cole and whoever else.

the likely NL MVP hasn't even been mentioned in this thread yet, i don't think

(though craig edwards seems to think degrom has a chance: https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/jacob-degrom-and-the-mvp-precedent/)