2018 awards thread

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/)

Yelich iirc

i actually think NL Cy is shaping up to be the one w/the winner most easy to predict at this point.

yeah, i have no doubt it'll be degrom

degrom
yelich
acuna

??? sale
betts
ohtani

i wonder about vote splitting in the AL w/Betts and Martinez, lots of people are still making noise about the latter despite Mookie having the trve kvlt MVP season. not sure it'd be enough for Trout to win but idk.

yeah, seems like there's a decent possibility of that happening for sure. it all depends on the good ol' triple crown, and martinez is close on BA and HRs now

fWAR hates snell

he's only a couple innings shy, but sale does not currently qualify for the ERA title -- have any starters ever won without qualifying?

despite degrom and his likelihood of winning in the NL, i still think that snell will be overlooked because he plays for the rays.

For NL ROY, I've gone from Soto being a lock, to Acuna overtaking him, and then Soto had a big couple of weeks and got back into it. When I look at them now, though, it still looks like Acuna.

https://www.mlb.com/mets/news/jacob-degrom-should-be-national-league-mvp/c-295265432

deGrom dominated the Nats with one run over seven innings, got the win (!) and probably locked up the Cy.

deGrom's a lock now; in what was a real close race a few weeks ago, he may even come close to winning unanimously. I can't see MVP, though.

The Triple Crown won't happen (Davis hit two HR), so I think that locks up MVP for Betts, unless you think vote-splitting will make room for Trout. Ramirez and Lindor have faded a bit in the second half; by WAR, Chapman's case is almost 40% defense, and I just can't see that in a year where Betts is such a blueprint MVP both traditionally and sabermetrically.

Betts would seem to be a virtual lock now after the last couple games, with Trout maybe possibly moving into the #2 spot at this point with his recent run.

Snell has a shot at 22 wins and is maybe locking it down as well, though he's not very inspiring as a #1 vote.

Betts has an outside chance at 11 WAR on Baseball Reference. The only two players to reach that this century were Bonds (twice) and Pedro in 2000.

And--forgot about this--he's only played 132 games. (Pro-rated, Trout's abbreviated season last year might have been in the same range.)

though he's not very inspiring as a #1 vote

He's got one clear shortcoming, his IP, and his BB/9 are a little high. But have things changed so much (or are we so spoiled by the recent bar set by Kershaw) that a guy with a 1.90 ERA, 5.6 H/9, and 10.8 K/9--I won't even mention the W-L record, which would only trigger squawking--is a pedestrian choice?

(Pro-rated, Trout's abbreviated season last year might have been in the same range.)

― clemenza, Monday, September 24, 2018 4:01 PM (two hours ago)

and his rookie year

His W-L record, incidentally, is not really a mirage.

In his 22 wins, he hasn't given up more than two runs, earned or otherwise.
In his 4 no-decisions, he gave up 0, 2, 0, and 1 run.
In his 5 losses, he pitched poorly in four of them and well (one run in 6.1 innings) in one of them.

Where he has been lucky is that he's picked up five wins where he didn't reach six innings. He pitched really well in these games--26 IP, 2 earned runs; he didn't give up an earned run in four out of the five games--but he left with a lead and the bullpen held it every time.

Overall:

21 wins: 1.09 ERA
5 losses: 7.71 ERA
4 no-decisions: 1.21 ERA

I'd say his W-L record reflects his game-level performance fairly accurately, with the caveat that he's never hit 8 IP even once this year. I don't know if that has more to do with him, where the game's at in general, or Tampa Bay's idiosyncratic strategies this year.

21 wins, that should read.

Whenever I do something like this, I know the general reaction is "Why are you bothering?" W-L record has been so thoroughly discredited by now, I think the general assumption is that every guy who puts up gaudy numbers did so mostly through random luck--that the record is hiding all sorts of cheap wins and lucky no-decisions. With someone like J. Happ, no argument, when you look a little closer, the season is never that good. And at the other end of the spectrum, you get seasons like deGrom's, his being an extreme case. But when Kershaw went 21-3, or with Snell this year, the W-L record is right in line with how well they pitched. And the four times where Snell didn't pitch well, he got tagged for a loss all four times.

Snell has been great but i'm a little ambivalent in a season where i suspect several AL pitchers have been more dominant overall. i'm not gonna sweat his win, tbh, i just think that IP total gives me a bit of pause.

who do you go with, then? sale and bauer have pitched even less (and sale is still unqualified)

Got even more curious about Snell's five under-six-IP wins: what was the score when he left?

May 29 vs. Oakland: left with a 3-1 lead after 5.2 IP, final score 4-3 (bullpen almost blew it in the 9th).

Aug. 10 vs. Toronto: left with a 4-0 lead after 5 IP, final score 7-0.

Aug. 16 vs. the Yankees: left with a 2-0 lead after 5 IP, final score 3-1.

Sept. 7 vs. Baltimore: left with a 7-2 lead after 5.1 IP, final score 14-2.

Sept. 18 vs. Texas: left with a 3-0 lead after 5 IP, final score 4.0.

The Toronto and NY games were soon after his DL stint, so they were obviously nursing him. Anyway, with three of those wins, he got a big assist from the bullpen--you would hardly expect to win all three games; the Toronto win, there was some help from the bullpen; the Baltimore win looked pretty safe when he left.

Pretty thorough explanation of deGrom over Scherzer (not much of an issue anymore):

http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2018/9/24/17890872/breaking-down-the-degrom-scherzer-cy-young-battle-new-york-mets-washington-nationals-mlb-awards

i think 21 wins and a 1.90 ERA basically wraps it up for Snell, tho I think Verlander and Cole are both better options. Kluber's K-rates aren't as astronomical as they've been in the past, so that puts him pretty far behind the other dudes in my estimation.

yeah i'd vote for Verlander tbh

Sale getting pounded by AAA Baltimore pretty much seals the AL Cy for Snell.

Snell's adjusted ERA is actually better than deGrom's--he just misses the Top 20 all-time list.

There are many ways to illustrate Jacob deGrom's dominant & unusual season, but this one stands out to me: he limited opponents to a .521 OPS this season -- lower than the worst everyday hitter in MLB this season, Chris Davis (.539 OPS). https://t.co/AML9dagUr5

— James Wagner (@ByJamesWagner) September 27, 2018

he prob should win MVP too, tbh

Yelich in striking distance of the Triple Crown. Even if he gets I'm #teamdegrom for the NL MVP, but that would be one hell of an accomplishment.

Verlander as one other start, against the Orioles. A quality start, and it is the Orioles, should give him the Cy Young.

Yelich is a deserving candidate too, and his ridiculous hot streak in September as the Brewers surged will be fresh in voters' minds.

yeah, definitely. he has stepped it up recently.

6 RBIs on Tuesday, 5 walks on Wednesday. He's been unreal.

Just noticed that Yelich already had a HOF'er on his Similarity Score list before the season; I'm sure he'll one or two more after this year.

Similar Batters through 25

Chet Lemon (965.5)
Johnny Damon (954.7)
Gary Matthews (950.1)
Carlos May (949.9)
Delmon Young (945.2)
Nick Markakis (943.7)
Lee Mazzilli (941.4)
Al Oliver (941.3)
Dave Winfield (941.2) *
Sixto Lezcano (940.3)
* - Signifies Hall of Famer

(Never realized that Lee Mazzilli had a pretty decent run in the late '70s.)

"he'll add"

think about how legendary a Yelich/Ozuna/Stanton outfield would be

that is a weird list

https://images-na.ssl-images-amazon.com/images/I/51pZnwi%2BOUL._SX329_BO1,204,203,200_.jpg