Top 5 #7: Who Should Have Won???
Posted: Sun Feb 08, 2015 8:15 pm
It’s a rare case when the baseball writers vote unanimously to give one player the Cy Young or MVP awards. An example of this happened in 2011 when Justin Verlander deservedly received all 28 first place votes for the AL Cy Young. However most years the writers split their first place votes; and while most times the majority makes the correct pick, sometimes they don’t. So here are the .................
Top 5 Times in the NFBC era that someone else should have won.
#5: 2005 NL Cy Young Award...............
Chris Carpenter won the award, receiving 19 of the 32 first place votes. Dontrelle Willis came in second with 11 first place votes. But the winner should have been Roger Clemens.
Clemens only won 13 games, but he was completely dominate. Clemens' era was a full run better than Carpenter's (1.87 to 2.83). His ERA+ was 226, the next closest was Andy Pettitte at 177. Roger was also second in the NL with a 1.008 WHiP. He helped lead the Astros to the World Series.
#4: 2014 AL Cy Young Award...............
Sure Corey Kluber had a great year, and it's a good story; but the Cy Young Award should go to the pitcher with the best numbers, and that pitcher was Felix Hernandez.
If the name of the game is run prevention, King Felix did it better. His era was 0.30 lower than Kluber's , as was his WHiP (0.915 to 1.095)
#3: 2006 AL MVP Award...................
Justin Morneau picked up 15 of the 28 first place votes and won the award, but it should have gone to the player that finished second, Derek Jeter.
Winning the MVP Award was one of the only things The Captain never did during his career, 2006 was the closest he ever came. Both he and Morneau had great numbers, Justin with a WAR of 4.3 and Derek with a 5.5, however Jeter put his up from the shortstop position which carries extra weight in my book. And if you think Jeter's WAR was helped more by his defense, it wasn't. Morneau had a oWAR of 4.1 while Jeter's was 7.1. Derek actually lost "value" because of his defense.
#2: 2008 NL ROY Award................
The writers were nearly unanimous in giving Chicago Cubs catcher Geovany Soto the ROY. Soto received 31 of the 32 first place votes. But in my opinion, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Edison Volquez should have won.
Volquez was 17-6 with a 3.21 era. His 206 strike-outs are the forth most for any rookie over the past 20 years. That season Volquez carried a lot of NFBC teams to league titles.
#1: 2005 AL Cy Young Award.............
I'm not sure what the writers were doing in 2005. I already listed the NL Cy Young as one mistake, and I could have easily put the NL ROY Award on this list; and now to top it off, the worst mistake of them all.
For years there has been a debate about whether the MVP Award should go to the best player in the league or the most “valuable” player on a post-season reaching team. That debate rarely applies to the Cy Young Award though. Almost always the award goes to the best pitcher that season regardless of his teams overall success. 2005 seemed to be different though when Bartolo Colon (17 first place votes) won the award over Johan Santana (3 firsts).
During the ’05 season the Twins were never in the division race and finished 16 games behind the eventual World Series Champion Chicago White Sox. The Angels on the other hand were in a tight race all year before finally pulling away from the Oakland Athletics and winning the AL West. It was this sprint to the finish and Bartolo Colon’s key role in that finish that probably won him the award.
Over his final 14 starts, Colon was 10-2. The award shouldn’t be given for a third of a season’s performance though. Especially when that performance wasn’t as dominating as people think.
First let’s look at those final 14 starts. Yes Colon was 10-2, but his ERA was 3.26 and he only pitched more than 7 innings 3 times during that stretch. In fact, Colon only pitched 5 innings in four of his last five starts. The credit for Colon’s great season ending run should probably go to the Angels offense. During those last 14 games Bartolo was supported by 88 runs, that’s 6.29 per game.
But you can’t just take the award away from one pitcher however, another has to win it, and Johan Santana did.
Here are each pitchers season totals.
Pitcher G Record ERA Inn K WHiP ERA+
Colon 33 21-8 3.48 222.2 157 1.159 122
Santana 33 16-7 2.87 231.2 238 0.971 155
Santana easily beats Colon in each stat, other than wins. Colon picked up 21 wins in his 33 starts and had 29 decisions overall. Santana on the other hand had “just” 16 wins and 23 decisions. So what happened in the other 10 games? The Twins were 8-2 in those games. Santana threw 71 innings (7.1/gm) with a 3.04 era. Clearly Santana was keeping his team in these games, but for one reason or another he just didn’t collect the win. In four of his 7 loses, the Twins scored 2 runs or less.
It seems to me that the writers were blinded by Colon’s 21 wins, which did lead the league, and his “great” stretch run. The real winner though should have been Johan Santana. Santana did win the Cy Young Award in both '04 and '06.
Top 5 Times in the NFBC era that someone else should have won.
#5: 2005 NL Cy Young Award...............
Chris Carpenter won the award, receiving 19 of the 32 first place votes. Dontrelle Willis came in second with 11 first place votes. But the winner should have been Roger Clemens.
Clemens only won 13 games, but he was completely dominate. Clemens' era was a full run better than Carpenter's (1.87 to 2.83). His ERA+ was 226, the next closest was Andy Pettitte at 177. Roger was also second in the NL with a 1.008 WHiP. He helped lead the Astros to the World Series.
#4: 2014 AL Cy Young Award...............
Sure Corey Kluber had a great year, and it's a good story; but the Cy Young Award should go to the pitcher with the best numbers, and that pitcher was Felix Hernandez.
If the name of the game is run prevention, King Felix did it better. His era was 0.30 lower than Kluber's , as was his WHiP (0.915 to 1.095)
#3: 2006 AL MVP Award...................
Justin Morneau picked up 15 of the 28 first place votes and won the award, but it should have gone to the player that finished second, Derek Jeter.
Winning the MVP Award was one of the only things The Captain never did during his career, 2006 was the closest he ever came. Both he and Morneau had great numbers, Justin with a WAR of 4.3 and Derek with a 5.5, however Jeter put his up from the shortstop position which carries extra weight in my book. And if you think Jeter's WAR was helped more by his defense, it wasn't. Morneau had a oWAR of 4.1 while Jeter's was 7.1. Derek actually lost "value" because of his defense.
#2: 2008 NL ROY Award................
The writers were nearly unanimous in giving Chicago Cubs catcher Geovany Soto the ROY. Soto received 31 of the 32 first place votes. But in my opinion, Cincinnati Reds pitcher Edison Volquez should have won.
Volquez was 17-6 with a 3.21 era. His 206 strike-outs are the forth most for any rookie over the past 20 years. That season Volquez carried a lot of NFBC teams to league titles.
#1: 2005 AL Cy Young Award.............
I'm not sure what the writers were doing in 2005. I already listed the NL Cy Young as one mistake, and I could have easily put the NL ROY Award on this list; and now to top it off, the worst mistake of them all.
For years there has been a debate about whether the MVP Award should go to the best player in the league or the most “valuable” player on a post-season reaching team. That debate rarely applies to the Cy Young Award though. Almost always the award goes to the best pitcher that season regardless of his teams overall success. 2005 seemed to be different though when Bartolo Colon (17 first place votes) won the award over Johan Santana (3 firsts).
During the ’05 season the Twins were never in the division race and finished 16 games behind the eventual World Series Champion Chicago White Sox. The Angels on the other hand were in a tight race all year before finally pulling away from the Oakland Athletics and winning the AL West. It was this sprint to the finish and Bartolo Colon’s key role in that finish that probably won him the award.
Over his final 14 starts, Colon was 10-2. The award shouldn’t be given for a third of a season’s performance though. Especially when that performance wasn’t as dominating as people think.
First let’s look at those final 14 starts. Yes Colon was 10-2, but his ERA was 3.26 and he only pitched more than 7 innings 3 times during that stretch. In fact, Colon only pitched 5 innings in four of his last five starts. The credit for Colon’s great season ending run should probably go to the Angels offense. During those last 14 games Bartolo was supported by 88 runs, that’s 6.29 per game.
But you can’t just take the award away from one pitcher however, another has to win it, and Johan Santana did.
Here are each pitchers season totals.
Pitcher G Record ERA Inn K WHiP ERA+
Colon 33 21-8 3.48 222.2 157 1.159 122
Santana 33 16-7 2.87 231.2 238 0.971 155
Santana easily beats Colon in each stat, other than wins. Colon picked up 21 wins in his 33 starts and had 29 decisions overall. Santana on the other hand had “just” 16 wins and 23 decisions. So what happened in the other 10 games? The Twins were 8-2 in those games. Santana threw 71 innings (7.1/gm) with a 3.04 era. Clearly Santana was keeping his team in these games, but for one reason or another he just didn’t collect the win. In four of his 7 loses, the Twins scored 2 runs or less.
It seems to me that the writers were blinded by Colon’s 21 wins, which did lead the league, and his “great” stretch run. The real winner though should have been Johan Santana. Santana did win the Cy Young Award in both '04 and '06.