November 17, 2008
NL MVP Preview
Ryan Howard
Photo:Icon SMI
The BBWAA announce the National League MVP award this afternoon, and the pundits seem to handicap it as a race between Albert Pujols and Ryan Howard. However, that ignores a middle infielder with a great season, Hanley Ramirez.
There is no doubt Albert Pujols was the best hitter in the majors this season. If I'm filling out a ballot, Pujols gets my number one vote. I'm not sure how high I rank Howard. Here's a list of qualifying MLB players by slugging percentage. Note that Hanley finishes just three points behind Howard, and blows him away in both batting average and OBA. On top of that, he played a pretty good shortstop this season. Voting Howard second also ignores Lance Berkman, who posted better numbers as a first basemen, and other offensive contributors at key defensive positions like David Wright, Carlos Beltran and Howard's own teammate Chase Utley. If Ryan wins the award or finishes second, the Home Run/RBI wing of the voters is still alive and well.
Hanley Ramirez
Photo:Icon SMI
My ballot would be something like:
- Albert Pujols
- Hanley Ramirez
- Chase Utley
- Carlos Beltran
- David Wright
- Dan Uggla
- Tim Lincecum
- Ryan Braun
- Ryan Howard
- Manny Ramirez
Manny was certainly the spark that brought the division to the Dodgers, but it's tough for me to include him for two months worth of work. I might put Cole Hamels there instead. We'll see how the voters decided at 2 PM EST.
Posted by David Pinto at
09:40 AM
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Stone hands really played great SS this year - so much that they want to move him - this is where you embarrass yourself by pretending these models have any relationship to reality.
My guess is that Ar-bee-eye wins it for Howard. And he should give half the award to Utley for his .380 OBP.
@Bandit:
I dunno, pretty much every metric I've seen this year thinks Hanley got his defense up to average for a SS. The scouts have always said that he has the athleticism to improve defensively as he approaches his prime. Keep in mind that for years almost all the people watching thought Derek Jeter was a very good defensive shortstop when all the models thought he was amongst the worst shortstops because he simply didn't get to enough balls. I tend to give a fair bit of wait to the rating when all of the different metrics (especially ones using drastically different methodologies) arrive at the same conclusion about a player's defense.
Berkman belongs in the top 5.
The name of the game is producing runs and winning. Howard is CLEARLY the best when it comes to that. Heres' the proof: http://phillyphorum.com/baseball/howard-pujols-for-mvp-not-even-close-t57.html
OPS and slugging percentage are more predictive than reflective. I'll take true run production over either one any day of the week.
Howard has to be closer to 1 than 9. Uggla? Beltran? Braun? I'm not sure they even belong in the top 10.
You say Berkman had better numbers than Howard (which is true, of course), but then you left him off your ballot while placing Howard at #8. Was that intentional, or just an oversight? Just wondering about the reasoning there.
