Cy, More Decisions
Continuing last week’s Keltnerizing of the awards
Last week, this space tackled the MVP award with its own Keltner List, or the Morneau List as I’ll now call it, after the 2006 AL MVP honoree who wasn’t even the MVP of his own team. After some thought, I realized that you could use the Morneau List for the Rookie of the Year voting too, but obviously limited to rookies, whether you define it like MLB does or insist it is someone in the early years of his major league professional career. Maybe that should make it the Jeter List, since *everyone loves Jeter*. This week, we’ll tackle the Cy Young.
Currently, the process for deciding upon the Cy Young Award appears to be this:
- Find the starters with the best W-L records or lowest ERA, and the reliever with the most saves, preferably on winning ball clubs
- Argue
- Vote
Wow. Someone in the BBWAA should become a political reporter. Or just make George F. Will a member of the group.
Needless to say, there are a few flaws with the Cy Young that are commonplace in the use of baseball statistics. Those who fancy themselves “statistical seamheads” will tell you wins and ERA are not good ways to measure a pitcher, as a win is almost entirely dependent on the team surrounding him and ERA has the influence of the scorer’s decisions that result in errors or hits. Saves aren’t much better, as Brian Cartwright explained very well last week they’re nothing more than a specialized situation of a hold.
However, as flawed as this logic may be, it seems that more often than not the Cy Young is given to someone who ranks highly across the board. Cliff Lee leads the majors in VORP for pitchers and appears to be in a tussle with Roy Halladay, who just happens to be #2 in the AL in the same statistic. Last year’s winners, Jake Peavy and CC Sabathia, were #1 in their league in this metric.
So if the writers seem to get the Cy Young right, do we really need a list? Yes, because you’ll see this year’s list has Tim Lincecum ranking atop the NL in many statistical categories except that wonderful statistic of wins because, well, he plays for the Giants. However, he gets more passing mentions than serious consideration. Alas, onward to the list, which will look very similar to the Morneau List:
- Did the player rank high against the league in numerous statistical categories?
- Did the player rank high against his teammates in numerous statistical categories?
- Did the player’s contribution greatly affect his team’s success?
- If a starter, did the player give his team a chance to win an average scoring ballgame each time he started? As a reliever, did he greatly improve the team’s chances for more wins with his collective appearances?
- Did the player do something historic within the season?
- Did the player make the All-Star team for his league?
- Did the player’s team achieve a berth in the postseason? Low on this list for a reason.
- Does the player have the reputation as the best player on his team? in the league?
- Does he do something that is unique to pitchers across the league? Let this be known as the Rivera question, in tribute to the tremendous cutter of the last active #42 in baseball.
Discuss!
11 September 2008 23:00
According to Bill James’ Cy Young predictor, Cliff Lee has a 14.1-point lead over K-Rod in the AL and Lincecum has an 8.3-point lead over Brandon Webb in the NL. I think what Lee and Lincecum are doing is pretty amazing considering they’re both pitching for sub-.500 teams.
I also think it would be a shame to give the Cy Young Award to Rodriguez just because he broke the saves record (he hasn’t yet but he will). Not to take anything away from him, but if not for the plethora of save opportunities he’s had this year, his numbers wouldn’t be any better than they typically are, and in some cases they’d be worse. In 2006 he had a better ERA, ERA+, WHIP, K/9, and K/BB ratio than he has now and he finished fourth in Cy Young voting with only 5 points. It would be ridiculous if he won the award this year with inferior numbers just because he set a new mark for saves in a season.
12 September 2008 01:26
Cliff Lee should be a lock. He wins games and many in dominant fashion. K-Rod is having a great season but he’s got a few blown saves and there’s a little padding going on there with the saves.
Webb was better than Lincecum until about two weeks ago BUT not by much. Since then, Webb has had three really rough starts and Lincecum two excellent starts and one bad and I think that vaulted him ahead.
Stats are wonderful but we can all dig into numbers and find something to make our case. There are so many things that can happen to skew numbers and change perceptions.
If you have MLB.TV, watch the condensed games of Webb’s starts and Lincecum’s starts and I think you will walk away with the feeling that Lincecum is the deserving one of the two for the Cy… and don’t watch Sabathia with the Brewers or you might think he deserves some support, too!
12 September 2008 11:48
The 2006 Minnesota Twins don’t make the playoffs without Justin Morneau. That makes him valuable. The award isn’t “best hitter”, it’s “most valuable”. And Morneau shouldn’t have to be treated like this.
You want a better name? How about the Andre Dawson List? You know, the guy who, without, the Cubs would’ve finished last in ‘87, and with him…finished last in ‘87. THAT’S your travesty.
14 September 2008 21:22
Mike,
It’s funny, but I totally forgot about the Cy Predictor when writing this. Must have been a by-product of me trying to “work”
Brian,
I don’t have MLB.TV, because I’m cheap and only subscribe to Gameday audio so I can listen to my White Sox in NE (and Steve Stone makes it’s all the worth while). But I agree very much with your assessment.
BJ,
You’ve defended Morneau’s value in 2006, which I have not and will not question that he indeed had, and still has, value to the Minnesota Twins. However, in 2006, he was not the “most valuable” player on that team in my opinion. That player would be Joe Mauer, who was clearly the best catcher in the AL, led the AL in BA, was 3rd in OBP, 5th in the AL in VORP, and was on base a lot so Morneau could rack up those 130 RBI. BTW, same categories, Morenau was 7th, 7th, and 13th, and his stats line is better but still comparable to Paul Konerko’s that year.
15 September 2008 09:03
From Joe Christenson’s Minneapolis Star-Tribune story, November 2006, announcing Morneau’s selection as MVP:
“…It was no coincidence that when Morneau turned around his season, the Twins turned around their season. On June 7, the Twins were 25-33, and Morneau was batting .236 with 11 home runs and 38 RBI.
From that point forward, Morneau batted a major-league best .362, with 23 home runs and 92 RBI.”
They got the right guy. And this comes from one of the biggest fans of Joe Mauer there is.
15 September 2008 17:09
Shouldn’t Morneau have credit taken away from him for sucking and playing a large role in Minnesota sucking?
15 September 2008 17:55
BJ,
I appreciate your defending Morneau. However, if that’s the logic for the MVP, then this year it should go to Sabathia in the NL, no? To me, the MVP should go to someone who produces throughout the year, not only for the final 4 months. Nobody votes for someone who’s hot for the first 4 months and then fades during the final 2, do they?