Friday, September 19, 2008

Let's Make Some People Pissed Off

I'm sorry, MLB rules clearly state that you can only win one MVP award in your life that you didn't deserve (with apologies to the Larry B argument).

ESPN's Friday Night Baseball essentially just started with the color commentator stating that Justin Morneau pretty much IS the MVP.

Let me clarify a few things.

Justin Morneau has easily been one of the 20-ish best people at hitting baseballs over the past few years. He is very good at hitting.

He plays first base. Lots of people who hit well can do that!

Justin Morneau actually has a lower VORP than Joe Mauer.

He JUST PASSED Carlos Quentin, who for the curious, has not been playing much baseball the past couple of weeks, and who also plays an easy defensive position.

He is significantly behind Ian Kinsler, who hasn't even played baseball since August the Seventeenth.

If you need a contender, he is behind Dustin Pedroia.

And I don't care what anybody says. Cliff Lee is the best player in the American League this year, and it's not close.

I FUCKING HATE MOTHERFUCKING JUSTIN MORNEAU.

19 comments:

Chris W said...

Justin Morneau was the least deserving Non-Ranger to win the MVP in the last like 15 years (hello I-Roid and Juan GonefrombaseballZalez!!!!)

GMAMFB. He was the 4th most valuable player on that 2006 Twins team, behind Joe Mauer (similar OPS+ while playing GG caliber CATCHER rather than FIRST FUcKING BASE), Santana (and maybe Liriano) and Joe Nathan.

But apparently he was the most valuable player in the entire American League despite the noticeable handicap of not even being close to the best player on his team.

That Morneau shit pisses me off too Pnoles

(ps: I heard we both like BA!!!!!! High Five!!!!!!!!)

Chris W said...

2006 in win shares:

Justin Morneau: 26
Joe Mauer: 30
Johan Santana: 24
Joe Nathan: 20
Derek Jeter: 32
David Ortiz: 27
Jermaine Dye: 25
Travis Hafner: 24

Derpsauce said...

::high fives back::

BA is teh titz

Derpsauce said...

To be fair, Chris, I believe Jimmy Rollins was less deserving than Morneau. But that's me. I'm a firm believer of "he who leads the league in outs shalt not win the MVP award."

Jack M said...

You guys are so Jay Gibbons for each other, it's almost comical.

JohnF said...

Kee-rist, Morneau already has one MVP that he didn't deserve. Do we really need to give him another one? It's not as if he's a bad player, just not an MVP.
Jeez.
Oh well. It's still not as bad as Bartolo Colon for Cy Young.

Unknown said...

I had a good yelling match with my brother on vacation about this (some things never change...both late twenties, and still arguing over shit like this). The question posed: Can a player be the MVP if the team has no value to begin with? I'll completely agree with you that Cliff Lee is certainly the best player in the AL, but can he be valuable on a team with no value?

The real point is...they should do away with the title "MVP" and change it to Most outstanding player.

Unknown said...

BTW kinda unrelated, but you invoked the name of Ian Kinsler, so I have to share:

In our Yahoo! fantasy draft this year, my pick is up. So I'm rifling through my fantasy guide trying to compare stats between Corey Hart and someone else who was pretty good (it was round 8). I ended up deciding on Hart, but I was a fraction of a second too late finding him on the player list to select him, so Y! selected the next available pre-ranked player. So I chuck my fantasy guide across the room in a tizzy, screaming at the top of my lungs "I DON'T WANT IAN FUCKING KINSLER!!! FUCK!!!"

He then proceeded to become (for much of the season) the second best player in all of Yahoo fantasy. The best part is, it's a keeper league, so I accidentally picked one of the best second basemen in all of baseball to keep for next year.

Sorry if nobody cares, I just had to share my screaming-fit-turned-to-happiness.

Derpsauce said...

Haha, no need to apologize for story-sharing. That's the kind of story dreams are made of.

In re:

"I'll completely agree with you that Cliff Lee is certainly the best player in the AL, but can he be valuable on a team with no value?"

Yes. It's not his fault that Ben Francisco has no business batting 3rd on a major league team the majority of the year.

The award is MVP, for Most Valuable Player. Not Most Valuable Player on a Value-Creating Value-Related Value Team (MVPVCVRVT).

Chris W said...

I agree with Pnoles.

Is Cliff Lee valuable to his team?

Is Justin Morneau valuable to his team?

The answer to both questions are "yes."

So who is more valuable to their team? The answer to that question has nothing to do with how "valuable" (Good?) their team is.

If you're valuable to one team you're equally valuable to another team....except in terms of need.

If anything Cliff Lee is MORE valuable to his team than someone on a good team because he and Sizemore are the only halfway decent players on the team. Without Cliff Lee the team would be much worse.

Without Morneau, the Twins would be worse, but nowhere near the magnitude of a Lee-less Indians.

Of course, this isn't what the MVP has traditionally awarded or anything but the question "can a player be valuable if his team's not 'valuable'." has a very simple answer:

Yes.

Chris W said...

Here's an imperfect analogy

Banker A makes $300,000 for his company in 2008.

Banker B makes $350,000 for his company in 2008.

If the only relevant component of their job is "money made for his company" who was the more valuable banker in 2008?

Clearly how big either's company is has almost no impact on your decision.

dan-bob said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
xirtAMoeba said...

CitizenX here, under an alias.


If Albie Pujols doesn't win the NL MVP, I quit.

Delgado?

Fuck ya sideways wench.

Arod won the MVP from last place. I think Cliffy or Grad should have a chance.

Eh, who am I kidding.

They should make it up to Jeter.

He has more hits at the Stadium than Babe Ruth AND Lou Gehrig. Can Dusty Pedryhumpingisasfarashegets say that?

xirtAMoeba said...

P.S. Roy Halladay is a better Cy Young candidate than Cliff Lee.

It's debateable, but I'm going to say it loudly and angrily so as to start and argument.

MORE TASTE! LESS FILLING!

Chris W said...

No he's not.

Halladay:

153 ERA+, 1.06 Whip, 8 CG, 2 SHO

Lee:

184 ERA+, 1.09 Whip, 4 CG, 2 SHO

Halladay has him on K/9 and K/BB but Lee's K/9 and K/BB are also quite excellent. 4 non-shutout complete game advantage is not particularly exciting. But Lee has the big time edge in ERA. And it's not like he's stockpiling a lot of UER or something--Halladay has 12 UER and Lee has 5.

Lee gave up 63 R this year. That is IT. Halladay gave up 22 more.

And anyway, Cy Young voters are simply not going to vote against a guy who's 22-2 with a 2.41 ERA.

xirtAMoeba said...

X here:

Chris, Lee has better numbers, but that's a product of facing worse hitting. The average OPS of the batters Lee has faced is .036 lower than the average faced by Halladay.

.001 in OPS is worth about .012 runs. Which means Lee had an edge of about .43 runs per game.

Now, Toronto is much better defensively, so a lot of that is mitigated and Lee comes out ahead.

But only by a little bit.

Oh and Cliffy has the highest winning percentage ever. Even if wins are stupid, it's still impressive. Especially considering how bad the team has been.

Though, if the team's problem is pitching, he shouldn't get credit for overcoming a bad lie...

Derpsauce said...

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/statistics/sortable/index.php?cid=314833

Lee leads Halliday in SNLVAR, a stat that adjusts for the lineups that each pitcher has faced, by a significant margin. He's better.

Unknown said...

For Lee to have 22 wins is pretty impressive, but what's more impressive is how many he would have had if Cleveland had a bullpen.

One game he pitched 9 shutout innings, tribe loses 3-0 in 10

He's also left 3 other games after more than 6 innings and 2 ER or less, only to have Cleveland's offense and/or bullpen blow it for him.

His last 2 no decisions (DET at the end of July and MINN just the other day) were rough, but he even left one of those with a lead.

This is part of why wins are a terrible metric. With a half decent bullpen, Lee is easily 26-2. Add in his shutout in Toronto that cleveland couldn't hit either, and he's 27-2.

I totally agree he's the best player in the AL (maybe the majors even), but voter's see "MVP" as something different.

I'll repeat...they should just change the name to Most Outstanding Player and be done with it.

Chris W said...

I SAY GIVE IT TO DICE K B/C HE IS A BETTER GAMER AND HIS TEAM IS IN TEH PLAY OFF