As regular readers may know, I joined the Internet Baseball Writers Association of America a few months ago. Duties for club members are fairly light, though one of the things we do is cast token votes on mid-season awards and All Star selections. I’m proud to offer my first ballots:
American League
| POSITION/ AWARD | NAME (Last, First) |
| First Base | Morneau, Justin |
| Second Base | Cano, Robinson |
| Third Base | Beltre, Adrian |
| Shortstop | Jeter, Derek |
| OF (vote for 3) | Hamilton, Josh; Suzuki, Ichiro; Crawford, Carl |
| Catcher | Mauer, Joe |
| DH | Guerrero, Vladimir |
| Cy Young | Lee, Cliff |
| MVP | Morneau, Justin |
| Rookie | Boesch, Brennan |
| Manager | Maddon, Joe |
National League
| POSITION/ AWARD | NAME (Last, First) |
| First Base | Gonzalez, Adrian |
| Second Base | Prado, Martin |
| Third Base | Wright, David |
| Shortstop | Ramirez, Hanley |
| OF (vote for 3) | Ethier, Andre; Pujols, Albert; Holliday, Matt |
| Catcher | Olivo, Miguel |
| DH | Jones, Chipper |
| Cy Young | Jiminez, Ubaldo |
| MVP | Jiminez, Ubaldo |
| Rookie | Heyward, Jason |
| Manager | Black, Bud |
Jones is a sentimental pick at National League DH, and with no third baseman doing anything especially noteworthy in that league, I was almost tempted to give the possibly-retiring Atlanta Brave the start. Beltre gets the nod for resurrecting himself, as does Guerrero, and I was tempted to tab Barry Zito for the same reason, but Jiminez has been simply too amazing, in this, the Year of the Pitcher. Lee may be a consensus choice as AL Cy Young, though if I was simply picking who’d make the All Star start, I’d tab Armando Galarraga to make a statement.
Mostly though, I went off of Wins Above Replacement (WAR) data to determine my picks. I used a Web site I recently learned of called TheBaseballGauge.com, which allows any number of different WAR comparisons, including by position and league. I encourage any fellow baseball geeks to make use of it. It could be the new Baseball-Reference or Retrosheet for fanatical baseball researchers.
IBWAA All Star voting ends Wednesday, June 30, 2010, at 9:00 p.m. PST. Anyone who writes about baseball in any capacity on the Internet is eligible to join (yearly dues are $20) and cast a vote for this, as well as Hall of Fame selections at the end of the year. Email Howard Cole, baseballsavvy@aol.com for more information.
What about Miguel Cabrera statistically he is the best 1b in the league. 19 homeruns 60 rbi’s and a .326 avg. Ubaldo has been a beast this year and I think what you said about him is right on. Also Alex Rios for the white sox has gotta be in there for the OF. I can tell you like Ichiro but he has gotta be replaced by Rios.
I agree on Cabrera. He needs to be in there over Morneau.
Before all is said and done I think Lester bests Lee’s numbers. Lester is a 2nd half guy. Lee tends to wear down.
Ubaldo looks to be possibly getting tired so I can’t see him winning MVP. Probably still will get Cy Young though.
Hi guys, thanks for the comments. I stand by my choice of Morneau. I’ve begun to place more importance recently on Wins Above Replacement (WAR), an all-encompassing metric which incorporates both offensive and defensive stats and attempts to rate a player as a whole. Morneau is second in the American League for WAR at 4.3, which is MVP pace, while Cabrera is 10th at 2.6. It doesn’t hurt that Morneau’s hitting .350 (to Cabrera’s .328) and looks like a dark-horse Triple Crown candidate if he can boost his power numbers.
I was going to ask “why no Cabrera” too, but Marcus and Joe beat me to it.
It’s too late to change my vote, but I’m wondering how I chose Lee over David Price. Even Clay Buchholz would have been a better choice. My mistake.