Mike Trout, the 2017 AL MVP, and Barry Bonds

[ivdown]

http://baselinetimes.com/mike-trout-the-2017-al-mvp-and-barry-bonds/

For real fans of baseball, and not just petty ones worried about their own team, it was awful when Mike Trout went down with an injury in May. Baseball is just better when Mike Trout is playing. Despite having missed 40-plus games, Trout's offensive season is so historic that he should absolutely be in consideration for the AL MVP if he keeps it up. 

Currently, Trout's got a 208 wRC+, which is good for 20th in the post-Dead Ball Era going back to 1918. The only other player on the top 20 list in the past 60 years is Barry Bonds, who has done it 4 times overall. Only 12 players have had any season with a 200 or better wRC+ since 1918, and all but four of them are HOFers. Two of those are Bonds and McGwire, one played half a season in 1919 and only 1220 in his career, and then Trout.

At the current pace, Judge, Trout, and Altuve will all finish with over 8 fWAR if they remain healthy. I'm certainly rooting for that as well as the crazy MVP cases for each player.

One thing to consider is even with historic numbers, voters tend to overlook them in favor of players who played the whole season, like Kershaw in the NL Cy Young voting last year.

[Ray McKigney]

3 minutes ago, hangin n wangin said:

And Trout is doing all of this with out cheating.

Bonds wasn't cheating. He was leveling the playing field. 

[HaloCory22]

Sum up this article with one pic.

 

[arch stanton]

If they get into the wild card game......

[zenmaster]

9 hours ago, arch stanton said:

If they get into the wild card game......

then we better find a way to clone Trout fast.

[tdawg87]

They HAVE to make the playoffs for him to have a shot.

I still think it's Altuve's to lose.