OC Register: Mike Trout is among 5 Angels named Gold Glove finalists

[AngelsWin.com]

Mike Trout, who has never included a Gold Glove award among his accomplishments, is a finalist for the award, which will be announced next month.

Gold Gloves are selected by voting of managers and coaches, along with a statistical component that comprises 25 percent of the calculation.

Trout is joined by Boston’s Jackie Bradley Jr. and Chicago’s Adam Engel among the finalists for the American League Gold Glove in center field.

Bradley is likely the favorite, although Trout has significantly improved his defensive performance this year.

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Andrelton Simmons, who has won the award three times, is also a finalist at shortstop. Simmons won last year, and twice in the National League with the Atlanta Braves. Oakland’s Marcus Semien and Cleveland’s Francisco Lindor, who won in 2016, are also finalists.

Kole Calhoun is a finalist in right field, along with Boston’s Mookie Betts and New York’s Aaron Judge. Betts, who won last year, is likely to win again. Calhoun won the award in 2015.

Second baseman Ian Kinsler and catcher Martín Maldonado, both traded by the Angels in late July, are also finalists at their positions. Maldonado won his first Gold Glove last year, with the Angels. Kinsler won in 2016, with the Detroit Tigers.

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[Blarg]

Aaron Judge? 

[goldenGlove]

no Upton? Lol.

[Second Base]

Focusing on run prevention instead of run production has led to yet another season of sub .500 ball.  Meanwhile the Brewers were a game away from the World Series and were using Travis Shaw at 2B and Mike Moustakas at 3B. 

Might be time to shift that philosophy, Billy.  In a perfect world, we'd have players than can do both like Trout and Simmons.  But if we're choosing between the two, you choose production, not prevention.  Or at least you should in our current situation. 

[Inside Pitch]

4 hours ago, Second Base said:

Focusing on run prevention instead of run production has led to yet another season of sub .500 ball.  Meanwhile the Brewers were a game away from the World Series and were using Travis Shaw at 2B and Mike Moustakas at 3B. 

Might be time to shift that philosophy, Billy.  In a perfect world, we'd have players than can do both like Trout and Simmons.  But if we're choosing between the two, you choose production, not prevention.  Or at least you should in our current situation. 

You've been saying this a lot but, Milwaukee had the 4th best defensive efficiency in MLB.   Half of season of Moustakas and 40 or so games at 2B from Shaw didn't really seem to impact them all that much -- Shaw FWIW ended 2018 with a dWAR of 1.0 -- Moustakas came in at 0.0.   Was actually surprised to see the metrics for Shaw.

Oakland, Tampa, Houston, Atlanta, Cubs, Dodgers -- all had better defensive efficiencies than did the Angels -- Boston was tied with them.     Using park adjusted data the Angels ranked 7th overall in def efficiency -- 5 of the 6 teams ahead of them made the playoffs, the one that didn't won 90 games (Tampa Bay), its possible their MLB second best defense had a large part to do with their success this year -- their pitching staff ended up with an ERA+ of 111.    

The bottom 10 teams in defensive efficiency included; Cinci, SD, Texas, Baltimore, KC...  That's 5 of the 6 last place teams in MLB.    Only the Yankees and Rockies ranked in the bottom third.

The Angels didn't fail to win because they focused on defense, whether or not they should be focusing so much on defense is up for debate, but too much run prevention isn't the problem.

 

[Docwaukee]

4 hours ago, Second Base said:

Focusing on run prevention instead of run production has led to yet another season of sub .500 ball.  Meanwhile the Brewers were a game away from the World Series and were using Travis Shaw at 2B and Mike Moustakas at 3B. 

Might be time to shift that philosophy, Billy.  In a perfect world, we'd have players than can do both like Trout and Simmons.  But if we're choosing between the two, you choose production, not prevention.  Or at least you should in our current situation. 

you're thinking about it wrong in my opinion.  the amount of value we got out of what we spent on defense would have cost a lot more had we paid for that on offense or pitching.  We got 2.2 WAR from Ian Kinsler for minimal prospect currency and ended up with two quality pen pieces.  

the only thing I've seen where we may need to rethink philosophy is acquiring a player who's been excellent defensively at one position and then moving them to another.   Cozart and Espinosa are good examples.