Caught Looking: AL MVP Talk

[FireThemAll]

If you put Trout on the Tigers they do not win any more games. They may even lose ground simply because Trout has yet to become the MOTO rbi hitter Cabrera is.

And you guys are mining fangraphs fools gold if you believe 23 home runs equal the impact of 43 home runs from the #3 hitter.

All excuses aside the production Cabrera provides from the plate would have increased the Angels win totals if he was a substitute for Trout.

 

Cabrera is a terrible defender and baserunner. Why are you implying that offense is more important than defense and baserunning?

Edited September 5, 2013 by FireThemAll

[Tyler]

It's stupid that the criteria changes every year. 

 

It can be determined by factors that have nothing to do with why the award should be won or lost like the players around them, their age or league experience, an arbitrary accumulation of certain stats but not others, voter momentum, the popularity of the team they play for,  etc. 

 

Most Valuable Player.  Which player provided the most value to their team. 

 

There have been defensive minded players who have won, pitchers, offensive players, complete players.  Ones that were clearly better than every other player that year yet on a losing team.  Ones that were clearly worse than several other players that year yet their team won. 

 

It's a completely inconsistent load of crap.

 

In 2011, Justin Verlander won with a 24-5 record, 2.4era, 250k, 250ip.  His team finished in 1st place

In 2009, Zach Greinke was 16-8 with a 2.16 era, 240k, 230ip.  KC came in 4th with 97 losses.  Zach came in 17th with 12 vote points.

 

In 2009, Joe Mauer won with a 7.7WAR and a 1.031ops and his team came in first with 87wins.

that same year, Ben Zobrist had an 8.6WAR with a .943ops.  tampa came in 3rd with 84 wins.  Zobrist finished 8th. 

Tex came in 2nd that year with about the same offensive stats as Zobrist but a WAR of 5.3.  The Yankees had 103 wins. 

 

Trout is the best player in baseball and proved it once again by a performance unmatched by an other player in the league.  Offense, Defense, Base running.

Great post. As always.

[Blarg]

Cabrera is a terrible defender and baserunner. Why are you implying that offense is more important than defense and baserunning?

Cabrera doesn't have to run out a home run. His defense is no more game changing than Callaspo so it would be a wash. Trout's defense this year was replaceable so his real contribution is his bat as well.

[FireThemAll]

Cabrera doesn't have to run out a home run. His defense is no more game changing than Callaspo so it would be a wash. Trout's defense this year was replaceable so his real contribution is his bat as well.

 

I don't think you quite understand how bad Cabrera is defensively. Also the home run argument is lame. He's on first base stationary plenty. He goes station to station on every hit to the outfield basically. He is a worse all around player than Trout. 

[Chuck]

Nobody is arguing who the better player is. That's Mike Trout. He's just the overall better player. Just who is the most valuable to their team.

 

I give that nod to Miguel Cabrera. 

[FireThemAll]

Nobody is arguing who the better player is. That's Mike Trout. He's just the overall better player. Just who is the most valuable to their team.

 

I give that nod to Miguel Cabrera. 

 

I don't understand. How can Trout be a better overall player, but not be more valuable? That doesn't make sense to me.

[eaterfan]

If you put Trout on the Tigers they do not win any more games. They may even lose ground simply because Trout has yet to become the MOTO rbi hitter Cabrera is.

And you guys are mining fangraphs fools gold if you believe 23 home runs equal the impact of 43 home runs from the #3 hitter.

All excuses aside the production Cabrera provides from the plate would have increased the Angels win totals if he was a substitute for Trout.

 

Total bases from hits:

Trout - 295

MCab - 329

 

Add in steals:

 

Trout - 295+31=326

MCab - 329+3=332

 

Add in walks:

Trout - 326+85=411

MCab - 329+77=406

 

Add in HBP:

Trout - 411+7=418

MCab - 406+3=409

 

Add in reached on errors:

Trout - 418+9=427

MCab - 406+0=406

 

Not all bases are equal and it certainly takes a lot of "other production" to make up for that difference but Trout is so much better in "other production" that Cabrera can't match.

 

We didn't even factor in the defensive discrepancy, which is huge. Not to mention other baserunning - scoring from 2nd on a single, 1st on a double, 1st to third on a single, etc.

 

Looking at the total bases number it shouldn't be tough to imagine a player like Trout being able to make up 20 HRs worth of production since he has the lead in bases without factoring in defense or base running beyond steals.

 

 

Not all bases are equal as you point out 20 HRs is a lot to make up. But total bases they are pretty damn close.

[Chuck]

I don't understand. How can Trout be a better overall player, but not be more valuable? That doesn't make sense to me.

 

 

The Tigers already have a leadoff man and and really good defensive CF in Austin Jackson. He's nowhere near Mike Trout offensively, but you take Miguel Cabrera out of their lineup and replace him with Trout and I don't believe they're as good as they are because of how well their team is already aligned. 

 

On the flip side, if Pujols and Hamilton really contributed as they should have this year, (and stayed healthy) I believe the Angels would be much better than they are ... not to mention if the Angels had a Scherzer, Sanchez and Verlander. 

[eaterfan]

So Mike Trout is less valuable because Callaspo wasn't as good as Austin Jackson?

 

Damn that Callaspo and his costing Trout the MVP!

 

Also wouldn't this make Felix Hernandez or Max Scherzer MVP? If we had them instead of Blanton the Angels would be close to the playoffs. Scherzer has like 18 more wins than Blanton. You can't argue with that kind of production at the top of your rotation.

Edited September 5, 2013 by eaterfan

[Second Base]

Personally, I equate MVP with best overall player in 2013.  Who was the best overall?  In 2012 it was Mike Trout.  In 2013, it's still Mike Trout.  But if you aren't going to choose Mike Trout, then Miguel Cabrera isn't a bad option.  He gets on base, hits for average, is a decent contact hitter, has tons of power and is disciplined.  With the exception of speed and defense, he's the complete package.  

 

Why couldn't it ever be Davis is my book?  Davis has one tool.  Power.  That's it.  His average is up around .300, which is nice, but when Trout's hitting .335 and Cabrera's hitting .350, Davis might as well be hitting .250.  His speed and defense aren't that great and he's a terrible contact hitter.  The only way I could legitimately make an argument for Chris Davis is if he smashed 60+ HR's and hit .300 and no one else reached 50.  This just isn't the case. 

[AngelsLakersFan]

My problem with this line of thinking is 2 fold.

 

1. How much winning is able to make up for a player being better? If the Angels were in 2nd place would Trout be more valuable? Can a player who isn't on the best team win? If we are just going based on feelings then it leads to voting for people based on who they like and don't like. If A Rod put up the same stats as Cabrera this year and his team were in 1st maybe more people would be voting for Trout because they feel that Trout was enough better to make up the difference for winning. If people think winning is more important there has to be some objective logical scale to measure the amount of wins vs. performance difference that makes one player "more valuable" than another. Is a player that leads his team to the playoffs as an 85 win division champion more valuable than a better player who's team wins 90 games but misses the playoffs because they didn't qualify for a WC in a tougher division? If winning is the primary factor in how valuable someone is then how can anyone vote for Trout in the top 3? Is he more valuable than Adam Jones? Is he more valuable than a Dustin Pedroia or Robbie Cano?

 

If we take most valuable to mean best player all these questions are answered in a consistent fashion.

 

2. If we take valuable at face value then why wasn't contract money factored in? If you can get nearly identical production for roughly $20 million less then that is far more valuable. The only way around factoring in contracts is to only look at production and Trout has out produced Miggy this season.

 

The MVP should always be the best player on the team that won their division by the slimmest margin. Second place should be the second best player on that team, then the third, 4th etc. I mean this is the ultimate of that logic at work here...

[AngelsLakersFan]

If you put Trout on the Tigers they do not win any more games. They may even lose ground simply because Trout has yet to become the MOTO rbi hitter Cabrera is.

And you guys are mining fangraphs fools gold if you believe 23 home runs equal the impact of 43 home runs from the #3 hitter.

All excuses aside the production Cabrera provides from the plate would have increased the Angels win totals if he was a substitute for Trout.

Bullshit. How long have you been watching baseball? Do you turn the channel when the Angels aren't batting?

[FireThemAll]

I really don't think some people realize how bad Cabrera is at third base. He literally has no range at all. He's a fat lard who should be playing DH. He costs the Tigers so many runs at 3rd. Even if Trout is a replacement level defensive player like the metrics are saying he is this year (I don't believe he is), he is still SIGNIFICANTLY better than Cabrera on the defensive side of the ball. Baserunning is another thing that you have to watch Cabrera to realize how bad he is at it. He's basically Pujols on the bases. Think about all the times over the course of a season that Cabrera is on first with one out, and a Tigers player hits a single that Trout would easily make it to 3rd on, but Cabrera has to stop at second because of his utter lack of speed and athleticism. Think about all the times over the course of a season that Cabrera is on 1st with 2 outs in the inning, and a Tigers player hits a ball in the gap that Trout would easily score on, but Cabrera has to stop at 3rd because of his lack of speed. These types of things add up, and Cabrera has cost the Tigers many runs on plays that Trout would have scored on.

[Bashbrothers]

Trout is the best player in the league and it's not really close.

[Angels Never Die]

I still don't understand how anyone would judge who the best player is by any metric that wouldn't also make them the most valuable player.  I don't care what team that player is on (that is completely out of their control, and so is the division that that team is in,) the best the player is the most valuable player and vice versa.

[YouthofToday]

Trout is the AL MVP again. Not really close IMO.

[Blarg]

Bullshit. How long have you been watching baseball? Do you turn the channel when the Angels aren't batting?

Since 1966.

What a weird and pointless second question.

[Blarg]

I really don't think some people realize how bad Cabrera is at third base. He literally has no range at all. He's a fatk lard who should be playing DH. He costs the Tigers so many runs at 3rd. Even if Trout is a replacement level defensive player like the metrics are saying he is this year (I don't believe he is), he is still SIGNIFICANTLY better than Cabrera on the defensive side of the ball. Baserunning is another thing that you have to watch Cabrera to realize how bad he is at it. He's basically Pujols on the bases. Think about all the times over the course of a season that Cabrera is on first with one out, and a Tigers player hits a single that Trout would easily make it to 3rd on, but Cabrera has to stop at second because of his utter lack of speed and athleticism. Think about all the times over the course of a season that Cabrera is on 1st with 2 outs in the inning, and a Tigers player hits a ball in the gap that Trout would easily score on, but Cabrera has to stop at 3rd because of his lack of speed. These types of things add up, and Cabrera has cost the Tigers many runs on plays that Trout would have scored on.

Please provide every game the Tigers lost this season attributed to Cabrera's defensive play at 3rd base. You must use facts and show your work not just pluck a number from Fangraphs.

[tdawg87]

You act like fangraphs is some crazy website with hokie statistics and witchcraft. It's actually very useful and provides statistics which can't be found in a generic box score.

Also, has he even mentioned that site in this thread?

[Troll Daddy]

Cabrera may not have the range of a Beltre but they both share the same fielding percentage.

He is playing out of position which gives him value to his team. He also has a knack for hitting in clutch situations.

[Blarg]

You act like fangraphs is some crazy website with hokie statistics and witchcraft. It's actually very useful and provides statistics which can't be found in a generic box score.

Also, has he even mentioned that site in this thread?

I respect the work they do over at fangraphs and bbref but they are just easy to read numbers crunched from raw data and used without context as to whether their results really reflect an in game situation.

Defensive metrics are the worst since one player is never the sum total of how any inning or a game plays out. An error by one player can be erased in terms of impact by the play of another.

And no, Troll Them All never mentioned using any source for his statements. He has stated before in a previous thread he is not a talent evaluator. He would rather just stick with personal opinions for his support.

[FireThemAll]

So you don't want me to use Fangraphs to support my opinion, and also don't want me to use my own personal opinion? Lol, so facts and opinions are off limits in this argument? Got it. Sounds like you're the one trying to troll here.

[FireThemAll]

I respect the work they do over at fangraphs and bbref but they are just easy to read numbers crunched from raw data and used without context as to whether their results really reflect an in game situation.

Defensive metrics are the worst since one player is never the sum total of how any inning or a game plays out. An error by one player can be erased in terms of impact by the play of another.

And no, Troll Them All never mentioned using any source for his statements. He has stated before in a previous thread he is not a talent evaluator. He would rather just stick with personal opinions for his support.

 

That's the point of defensive metrics. They evaluate a players individual work on the defensive side, not the teams. I guess since that doesn't support your argument that Cabrera is MVP, you don't like it....

[Blarg]

So you don't want me to use Fangraphs to support my opinion, and also don't want me to use my own personal opinion? Lol, so facts and opinions are off limits in this argument? Got it. Sounds like you're the one trying to troll here.

 

I don't want you to pull some convenient pre calculated number and say "See here, the number is supporting my anecdotal opinion." I want you to go game by game, for every error Cabrera is charged with and show it lead to x amount of Tigers losses that were not offset by his .355 batting average, 43 home runs and 130 rbi.

 

Then do the same thing with Mike Trout. Go game by game and replace Cabrera with Mike Trout, like you were in a fantasy league and see who adds or subtracts more games for the Tigers or Angels.

 

Or just shrug it off and say you have another person's formula that proves Cabrera's defense costs the Tigers more games than his offense provides. Or that Cabrera on the Angels would not provide more wins over this season than Mike Trout has. That is the quick and easy solution and many here will applaud you for copy and paste.

[FireThemAll]

^^ Strawman alert ^^

 

That is such a ridiculous thing for you to say. My argument isn't even about errors. That's the kind of barbaric stat that gold glove voters from the BBWA use. It's about range - Cabrera lacks that big time, and the defensive metrics all back that up. If you think you're smarter than the metrics, then go ahead and keep up all the strawman arguments...