Nothing reminds us more about the golden age of baseball than the playoffs. Dramatic finishes and heartbreak throughout the nation, all to accomplish one thing. Now its time to see who will come out on top. The Detroit Tigers and the San Fransisco Giants will face off Wednesday to start off the World Series. We don't know who will get the crown yet, but we do know it wont be given to either team without a fight. Both teams have the potential, but what needs to be done for them to accomplish greatness?
Giants - The main goals for the Giants should be to get ahead of the count against the Tigers pitching, strike early and shut down Delmon. The Tigers pitching has been phenomenal so the Giants are going to need to change that, the easiest way to do that would be to get ahead in the count, and knowing the Detroit staff scoring early is the best option to success. Both Max Scherzer and Justin Verlander have shown all year they are nearly unhittable after the third inning, before that is when they have some vulnerability. The other thing that must be done if the Giants want to win it all is they must shut down Delmon Young. Everyone knows the damage Cabrera is capable of but Delmon is one of the best players in the postseason in the MLB and if he gets to you, it could be over early.
Tigers - For the Tigers they need to keep the momentum and secure the lead. After sweeping the Yankees and sitting for almost a week the Tigers could lose their momentum and come to a slow start, yet if this momentum is kept it would be easy to see a sweep in the World Series. With one of the greatest team starting pitching performances in a single postseason ever the Tigers still had a major problem, closing the game. It doesn't matter how good the starters for Detroit are if they cant find an answer to the closer spot, obviously Valverde isn't the answer. With as much as the Giants have been coming back in this postseason a weak bullpen could be all the comeback kids need to bring another title to San Fransisco.
Monday, October 22, 2012
Thursday, October 4, 2012
The MVP has been Crowned
It's official, the impossible has been accomplished. How many times have you herd sport fans say "we will never see another Triple Crown winner"? Every year a player goes on a run and then it gets mentioned, could it be done? Every year we have the disappointment of it not happening, until now. It's been 45 years since the great Carl Yastremski accomplished the feat in 1967. Now it's time to give the credit to Miguel Cabrera who finished the 2012 season with a .330 average, 44 home runs and 139 RBIs to make him the first Latino-born player to do so. While this is an unbelievable story the talk has seemed to lead to the "Trout for MVP" campaign, almost as if to try to disregard the work it took for Cabrera to have such a great season. In reality there isn't a debate for MVP, it goes to Miguel. Need some reasoning? I will pick apart every argument for Mike Trout while adding in statistics to prove my points.
1. WAR? - Wins above replacement? This is the most ridiculous of all stats I have ever herd of, and the center of the Trout campaign. According to these numbers Trout is worth 10.7 more wins than an average replacement while Cabrera is worth only 6.8 wins. So according to this the discussion should be over, right? Wrong, this takes into consideration alot but where does it rank your teammates? How do we calculate the numbers increased by Prince Fielder due to Cabrera? Should this be completely ignored? To say that how a player effects his team, or in other words how VALUABLE he is to his team, doesn't play a role in being the MVP is complete nonsense. I can guarantee you right now that the Tigers would have lost at least 20 games more this season without Miguel Cabrera. I don't need some silly calculations to tell me otherwise.
2. Stolen Bases - Countless people are raving at the fact that Trout led the league with 49 SBs, is this suppose to impress everyone? When Rickey Henderson stole 130 bases in 1982 he finished 10th in MVP voting. Henderson would have three career seasons with at least 100 stolen bases, finishing no better than 10th in MVP voting in any of them seasons. Now lets talk Ron Leflore, who stole 97 bases in 1980. He would finish 22nd in MVP voting. One last name to mention is Lou Brock. In 1974 Brock stole 118 bases to see his name fall 2nd in the MVP voting. So for all who say Trout has this speed that can't be matched on the base paths, you need to look back to see true speed. Trout is fast yes, but if 130 stolen bases isn't enough to win MVP then how is 49 impressive?
3. Fielding - From every one's perspective you would think that Miguel Cabrera would be dead last in the majors when it comes to fielding percentage, this is false. Cabrera owns a .966 fielding percentage at third base, which puts him as the 3rd highest in the category in the American league and only .001 away from 2nd. Mike Trout finished with a fielding percentage of .993, which while it seems better than Cabrera's is not. That put Trout as the 5th highest amongst American league center fielders. Want to use another way to show coverage area? Let's use the range factor calculation. Trout has a range factor of 2.42, also the 5th highest amongst American league center fielders. Cabrera on the other hand is at a 2.40 on the range factor scale, putting him in 3rd at his position. Truth is that Cabrera is a better fielder than given credit for.
4. RBIs and average are pointless - Believe it or not, this is a true argument by many Trout supporters. We will start with the RBIs. The main reason people want to discredit Cabrera and his RBIs is by saying it takes base runners to get RBIs and Cabrera has had more base runners than Trout has. True, but when people argue that Trout has more runs scored than Cabrera shouldn't we discredit it since you have to have help just like you do for RBIs? You can't disregard this for that reason alone, otherwise you have to take away Trouts runs scored. Another stat that we would have to take away is the double plays each has grounded into, since Cabrera grounds into more double plays it should be disregarded right? According to this theory it should, but once again, that is an unrealistic way to calculate value. Now on to average. I'm not too sure how to even counter this claim due to the stupidity behind it. Average calculates how many hits you get per at bat, which leads to run production. Without average we would be looking at players like Carlos Pena or Mark Reynolds as some of the leagues elite batters right now.
5. Home runs don't tell a batters power - Ive herd alot of talk about how Trout has shown just as much power as Cabrera. This has no statistically proof at all. Lets look deeper into it. Obviously Cabrera beats out Trout at home runs with 44 compared to 30, and remember Cabrera plays in one of the deepest ball parks in the league. When we compare doubles Cabrera leads with 40 to Trout's 27. Triples goes to Trout with his 8 compared to 0 from Cabrera. That means Cabrera had 84 extra base hits while Trout had only 65. That 65 doesn't even lead the Angels, teammate Albert Pujols has 15 more extra base hits than Trout. Now lets take the slugging percentage of both players and see how it stacks up. Cabrera is sitting high with a .606 slugging percentage compared to .564 by Trout.
6. Clutch - When I think of an MVP I think of someone who helps his team in crunch time. So when is it that a team would want its player to perform its best? I would say its the final months without a doubt. So August and September are the months we will look at. In August Cabrera hit .357 with 8 home runs and 24 RBIs, Trout hit .284 with 7 home runs and 26 runs scored. In September Cabrera hit .308 with 10 home runs and 27 RBIs, Trout hit .257 with 5 home runs and 21 runs scored. Clutch goes to Miguel.
7. Strikeouts - A great ball player puts the ball in play. When you see a batter strike out with runners on and no outs it really hurts the team. This year Cabrera struck out 98 times compared to being walked 66 times. Trout on the other hand struck out 139 times this year, 17th most in the AL, compared to being walked 67 times. No one ever mentions it but Mike Trout is a strikeout machine, and it hurt his teams chance to produce runs.
The debate will continue but true fans across the globe are aware that there is already an MVP and voting won't change that. Miguel Cabrera won the Triple Crown and definitely had the best season in the majors. Take your crown Cabrera, as you are the 2012 American League MVP!
1. WAR? - Wins above replacement? This is the most ridiculous of all stats I have ever herd of, and the center of the Trout campaign. According to these numbers Trout is worth 10.7 more wins than an average replacement while Cabrera is worth only 6.8 wins. So according to this the discussion should be over, right? Wrong, this takes into consideration alot but where does it rank your teammates? How do we calculate the numbers increased by Prince Fielder due to Cabrera? Should this be completely ignored? To say that how a player effects his team, or in other words how VALUABLE he is to his team, doesn't play a role in being the MVP is complete nonsense. I can guarantee you right now that the Tigers would have lost at least 20 games more this season without Miguel Cabrera. I don't need some silly calculations to tell me otherwise.
2. Stolen Bases - Countless people are raving at the fact that Trout led the league with 49 SBs, is this suppose to impress everyone? When Rickey Henderson stole 130 bases in 1982 he finished 10th in MVP voting. Henderson would have three career seasons with at least 100 stolen bases, finishing no better than 10th in MVP voting in any of them seasons. Now lets talk Ron Leflore, who stole 97 bases in 1980. He would finish 22nd in MVP voting. One last name to mention is Lou Brock. In 1974 Brock stole 118 bases to see his name fall 2nd in the MVP voting. So for all who say Trout has this speed that can't be matched on the base paths, you need to look back to see true speed. Trout is fast yes, but if 130 stolen bases isn't enough to win MVP then how is 49 impressive?
3. Fielding - From every one's perspective you would think that Miguel Cabrera would be dead last in the majors when it comes to fielding percentage, this is false. Cabrera owns a .966 fielding percentage at third base, which puts him as the 3rd highest in the category in the American league and only .001 away from 2nd. Mike Trout finished with a fielding percentage of .993, which while it seems better than Cabrera's is not. That put Trout as the 5th highest amongst American league center fielders. Want to use another way to show coverage area? Let's use the range factor calculation. Trout has a range factor of 2.42, also the 5th highest amongst American league center fielders. Cabrera on the other hand is at a 2.40 on the range factor scale, putting him in 3rd at his position. Truth is that Cabrera is a better fielder than given credit for.
4. RBIs and average are pointless - Believe it or not, this is a true argument by many Trout supporters. We will start with the RBIs. The main reason people want to discredit Cabrera and his RBIs is by saying it takes base runners to get RBIs and Cabrera has had more base runners than Trout has. True, but when people argue that Trout has more runs scored than Cabrera shouldn't we discredit it since you have to have help just like you do for RBIs? You can't disregard this for that reason alone, otherwise you have to take away Trouts runs scored. Another stat that we would have to take away is the double plays each has grounded into, since Cabrera grounds into more double plays it should be disregarded right? According to this theory it should, but once again, that is an unrealistic way to calculate value. Now on to average. I'm not too sure how to even counter this claim due to the stupidity behind it. Average calculates how many hits you get per at bat, which leads to run production. Without average we would be looking at players like Carlos Pena or Mark Reynolds as some of the leagues elite batters right now.
5. Home runs don't tell a batters power - Ive herd alot of talk about how Trout has shown just as much power as Cabrera. This has no statistically proof at all. Lets look deeper into it. Obviously Cabrera beats out Trout at home runs with 44 compared to 30, and remember Cabrera plays in one of the deepest ball parks in the league. When we compare doubles Cabrera leads with 40 to Trout's 27. Triples goes to Trout with his 8 compared to 0 from Cabrera. That means Cabrera had 84 extra base hits while Trout had only 65. That 65 doesn't even lead the Angels, teammate Albert Pujols has 15 more extra base hits than Trout. Now lets take the slugging percentage of both players and see how it stacks up. Cabrera is sitting high with a .606 slugging percentage compared to .564 by Trout.
6. Clutch - When I think of an MVP I think of someone who helps his team in crunch time. So when is it that a team would want its player to perform its best? I would say its the final months without a doubt. So August and September are the months we will look at. In August Cabrera hit .357 with 8 home runs and 24 RBIs, Trout hit .284 with 7 home runs and 26 runs scored. In September Cabrera hit .308 with 10 home runs and 27 RBIs, Trout hit .257 with 5 home runs and 21 runs scored. Clutch goes to Miguel.
7. Strikeouts - A great ball player puts the ball in play. When you see a batter strike out with runners on and no outs it really hurts the team. This year Cabrera struck out 98 times compared to being walked 66 times. Trout on the other hand struck out 139 times this year, 17th most in the AL, compared to being walked 67 times. No one ever mentions it but Mike Trout is a strikeout machine, and it hurt his teams chance to produce runs.
The debate will continue but true fans across the globe are aware that there is already an MVP and voting won't change that. Miguel Cabrera won the Triple Crown and definitely had the best season in the majors. Take your crown Cabrera, as you are the 2012 American League MVP!
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