AL and NL MVP Winners

http://sports.espn.go.com/dallas/mlb/news/story?id=5841798

The above link takes you to a write-up about Josh Hamilton winning the 2010 AL MVP award.

SportsReaction

I’m surprised Hamilton didn’t get all of the 1^st place votes.  While only playing 133 games Hamilton outperformed everyone in the American League in some major categories including my favorite; WAR.  Which is very impressive when you consider that WAR is a cumulative statistic where more playing time usually equals a higher WAR…but Hamilton was so dominant he still led the league in this category despite the missed games.

Name	G	PA	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA	Fld	WAR
J. Hamilton	133	571	32	100	8	0.359	0.411	0.633	0.447	7.9	8
A. Beltre	152	641	28	102	2	0.321	0.365	0.553	0.390	12	7.1
J. Bautista	161	683	54	124	9	0.260	0.378	0.617	0.422	-7	6.9
E. Longoria	151	661	22	104	15	0.294	0.372	0.507	0.376	11	6.9
C. Crawford	150	663	19	90	46	0.307	0.356	0.495	0.378	19	6.9
R. Cano	160	696	29	109	3	0.319	0.381	0.534	0.389	-0.6	6.4
M. Cabrera	150	648	38	126	3	0.328	0.420	0.622	0.429	-6.2	6.2

Hamilton was the obvious choice here.

Let’s do another SportsReaction on the NL MVP award going to Joey Votto of the Cincinnati Reds…here’s the link to the story:

http://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20101122&content_id=16171678&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb

In this instance Votto almost did get all of the first place votes…all except one.   This one I don’t quite understand.  I am fine with him winning the award…but getting 31 of 32 first place votes when he had a very similar season to Albert Pujols is a little absurd.

Name	G	HR	RBI	SB	AVG	OBP	SLG	wOBA	Fld	WAR
J. Votto	150	37	113	16	0.324	0.424	0.600	0.439	1.6	7.4
A. Pujols	159	42	118	14	0.312	0.414	0.596	0.420	1.5	7.3
R. Zimmerman	142	25	85	4	0.307	0.388	0.510	0.389	14	7.2
M. Holliday	158	28	103	9	0.312	0.390	0.532	0.396	8.2	6.9
T. Tulowitzki	122	27	95	11	0.315	0.381	0.568	0.408	7.1	6.4
R. Weeks	160	29	83	11	0.269	0.366	0.464	0.368	1.8	6.1
A. Torres	134	16	63	26	0.268	0.343	0.479	0.363	21	6
K. Johnson	154	26	71	13	0.284	0.370	0.496	0.377	7.1	6
C. Gonzalez	142	34	117	26	0.336	0.376	0.598	0.416	-2.7	6

The only reason he must have gotten so many votes was because his team made the playoffs while Pujols’ Cardinals did not.  This is a theory I don’t agree with at all since it is never a single player’s fault that his team doesn’t perform well.  Look at Pujols’ numbers in that chart above and tell me it was his fault the Cardinals missed the playoffs.  I don’t think you can.

Either way, Votto and Hamilton both rightly deserved the awards they got; I just think Hamilton should have been the one to almost unanimously won the award, while Votto should have split the votes with his nearest competitor a little more evenly.