AL MVP Race: Bobby Witt Jr. is placing collectively an MVP-caliber season on the fallacious time

Bobby Witt is having an all-time nice season, particularly for a shortstop. Going again to 1969, solely two shortstops have put up greater than 10 fWAR, 1991 Cal Ripken Jr. and 2002 Alex Rodriguez. For bWAR there are three together with Ripken, Rodriguez, and Rico Petrocelli who I’ll come again to once more later as he’s the one baseball participant in historical past with a ten+ WAR season that I had by no means heard of earlier than. Witt is on tempo to affix their ranks. He presently has 9.6 WAR per Fangraphs and eight.9 on Baseball Reference. He has performed each recreation this season and is on a per 162 recreation tempo of 11.1 and 10.4 respectively.

It’s not simply WAR both. Amongst certified shortstops since 1969, he ranks eighth in batting common, sixth in slugging, and first in wRC+. It’s onerous to inform the place he’ll find yourself with the counting stats, however he’s doubtless going to be 30/30 and already has 117 runs and 97 RBI. It’s only a straight up monster season, and but he isn’t going to win the MVP. In nearly some other 12 months, or heck within the Nationwide League this 12 months, he would doubtless win it simply. Sadly for Witt, Aaron Choose is having presumably the best (non-steroid aided) fashionable season on the plate that we’ve ever seen.

A lot of persons are giving plenty of stats about how nice Choose is and also you can learn them at your leisure. He’s on tempo to hit proper round 60 dwelling runs, however with what he has been doing these days, would possibly break his personal American League file. His wRC+ is 223 which implies he’s 123% higher than the common hitter within the league. Witt will in all probability win the batting title, however Choose is second. His OBP is .464, and no one with out the final identify Bonds has performed something like this degree of manufacturing within the 2000s. Return additional and solely Ted Williams and Babe Ruth be part of the occasion.

So, Witt may be very doubtless going to complete second in MVP voting this 12 months, and it simply made me surprise who the perfect gamers to lose out on the MVP have been. These break down into a number of teams, however first I’ll present you the highest 10 based on Fangraphs and Baseball Reference WAR. Then we are going to delve somewhat deeper into how they ended up lacking out on the {hardware}. I’ll keep away from pitchers for simplicity’s sake. They don’t win usually and have their very own award which muddies the water.

You possibly can see that that the 2 formulations don’t notably agree what this prime 10 ought to appear to be, however it’s extra that I’m utilizing an arbitrary reduce off at prime ten. As an example, Mike Trout 2018 is simply exterior the Fangraphs record. Regardless, this offers an excellent record of participant years that might usually be MVPs, however as a result of some dangerous voting, luck, or timing, they didn’t get the award. That occurred in a number of alternative ways, so I’m going to group them into these archetypes. We are going to save essentially the most ludicrous for final. Additionally, Witt is on tempo to eclipse all of them.

Three of those gamers misplaced in the identical approach it appears to be like like Witt goes to. That they had an unimaginable 12 months, however another person was even higher. Two of them bumped into peak Barry Bonds when he gained 4 consecutive MVPs from 2001 to 2004. Sammy Sosa’s nice 2001 had no likelihood towards 73 dwelling runs. Ditto for Adrian Beltre in 2004 when Bonds had a 212 wRC+. All the traditional Barry Bonds caveats apply, however dishonest or not, he was the perfect participant by the numbers and far of the league nonetheless had their blinders on. Mike Trout bumped into one other nice participant in 2018. Mookie Betts had an exceptional season, higher than Trout’s in all probability and Betts had by no means gotten an MVP earlier than. The voters’ tendency to become bored with giving it to the identical folks again and again made it practically inevitable. The following group in all probability mustn’t have misplaced, however no less than you’ll be able to see the argument

Comprehensible however in all probability not proper:

Jason Giambi had an MVP caliber 12 months in 2000, and whenever you evaluate him to Alex Rodriguez it isn’t loopy that he gained. Giambi hit 43 homers and Rodriguez completed with 41. Giambi had a number of extra RBI and A-Rod scored extra runs. Total, Giambi was only a higher hitter that season by most metrics together with all three slashes the place he hit .333/.476/.647. WAR likes Rodriguez higher primarily based on protection, each high quality and the place he performed. That was nonetheless the Seattle primarily based shortstop model of Rodriguez, and he was actually good. Giambi was a BAD first baseman. The defensive distinction between these two is very large. He in all probability didn’t deserve the award, however no less than I perceive what occurred. The one defensible selection over Rodriguez would have been Pedro Martinez who was unbelievable that 12 months.

In 1973, Pete Rose had a really Pete Rose season, however only a bit higher than all of the others. He collected 230 hits and managed a .338 common whereas getting on base 40% of the time. By all fashionable defensive metrics, it was additionally his greatest season within the area. He ended up at 7.3 fWAR and eight.3 bWAR. In 2024 the slugging discrepancy between him and Darrell Evans would have been understood significantly better. Evans hit 41 dwelling runs and slugged .556 ending second in that statistic. Rose hit 5 homers and his .437 slugging share was wonderful, however approach behind Evans. Evans simply performed within the fallacious period to win primarily based on the combo of statistics he produced, however he additionally misplaced to somebody who was solely barely much less incredible. Nonetheless, Evans completed 18th within the voting.

Now essentially the most memorable MVP dialogue of my lifetime as a result of I used to be very a lot within the on-line baseball group throughout it. Miguel Cabrera gained the MVP in each 2012 and 2013. In these two seasons Mike Trout took second place in each votes. It’s fairly straightforward to clarify what occurred in 2013. Cabrera gained the triple crown, which had not been performed since Carl Yastrzemski in 1967. Trout had an exceptional season, however the historical past of the triple crown makes me suppose the hole in WAR of 1 and a half or so by each estimations was not sufficient. The 2012 vote was the one which I might actually take situation with.

They have been practically the identical from a hitting perspective. Cabrera has an edge in slugging, however they have been nearly equivalent after park changes and such. I believe Trout being a rookie harm him quite a bit as a result of voters may assume he was already going to get a giant award, so they may break up and ensure each gamers get an honor. I simply suppose the hole in protection, each place performed and the way significantly better Trout was on the more durable job, was so large that it’s absurd to say Cabrera was extra deserving.

The curious case of Rico Petrocelli was not one I used to be anticipating to see going into this. Petrocelli manned brief all through the again half of the 60s for the Pink Sox after which switched and coated third for the primary half of the 70s. He was an excellent participant, not Corridor of Fame good, however a strong on a regular basis man for 10 years. He was normally price 2 to 4 WAR, however in 1969 he doubled his WAR output relative to some other season by placing up 10. Harmon Killebrew beat him out for the award with a strong, although unspectacular season. He led the league in dwelling runs and RBI whereas amassing 145 walks. Killebrew was good, however he was fairly tough over at third base and solely okay when he performed first. Regardless of Killebrew having 17 extra homers than Petrocelli, their slugging percentages have been .584 and .589 respectively. Petrocelli had a greater common and slugging share, and he was an unimaginable shortstop. He was fourth in fielding share and made the fewest errors of any common shortstop in baseball, simply fewer makes an attempt for no matter purpose, which pushed the fielding share down a bit. It was comparable in fashionable phrases to what Bobby Witt is doing now defensively. Killebrew had the massive identify and out hit him barely, so Petrocelli needed to accept a seventh place end within the MVP voting. He sadly by no means even gained a Gold Glove, which he would have performed many instances by fashionable metrics.

The egregiously dangerous MVP selections:

We’re performed with the comprehensible outcomes, now on to among the indefensible nonsense that MVP voting has hire previously. Beginning with a traditional in 1985 the place Don Mattingly took dwelling the award over Rickey Henderson. Rickey would inform you that Rickey was the perfect baseball participant, and in 1985 he was. He hit .314/.419/.516 whereas scoring 146 runs and stealing 80 bases. His slugging share ought to all the time be adjusted since half of his walks and singles flip into doubles. Don Mattingly hit .324/.371/.567 whereas enjoying awful first base protection. Nobody ever charged him with an error although, and so it appeared like he was good and he gained a number of gold gloves. He additionally performed for an excellent Yankees staff whereas Henderson was on a really mediocre Oakland staff. It was not a sensible choice, however among the upcoming ones are a lot worse.

The 2002 model of Miguel Tejada led the league in nothing. Properly, apart from video games performed, I assume. It was a wonderful season, however not an MVP caliber one. Alex Rodriguez in the meantime was spectacular. He hit 57 dwelling runs and had 142 RBIs to Tejada’s 108. Tejada outhit A-Rod by .008 in common however Rodriguez crushed him in on-base and slugging. Sadly, the Rangers have been final of their division whereas Oakland gained it, and the voters thought that was sufficient to make up for the 4+ WAR hole in manufacturing. Clearly Tejada didn’t have the higher season, even among the voters would concede that, however his staff made the playoffs so he was “extra precious”.

The following one is private for me. Ken Griffey Jr. has quite a bit to do with why I’m writing about baseball proper now. He was my favourite participant as a child, and I bear in mind getting up each morning and turning on SportsCenter to see if he hit a house run the night time earlier than. Juan Gonzalez nearly matched Griffey as a hitter in 1996. Griffey completed 49 dwelling runs and 140 RBIs whereas Gonzalez had 47 and 144. Their OPSes have been 1.020 and 1.011, so it appears to be like like they have been fairly near even. Right here’s the rub although, Arlington was a very pleasant park to hit in whereas the Kingdome was a really common park, so Griffey was doing it in onerous mode. Oh yeah, and he was probably the greatest middle fielders of all time that season versus a nasty nook outfielder. Griffey ought to have gained this simply, or no less than it may have gone to his teammate, Rodriguez, who would have additionally been deserving that 12 months.

Mike Schmidt led all of baseball in dwelling runs and slugging in 1974. He was second in runs and third in RBIs. He was an distinctive third baseman. And he nonetheless misplaced to Steve Garvey within the MVP vote. He additionally completed behind Lou Brock, Mike Marshall, Johnny Bench, and Jim Wynn. Garvey hit .312 and drove in 111, so he wasn’t dangerous or something. He simply didn’t do something that stands out. He gained a Gold Glove at first base? That’s all I acquired. It simply doesn’t make any sense besides that Schmidt struck out an excessive amount of for that period.

Lastly, the final and most ridiculous of the bunch. Are you able to think about placing up an all-time nice season as a shortstop after which watching a aid pitcher win the MVP over you? In 1984 Cal Ripken Jr. completed the 12 months fifth within the AL in wRC+, hitting .304/.374/.510 whereas scoring 103 runs and driving in 86. He had the perfect offensive WAR by Baseball Reference due to the positional adjustment. He was additionally the very best defensive WAR. He gained the 1983 MVP so perhaps folks didn’t wish to give it to him once more? Ripken not solely misplaced the vote, he completed twenty seventh? I’m not sufficiently old to recollect this time interval, however it’s baffling to take a look at with 2024 eyes. The winner that 12 months was Willie Hernandez who threw 140.1 innings in aid for Detroit. He had the perfect ERA for any AL reliever at 1.92, however second was 2.03, so not precisely otherworldly. Two different AL relievers had extra saves. Hernandez additionally gained the Cy Younger Award despite the fact that Mike Boddicker had a 20-win season. In 1983 Jesse Orosco had a significantly better aid season and completed third. I really feel like there was one thing else that induced this. There isn’t any approach that many citizens actually thought Hernandez had an MVP season. Cal Ripken Jr. can add to his trophy assortment the worst therapy in an MVP vote of all time.