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Baseball Writers Screw Up MVP Balloting Again

The latest edition of the MVP voting has me thinking of Elvis Costello and his red shoes. A look back at the recent history of MVP voting and what we can do about it.

There's no better way to sum up baseball's MVP vote this year in both leagues Baseball is the sport whose post-season awards mean the most. Well, it used to be that way. At one time, I could tell you the MVP winners in both leagues (despite being a National League fan) for every year, going back to at least 1950. Now, I couldn't even tell you who won last year's races.

It's not because I'm less of a fan. On the contrary, I know more about the sport now than at any time previously in my life. It's just that the people who choose these awards, the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) do such a poor job making their choices, year after year after year, that it has ceased to be important to me. I used to get my feathers all ruffled up about these things - how could they give the 1997 NL MVP to Larry Walker over Mike Piazza? - but when you see the same group of people making the same type of mistakes on an annual basis, it sort of loses its impact after awhile.

Here's a chart of the five-year period from 1997-2001 with the BBWAA picks on the left and a clearly better choice on the right:

1997 Larry Walker Mike Piazza
1998 Sammy Sosa Mark McGwire
1998 Juan Gonzalez Albert Belle
1999 Ivan Rodriguez Pedro Martinez
2000 Jeff Kent Barry Bonds
2001 Ichiro Suzuki Jason Giambi

The only way to vote for Walker over Piazza is to have no understanding of park effects or the defensive spectrum. Walker had better raw numbers, but he also played in Coors Field when it was the best hitting park in the Majors. Piazza played in Los Angeles, a well-known pitcher's park. Plus, he played a much more valuable defensive position than Walker. Finding a big bat who plays a corner outfield spot is relatively easy. Finding anyone to play catcher who can put up numbers like Piazza did in 1997 is virtually impossible.

In 1998, McGwire led the league in on-base percentage, slugging, OPS, home runs, extra-base hits and walks. When adjusting for home ball park, McGwire posted an OPS+ of 217 compared to 160 for Sosa. And Sosa made more outs. But Sammy led the league in RBIs (a stat the BBWAA loves, despite it being a context-dependent stat and not indicative of an individual's true skill level) and his team squeaked into the Wild Card.

In the American League that season, Belle led the league in slugging, OPS, runs created and total bases. Gonzalez in RBIs.

The following year was truly a low point in MVP voting. Pedro Martinez turned in one of the greatest pitching performances of all time, in the midst of one of the biggest offensive seasons in Major League Baseball history. Martinez led the league in wins, ERA, strikeouts, WHIP and adjusted ERA (accounting for ballparks). But several members of the BBWAA refuse to vote for pitchers for the award. And three knucklehead put him seventh on the ballot! You can almost make a case (it would be wrong, however) for not voting for pitchers, but how on earth could anyone who paid any attention to baseball think that six other players in the American League were more valuable in 1999 than Pedro? And to make matters even worse, Rodriguez wasn't even the best hitter that season! Manny Ramirez and Derek Jeter both would have been better choices than Gonzalez.

The BBWAA ballots in more recent years have scored better, simply because they had the slam dunk of voting for Barry Bonds for the NL award. Yet, they messed that one up too, giving it to teammate Jeff Kent in 2000. Kent played the tougher defensive position, but that doesn't make up for Bonds' huge edge in every offensive category. Todd Helton would have been a better pick, too.

In 2001, voters were swayed by Japanese newcomer Ichiro Suzuki, who displayed such a unique combination of talents, most of them asthetically pleasing, as well. But Giambi led the league in on-base percentage, slugging, doubles, walks and runs created. Ichiro led in at-bats and singles. But despite that edge in at-bats (692-520), Giambi led the league in most times on base, outpacing Ichiro by 40.

With 10 awards to vote on in the 1997-2001 span, the BBWAA clearly made the wrong choice in six of them. And there's certainly room to quibble on the other four.

You know that it still hurts me just to say it.

Fast forward to this year. The MVP winners were Ryan Howard and Justin Morneau. Both of these were wrong. Both Albert Pujols and Carlos Beltran had better years than Howard, especially when you factor in defense, where Howard is a complete butcher. But the AL vote is even more curious. Morneau wasn't even the most valuable player on his own team! Joe Mauer would have been a better pick from the Twins. Or Johan Santana. And poster boy Derek Jeter, often praised despite all physical evidence to the contrary, would have been a better pick.

Morneau got the award in large part because he was viewed as carrying his team to the playoffs. But the voters ignored that strain of logic when awarding the NL award, bypassing Pujols and Beltran, who both led their teams to the playoffs, while Howard and the Phillies failed to get in. But Howard was praised for his clutch hitting, which at the same time didn't help David Ortiz out in the American Leauge.

It's a traveshamockery.

But since their wings have got rusted.

People are so fed up with the incompetence displayed by the BBWAA that they have taken matters into their own hands. This year marked the 15th annual edition of the Internet Baseball Awards. This year, more than 1,400 cyberspace baseball fans participated to honor those players and managers whose performance in 2020 were most deserving.

The MVP Award winners this year were Albert Pujols and Derek Jeter. Forget the BBWAA, these are the true MVPs that I'll remember.