The baseball Rawlings Gold Glove award winners were announced Tuesday and this year’s troop has many first time winners. This award is voted on by the managers and coaches for the players in their league, but they can’t vote for a player on their team. The gold glove awards often have several questionable picks and usual one or two horrific ones.
Why is this award so hard to get right? Much of the problem with the voting in (at least) the past 2 decades seems to be the slant towards the players with the better offensive years. It’s very peculiar that the offensive stats should help sway a defensive award. I grew up watching baseball in the late 70’s early 80’s where there were many players who were labeled defensive specialists (you almost never hear that term in today’s game). These players were only on the field because of their glove and they received the gold glove award independent of any offensive stats. I am talking about the Mark Belangers and Ozzie Smiths of the world.
Below is a list of this year's gold glove award recipients along with my opinion of who should have won it instead. Many positions have 2 or 3 players who are worthy of the award and it’s hard to argue against any of them receiving it.
C Matt Weiters Fine Yadier Molina Fine
1B Adrian Gonzalez Fine Joey Votto Albert Pujols
2B Dustin Pedroia Robbie Cano Brandon Phillips Fine
SS Erick Aybar Asdrubal Cabrera Troy Tulowitzki Fine
3B Adrian Beltre Fine Placido Polanco Fine
LF Alex Gordon Brett Gardner Gerardo Parra Fine
CF Jacoby Ellsbury Peter Bourjos Matt Kemp Carlos Gomez
RF Nick Markakis Torii Hunter Andre Ethier Justin UptonP Mark Buehrle Who cares? Clayton Kershaw Who cares?
Some quick comments on this year’s choices: Robinson Cano gets short changed because he is just so smooth and makes every play seem so nonchalant. Pedroia is just the opposite in every way to Cano on the field. Every play he gets his uniform dirty. Every at bat I get a strained back watching him swing so hard. I give it up to Pedroia, he is one heck of a player who squeezes greater results out of his body than he has a right too. But if you watch Cano day in and day out, he should have gotten this year’s award.
Erick Aybar arguably is one of the worst picks this year (and no, I am NOT talking about giving it to Jeter instead). If the Cleveland Indians had a top tier fielding first basemen scooping up throws instead of Carlos Santana/Matt LaPorta (think about how many errors Mark Teixeira prevented this year for the Yankees' infield), then Asdrubal Cabrera probably has his error total halved. Asdrubal's range is just incredible and his acrobatics around second base are fun to watch.
But which was the worst pick this year? Both Nick Markakis and Matt Kemp are simply just horrible picks. But, by far, the silliest one is Alex Gordon in the American League left field position over the Yankee’s Brett Gardner. Nick Markakis has a solid arm and probably is even above average range-wise, but he doesn’t come close to Torii Hunter, not to mention Ichiro or even Jeff Francoeur. Matt Kemp is really more of a corner outfielder that is speedy enough to get by in centerfield. But Kemp regularly takes bad routes and gets bad jumps, not to mention he can be tentative as he nears other fielders. Kemp is a perfect example of the offensive stats swaying the vote. The argument can be made against my pick Carlos Gomez since he didn’t even play 100 games this year (basically because he will never hit a major league curveball to save his life). But Chris Young, Shane Victorino, Andrew McCutchen and even Rick Ankiel all would have been much better choices.
How could the managers and coaches (who should know the game better than most) vote for Alex Gordon over Brett Gardner? Most managers and many coaches still subscribe to the older school of baseball thought, which unfortunately is swayed by a player’s offensive stats (Alex Gordon had a great offensive year). The old school thinking also ignores most newer stats designed to analyze defensive ranges and runs prevented for outfielders (Brett Gardner was near or at the top in every advanced stat). Alex Gordon had 20 assists, the most in the majors. Alex Gordon arguably has the strongest arm in leftfield in all of baseball. Alex Gordon made fewer errors than Brett Gardner (3 to Gardner’s 4). All of these pieces factors into why this injustice would occur.
I put much more credence in the Fielding Bible Awards instead of the Rawlings Gold Glove Awards. They only select 1 player at each position in the majors by a real panel of experts that use every modern stat to weigh the choices. For completeness I post the Fielding Bible Award choices:
First Base – Albert Pujols, St. Louis
Second Base – Dustin Pedroia, Boston
Third Base – Adrian Beltre, Texas
Shortstop – Troy Tulowitzki, Colorado
Left Field – Brett Gardner, New York Yankees
Center Field – Austin Jackson, Detroit
Right Field – Justin Upton, Arizona
But all stats or awards aside, I have never seen a better left fielder in terms of pure range and cutting off the balls down the line/into the gap. Gardner also possesses a strong and VERY accurate arm. He holds just an amazing amount of runners to a single, by far more than any other leftfielder. I guess in baseball there are more crimes than just stealing bases.
I would also argue that the Votto pick for GG at first base was horrible, taking into consideration that the men whose very job it is to watch the Reds play day in and day out are the Reds' broadcast crew, and they repeatedly noted during telecasts how much Votto's defense had regressed this year. (On the other hand, I had not heard anyone saying that Pujols' defense had declined this year.)
ReplyDeleteI agree with that totally. Many times these awards are also "retro" awards meaning that they are given one year to make up for a previous year when the player did not win. That might be the case with Votto's selection.
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