If, at the beginning of the season, someone had given you 1,000-1 odds to place $20 on Carlos Quentin as AL MVP, would you have taken the plunge? How about on Ryan Ludwick as NL MVP? Unless you're a diehard baseball fan, you would have been less likely to say "yes" than to say "who?"
With six weeks left in the season, Quentin and Ludwick are, if not favorites for hardware, certainly contenders. In his first two partial seasons with the White Sox, Carlos Quentin had struck out about as often as he had reached safely. In 455 plate appearances, Quentin had shown some pop -- 14 homers -- but little ability to get on base. His .230/.315/.431 "slash stats" -- batting average/on base percentage/slugging average -- in the hitter-friendly BOB, are minor league material for a corner outfielder.
Ludwick's resume was even less impressive. After six years bopping between the majors and minors of three different organizations, Ludwick had established himself as a first-rate bench warmer who could provide an occasional long ball. By age 28, Ludwick had managed just 600 at-bats, half of them last year. In that time, he posted a .258/.329/.466 line. That's a good fourth outfielder, but at age 29 entering 2008, Ludwick had to figure there wasn't much time for improvement.
Fast forward to today: Carlos Quentin and Ryan Ludwick are major reasons their teams are out-performing expectations. Quentin has banged out 33 homers and 91 RBI and improved to .289/.391/.574, while Ludwick had pounded 31 homers and 92 RBI while batting .304/.379/.611. That kind of play is worth 6-8 wins over a replacement level player, which both were, and can catapult a .500 team into contention in a weak division.
Because neither the White Sox nor Cardinals appeared to reach the level even of adequacy entering the season, neither Quention nor Ludwick is singularly responsible for their teams' success. But it takes these kinds of breakout seasons to help clubs pegged for 70 wins take 92 and a post-season berth.
Neither of these players is really a legitimate choice for MVP right now, particularly if you understand that a player's value is not dependent on his teammates. Ludwick isn't even the MVP of his team; that honor goes, as usual, to Prince Albert. Besides Pujols, Lance Berkman, Hanley Ramirez and Jose Reyes are all clearly better choices. Just by way of comparison, Pujols sports a superior .349/.459/.621 line, and plays a stellar first base. Ramirez and Reyes have their own unique virtues as middle infielders: Reyes's 14 triples and 40 steals compare favorably with the 12 triples and 32 steals of the base ball club in Pittsburgh. The whole thing. I'm not kidding.
In the Junior Circuit, Josh Hamilton is the sentimental choice, but the best candidate is (sorry) ARod. If voters are able to overcome their bias towards a) a compelling narrative, b) a gaggle of RBIs, and c) the irrational need to ascribe team success to a single player, they would see that ARod plays an important defensive position, steals 16 of 18 bases, and hits .308/.396/.587.
There's plenty of time in this race, and plenty of potential nominees, so let's wait six weeks before pronouncing anyone most valuable. Still, it's nice to see Carlos Quentin and Ryan Ludwick among the finalists this late in the season.
2 comments:
A-Rod? Since I get to see him play often he certainly has not been a big time performer this year for the Yankees. He might even be the first to admit it. Yankee team MVP is Mike Mussina.
Kevin Youkilis and Dustin Pedroia consider heavy consideration.
Dickie, Dickie, Dickie...have you learned nothing from reading my blog?
The notion that "value" is achieved by hitting the game-winning three-run homer in the ninth inning, but not by hitting a game changing three-run shot in the fourth, or the game-defining three-run blast in the first, is nonsense.
ARod has been a greater contributor to Yankee success than Mussina by a margin so wide you could fit two Hummers and Rosanne Barr in it.
As for your Sox candidates, Youklis for sure, Perdroia not so much. Though he's having an excellent season, he doesn't hit for much power and he doesn't make up for it with a .400 OBP, bagloads of steals or spectacular defense. I'd say he's a second-tier candidate, which is to say he's not really a serious one.
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