I began filling out my postseason award ballot on Wednesday, and drew some interested responses, and after reflection, I have to think that Yoshinobu Yamamoto is going to win the PL MVP award because people infer that the player whose season is the biggest outlier in the league MUST be the MVP.
I was asked why Yamamoto was absent from my Pacific League MVP votes, and why Lotte’s Shogo Nakamura was there at all.
Although I think it’s exceedingly hard to argue that Yamamoto was more valuable than Mastaka Yoshida, there are things players do and don’t do that aren’t measured except in anecdote.
For the first time in a few years, I’ve relied on my own work to cast my postseason award ballots. This allowed me to do without wins above replacement, which I kind of understand but philosophically can’t get behind for two reasons:
- WAR allows elite pitchers working seven-plus innings a week to be considered on a par with elite hitters who also have some defensive value.
- WAR credits or debits hitters with a “positional adjustment” based on the contribution of the players at their position. But batters don’t contribute offensively as catchers or first basemen, they contribute as hitters, period.
That’s why I’m partial to Bill James‘ Win Shares, and for the further reason that the individual players on a team cannot receive more credit for wins than their team actually wins.
Continue reading That time again