Thursday, November 25, 2010

Papi Had a Better Year than Vlad

The Commissioner's Office announced that Vladimir Guerroro won the Edgar Martinez Outstanding DH Award. While it remains a puzzle to this writer on who votes for such an award that apparently has been around since 1973 and was renamed for the guy who won it five times, they got it wrong. The only criteria that you can vote on for such an award is offensive production. There is, of course, no fielding. And by the only criteria available to us (offense), Ortiz had a better year.

Here are some comparisons:

OBP - Ortiz (.370), Guerrero (.345)
SLG - Ortiz (.529), Guerrero (.496)
OPS - Ortiz (.899), Guerrero (.841)
OPS+ - Ortiz (137), Guerrero (122)
WAR - Ortiz (3.3), Guerrero (2.4)
Runs - Ortiz (86), Guerrero (83)

The only areas that Vlad beat the Big Papi on were batting average (.300 vs .270) and RBI (115 vs 102). Ortiz struck out more but hit into ten less double plays.

This is purely an offensive award and David Ortiz had the more valuable offensive season. This Fan isn't a big fan of Ortiz, but facts are facts and Ortiz should have won this award.

1 comment:

Josh Borenstein said...

Have to agree. I give both of them credit, though, for having bounceback seasons.