Dozier's Case For American League MVP

It's pretty crazy that Trout only has one MVP at this point in his career.

Even crazier is that he just turned 25 last month and should already have four.

Too bad Dozier did not combine his first half last year with the 2nd half this year.   Then we would be looking at a real contender.   Of course if he had the good first half this year the Twins might not be looking at 100 losses either.  Sadly if Dozier didn't get hot in the 2nd half my vote would still be Nunez for MVP of the Twins.    Has that kind of thing happened before?

And Dawson got it because of HR. There were quite a few players who deserved it way more than he did.  Don't know what the voters were thinking, really.  If their idea was, 'We want to prove standings don't matter in our voting' why not pick Gwynn or the guy I would have picked, Dale Murphy.

That was the year when Dawson refused to sign with Montreal and dared any other team to offer him a contract. The intent was likely to show MLB collusion between owners and win a gigantic class-action lawsuit. The Cubs bit the bullet and offered him $700K, and Dawson signed. Dawson's bid for 50 HRs that year were dashed by a very strong wind the blew the ball into the LF well (along the line) which is significantly deeper than to straight-away LF.

I think the defensive metric side of WAR has plenty of flaws.

Most stats have flaws either by how they are made or the conclusions drawn from them.  It's about finding the best stats available.

But since you brought it up, in one of the two years Cabrera won MVP over Trout, Trout actually had the better wRC+ as well.  So, excluding defense altogether (and without taking into account positions at all), Trout was still better.

I'm curious.....you think Trout is not valuable, and Dozier is not valuable, because the teams are bad?

You misunderstood my post. Dozier's performance didn't correlate with his team's success or failure--thus he isn't as valuable as his personal statistics suggest.

it's good to dream.

How so? There are 9-13 other players playing every game....even if Dozier put up 12 WAR*, if the SP gives up 6 runs a game, and the other players are all bad......how could Dozier change this team's success one way or the other over 162 games?

 

*choose your stats, you know what I mean.

Your entire argument is "stats tell all". I don't believe that. Most Valuable Player is the award. Is there a cause/effect relationship between player and team? Ex: there was a year where Steve Carlton won a ton of games--nearly half of what PHL won that season. They were an awful team--except when Carlton pitched! My point was Dozier was ancillary to the Twins performance. An MVP should make his teammates better players, hence a better team. Was Dozier that player? It likely isn't cut and dried this year over who should be MVP in the AL, but I don't see Dozier as MVP. I see him as a savvy guy who knows MLB pays huge for HRs, even as the lead-off hitter (where he is his most effective).

It's fun that we are even having these thoughts or discussions about the possibility of a Dozier MVP year.

 

I don't think it's going to happen, but I'm hoping he can continue to pile on as many numbers as possible.  This is certainly one of the best team MVP seasons in quite some time.  In many ways this is better than the 09 Mauer or 06 Morneau MVP years and could even rival some of the fantastic Killebrew seasons of 67 and 69.

Come on now,  Mauer lead the league in BA/OBP/SLG% and when he did that, he was the first player to do that in 30 years. He also had a league leading wRC+ of 170. And he did it as a catcher.

I hope he gets a Ron Meshbesher to plead his case, because, to quote Dan Rather, "The people of Washington could not be more surprised if Fidel Castro came loping across the midwestern prairie on the back of a hippopotamus."

Baseball is different from football and basketball.  It's mostly just a bunch of individual battles.  Pitcher against batter, batter against pitcher, defender with the ball, etc.  Yeah, some teamwork is involved out there, but not to the degree of football and basketball.  A guy like Jordan could make the other 4 on the court look better, but one guy on a 25 man roster isn't going to make other players better on the team.  The best position player in baseball can't make his pitchers pitch well or other players hit or field well and a great pitcher can't make his team hit better.  It really is a tired narrative in baseball.

I always find it funny to listen to Twins fans piss and moan about losing David Ortiz, and now that we have somebody who can hit homeruns we rush to trade him.  Sad fans, if you look at home run stats between the two they are on par with each other at this age.  Both working up their numbers from age 25...from 29 years old on to now Ortiz probably averaged just above 30 home runs a year...I find it funny we don't learn from our mistakes.

 

Second, when was the last time the Twins management actually acquired a solid, not wasted over the hill pitcher from trades?  Not lately...if you want commitment from ownership, buy a couple of solid aces...don't trade away our power cause it gonna be awhile before our youngsters start hitting dingers.

No one "pisses and moans" about losing Ortiz.  Or even gripes or complains.  

We feel it was unfortunate.  That's it.

One big difference between then and now is that, back then, the Twins had a good pitching staff and few holes on the field.  Now?

Okay, if there are none to buy why trade?

This question confuses me.

FAs can't be traded.  They'd be the ones you would buy.

There are plenty of pitchers that may be able for trade for the right package that can't just be bought on the open market.

Has anyone looked up the Twins W-L record in games that Dozier hit a home run?  We'll find out right there how valuable he is since he is only in this discussion due to his dingers.  

17 HR in wins.

25 HR in losses.

He's hit a HR in 38 games

15-23.

There are power hitters growing right now. Sano, Buxton (i saw a graphic on TV he hit 7 since 9/1), Kepler, Vargas. Will any reach 40 in a season? Probably not--but enough power for the entire team to be near 200 in a season--which averages  to about 1-1/4 per game! Tis enough HRs. 

Pitching--Ouch! A major need there. Probably 3 SPs and 3 RPs at least.