October 2, 2007

End of Season Award Winners - American League

With the season officially ending yesterday, I decided that now would be a good time to give my award picks for the end of the season. Make sure to compare them to my "Mid-Season Award Winners" back in July.

American League Cy Young

Player: C.C. Sabathia
Team: Cleveland Indians
Position: Pitcher
Throws: Left
Bats: Left
Age: 27
Season: 19-7, 3.21 ERA, 209 K, 37 BB, 241.0 IP, 86 ER, 34 G/GS


It's a hard to choose between 4 different starters who could all make cases for the Cy Young, and a closer who could also be mentioned in the same category. C.C. Sabathia finished 1st in innings pitched, and had a 5.6 K/BB ratio. All that while pitching in a very tough Central Division and still managing to pick up 19 wins. He also had a very impressive 1.14 WHIP and held batters to a respectable .259 average.
Runner Up: Josh Beckett
Mid-Season Winner: Dan Haren
Mid-Season Award Prediction: Johan Santana


American League Rookie of the Year

Player: Delmon Young
Team: Tampa Bay Devil Rays
Position: Outfielder
Throws: Right
Bats: Right
Age: 22
Season: .288 avg., 13 HR, 93 RBI, .317 OBP, .409 SLG%


Another toss-up. Young ultimately beat out Boston's Dustin Pedroia because he played in every game at a more physically demanding position and was more of a run-producer. Young would be the clear-cut winner if he were on a better team, but the Devil Rays finished in dead-last this season and thus there was a bit of a controversy with this choice. But you can't deny that Young played a big role in the Devil Rays lineup compared to Pedroia in an already stacked Red Sox lineup.
Runner Up: Dustin Pedroia
Mid-Season Choice: Daisuke Matsuzaka
Mid-Season Award Prediction: Daisuke Matsuzaka


American League Most Valuable Player

Player: Alex Rodriguez
Team: New York Yankees
Position: Third Base
Throws: Right
Bats: Right
Age: 32
Season: .314 avg., 54 HR, 156 RBI, .422 OBP, .645 SLG%


This on the other-hand is not really debatable. Sure the Yankees have a very good lineup, even without this guy, but his 2007 season was a historical season and his season capped it off with a very memorable comeback. The team went from being "out of the picture" in July, to making the Red Sox sweat bullets in September. And it's hard to deny that his strong play was not (at least a big part of) the reason for the comeback.
Runner Up: Magglio Ordonez
Mid-Season Choice: Alex Rodriguez
Mid-Season Award Prediction: Alex Rodriguez


Wednesday, I will have my NL Award Winners.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Josh:

I think you've got somebody else's stats in A-Rod's spot :-)

Josh Johnson said...

Wow. Thanks... I did a "compare stats" on yahoo and had a few players in there and ended up looking at Magglio Ordonez's. Thanks for pointing that out.

I'll change that right now.