Because it's funny!

I've lost much of my spitting hatred for Notre Dame over the years. It just isn't much fun to hate on something so mediocre, but this is worth it.

"BC's got better Christians!!!"

And Then There's the Senior Circuit.

In the race for the 'Biggest Boob in TV sports broadcasting' trophy, Tim McCarver gets the nod over Big Joe. His lack of basic knowledge of how to pronounce players' names is legendary. His stubborn refusal to even acknowledge a better system of baseball statistics is asinine.

To wit: "I only care about on-base percentage if you can run. If you can't run, I could care less about on-base percentage."

Um, what?

Or saying silliness like this: "I think if Norman Rockwell were alive the guy that he would paint more than anyone else would be David Eckstein."

But, in my world, it's his continued belief that the NL is a better league than the AL that makes him the biggest terdball in this or any other universe. When pressed, he substitutes 'better' with 'exciting'. What a douche.

With that, here's the right and proper answers to the question, "Who are the best players in a terribly average league."


NATIONAL LEAGUE


Most Valuable Player: Matt Holliday, LF, Colorado Rockies

The Rockies won 14 of their last 15 (including last night) to win the Wild Card. Holliday, during that stretch, hit .442 with 5hr and 17rbi. His .340 AVG. was tops in the NL. His 137rbi was tops as well. His SLG and OPS were second to Prince Fielder by a few hundredths of a point in both categories. In short, the Rockies are a .500 team without him.

Runner-ups:

Jimmy Rollins: A fairly close second, Rollins played in every game this year, no small feat at the hardest position to play in baseball. He hit .296/.344/.531-30-94-41, numbers that were significant improvements over last year. He has become a star. But he hit a very ordinary .272 with RISP and .255 Late & Close. Holliday hit .330 with RISP and .294 L&C. Take away 25 stolen bases (a very overrated stat) and Ryan Braun has better overall numbers. Close but not really.

Jake Peavy: Meh.

Ryan Howard: .268/.392/.584-47-136-1. And he missed almost a month. Hit 47hr but struck out 200 times, a Major League record. Hit 47hr and still managed to have an OPS under 1.000. A bit one-dimensional.

Prince Fielder: .288/.395/.618-50-119-2. Great year. Not better than Holliday or Rollins.

Trivia Question: Who led the NL in OPS? Highlight ---> Chipper Jones (1.029)


Cy Young Award Winner: Jake Peavy, RHP, San Diego Padres

19-6, 2.54ERA, 1.06WHIP, 240K in 223 innings. First in wins, ERA, WHIP, SO. ERA was a half run better than Brandon Webb. Consistent throughout the season, going 9-3 (2.19ERA) in the first half and followed it by going 10-3 (2.57ERA). Had an ERA of 2.10 on September 1. Not a tough one.

Runner-ups:

Brandon Webb: 18-10, 3.01ERA, 1.19WHIP, 194K in 236 innings. Had what will most likely be a typical Webb season and is really a John Lackey clone in more ways than one. Had a 42 inning scoreless in July and August, corresponding with Arizona's resurgence. Just 8-6 at the break, but was 8-2 in the last two months of the season. Threw four complete games including three shutouts. That's good.

Cole Hamels: 15-5, 3.39ERA, 1.12 WHIP, 177K in 183 innings. Long-shot, but he really came into his own. Legitimate ace at just 23.


Rookie of the Year: Ryan Braun, 3b, Milwaukee Brewers

The most heated and stupid argument currently in rotation. He hit .324/.370/.634-34-97-15. He did all this in 451 at-bats and played his first game of the year on May 25!!!! If he qualified, his BA would have been fifth in the NL, his SLG would have been the best by a fairly large margin. He finished tied for 5th in home runs...in 451 ab!!! Oh, and had 60RBI with runners on...in only 122 abs!!! Okay, no más punta del exclamation. His fielding is atrocious but who cares?!

Runner-up:

Troy Tulowitzki: .291/.359/.479-24-99-7. He may be the next great shortstop. He is that good. Aside from his overall numbers, he went .295-15-60 after the break. Silly baseball minds (Mr. Boers) want to give him the award for the world's great human because of his fielding. He handled the most chances in the league and committed only seven errors, helping to boost his WARP3 to an astounding 10.3. For a shortstop, especially a rookie, that is unheard of and should be heavily considered. But it does not make him a better rookie than Braun, who had more extra base hits in nearly 200 fewer plate appearances than Tulowitzki. When the pitching and nearly every other player in the lineup laid an egg for Milwaukee during the middle of the season, Braun and Fielder single-handedly kept them in it.


Comeback Player of the Year: Dmitri Young, 1b, Washington Nationals

Playing on a team that everyone predicted would be historically bad, Young was one of the reasons they weren't. In fact, they showed signs of being a fairly decent team with eight teams having a worse record than the Nats (including the White Sox). Going .320/.378/.491-13-74 overall, Young hit .397 in May, .377 in June and .373 in August. If he didn't hit .159 in September and just hit his average, Young would have finished second to Holliday. Not bad for someone that everybody wrote off as done.

Runner-ups:

Aaron Rowand: Threatening to fade into obscurity, Rowand had a year nearly identical to his 2004 year. He hit .309/.374/.515-27-89-6 and, as White Sox fans know, was inexplicably consistent throughout the year, never hitting below .264 (August) and hit as high as .378 (April). It WAS a contract year, but he had the kind of year that gets you 5/$50 mil.

Derrek Lee: I hardly think anyone should be considered for 'comeback POY' if he was injured but I'd give Lee consideration based solely on the fact it was a major wrist injury to his lead hand. He hit .317/.400/.513-22-82-6 and seemed to find his home run stroke again later in the year (16 hrs after the break). He also hit .365-7-14 in September, a time when the Cubs made their (f'-in') run.


Manager of the Year: Manny Acta, Washington Nationals

This one's not really close. This team on paper should have lost 110 games. And their best pitcher (by far! - Patterson) barely pitched. Mostly, they held serve, going 40-41 at home. The bullpen had the ninth-best ERA in the majors and were 27-24 in one-run games. How a team that was outscored by more than 100 runs won 73 games is beyond me but Manny Acta is the reason.

Runner-ups:

Charlie Manuel: The Phillies started 4-11, at one point, he wanted to beat up a sports talk show host and they were .500 at the break, but they completed the most remarkable comeback with 15 days left in the season in the history of baseball. Manuel should be given some credit for that, even if it's mostly for staying out of the way.


Coming Soon: Team-by-team reflections and a look back on preseason predictions.

Thanks for reading.

Individual AL Awards. And this is gospel.

Idiots abound on these internets (I'm looking squarely at you, Mr. Morgan). And it is no more acute than in the world of internet sports writing. Expect that idiocy to be amped up in the coming days and weeks as the creepy-crawlies come out of the woodwork to make their picks for individual MLB awards. Oh, the contrarianism! So as a preëmptive strike, I shall give mine. If you disagree, you are wrong. Crawl into a corner, wish for death and hope you come back as a smarter person. HA!


AMERICAN LEAGUE


Most Valuable Player: Alex Rodriguez, 3b, New York Yankees

The most obvious pick and cannot be argued. Don't try. It only makes you look stupid. He hit .314/.422/.645-54-156-24 this year. And for you people out there that continue to refer to A-Rod as a choker, his September numbers, in the thick of a very tight wild-card race until the last week, were .362/.470/.723-10-31-4. He was ridiculously good and put up historic numbers without any suspicion of being juicy. He was the shit. And I don't even like him.

Runner-ups:

Magglio Ordoñez: .363/.434/.595-28-139-4. Average 40 points higher than next best season.

Carlos Peña: .282/.411/.627-46-121-1. Silly good OBP with that average. Only 29.


Cy Young Award Winner: C.C. Sabathia, LHP, Cleveland Indians

I'm not falling prey to the arbitrary 20 win plateau as an argument. As the Indians pulled away from the Tigers in the last month and a half of the season, Sabathia went 6-1 with a 2.49 ERA, allowing only three home runs in 80 innings and beat Johan Santana twice. Finished 19-7, 3.21 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 209 K and went 2-1 with a 1.17 ERA against this year's playoff teams. The Indians scored three runs or less in ten of his starts.

Runner-ups:

Josh Beckett: 20-7, 3.27 ERA, 1.14 WHIP, 194 K. Red Sox went from very good to dominant with him. Very close second, but had 1.5 more runs of support to work with than Sabathia. The Red Sox scored seven runs or more in 12 of his starts.

John Lackey: 19-9, 3.01 ERA, 1.21 WHIP, 179 K. Very good year, but numbers inflated by three late-season wins when the games meant nothing to the team. The Angels scored three runs or less in a whopping 13 of his 33 starts, though.


Rookie of the Year: Brian Bannister, RHP, Kansas City Royals

He went 12-9 on a team that went 69-93. Coupled with a 3.78 ERA and 1.21 WHIP, he wins it hands-down over Pedroia/Matsuzaka. It could have been better. On September 2, he was 12-7 with a 3.16 ERA that would have been fourth best in the AL this year.

Runner-ups:

Dustin Pedroia: .317/.380/.442-8-50-7. Great average for a rookie. Very durable. Solidied a position that was a HUGE question mark for Boston coming into the season.

Daisuke Matsuzaka: 15-12, 4.40 ERA, 1.32 WHIP. Yo-yo type year. On pace to win 20 early on and then blew up.


Comeback Player of the Year: Carlos Peña, 1b, Tampa Bay Devil Rays

After 33 at-bats with the Red Sox last year, Peña finally did what he's been telling everyone within shouting distance he could do. After a slow start, he had an OPS over 1.000 in four of the last five months, walked 103 times on the year and hit 13 hrs in September with a .484 OBP. This one wasn't even close.

Runner-ups:

Chone Figgins: .330/.393/.432-3-58-41. Was hitting .347 as late as September 22 before going 0-18. Broke hand in Spring Training, came back to go 12 for his first 90 (.133) and then hit .461 in June, .351 in July and .342 in August.

Javier Vazquez: The 'comeback' moniker is so arbitrary, but if it means the biggest disparity between consecutive years, Vazquez should be mentioned. Finished 15-8 (on a team that finished 72-90) with a 3.74 ERA, a 1.14 WHIP and 213 k in 216 innings. And the White Sox scored one run or less in seven of his starts. He returned to the form that made teams salivate over him four years ago in Montreal.


Manager of the Year: Mike Scioscia, Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim

He took a team with absolutely no power and got 94 wins out of them. Finishing 27th in the MLB in home runs but 6th in runs, no other manager got more from less, played four rookies (basically) in the starting lineup and dealt with more strange injuries in key positions than any Angels team in recent memory.

Runner-up:

Joe Torre: Yes, I said it. This team was in shambles as late as the end of May. And that pitching was brutal. Something was settled down and someone figured out how to manage the egos.


The terribly average National League tomorrow. NL ROY is the flashpoint for stupidity.

Thanks for reading.