The major league baseball awards season is behind us now, and the Boston Red Sox went .500 last week.
On Wednesday, Rick Porcello won his first Cy Young Award. A day later, Mookie Betts had to settle for runner-up in the American League MVP Award.
Voting for the two awards served as a reminder that we are at a crossroads in baseball, an intersection where modern analytical analysis is clashing with old-school axioms.
Porcello’s Cy Young was met with outrage in some corners. He didn’t receive nearly as many first-place votes as Detroit’s Justin Verlander, but Porcello had more total points than any other candidate. It’s kind of like losing the popular vote but taking the Electoral College … but I’m not going there.
Voters faced an interesting group of pitchers to choose from. Porcello’s numbers were very similar to those of Verlander and Corey Kluber of the Indians. Porcello’s numbers were impressive, with a 22-4 record over 223 innings of work. He struck out 189 batters and posted an ERA of 3.15.
Trouble is, Verlander threw more innings, struck out more batters, and had a lower ERA than Porcello. Verlander got 14 first-place votes to Porcello’s eight. The problem he had is that he didn’t receive any votes at all from two voters (both, interestingly, from Tampa Bay).
It was only the third time in history that a pitcher won the Cy Young without receiving the most first-place votes.
Porcello’s 22 wins led the American League, and some believe it was that total that gave him the edge. And therein lies the problem for the followers of modern metrics. Most of them don’t believe that a win is a viable pitching statistic. They believe winning is the byproduct of a team, that there are too many variables for it to factor into pitching analysis.
The old-schoolers say wins show a pitcher who hangs in long enough to get a W. On Wednesday, they held the day.
A day later, things changed. Mike Trout won the MVP Award despite playing for an Angels team that didn’t make the postseason. Many old-schoolers believe the word “value” should be defined as what a player did to help a team compete. Their argument is that without Trout the Angels wouldn’t make the playoffs; with him, they still didn’t. The Red Sox may not have made the postseason if not for Betts’ contributions.
Trout had a better statistical season than Betts. His OPS was nearly 100 points higher. If you prefer more modern metrics, you can look at the difference in WAR (Wins Above Replacement). Trout was at 10.55, while Betts came in at 9.55, according to Baseball Reference.
Many thought the biggest difference between the two would be the team’s success. The Red Sox won 19 more games than the Angels this season. Wouldn’t the players’ value factor into a team’s success?
Trout thought it would.
“I was really surprised,” Trout told reporters after winning the award last week. “If your team doesn’t have a great record, what do you think about your MVP chances?”
It turns out team wins aren’t valued as highly for individual awards anymore. At least, not in the MVP race. They still mattered for the Cy Young Award.
Tom Caron is a studio host for the Red Sox broadcast on NESN. His column appears in the Portland Press Herald on Tuesdays.
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