Whoever Gave Albert Pujols a 7th Place MVP Vote Should Lose His/Her Voting Privileges Forever

...and I'm not just talking about MLB regular season awards, here. I'm talking about voting for anything at all ever. Feel like casting a vote in that upcoming school board election, Mr./Mrs./Ms. Anonymous BBWAA Voter Person? Sorry; you picked Pujols 7th in the '08 NL MVP race. We've got your picture right here at the polling station to prevent you from failing democracy ever again. Trying to vote down your eight-year-old son's suggestion that your family stop at Arby's for lunch? Tough shit; you thought Pujols was only the 7th most valuable player in the National League in 2008.

And so on and so forth.

In fairness, I should mention that I've been pretty happy with the voting for most of the major regular season awards so far this year. Lincecum wasn't my pick for the NL Cy Young, but he was a good pick nonetheless (although Santana deserved a lot more love than he got). Lee followed by Halladay was the right choice in the AL, and the voters deserve a lot of credit for not sending a single first place vote K-Rod's way. Longoria followed by Ramirez was spot on in the AL Rookie of the Year race (as was Longoria's unanimous selection), and Soto followed by Votto was the right call in the NL.

And Albert Pujols was the right choice for the National League's Most Valuable Player award in 2008.

But Ryan Howard shouldn't even have been in the same area code as Pujols in the MVP voting, let alone only 61 points back (and with 12 of 32 first place votes, no less!). Not only did Howard have his worst full big league season to date in 2008, but he might not have even been the MVP of his own team.

But I'm getting ahead of myself.

First off, it's important to note that with the exception of HR and RBI, Pujols outperformed Howard in every single major offensive category. In most categories, Howard wasn't even close to Pujols. But just like seemingly every year, the definition of the term "valuable" was a major point of disagreement among writers (voters and voteless alike) when the time came to debate this year's MVP. There is little question that Pujols was the better player in 2008, but was he the more valuable player? After all, when the MVP voting took place, Howard's Phillies were gearing up for the postseason and Pujols's Cardinals were cleaning out their lockers, and typically league MVPs are expected to lead their teams to success (translation: October). Put simply, many voters equate "MVP" with "team success," and "team success" with "postseason berth," meaning the MVP should play for a postseason team.

And yet, while the Phillies outperformed their preseason PECOTA projected W/L of 86-76 and finished the year 92-70, ahead of a Mets team that, for the second straight year, folded like a cheap card table in September, the Cardinals blew their 75-87 projected W/L out of the water en route to an 86-76 record that kept them in the NL Wild Card hunt until the last month or so of the regular season.

To call the Cardinals' 2008 season a "surprise" would be an understatement. St. Louis lost their top two starters (Carpenter and Mulder) for the year and got a 75 ERA+, 1.641 WHIP season out of their former closer (Isringhausen). Their number one starter was Adam Wainwright. I'm pretty sure Busch Stadium was the site of at least a couple "who wants to pitch the sixth inning for the St. Louis Cardinals tonight?" promotions this year. And still, the Redbirds won 86 games in '08.

So even if we assume that a player's "value" is inextricably linked to his team's "success," defining a "successful" season presents some tricky questions. Does success mean outperforming preseason projections by 6 wins en route to a playoff berth, or winning 11 more games than PECOTA predicted and going home early after shaking up the playoff picture for most of the regular season?

I'm not trying to undercut Philadelphia's accomplishments this year. After all, the Phillies would have won the Wild Card by two games even if the Mets hadn't handed them the division. But to call St. Louis's season "unsuccessful" seems ridiculous to me. Sure, the Cardinals weren't the Rays this year. But they also weren't the Mariners, and they finished well over .500 (.531), when they had no business doing so, on the strength of Pujols and, to a lesser extent, Ryan Ludwick (and to a lesser, lesser extent, Troy Glaus).

Ryan Howard's supporting cast (which, notably, includes pitchers)? A few guys named Utley, Rollins, Burrell, Hamels, and Lidge.

Further eroding Howard's MVP case is the possibility that Chase Utley, and not Ryan Howard, was the Phillies's MVP this year. Utley outperformed Howard in VORP, WARP1, EqA, total win shares, OBP, OPS, OPS+, H, 2B, BA, and R, was only slightly behind Howard in batting win shares, SLG, and TB, and was dead even with Howard in XBH, all while playing excellent defense at a skill position (2B).

In St. Louis, Pujols was clearly his team's MVP, finishing ahead of teammate Ryan Ludwick (who, notably, outperformed Howard and Utley in quite a few categories himself!) in every major offensive category except HR and R while playing a strong defensive first base.

Here's how the numbers break down (NL rank in parenthesis, assuming league rankings were readily available and the player was high enough on the list that I didn't get tired of counting):

VORP
Pujols: 96.8 (1)
Utley: 63.7 (6)
Ludwick: 54.8 (10)
Howard: 36.6 (29)

WARP1
Pujols: 13.0
Utley: 10.4
Ludwick: 10.1
Howard: 5.0

EqA
Pujols: .372 (1)
Ludwick: .320 (4)
Utley: .308 (12)
Howard: .291

Total Win Shares
Pujols: 35 (2)
Utley: 30 (5)
Ludwick: 26 (10)
Howard: 25 (16)

Batting Win Shares
Pujols: 33.0 (2)
Howard: 23.8 (9)
Utley: 23.2 (10)
Ludwick: 22.7 (11)

OBP
Pujols: .462 (2)
Utley: .380 (T-12)
Ludwick: .375 (T-17)
Howard: .339 (T-48)

SLG
Pujols: .653 (1)
Ludwick: .591 (2)
Howard: .543 (7)
Utley: .535 (10)

OPS
Pujols: 1.115 (1)
Ludwick: .966 (4)
Utley: .915 (8)
Howard: .882

OPS+
Pujols: 190 (1)
Ludwick: 150 (4)
Utley: 135 (10)
Howard: 124

HR
Howard: 48 (1)
Pujols/Ludwick: 37 (T-4)
Utley: 33 (T-9)

2B
Pujols: 44 (T-4)
Utley: 41 (T-10)
Ludwick: 40 (T-13)
Howard: 26 (T-60)

H
Pujols: 187 (3)
Utley: 177 (T-10)
Ludwick: 161 (T-30)
Howard: 153 (T-43)

XBH
Pujols: 81 (2)
Ludwick: 80 (3)
Howard/Utley: 78 (T-5)

TB
Pujols: 342 (1)
Howard: 331 (4)
Utley: 325 (6)
Ludwick: 318 (T-7)

BB
Pujols: 104 (2)
Howard: 81 (T-13)
Utley: 64 (T-29)
Ludwick: 62 (T-31)

SO
Howard: 199 (2)
Ludwick: 146 (7)
Utley: 104 (T-40)
Pujols: 54

BA
Pujols: .357 (2)
Ludwick: .299 (15)
Utley: .292 (19)
Howard: .251 (T-58)

R
Utley: 113 (T-5)
Howard: 105 (9)
Ludwick: 104 (10)
Pujols: 100 (14)

RBI
Howard: 146 (1)
Pujols: 116 (4)
Ludwick: 113 (6)
Utley: 104 (11)

By the numbers, Pujols was far-and-away the best player of the four; I'm not going to insult the intelligence of anyone who has read this far by presuming it necessary to perform a Pujols vs. Howard statistical analysis. But Howard vs. Utley is tough to call. For my money, Utley was the better hitter in 2008, and his defensive contributions at second were far more valuable (there's that word again!) than Howard's at first. But even if I believed that Howard was the MVP of the Phillies this year (which I don't), the fact that he was not clearly better than Utley while Pujols was so clearly better than Ludwick, coupled with the Phillies' depth in 2008 as compared to the injury-riddled-but-nevertheless-86-win Cardinals, makes Ryan Howard a poor MVP choice in my book.

And yet, somehow, enough people overlooked Howard's low VORP, WARP1, and OBP—not to mention the fact that he hit behind Jimmy Rollins and Chase Utley and was protected by Pat "The Bat" Burrell—and overrated his HR and RBI totals as well as his team's playoff berth enough to make this year's NL MVP race far more competetive than it should have been.

I suppose I should be grateful that, despite Howard's absurdly strong showing, Albert Pujols still took home his second NL MVP award this year. And I am. But I'm disheartened by definitions of "valuable" that allow such a clearly inferior player (inferior to Pujols, that is—I mean no offense to Howard) to come so close to beating out the best player in the league for the MVP.

And c'mon...7th place???

So congratulations, Albert. Here's hoping every one of your trips to Wrigley ends with the Cardinals losing despite your valiant 4-for-4 effort at the plate, and that the BBWAA finally gets comfortable with sending MVP votes your way every single year in this, the post-Bonds era.

2008 Positional MVP Picks: Catchers

This is the second installment in a position-by-position look at the most valuable players of 2008. I had initially intended to analyze relief pitchers second, immediately after their SP counterparts, but decided instead to switch to position players first and to then return to RP's near the end of the series. So welcome to Installment #2: Catchers.

Thanks to Jorge Posada’s shoulder surgery and Victor Martinez’s two+ months on the disabled list, the race for the top catcher in the big leagues looks much different this year than it did last year. Five backstops had solid-to-big years. Of those five, two have legitimate shots at the catching MVP, and in a wide-open AL MVP race, one even has a chance at a league MVP—you know, a real award—as well.

But before I rank the top five, I want to give a quick “Honorable Mention” to Mike Napoli, who would have easily cracked the list this year given more than 78 games under his belt. Based on his ridiculous partial season numbers and obvious talent (he’s put together better and better partial years the past three seasons), don’t be surprised if he makes a splash as soon as he gets 120-140 starts in a season.

Also, I feel I should make a few statistical disclaimers for this and all future posts concerning position players. I don’t care all that much about runs scored, and I care a whole lot less about RBIs. Both totals are too reliant on teammates’ performances to be primary metrics for individual awards (even made up awards like these positional MVPs). I don’t mean to suggest that a lot of runs and/or RBIs can’t be indicative of a good player and/or season, but rather that fewer runs and/or RBIs are not necessarily indicative of a comparatively worse player/season. Similarly, I don’t care about batting average in a vacuum, but coupled with OBP and/or BABIP it can show whether a hitter puts a lot of balls into play or takes a lot of walks (or both), and coupled with SLG can show how many of those hits go for extra bases. The relative unreliability of these metrics when cited, as they too often are, “in a vacuum” (without qualification) is much less of an issue in this installment than it will be at the big RBI positions (1B and corner outfielders), but I felt a blanket qualification was in order nonetheless.

And now, on with the top five catchers of 2008:

5.) Russell Martin regressed from his 2007 numbers, but he still put together a respectable season, particularly for a guy who spent 149 games crouched behind home plate. Martin hit .280/.385/.396 (BA/OBP/SLG) with 13 HR for an OPS of .781 (which translates into an OPS+ of 103), an EqA of .283, 22 total win shares, and a VORP of 33.7. His offensive numbers aren’t overwhelming (his SLG, in fact, is downright underwhelming), but they are above league average, and Martin was good enough defensively at a skill position to remain a valuable catcher in ’08. But the other four players on this list pace or outpace him in nearly every category, which makes Martin a third-tier catching MVP candidate this year.

4.) Ryan Doumit may not be a household name, having played his entire career (brief though it has been) in baseball purgatory (aka Pittsburgh), but in 2008 he showed what he’s capable of doing with more than half a season of playing time. Doumit’s batting line this year was .318/.357/.501 with 15 HR, good for an OPS of .858 (OPS+ 125), a .297 EqA, 22 total win shares, and a VORP of 35.8. He’s probably the weakest fielder on this list, but his bat kept him near the top of the catching heap in 2008 even though it wasn’t nearly enough to make him more than a second-tier candidate.

Like Napoli, though, Doumit didn’t play in as many games (only 116 games, 106 of them behind the plate) as any of the other catchers in my top 5, so we can only guess at the sort of year Doumit can put together given 20-30 more starts. He'll be interesting to watch, particularly if he escapes the anemic offense and small-market exposure in Pittsburgh.

3.) Geovany Soto will probably run away with the NL Rookie of the Year award, and, as a rabid Cubs fan, I’m very excited at the prospect. That said, Joey Votto is another deserving candidate, but Soto should (rightly) beat out the Reds’ first baseman due to his excellent defensive numbers at a skill position (good reasoning) as well as the fact that he played for a big market, division-winning team (bad reasoning).

Soto’s numbers are fantastic for a catcher, and even more impressive considering 2008 was his first full season (and only second overall) in the bigs. He went .285/.364/.504 with 23 HR, an .868 OPS (OPS+ 122), .288 EqA, 24 win shares (including a very impressive 9 fielding win shares), and a VORP of 39.3. He beats out Doumit for third primarily because he played in more games (allowing him to rack up higher quantitative statistics, like HRs) and played better defense in those games. Soto is a borderline first-tier candidate for the catching MVP, but the next two men on this list are simply too far ahead of him in VORP, and either comparable defensively or, in the case of my #2 man, not so much worse that Soto can make up such gaps in VORP (in particular), EqA and, to a lesser extent, OPS+.

2.) Three full seasons into his career, Brian McCann has certainly proven that he can punish a baseball. In 2008, McCann’s numbers included a .301/.373/.523 line, 23 HR, .896 OPS, 136 OPS+, .307 EqA, 21 win shares, and a VORP of 51.6. In fact, if I were only looking at offensive statistics, McCann might even be #1 on this list, though it would still be a pretty close race.

However, once defense is added to the equation, McCann’s overall value drops somewhat. Not by an awful lot, mind you—he’s ahead of the next runner up (Soto) in too many offensive categories (OBP, SLG, XBH [66 to 60], OPS, OPS+, EqA, and, in particular, VORP) for his glove to drop him past the number two slot—but faced with a similarly valuable offensive catcher with superior defensive skills, McCann falls short of the top catching spot in 2008.

1.) Joe Mauer returned to his ’06 form (see: ridiculously, ridiculously good) in 2008, compiling a .328/.413/.451 batting line with 9 HR, an .864 OPS, 134 OPS+, .316 EqA, a league-leading 31 win shares (22 batting and 9.2 fielding), a VORP of 55.5, and a substantial amount of MVP buzz. Mauer’s EqA, total win shares, and VORP were all tops among catchers.

Mauer and McCann are both very different (albeit very good) hitters. McCann hits for more power than Mauer does: he chalked up 66 XBH vs. only 44 for Mauer, who collected 31 doubles and 4 triples to go along with his 9 HR. But Mauer is an OBP machine. He takes a lot of walks (84 in ’08) to add to his characteristically high batting average (he won his second batting title this year) as well as to Justin Morneau’s characteristically high RBI totals. In a final offensive analysis, McCann has the edge in HR, XBH, SLG, OPS, and OPS+, but Mauer leads in hits (176 to 153), BA, OBP, EqA, batting win shares (22 to 16.2), and VORP.

Even in an offensive vacuum, Mauer probably deserves the nod for the top catcher of 2008, but adding his higher fielding win shares (9.2 to 4.9) to the equation widens his advantage over McCann in total win shares to 10 (31 to 21), giving Mauer the edge by a little over three wins. Baserunners were more conservative with Mauer than with McCann, as well, running on the Twins’ catcher only 80 times (and getting caught 29 times) as opposed to 120 times on McCann (who threw out two fewer runners—27—in 40 more chances).

Joe Mauer should not be the AL MVP this year, but he was definitely the most valuable big league catcher in 2008, and an easy choice for the top spot on this list.