The Daily Prospectus: A Ballot

Below is my ballot for this year’s Internet Baseball Awards. I’m not going
to get too deeply into explaining the choices, but I will provide a general
description of my rationale in putting together each ballot.

If you’d like to vote in the IBAs,
go to the page here at Baseball
Prospectus and cast your vote by October 12.

Most Valuable Player

I don’t spend a whole lot of time worrying about team performance. I’m
looking at what the player himself did; if it’s close, I may consider more
context, but for the most part, it’s only about the player.

My primary bias is towards up-the-middle players, even over and above the
kinds of adjustments you see in
Runs Above Replacment
or
VORP or other
metrics. I believe that hitters at first base or DH or lousy defensive left
fielders are a dime a dozen these days, but that having a quality bat who
can play shortstop or catch is gold.

One other thing, and this applies to Cy Young and rookie balloting as well:
I’m increasingly suspicious of short-term park factors in any places other
than Denver and Los Angeles. I’m not ignoring them, but I am taking
them with a larger grain of salt than I used to.

AL MVP

1. Alex Rodriguez
2. Pedro Martinez
3. Nomar Garciaparra
4. Jason Giambi
5. Carlos Delgado
6. Manny Ramirez
7. Frank Thomas
8. Charles Johnson
9. Troy Glaus
10. Jorge Posada

NL MVP

1. Mike Piazza
2. Jeff Kent
3. Barry Bonds
4. Vladimir Guerrero
5. Andruw Jones
6. Jim Edmonds
7. Randy Johnson
8. Sammy Sosa
9. Edgardo Alfonzo
10. Brian Giles

Cy Young

Cy Young is pretty basic: keeping runs off the board and pitching a lot.
Again, while I look at things like
Support-Neutral statistics
and
VORP, the
park-factor element means I’ve weighted them less than in previous years.

OK, one comment: anyone who votes for anyone but Pedro Martinez for
AL Cy Young is an idiot.

AL Cy Young

1. Pedro Martinez
2. Mike Mussina
3. Roger Clemens
4. David Wells
5. Mike Sirotka

NL Cy Young

1. Randy Johnson
2. Kevin Brown
3. Greg Maddux
4. Jeff D'Amico
5. Tom Glavine

Rookie of the Year

Best player with rookie status. I’m inclined to take a guy with less
playing time if the performance was really good, and slightly more inclined
to consider team/season context. Slightly.

AL Rookie of the Year

1. Terrence Long
2. Kazuhiro Sasaki
3. Barry Zito

NL Rookie of the Year

1. Rick Ankiel
2. Rafael Furcal
3. Mitch Meluskey

Joe Sheehan can be reached at jsheehan@baseballprospectus.com.