Kuzul

Every year, managers, coaches and writers from around Major League Baseball award honors and trophies to the players—and every year, they screw up.

So Bleacher Report’s Featured Columnists decided to do it ourselves. Instead of just complaining about the awards as they are announced as we would normally do on our own, we teamed up to hold our own mock awards vote.

Yesterday, we kicked off Week 2 of our four-week-long results series with our picks for AL Comeback Player of the Year. Today, we look at the veterans from the Senior Circuit who best resurrected their careers in 2010.

Of the 17 players who received votes, the top five are featured here with commentary from people who chose them. The full list of votes is at the end.

So read on, see how we did and be sure to let us know what we got wrong!

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Every year, managers, coaches and writers from around Major League Baseball award honors and trophies to the players—and every year, they screw up.

This week, Bleacher Report’s Featured Columnists kicked off our preemptive response to the BBWAA’s ineptitude: a 16-part series in which 33 writers weighed in on who should win the game’s top honors, starting with the Gold Gloves in the AL on Monday and the NL on Tuesday.

Yesterday, we turned our attention to the AL Silver Sluggers—the best hitters at each position in the Junior Circuit. Today, we round out the first week of results with the NL Silver Sluggers.

So read on, see how we did and be sure to let us know what we got wrong!

Begin Slideshow

Every year, managers, coaches and writers from around Major League Baseball award honors and trophies to the players. And every year, they screw up.

This week, Bleacher Report’s Featured Columnists kicked off our preemptive response to the BBWAA’s ineptitude: a 16-part series in which 33 writers weighed in on who should win the game’s top honors, starting with the AL Gold Gloves on Monday and the NL Gold Gloves on Tuesday.

Today, we turn our attention to the AL Silver Sluggers—the best hitters at each position in the Junior Circuit.

So read on, see how we did and be sure to let us know what we got wrong.

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Each year, at least a handful of undeserving players take home one of MLB’s annual end-of-season awards.

Consider Jimmy Rollins’ MVP award in 2007 and Roger Clemens beating out Randy Johnson for the NL Cy Young in 2004.

Even last year, it would be hard to argue for why Torii Hunter deserved a Silver Slugger or Derek Jeter really earned his Gold Glove.

Rather than just complain about the voters’ inevitable mistakes after the fact, Bleacher Report’s Featured Columnists decided to put our money where our collective mouth is.

During the last week of the regular season, 33 FCs submitted their picks for Gold Gloves, Silver Sluggers, Comeback Players of the Year, Relief Men of the Year, Rookies of the Year, Managers of the Year, Cy Youngs and Most Valuable Players in at least one of the two leagues.

Yesterday, we kicked off our four-week, 16-part series with the results of the AL Gold Glove winners. Today, we take a look at the best defenders in the Senior Circuit.

So read on, see how we did and be sure to let us know what we got wrong.

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Every year, members of the Baseball Writers’ Association of America fulfill their duties by voting for the Rookie of the Year, Manager of the Year, Cy Young and Most Valuable Player awards. And every year, they find new ways to screw up.

Remember when Justin Morneau was named AL MVP in 2006? Or when Bartolo Colon took home the AL Cy Young in 2005? Just last year, a majority of voters chose Adam Wainwright over one or both of Chris Carpenter and Tim Lincecum for the NL Cy Young, therefore implicitly declaring that wins are somehow the most important pitching statistic.

When managers and coaches vote, things get even worse. What possible justification could there be for Torii Hunter being named a Silver Slugger and Derek Jeter taking home a Gold Glove after last season? Then there’s the Rolaids Relief Man Award, which is given out based solely on wins, losses and saves.

Everyone has an opinion, and everyone thinks he could do a better job. But talk is cheap, and saying you could do better is very different from actually doing better.

So Bleacher Report’s Featured Columnists decided to put our money where our collective mouth is. During the last week of the regular season, 33 FCs submitted their picks for Gold Gloves, Silver Sluggers, Comeback Players of the Year, Relief Men of the Year, Rookies of the Year, Managers of the Year, Cy Youngs and Most Valuable Players in at least one of the two leagues.

This slideshow, showcasing the winners of our AL Gold Glove vote, will be the first of a four-week, 16-part series featuring 110 players and managers. So read on, see how we did, and be sure to let us know what we got wrong.

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In Baseball Between the Numbers: Why Everything You Know About the Game is Wrong, Nate Silver and Dayn Perry tackled a question that had mystified fans and analysts for more than a century: What are the most important qualities for a team to have in the playoffs?

Through the magic of statistics, Silver and Perry found that only three aspects of the game had any correlation with teams doing well once they got to the postseason. The results: Good defense, a lights-out closer, and a pitching staff’s strikeout rate.

After re-reading their essay last week, I started to wonder how this year’s best teams stacked up in terms of these core qualities. So I did a bit of research and found some interesting results.

I ranked each of the eight playoff teams in all three categories, using FanGraphs’ ultimate zone rating for fielding and Baseball Prospectus’ win expectation above replacement to measure closers. Then I took each team’s average rankings and sorted them that way. 

The results are by no means conclusive—I certainly don’t advocate using this list as the end-all be-all—but it’s interesting to see what the math has to say instead of just waiting to hear Joe Morgan’s idiotic rant du jour.

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You can spend all season waiting for the playoffs. You can design a roster around winning a seven-game series. You can run simulations and statistical analysis until you’re blue in the face.

But you still won’t be ready for October.

Each year, problems and uncertainties arise, and even the best teams are forced to face the unpleasant reality that things don’t always go the way you plan them.

Here are 15 of the biggest questions facing playoff teams as they prepare to kick off the postseason tomorrow.

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Say what you want about the problems with MLB‘s current playoff system. You can bemoan the addition of the Wild Card, or whine about how home field advantage for the World Series is determined by the All-Star Game, or complain that a best-of-five series is a poor way to determine which of two good teams is superior.

But when the first round kicks off on Wednesday, don’t pretend that you won’t be watching.

The postseason is when heroes are made. It’s when role players become household names, and stars aim to reach immortality. I know it sounds like a cheesy MLB Network commercial, but I defy any baseball fan to disagree.

In this slideshow are the 25 players who have had the best postseason careers in MLB history. Because this is about the career as a whole, I tried to make rankings relatively context-neutral, so a clutch hit or a walk-off homer didn’t matter as much as they would have in, say, a “top postseason moments” article.

If someone you think deserves to be here didn’t make the cut, that doesn’t mean he wasn’t considered—my original list had 75 names, meaning 50 nearly worthy players almost made it in.

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It’s been a bad year for Cleveland Indians fans.

Most of us Tribe faithful had low expectations when the season began. This was supposed to be a transition year, as the fruits of one of the deepest farm systems in the game got their first taste of the big leagues.

But even if they weren’t supposed to be serious contenders, it’s hard to see the Indians flailing behind even the Kansas City Royals in the basement of the AL Central without wondering how things went this wrong.

It wasn’t just the kids’ growing pains that sent the season off the rails—it was consistent ineptitude from the established veterans who were supposed to set good examples for their whippersnapper teammates.

Face-of-the-franchise Grady Sizemore got bitten by the injury bug again in 2010, (not that he did the team much good when he was healthy). Travis Hafner continued his decline, and guys like Jhonny Peralta, Luis Valbuena, and David Huff all were mediocre at best.

And yet, buried somewhere in the metaphorical pile of vomit that has been the Indians’ season (I don’t think that really makes sense, but it’s a fitting image) there have been some things that should make us Tribe fans feel hopeful and—dare I say?—proud.

Here are 10 reasons why Cleveland still rocks.

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The advent of sabermetrics has changed the way we look at “clutch.”

“Situational hitting” is luck. “Inducing weak contact” is luck. “Performing under pressure” is luck. It’s all been proven with math and logic and regression analysis.

But screw that, because it’s a pennant race, and even the most logical stathead has subjective ideas about who he’d most want to see step to the plate with his favorite team’s season on the line.

Here is my 2010 All-Clutch team, comprised of the players who have demonstrated the best ability to perform when it counts. I tried to limit my list to players from contending teams, since they’re the only ones who really matter at this point.

Here’s to hoping we get to see one of these guys come up with a big hit this October.

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