{"id":13179,"date":"2016-11-18T10:04:25","date_gmt":"2016-11-18T15:04:25","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=13179"},"modified":"2016-11-18T10:04:25","modified_gmt":"2016-11-18T15:04:25","slug":"bbwaa-award-post-mortem-are-the-writers-finally-getting-things-right","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=13179","title":{"rendered":"BBWAA award post-mortem; are the writers finally getting things right?"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_4991\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/VerlanderJustin-unknown-via-rumorsandrants.com_2.jpg\" rel=\"attachment wp-att-4991\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-4991\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-4991\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/VerlanderJustin-unknown-via-rumorsandrants.com_2-300x285.jpg\" alt=\"Well, he'll always have Kate. And his Ferraris. Photo unk via rumorsandrants.com\" width=\"300\" height=\"285\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/VerlanderJustin-unknown-via-rumorsandrants.com_2-300x285.jpg 300w, https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/VerlanderJustin-unknown-via-rumorsandrants.com_2.jpg 407w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-4991\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Well, he&#8217;ll always have Kate. And his Ferraris. Photo unk via rumorsandrants.com<\/p><\/div>\n<p>Every year I publish an &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=12186\">End of Season Awards Prediction<\/a>&#8221; piece, and then every year I write a post-mortem patting myself on the back for how good I was at predicting the awards.<\/p>\n<p>(I should put this in as a reminder; my &#8220;prediction&#8221; pieces are just that; my attempt to Predict how the BBWAA electorate will vote. \u00a0It is NOT my personal opinion on who should have won. )<\/p>\n<p>In 2015 I went (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=11524\">7 for 8<\/a>). \u00a0 In 2014 (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=9957\">6 for 8<\/a>), 2013 (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=7808\">8 for 8<\/a>), 2012 (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=5004\">7 for 8<\/a>), 2011 (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=3052\">8 for 8<\/a>), and 2010 (<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=192\">8 for 8<\/a>).<\/p>\n<p>However this year, I missed on fully half the awards. \u00a0Here&#8217;s the ones I got right:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>NL MVP<\/strong>: Predicted Bryant, Seager, Murphy, Rizzo, Freeman\/Arenado. \u00a0Actual went\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/bbwaa.com\/16-nl-mvp\/\">Bryant, Murphy, Seager, Rizzo, Arenado<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>NL Cy Young<\/strong>: Predicted Scherzer, Fernandez, Hendricks, Lester,\u00a0Snydergaard. \u00a0Actual went\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/news\/nationals-ace-max-scherzer-wins-nl-cy-young-award-232134299.html\">Scherzer, Lester, Hendricks, Bumgarner, Kershaw<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>NL Rookie<\/strong>: Predicted Seager, Turner, Maeda. \u00a0Actual went\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.mlbtraderumors.com\/2016\/11\/corey-seager-michael-fulmer-win-rookie-of-the-year-awards.html\">Seager, Turner, Maeda<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>AL Manager<\/strong>: Predicted Franconia, Bannister, Girardi. \u00a0Actual went\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/m.mlb.com\/news\/article\/208911150\/bbwaa-al-and-nl-managers-of-the-year-announced\/\">Franconia, Bannister,\u00a0Showalter<\/a>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>And here&#8217;s the ones I got wrong:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>AL MVP: <\/strong>Predicted\u00a0Betts, Trout, Donaldson, Machado, Altuve (maybe some 5th place votes for Ortiz). \u00a0Actual went\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.mlbtraderumors.com\/2016\/11\/mike-trout-kris-bryant-win-mvp-awards.html\">Trout, Betts, Altuve, Donaldson, Machado<\/a>. \u00a0(Ortiz came in 6th).<\/li>\n<li><strong>AL Cy Young<\/strong>: Predicted Kluber, Verlander, Porcello, Sale, Britton. \u00a0Actual went\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/sports.yahoo.com\/news\/nationals-ace-max-scherzer-wins-nl-cy-young-award-232134299.html\">Porcello, Verlander, Kluber, Britton, Sale<\/a>\u00a0(Verlander get hosed, as\u00a0<strong>Kate Upton<\/strong> noted on twitter).<\/li>\n<li><strong>AL Rookie<\/strong>: Predicted Sanchez, Fulmer, Mazara. \u00a0Actual went\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mlbtraderumors.com\/2016\/11\/corey-seager-michael-fulmer-win-rookie-of-the-year-awards.html\">Fulmer, Sanchez, Naquin<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li><strong>NL Manager<\/strong>: Predicted Baker, Maddon, Roberts. \u00a0Actual went\u00a0 <a href=\"http:\/\/m.mlb.com\/news\/article\/208911150\/bbwaa-al-and-nl-managers-of-the-year-announced\/\">Roberts, Maddon,\u00a0Baker<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>For the ones I got wrong, here was my thinking for predicting the wrong winner:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>For AL MVP, I figured that once again Trout would be penalized and get a 2nd place MVP vote thanks to his team being awful. \u00a0Instead, he got <a href=\"http:\/\/bbwaa.com\/16-al-mvp\/\">19 of the 30 1st place votes<\/a> to rightfully earn his 2nd MVP.<\/li>\n<li>For the AL Cy Young, I never thought Verlander would get close thanks to his slow start, and I figured Kluber would repeat as a result. \u00a0Instead Porcello won when two writers inexplicably left Verlander completely off their ballots.<\/li>\n<li>For the AL Rookie, I absolutely figured that the NY media would over-blow Sanchez&#8217; amazing start and give him the award over the more deserving Fulmer. \u00a0 \u00a0I was way off; Fulmer got 26 of the 30 1st place votes to win in a landslide.<\/li>\n<li>And for the NL Manager, I figured people would do what they always do; look at the team that improved the most and give the award to their manager by default. \u00a0For 2016 that was easily the Nats.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>So what happened? \u00a0 My conclusion; I think the Electorate is finally starting to get these awards &#8220;right,&#8221; or at least more &#8220;right&#8221; than in recent memory. \u00a0All of my &#8220;narrative-driven&#8221; predictions were wrong thanks to voters being smarter and picking the right winner (well, except for Verlander of course).<\/p>\n<p>This is great news! \u00a0 Bravo to the BBWAA writers for improving. \u00a0 Now about that Hall of Fame ballot&#8230;.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Every year I publish an &#8220;End of Season Awards Prediction&#8221; piece, and then every year I write a post-mortem patting myself on the back for how good I was at predicting the awards. (I should put this in as a reminder; my &#8220;prediction&#8221; pieces are just that; my attempt to Predict how the BBWAA electorate [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2667,5],"tags":[593,1174,1169,426,1957,2594,1859,604,845,187,3297,2975,1395,419,221,2562,1886,2046,44,3375,1597,1776,2912,894,1753,1037,3303,456,3354,2326,1947,3357,266,248,2426,3358,2327],"class_list":["post-13179","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-awards","category-natsgeneral","tag-anthony-rizzo","tag-buck-showalter","tag-chris-sale","tag-clayton-kershaw","tag-corey-kluber","tag-corey-seager","tag-daniel-murphy","tag-dave-roberts","tag-dusty-baker","tag-freddie-freeman","tag-gary-sanchez","tag-jeff-bannister","tag-joe-girardi","tag-joe-maddon","tag-jon-lester","tag-jose-altuve","tag-jose-fernandez","tag-josh-donaldson","tag-justin-verlander","tag-kate-upton","tag-kenta-maeda","tag-kris-bryant","tag-kyle-hendricks","tag-madison-bumgarner","tag-manny-machado","tag-max-scherzer","tag-michael-fulmer","tag-mike-trout","tag-mookie-betts","tag-noah-snydergaard","tag-nolan-arenado","tag-nomar-mazara","tag-rick-porcello","tag-terry-franconia","tag-trea-turner","tag-tyler-naquin","tag-zach-britton"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13179","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=13179"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13179\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":13183,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13179\/revisions\/13183"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=13179"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=13179"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=13179"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}