{"id":8128,"date":"2013-11-15T07:16:55","date_gmt":"2013-11-15T12:16:55","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=8128"},"modified":"2014-11-13T09:02:44","modified_gmt":"2014-11-13T14:02:44","slug":"repost-why-didnt-carlos-gomez-get-more-nl-mvp-support","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=8128","title":{"rendered":"Repost: Why didn’t Carlos Gomez get more NL MVP support??"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Why<\/a>

Why didn’t Carlos Gomez getting the same attention for MVP that Mike Trout gets? Photo Denis Poroy\/Getty Images via zimbio.com<\/p><\/div>\n

[Editor’s Note<\/strong>: I posted this initially on\u00a0October 29th, 2013<\/a>,\u00a0and didn’t get a SINGLE comment. \u00a0Maybe it got lost in the World Series hoopla; maybe all the readers of this blog were taking a post-season Nats break. \u00a0I’m reposting this and changing all the cases to past tense in the wake of 11\/14\/13’s MVP voting<\/a>. \u00a0I’d like to get some discussion here; if you are an ardent Mike Trout supporter and use WAR as part of your argument, i’d like to hear your thoughts on this post].<\/p>\n

The title of this post says it all. \u00a0It is a simple question.<\/p>\n

Brewers break-out star\u00a0Carlos Gomez<\/strong>\u00a0led the\u00a0NL in bWAR<\/a>\u00a0in 2013. \u00a0Gomez played for a non-playoff team. \u00a0He\u00a0augmented his 24-homer<\/a>\/.506 slugging bat with speed on the basepaths (40 SBs) and plus defense in center (he was just named to\u00a0Bill James<\/strong>\u00a0Fielding Bible Team<\/a>\u00a0as the best defensive Center Fielder in the game and won a Gold Glove<\/a>). \u00a0Yet Gomez lost out on the MVP award, which went to<\/a>\u00a0Andrew McCutchen<\/strong>, a player who trailed him in the bWAR standings but who played for a playoff team.<\/p>\n

Sounds an awful lot like the\u00a0Mike Trout<\/strong>\/Miguel Cabrera<\/strong>\u00a0comparison, doesn’t it?<\/p>\n

Gomez didn’t just lose out; he\u00a0wasn’t even named a FINALIST for the NL MVP, meaning he wasn’t even in the top 3 candidates in the NL. \u00a0In fact, Gomez\u00a0came in NINTH<\/a>! \u00a0He wasn’t even close to winning despite leading the league in one version of WAR.<\/p>\n

Why did nobody talk about Carlos Gomez for the NL MVP? \u00a0In fact, in the litany of post-season award prediction pieces I read, he was never really even mentioned. \u00a0You heard about McCutchen,\u00a0Clayton<\/strong>\u00a0Kershaw<\/strong>\u00a0and\u00a0<\/strong>Paul Goldschmidt<\/strong>\u00a0as the top 3 NL candidates, then you heard about guys from the other playoff teams (Yadier Molina\u00a0<\/b>or\u00a0Matt Carpenter<\/strong>\u00a0from St. Louis,\u00a0Joey Votto<\/strong>\u00a0from Cincinnati, or\u00a0Freddie Freeman<\/strong>\u00a0from Atlanta). \u00a0Where’s Gomez on this list?<\/p>\n

If you are a critic of the Miguel Cabrera pick and maintain that Mike Trout deserves the MVP in the AL and use “WAR” as a basis for your argument … then are you similarly arguing that Gomez should have won in the NL MVP right now?<\/p>\n

I think the entire Trout-Cabrera argument is tired; I’m tired of hearing it and I’m sure people are tired of talking about it. \u00a0The critics of those who support Cabrera for MVP like to talk about the “narrative” of the MVP, how the award criteria definition on the ballots seems to imply that the winner “should” come from a playoff team. \u00a0But I’m of the opinion that those who blindly live by the WAR stat and support Trout but do NOT similarly demand support of Gomez are falling victim to their own “narrative” as well. \u00a0And that narrative is continued obstinance to a cause without looking up to see what else fits their world-view.<\/p>\n

Ask yourself; if you think Trout is the AL MVP (this year or last year) … then what’s your argument that Gomez is NOT the NL MVP this year? \u00a0Where’s all the narrative-driven arguments about how “you shouldn’t lose the MVP because your teammates were bad” or that “the MVP doesn’t have to come from a playoff team.” \u00a0Because if you make those arguments in favor of Trout and not in favor of Gomez, then you’re a “narrative hypocrite” just like someone who says the reverse and supports Cabrera and McCutchen BECAUSE they played on playoff teams.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

[Editor’s Note: I posted this initially on\u00a0October 29th, 2013,\u00a0and didn’t get a SINGLE comment. \u00a0Maybe it got lost in the World Series hoopla; maybe all the readers of this blog were taking a post-season Nats break. \u00a0I’m reposting this and changing all the cases to past tense in the wake of 11\/14\/13’s MVP voting. \u00a0I’d […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2667,6],"tags":[424,635,1924,426,187,592,1183,405,456,1662,1923],"class_list":["post-8128","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-awards","category-nonnatsbaseball","tag-andrew-mccutchen","tag-bill-james","tag-carlos-gomez","tag-clayton-kershaw","tag-freddie-freeman","tag-joey-votto","tag-matt-carpenter","tag-miguel-cabrera","tag-mike-trout","tag-paul-goldschmidt","tag-yadier-molina"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8128","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=8128"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8128\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8133,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8128\/revisions\/8133"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8128"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8128"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8128"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}