Early-Season MVP by WPA
| 13
|
by user Tylersalt
Finally, I've found a good way to quantitatively define "valuable" in Most Valuable Player in a way that should end arguments on the matter... just in time to start another firestorm. Here are the top five hitters in each league by Win Probability Added.
- Alex Rodriguez (2.05)
- Magglio Ordonez (1.91)
- Grady Sizemore (1.87)
- Vladimir Guerrero (1.70)
- Placido Polanco (1.65)
- Barry Bonds (2.18)
- Todd Helton (1.77)
- Kelly Johnson (1.58)
- Lance Berkman (1.44)
- Adrian Gonzalez (1.39)
So there you have it. By definition, Bonds and A-Rod have been more valuable to their teams than any other hitters (that qualify for the batting title) in baseball. If you want to extend it to pitchers as well, Rafael Soriano (1.79), Jason Marquis (1.72), Tim Hudson (1.59), and Jake Peavy/Francisco Cordero (1.51) would be 2-5 in the NL behind Bonds, but the AL wouldn't change (the highest WPA for a pitcher in the AL is James Shields at 1.59 -- in fact, the two highest WPAs for pitchers are both Tampa Bay Devil Rays).
More importantly, In order to provide "Clutch" hits your team needs to put you in said situation. In order to get a save, you need a save situation...in order to get a clutch hit with men on, men need to get on...in order to win any type of game, pitching needs to be good, or hitting needs to be better.
I'm just ranting about how much a hate sabermetrics really...for the love of the game...ha
Good article
Any idea why Bonds is so high (besides the obivous)...his lineup sucks and you can really attribute a lot of his "WPA" to solid pitching...IMO