One of the biggest debates/misunderstandings/piles of shit in Baseball is the definition of the MVP award. Everyone presumably understands MVP stands for Most Valuable Player. OK, let's dissect these three words: Most...got it....we can throw Player in that bag as well...Valuable is where the confusion arrives. Notice how it is not the "Best Hitter" award or even "Most Skilled Player" award. One school of thought feels it should be the best player on the best team. Another feels it should be whatever hitter has the most eye popping numbers regardless of where he plays (2003 Alex Rodriguez on Texas), and lastly those baseball writers who enjoy using their brains a bit and actually investigating deeper into a player's season than plain stats and perhaps looking into situational stats, fielding, and in my opinion, most importantly to the word VALUABLE intangibles and peripherals.
Now let me digress for a quick second. The "Best Hitter" should be awarded with some hardware every single season. The Hank Aaron award should be voted on by the baseball writers and should be a mirror image of the Cy Young award. The Best statistical hitter in the American League this summer is Joe Mauer. Perfect, send him a Hank Aaron award and his silver slugger award, and most likely his batting title. QUITE A YEAR! By no means will my next argument discredit his season in any way...
Earlier this month I made an argument for Derek Jeter to be the MVP of the American League. Unfortunately I do not vote on this award, but if I did it would be a hard decision because another Yankee player is making quite a case for himself. I won't lie, I have no real allegiance to Mark Teixeira yet. He's been great to watch all season and he's quickly becoming one of my favorite Yankees. BUT he has proved nothing to a Yankee fan compared to The Captain, Derek Jeter. For this, I overlooked Teixeira's MVP campaign while making my argument for Derek Jeter. Let's check out the Teixicutioner's numbers.
He started out miserably, as many do when they come to NY and pitchers were showing him no strikes... 14 for 70 with 3 home runs in April. For the sake of argument (my argument obviously) lets scrap these numbers...or at least put them aside for a moment. Since May 1st Mark his gone 114 for 382...a .301 Average, much sexier than the .285 average he has including the April adjustment period. He has 27 homers since then (30 overall) and 75 RBI (85 overall). That averages out to a home-run more than once in every 4 games. He is 2nd in the league in home runs (one behind Carlos Pena) 3rd in RBI, 4th in Slugging and 5th in OPS (obp+slg) and my favorite Teixeira stat: he is hitting .350 with runners in scoring position and 2 outs!! Those are the hits that cripple pitchers. This is a tribute to his VALUE. These runners in scoring position 2 out hits are hits that swing momentum or create unstoppable momentum for the Yankees. There have been more than a dozen games when you can look back at a Tex 2 out RBI and say wow, that's when they put that team to bed that night. Not to mention the amount of errors he has saved the Yankees infield with his Flawless gold glove. Every single game I watch he makes at least one amazing play. He constantly saves runs in close games, which is very important for your pitching staff and he SLUGS. So Mark Teixeira helps the pitching staff, the infield and the overall offense. Do you think Johnny Damon would be seeing this many strikes if anyone else were behind him? Pretty valuable if you ask me.
Oh, one more thing...HE KILLS THE RED SOX slugging .708 with 5 TEX MESSAGES in 48 At bats against the Sawx.
Photo: Mike Antonelli
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