Mark Teixeira, Miguel Cabrera, and Brian Giles.
Anyone guess what they have in common? They'd be all star snubs if the balloting ended today (if it stays on the trend of the last numbers we had, shown here
Now my own personal biases aside, TINO MARTINEZ! TINO MARTINEZ!
The lines:
Tino Martinez: .226/.321/.470 12 HRs 32 RBI 7.3 VORP That's good enough for 182nd in all of baseball. But, let me hold out momentarily on my YANKEE FANS ARE ALL BALLOTING STUFFING EVIL PEOPLE! chant until we see the other guy.
Mark Teixeira: .292/.358/.577 20 HRs 56 RBI 28.6 VORP That's good enough for 17th in all of baseball. THAT'S A DIFFERENCE OF 165 PLAYERS IN TERMS OF VORP!
But I guess Tino hit a lot of homeruns that one week, and deserves to start over the MVP contending Teixeira, who's done nothing but continue breaking out into one of the best players in all of baseball. Unfortunately, he doesn't wear pinstripes.
Now let's look at Miguel, who is 4th behind Beltran (a travesty), Edmonds (understandable), and Abreu (congrats on being recognized, finally).
The lines:
Carlos Beltran: .265/.321/.422 8 HRs 35 RBI
8.6 VORP (163rd in baseball, definitely what you want from your leading vote getter).
Miguel Cabrera: .332/.387/.548 12 HRs 45 RBI
30.4 VORP(14th in baseball, the type of number you want from your number one vote getter).
So Cabrera is better in every way, shape, and form than Carlos this year offensively, yet he's behind him. Can we assume any other reason than New York Ballot stuffing? Unfortunately, the voting travesty only gets work as we turn to the Brian Giles Award for Unheralded Greatness Award Winner, Brian Giles.
149 VORP PLAYERS BETTER THAN BELTRAN
Brian Giles: .290/.424/.518 9 HRs 45 RBI
31.4 VORP (12th in baseball)
151 VORP PLAYERS BETTER THAN BELTRAN
Where is Brian in the voting you ask? He's not even in the Top 15 for NL outfielders, and he has the 3rd highest VORP (behind Bobby Abreu and Jason Bay).
It's a travesty, and the demi fan wannabe fair weather hacks who call themselves New York baseball fans because they remember them winning a World Series once so all their players must be great are to blame for these voting travesties. It could just be me, but I'm guessing the Friar Faithful didn't leave Brian Giles off their ballot, but I bet they left Carlos Beltran off.