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Date Posted: 21:52:02 10/02/02 Wed
Author: Jason
Subject: Re: Post Season Award Picks...
In reply to: weas 's message, "Re: Post Season Award Picks..." on 16:40:20 10/02/02 Wed

First thing, I didn't say your opinion of Tejada was influenced by Gammons. I said that Tejada is one of the worst fielding SS, and that the numbers bear that out, no matter what Gammons says. I wasn't questioning where you got your opinion of Tejada's defense, because, well, you never mentioned his defense. Maybe it's unimportant in an MVP race, I dunno.

Anyway... measuring defense isn't an easy thing to do. I don't think that FLD%, Zone Rating, and Range Factor are perfect when used individually, but I think taking a look at all 3 paints a pretty accurate picture.

Fielding%
Tejada ranked 9th among AL Shortstops
Chavez ranked 5th among AL 3rd basemen

Range Factor
Tejada ranked 7th among AL Shortstops
Chavez ranked 1st among AL 3rd basemen

Zone Rating
Tejada ranked 9th among AL Shortstops
Chavez ranked 2nd among AL 3rd basemen

A pretty substantial difference. Then again, Gold Gloves are based on reputation, offensive output, acrobatics, how many times you got a Web Gem, clutch hitting, etc....

I'm not disputing that Tejada is important to his team, or that he's more important/better than he was last year. I just think that if you put a good fielding, average hitting SS in his place, the A's are not a very different team. I mentioned in my last post that Mulder, Hudson, Zito were a pretty big part of that success, but the stat they showed on today's game blew me away. Since August 13th, that trio of pitchers is 21-0 with an ERA around 2.00

As for ARod/Thome I think it's very close, and would be happy with either getting it. ARod is very good defensively, and Thome plays a position where defense is an afterthought. But I'm not sure many people are aware how good Thome's season was offensively, since he played on a pretty bad team.

Average
ARod - .300
Thome - .304

OBP
ARod - .392
Thome - .445

SLG%
ARod - .623
Thome - .671

Thome had an OPS that was 107 points higher than ARod this year! Thome also put up those numbers on a team that scored 104 less runs than the Rangers, and had a team OBP 61 points lower than the Rangers'. His supporting cast was far less potent than ARod's, and he had a monster season. I think the defensive importance of the two is enough to substantially close that gap, but in the end, my opinion for what it's worth, is that Thome is the MVP. Just because you can't see that Thome would garner even 1 1st place vote, doesn't mean he isn't worthy. It won't surprise me if he doesn't get 1 either, but that doesn't mean I have to go along with what the media decides, and accept that as fact.

If we were picking from Playoff teams only, then there are still a handful of position players that I'd pick before Tejada.

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