AL Real Life MVP? Miggy vs Trout

By the best measures of performance that we have, Trout is clearly more valuable than Cabrera. How many wins did Trout add to his team? How many did Cabrera add to the Tigers? WAR, while not good for distinguishing value of performance within tenths of a win, is certainly good enough to tell us that Trout was ~2 wins more productive than Cabrera. If you value Avg, HR & RBI above WAR, wOBA or WRC+, you are ignoring better, more accurate measures of performance. Sure, you can do that if you like. I'm not gonna stop you. But you're going to be objectively wrong a lot more than if you use better information.

If I had the first pick in a dispersal draft - guaranteeing you got this year's performance for the one and only year you would have the rights to that player - I'd pick Trout. He's simply been the best and most valuable baseball player in the world this year.

All that said, Cabrera had a great season and, if the writers want to ignore better stats, giving him the MVP won't be a travesty. We've seen much worse mistakes made in the MVP just in the last decade.

The funny thing is that it doesn't matter if your a traditional stats guy or a SABR metric guy - we still have the age old debate about how the MVP is measured - best hitter, best overall, most valuable to his team, best in specific categories, etc..

My vote? I think Trout had the best overall season, but think Miggy should get the MVP...heres my own twist - his consenting to move to 3b (yes, i realize he's a liability there) for the betterment of the team, putting Fielder at 1b...on top of his awesome offensive production. And yeah, postseason qualification comes into my idea of "value" as we'll, regardless of the records of the teams.

And if you prefer Trout - I won't argue.

I've never understood why an RBI is sacred while runs scored get little attention.

Miggy has over 80 more RBI opportunities than Trout, Trout actually converted a higher % of RBI opportunities into RBI's.

There really is no comparison.

Cabrera "volunteered" or was pursuaded to change defensive positions. By moving to 3B, he really strengthened his team. Combing a triple-crown season and this willingness to play 3B makes him the MVP.

we still have the age old debate about how the MVP is measured - best hitter, best overall, most valuable to his team

Indeed, the MVP has never been about who was the best player. There actually is an award for best position player. It is the Henry Aaron award. You hear very little about it each year. It gets named each year without any debate or discussion.

Henry Aaron Award

This year I would be inclinded to give Miggy the MVP and Trout the Henry Aaron award.

While on this subject some might want to bring Trout's superior baserunning and defense in to the discussion. Historically defense has not been much of a talking point. And basestealing has received very little consideration. How much talk was there for giving Henderson the MVP when he stole 130 bases? I think he was 10th that year in voting. Personally I think that and other leadoff skills should receive more consideration. But middle of the lineup skills have almost always been the primary basis for MVP consideration.

I do not think you can say Trout has more value because he has a higher WAR. WAR is a contrived number based on an imaginary baseline of the replacement player. It is nice for a conversation piece but is not a true hard real statistic. I doubt 99% of those who reference it could determine what it should be if they did not have a chart to reference. And WAR changes for any player depending on which service you use to obtain it because there are several different organizations that calculate it and each one uses a slightly different formula.

But the debate about WAR and other quasi-stats is probably better for a separate thread.

I think Miggy moving to third is huge. It allowed the Tigers to add Fielder. Without Fielder they do not sniff the playoffs.

If I were attempting to make a case for Trout I would not be citing WAR or anything else. I would simply be pointing to their record when Trout was recalled and their record after. But then there were additional factors to that turnaround such as the increased role of Trumbo and Pujols getting in gear.

2. I don't know that it was easier to do back then or nowadays.

No question about this. At one time it happened every few years. There was at least one about every decade. Now there has not been a triple crown winner in over half a century. Think about that and let it soak in, half a century.

The pitcher already has the Cy Young to win. Same argument comes up with relief pitchers, they can win the Fireman award.

And position players have the MVP award. So everyone has an award for their niche. The MVP should be all inclusive of all players at all positions. I see no reason to exclude starting pitchers or relievers, especially if you are basing that on the existence of the Cy Young and Rolaids awards. By that logic the Henry Aaron award would also elimiinate position players from MVP consideration. What is left?

For me the most important thing about the MVP is it gives us a chance to have something to talk about.
Regardless of whether Miggy or Trout or someone else deserves MVP it is fun to debate it.

we still have the age old debate about how the MVP is measured - best hitter, best overall, most valuable to his team

Indeed, the MVP has never been about who was the best player. There actually is an award for best position player. It is the Henry Aaron award. You hear very little about it each year. It gets named each year without any debate or discussion.

Henry Aaron Award

This year I would be inclinded to give Miggy the MVP and Trout the Henry Aaron award.

While on this subject some might want to bring Trout's superior baserunning and defense in to the discussion. Historically defense has not been much of a talking point. And basestealing has received very little consideration. How much talk was there for giving Henderson the MVP when he stole 130 bases? I think he was 10th that year in voting. Personally I think that and other leadoff skills should receive more consideration. But middle of the lineup skills have almost always been the primary basis for MVP consideration.

First, I do agree that the Hank Aaron award should be recognized more, and perhaps with time it will (it's only been around since 1999). However, you are slightly off in its description. The award is given to the best hitter, not the best position player. I think most people would think that, if anything, Cabrera should win the Hank Aaron award and Trout should be given the MVP. Cabrera is obviously being touted this year (and just about every year of his career so far) purely for his offensive prowess, while Trout is being recognized for his overall performance, including batting, baserunning, and defense. This is precisely why folks are looking at WAR, a statistic that combines all three phases of the game.

WAR was obviously not used back in 1982 when Henderson stole 130 bases. In fact, OBP and SLG were still a few years away from becoming official stats back then. For reference here are the top 10 finishers in the AL MVP race in 1982 with their MVP vote points and calculated WAR (from baseball-reference.com):

385 Robin Yount - 10.4
228 Eddie Murray - 4.9
178 Doug DeCinces - 7.3
175 Hal McRae - 4.0
152 Cecil Cooper - 5.4
107 Reggie Jackson - 2.9
57 Dwight Evans - 6.2
44 Gorman Thomas - 4.6
39 Dan Quisenberry - 3.2
38 Rickey Henderson - 6.5

Looks like the right guy won the award in 1982, though it's likely that the rest of the pack may have been out of order. However, that's probably a result of the tradition of the statistics like homeruns and RBI leading the debate on the MVP candidates.

Since 1974, the date from which Baseball Reference claims to be able to fully track the stats that comprise WAR, just 13 players from the NL and 9 players from the AL have led the league in WAR and won the MVP. As long as the traditionalists persist, it will be difficult raise that percentage.