Joe Sheehan's already done a bang-up job in analyzing why Jimmy Rollins shouldn't have won the NL MVP (for roughly the same reasons Justin Morneau shouldn't have won last year), though I don't really agree with his conclusions---the defense a first baseman has to offer is pretty much whateverific, and Chase Utley, to me, was the best player in the NL all year when healthy. But enough about the winners. I use this platform to note five oddities from the voting results, which can be found here:
(1) All of those carping about Ryan Braun beating out Troy Tulowitzki for Rookie of the Year (and I'm looking at.....you, Mr. Neyer) can take solace in the fact that somehow, despite the exact same people voting for both awards, Mr. Troy finished a good 11 points ahead of Braun in the MVP voting. Most of the 11-point differential between the two stems from a rogue 3rd place vote for TT, presumably from someone voting with Dan O'Dowd in the room.
(2) I'd like to find the voter who put Prince Fielder 8th and shake his hand. He's the only person to put him below 4th, and he's the only person that's right.
(3) I watched Carlos Beltran play the entire year. Check that---I watched Carlos Beltran saunter about like an injured elephant for 5 months, and then start to play after the Feast of the Assumption. He was a waste of money for 3/4 of the year. So of course, he merits a pair of 8th place votes. Good job of paying attention, lads.(4) Is Brandon Phillips the first player ever to get the only MVP votes from his team when he wasn't the most valuable player on his team? Outside of steals and shortness, there isn't a category where Adam Dunn didn't whup his ass. Phillips isn't awful, but please, tell me his stats are different from Chris Sabo with speed. Or on speed for that matter.
(5) And lastly, and most hilariously, there's the person who voted Carlos Marmol for a 10th place vote. This is even more laughable than when the Hall of Fame ballot comes out and players like Gary Gaetti and Scot Sanderson are nominated. I realize that VORP doesn't tell everything, and I'm going to piss off Jon Heyman by using numbers, but Marmol's VORP was squarely between Greg Maddux and John Maine for NL pitchers, and roughly equivalent to that of Fat Squirrel for position players, and we already know my feelings on him. I have to think the guy who made this vote lost a bet.This lends itself to an obvious question: why do we allow voters 10 spots on the MVP ballot? Has someone ever won because of a 9th or 10th place vote? (Maybe Pudge?) Why not just give them 3 or 5 and be done with it?
