Major League Baseball has started handed out their awards. They started with the Rookie of the Year award and yesterday the Manager of the Year awards where given out. We still have the Cy Young award and the MVP award to be handed out, but let’s take a look at the two categories they’ve handed out.
There where three really good candidates up for the NL Rookie of the Year award, but in the end it was Ronald Acuna Jr. of the Atlanta Braves who took home the award. Acuna Jr. got 27 of the 30 1st place votes cast. Juan Soto of the Washington Nationals came home in 2nd place while the Los Angeles Dodgers Walker Buehler finished in 3rd place. Brian Anderson of the Miami Marlins finished 4th, Jack Flaherty of the St. Louis Cardinals came in 5th. Harrison Bader of the Cardinals Yoshihisa Hirano of the Arizona Diamondbacks and Jeff McNeil each picked up one 3rd place vote.
I don’t think there’s any real issue with Acuna Jr. bringing this ward home. I wouldn’t of been surprised if the voters had went the other way and Soto had won, but either or would been a good choice for Rookie of the Year. Buehler would’ve been a bit of a surprise if he had won, but even that wouldn’t have been a big deal.
Sadly over in the American League stupidity reigned supreme and Shohei Otani of the Los Angeles Angels ended up taking home the AL Rookie of the Year award. Because the voters bought the hype Otani got 25 of the 29 1st place votes cast. That meant that the player who should’ve won the award Miguel Andujar of the New York Yankees finished in 2nd place. There where at least 5 voters smart enough to pay attention to the actual game of baseball as they had Andujar first on their ballots. Andujar’s teammate Gleybar Torres came in 3rd while Joey Wendle of the Tampa Bay Rays finished in 4th. Ryan Yarbrough also of the Rays and Daniel Palka of the Chicago White Sox each garnered one 3rd place vote.
I am just so tired of fighting this fight that I can’t do it anymore. Otani didn’t deserve to win the award, but since no one pays attention to how the game is played on the field even though the most important thing is still winning games he ends up winning Rookie of the Year. I’m also really tired of everyone calling Otani a two-way player. At best he’s a one and a half way player since he doesn’t play a defensive position and just DH’s when he’s not pitching. I’m just so done with these idiots.
In the National League again I thought they had three solid choices for Manager of the Year. I don’t think you could’ve argued with anyone of them winning the award. In the end it was Brian Snitker of the Atlanta Braves who picked up the award. Snitker got 17 of the 30 1st place votes cast. Craig Counsell of the Milwaukee Brewers picked up 11 1st place votes on his way to finishing 2nd while Bud Black of the Colorado Rockies finished 3rd. Even though he didn’t manage the entire season Mike Shildt of the St. Louis cardinals finished in 4th place while Joe Maddon of the Chicago Cubs came in 5th and actually got a 1st place vote. I found it hard to believe that Dave Roberts of the Los Angeles Dodgers only got 1 3rd place vote, but I guess winning when you’re expected to doesn’t get you any votes.
I looked into and saw that Maddon’s 1st place vote cam from a Chicago voter. It was Bruce Levine who is a baseball analyst on WSCR 670 The Score. He had Maddon 1st, Counsell 2nd and Snitker 3rd. I would love to know what his thinking was for this. How did he put Maddon ahead of Counsell when the Brewers finished ahead of the Cubs in the standings and Maddon had a much better roster to work with. I guess Levine figured he better kiss the Cubs rear end and hopefully it will pay off for him when he needs tickets or an interview or something like that.
Over in the American League it was Bob Melvin of the Oakland A’s who took home the Manager of the Year award and won by a bigger margin than I expected him to. Melvin got 18 of the 30 1st place votes cast on his way to the win. Alex Cora of the World Series champion Boston Red Sox picked up 7 1st place votes as he finished in 2nd place and it was Kevin Cash of the Tampa Bay Rays who picked up 5 1st place votes on his way to a 3rd place finish. A.J. Hinch of the Houston Astros was the 4th place finisher while Aaron Boone of the New York Yankees finished 5th.
In just his first year as a major league manager and with the season the Red Sox ended up having I really thought that Cora would win this award, but it was Melvin who picked up his third Manager of the Year award of his career.
Melvin won his first Manager of the Year award in 2007 when he was with the Arizona Diamondbacks. His second victory came in 2012 with the A’s. Melvin needs just one more Manager of the Year award to tie Tony LaRussa and Bobby Cox for the most Manager of the Year wins at 4. Melvin does join a pretty good group of managers who have won this award three times. Melvin is now in a group with Dusty Baker, Buck Showalter, Jim Leyland, Lou Pinella and joe Maddon. That’s not to bad of a group to be in.
I’m under the impression that everyone knows this, but just in case you don’t. Post season play doesn’t count in the awards. These are all regular season awards.
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