Tight MVP Awards

I never took awards seriously all that much. Maybe I'm jealous or jaded or something. The Oscars and Nobel Prize for politics don't help.

Anyway.

I'm beginning to wonder about awards in sports as well. In this case the MLB MVP.

Seems like writers are still warming up - or remain cool - to the era or sabremetrics.

I don't know why. Just like scientists are never convinced of anything, statistics don't always tell the whole story. You need to dig further sometimes and sabremetrics help to go "behind the scenes" of traditional baseball statistics.

I think the arrival of such a new outlook is indispensable to sports. It helps to weed out something that is notoriously difficult to control: Built-in bias.

Lately, and we see this in politics as well, you get the feeling journalists are not even trying to be balanced or objective anymore. Worse, some have become outright lazy in their fact-checking.

They can react with hostility to the new paradigm all they want, but thank God for bloggers dedicated to watching over our guardians of information.

In baseball, the statistical revolution is here to stay. Either you learn it or become obsolete.

Which brings me to the recent MLB MVP voting. I don't think there was much surprise or controversy in Buster Posey winning the NL MVP or R.A Dickey winning the Cy Young. Where I think there's a valid debate is with Miguel Cabrera and David Price winning the MVP and Cy respectively in the AL.

Personally, Price had a superb season but I think Verlander should have gotten the nod. Let's end that there.

Where it has been an intense debate for a while now  is Cabrera winning over Mike Trout. In every major statistical category, they're pretty much neck and neck with Cabrera winning the 'Trad stats' and Trout edging Cabrera out in 'New stats.'

I know, Cabrera won the Triple Crown. Quite a feat. In straight raw numbers, based on past criteria, yes, he wins. But beware clinging on to hallowed metrics!

My friend in my hockey pool, a doctor, in an effort to pry a player off your team would often say, 'Big Blue, my friend. Don't be Big Blue.' His theory on hanging on to a stock long past its prime - Big Blue referring to IBM.

And with all that...

Imagine my surprise when I was looking at who got votes to see Raul Ibanez get one.

Ibanez? Really?

A part-time player?

That person who gave him a vote should get his voting privileges revoked.