GIVE ICHIRO AND BIGGIO THE MVP
By John B Holway
Ichiro? Boone? Giambi?
Bonds? Sosa? Gonzalez?
The annual MVP handicapping begins. Who would you want up to bat for your team when the game is on the line?
The early favorites seem to be Giambi and Bonds.
They're both very good hitters. But MVP?
A game-by-game, play-by-play analysis says otherwise. The real MVPs - the guys who get the runs when they count most and who let the team down the least were
Ichiro and Craig Biggio
John B. Holway has written ten books on baseball, including the first one in English on Japanese baseball.
Like most everyone else, the baseball writers who do the voting go by the usual criteria - home runs, RBI, and batting average. The assumption is that a batter who hits a lot of homers and bats in a lot of runs, will also do it more often than anyone else in the clutch. This sounds reasonable. But maybe it is, and maybe it isn't.
I use a different standard and have been tracking players off and on with it for over 50 years -- batters can win and lose games just as much as pitchers can. I've found that about half the time the "official" MVP is not the leader in Batting Wins.
Here's how it works:
A BattingWin goes to every man on the winning team who produces enough runs, scored or batted in, to equal the margin of victory. A Batting Loss goes to every man on the losing team who strands enough men on base to equal the margin of defeat (however I first give credit for runs he does produce).
Thus, producing one run in a 7-6 victory earns one Batting Win. In a 7-5 victory, it takes two runs, etc. (I don't double-count home runs.) Stranding one man in a 4-3 defeat results in a Batting Loss. In a 4-2 defeat, it takes two men left on, etc.
Unlike pitching wins, every batter on the winning club can get a Win, especially if the game is close and high-scoring. Every man on the losing club can get a Loss, or none of them might if the game is not close.
Sure, it's situational. Sure there is luck involved. The same is true of pitching wins or saves, or RBIs, or almost every other baseball stat, for that matter. Sure, other players may be more excellent, but this is not the Most Excellent Player award. It's the MVP, with the emphasis on V.
Based on this, here the top ten MVPs for 2001:
| American League | Wins | Losses | Net | National League | Wins | Losses | Net |
| Ichiro | 31 |
7 |
23 |
Craig Biggio | 29 |
6 |
23 |
| Juan Gonzalez | 32 |
10 |
22 |
Jeff Bagwell | 32 |
12 |
20 |
| Bret Boone | 32 |
12 |
20 |
Barry Bonds | 29 |
13 |
16 |
| Edgar Martinez | 25 |
7 |
18 |
Rich Aurilia | 23 |
9 |
14 |
| Roberto Alomar | 25 |
9 |
16 |
Sammy Sosa | 23 |
12 |
11 |
| Jason Giambi | 25 |
10 |
15 |
Reggie Sanders | 21 |
12 |
11 |
| Mike Cameron | 22 |
9 |
13 |
Gary Sheffield | 27 |
17 |
10 |
| Bernie Williams | 22 |
10 |
12 |
M Grudzielanek | 18 |
8 |
10 |
| John Olerud | 18 |
8 |
10 |
Tom Goodwin | 16 |
7 |
9 |
| Craig Koskie | 26 |
17 |
9 |
Luis Gonzalez | 22 |
15 |
7 |
| Jorge Posada | 19 |
10 |
9 |
Brian Jordan | 22 |
15 |
7 |
| Frank Menenchino | 19 |
10 |
9 |
Aramis Ramirez | 20 |
13 |
7 |
| Matt Lawton | 13 |
4 |
9 |
|
|
|
These are not necessarily the players you might want for your Rotisserie or computer league team -- the computer doesn't measure value, only excellence. But they are the players I would choose for a real flesh-and-blood team playing on real grass if I wanted to win a real game.
Incidentally the Dolly Parton Awards for biggest busts in the clutch go to:
| American League | Wins | Losses | Net | National League | Wins | Losses | Net |
| Robert Fick | 8 |
21 |
13 |
Derrick Lee | 10 |
23 |
13 |
| Carlos Beltran | 10 |
24 |
14 |
Phil Norton | 5 |
18 |
14 |
I am glad to see Bonds in a strong third place in the National League. He might have been on top if the pitchers had given him half a chance to hit.
Cleveland's Juan Gonzalez doesn't get much attention from the MVP pundits. But if his agent sees these numbers and puts them high in his resume, it could mean millions of extra dollars for Juan at contract-signing time.
Aramis Ramirez deserves a Special Merit Award. His seven net wins for last-place Pittsburgh ties home run king Luis Gonzalez' seven with the NL champ Diamondbacks.
Oakland's Menenchino (batting average .242) is a big surprise. Yet that's what the numbers say - he was quietly getting those scratch hits and getting on base for the big stars like Giambi to drive in. Giambi got the headlines and will get the big bucks this winter. Menenchino ought to get a healthy commission.
After 85 years of being thoroughly trained in the Old Math, it may be difficult to accept this New Math. We are used to forming our opinions through newspaper headlines such as:
RODRIQUEZ BLASTS HOMER AS RANGERS WIN
The score may be been 9-2, but no matter; the impression is planted that A-Rod, with a league-leading 51 homers, is in there smashing them to help his team win in the clutch. Of course, many times he does; his won-lost this year was 20-15. However, in another game he may ground out in the fourth inning with a man on second as Texas loses by one run; the paper doesn't mention that at all. Rodriquez isn't entirely responsible for the Ranger's last-place finish, but he isn't entirely blameless either.
There is a certain consistency over the years. Throughout the late 1980s Biggio and Bagwell were year after year among the leaders in Batting Wins, so it is no surprise to see them atop the list in 2001. Similarly, when Mark Grudzielanek was with Montreal, he was consistently a winning batter, and he is still in the top ten this year.
Likewise, year after year Eric Karros (7-17) and Bobby Bonilla (0-8) were consistently near the bottom of the Least Valuable list as they are again. When will their owners wake up and finally cut these dead weights free?
With their impressive traditional stats, why didn't Albert Pujols (21-25), Carlos Delgardo (20-21), Larry Walker (22-20), Jeff Kent (23-21), Derek Jeter (20-16), or Chipper Jones (23-18) produce more wins and fewer losses for their teams?
As for Ichiro, is there anything this guy can't do? He hasn't batted .400 yet -- maybe next year? He almost did it in Japan, and his U.S. stats (.350) are almost identical to his lifetime Japanese average (.353).
His Batting Wins are the more remarkable because he bats lead-off and has less chances than the big boys to bat runs in. (He also has less chance to leave men on base.)
To these Batting Wins we must add his fielding skill, which includes perhaps the best throwing arm in any hemisphere. How many games has he saved the Mariners in the field in addition to those he won at bat? I've seen him nail a runner at home in a 1-0 victory. I also saw him gun down a man at third in a game the Mariners won 3-1 - he contributed one run scored, plus the one potential run saved.
Biggio also plays a difficult skill position, second base. If we could count his Defensive Wins, his claim to the MVP award would be even stronger. Unfortunately for him, the electors don't know anything about his Batting Wins. It will be interesting to see if he gets even a single vote for MVP.
Wee Willie Keeler used to say he "hit 'em where they ain't," but it's even more important to "hit 'em when they count."
Ichiro and Biggio did both.
A complete list of Holway's 2001 BattingWins will be available in a few days. Please check back soon.
