Jon Morosi: finding new ways to support Miguel Cabrera for MVP depending on the circumstances

By Craig CalcaterraSep 16, 2013, 2:07 PM EDT
26 Comments

You don’t have to have some set of hard and fast rules about how you feel about awards if you don’t want to. Feel free to go with your gut each year. Feel free to just vote for your favorite player all you want. Or not. I don’t care. And if you think Miguel Cabrera is the MVP this year I won’t quibble at all. Wonderful choice and I won’t squawk a bit if he wins the award.

But if you claim to have rules for such things, don’t change them every couple of years and claim you’re consistent.

Here’s Jon Paul Morosi a few minutes ago:

Jon Paul Morosi in 2010:

In 2010, of course, the Tigers finished 81-81 and were out of the playoff picture while Hamilton’s Rangers won the AL West with a huge assist from Josh Hamilton. I guess that whole thing about “helping their teams win division titles and make the playoffs” criteria for the MVP award only matters when it helps Miguel Cabrera and doesn’t matter when it hurts him.

For what it’s worth, here was Morosi’s full rationale for Cabrera over Hamilton in 2010. It can be boiled down to “the Tigers would be AWFUL if it wasn’t for their one awesome player. The Rangers, on the other hand, have lots of awesome players, so Hamilton is not necessarily as important.”

In other words: the exact opposite of what his argument for Cabrera would be this year, should he go with Cabrera. Which, given his “playoffs are essential” criteria seems about right.

Kenley Jansen gives up two homers, loses game in his return

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By Craig CalcaterraAug 21, 2018, 11:03 AM EDT
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Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen was activated yesterday after missing ten days due to an irregular heartbeat. He says he feels great. That’s good!

Jansen also allowed back-to-back homers after entering a tie game in the ninth inning of last night’s game against the St. Louis Cardinals, picking up the loss. Jedd Gyorko and Matt Carpenter did the honors. That’s . . . not so good! At least not for Jansen and the Dodgers.

Jansen said after the game that he was healthy, but that his pitchers were simply flat. One has to assume it’s a matter of rust. And a matter of Matt Carpenter hitting a boatload of homers this year, and at some point there is only so much you can do to stop him. Bad result, of course.