Every year, the Baseball Bloggers Alliance votes on 5 specific postseason awards. These awards are announced in October, here are the awards and the dates they will be announced.
October 15: Connie Mack Award (Manager of the Year)
October 16: Willie Mays Award (Rookie of the Year)
October 17: Goose Gossage Award (Top Reliever)
October 18: Walter Johnson Award (Cy Young)
October 19: Stan Musial (MVP)
These awards aren't associated with the actual MLB awards, we just do this because we write about baseball quite a bit, and it's a great way to not only publicly enforce our own dedication to writing about baseball (as individuals, as well as an alliance), but also to compare our own collective opinions with those of the actual MLB award equivalents.
You may not know this, but officially, the BBA selections have matched those of the Baseball Writers of America in all but two instances in the past few years or so. The Goose Gossage award is an exception, as this award is exclusive to the BBA.
For the 2012 Season, here's how I voted for each of these honors.
CONNIE MACK AWARD:
1. Mike Matheny (NL)
2. Robin Ventura (AL)
3. Davey Johnson (NL)
Avoiding the "filling LaRussa's shoes" cliche, it matters not who Matheny suceeded...he's doing a damn fine job with the Cardinals. Ventura was such a close second, I almost had to give up and call them a tie.
WILLIE MAYS AWARD:
1. Mike Trout (AL)
2. Todd Frazier (NL)
3. Wade Miley (NL)
My heart has Frazier at the top of this list, but my common sense has Trout running away with this award.
GOOSE GOSSAGE AWARD:
1. Fernando Rodney (AL)
2. Craig Kimbrel (NL)
3. Jim Johnson (AL)
My only regret this season, is that I wasn't following Rodney close enough until recently.
WALTER JOHNSON AWARD:
1. R.A. Dickey (NL)
2. Max Scherzer (AL)
3. Gio Gonzalez (NL)
4. Johnny Cueto (NL)
5. Chris Sale (AL)
Both Dickey and Scherzer have been eerily consistent and fantastic this year, if you had to pick two outstanding breakout seasons from each league, they would both be at the top of that list. Using this as justification for the award from my perspective, this one was nearly a draw at the top spot.
STAN MUSIAL AWARD:
1. Mike Trout (AL)
2. Andrew McCutchen (NL)
3. Miguel Cabrera (AL)
4. Chase Headley (NL)
5. Buster Posey (NL)
6. Robinson Cano (AL)
7. Adam Jones (AL)
8. Yadier Molina (NL)
9. Josh Reddick (AL)
10. Ryan Braun (NL)
Once again, Trout is literally running away with this one. For me, defense is the primarily unregistered key to the intrinsic variables for an award such as this. Without proper defense evaluation metrics, you have to watch the player at his position. Stolen bases don't mean a lot to me, but Trout's presence on the field does. You can't see it in a box score, you have to see it for yourself. All that aside, what kind of a season can you see for the Angels without Mike Trout as part of it?
BASEBALL!!
