My Very Brief Commentaries on the MVP, ROY, and CYA

     The 2024 baseball season was filled with some extreme talent. There were two triple-crown winners among pitchers, and we had some rookies carrying their teams. All in all, the awards I'm giving my opinions on today should have been:

1) Fairly obvious choices

2) Well-deserved

The Rookie of the Year awards were announced on November 18th.
The Cy Young awards were announced on November 20th.
And the MVP awards were announced today.
I don't really care too much about the Manager of the Year awards.

NL Rookie of the Year:

Winner: Paul Skenes
My Choice: Jackson Merrill
Correct Choice: Either Skenes or Merrill

    I would have loved to see Jackson Merrill win the Rookie of the Year award. He not only was the most clutch hitter in MLB, but played stellar defense in center and took his team to the playoffs. However, it's hard to beat a flamethrower who posted an 11-3 record and 1.96 ERA. I think it could have gone either way, but of course, I'm a little bit biased :)
    What do y'all think? Who should have taken this one?

I don't have a Paul Skenes card :(

AL Rookie of the Year:

Winner: Luis Gil
My Choice: Mason Miller
Correct Choice: Mason Miller

    Mason Miller wasn't even a finalist for the Rookie of the Year. I feel they kind of jipped. He throws 104, threw to a 2.49 ERA, and collected 28 saves. His opposing slash line was .160/.233/.262, so he was near impossible to hit. Don't get me wrong, Luis Gil was solid (15-7, 3.50, 171 K), but he was inconsistent. At times he was lights-out, and at other times he looked horrible. I really think this one should have been Miller.

I don't have any Luis Gil cards either

NL Cy Young Award:

Winner: Chris Sale
My Choice: Chris Sale
Correct Choice: Chris Sale

    This one isn't very hard. Sale won the triple crown (18 wins, 2.38 ERA, 225 K). Though we have two dominant starters as the other two finalists in Zack Wheeler and Paul Skenes, you can't beat a triple crown. 

I do have Sale, but not with the Braves...

AL Cy Young Award:

Winner: Tarik Skubal
My Choice: Tarik Skubal
Correct Choice: Tarik Skubal

    I think this one was even easier. Tarik Skubal was likely the best pitcher in MLB this year, and like Sale, won a triple crown too (18 wins, 2.39 ERA, 228 K). And it was his 28th birthday yesterday when the award was announced, which makes for a nice gift. Emmanuel Clase was a finalist, which is kinda cool since he's a closer. Clase had an 0.61 ERA and 46 saves, so it's well-deserved. Seth Lugo is the other finalist, finishing as the second place man -- he was the only finalist with an ERA of 3.00.

This is my favorite card of Ubals that I own

NL MVP Award:

Winner: Shohei Ohtani
My Choice: Shohei Ohtani
Correct Choice: You guessed it, Shohei Ohtani

    I'm not gonna lie: I'm not the biggest Shohei fan. But come on, he had a 50-50 season. Even as a DH, with an offensive season that good (and his popularity), he can't lose. The other finalists were middle infielders in Ketel Marte and Francisco Lindor. They were both elite; but beating 54 homers and 59 steals is near impossible.

Bomb Squad seems right for the year Shohei had

AL MVP Award:

Winner: Aaron Judge
My Choice: Bobby Witt Jr.
Correct Choice: >sighs< Aaron Judge

    Bobby Witt played outstanding defense and was an incredible hitter (he won the batting title you know) from a harder position than Aaron Judge. But Aaron Judge did Aaron Judge things, belting 58 homers and batting .322. Not to mention his 144 RBI, 122 Runs, and OPS of 1.159. I think he'll be the next guy to win a triple crown for batting. They got it right, though I wanted Witt.

I don't know, I just like the picture on the card

Also, I gave my Stars of MLB Judge as part of a birthday gift

    

    There we go. I think for the most part, the BBWAA got the awards right. I would not have complained had Jackson Merrill won ROY or Bobby Witt MVP, but the winners were deserving of the award. What do y'all think? Did they get the awards right? What would y'all have done differently? 

    Well, thanks for reading, congrats to the winners of the awards, and happy collecting! Enjoy the rest of you week!

    I know that I said I didn't care about the Manager of the Year award. However, I would like to point out that Mark Kotsay made the leaderboard. The A's manager had a record of 69-93 -- he didn't get a vote for his record. I bet he got a vote for the way he dealt with his team leaving Oakland. Kotsay couldn't control the situation, but dealt with it the best he could. His speech on that last home game was great, and I think the fans appreciated it. I can commend that vote, even though he didn't win 100 games. 

Player of the Week 4

     Nothing like getting on the blog once you get home from being at ball fields since 7:30 in the morning. Ugh, it was a long day. Well, here we go, my second-to-last Player of the Week.

    A few interesting things happened in baseball this week, but not a ton (quantity-wise) that caught my eye. I found out who Eric Wagaman is, which by no means makes him eligible to win (unless nothing else interested me). But he's slugging .538 in his first 10 major league games, which is cool.

    I also saw the first MLB hit of Brandon Lockridge. The Padres rookie bunted down the third base line for his initial big-league knock, which I thought was so cool. Lockridge is a 27-year old leftfielder out of Pensacola, Florida. He played 526 games in 6 seasons on the farms, accumulating a slash line of .271/.348/.416 in that time with 147 steals. I'm very interested in this guy now and will be paying attention to him.

    But, there is one thing that gives the guy I chose the title of Player of the Week. I know I said I wasn't necessarily basing this on performance, but I kinda feel as though I have to. My penultimate Player of the Week is......

    On Thursday, Shohei himself got six times more hits than my entire fantasy team for that day, on my opponent's squad. This is quite possibly the greatest offensive performance the game of baseball has ever seen, and for that reason Shohei just has to be the Player of the Week.

    As the Dodgers cruised to a 20-4 win over the Marlins, Ohtani went 6-for-6 with two doubles and three home runs. The homers put him to 51. He also stole two bases, which made him the first 50-50 player! I actually didn't think he was going to do it, but this man is on a tear. He also drove in 10 and scored 4 times. I think he's easily going to be the first DH to win an MVP award, which pains me, but at the same time, who else could possibly beat him?

    Well, that does it for this week's Player of the Week post. Come back next Saturday to see who will win the last Player of the Week title. Maybe I'll throw in some playoff predictions as well, but that may need to be an entirely different post. We'll see. But for now, I hope y'all have a great rest of your weekend! Good morning, good evening and goodnight (and happy collecting).

Shiny deGrom

     I was at the good ol' grocery store, when I saw a package of 29 2023 Topps cards for $7 by the checkout. While certainly not the greatest price in the world, the thing that jumped out at me was the headliner; Silver Pattern Foilboard #48 Jacob deGrom. I couldn't pass up that deal and made the purchase.
    The company selling these cards is able to sell Topps cards for less money than the company itself sells them for, which I found both interesting and economically helpful.

    And here's the foilboard deGrom. Beautiful, isn't it? When I first saw it I thought 'Shiny deGrom,' but I guess theSilver-Pattern Foilboard is more accurate. deGrom should be returning to the Rangers rotation soon, but it seems to be too little too late. Hopefully he'll be healthy for next year as we try to clean things up a bit. 

    I like the Alec Burleson rookie. The 25-year old is having a great season with the Cardinals, slashing .280/.320/.453 with 21 home runs and 72 RBI. 
    Those Athletics uniforms (top right) are......interesting. Not really sure that they got the colors right, but oh well. It doesn't look bad. 
    Also, the highlight of this page, the Topps Update purple foil Dominic Smith numbered 095/799. It's a nice card, but I'm putting it on my trade bait list. If any of y'all want it, go for it. 

    Not much coming out of this page. The Aaron Nola card is nice. I kinda like the Stars of MLB cards as a whole, though I miss reading the stats on the back. Hey, at least it's not Stars of LMB! Otherwise, just a few base card 'needs,' though I don't really try to collect the full sets.

    I like this page a bit more. I got another deGrom card, as well as a Corey Seager parallel. I like the Max Fried card, though I have like fifteen of that same base card. Stars of MLB Shohei Ohtani is cool too. And boy is he having a year in 2024 with the Dodgers. Though unable to pitch until next year, he's currently batting .292 with 44 homers, 109 runs (both league-leading), 98 RBI, and a .993 OPS in 135 games.  

    And these two guys. 

    I notice that I said I got 29 cards, but only 28 are shown. It seems evident that I traded one of these cards before writing the post, most likely a base card dupe, but I don't know for sure. That's on me.

    All in all I'm happy about this purchase. Though most of it was pretty boring, there were a few good points; the deGrom foilboard, of course, as well as Dominic Smith and Corey Seager. I will never complain about some Stars of MLB cards either. I like the 2023 design on them a lot. 

    That'll about do it for this post. Y'all have an amazing week, and happy collecting!

    

    P.S. I know I promised Fuji a post focused on Jackson Merrill, but I'm gonna take a little bit longer than intended because I have been really busy lately and need to do more research (as of right now I only have some stats, but for a post centered on one guy I want more information), but it's definitely going to happen.