New York Mets manager Terry Collins is one of three finalists for the National League Manager of the Year Award. Cubs manager Joe Maddon and Cardinals manager Mike Matheny are also finalists. The award winner will be announced November 17th.
Continue reading “Collins a finalist for NL Manager of the Year; Cespedes wins Gold Glove”
New York Mets CF Juan Lagares is a finalist for a Gold Glove Award, along with Washington’s Denard Span and Cincinnati’s Billy Hamilton.
If Lagares wins the award, which is determined by advanced defensive statistics as well as voting by National League players and managers, he will be the third Mets outfielder to achieve this distinction.
Carlos Beltran and David Wright were the last Mets players to win a Gold Glove in 2008.
Baseball award season started this week with the announcement of the Gold Glove awards. Derek Jeter won his fifth, igniting a firestorm of criticism because the only things he had in his favor were his fielding percentage and his reputation.
In the National League, Albert Pujols took home the Gold Glove at first base even though at least one columnist thought Ike Davis should have won instead.
Most of the arguments focused on the use of advanced fielding statistics – UZR and Plus/Minus. I’ll admit that the traditional fielding percentage stat is virtually useless since it rewards players with limited range because they are less likely to be charged with errors. But at least it’s easy to explain – (putouts + assists) / (putouts + assists + errors).
UZR and Plus/Minus have to be better metrics of actual fielding ability, but until somebody can explain exactly how they are figured I can’t understand why their proponents expect to see widespread adoption.
Besides, you don’t really need anything more than your own eyes to see that Derek Jeter’s range has greatly diminished or that Ike Davis is a really good first baseman.
Continue reading “Random Thoughts: Gold Gloves, managers, minor league free agents & Jeff Francoeur”
Congratulations are in order for Carlos Beltran and David Wright, who both won Gold Glove awards this year.
This is Beltran’s third award, and Wright’s second. Keith Hernandez holds the team record with six Gold Glove awards.
At first, I was a little surprised that Wright took home the Gold Glove again. I only saw about half of the Mets’ games this year, but Wright’s defense seemed to take a little step backwards. Then again, the only other guy that came to mind for the award was Nationals’ third baseman Ryan Zimmerman — and he only played in 106 games this year.
PaulHadsall.com 