First Set of MLB Awards; Voters Actually Do OK!

...except for the three people who voted for Edinson Volquez for NL Rookie of the Year. Who is not a rookie. But he was on my fantasy team. Just like the (deserving) winner, Geovany Soto of the Cubs. And since I didn't win the league, I'll use this opportunity to credit myself for also having the AL Rookie of the Year, the Rays' Evan Longoria. These votes were pretty predictable, and I think the voters called them correctly.

Tim Lincecum took home the NL Cy Young. I would have voted for him, too. He was definitely more deserving than Brandon Webb, despite Webb's gaudy win totals - so perhaps the voters are getting smarter. There is definitely a case to be made for Johan Santana, who if the Mets bullpen was even halfways decent would have had about 5 more wins and probably taken home the award easily. I guess I side with Lincecum because Santana is suffering from Albert Pujols Syndrome for Awards Voting: he's so damn good on a regular basis that he has to be absolutely spectacular to get noticed (see also: Rodriguez, Alex). Lincecum has that funky delivery that is just awesome to watch (not that that should be a criteria), and also played for a terrible team - so who knows how many wins he could have had with an adequate offense. By most advanced metrics, there's not much to choose between Santana and Lincecum: almost equal in VORP and almost equal in WPA/LI (although Lincecum has aabout a 0.5 win edge when just looking at WPA and not correcting for leverage). Their ERA's are very similar as well, but when you take out defense and only look at their controllable stats, Lincecum takes a big lead: his FIP (Fielding Independent Pitching) was 2.59, vs. 3.51 for Santana, primarly due to Lincecum's high strikeout totals (10.51 per 9) and the fact that he allowed homers at half the rate of Santana (0.44 HR/9 vs. 0.88 HR/9). With this in mind, I think you can make a strong case that Tim Lincecum was the best pitcher in the NL this season. Oh, and of course, he's a tiny little guy, which makes him an underdog. Which is the best reason of all.

Kidding.