Thursday, November 10, 2005

Somebody Start a Petition

While it is clear that most members of the Baseball Writers' Association who vote for the Cy Young awards are fairly dumb, most of them do not decide to write entire articles in their publications spouting forth indefensible claptrap. Patrick Reusse, however, did so in the Star Trib. The following quote illustrates perfectly well all the reasons you need for why he should be stripped of his vote:

"Get this through your skulls here in Twinsland: Starting pitchers who win 16 games for mediocre teams do not win Cy Young Awards."

Why? Is it Santana's fault that his team was mediocre? He pitches one out of every five games, how could one possibly expect him to turn around the team's fortunes when they had no offense and every other starter was inconsistent at best? It boggles my mind that some of these select 28 people who actually have the privilege of being able to vote for this important award have no idea the critera on which it should be judged. This is not homerism opinion, this is common sense. The Cy Young award is designed to judge the BEST PITCHER in the league, and looking at one statistic that is really not even in their control is absolutely idiotic and amateurish.

His article about a month ago explaining his decision to vote for Colon ahead of Santana on his Cy Young ballot, which I just recently stumbled upon thanks to a commenter, frustrated me so much that I actually e-mailed him and told him straight-up that he should have his vote stripped. I'll let you know if I hear back.

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