Tulo for MVP?

Alright, so Albert Pujols is the MVP. And Hanley Ramirez and Ryan Howard will likely be filled out second and third on most ballots. And those guys are very deserving. However, I wonder if people are really seeing what Troy Tulowitzki has done over the last 4 months. He's a shortstop who's slugged over .600 for 4 straight months. How many times in the history of the sport has that been done?

Remember the MVP races that were all about who had a huge September and carried their team into the playoffs? I think Vlad won one like that. Well, Pujols being the MVP has been a foregone conclusion seemingly forever, and all three division races have been anticlimactic, so I can't help but wonder how writers would feel if races were a little closer, and late season production was more heavily weighted.

On June 6th, Tulo was hitting .216/.306/.377, and the Rockies were 9 games under .500 and in last place. Since then, he's hit .337/.418/.633, and the Rockies are 32 games over .500 and have, as of today, punched their ticket to the postseason.

Not convinced? Tulo's numbers are better than Ryan Howard's. After today's Rockies game, and before today's Phillies game (which is when I'm writing this), Tulo sits at .299/.380/.553, and Howard's line is .276/.357/.564. Yes, Howard has driven in a ridiculous number of runs, but he has three great players batting in front of him, he has 70 more abs than Tulo and Tulo has as many runs scored, and my people in the National League West tell me that Tulo doesn't play good or great defense at the game's most demanding defensive position, he plays spectacular defense at the game's most demanding defensive position.

Hanley has had a better offensive season than Tulo, but his defense is nowhere near as good, and Hanley has had his worst month when his team needed him the most.

If Hanley's Marlins wind up 6 or 7 games back, or even 8 or 9 games back, does he get credit for being the best player on a contender? What is a contender? Meaningful games in September? Meaningful games the second half of September? I'm assuming that Prince Fielder won't get much love from the writers, but maybe he will. If Hanley's Marlins were basically done 5 days ago, and Derrek Lee's Cubs were done two or three weeks ago, and Prince's Brew Crew were done a really long time ago, where do you draw the line? They're not on bad teams.

My guess is that Tulo comes in 5th. That Hanley is perceived as having played for a contender, and that he and Howard finish 2nd and 3rd in the voting. Prince edges Tulo for 4th.

I forgot about Pablo Sandoval. How do you quantify his value? He's the only guy in that lineup that's good. That lineup is ridiculous. Molina hits big homers, but he's hitting .265. Plus, the Giants didn't make the playoffs. This MVP thing is very subjective, that's all I'm saying.

The Scott Kazmir Trade and its Repercussions Part 5: The Lightning Round

Raise your hand if you're getting tired of me breaking down trades. Let the record state that I raised my own hand.

Now the lightning round...

There was no way I wasn't going to forget trades and do this out of order, and now it's official! Two weeks before Alfonso Soriano was sent to the Nationals, probably the biggest trade in the last five years took place. The Marlins traded Josh Beckett, Mike Lowell, and Guillermo Mota for Hanley Ramirez, Anibal Sanchez, Harvey Garcia, and Jesus Delgado.

Beckett was something of an emigma at the time of the deal (and sort of still is). He's the best post-season pitcher of the decade, but gets hurt a lot, gets blisters a lot, and tends to be pretty average during a lot of regular season starts. All of that doesn't really matter because he's personally responsible for the Marlins winning in '03, and the Red Sox winning in '07. I almost didn't include the trade because at the time it was made Beckett was 25 years old. This really ought to fall into the Miguel Cabrera category, and I've just decided to put it there.

Also, Hanley Ramirez is good at baseball.

Moving right along. The Braves shrugged off fears of a Scott Kazmir redux when they traded Jarrod Saltalamacchia, Elvis Andrus, Neftali Feliz, and Beau Jones for Mark Teixeira and Ron Mahay. The Rangers were just rated by Baseball America as having the best farm system in all of baseball, and this trade is a big reason why. Saltalamacchia and Andrus were both top prospects (not elite) when the deal was made, but Neftali Feliz exploding the way he did last year makes this trade, at least at this point, incredibly one-sided.

To makes matters worse the Braves got far, far less when they turned around one year later and dealt Teixeira to the Angels for Casey Kotchman and Stephen Marek. Kotchman is a classic, slick fielding, no power, first baseman in the Rafael Palmeiro (before steroids) David Segui (before steriods), James Loney (maybe he should help out my fantasy team and take some steroids) mold. Remember when you could be a slick fielding first baseman with gap power, and not be a huge handicap to your team? Well, the Mark Graces and Keith Hernandezes of the world would probably have a hard time getting scouted these days.

Leading up to the 2008 campaign, 3 young aces were dealt for hundreds of thousands of prospects. This reminds me of something Keith Law wrote about taking Bryce Harper over Stephen Strasburg, if he were eligible, in the '09 draft. Your appropriate reaction to that should be, "Whhaaahhhtttt???" Oh my god, I reacted exactly the same way! But Law actually makes a really good point. How many young, cornerstone of a franchise type, catchers do you see traded? How many times have McCann, Mauer, Wieters, and Martin been traded? Compare that with young aces that seem to get traded all of time. Chew on that.

So Bedard goes to the M's for Adam Jones, George Sherrill, and Chris Tillman; Dan Haren goes to the D'Backs for Carlos Gonzalez, and a lot of other people that wound up in Oakland's rotation in '08; and Johan Santana, the best pitcher in baseball, gets dealt to the New York Mets, the Mets are granted a window to negotiate with him, that window is then extended by Major League Baseball, and the Twins get in return...

Carlos Gomez, Deolis Guerra, and three large cartons of orange juice.

Now that's making a splash with your first trade as a general manager. The Twins probably should have bit on the package built around Lester, or the package built around Ellsbury, or the package built around Hughes. Speaking of Deolis Guerra, I need to write about the Mets insistence on pushing top prospects so that they're always young and overmatched at every level of the minors.

And in the last 10 months, C.C. Sabathia was traded for a group of minor leaguers headed by Matt LaPorta (definitely not an elite prospect because, although he can hit, he's an unathletic outfielder); Manny Ramirez was traded to the Dodgers in a three way trade that I'll write about later; and Matt Holliday was traded for a then not as well thought of Carlos Gonzalez, Huston Street, and spare parts.

In hindsight, the prospect packages have really worked out on three occasions: Haren's been infinitely better than Mulder, the Bedard deal looks great for the Orioles (Jones is a beast, Sherrill's their closer, and Tillman is supposed to be great), and the first Teixeira deal looks great for the Rangers. However, I'm more interested in the level of prospect that has been dealt since our boy Scott...