Congratulations Dustin!

The voters have spoken. As usual, they don’t care in the least what I think. Would I have given it to Pedroia? No. Can I make a rock-solid case against him? No. That’s the beauty (or problem) with this award. One writer (I won’t give him the extra pub by using his name) left Pedroia completely off his ballot, while 16 voters had him in the top spot. That’s what you get when people vote, and I really don’t have a problem with that. What is valuable to one person isn’t valuable to another. As long as it wasn’t a blanket statement like “second basemen shouldn’t count” he can vote or not vote for whomever he likes. I’m not wrong by thinking Pedroia wasn’t the most valuable, just like I don’t think any of the voters are wrong for their votes. (Well, maybe some of the votes are wrong)

My argument of a couple days ago was brought up again with yesterday’s results. I suggested that a player on a bad team might be more deserving of the award than a player on a good team. Since the player on the bad team obviously had less help, doesn’t that make him more valuable? In yesterday’s results, the first and third place finishers were on the Sox, wile second and fourth went to the Twins. Is it hard to say that Pedroia was more valuable to his team than any other player when Youkilis was on his team? The other way is even easier…how valuable could Youkilis be when he’s sharing the line-up with the most valuable player in the whole league?
I like examples, so here’s one. Say I have a baseball card collection, and you have a baseball card collection. Each collection has 3 cards. My collection has a Ted Williams rookie card, a Carl Yastrzemski rookie, and a Carlton Fisk rookie. Yours has a Carlton Fisk Rookie, a Jody Reed Rookie, and a Wilton Veras rookie. Now, each collection has that Fisk card. If we looked the value of the card up in a price guide, each of us would find the same value assigned to the card of $50 or so. But, the Fisk would be the worst card in my collection, and far and away the best card in yours. Wouldn’t that make it much more valuable to your collection? Without the Fisk, I still have a pretty good set of cards. Without the Fisk, you might as well use your collection as coasters. So, does the presence of Youkilis diminish Pedroia’s value to the Sox? How could it not?

Whatever the results, Pedroia had an amazing year. Bottom line, that’s all that matters.