SHOULD CC BE THE MVP?

Interesting take and I totally agree the Brew Crew are watching at home without CC, but NL MVP? Meybe TEAM MVP. But, I think you answered yourself…”only 17 games”. Even with some weak MVP competition this year in the NL, I just couldn’t justify voting someone who played about one in every ten games for a team a league MVP, not that I have a vote.
BTW, can ESPN stop with the East Coast bias for Ryan Howard for NL MVP? Seriously? Forty-eight taters is nice. But 199 whiffs??? Can we retroactively name Dave Kingman a 70′s MVP for like three straight years back then under that criteria??

I didn’t even bring up Howard because he hit under .250 and his OPS was not even .900.

The year Dave Kingman hit 48 homers was just awesome.

YOU didn’t but the Baseball Tonight crew was all over Howard last night. Seriously ridiculous. Vote Kong!!

Here’s to you, Matt. I agree with you 100%.
And I’d agree with you even if I wasn’t a Cardinals fan.

The MVP of the NL should clearly be a close battle between Sabathia and Pujols. But unfortunately too many folks out there are in love with home runs and think they are FAR more important than any other facet of the game. Therefore, guys like Ryan Howard, who hit .240, strike out 200 times a year, play horrible defense, and are basically one dimensional baseball players get tons of votes. It’s pathetic.

.357 37 HR’s 44 2B’s 116 RBI’s .462 OBP 1.111 OPS

One of the best fielding first basemen in baseball.

Yeah, that’s WEAK!

Hard to argue against the Big Fella, though with Pujols his excellence is so consistent that it’s become easy to overlook.

It’s a good point. You expect that from Pujols, so fans are not necessarily wowed with it as they should be.

Well, I think we’re at the point where we can expect Ryan Howard to hit around 45 homers every year. Why is anyone “wowed” by that?

Howard still drove in a boat-load of RBI’s despite the bad AVG and high K count. Plus Howard got Phillies into post-season, as strong as both statlines were Howard had better September, including better AVG, OBP and SLG… despite striking out twice as much.
If you’re gonna say CC what about Manny Ramirez? He was mid-season pick up who helped Dodgers into playoffs. ManRam’s stats comparable to Pujoles and Howard.
In 1984 when Cubs won East Ryno was MVP and he didn’t have fat stats by any means, but wa an all-around influence… like… gulp… Mark Derosa is now for the Cubs. But I realize if you took Derosa off Cubs would still be decent so I take his name back.

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JKDilla, Howard is still a one dimensional player. Driving in runs and hitting home runs aren’t the ONLY stats one must look at when deciding an MVP.

If the Brewers don’t pull the trigger in the Sabathia deal, where are they today? Not playing the Phillies, that’s for sure. He is the only MVP candidate that was the difference maker between making the playoffs and watching the playoffs.

If the Phillies lineup lost Ryan Howard, I’m not so sure it would have been enough to keep them out of the playoffs.

http://baseknocks.com/2008/10/01/cc-sabathia-big-frame-bigger-impact/

Required reading for baseball writers and fans….

http://www.lookoutlanding.com/2008/10/3/627263/the-most-underappreciated