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hive17
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- Aug 7, 2008
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A friend of mine mentioned this, and I want to get some opinions.
The big arguement against a pitcher winning an MVP is that he only appears in roughly 35 games, while someone like Granderson appears in roughly 155+ or whatever. This issue here is that batters appear to "work" more than pitchers. Of course, the definition of work is roughly moving something over a certain distance over a certain time.
But here's the thing: a pitcher throws about 100 pitches a game (or a stud like Verlander, who probably edges closer to 115), and we could say that the average PA lasts 6 pitches (maybe less? probably not more), so that's about 19-20 PA's that the pitcher is involved in per game (this number is closely related to the average IP per game, 7 or so in Verlander's case).
So if a hitter's prowess and value are related to the number of chances he has to excel in a PA, it stands to reason that a pitcher is doing just as much work as a batter, if not more. A pitcher is just doing it all in one game.
Now, obviously, you get to factor in base-running with a hitter, so the "work" goes up; but the differences aren't so great that you should be dismissing pitchers out-of-hand for the MVP just because they pitch.
Thoughts?
The big arguement against a pitcher winning an MVP is that he only appears in roughly 35 games, while someone like Granderson appears in roughly 155+ or whatever. This issue here is that batters appear to "work" more than pitchers. Of course, the definition of work is roughly moving something over a certain distance over a certain time.
But here's the thing: a pitcher throws about 100 pitches a game (or a stud like Verlander, who probably edges closer to 115), and we could say that the average PA lasts 6 pitches (maybe less? probably not more), so that's about 19-20 PA's that the pitcher is involved in per game (this number is closely related to the average IP per game, 7 or so in Verlander's case).
So if a hitter's prowess and value are related to the number of chances he has to excel in a PA, it stands to reason that a pitcher is doing just as much work as a batter, if not more. A pitcher is just doing it all in one game.
Now, obviously, you get to factor in base-running with a hitter, so the "work" goes up; but the differences aren't so great that you should be dismissing pitchers out-of-hand for the MVP just because they pitch.
Thoughts?