Shenanigans

I'm calling shenanigans on some of these so-called "baseball writers." Newsday has listed here how each individual voted for the AL MVP. For those that don't know how the voting goes, it looks like 2 writers from each AL team's area gets a vote. There are certainly some eyebrow raisers. I'd love to hear the justification that some of them have for how they voted, because quite frankly, some of them just don't make much sense to me, so I'm calling shenanigans.
For starters, some one tell me how Joe Mauer gets left off 5 ballots? He won the batting title and was instrumental in the Twins run to the Central. Shenanigans on these 5:

1. Joe Cowley - Chicago Sun Times (Chicago)
2. Sheldon Ocker - Akron Beacon Journal (Cleveland)
3. John Hickey - Seattle Post Intelligencer (Seattle)
4. Allan Ryan - Toronto Star (Toronto)
5. Joe Roderick - Contra Costa Times (Oakland)

I find it interesting that Larry Millson of the Toronto Globe and Mail and Allan Ryan of the Toronto Star, both cast first place votes for Morneau and second place votes for Jeter. For those that don't know, Morneau is Canadian. Perhaps these two were swayed by a little national pride? Reverse their votes and Jeter is your winner. Something smells fishy? Shenanigans.
Johan Santana was named on 21 ballots and finished 7th overall. My question to those that voted for Santana is how can you not cast a vote for Chien-Ming Wang? Both had identical records at 19-6. Johan blew Wang away in many statistical categories, but each won 19 games and each lost 6. If you want to put a value on each guy, it was 19 wins and 6 losses. No two ways about it, equal value. It doesn't matter how you got there, just that you did. And both got their 19 times. Yet Wang had 1 vote cast for him; A 9th place vote cast by Eduardo Encina of the St. Petersburg Times (Tampa Bay). At least he got it right. The rest of you: shenanigans! And a special shenanigans to Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News (Texas). He cast his number one ballot for Santana. They each were equally valuable to their teams. The numbers don't lie. you can't justify one over the other.
I want to know what Joe Cowley of the Chicago Sun Times (Chicago) is smoking. He's the writer that cast a 6th place vote for Jeter. In my opinion his cast ballot is the worst of the bunch. Dye gets your second place vote? Excuse me while I cough and say the word "hometown vote" at the same time. Johan gets his 3rd place vote. See my Wang argument above. Ortiz in 5th? Even I wouldn't have scored him that low. A-Rod? How does A-Rod even rate in the top 10? And finally, everybody's favorite catcher, AJ Pierzynski. Could luck trying to sell that argument. There is no argument that you can make that justifies casting a 6th place vote for Jeter. Shenanigans Mr. Crowley. Shenanigans.
There were some other puzzling votes cast:

1. Bob Klapisch of the Bergen Record (New York) cast a 7th place for Ortiz and a 9th place vote for Mariano Rivera. Rivera shouldn't have ranked and Ortiz was definitely not the 7th best player in the league. Shenanigans.
2. Dave Heuschkel of the Hartford Courant (Boston) cast a 5th place vote for Johnny Damon. Sounds like a little leftover love from 2004? Shenanigans.
3. Allan Ryan of the Toronto Star (Toronto), Joe Cowley of the Chicago Sun Times (Chicago) and John Hickey Seattle Post Intelligencer (Seattle) all cast votes for A-Rod. Hickey cast a 5th place vote for Alex. I love A-Rod, but he didn't deserve to be on the list. Shenanigans.
4. John Lowe of the Detroit Free Press (Detroit) cast 7 of his 10 votes for players on AL Central teams. The three non-Central players were Jeter, Ortiz, and Frank Thomas. Now if you leave Jeter and Ortiz off your list, it's further proof that you're an idiot. His ballot included 4 Twins (Nathan, Santana, Mauer, and Morneau) and also featured Kenny Rogers. The Gambler? You've got to be kidding. To his credit, he cast his first place vote for Jeter. Shenanigans.

I would really love to know the justification some of these voters had for casting votes the way they did as there are a lot of puzzling things. It makes me question the integrity of the vote and its outcome. Casting a hometown vote for a guy does no justice to anyone. As I asked yesterday, what criteria do these baseball writers have to meet to be able to cast these votes? I feel many demonstrate that they just don't get it. Again, I point to last year's HOF vote. Walt Weiss? Gregg Jefferies? I rest my case.
But as Derek Jeter said, "While I know that voting for these awards is primarily based on differing opinions and statistical debates, it's also part of what makes baseball such a great sport." I'll second that. A lot of people don't even consider Morneau to be the MVP of his team, yet he had 15 first place votes. The majority of voters saw Jeter as one of the 2 best players in the league, but someone saw him as the 6th best. It's amazing how people see things so differently. Regardless, it's fun to talk about and debate. It's part of what makes baseball such a great sport.
Peace, love and baseball.
J