All I'm saying is change the name.
Albert Pujols was no doubt the best baseball player in the National League during the 2008 season, but was he the “Most Valuable Player?” The team for which he plays, the St. Louis Cardinals, finished in fourth place. Fourth place! Eleven-and-a-half games behind the Cubs. Their season was over in August.
So how “valuable” was Albert Pujols? Not very. Are you telling me that the Cards would have finished fifth without him?
Just change the name. Call it something else. Call it the Player of the Year, or Best Player, or the Most Wonderfulest, Awesomest, Incrediblest Player of the League, but not The Most Valuable Player, lest the word “valuable” lose its value.
Call it the “Ernie Banks Award” after the Chicago Cubs great who won consecutive MVP awards in 1958 and 1959 despite the fact that the Cubbies never saw the postseason, causing one writer at the time to comment, “Without Banks, the Cubs would have finished
Legend has it that in 1952, when Pirates General Manager Branch Rickey wanted to trade his big star, Ralph Kiner, to the Cubs, he said. ”We finished in last place with you. We can finish in last place without you.”
Maybe it's just me, but it seems that a player's value should be based upon the question: “Would his team have been able to accomplish what they did without him?” In Prince Albert's case, the answer is yes.
Pujols even said as much two years ago when he got beat out for the award by Ryan Howard of the Phillies, who finished second that year but didn't get to the playoffs. Pujols said at the time, “I see it this way: Someone who doesn't take his team to the playoffs doesn't deserve to win the MVP.” I wonder if he's rethinking that position now that he's turned the tables and beat out Howard, who by the way, took his Phillies all the way to the World Series and brought home a championship.
Some people, especially those with Missouri zip codes, think that Pujols was robbed in 2006 and maybe he was. Phillie Phanatics think that Howard was robbed this year and maybe he was. But the controversy would not exist if we just called it something else.
Or maybe have two awards: The MVP and the Player of the Year.
The American League MVP Award went to our very own Dustin Pedroia. Think about it, Mike Lowell, J.D. Drew and David Ortiz spent a big part of the season on the disabled list. Jason Varitek did very little with his bat. Manny left for LA. and still the Boston Red Sox came this close — making pinching motion with right index finger and thumb while feverishly typing away with only my left hand — to beating the Tampa Bay Rays and winning a ticket to the World Series.
His numbers included a .326 batting average, 17 home runs, 83 runs batted in and 20 stolen bases out of 21 tries. He had 213 hits and led the league with 54 doubles. Oh, and he scored 118 runs for the Sox.
And that doesn't even take into consideration what he did with his glove. If the Sox finished out of the running, I'd be first in line to say give the MVP to somebody else, but I am convinced beyond a shadow of a doubt that the Sox don't get to the playoffs this season without Pedroia.
I'm not a sportswriter and I've gone around and around with the good folks in that department over this. They're of two minds and the half who disagree with me and tell me I should stick to news.
Dennis Shaughnessey's e-mail is dshaughnessey @lowellsun.com .
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