Potential AA target: Paul Maholm

Word broke yesterday that the Pittsburgh Pirates don't intend on paying Paul Maholm $9.75MM next season.  Immediately, people began reading between the lines, claiming that such a report meant that Pittsburgh would buyout the option for $750K.  Neil Huntington, Pirates' GM, claimed that they weren't intending on rejecting the option, however, saying that they would either trade him before the season starts, or during the season.  Obviously, this could just be posturing, since everyone wants starting pitching, and he might try and build some kind of market for a team like the Yankees, but if he doesn't find an offer he likes, he's got a reasonably effective pitcher at a price that might not be great, but certainly isn't bad.

This option projects to be close to a wash.  Maholm was worth ~2.1 WAR last season, so on the free agent market, the $9.75MM is right around what is standard, if we equate 1 WAR to $4.5-4.75MM, and project Maholm to be approximately as effective next season. Part of a GM's job, however, is to get as many wins out of his team without spending a cock-load of money, and at $9.75MM, Maholm projects to be worth right around what he will be paid, and thus, isn't scheduled to provide much of a surplus. (Sidenote-- Maholm wasn't a free agent signing; he avoided arbitration, and was worth ~5 fWAR over the last two years, in which he was paid $6.5MM, which pretty much means that Pittsburgh got some value out of him, though not tons.  Considering his back to back 2WAR seasons, 9.75MM doesn't provide much surplus, but there is some.  If the cost per WAR rises, which it usually does, we could reasonably expect $5MM of surplus value with a 2.1WAR season.)

Something I don't understand is the timing of this announcement.  Given Charlie Morton's recent injury and surgery, and the revelation that he will be out of action for 6 months, I'm wondering why the hell they would decide to make this claim now regarding Maholm.  He's been fairly average for a starter over his career, despite being fairly inconsistent, even if we consider the fact that he's been playing in the NL Central his whole career.  Having said that, he plays for the Pirates, so he hasn't gotten to face the shitty Pirates lineups of the last 6 years, which negates some of the advantage of pitching in the NL Central.  He's had FIP's right around the 4.00 mark each season in his career, which isn't great, and he had 3 straight seasons of descending K-rates, combined with ascending BB-rates, before sort of fixing that this season.  He's also suppressed HR's very well in each of the last 3 years (partly due to playing in pitcher friendly Pittsburgh).

So why am I writing this?  Well, we know that if the Jays choose to add a pitcher, it will be a front-mid of the rotation type of guy, which isn't exactly a description that Maholm represents, but there is an inherent value in his ability to pitch 200+ innings (2 WAR over 200IP > 2 WAR over 170 IP due to bullpen wear and tear).  I'm wondering if the Jays will look in to a guy like Maholm, who was on pace for a career high in innings pitched until missing the last 6 weeks of the season with an elbow issue.  As far as I can tell, however, this is the only time he's missed over the last 3 years.

Maholm's $9.75MM pricetag seems a little high for Alex Anthopoulos, and he's certainly not the first guy I'd think of paying $10MM to.  However, I feel like one of the main reasons the Jays would elect to go after a mid-rotation guy is the ability to throw innings and go deeper in to games so as to alleviate the use of the bullpen, in contrast to this past season.  Maholm can definitely throw somewhere in the 200+ inning range, which would obviously be a help to the bullpen, especially if younger guys like Joel Carreno and Luis Perez will be there.  I'm not sure if AA is interested or not, nor am I overly confident about the cost of 1 year of Maholm on the trade market.

The Pirates have 5 days after the end of the World Series to decide whether or not they would like to exercise Maholm's contract option, which leaves an awful lot of scenarios.

• Exercise Maholm's option, and move him at the trade deadline to a contending team, assuming PIT is out of  the playoff race by then.  The return will be smaller, but there will be fewer question marks in the starting rotation, and it allows Pittsburgh to determine what they have with their young starters who might not necessarily begin the year in the majors (Jameson Taillon, Stetson Allie, Gerritt Cole).
• Exercise Maholm's option, and move him before the start of the season.  They do have guys that can start, and don't necessarily need Maholm in that rotation, especially if they don't think they're ready to contend.  I honestly don't think they're too far away, and they started well enough this season to fool me, but I'm not sure they're quite good enough to get the job done in the NL Central, especially if the Astros are moving to the AL, making that division tougher.  Having said that, barring any trades or free agent signings, Maholm would probably be the best pitcher in the Pirates rotation (unless one of the aforementioned draft picks make the team and is awesome, which is very possible).
• Don't do anything with the option, trade the rights to Maholm before the 5 days are up.  Maholm won't be a type-A or type-B free agent in the event of his option being declined.  As such, there won't be a Miguel Olivo situation like last year, where AA essentially bought a draft pick from the Colorado Rockies.  The return would be next to nothing for the Pirates, but they wouldn't have to worry about having the $9.75MM on their books, or the $750K buyout.
• Decline the option, allow Maholm to become a free agent.  Seems unlikely to me, but they can open up a big chunk of change if they feel comfortable with their pitching going in to the season.  They can then use that money to spend on free agency or sign draft picks, since they choose 8th overall this season.  The farm system is good right now, but a lot of them will be graduating to the bigs sooner or later.

The first two seem a lot more likely than the last two, for what it's worth.

If the Jays want to make a move on Maholm, they might have a competitor or seven, given the lack of starters on the free agent market.  $10MM might be a little pricey to give up anything of use, so if the Pirates want to get anything of reasonable impact in return, they might have to either eat up a contract, or toss in some cash.  They have a lot of young, decent position players, but there are certainly some positions that could be upgraded.  I assume Pedro Alvarez will get multiple second chances to prove that he could get the job done, as will Jose Tabata.  Alex Presley played well enough down the stretch that they probably wouldn't take AB's from Garrett Jones for anybody else's benefit.  Ryan Doumit is good enough at catcher if he can stay healthy, and Andrew Mccutchen and Neil Walker aren't going anywhere anytime soon.

I'm sure the Pirates are looking for major-league ready-ish talent in this trade, and the only real holes I see are at 1B, SS, and maybe C depending on Doumit's health (which could shift him to 1B).  The Jays obviously have a wealth of catching depth, but I can't see them selling anything there for 1 year of Paul Maholm, especially on a contract that doesn't suggest to offer much surplus.  I don't think the Jays extended Yunel Escobar to a team friendly contract this season just so that they could trade him, especially after the season he just had, and especially when Adeiny Hechavarria is still a question mark, especially for, again, a contract that doesn't offer much surplus over 1 season, and I can't imagine they're cool with moving Hech yet either.

That leaves 1B.  Adam Lind might not be as good as we thought he was going to be 2 years ago; he doesn't walk, he strikes out a lot, and not a very good fielder.  The problem is, his trade value is not very high after having a shitty second half of the season, and he has an incredibly team-friendly contract ($5MM in '12 and '13, with 3 club options of 7, 7.5, and $8MM).  I wouldn't be surprised if the Jays trade Lind at some point, especially if they pick up a big name 1B elsewhere, but again, this is for 1 year of Maholm.

How about David Cooper?  He might still turn in to something, but he doesn't really appear to have much of a spot on this team going forward.  He doesn't field very well, and his bat doesn't really play well at 1B, as he hits for little power.  It was his second go-around at AAA last season, and he did put up really good numbers in the PCL, so Pittsburgh might see some kind of value there.

I'm just kind of struggling on determining the value that Cooper has, especially relative to Maholm.  If I were Huntington, and asked for Cooper for Maholm straight up, I don't think we'd have a deal (nor do I think Huntington would make that offer), simply because I think there would be a better offer from another team.  Maholm isn't good, per se, but he's not tradeable-for-David-Cooper bad either.  The fact that AA has such a good farm system means that he could definitely give up some middling prospect that might make it somewhere someday (i.e. Chad Beck/Danny Farquhar or something) in exchange for getting Huntington to give up a bit of cash to help pay for the $10MM contract (you might even need to go quite a bit higher than Beck/Fark).

Basically what I'm trying to say here is that Maholm and Brett Cecil aren't incredibly different from one another, and Cecil is 4 years younger, probably hasn't peaked yet, and is several million dollars cheaper.  Maholm was definitely better this year, but Cecil clearly had a down year, and the fact that Maholm would cost literally 10x what Cecil costs doesn't really make up for the fact that Maholm would upgrade the rotation by 1 WAR, give or take, especially when you consider that we already have Cecil on the team.  Guys like Cecil, Drabek, Alvarez, and Mcgowan will all need somewhere to pitch next season, and if the Jays get Maholm, only to have him stink... well I just think that's a worst case scenario in terms of the development of a promising young pitching staff.

If Cecil (or whomever) stinks and Maholm is still available next season, and the Jays are still kicking around in the division a few months in to the year, then sure, I'm for it.  Paul Beeston said that money is available for this coming season if they decide that it's a good idea.  I'm not fussy about the idea of getting Maholm if it's going to cost anything of substance, unless the Pirates are willing to throw in some cash, or take Mark Teahen.

The fact of the matter is that, in order to compete this season, the Jays are going to need a lot of stuff to go right for them.  Offense needs to improve (Snider/Rasmus, etc.), nobody in the rotation can have years like Cecil/Drabek had, and other teams will probably need to take a step backwards.  I really feel like the margin of error on the Jays being good enough to win this division can begin and end with the rotation not having fuck-ups the way they did this past year.

Are the Detroit Tigers stupid?

Or is it just Jimbo?

Maybe someone can help me out here--  What's up with this Tigers' lineup?  I get that it's a lefty on the mound for the Rangers, and I get that right-handed batters hit better against lefty pitching... it totally makes sense to me so far.

But Delmon Young is clearly pretty hurt.  If you've missed it, Young had been held out of the lineup for the last two games with an oblique strain or twinge or pull or something.  Something Obliquey.  FOX just showed a video of Young fielding a ball that went to the LF gap (presumably from the last game that he played), where he got to the ball and (seemingly) considered flipping it to Austin Jackson as if they were a 2B-SS combo going for a double play.  Ultimately, he decided that it would be better to just lob it a third of the way back to the infield.  Commentators were saying that it was obvious that he wasn't 100% at the time, and he doesn't look much better tonight, from what I've seen so far.

Joe Buck just pointed out that to Detroit, it's worth the defensive liability to keep the bat in the lineup, which is oddly reminiscent of Vladimir Guerrero attempting to play RF last year in the World Series, only to look like a god damn buffoon out there and ultimately cost the Rangers a couple runs in game 3 (?).  Vlad was actually a pretty good hitter, but without the DH rule in the NL park, there was a cost-benefit analysis that needed to be  done by Ron Washington: Does keeping Vlad's bat in the lineup outweigh the risk of having him run around like a chicken with his head cut off in the outfield?*

Ultimately, no, it wasn't.  So here is my question: if it wasn't worth it to have Vladdy in the field, why would it be worth it to have an injured Delmon Young out there?  Vlad, in 2010 had a 119 wRC+, with a .300/.345/.496 slash, and was one of Texas' better hitters.  Delmon Young, on the other hand, is injured, and has been below average all season.  Even if you want to take in to account some kind of weird excuse to look at the sample size of his Detroit-only numbers, he's been perfectly average, with a 101 wRC+.  If you want to use that small sample, he had a UZR of -5.5, which goes along correctly with his -54.7 UZR for his career over 6 seasons.

It's not like there's much better as an option for the Tigers, so I don't really know what I'm saying here--  I guess I kind of like Don Kelly?  Andy Dirks maybe?  I dunno.  Young can't possibly be the right play in LF, and definitely can't be the right play as your 5th batter.

[sidenote- Jamie and Gregg just spoke about exactly what I'm currently writing about between innings... only for Delmon to make a running catch at the wall.  Great.]

*- There's obviously something to be said about the fact that Vlad was playing RF that game, and not LF.  Vlad should obviously never be in the outfield, but I'd definitely have him in left in that situation, even if it means putting Nelson Cruz in right.  At least Nelly gets out there everyday.

Post-TG hangovering

Well I ate a shitload, and got sloppy drunk, but I still managed to lose weight this week.  Figure out if that makes sense.  I also managed to miss the whole TEX-DET game, and most of the STL-MIL one yesterday, the first games I've missed since the day the Red Sox died.  I'd like to point out the Nelson Cruz is really fucking good at baseball, and is criminally underrated.  I'm pretty sure I've written that on here somewhere before.

Anyway, there's a small spattering of Jays news on the intertubes lately, so...

Stuff


Paul Beeston sat down and had a chat with Richard Griffin of the Toronto Star.  MLBTR summarizes the chat well enough, I suppose, but the real meat is within the comment section, where two guys troll every single Jays fan on there expertly.  A note for idiots: Beeston says they're going to spend more money, starting either this year or next.  You don't have to complain for much longer!

Rumor has it, according to Jon Heyman of Sports Illustrated, that teams are inquiring on Joey Votto.  And wouldn't you know it, the Jays are considered to be one of those teams.  When asked, Walt Jocketty, Reds' GM, said that they weren't going to trade him, obviously.  Because why the fuck would you ever say otherwise and drive the price down?  You wouldn't.  It's pretty tough to argue that Votto would look fucking awesome in this lineup, if for nothing else than to get rid of Adam Lind.  I'm not going to go off on this one, at least not yet-- maybe if this rumor picks up a little more steam, I'll tickle myself with a post dedicated to the awesome outrageousness that is Joey Votto, but I'm fairly sure that there won't be any trading and whatnot until after the World Series.

Related to Jocketty's claim that he's not trading Votto, MGL looks at the usefulness of such a claim, and whether it ever makes sense for a player to be untouchable.

Fangraphs/Rotographs writes something really open-ended about what Kelly Johnson should be expected to do next season.  They figure he bounces back a bit next year!  They also wrote something about Ricky Romero last week that I don't remember linking, but may have and will just have a repeat right here.  I really wonder sometimes if just anybody can write for fangraphs, because basically all these rotographs articles follow the same formula of finding someone with an abnormal [babip/fip/line drive%/etc.] compared to their career norms, and then establish the opinion that he's due for a regression next season.  No shit.

Keith Law wrote the other day, saying that Jays prospect Anthony Gose is pretty much a guaranteed superstar in the making.  It's an insider article (i.e. behind a paywall), but someone copy and pasted it on the internet, and as result, here you go (stuff in square brackets is mine):

Toronto Blue Jays centerfielder Anthony Gose took a major step forward this year with his performance in AA at age 20, showing patience and a little more pop, with a strong .254/.358/.444 line against right-handed pitchers. He does need to improve against southpaws, and his line was boosted by a good home park (especially for left-handed hitters), but given his athleticism and other tools, the hitting line and the improvements in his swing that caused it are really promising.

Out of high school, Gose started with a wide stance and drifted onto his front foot, almost without purpose, then generated most of the power in his swing with his hands, throwing the bat head at the ball with an inconsistent swing path and finish. Now, he's starting with a narrower base, striding forward to get his swing started, keeping his weight back longer and his back more stable, letting him drive through the ball and generate some power from his hips and legs while maintaining a much more consistent swing.

Gose is a 70 runner with a 70 arm [out of 80] (although the one game throw I saw was more of a 60, if you want to nit-pick) who should have plenty of range for centerfield, so the offensive baseline for him to be an average everyday player in the majors is pretty low. He still has a lot of improvements ahead of him to become a star but I am very optimistic about him reaching that. When the Jays traded Brett Wallace to Houston for Gose two summers ago, I didn't understand the deal, as Wallace was a polished, disciplined hitter while Gose was all tools but didn't have great performances or advanced mechanics. Wallace, it turns out, had a fatal flaw that was exposed in AAA and now in the majors -- he cannot turn on inside pitches, so he tries to go to the opposite field instead; with minimal defensive value and no apparent way to fix that flaw, he was expendable for the Jays. Gose, meanwhile, is no longer a tools goof but the kind of high-upside prospect Toronto GM Alex Anthopoulos has said all along that he wants in the organization. They took a risk, but right now it appears to be paying off in a huge way.

Hi everybody

I vaguely remember having a blog.  Stuff, I suppose.

Not a ton going on, besides everybody who spends any time at my house ever being totally sick of baseball.  I guess the Yankees and Phillies lost, which pretty much means that I went 1/4 in my playoff predictions for the first round, which I actually don't even remember posting here.  My correct one was Milwaukee, for the record.  My second round teams are MIL and TEX.

As for the world of the Bluejays, everything seems quiet for now.  Baltimore is looking for a new GM, and Jays assistant GM Tony Lacava is said to be on the short list for that gig.  Boston is looking for a new manager, and I heard musings that Jays bench coach Don Wakamatsu is a candidate.  Torey Luvollo was thought to be considered too.

Both Jayson Nix and Rommie Lewis have declined their minor league assignments and have become free agents, according to CBS Sports transaction page.  Chris Woodward, Wil Ledezma, and DeWayne Wise have all become free agents this past week as well.  Nobody else will sign Woody, and Wise and the Jays are like a highschool relationship, so I half expect both to either resign or retire.

See?  There's not much.  That's why I'm hardly writing anything.  I figured we'd hear about guys needing offseason surgeries by now or something, because lord knows the Phillies needed a few of those (Hamels, Pence, Polanco all have sports herniae apparently, Howard ruptured his Achilles tendon the other day and might be not be back for the start of next season), but I haven't heard anything from the Jays side of things yet.  Contracts don't end until after the World Series, at which time teams will have 5 days of exclusive negotiation with their free agents, so the free agent frenzy won't start for at least another couple of weeks, and I'm pretty sure trades can't happen until that point too.  So basically, you're all going to have to just sit there and be patient before the real fun starts.

2011 report cards

I assume every other Jays writer has done this already, so I may as well too.

Pitchers


Ricky Romero- A+.  Helped by a really low babip, Ricky put up some outrageous numbers this season.  I honestly don't think much needs to be said here other than the fact that this is probably his ceiling.  If he improves as a pitcher, I'd expect him to be right around the same as he was this year, if that makes any sense.  Regression and improvement will cancel each other out, I guess is what I'm saying here.

Brandon Morrow- B.  I'd like to see some more conditioning over the offseason.  He started the year on the DL, and appeared to waiver a bit down the stretch, but he threw a career high in innings for the second straight year, and showed flashes of brilliance, along with flashes of suicide.

Brett Cecil- C.  It was good to see him rebound from a terrible first half, but again, down the stretch, I meh'ed.  He might have a future as a relief pitcher.

Carlos Villanueva- B-.  Was really good as both a reliever and starter in the first half, especially as someone who didn't expect to start.  I assume the innings caught up to him around the 2/3 mark of the season, which is totally reasonable.  He was on pace to shatter his career high in IP before hitting the DL and missing like a month.  I would suggest that, had he known he was going to be starting 13 games, he would have had his arm stretched out a little better before the season.

Henderson Alvarez- A+.  I'm not sure what more we could expect for Hendy.  He made 10 starts, hardly walked anyone, and put up 1.3 rWAR as a 21 year old.  I wouldn't be surprised if he was the ace of this staff in 3 years.

Kyle Drabek- F.  Terrible.  Throw strikes, blow it by people, make hitters look silly.

Dustin Mcgowan- B+.  Fought back, good for you, more work to do, etc.  Still has a 96 MPH fastball, so there's definitely something there.  Probably better suited for the bullpen in the future, but obviously I'm not talent evaluator.

Luis Perez- B.  There's no need to have him in the rotation.  Just be a dominant lefty bullpen guy and we'll all get along.

Frank Frank- B.  Terrible first half, combined with an awesome second half.  Again, probably a conditioning issue in the first parts of the season.  He was injured in spring training, and thus, didn't really have a spring to get back in to game shape.  He was also used fairly poorly (multiple consecutive days when he clearly wasn't ready) early on, but I think Farrell kind of fixed that eventually.  Straight up dominated the last two months of the year, and I'd love to see him come back.  People bitch about the Jays lack of a closer... this is your closer if he'll come back.

Jon Rauch- F-.  If there was anything worse than F-, he'd get it.  This guy was the worst pitcher on the team by a mile, and Brad Mills happened.  I wonder if this was a blip, because his career numbers don't really make any sense of this season.  I'd expect him to bounce back a little next year.  The fact that he has type-B status goes to show how broken this Elias system really is.

Brad Mills- F-.  Really fucking bad, but then again, this guy isn't a major-league calibre pitcher.

Joel Carreno- B.  I was impressed over a small sample.

Shawn Camp- C+.  Somehow fought back to Type-B with a strong showing in the last 6 weeks or so.  Had a couple of really bad outings in May and June which really fucked him hard with regards to ERA and WHIP, but he fought back.

Jesse Litsch- C.  Pitched better after transitioning to the bullpen, but in a small sample.  Seemed to get fatter and fatter every time out there.

Casey Janssen- A.  Awesome year.  Totally blew everyone away for the first couple months.  Not sure if that was just a lucky stretch, or if he's actually that good, but until September, Janssen went out there and dominated folks.

Position Players


Jose Bautista- A+-  MVP.  Bondsian first half, regular all-star second half.  I wish he'd let Colby Rasmus take charge in the outfield.

Edwin Encarnacion- B+.  Start of the year was a laugher, both at the plate and in the field.  Once he was banished from 3B, things seemed to turn around.  From 2 weeks before the allstar break to the end of the season, he was the team's best hitter.

Adam Lind- B-.  Transitioned to 1B, and played it well, and tore the cover off the ball for about a month and a half.  I would have given him a C/C+ had I not heard Gregg Zaun on tv the other day say that Lind was just too exhausted from adjusting to playing the field.  Before hearing that, I was completely ready to give up on Lind and look for another 1B/let Edwin play 1B and find another bat somewhere, but I'm willing to give Lind a short leash for next year if he gets in to better condition.

Brett Lawrie- A+.  Barring a hand injury two days before his scheduled callup, we'd be looking at the AL ROY.  He did absolutely everything very well, and is probably the most exciting baseball player in the league right now, save for Mike Stanton or Jacoby Ellsbury.

Yunel Escobar- A+.  Tough year in terms of injuries, but when he was around, he was quite excellent.  He is an elite fielder, and he gets on base better than almost anybody else on the team.

JP Arencibia- B+.  Lotta taters, and did a good job catching.  I'd like to see him get on base more, obviously, but that probably stems from a really low babip.  He strikes out too much, but I'd expect the walkrate to rise and the K rate to drop over the next couple years.  When Travis d'Arnaud is ready to come up, JP could be a very useful trade chip, or he might have to learn 1B.

Kelly Johnson- B.  I guess.  Really small sample, but he got on base at a pretty good clip.  I've always been a fan, and hope he comes back next year.  2B is really shallow this offseason.  If only Aaron Hill still sucked.

Travis Snider- D.  I'm not ready to drop the F-bomb here, mostly because he didn't really get a chance to succeed.  Still kind of sad panda about this though.

Eric Thames- B.  Pretty good performance out of a rookie.  Probably gives the worst interviews in the history of interviews, and doesn't play very good defense either.  He should probably be on twitter if he wants to be a part of this team's future.

Mike Mccoy- B.  Not sure what else you could ask for.  Played good defense, took way more than his share of walks, and travelled back and forth from Las Vegas like 80 times.  Without McDonald around, I'd expect Mccoy to have himself a permanent bench role.

Jose Molina- A.  A really high babip, plus some clutch hits have helped turn him in to the best backup catcher in baseball.  He still won't be a starter wherever he signs (at least I fucking hope not, for the sake of baseball), but I'm sure there's some value to be had.

Colby Rasmus- B-.  It would be nice to see the bat return, but that glove...  It's really refreshing to see a CF take really good routes to flyballs, much less be able to catch something over his head.  I have no doubt that he's going to recover and become one of the best CF's in the game, but I'm sure there's some mental hurdles that need to be jumped over.  I think it's on the coaching staff for this one.

Mark Teahen- N/A.  Get off my team.

TV


Breaking Bad- A+.  This is the best show on TV right now, and might go down as the best ever when it's all said and done.  If you're not watching this show, fuck you.

9 consecutive hours of baseball

My End-of-season Awards

I'm going to give my awards, and justify why.  I'd like to point out that I'm not just going to sort by any stat (i.e. WAR, ERA, etc.), and give an award based on that.  I'm going to explain a whole lotta reasons why whoever gets my vote deserves it.

AL Cy Young: Justin Verlander.  Big fucking surprise.  Simply put, he was the best pitcher in baseball this season.  I won't acknowledge the .242 babip as an advantage or disadvantage to his win here, nor will I include fip/xfip, because that just kind of happens sometimes.  I don't think he'll ever be this good again, but that doesn't matter at all.  I'm looking at what happened, and not what should have happened.  Honorable mention goes to CC Sabathia, Jered Weaver.

NL Cy Young: Roy Halladay.  Halladay was the second best pitcher in baseball this year.  I feel like it's going to end up as a toss up between he and Clayton Kershaw, but Halladay gets the nod, simply because Halladay put up similarly amazing numbers against a tougher division.  Honorable mention goes to Kershaw and nobody else, because those two separated themselves by miles.

AL MVP: Jose Bautista.  Simple, really.  The best hitter in baseball.  Leader in pretty much everything important (HR, OBP, SLG, OPS, etc.).  Second place, and not by that much, goes to Jacoby Ellsbury, who put together a completely retardedly amazing season.  Anyone who gives 1st place votes to anyone but those two, fuck you.  Ellsbury led the league in WAR, which stems largely from the differences in defense between the two.  Bautista plays RF mediocrely (is that a word), while Ellsbury plays a good CF.  The problem is that defensive metrics are too volatile to include in a single season.

NL MVP: Matt Kemp.  I'm honestly having a hard time coming up with anyone other than Ryan Braun that even comes close here.  Cool.

AL ROY: Jeremy Hellickson.  This one was close.  Pineda would have won, as that first half of the season was so ridiculous.  He kind of got figured out a big over the second half, and I'm sure the innings caught up to him, so he lost to the more consistent Hellickson.  HM: Dustin Ackley, Brett Lawrie, JP Arencibia, Mark Trumbo, Jemile Weeks, Pineda, Desmond Jennings, Alexi, Ogando, Eric Hosmer.... You can see where I'm going with this.  Everyone has pros and cons: Hellickson and Pineda are starting pitchers, and are thus more valuable than the others.  Arencibia plays a premium position and hit a bunch of homers, but hit like.222.  Trumbo hit a bunch of homers but is a first baseman.  Some guys didn't play the whole year, as opposed to JPA, Trumbo, Pineda...  There's a lot of ways this one could go.

NL Roy: Craig Kimbrel.  As a reliever, he isn't incredibly valuable (though he was the NL Rookie rWAR leader, and was close in fWAR).  I could certainly see a case for Freddy Freeman, Danny Espinosa, Brandon Beachy, and Vance Worley.  All of these guys were very good, but Kimbrel was straight up dominant until the last month or so of the season, where he was clearly being overused.

For the Bluejays, my awards go to Ricky Romero as best pitcher, Jose Bautista as MVP, and JP Arencibia as ROY.  Lawrie probably could have stolen that away with another month or so of playing time, assuming it remained at the level he was producing before his injury.