We are now entering the final week of the season. Some of the pennant races are tightening up. The Wild Card races are going down to the wire. Some of the players, individually, are getting close to winning honors for their great seasons. The Rookie of the Year award is just such an honor.
Rookies come into the season on the lowest rung of respect on a major league team. They may have had success in the lower level of baseball, but the MLB is where the elite of the game play. You have to earn your respect as a rookie in this league.
These rookies have certainly proved their worth. They have had great seasons, helping their teams be as good as they can be. They have turned from unknown rookie nobodies to team stars. They are becoming key cogs in their team either continuing their winning ways or helping their teams turn their fortunes around.
Unlike with the MVP voting where there is controversy over whether or not a pitcher should win the award, pitchers are absolutely welcomed as candidates for the award. In fact, since 2005, five pitchers have won thr Rookie of the Year Award. One rookie pitcher might have even saved his team’s season by stepping in and doing a great job when a veteran went down for the season.
So here are the top 5 candidates for AL Rookie of the Year honors:
5. Marcus Stroman (11-6, 3.77 ERA, 1.20 WHIP)
At 5’6″, Stroman does not seem like the prototypical MLB pitcher. Scouts, both in college and in the pros, kept talking about him being too small to be a starter. If he does make it, it will be as a reliever was what they would all say.
Coming out of college, scouts had Stroman with two plus, major league pitches (fastball/slider), and two average pitches (change-up, curveball), yet he was still projected as a reliever.
Stroman proved them wrong in college, where he took the ball as a starter every opportunity he had, and now in the MLB. He has a 7.6 strikeout-per-nine innings rate in his rookie season.
Being a small pitcher, Stroman has to have sound mechanics, and he does. He has no herky jerky movements in his wind up, and he finished with perfect form, facing the batter ready to field a ball, and not putting a lot of pressure on either his arm or legs. He has no margin for error so doing this has helped him greatly.
Stroman also has some edge to his, and he will stand up for his teammates. He is currently serving a six-game suspension for throwing a pitch over the head of Baltimore Orioles catcher Caleb Joseph after Joseph stepped on Jose Reyes’ hand as he slid at home plate the inning before.
I don’t condone head hunting, but I don’t think Stroman was doing that. He might have wanted to throw a brushback pitch as a message, but the pitch sailed. Stroman was not ejected and he eventually struck Joseph out in the same at-bat.
Stroman is looking to continue to prove the doubters wrong. He has set himself up as a middle-of-the-rotation pitcher for the Blie Jays. We will see if he continues his good pitching.
4. Collin McHugh (10-9, 2.66 ERA, 1.03 WHIP)
McHugh has had a terrific season. He would be higher on this list if he did not pitch for the Houston Astros. The Astros is twenty games under .500 this season, yet McHugh is one game over. McHugh has a 4.2 WAR, which ranks ninth in the American League for pitchers.
When the Astros picked McHugh after the Colorado Rockies waived him, no one knew that he would eventually become one of the best rookie pitchers in MLB, forget about American League. He had a career 0-8 record while with the Rockies and New York Mets.
Now, McHugh has ten wins and has won his last six decisions. Among rookie MLB pitchers, his 2.66 ERA is the lowest. During this six game winning streak, he has shown tremendous control. In his last four games, covering 29 1/3 innings, he has not walked a batter.
He also misses bats. He has 151 strikeouts in 148 2/3 innings.
When looking at McHugh, you do not see a dominating pitcher. It was the same with his idol, Greg Maddux. McHugh tries to pattern his pitching with Maddux. He is not so much a power pitcher, but he knows how to pitch and can place his pitches where he needs to .
We will see if McHugh is a one hit wonder. Whatever the case, he is certainly a hit this season.
3. Yordano Ventura (13-10, 3.19 ERA, 1.28 WHIP)
When you have “Ace” as your nickname, you have to bring it. Yordano Ventura does just that.
On Wednesday, the Kansas City Royals found themselves struggling in their series against the White Sox, and had to face one of the best pitchers in the league, Chris Sale. Ventura went to the mound and outpitched Sale, giving up just one run on three hits, and striking out seven in seven innings.
Just like an ace, he pitches well against the good teams. His lowest ERA comes against the playoff contenders like the Orioles (1.26), the Cleveland Indians (2.08), the Oakland A’s (3.00) and his inter-division rivals, the Detroit Tigers (3.12).
With his 98 m.p.h. fastball, Ventura can close you out as well as anyone. He has faced 52 batters with an 0-2 count, and has struck out half of them. Hitters have a .060 batting average against him on that count. With runners in scoring position, batters are hitting just .201 against him.
Ventura has shown the stuff of an ace. If the Royals end their playoff drought this season, Ventura could have a chance to really show his stuff on the biggest stage in baseball. In any case, Ventura looks to be a Royals ace for some time to come.
2. Matt Shoemaker (16-4, 3.04 ERA, 1.07 WHIP)
Los Angeles Angels fans can thank their lucky stars for Matt Shoemaker. On August 20th, the Angels were trying to catch the Athletics for the top spot in the AL West. The Angels’ ace, Garrett Richards, went down for the season with a knee injury. Many were wondering who would step up to take the ace role for Los Angeles.
Shoemaker was the one who stepped up. In six games since Richards went down, Shoemaker has gone 5-0 with a 1.12 ERA and a 0.80 WHIP. In 40 innings, he struck out 31 batters. The Angels went from hunting the Athletics to becoming the AL West champions.
During a postgame press conference on Monday, manager Mike Scioscia was asked about what Shoemaker has done for the Angels. “Besides saving our season, what has he done?” Scioscia said.
Now Shoemaker is the victim of the injury bug. He left his last start because of an oblique strain. he probably will not make his last start before the end of the season, and his place in the ALDS could be in danger. What happens when the team’s savior needs a savior of his own?
Shoemaker is the first rookie to get at least 14 victories and throw at least 115 innings since a guy named CC Sabathia did it 14 seasons ago while with Cleveland.
I certainly hope Shoemaker is healthy during the playoffs. He has had a special season, and it would be nice to have him continue it on a big stage.
1. Jose Abreu (.319/.386/.592, 35 HR 104 RBI)
In any other year, Shoemaker would be considered the leading candidate for AL Rookie of the Year. Not this year, however. Not when this year there is another rookie like Jose Abreu.
Abreu was signed by the Chicago White Sox to replace the popular Paul Konerko, who announced that this would be his final season. Boy, Abreu is trying to make people not miss Konerko.
Abreu is having one of the greatest rookie seasons in MLB history. He is leading the AL in slugging percentage, OPS, Adjusted OPS+ and offensive win percentage. He is in the top ten in WAR for position players (tenth), Offensive WAR (fourth), on-base percentage (fifth), batting average (sixth), total bases (second), doubles (eighth), RBI (third), extra base hits (third) and runs created (second).
Whew, I got tired just writing those accomplishments!
If it was not for the silly unwritten rule that baseball writers have that the MVP’s should play on winning teams, Abreu might be the runaway winner of the AL MVP as well.
Anthony Castrovince of MLB.com analyzed Abreu’s season, and came up with an interesting fact.
“Abreu this season has a 172 OPS+, which is a way of saying he’s been 72-percent better than average. In the game’s long history, just one other rookie who qualified for the batting title has posted an OPS+ of 170 or higher, and, no, it wasn’t Mike Trout (168) in 2012. It was Shoeless Joe Jackson (193), way back in 1911.”
With apologies to Anthony, but that OPS+ stat for Abreu is now at 173. This is the best offensive output by a rookie in over a century.
The White Sox look to have an offensive force for years to come. He should enjoy this season, because the pressure will be on for him to repeat it. For the time being, we should all take in Abreu’s accomplishments.
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