It is hard to rate the Indians 2014 season successful or unsuccessful, largely because the quality of the players involved and the disappointing finish of the team as a whole. When a team has such talented players who stand out, as Michael Brantley and Corey Kluber did this year, the accolades shouldn’t be far behind and the Indians have a chance to bring home a lot of hardware this year. No Indian has won a major award (Cy Young, MVP, Rookie of the Year) since Cliff Lee in 2008 (and no MVP since Al Rosen in 1953) and none have won a minor award (like a Silver Slugger or Gold Glove) since Grady Sizemore (excluding Terry Francona‘s Manager of the Year in 2013). This year, there are few players deserving of recognition, but those players are more deserving than any Indians in a long time.
Most Improved Player
Carlos Carrasco‘s season will be largely discounted this year due to his time spent in the bullpen, but he still finished with more than 130 innings and a WAR of 3.7, good enough for 16th in the American League (according to baseball-reference.com). This number outpaces former Cy Young hopefuls Masahiro Tanaka, James Shields, Yu Darvish and Sonny Gray for the entire season. Carrasco did this after blowing each of his first four starts this year and posting a negative WAR in 2013. It is hard to imagine a more worthy candidate for this minor award than Carlos Carrasco.
Expected Winner: Carlos Carrasco
Gold Glove
It would be interesting, to say the least, if a player from the worst defense in baseball won a Gold Glove, even more so since the one player who is deserving was considerably worse than last season. Michael Brantley absolutely deserved a Gold Glove in 2013, but like often happens, his lax offensive performance left him behind. This year, he had the offense that isn’t supposed to matter, but he committed one error (that wasn’t his fault) instead of the zero from last season and threw out less base runners. In addition, he ranks 19th in UZR among AL outfielders (-5.3), so if he wins, it would just further the notion that the award has more to do with offense and making up for previous slights than actual defense.
Expected Winners: Alex Gordon, Jackie Bradley, Jr., Lorenzo Cain
Silver Sluggers
Unlike the Gold Glove, the Indians have two players worth of serious consideration for a Silver Slugger. Given to the best hitter at each position, it would be hard to find three outfielders more prolific than Michael Brantley this year. Since awards are given to the top three outfielders irrelevant of exact position, the first is likely to go to Mike Trout, more on him later, but after him, Brantley seems an easy second. Among AL outfielders, Brantley is first in average (by .026 points) and doubles, third in runs scored and steals, fifth in RBI and eighth in home runs. The only players who leads Brantley in multiple categories of those listed are Trout and Jose Bautista, neither of whom were able to match Brantley’s stolen base numbers.
In addition, there is one other Indian worthy of the silver. There were only six AL catchers to qualify for the batting title this season and among them, Yan Gomes leads all in WAR, home runs and runs scored, coming in second in batting average and RBI. Gomes is in just his first season as a starter, but already seems to have surpassed last year’s winner, Salvador Perez as well as multi-millionaire Yankee catcher Brian McCann. Gomes only real competition comes from Blue Jays catcher Dioner Navarro, but even he ranks behind Gomes in every significant stat.
Expected Winners (OF): Mike Trout, Michael Brantley, Jose Bautista
Catcher: Yan Gomes
MVP & Hank Aaron Award
Baseball press has already anointed Mike Trout the 2014 AL MVP and since they are the ones voting, it will likely come to pass. Despite this, Trout barely surpassed Brantley in WAR (7.8 compared to 6.6), although he did lead the league in RBI (111) and runs scored (115). Just as within the outfield subsection, Brantley sits among the league leaders in almost every statistical category including average (3rd), doubles (3rd), runs (6th), steals (7th) and RBI (12th). Of course, home runs are often over emphasized in the MVP discussion and that is a number in which Brantley lacks. Of course, he more than doubled his career number with 20 this season, but that number sat far behind the leaders like Nelson Cruz, Jose Abreu and Trout. Likely, all these will receive some votes, as will Jose Altuve and Victor Martinez, who finished one and two in the batting race and the fore mentioned Jose Bautista. Despite all this talent, Brantley absolutely deserves to come in second in this year’s AL MVP voting.
One thing that could help Brantley finish second in the MVP is his great defense, something not produced by Cruz, Abreu, Martinez or Bautista. There is another award he is in the runner for that does not take defense into account. Brantley has been nominated as the Indians choice for the Hank Aaron award, given to the leagues top hitter each year. He has the same credentials and opponents as listed above, although the different criteria and voting rules may give him an edge. A fan vote will be considered as part of the final tally, alongside the picks of a group of select Hall of Famers, not the BBWAA. To vote for Brantley, you can click here, but don’t expect anyone from Cleveland to ever win a popularity contest. Instead, look for Mike Trout to take home another accolade with an outside shot going to Jose Altuve, who won the batting title and stole 17 more bases than the best best base stealer.
Expected Winner (MVP): Mike Trout
Expected Winner (Aaron Award): Mike Trout
Cy Young
The strongest case for any Indian to win any award this year is for the biggest of them all, the American League Cy Young. This award is down to a two man race as other contenders, like Chris Sale, Masahiro Tanaka and John Lester all missed time with injury. Corey Kluber was just eight earned runs away from winning the triple crown as he lead the AL in wins (18) and strike outs (269). Of those eight earned runs, six recently changed distinction as a Mike Aviles error was turned into a single and a Felix Hernandez single turned into an error.
Comparing total runs allowed is a little more fair as the difference is just four total runs. Using Fangraphs‘ UZR, the Mariners saved 8.4 more runs than the average team while the Indians allowed 72.4 more runs. Taking this into account, Seattle’s defense actually saved Hernandez 1.4 runs for the season while Kluber’s cost him 11.6. With those runs changed, Hernandez’s runs/9 would rise to 2.63, while Kluber’s would fall to 2.29. While it is more important to note what actually happened on the field than what could have happened, it is also necessary to see what each pitcher had behind him. In addition, the FIP (fielding independent pitching), which is meant to measure a pitcher’s quality with an average defense behind him, agrees with the altered numbers. Here again, Kluber beats Hernandez 2.35 to 2.56. Like in the other numbers, Kluber and Hernandez rank first and second in the American League. In a season with a less obvious MVP, the voters may have picked Kluber for Cy Young and Hernandez for MVP or one or the other for both, but with Trout such an obvious favorite, that won’t be an option this year.
Expected Winner: Corey Kluber
Add The Sports Daily to your Google News Feed!
