Most Intangible Player here just in time to save MLB awards season
We've done it. We've changed the conversation. Judging by recent results, it appears that we -- the thoughtful, the analytical, the relentlessly argumentative -- have hijacked the voting for baseball's major awards. In doing so, we've transformed them from a pointless celebration of RBI and easy narratives to a more informed but equally pointless celebration of metric-affirmed excellence.
Cy Young triumphs by Zack Greinke and Felix Hernandez suggest that win-total-inflating run support is no longer the most important weapon in the Cy aspirant's arsenal. Similarly, playing for a contender is no longer a prerequisite for Most Valuable Player consideration. Why, excellent players on crapbag teams are now occasionally deemed even more valuable than Michael Young. These are the days of miracle and wonder.
The only problem? A reality-based approach to award allocation effectively disenfranchises a chunk of the electorate. What about those voters who believe both in clutchiness and ghosts? How about the ones who would no sooner consider a pitcher for MVP than a misogynist cartoon squirrel for Senate? And what of those who stopped learning about baseball back in 1994 and now mostly traffic in stat-acronym puns ("Maybe you win the WAR -- but I win the battle, and you end up looking like a DIPS-tick. I'll just be over here, watching the game I love and waiting for death's cold embrace")?
We need to keep these voters engaged, because they could revolt, organize and start handing all the accolades to Jeter. To counteract any such coup de dullard, I propose adding another award to baseball's end-of-season slate: Most Intangible Player, to be awarded to the player who ... I dunno, just seems to get it done out there.
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We need a Most Intangible Player (MIP) award because we've gotten away from what matters most: The spirit and intensity that elevate the game's smallest yet grandest moments, like mistimed lunges for misjudged pop flies. In our quest to understand what we're seeing on the field and quantify performance in a way that any other forward-thinking business might, we've removed "gut feel" from the equation. And that's wrong, because our gut is capable of telling us a great many things -- for instance, that Jack Morris just wanted it more than John Smoltz in Game 7 of the 1991 World Series, or that it's time for a snack.
Thus there's only one rule in the voting for MIP: There are no rules, except the one that says there are no rules. Just as we're left to parse the meaning of "most valuable" on our own, so too shall we be charged with interpreting "most intangible."
Many MIP voters will go with their gut, which could result in Joe McEwing finally receiving the award acknowledgement he was denied during his playing days. Some might turn to the dictionary for guidance and, upon learning that intangible means "incapable of being appraised at an actual or approximate value" rather than "able to advance a runner from second to third with fewer than two outs," get confused and file a protest vote for someone/something truly intangible, like a pine cone.
Me, I'd approach my MIP ballot with the utmost studiousness, measuring any number of factors. My mission would be to render the intangible tangible, regardless of the consequences to the time-space continuum.
My research would begin where it usually does: at the Google, where I'd cross-reference specific players with specific keywords -- say, "Chris Getz" and "perseverance," "Ryan Theriot" and "baseball intelligence," and "Nick Punto" and "all the times he's been told he's not big enough, not skilled enough, not strong enough." Then I'd turn to the videotape, which would help me determine how many times my top candidates slid headfirst into first base. I wouldn't discount the human element; a few quick conversations with clubhouse peons would reveal which players soiled the most uniform trousers and ran up the highest dry-cleaning tab.
I would not seek players' spring-training EKG readings. You can't measure heart.
Would I consider a pitcher for MIP consideration, you ask? Sure. Just this year alone, hurlers ranging from Chris Volstad to Rick Porcello managed to exist at the intersection of pointlessness and despair without losing that proud glint in their eyes. Their positioning on my ballot would be dictated, however, by their innings total. This eliminates relievers from consideration, as one can only provide so much intangibility in a mere 70-75 innings. That's just simple math.
Finally, I'd go all stat-monkey on the task at hand. The most intangible players, it says here, are the ones who evoke squeals of "great hustle!" even as they do everything within their power to undermine the cause of winning. Juan Pierre -- by every account, a "hard worker" -- topped both the sacrifice-bunt and caught-stealing leaderboards in 2011. While Willie Bloomquist couldn't match Pierre's out-making prowess at the plate, he reverse-contributed mightily on the basepaths (10 caught-stealings) and played below-average defense at two positions. Perhaps sensing that Bloomquist wouldn't receive much love in the MVP derby, the Diamondbacks recently awarded him a two-year contract for $3.8 million. He reportedly turned down a higher offer from the San Francisco Giants.
So there you go. Juan Pierre and Willie Bloomquist were, by my reckoning, the Most Intangible Players in the American and National League, respectively, during the 2011 season. I cannot find any tangible way they help a baseball team win baseball games; the value they contribute can only be measured in imaginary units, like goodeffortplays and toughouts.
Great work by the two winners and by the fans who, by wearing their jerseys and cheering their every doofus basepath walkabout, enable them. Congratulations, I think.
