Should MLB replace Cy Young awards with the "C. Mathewson" and "W. Johnson" awards?
 

Hi all,

I just finished reading "Walter Johnson: Baseball's Big Train" by Henry W. Thomas (his grandson, who I understand is a Net54 member). It is a magnificent book, and I highly recommend it. Having grown up in Idaho, I especially enjoyed reading Chapter 2 "The Weiser Wonder" detailing his time in the Idaho Southern Idaho League! (As a kid I can fondly remember playing in baseball tournaments at Walter Johnson Field in Weiser, ID.)

As I was finishing the book, the idea occurred to me (probably not the first to have it): Should MLB not replace the NL and AL Cy Young Awards, respectively, with the Christy Mathewson (NL) and Walter Johnson (AL) Awards? (Could be colloquially referred to by their nicknames e.g. the "Matty" and the "Barney").

The great Cy Young has been duly honored as the namesake of the best pitcher awards since 1956. However, dating back even to the first HOF vote to the present day, it seems to be general (though obviously not universal) consensus that Mathewson and Johnson were historically the more dominant pitchers in their respective leagues.

I am sure it won't happen, but would be curious to hear other thoughts on the idea!

(Feel free to also post your favorite Mattys, Barneys, and Youngs).

I really hope they don't do that. I am probably in the minority but I hated the batting titles getting Gwynn's and Carew's name added to the award.

Im all about the traditions in Baseball and would like to keep as many of them as possible. Cy Young does hold the record for most wins career so I think its not so bad having the award in his honor.

I agree it is "not so bad" to honor Young. I simply feel a change would be especially timely now as voters no longer tend to blindly vote for the pitcher with the most wins. Also, would be cool to honor two greats with strong NL/AL associations, rather than just one!

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I'm right with your line of thought.

Baseball seems to be trying to make " things " current, and the significance of awards is diluted down imo.

Gwynn and Carew were fine players, but not deserving of their names to an award.

I agree. And they should have changed the batting title to the "Ty Cobb Award", if anything.

They can change it but maybe with more modern players like the Koufax , ,Gibson . I don't see why we have to have such a dated reference.

Because they (Cobb and Young) had the best numbers? (Highest avg and most wins)

Sounds like a good reason to me.

With baseball's rich history, i fully agree with you all that it is rather rediculous for MLB to attach modern player names to its awards. Cobb is obviously more worthy. Along the lines of my original post, then, how about e.g. Cobb (AL) and Hornsby (NL) awards for the batting titles?!

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No. Keep them as-is. Gwynn and Carew awards = horrible idea.

Because without the history/tradition the whole thing devolves into a situation like modern cards. I really can't see naming the awards after whoever led in that stat last year. Or more like new cards, last month or week or maybe named after some hyped minor leaguer who's expected to be special.

There's too much stuff where many younger people don't appreciate it because they're entirely unaware of anything that came earlier. There's also a boatload of stuff that's the "new" thing even if it's been around since the 1800's (Or 1970's, or whenever it was actually invented. )


Steve B

The less tradition MLB chooses to throw away, the better.

I say no. The CY award has a very special meaning to the game.


HoFAutoRookies.com

Plus I might have to find another favorite card. :cool:

Wow! That is a beauty!!


HoFAutoRookies.com

I really liked the name change with Gwynn and Carew. Don't like at all the idea of Cobb getting it, and I'm cool with the Cy Young award staying as is.

If I was forced to choose two names to be on the batting awards, it would have been Ted Williams and Stan Musial.

I get why cy young had it named after him. I just think the game has changed a ton since then. It's like the nfl mov award being called the red grange. It's
In the 56 it made more sense to name it cy young . If they were to name it today I don't think it should have any of the early players.

I'm surprised at the reaction to Gwynn. In my opinion he is an extremely worthy pick. The guy hit 300 19 years in a row. That's incredible. I am however really disappointed with the Carew pick. I don't care if he has the batting titles, Ted Williams is the obvious pick for AL. No one will think of Rod Carew when you ask them to name the top ten hitters of all time.

Well, MLB could do like the NHL where all the awards are known by a player's name (ie, the Calder Trophy for the ROY)

Let's see:

Jackie Robinson Award - ROY

Cy Young Award - Best pitcher in baseball
Christy Mathewson Award - NL
Walter Johnson Award - AL

Ty Cobb Award - Best hitter/highest BA in baseball
Honus Wagner/Tony Gwynn Award - NL
Ted Williams - AL

Hank Aaron Award - Most HRs in baseball
Babe Ruth Award - AL
Willie Mays Award - NL

Fielding Awards:

OF - Tris Speaker Award
2B - Joe Morgan Award
C - Johnny Bench Award
SS - Ozzie Smith Award
3B - Brooks Robinson Award

The only one I have a concern with would be the Walter Johnson Award. I'm afraid the name would be shortened, and it would euphemistically be known as "The Johnson Award" ;)

Steve

Edited to correct the name of the Calder Trophy (thanks to Paul H for the correction).

Change Aaron to Bonds :) (Aaron already has an award after him too), Bench to Pudge, OF Andruw Jones.


HoFAutoRookies.com

yup.
 

I would certainly be OK with that AL/NL duo as well.

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In my opinion the Cy Young award has little to do with Cy Young and its association is a historical one known only to purists. If you asked Kershaw to tell you anything about Cy Young I don't think he could. For that reason I don't really see any real need to change the name. It has taken on a different meaning and naming it after another pitcher I think would be a distraction. The award Cy Young has surpassed the player and man.

Be glad we're not talking about Randy Johnson, because then it would be "The Big Unit Award."

I think all MLB awards should have the name of a great player attached. For me, it doesn't even have to be the "best" player. Attaching names to awards encourages people to think (and care) about the the history of the game.

Same goes for other sports. I especially like the college football awards -- Heisman, Lombardi, Nagurski, Thorpe etc. etc.

No, please don't.

Steve, The NHL ROY is the Calder award. The Hobey Baker award is for college hockey's best player. BTW I'm always looking for Hobey items if anyone has any ;)

That being said, I like the idea of the Matty and WaJo awards but it will never happen!

You spelled Sandberg wrong. ;)

David, I'm ok with your suggestion, except that I prefer the "Big Train" rather than "Barney."

What is a Kershaw? Is it something like this?

The awards should be left as is! If you don't know who Cy Young is and what he did you should follow bowling or polo.

It should stay how it is, I think you'd be surprised by how many players know who the old timer are.

But, if you wanted to be a stickler and name the awards after the greatest players you'd have to go as follows:

AL MVP- Babe Ruth Award

NL MVP- Wille Mays Award

AL pitcher- Walter Johnson Award

NL Pitcher- Greg Maddux Award


AL Best Hitter- Ted Williams Award

NL Best Hitter- Rogers Hornsby Award


Gold Gloves by position:

C- Johnny Bench

1b- Keith Hernandez

2b-Bill Mazeroski

SS- Ozzie Smith (for now)

3b- Brooks Robinson

LF-Yastrzremski

CF- Andruw Jones

RF- Roberto Clemente

P- Jim Kaat Award (since Maddux already gets the nl pitching)

They named a sports award after a sculptor?

:D

Used to go past one of his workshops pretty regularly as a kid, and some of the local towns had small lawn sculptures until they got expensive enough that people stole a couple, after that they all got sent to art auctions.

Steve B

...with the history of baseball, the idea of having an Andruw Jones award is kind of hilarious.

...and I think Willie Mays should be on more awards:

Best Pitcher - NL = Willie Mays
Best Pitcher - AL = Willie Mays
MVP - NL = Willie Mays
MVP - AL = Willie Mays
ROY - AL = Willie Mays
ROY - NL = Willie Mays

(kind of brings to mind... "At first base, Bugs Bunny. At second base Bugs Bunny. At third base, Bugs Bunny...")

IMHO there are already enough awards named after players. The 'age of specialization' lends itself to even more possibilities: Best set-up man; best seventh inning reliever; best OF performing in a platooned roll; etc. etc.

Statues are another thing - I'm not sure if Burger King has one in the works for me yet.

Too much celebrating for just performing whether as a player or an eater.

They have their piles of money and they can make their own statues - as Ivan Rodriguez has in his back yard (S.I. story).

No- Who's on First, What's on second, and I don't know is on third

well, he IS easily the greatest fielding CF'er of all time, it really isn't even close. every fielding statistic of any merit has him wayy ahead of everyone else

I'd feel completely comfortable taking Mays over Jones in a purely defensive role.
People who watched him play speak of his incredible instincts to go with his out of this world physical talents... Obviously Jones was a great defensive player, but better than the guy who had to patrol the vast Polo Grounds and the horrors of Candlestick? I don't think so.

in every single defensive statistic he beats Mays. Mays was a better hitter, and a better overall player, but AJ was easily the best defensive Cf'er f all time. He made catches on the trot that most guys had to dive for. His instincts off the bat were simply astounding as was his ability to track the ball as well as his arm.

Total Zone Runs career : AJ-220 Mays-176

Fangraphs DEF number: AJ- 281 Mays- 170


yeah, it's not really close

Player Awards
 

Right on with Hornsby as best NL hitter. He averaged .401 over 5 consecutive seasons and .399 over 6 years...that's amazing! Have to disagree with NL pitcher...Mathewson, Alexander and Seaver better than Maddux with Seaver & Alexander both posting better WAR & JAWS figures than Maddux. Also, one of the stats that gets lost with post 90's to present day pitchers is the fact that they simply didnt or don't complete games. The toughest outs for a pitcher is the final 3-6 outs and starters don't have to get them anymore. Not their fault of course because that's the way the game is played, but it's hard to say a 7/8 inning pitcher is better than a hurler who completed 50%+ of his games during his prime.

Regards,
Joe T.

Mddux has higher WAR than all but Clemens (cough cough roids) Cy Young and Walter Johnson (and only 1 behind WJ in 906 less innings) I think when you consider he did most of his pitching in the steroid era AND didn't possess a 95+ fastball, a very good argument could be made that Maddux is the greatest pitcher of all time.

I am not a fan of baseball reference as I think most of their proprietary stuff is garbage, I use fangraphs


http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.asp...ter=&players=0

WAR Rankings
 

Not. You better check your data on baseball reference. Maddux is ranked 8th all-time in WAR behind: 1) Young, 2) Johnson, 3) Clemens, 4) Alexander, 5) Nichols, 6) Grove, 7) Seaver. Also, interestingly enough and as I stated in my previous post, Seaver averaged approx. 7.40 innings per start over his 20-year career while Maddux averaged only 6.77 innings per start. That is a significant 2/3 of an inning disparity per start and a loud statement of how Seaver pitched much deeper into games.

Dustin, you're going to have to help out a bit.

How has the game changed " a ton "?

The basics, fundamentals, foundation of the game are still in place. In fact you can go to any neighborhood park and find people playing a ball game that's easily recognizable from current day or 100 years ago.

Sure there are teams throughout the country now, and bats have weight limits, and the mound is just a bit lower. But other than that, not much seems to have changed, imo.

WAR Rankings
 

Here you go...Rank, Pitcher, MLB Years, WAR#. Taken from BaseballReference.com

1. Cy Young+ (22) 170.3
2. Walter Johnson+ (21) 152.3
3. Roger Clemens (24) 139.4
4. Pete Alexander+ (20) 117.0
5. Kid Nichols+ (15) 116.6
6. Lefty Grove+ (17) 109.9
7. Tom Seaver+ (20) 106.3
8. Greg Maddux+ (23) 104.6

I haven't studied it in detail, but one of the things I wonder about WAR is how they account for some of the slightly connected stuff. Those things make it slightly similar to wins as far as pitchers go.

For instance, Wins relies on how good the team is, and who the pitcher pitches against. I believe one reason fewer pitchers reach 20 wins is because the rotations are set up so the better guys get matched up against the other teams better pitchers. (I'd have to really get into it to see if this happens more now with larger rotations and less travel time, or if it happened more back then with smaller rotations and more travel time.)

Like wise for WAR, the players who are the second tier players, very good but not great might have that stat dragged down by being up against someone "special" Realistically a pitchers chances against Johnson, Young, or any of those others when they were in their prime weren't all that good.

Of course, WAR might be set up to account for that, and if it is then I'll have to rethink things.

Al things considered, I'd still think Young did stuff that's far beyond what almost anyone else has. Not to mention the amazing durability in an era when pitchers were used as much as possible.

Steve B

I provided a link in my reply above to Fangraphs (which has Maddux 4th) their proprietary WAR is much better and used more often by the saber community than baseball reference.(which to be honest, is considered a little dated)

1- Clemens- 133.7
2- Young- 131.5
3- W. Johnson- 117.1
4- Maddux- 116.7



http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.asp...ter=&players=0

and, to be fair, using RA9-WAR Maddux is 6th (and he and Clemens are the only live ball era pitchers in the top 6, which means a good bit and WAR per game rank higher than all the rest)

and using RAR he is 3rd behind only Young and Clemens



WAR does not consider pitcher wins at all, it looks at the individual pitcher's on field performance relative to a statistical "replacement player" so who a pitcher faces doesn't matter. If he goes 6 innings, K's 9, walks 0, gives up no home runs, one unearned run and loses 1-0 he will be given as much credit as if he went 6, K'd 9, walked 0 gave up no home runs and won 19-0 as he is only credited with the things he has control of (very loose comparison but you get my drift)

War
 

You are kidding....right? Fangraphs has Perry, Blyleven and Ryan ranked ahead of Seaver, Grove, & Mathewson (not to mention Pedro Martinez)....INNEDIATELY placing its rankings as a complete Joke! And this is the ranking system you swear by? Those 3 pitchers aren't in the same league as the latter 4...LOL...

War
 

You should also check out JAWS which weights WAR for both career & a pitchers 7 best seasons (for peak value purposes) at 50% each. Very interesting...