Jim Alexander: We seem to be having a fairly lively debate on Shohei Ohtani’s bid for his third MVP award in four seasons, and first in the National League. It doesn’t transcend the Dodgers star’s chase for baseball’s first 50-50 season; he got his 49th stolen base Wednesday night in Miami and needs two homers to reach 50, although it seems to this untrained (but experienced) eye that he’s pressing, chasing some pitches he shouldn’t in the quest for history. For what it’s worth, he’s hitting .234 with an OPS of .803 (and three homers in 64 at-bats) in 16 September games going into today’s series finale in Miami, compared to season-long numbers of .287 and .978.
But recent performance isn’t the issue. The argument against – much of it, I suspect, coming from those who are lobbying for Mets shortstop Francisco Lindor – is that Ohtani is a full-time DH and a full-time DH has never won an MVP and never should. (This even though in most cases, MVP voters don’t take defensive metrics into account anyway.)
One counterpoint I heard recently is that Ohtani isn’t playing in the defensive half of the inning because he can’t, and that if it weren’t for his recovery from a second Tommy John surgery in five seasons he would be pitching as well as hitting, the circumstances under which he won his first two MVPs with the Angels. Not his fault, in other words.
If Ohtani’s throwing program ramps up enough that he can indeed take the mound before this season ends, would that sway some votes? (He seems to be a serious possibility for some postseason pitching duties given the woeful state of Dodger pitching health, but MVP votes are due before the postseason begins.)
Does – should – defense matter in this case?
Mirjam Swanson: Should it and does it and has it are all different steps in the same dance, I guess.
Didn’t Ohtani just lose the American League MVP race to Aaron Judge a couple years ago – and handily, by a vote of 28-2 – because Judge’s offensive exploits were so magnificent? The American League-record 62 home runs? Never mind that Ohtani didn’t just play defense, he pitched – and pitched well! (15-9 with 219 strikeouts in 166 innings that season for the Angels?)
I believe voters also took into account the Yankees’ place in the standings in 2022 – first, with a record of 99-63, vs. the Angels’ mediocre 73-89 record that left them outside of the playoffs again.
So here we are this year and Ohtani is an offensive player only, putting up monster numbers – making history of his own as the first player in the 43-43 club, and now toeing the mind-bending 50-50 line – and the conversation has shifted, it would seem, to how much more valuable a good shortstop having a great season is vs. someone who’s done something historic offensively for a first-place team?
I get the argument. But I wonder whether there’s crossover between people who argued on Judge’s behalf and who are now arguing on Lindor’s? ‘Cause it seems slightly hypocritical.
I think they’ve got to give it to Ohtani, and I hope they do, because A) he’s been so incredibly valuable at the top of the lineup for a banged-up Dodgers club and B) I don’t want to have to explain to future generations of baseball fans why the greatest player ever only has however few MVP awards instead of a whole yacht full of them.
Jim: There’s not usually that much overlap between Mets partisans/apologists and Yankees partisans/apologists, but that is an interesting point. (And trust me, east coast bias is alive and well.)
Meanwhile, we have the case of Ohtani’s former teammate in Anaheim who spoke to the media this week for the first time in a while. Mike Trout – at one time a surefire Hall of Famer, at one time arguably the consensus best player in the game – is on the back nine of his career at age 33, and after a series of injury-interrupted seasons he acknowledged he will likely have to change positions, either to left or right field or full-time DH. First base seems less of an option if Nolan Schanuel can hold down the position.
Two meniscus injuries this season continued Trout’s streak of bad injury luck over the past few seasons. A calf injury in 2021, a back issue that kept him out for five weeks in 2022 and a broken bone in his hand in 2023 limited him to, respectively, 36, 119 and 82 games in those seasons. This year, he will have played in 29 games. And with six seasons and $248.15 million remaining on his contract … well, the deeper we get into the 12-year, $426.5 million deal Arte Moreno gave him in 2019, the worse it looks. Especially for a franchise that has become a dumpster fire over what is now a full decade of non-playoff seasons.
I wrote this earlier in the summer, but it bears repeating: Do you ever wonder how this might have turned out for Trout if he hadn’t been so darned loyal to the Angels?
Mirjam: It hasn’t worked out for anyone, honestly. But what can you do? Trout’s greatness is undeniable, we’ve witnessed his immense talent, we believe in it because we’ve seen it with our own eyes. If he’d been healthy any of these recent seasons, maybe the Angels do sneak into the playoffs? Or … maybe not.
Injuries just suck. And some guys just can’t avoid them.
Following Trout feels a lot like following the Clippers’ Kawhi Leonard – two absolute game-changing superstars when they’re on the field/court, who just can’t get right physically. As soon as they’re almost back or just back from one thing, it’s another. Leonard, though, hasn’t only played for the Clippers – he won titles in San Antonio and Toronto, so while we’ll always wonder what could have been for Trout, Leonard’s legacy will be that of a two-time champion.
I had to look this up, because I remember seeing somewhere that Kawhi was a fan of Trout’s, and I was right – back in 2019, when Leonard was still with the Raptors, MLB’s Twitter account posted a video of the NBA star recording video of the Angels’ star at-bat, captioning it: “Kawhi Leonard is focused on Mike Trout, per source.”
Which, of course, is an ode to ESPN’s NBA newsbreaker Adrian Wojnarowski, who announced this week that he’s leaving journalism to become the general manager of the basketball team at St. Bonaventure University, his alma mater.
What did you make of that Woj Bomb, Jim?
Jim: My first thought when I heard the news Wednesday: “Shams wins.”
That would be Shams Charania of The Athletic (and FanDuel), Wojnarowski’s rival in the business of breaking NBA news. Interesting post from Tyler Conway, former Bleacher Report correspondent, on X this morning: “btw for anyone who ever thought the Woj-Shams beef wasn’t real, it’s been 24+ hours since Woj announced his retirement and not even a mention of mutual respect from Shams despite the fact Woj mentored him.”
We will miss those Woj Bombs the most on and around July 1, the start of the NBA’s business year. But I get why he decided for a less hectic (?) lifestyle as the general manager of the men’s basketball program at his alma mater. (Which, to be sure, is much different than being the GM of a professional organization. In college basketball, this seems to have more to do with fundraising, managing NIL matters, keeping track of the transfer portal and the like, besides which the GM reports to the head coach rather than vice versa.)
But no longer will he need to be on or near his mobile phone 24/7/365 just in case something happens. The key words in his announcement on X were these: “I understand the commitment required in my role and it’s an investment I’m no longer driven to make. Time isn’t in endless supply, and I want to spend mine in ways that are more personally meaningful.”
Who among us, as much as we love what we do in this business, hasn’t thought that at one time or another? The trick is to make sure the work-life balance isn’t overwhelming in one direction or the other. In this case, Woj decided it had, and I get it.
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Mirjam: I’ll say this, the work Woj did with the NBA made the average basketball fan care more about minor transactions than anyone before.
Reading, say, “USC forward Drew Peterson has agreed to an Exhibit 10 contract with the Miami Heat, source tells ESPN” on June 22, 2023, hit different when you’re reading it via a tweet from Woj than if you saw it in small print in the paper or at the end of a Heat beat writer’s notebook.
While we might be explaining to future generations why Ohtani didn’t have more MVP awards, we’ll definitely be describing what it was like to get those notifications for all of Woj’s tweets back in the day, too.