He’ll probably lose out for MVP like he did several times when steroid Barry Bonds kept beating him even though Pujols was a better all around player every year.
Oh well, every baseball fan knows who a team would pick if they had a chance to pick Albert or Howard to start a new team.

Great research, DG!!

Lets remember that AP missed 16 days with his Calf injury suffered agaisnt Cincy in early June. It’d be interesting to see how many chances AP would have had with men in RISP, if he had not missed the better part of three weeks.

On the list you posted of NL hitters with the top ten most AB’s with RISP the name that stood out to me was Troy Glaus. Doesn’t that go to show how valuable AP is? His high OBP means that guys hitting behind AP are going to be put in situations to produce runs. That right there supports AP’s argument for MVP.

Another rarely mentioned fact when trying to downplay Howard (St.Louis native by the way, but you would never know it the way he is scorned in St.L. If he looked a little more like Chase Utley, I’m quite sure this town would be falling all over him, but that is STRICTLY my OPINION, not a fact by any means), is he produces because he shows up day in and day out for his team. He is the current MLB ironman with 277 consecutive games played, which means he actually played all 162 games this year. So the question is what if Pujols actually played everyday, what would his RBI totals look like.
Pujols is the greatest player I have ever seen. 2008 Player of the Year, yes. 2008 Hank Aaron Award winner, yes. 2008 NL MVP, no. Ask yourself this would the Cards have edged out the NL Central powerhouse known as the Pittsburgh Pirates for the 4th place divisional trophy if Pujols had not been there. I truly believe they would have. Now ask yourself, do you believe the Phillies would be repeating as NL East Division Champs without Ryan Howard. You can answer that one for yourself.
A kid born and raised in this crappy one horse town (and proud of it, he makes sure the world knows he’s from here)deserves MUCH better than the constant sour grapes this biased community gives him.

Correction to previous post, it was not the Pirates, but the Reds that they edged out for for 4th place.

As we said in the past. Barry Bonds won the MVP while on a losing team a few times. Just because he hit home runs that didn’t help his team win. Albert hits home runs to keep his team above .500. Philly could have won their division without Howard. Next season hopefully the Cardinals will learn to either walk Howard more or give him curve balls outside all the time. Never a fast ball. 5 of his home runs were against the Birds.

Richard: Prepare to be surprised. There appeared to be considerable momentum around the country — including with voters — for Pujols to win his second MVP. Anything is possible, and the pulse is strongest in this time zone, so the East could still sway Howard’s way. Gosh, it sounds like I’m describing the electoral college …

EMC: Careful there, because if you use that argument for Pujols, you have to use the same for Howard (re: Victorino, Utley, etc.) and Beltran. Suddenly Beltran’s case for the MVP looks stronger.

Steve: A little inside baseball … A common joke around the press box is calling me the P-D’s Ryan Howard beat writer. Scorned? You must mean by the public at large, because the paper has done well covering Howard, from rising star to Favorite Son to slugger to MVP. Heck, he received his MVP award for the first time at the Baseball Writers dinner in … St. Louis.

dg
-30-

Derrick, I DEFINITELY mean the public at large. As November draws nigh and the MVP votes are to be announced, I’d personally like to see you put out a blog or some other instrument that taps into the at-large public opinion not just about the award, but the guy himself. As a native St.Louisian, that gets to travel probably more than the the average joe (and it typically would involve more east-coast destinations, so I will defer that much), the general attitude and common man’s acknowledgement of Howard vs. the treatment he gets here is staggering. St. Louis is a big “small town” in attitude, action, tradition, and most of all pride. There are people that will still reference individuals like John Goodman or even Vincent Price being from St. Louis. Yet I bet if you polled 100 random people (all walks of life: ages, race, affluence, etc.) you would be shocked at the amount of people that haven’t a clue who he is or that he is even from here. For that to be stated about anyone famous from St.Louis (again, I’m going by the way we revere anyone the least bit famous from here),it is a shame.

Bluebirds66-I respectfully disagree with “Albert hits home runs to keep his team above .500. Philly could have won their division without Howard.”

As the above stat line showed Howard, when the situation arises (175 times) he is producing at the best rate (.320) with the best results (146 RBI. You can WARP and VORP that all day long, but run production (especially from your clean-up batter) is the name of the game, and no one is doing it better than Howard. Considering that the Phils only edged out a 3 game lead over the Mets to win the division, do you REALLY believe they would have done it WITHOUT him? I don’t. Yet I do believe without Pujols, they still wouldn’t be higher than 4th place, but I do believe they would have kept some of that 12 1/2 game lead they have over the Reds to hold the spot they have now.

I DEFINITELY need to proofread what I type. In the preveious post I meant WPA not “WARP”. Call it a brain fart (lol).

AP’s batting average and strikeout total speak volumes for AP’s case to be MVP. I could care less about the difference of 11 home-runs. If the Phils could choose whom to have I’m sure it would be AP. I really think AP will get it this year.

Steve,

I don’t think he is scorned as much as you seem to think. I think most people here are just upset that he gets more press in ESPN. Personally I like Howard and wouldn’t mind having him on the Cards if it wasn’t for Pujols already holding down the position. But I don’t think Howard deserves the MVP this year, IMO he isn’t even the MVP of his own team much less the league. Utley had 130 RC to Howards 113, Utley had a 133 OPS+ to Howards 123, Howard leads in WPA 2.18 to 1.42. Pujols has BTW, 160, 190 and 6.20 respectively. Pujols may not play as many games because he is nursing an injury but when he plays he influences more wins then Howard and Utley combined, he has created over 35 more runs then Howard in that less playing time as well. There is no way Howard can even come close to matching him. I don’t think people are rooting for Pujols because we don’t like Howard it is just that he is truely better. Lastly, I really don’t see how in a city like StL, that has over 50% minority population in the City and about a 20% in the County, would be racist against Howard, just don’t see that argument.

Awesome research. Only 2 stats show Howard as more valuable than Pujols. Unfortunately, those are the 2 a lot of people see.

Part of the reason El Hombre’s batting average skews so high with RISP is all those walks. How about somebody take a look at plate appearances with runners in scoring position. You’d probably also want to include sac fly numbers. While pushing a runner across is valuable, its not as valuable as doing it without giving up an out. I’d also recommend looking at Sac Bunts, but seeing as neither of these sluggers play for Dusty Baker they surely didn’t attempt any.

I did enjoy the analysis though. Pujols for MVP indeed.

WOW DG! What an awsome read! You just provided the statistical information that supports the reasons why the Cards need to get a “fearfull-impact bat” to hit behind Albert Pujols. Also, you need to forward this to all those sportswriters who cast votes for the MVP. Very telling stuff. We Cards fans are blessed to have BIRDLAND to feed on. GREAT DINNER!! THANKS DG!!

If Albert played on the east or west coast there would not be any discussion of “if” he would be MVP. He would be a shoe in.

Steve

EDGED out Cincinnati for 4th place? Did you even LOOK at the standings and records when you posted that? Did you realize that Cardinals were closer to the CUBS than the Reds were the Cardinals? The Cardinals finished 11.5 games back of Chicage whereas the Reds were TWELVE games behind the Cardinals?

The Cardinals finished four games out of the wild card with a better record than the Dodgers, who are hopefully on the way to an upset over the Cubs.

In 2006, Albert was pretty much just as deserving of the MVP as this season, except that the Cardinals actually won the division and the Phillies didn’t make the playoffs. Yet Howard won the MVP that year. Now, the situations are reversed, though the stats are roughly the same for both Howard and Pujols (Albert’s numbers are probably even better this year, he’s something like 80 points ahead of the second-place in slugging in the NL). It will be interesting to see if the East Coast double standard holds true for Howard this year over Pujols.

The big factor in Albert’s favor that gets far too little mention is defense. Pujols is a legitimate gold glover in the past. There are a few guys like Derrick Lee who are slicker fielders at first, but Albert probably has the most positive defensive impact of any first baseman in baseball. Fielding stats are a science still in its infancy (or maybe Little Man stage), but Pujols has crazy zone ratings. He’s also an integral part of most of Molina’s pickoffs from behind the plate, which helps keep opposition runners honest, reducing steals, extra bases going first to third or scoring from first on a double. Albert is also an aggressive and effective baserunner, especially for a guy with his very modest footspeed. He plays all out in all phases and impacts the game to his team’s benefit for three outs every inning and every at bat of every game.

Ryan Howard seems like a nice young man, Pride of St. Louis, already up there with Joe Garagiola (!). But when he’s not holding a bat, he’s a liability to the Phillies. He’s a minus fielder, easily in the bottom half or worse of Major League first basemen. Howard is a better, more durable version of Chris Duncan. You have to wonder if Howard’s future is in the American League.

Just think how obscene it would be if Howard wins his second MVP before Pujols.

Actually, Joey Votto WAS in the majors all season. He broke camp with the Reds. He was limited to platooning at 1st base until a few weeks into the season, so that might limit at-bats, but he wasn’t ever in the minors this year. You may be thinking of Jay Bruce, who didn’t join the team until late May.

DG - A few thoughts of the top …

I would say that the lack of any Cub on the list is an indication that they spread it around from top to bottom.

Conversely I am appalled that Albert trailed by so much, even with his time off. It is obvious now to me what the main priority in the offseason should be and that is upgrades at 2B AND SS.

I am glad you saw fit to consider the situations in which Albert was actually pitched to. This only solidifies my thought in the 2nd paragraph.

Question - do know if there are any others that have more RBIs than ABs with RISP? Arod? Manny? Ortiz?

Please show this to the Cardinals FO. They need to see what kind of animal they have batting third and realize the need to set him up regularly, consistntly and without fail. Just imagine the possiblities!

JackD

Eli,

You are correct. Thanks for the catch. I meant to somehow clarify that Votto had not been a full-time player all year — offering some context for his total. I’m diving back in to make the fix. Thanks again,

dg

Bluebirds66,

Not to be a Barry Bonds apologist but he never won an MVP for a losing team. The smallest number of wins for any Bonds led team in an MVP year was 90 for the 2001 Giants.

Apparently, we need to recruit for a Bird Land Truth Squad. Probably would be a good thing.

I posed a similar question on a baseball forum a few days ago. I think in order to fully compare you need to input Ryan Howard into AP’s at-bats as well to project the sort of numbers he might have.

I bleed Cardinals red and I say Pujols is the greatest offensive player in the game and the best in a Cards uniform since Musial, surpassing even Brock. The only other Cardinal in the last 40 years who meant as much to the club was Gibson. And yes, Pujols did get screwed out of a couple of mvp awards when Bonds was juicing his way to the award. But, if Howard (or Berkman who has to be the most underrated superstar in the game) gets it this year, it won’t be a total injustice. Howard is the reason the Phillies are playing in October and he played every game, which is part of the reason he got more rbi chances. Also, let’s not forget Albert had some decent help in the lineup this year. Ludwick, Glaus and Miles won’t make anyone forget the MV3 days but it’s not as though Albert was all alone out there.