As a member of the newly formed, and so far highly successful Baseball Bloggers Alliance, I am supposed to get my ballot in for NL Manager of the Year. For those who don't know about the BBA yet, it's a pretty cool thing. We have 28 of the 30 ML teams accounted for and our Pittsburgh Chapter of the BBA includes North Side Notch, Raise the Jolly Roger, and WHYGAVS. For more about the BBA, check it out here.
One of the main reasons for establishing the BBA is to vote on season-ending awards. After all the voting has been tallied, the voting results will be put into a press release and sent to various media outlets.
So on to my ballot for NL Manager of the Year:
3) Joe Torre - Los Angeles Dodgers
Sure, it may seem like the Dodgers were stacked this season. But Torre did an impressive job this year with this team. Remeber, Manny Ramirez, easily their best player, was suspended for 50 games due to violating baseball's drug policy. However, the Dodgers did not skip a beat. The Dodgers are definitely talented, but there are a lot of talented teams who don't win 95 games.
2) Tony LaRussa - St. Louis Cardinals
LaRussa never ceases to amaze me. No matter who is on his team, he gets the most out of those players. At the beginning of the season, the Cubs were HUGE favorites to win the NL Central. St. Louis practically had the division wrapped up with a month to go. You could replace just about every manager in the NL with LaRussa and I think he would add at least 5 wins by himself.
3) Jim Tracy - Colorado Rockies
This pains me...because Tracy was awful as the Pirates' manager. Like, probably the most awful manager during the entire losing streak. But it's hard to argue with what he did with the Rockies this season. I still refuse that Tracy had much to do with the Rockies' incredible 2nd half, but their great play coincided directly with Tracy taking over the team...so I guess I have to at least show that I give him credit for it. The Rockies were 74-42 under Tracy and 18-28 without him.
The 2nd greatest moment of 2009 will be posted Sunday.
Saturday, October 10, 2009
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