Also Juan Gonzalez and Joe Carter.

Alfonso Soriano comes to mind as someone who'd fit that profile.

The main difference between Scherzer and deGrom seems to be home runs allowed and Ks.  Otherwise, their performance (taking out team Wins) were nearly identical.  I like to do a simple equation of IP*ERA+.  For Scherzer that's 37,073.  For deGrom it's 46,872.  That's because deGrom's ERA+ was so much better.  Which seems odd considering deGrom pitched in a pitcher friendly park and Scherzer a hitter favorable park.  FIP bears it out too.  Must be the HR allowed.

Somers is from San Francisco, so no need to be embarrassed Alex. Also, Somers is older than Maffei.

Frankly, I'm surprised the vote was so overwhelming. DeGrom had the better year, but not that much better, and while the RS differential between the two was great, there is a bit of argument to be made for the results, which gave Scherzer more strikeouts and more wins. I think I would have voted for deGrom, his season was that good, but Scherzer was also deserving. 

Wins or no wins, he gets a nice salary in fantasy circles.

Peter I believe has him earning even more.

In real life?

Here's Joel Sherman on that subject.

"By Fangraphs calculations deGrom has provided the Mets $197.7 million in value since his 2014 debut and been paid $12.6 million. In the next two years, he is likely to earn about $33 million as an arbitration eligible player. He will not be a free-agent until after his age-32 campaign and, thus, faces never being compensated for his actual value."

That's worth looking into. Here's one totally random piece of evidence.

Baez had a 1.194 OPS when ahead in the count last year, and a .627 when behind. His OPS+ was 126.

Jose Ramirez, who had a much better season (150 OPS+) and walked 70 times more while striking out 80 fewer times, had a 1.184 OPS when ahead in the count and a .576 when behind.

Clearly not proof of anything, but a little surprising.

Well, he's 70. And the real villain here is Steve Somers.

Sometimes I'm embarrassed to be a New Yorker.

Totally justifiable to vote for Scherzer, but his explanation wasn't good.  It was basically, "Randy Jones told me wins are good."  Also, the old, "If you only get one run of offense, you have to get all scrappy and plucky, and give up zero."  Also known as the Modified Wilbon.   Some of these guys are too young to be that stupid, and I'm 59.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/sports/2018/11/15/one-writer-who-voted-max-scherzer-ahead-jacob-degrom-cy-young-explains-his-ballot/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.a5f14e6e4d21

The drop in slugging seems to result from a drop in launch angle. Still, he was a fearsome hitter. They were talking him up last night on the MLB network as next year's MVP.

What should his bid limit be?  

I have a theory( I haven't done any extensive research on it...just a general observation from watching a lot of years) that hitters that succeed with a mediocre walk rate and/or K/W ratio do more damage, comparatively speaking, on 2-0 and 3-1 counts than other type hitters. 

So, in Patton$ he earned $23 in a partial season. In my formula he earned $22. How do we deal with increased playing time? And pitcher adjustments? And his extreme walk rate? Soto is wicked young, do we even have a timeline to deal with him? Is that pertinent?

I'm pricing him at $29 in NL leagues right now. I'd like to hear arguments for and against. 

I've got a price on him of $30 right now (NL 5x5 league). I'm feeling that's too meek. Steals get a discount, but he should still be $35 or so. What do you think?

The Houston writers were very fair on their Cy Young ballots. Both put Snell second after Verlander.

The Tampa writers both had Kluber second after Snell.

They knew who the competition was. 

And now, getting to the point, what do we bid for a mid-30-something pitcher with all that mileage? 

deGrom the near-unanimous winner in the AL... and Blake Snell barely squeaks to victory in the AL.

That's going too far. I'm as pleased as everyone else that deGrom won -- I just wish he had lost his last start so he had a losing record -- but there's no way I don't vote for Snell.

Is it all about the IP? Is that it?

Please, please, please don't tell me it's about WAR. Or FIP. Or ERA+. Or ERC. Or Siera...

He's slowly bringing the strikeout rate down, maybe because he's hitting a lot of stuff hard. Hard to project a similar season again, and yet I can't say any rational way he won't repeat, unless he hits 50 doubles and only 24 HR.

Trout became the 1st player to have 3 seasons of a .300+ avg with 30+ HRs and 90 RBIs or less....Bonds is the only player with 2 and ironically Betts did it for the 1st time this year. 

Shandler did promote the idea that IP replace Wins in some leagues, but not the XFL. We talked about what to do in Tout Wars and saw no good alternatives. Wins wins!

You could always use Shandler's puppy..the PQS starts as a category.....just have someone willing to do the grunt work to figure out if it's PQS 1 2 3 4 or 5.

John Maffei San Diego Union Tribune 

The breakdown of each voter can be found at bbwaa.com 

Another tough one to price, no?

Somehow he became a much better hitter while being even less picky about what he swung at.

Does he continue to be a serious base-stealer?