Today, we’re writing up affirmative arguments for each of the three primary MVP candidates, and I get to make the case for Jacoby Ellsbury’s candidacy. On the surface, arguing for Ellsbury is something easy case to make – after all, he led the majors in WAR, and even though it is not a precise measure of value that should be taken as gospel, the guy with the best WAR in baseball is obviously a serious candidate for the award. That said, you don’t have to buy into WAR to see that Ellsbury was probably as good as anyone else who played the sport this year.

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Major League Baseball will announce the winner of the 2011 American League Most Valuable Player this afternoon. While sabermetric tools such as Wins Above Replacement are very helpful, and perhaps even necessary for sorting out which players have been the most valuable, they are not necessarily sufficient by themselves for deciding such issues. As I discussed in an earlier (no-longer-so-“official”) post on using WAR to help determine the MVP, WAR and its cousins should start conversations about the MVP, not end them. However, this post is less about the general framework and more about why I think, despite the presence of other viable candidates just as Jacoby Ellsbury and maybe Justin Verlander, Jose Bautista is my choice for the American League’s Most Valuable Player of 2011.

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Only a few days ago, it seemed as though the Phillies would be going into the 2012 season with the bullpen set just as in 2011: with Ryan Madson as closer. The rumored four-year, $44 million dollar deal between Madson and the Phillies blew up nearly as soon as it was “confirmed.” Less than a week later, the Phillies have reached an agreement with a new closer. According to Jim Salisbury of Comcast Sports Philadelphia, Jonathan Papelbon will be the Phillies new closer after inking a four-year, $50 million contract on Friday. The deal also includes a $10 million vesting option for a fifth year.

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News broke late Tuesday that the Philadelphia Phillies were on the verge of signing Ryan Madson to a 4-year year/$44 million deal. By Wednesday, there was news that the deal was “waiting approval” by Phillies ownership or “only a deal in principle” or “falling apart.”

However this plays out, the idea of a 4-year/$44 million deal for a top-line closer is likely to set the standard against which other closer deals are negotiated this winter. We’re looking at you, Jonathan Papelbon.

What should we make of a possible 4-year/$44 million deal for a pitcher like Ryan Madson?  Several things.

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On Tuesday, we took a quick look at the competitive balance in the MLB, and I made the claim that baseball may have more parity than most leagues, but it also has want of greater balance. During the course of the piece, I made this statement:

The NFL has decided it wants payroll to have essentially no impact on winning, so teams basically trot out the same amount of money every Sunday and hope their money was better-spent. Is that what the MLB wants?

Aft’wards, Paul Swydan pointed out to me that indeed NFL salaries are not flat. Despite their hard cap, their hefty revenue sharing, and their tight spandex pants, the NFL still exhibits nearly a $77M gap between the biggest and lowest payroll — impressive, but still nothing compared to the MLB:

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October is the month. October is the month you have to survive if you are a general manager of a losing team. Survive that month and your chances of making it through another season skyrocket. In fact, looking through the prism of past firings, the distance between October (Andy MacPhail) and November (Bill Smith) is greater than a mere sum of the days.

Comb through the Baseball America executive database and add in the missing information, and you’ve got something like 59 general manager firings since 1950. That might not seem like a large sample, but a firing is a rare occurrence. Many general managers come to the end of a contract on a flagging team and are allowed to leave. Most others resign if the writing is on the wall. A firing suggests a difference in opinion about the team. It’s a jarring, rare moment, born of conflict.

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The Red Sox want to move past the J.D. Drew era in Boston and pick up a new right fielder. Being that these are the cash-loaded Sox, there are a bunch of prominent free-agent options who’ve been mentioned as options — namely Grady Sizemore.

But would Grady be the right move for Boston?

What’s left of Grady Sizemore?

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Yesterday, Cubs President of Baseball Operations Theo Epstein announced the Chicago Cubs and manager Mike Quade have parted ways. Kudos to Theo Epstein for not doing what we all expected him to: Fire Quade immediately.

It appears Epstein — like he has approached most everything in his young Cubs reign — decided to withhold judgement until he had fully investigated the matter himself. Like Joe Maddon is wont to say, “Tell me what you think, not what you heard.”

Quade’s managerial time with the Cubs was both short and possibly undeserved. Taking the helm when Lou Piniella suddenly retired in 2010, Quade inherited a team that was predisposed towards failure. But, despite that, the team went 24-13 to close out the season. That was enough proof for Jim Hendry to vault Quade not only into the manager discussion, but the manager’s chair:

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Thanks to Patrick Newman for his help in writing and researching this article.

Judging from the first responders to the coming storm over the Pacific, this title bears repeating: Yu Darvish is not Daisuke Matsuzaka. The natural search for comps, paired with the disappointment that was Matsuzaka’s career, will lead to suspicion when it comes to the newest ace slated to come over from Japan. Why should it work out this time if it didn’t work out the last couple times? But there are real differences between the two pitchers that could use a little emphasis.

Consider this list your consolation if you are dumbfounded by the posting fee that your team will spend simply for the right to speak with Darvish.

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With a classic World Series — the most exciting in a long time, if not the best-played or best-managed — now over, it is time to hand out individual awards for the 2011 regular season. Sure, some people are anticipating the Cy Young, MVP, and Rookie of the Year announcements, but I bet true baseball fans really pumped for stuff like today’s award, which attempts to measure how much a hitter has contributed to his team’s wins beyond what traditional linear weights indicates. Who is 2011’s King of Little Things?

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