Howard MVP

[metirish]

] Fielding Runs Above Replacement. The difference between an average player and a replacement player is determined by the number of plays that position is called on to make. That makes the value at each position variable over time. In the all-time adjustments, an average catcher is set to 39 runs above replacement per 162 games, first base to 10, second to 29, third to 22, short to 33, center field to 24, left and right to 14.

[G-Fafif]

Edgy DC wrote: I think being on a playoff team is irrelevant. In fact, the Gold Glove, deserved by Beltran or not, is too much a byproduct of the visiblity of being on a playoff team and the visibility of being a slugger, so that's made less relevant also.

Unto themselves, a Gold Glove or a playoff berth do not necessarily add up to MVP status. If they did, Doug Flynn and Rafael Santana are owed some votes. But taken together, Beltran's accomplishments -- not so much the fielding and slugging awards per se (not bestowed until after MVP balloting) but what they represent about his performance (and his defense was legitimately standout, so this wasn't lazy "let's give it to a good hitter" assignation) -- provide a snapshot of an extraordinarily valuable player. The playoff team component indicates his performance was not in the service of stats alone.

This isn't an argument to take away Howard's hardware so much as mystification that a player of Beltran's caliber on a team of the Mets' caliber (visible to all) didn't at least finish ahead of Lance Berkman or rate a stray second-place vote from some renegade writer.