Idiots Write About Sports

We have never really made at a secret here at Idiot World Headquarters that we think very little of Phil Rogers, the baseball scribe for the Chicago Tribune and occasionally ESPN.com, for his insistence on making arguments that fly in the face of both logic and empirical observations. But Rogers outdoes himself today in his argument on behalf of David Ortiz* for this season’s American League MVP award.

Voting members of the Baseball Writers Association of America aren’t permitted to consider postseason performance when they fill out their award ballots. That’s why votes are requested to be in before the first game of the playoffs. But it’s not like Game 4 of the 2004 American League Championship Series didn’t happen. David Ortiz’s 12th-inning homer off Paul Quantrill, coming at 1:22 a.m. at Fenway Park, paved the way for Games 5, 6 and 7, which allowed the Boston Red Sox to reverse the curse. It also put Ortiz’s flair for dramatics on center stage. That homer has nothing to do with the 2005 season, of course, but it is moments like that one which give Ortiz the slightest of edges over Alex Rodriguez in the MVP race.

So, to recap: David Ortiz has an edge over Rodriguez for an award recognizing the top preformer in the 2005 season… for things he did in the 2004 postseason. I just want to make sure I’m following along here since I’m not blessed with Phil Rogers’ awesome powers of analysis. Because after all, it’s not like there’s already an award recognizing postseason accomplishments, right, Mr. Rogers?
Just to brighten your day a little more, Phil Rogers gets to put his mind powers to work voting on things like awards and Hall of Fame inductees. And you, gentle reader, do not.
* I am not, of course, advancing the counter-argument that David Ortiz shouldn’t win the MVP award. A very convincing argument can be made, though, if I had a vote, I’d probably go with A-Rod. Rather, I am simply suggesting that using 2004 postseason achievements to decide an award given for 2005 performance is about as dumb as suggesting that Dontrelle Willis’ offensive stats should be the deciding factor in Cy Young voting. And no ESPN.com personality is dumb enough to suggest that, are they?
Oh.