Rookie of the Year is always such a tenuous award. Sometimes it’s given to a solid steady but unspectacular player (*cough* Bobby Crosby *cough*) who had the luck of not getting hurt his first year in the majors.
This year’s winners?? Outfielder Chris Coghlan of the Marlins and reliever Andrew Bailey of the A’s.
Our own Teddy Ballgame (who knows more about the young talent in the majors than I ever will) did his predictions of the Rookie of the Year award in mid September. He wrong on both counts but I’ll give him credit. His pick, Elvis Andrus both placed second in the voting in the AL. As for his pick of Dexter Fowler?? Well… he barely made a showing, getting one third place vote.
Both votes were close especially the Reds’ J.A. Happ who came within 11 votes of Coghlan.
Coghlan batted .321 in 128 games with 84 runs scored and a pretty impressive .390 on-base percentage. As for Bailey (who by the way, our guest poster Shawn Lee DID pick as the Rookie of the Year in the midst of his Cy Young Predictions… nice call, Shawn!), he saved 26 games for the A’s with a 1.84 ERA. He also had a tasty BB/K ratio at 24/91.
The last reliever to win the ROY in either league was
Good luck next year, Teddy.