rookie of the year | The Baseball Zealot

Coghlan, Bailey are 2009 Rookies of the Year

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

Kazuhiro Sasaki in 2000.

Good luck next year, Teddy.

2009 Rookies of the Year: Gordon Beckham & J.A. Happ

Dodgers Sox Spring Baseball The Sporting News has announced the winners of the 2009 Rookie of the Year Gordon Beckham of the White Sox and J.A. Happ of the Philadelphia Phillies.

Beckham was called to Chicago on June 4th, playing thirdbase everyday, he ended up batting .270 with 28 doubles, 14 home runs, and 63 RBIs, in 103 games. The most remarkable thing was that Gordon was a SS at the University of Georgia last year when he hit more homers than anyone in NCAA Division I. So he was learning a new position in the big leagues, and learn it he did, I predict several Gold Gloves in his future. Other White Sox Rookies of the Year are 1951 Minnie Minoso, 1956 Luis Aparicio, 1963 Pete Ward & Gary Peters, 1966 Tommie Agee, 1969 Carlos May, 1983 Ron Kittle, and 1985 Ozzie Guillen.

Happ was 12-4 with a 2.93 ERA for Philadelphia, appearing out of the bullpen until late May when the young lefthander moved into the rotation. I remember seeing his changeup in spring training in Clearwater, FL, and thinking how much he reminded me of Phillies ace Cole Hamels. He pitched two shutouts, while striking out 119 batters in 166 innings. Other Phillies Rookies of the Year are 1946 Del Ennis, 1948 Richie Ashburn, 1957 Jack Sanford, 1964 Dick Allen, 1980 Lonnie Smith, 1984 Juan Samuel, 1997 Scott Rolen, and 2005 Ryan Howard.

Volquez tries to sneak in the NL ROY voting

The Rookie of the Year voting this year was pretty much a shoo-in for both the National League with the Cubs’ Geovany Soto winning it all and the American League with Tampa’s Evan Longoria taking it. I don’t know of anyone who predicted otherwise.

That didn’t stop Cincinnati pitcher Edison Volquez, who wasn’t even officially a rookie, from getting some votes from the the baseball writers. By doing so, Cincinnati performed a hat trick by getting Volquez, Joey Votto, and Jay Bruce in the top five.

Under baseball rules, if a player spends more than 45 days on a team’s active roster in a previous year, he is not considered a rookie.