Ask anyone who the AL MVP should be… OK, not anyone, that homeless guy that lives beneath the underpass near the freeway on-ramp you take to get to work probably doesn't have a ready answer, but ask any baseball fan who the AL MVP should be and you are certain to get a very definitive answer. They will tell you that the answer is clear and not even remotely up for debate. They might even call you a fool for even intimating otherwise, depending on the temperament of the person you chose to ask.
But here is the catch, the actual name that they give you for the undisputable AL MVP selection is not uniform. Judging by the various articles, blog posts and tweets from experts and fans alike, there is a roughly 50/50 split between those who are stumping for wunderkind Mike Trout and those in the corner of hitting savant Miguel Cabrera, especially after Cabrera's monster performance on Tuesday. Alas, only one of them can actually win the AL MVP (barring the unlikely event of them ending up tied in the voting, of course).
So who should win? Well, I'm not going to tell you. In fact, you've probably already made up your mind on who the winner should be and you are also likely not open to having someone even attempt to sway your opinion. And that, my friends, is going to create some real fireworks.
What the Trout vs. Cabrera debate has devolved into is a philosophical divide between old school fans enamored with Miggy pursuit of the fabled Triple Crown and more progressive fans who are wowed by Trout's shiny WAR value. But what makes this situation so contentious is the lack of tolerance each side has for the other side's argument. When old school fans trumpet the Triple Crown, all the saber-friendly fans just hear "Ermahgerd, Trerple Crerwn!!!" and then they make some derisive comment about RBIs. Whereas the new, complicated metrics Trout's supporters love to quote are shouted down as nerdery of the highest order. Hey, nobody ever said that this was a high-brow, sophisticated debate.
Neither side is definitively right and both sides are kind of being jerks about it. The only way it could get more polarizing is if the repeal of Obamacare was somehow tied to whichever player gets the award.
Amazingly, with just two weeks left in the season, there is still some story left to tell in this race, so nobody really knows who will eventually emerge as the victor. What we do know, however, is that a whole lot people are going to be pissed off about whoever wins.
Yeah, It's pretty great.
