CarGo made some good plays in the field in 2012 but as a whole was very disappointing.
OK, I’ll bite. It has been a while since anyone wrote anything new for BSB. What can we say? We are passionate fans who were worn out by an exhaustively disappointing year for the Rockies. As Logan has said many times: “how many times can we write ‘The Rockies Suck’ and come off fresh?” I know I have had a hard time thinking of anything new to write.
There are plenty of sites that provide news on the Rockies and re-writing AP releases is just plain boring, I would rather give my opinion on items relating to the Rockies and right now, honestly, I haven’t cared much about the Rockies. They don’t care about winning and my caring about them has dropped. Give me a few months to recharge and I am sure I will be exploding with opinions on the team again. I know I keep getting asked about who the next manager will be and I think it will be Tommy Runnels; someone who is willing to be a talking head in hopes to use this position as a stepping stone to a real MLB manager position.
But last night some juicy news dropped as it relates to the Rockies: Carlos Gonzalez won a Gold Glove. This is his second GG (2010).
In years past this would be a no-brainer; CarGo makes brilliant plays in the outfield. He plays all three outfield positions and plays them well. He has a cannon attached to his body and who doesn’t love watching him throw a bullet home? But this wasn’t the year in which he deserved the award.
Among all outfields in baseball (62 qualify when using minimum innings requirements) and CarGo ranks eighth worst in UZR. He is dead last when filtering by only left fielders.
Among all outfielders in baseball (308 players played in the outfield in 2012) and CarGo ranks 280th in Total Zone Runs above average. He is 227th out of 234 who played left field.
When looking at vote totals on FieldingBible.com CarGo did receive a few votes but received far fewer votes than Martin Prado, for example, who led National League left fielders.
Defensive metrics are far from perfect, but they seek to verify what the eye sees. When I watched CarGo play the outfield this year my eyes told me he sucked. I wish I would have kept track how many additional bases he allowed by jogging to a baseball rather than running to get it. He turned many a singles into doubles this year. His routes were bad and we all remember the game in which the sun got to him…
He was awful.
Terrible.
And the metrics verify what I saw. It just didn’t appear that CarGo cared this year, especially in the second half when it became apparent the Rockies had no chance and they went with the funky pitching staff. Gold Glove shouldn’t take into account batting but to help prove my point look at CarGo’s first and second half splits:
Pre All-Star break: .330/.389/.578
Post All-Star break: .261/.345/.404
Pretty drastic. I don’t think we have seen it here in Colorado, or it hasn’t been apparent, but the reason a top-notch prospect like CarGo was traded twice before he landed in Colorado was due to his perceived lack of participation and lack of effort. Is it really a jump to say that he threw in the towel in July and coasted to the finish line?
Anyway, he didn’t deserve the Gold Glove this year. The award is generally a joke and if you see a writer using number of Gold Glove accumulated by a player to justify (or kill) that player’s worthiness for the Hall of Fame ignore them immediately.
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6 comments
Pete
October 31, 2012 at 3:47 PM (UTC -6)
Maybe the voters were watching Scott Rolen and Chipper Jones, two perennial GG players, toss their teams entire season down the crapper with one terrible misplay each. Or maybe they think that Cargo is so great he only has to play well when he wants to, a la Barry Bonds and Andruw Jones when they were winning GGs. Nothing is more meaningless than the GG voting, not All Stars, not HOF, nothing.
TroyF
October 31, 2012 at 5:22 PM (UTC -6)
Gold Glove awards are usually a joke. In this case, it’s beyond a joke. I understand they play in different leagues, but the fact Cargo is going home with a GG and Trout is not, is beyond insanity. He was one of the single worst LF in the national league this years. Truly pathetic.
Dennis
November 1, 2012 at 6:59 AM (UTC -6)
I agree with the previous comments about the GG in general and Cargo specifically. Many times, it looked to me as if he quit. As a side note, has anyone checked out MLB Trade Rumors ( http://www.mlbtraderumors.com.?)
They discussed the 50 top free agents and the teams they think have the best chance at acquiring these guys. Looking for the word “Rockies” was like playing “Where’s Waldo?”
Dan
November 1, 2012 at 12:30 PM (UTC -6)
I noticed that too. Right now the Rockies are about as irrelevant in MLB as a team can get.
chrischrisman
November 1, 2012 at 9:16 AM (UTC -6)
The Gold Gloves rightly have been the butt of jokes for years. While this year wasn’t as bad as others, it was still bad, and CarGo is an example of that. Normally, I wouldn’t much care, other than to be happy that a Rockie won, and to think of it as hardware payback of sorts for past years where the Rockies were hosed (like 2007). My concern, though, is that a Gold Glove will be seen as affirmation of CarGo’s 2012 defense, in particular, and the Rockies’ 2012 defense, in general. That absolutely can’t happen, since the defensive ineptitude has to be solved if they want to be competitive going forward. For that reason, I think it’s important to push back against the claim that this award was well earned, even if if comes at the expense of one of the Rox’s best players.
Simone
November 1, 2012 at 11:37 AM (UTC -6)
Wow! Such as amazing job CarGo. Maybe I can win the GG one day as well.
Not only did CarGo NOT deserve the GG…he plainly sucked in the outfield!