Comeback Players, Gold Gloves, and Silver Sluggers

Kudos to Amy Preston for reminding me that I had not yet written a season-ending awards prediction post. Obviously, that means I will start that now.

For starters, Cliff Lee and Brad Lidge were named the AL and NL Comeback Players of the year, respectively. I completely agree with Cliff Lee, but I am skeptical of Brad Lidge as a pick. No one was even close to Lee as a pick for this award. Last year, he was sent down to the minors and not even named to the Indians playoff roster. This year, he posts career highs/lows in almost every single statistical category and is a front runner for the Cy Young; more on that later. Lidge, however, brought something to my attention in his interview after winning the award: was he really so bad that he earned the title? Obviously, no MLB players want to be in the position to win a comeback player, but I don't really feel Lidge was in that position. He had a down year last year, but it was one hiccup in his career line. I think Kerry Wood, Ryan Ludwick, Fernando Tatis, or Jim Edmonds would have been more deserving.

Moving on, Gold gloves are very hard to predict strictly because there aren't really any accurate defensive metrics, but mostly because voters usually go off name basis. That being said, I will say that my predictions are as follows:

American League	National League
C: Joe Mauer, MIN	C: Chris Snyder, AZ
1B: Kevin Youkilis, BOS	1B: Albert Pujols, STL
2B: Dustin Pedroia, BOS	2B: Chase Utley, PHI
3B: Adrian Beltre, SEA	3B: Troy Glaus, STL
SS: Orlando Cabrera, CWS	SS: Jimmy Rollins, PHI
OF: Grady Sizemore, CLE	OF: Carlos Beltran, NYM
OF: Torii Hunter, LAA	OF: Chris Young, AZ
OF: Nick Markakis, BAL	OF: Aaron Rowand, SF
P: Roy Halladay, TOR	P: Derek Lowe, LAD

Lastly, the Silver Slugger award is given each year to the best offensive player in each league. Usually, it is determined by home run totals, but sometimes can be determined by OPS. In other words, it's easy to predict, but not really.

American League	National League
C: Joe Mauer, MIN	C: Brian McCann, ATL
1B: Miguel Cabrera, DET	1B: Albert Pujols, STL
2B: Dustin Pedroia, BOS	2B: Chase Utley, PHI
3B: Alex Rodriguez, NYY	3B: David Wright, NYM
SS: Jhonny Peralta, CLE	SS: Hanley Ramirez, FLA
OF: Carlos Quentin, CWS	OF: Ryan Ludwick, STL
OF: Josh Hamilton, TX	OF: Ryan Braun, MIL
OF: Jermaine Dye, CWS	OF: Adam Dunn, CIN/AZ
DH: Aubrey Huff, BAL	P: Carlos Zambrano, CHC