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Happy 11/11/11. It's a lucky day, so they say. Especially if you somehow thought to bet on the SBNation NL MVP. And your bet was Matt Kemp. Or if you actually are Matt Kemp (I suspect one of you must be).
Matt Kemp is another in a long line of good players who I wish the Reds had traded for when he was said to be available on the trade market, but probably actually wasn't. Kemp took this award in convincing fashion, getting 75% of the first place votes from SBNation writers, the rest going to Ryan Braun. Both had 30-30 seasons, but Kemp gets the nod for several reasons - among them park adjustments (led the league in OPS+), defensive position (CF) and hitting the 40 SB mark on the nose, while falling just one HR shy of 40-40. He was also brutal to the Reds this season, slashing .550/.690/1.050 in 29 PAs. You're welcome.
Kemp is well positioned to take the BBWAA MVP, with superb counting stats to complement his slash line. He notched 2/3rds of the Triple Crown to go with a respectable .324 average and that 40-40 near miss.
MVP of our hearts, Joey Votto, was the favorite third choice, so it seems the Academy voted pretty closely on WAR lines, with a preference for position players. I was going to say he was the Rick Perry of this ballot, but I don't know if that holds anymore. Oops. BP finds himself at #16. If this were strictly an ordered ranking of position players, Phillips should easily make the Top 10 for 2011.. But even with pitchers included, he deserves some more plaudits. There is a bias here against a guy who everyone might agree is #11 vs. more divisive guys who pick up more mid-range votes. In any case, anything below about #5 doesn't matter anyways.
| Num | Name | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | 9th | 10th | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Matt Kemp | 21 | 5 | 1 | 1 | 269 | ||||||
| 2 | Ryan Braun | 7 | 19 | 2 | 257 | |||||||
| 3 | Joey Votto | 8 | 7 | 6 | 3 | 4 | 176 | |||||
| 4 | Justin Upton | 1 | 7 | 3 | 3 | 5 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 140 | ||
| 5 | Prince Fielder | 2 | 3 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 119 | |
| 6 | Troy Tulowitzki | 3 | 1 | 3 | 5 | 7 | 3 | 2 | 91 | |||
| 7 | Jose Reyes | 1 | 2 | 5 | 7 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 86 | |||
| 8 | Roy Halladay | 1 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 85 | |||
| 9 | Clayton Kershaw | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 56 | |||
| 10 | Albert Pujols | 1 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 51 | |||
| 11 | Lance Berkman | 1 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 44 | ||||
| 12 | Shane Victorino | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 41 | |||
| 13 | Cliff Lee | 3 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 33 | ||||||
| 14 | Andrew McCutcheon | 1 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 3 | 26 | |||||
| 15 | Pablo Sandoval | 2 | 1 | 1 | 19 | |||||||
| 16 | Brandon Phillips | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 17 | ||||||
| 17 | Matt Holliday | 2 | 1 | 12 | ||||||||
| 18 | Mike Morse | 1 | 2 | 5 | ||||||||
| 19 | Carlos Beltran | 1 | 4 | |||||||||
| 20 | Mike Stanton | 1 | 2 | 4 | ||||||||
| 21 | Ryan Roberts | 2 | 2 | |||||||||
| 22 | Ian Kennedy | 1 | 1 | |||||||||
| 23 | Hunter Pence | 1 | 1 | |||||||||
| 24 | Raul Ibanez | 1 | 1 |