Although San Francisco Giants catcher Buster Posey rolled to the 2010 NL Rookie of the Year award, it should be noted that there is still room for complaint, both from Posey and from runner up Jason Heyward. Yasushi Kikuchi, who covers the Dodgers for Japan’s Kyodo News Service, did not vote for Posey, instead selecting Gaby Sanchez, Jason Heyward and Jaime Garcia on his ballot. Kikuchi’s rationale was this:
Kikuchi said he left Posey off his ballot because of the late-May promotion.
“Obviously it was a tough decision,” Kikuchi said. “To me, Rookie of the Year is the best rookie player throughout the whole season. On the other hand, I know Buster had a very big impact for the Giants. I know how important his role was to contribute to the Giants winning the championship.”
I’m not really understanding the point of that. He says he didn’t vote for him because he didn’t join the team until late May but then he acknowledges his important contribution to the Giants. At the end of the day he put up numbers equal to Jason Heyward while managing the Giants pitching staff and throwing out base runners at a solid clip. Add in that he was a key member of a Giants team making the playoffs and it seems like a no-brainer that he would be on your ballot.
I can see arguments for Heyward being the winner, but to discount Posey entirely from the top three? Even if the Giants hadn’t won the World Series Posey would still be deserving. I don’t think it’s a pro-Dodgers, anti-Giants thing so much as a pro-idiocy, anti-logic type of thing.
Elsewhere Dejan Kovacevic left Heyward off his ballot entirely. He voted for Buster Posey first and then included the Pirates Neil Walker and Jose Tabata. This was particularly unique as he was the only person to include Pirates on his ballot. Oh, and he happens to write for a Pittsburgh newspaper. The folks at SB Nation Pittsburgh throw out some arguments for this ballot, and Kovacevic himself tweeted that he felt the two belonged in the argument, thus his vote for them second and third.
Everyone’s entitled to their opinion but it seemed like Kovacevic was making this more about himself than the players. He seemed to feel he was doing something that had to be done to get them in the argument. Maybe they were in the argument, but it seems like the simple fact was that Jason Heyward had a stronger 2010 campaign than either of them. But at the end of the day, it’s mostly opinions I suppose.