Skip to content
PUBLISHED: | UPDATED:

No offense, Clayton Kershaw and Pedro Martinez, but David Ortiz is not a believer in your MVP credentials — present, past and future.

“I don’t care, it can be Pedro Martinez, my brother, but the Cy Young is good enough for pitchers,” Ortiz said. “You were the best at what you do. What else do you need?”

The topic of pitchers and their worthiness for the MVP award is very much on the front burner this month, as National League MVP voters weigh the respective merits of the Dodgers’ Kershaw — in the midst of an epic season — against the Marlins’ Giancarlo Stanton and fast-finishing Andrew McCutchen of the Pirates.

The subject, which Ortiz brought up himself in a conversation last week that began about the horrific injury that ended Stanton’s season, animated the designated hitter to a remarkable degree. (That he did not win the MVP himself in 2005, finishing second to Alex Rodriguez, still rankles Ortiz.) But the notion of a pitcher more or less butting in on what should be the private property of position players causes him to bristle.

The issue is almost completely black and white to Ortiz. A starter only appears in 30-plus games a season. And that’s just not enough.

“Let’s put it this way: How many pitchers have won every single start out there?” said Ortiz. “If we’re talking about a guy like Miguel Cabrera, who hits 40 something home runs and 140 RBI, how many games do you think he helped out to win that season? Huh? I’ll tell you what, it’s more than 35.”

Ortiz stressed he was not trying to minimize the value and the importance of Kershaw to the Dodgers. It just boils down to two trophies being too many for one baseball player.

“I know Kershaw makes the Dodgers better, no question about that, no doubt,” said Ortiz. “And he has the Cy Young. When you get the Cy Young, there’s not a better award than that for a pitcher.

“If I’m a pitcher and I win the Cy Young, I walk into my clubhouse with the biggest (sense of pride). ‘Here, I won the Cy Young, here’s when I’m going to make my money, because I won the Cy Young.’

“You win the Cy Young, you’re the best pitcher in the game, but when you win the MVP as the pitcher that means you were better than everybody on your team — but you never got a (expletive) hit, you never dived for a (expletive) ball.”

Ortiz brought it back to the Red Sox.

“If I go out there and play 35 games for this ballclub out of 162, am I helping?” he asked, not pausing to hear an answer. “I don’t care what anybody says. Special players perform every day. A starting pitcher goes out every five days. I wish I could go out here and play every five days. I’d go to New York for three days, have a day off in between, and then a few more in the following day.

“For a position player to win MVP, you have to be on top of your position every day, every game.”

The need for oxygen did create an opportunity for Ortiz to listen to the argument about how a starter who goes deep into games actually impacts the games around his start. The day before, the manager can use his bullpen almost at will, knowing there should not be a heavy need coming up tomorrow. The day after, the ace should have left the bullpen close to fully rested.

That ups the pitcher’s impact closer to 100 games — not 162, but a lot more than 35.

“I don’t know, maybe you’re right,” said Ortiz, somewhat softened. “It’s so confusing. You guys make the rules, you guys figure it out.”

As for Martinez, his friendship with Ortiz will survive this philosophical chasm. The pain of being snubbed for the AL MVP award in 1999 is still felt by Martinez, who is mostly offended that two writers left him off the 10-deep ballot entirely for reasons essentially in line with Ortiz’s.

“It’s normal for an everyday player to feel that way!” said Martinez in a text. “We did not tell voters to elect starting pitchers as MVPs, voters did that on their own.

“Sometimes pitchers change history.”

If I had a vote, I’d go with Stanton or McCutchen, but not because I have a problem with a pitcher winning an MVP. Kershaw missed six weeks of action — including all of April — and will likely finish with just 27 starts and fewer than 200 innings pitched. He has been extraordinary when he has pitched, but missing nearly a fifth of the season is too much to make up for the others’ equally extraordinary contributions. (Even considering Stanton’s going to miss Miami’s final two-and-a-half weeks.)

That said, there is nothing easy about the decision this year.

Legendary chatter

Grantland’s Ben Lindbergh penned a fun fictional letter from Martinez to Kershaw, complimenting him on the season and passive-aggressively pointing out a few ways in which it’s clear that Martinez’ 2000 tops Kershaw’s 2014. Like how Martinez pitched in the steroids era, how he pitched half his games in the more hitter-friendly Fenway Park, and how he faced a DH rather than a pitcher in the lineup.

There’s numerical support for the idea, using WHIP (walks plus hits per inning pitched) and two sabermetric stats: ERA-plus, which adjusts an ERA to both the pitcher’s ballpark and league, and Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP), which calculates ERA with the uncontrollable elements of defense and luck taken out.

After Kershaw’s Friday start, he has a 1.80 ERA, 197 ERA-plus — 100 is league average — 1.87 FIP, and 0.856 WHIP. In 2000, Pedro posted the lowest WHIP in baseball history (0.737), the best ERA-plus (291) of anyone outside of Tim Keefe in 1880, a 1.74 ERA, and a 2.17 FIP.

All that and, as “Pedro” quips at the end of the piece, “I was even better in 1999.” (His 1.39 FIP that year trails only 1908 Christy Mathewson and 1910 Walter Johnson.)

Cold shoulder

Matt Barnes, who has been pitching out of the Red Sox bullpen but is part of the long-term rotation plans, is a native of Danbury, Conn. And just like last year, he’s not going anywhere once winter hits.

Barnes will work out indoors all winter long, alternating between two different facilities in the area — one has a mound, the other doesn’t but it good for long-tossing. It’s a safe bet he will be the sole member of the 2014 team to stick around New England, no matter how cold and snowy it gets.

“Last year was tough, it was cold, and cold a lot, but I love the Northeast,” Barnes said. “Love it.” . . .

Here’s what general manager Ben Cherington had to say about how and where Mookie Betts fits into the defensive lineup next season:

“Mookie’s done a lot of good things at the big league level, and sort of looks like someone who can help us win games. I don’t know. I think when you are where we are, we need more good players, not fewer, so we’re happy that (both Betts and Rusney Castillo) are here and I’m sure it’ll work itself out.

“Next April, there’ll be nine guys in the lineup and there’ll be 13 position players on the team and there’ll be more . . . that we rely on over the course of the season. A lot can happen between now and then, but we really like having not just both of them but Jackie (Bradley Jr.) and the other outfielders that we have. We hope it gives us a better chance to have a good outfield and control a good outfield for a long time than if we didn’t have those guys.”

Loose threads

What a sad, heartbreaking moment for former Rangers manager Ron Washington, who held a press conference on Thursday to admit to an affair. Perhaps it was a desire to quell speculation that his resignation was related to a recurrence of a recreational drug issue, but to see Washington confess was just so strange.

“Today, I’m at a very low time in my life,” he said, reading from a statement. “I’m sorry for breaking the trust that I had with my wife, and for disappointing my players, for disappointing my coaches, for disappointing Major League Baseball and for disappointing the Texas Rangers. All I ask is for your forgiveness and understanding.”

As tempting as it is to wonder if he really had to go to such lengths about a private transgression, there’s little to be gained with that kind of second-guessing. Washington has always been upright and forthright about what’s on his mind, so his decision fell right in line with who he is and his track record.

The hope and expectation here is that he returns to baseball after weathering a storm that has been obviously extremely rocky for him, but one that pales compared to stories that have swirled around other sports, like the NFL, of late. . . .

Speaking of unrest, one unresolved American societal issue that could flare up and affect baseball is what is still happening in Ferguson, Mo. Residents there are still upset that no arrest has been made of the police officer who shot and killed Michael Brown. At a recent public meeting in the St. Louis suburb, one person spoke of an “October Surprise” if the Cardinals reach the World Series. . . .

Members of the Orioles did a great lip-sync to the otherwise forgettable pop ditty “We Won’t Stop,” to thank their fans and dedicate themselves to a march deep into October. Buck Showalter gives a sober introduction before the players have fun.

The only thing missing was having general manager Dan Duquette appear. For a guy who’s decided that it’s OK to reveal his ample (but previously cloaked) sense of humor, this was a wasted opportunity. Hopefully he’ll re-consider.