How did the writers do? Well, how about if we take a look at eight key pitching stats in the AL:

          ERA   ERA+   H/IP   WHIP   SO   K/9   K/BB   HR/9   
Colon    3.48   120    0.96   1.16  157  6.35   3.65   1.05
Santana  2.88   153    0.77   0.97  238  9.25   5.29   0.85

What am I missing here? Ohhhhhhh. Wins. Dummy me. Colon, 21. Santana, 16. Man, how could I have missed that? Now I understand why the writers gave (and I mean gave) the award to Colon. Sheesh, I thought the honor was supposed to go to the "best pitcher." If it's designed to go to the pitcher with the most wins, why jerk everyone around and vote?

I realize that the pitcher with the most wins (Dontrelle Willis, 22) didn't win the CYA in the NL. That's because the winner was close enough (21) for BBWAA work while fashioning a much better W-L % (.808 vs. .688), the other team-dependent criterion that gets way too much attention. Although Clemens got aced out of the award this year, he beat out Randy Johnson in 2005 for the same reasons. He won more games (18 to 16) and had a much better W-L % (.818 vs. .533) than the Big Unit, yet the latter had superior K-BB stats, such as K/9 (10.62 to 9.15), K/BB (6.59 to 2.76), similar HR/9 (0.66 to 0.63), and a lower ERA (2.60 to 2.98) and ERA+ (171 to 145).

Carpenter was a much better selection than Colon. But guess what? Bartolo won by a substantially wider margin than the St. Louis right-hander. Don't pay attention to me though. My choices finished third in both leagues. Five writers didn't even see fit to include Santana on their ballots and one voter thought Chad Cordero was more deserving than Clemens. I'm serious. The writer in question must have thought that ol' Roger didn't have enough victories or a good-enough winning percentage for his tastes so he chose the relief pitcher who went 2-4 with a .333 W-L % while recording 411 fewer outs than the man who led MLB with a 1.87 ERA.

Hmmm. Didn't Paul DePodesta trade for Bradley? Gosh, maybe the former GM did have a "keen eye for talent," despite Frank McCourt's claims to the contrary.

Didn't Bradley cause chemistry problems? Or was that Jeff Kent (.289/.377/.512), the All-Star second baseman who DePo forced upon his poor manager?

Besides, I thought Tracy liked to keep his teams intact? If that is the case, it seems to me the Pirates would be better off fielding a lineup of Humberto Cota, Daryle Ward, Jose Castillo, Freddy Sanchez, Jack Wilson, Jason Bay, Tike Redman, and Craig Wilson, don't ya think? Speaking of Ward, I wonder how he is feeling these days? He played for Tracy in 2003 and hit .183/.211/.193 with 3 BB, 19 SO, 1 XBH, and 0 HR in 52 games and 109 AB. D'oh!

Let's see how Sammy has been doing of late. Anyone notice a trend?

YEAR    G   AB    R    H  2B 3B  HR  RBI   BB   SO   AVG   OBP   SLG   OPS+
2001  160  577  146  189  34  5  64  160  116  153  .328  .437  .737   201
2002  150  556  122  160  19  2  49  108  103  144  .288  .399  .594   160
2003  137  517   99  144  22  0  40  103   62  143  .279  .358  .553   135
2004  126  478   69  121  21  0  35   80   56  133  .253  .332  .517   110
2005  102  380   39   84  15  1  14   45   39   84  .221  .295  .376    82

Yeah, me neither (cough, cough). The number of games, at-bats, runs, hits, home runs, RBI, walks, batting average, on-base percentage, slugging average, and OPS+ have declined for four years in a row. Sosa went from superstar to great to good to average to poor or from the proverbial penthouse to the outhouse in four years.

You know, Sosa's trend kinda looks like Westley Sissel Unseld's coaching record.

YEAR     W-L     WPct
1988    30-25    .545    
1989    40-42    .488
1990    31-51    .378
1991    30-52    .366
1992    25-57    .305
1993    22-60    .268
1994    24-58    .293

Just think, if Sosa can bounce back in 2006 the way Wes turned things around in 1994. . .

Quiz: The franchise that is now known as the Washington Wizards was previously the Baltimore Bullets (1964-73) and the Washington Bullets (1975-97). What was the full name of the team in 1974?