Rookies of the Year: Bailey and Coghlan

Over at NBC I figured that Beckham and Happ would win it. I even forgot to mention Andrew Bailey in my first pass at it and had to go back and update. Shows you what my figuring is worth:

A’s right-hander Andrew Bailey’s rise from Minor League obscurity to Major League limelight turned historic Monday when he was named the 2009 American League Rookie of the Year.

and

The franchise with a knack for producing some of the best young talent in the Major Leagues has another gem to add to its resume — Chris Coghlan.

That fact was evident through the rookie sensation’s first season in the big leagues this year, but it was a point that was driven home on Monday afternoon – when the 24-year-old infielder-turned-outfielder took home National League Rookie of the Year honors from the Baseball Writers’ Association of America.

I’ll take Hanson and Beckham over both of them over the long term, but hey, that’s not what the award is about.


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APBA Guy
14 years ago

I watched Bailey all year, and fwiw, I agree with Keith Law’s assessment that this is probably Bailey’s career year. Very quirky delivery, lot of shoulder stress, these are not good things.

On the other hand, his approach is one that a lot of pitchers, young and old, would do well to emulate:

– Work fast (or in his case, very fast)
– throw strikes
– retain composure

The guy was really no nonsense.

Now I’ll add something to make the metric oriented readers go insane. A part of Bailey’s success was due to the positive impact that Kurt Suzuki has on the team’s young pitchers, including Bailey.

Watching nearly all the A’s games you see the obvious affection and respect the pitchers have for Suzuki. When he talks they listen. And a big part of Bailey’s success came from pitching what Suzuki calls. No shake-offs fuels pitching pace. And that relentless pace of Bailey’s plus first strike percentage had a lot to do with his success, to say nothing of Suzuki’s ability to block pitches.

We’ll see how Bailey’s fares career wise. I think 2008 Joey Devine was better than 2009 Andrew Bailey. Devine will be returning from surgery this Spring. There could be an interesting battle for A’s closer in Arizona.

Max
14 years ago

McCutchen’s ‘09 > Coghlan’s ‘09

I know the voters don’t care about positional scarcity and defense but they both matter.

Jamie
14 years ago

since the ROY is based off of results, i’d take Happ over coghlan and hanson and mccutchen.