Exalting A Streak Over A Season of Greatness

News item: Madison Bumgarner named Sports Illustrated Sportsman of the Year

It's a cliche that baseball is a marathon: it begins with the first stirrings of spring when hope has a heartbeat in every city. It runs through the blooming of flowers, then the dog days of summer and into the changing leaves of Fall. In this long race patience is a virtue and trends earn coherence only over the long haul.

So why do we ignore all but the final 100 yards?

Madison Bumgarner rewrote the history books in the post-season, leading the Giants almost single-handedly to the World Series crown. His 4-1, 1.21 performance over 58 frames of playoffs, with two shutouts and a five-inning save on two days' rest was sparkling and unprecedented. He won the World Series with 21 innings at an 0.43 ERA and 17-1 K/BB ratio.

For this dominance he was rightly rewarded with the MVP of both the league championship series and the World Series. No one could credibly dispute either.

And Bumgarner was no 1972 Gene Tenace or 1969 Al Weiss. At age 24 and already in his fourth full season, MadBum went 18-11, 2.98 in 217 innings, with a 5.1 K/BB ratio en route to a fourth place finish in the Cy Young voting.

In other words, Madison Bumgarner is a bonafide star who had pitched out of his mind in the playoffs. But sportsman of the year? He was fourth in Cy Young voting.

Allow me to introduce you to The Claw, whose entire season looked like Bumgarner's final 58 innings. Clayton Kershaw missed six starts in the first weeks of 2014 and still managed to unravel the record books. He terrorized NL batters to the tune of 21-3, 1.77 and a 7.7 K/BB ratio, earning him the Cy and the MVP. Kershaw's value, despite a lost month, was twice Bumgarner's during the regular season.

It's true that Kershaw blew up in his post-season starts. Maybe he can't handle cold weather; maybe opponents figured him out and maybe he's a sissy-ass choker who can't handle the pressure. Or maybe he just endured a four-game skid, as every other pitcher in baseball has done. Thirty-five frames of work aren't sufficient information to draw conclusions. 

But one thing is for sure. Madison Bumgarner, great as he is, couldn't pack Clayton Kershaw's lunch. In their careers, Kershaw owns three Cy Youngs and a second place finish. Fourth is Bumgarner's peak so far. Kershaw owns a 2.48 lifetime ERA; Bumgarner, 3.06 in 420 fewer innings. Kershaw has posted 41 wins against replacement to MadBum's 17. Etc. etc. etc.

Naming Bumgarner Sportsman of the Year exalts his final seven starts (including 21 innings against the light-hitting Royals) over Kershaw's full body of work, which was not just superior but vastly so. The tournament that follows the season may decide who gets to call themselves "champion," but it doesn't determine who's best.

Clayton Kershaw was the transcendent star of baseball in 2014. If Madison Bumgarner was second he was light years behind, making him a terrible choice for that award.