BBWAA in difficult position when it comes to voting for awards
As an American the opportunity to vote is a precious right. To a sportswriter sometimes it’s more than that. I’ve always voted in November but I’ve also voted in many other months as well. It became standard.
A typical year would start with the Auto Racing Hall of Fame vote in January. Then there would be the John R. Wooden Award in March, the Heisman Trophy in November and the Baseball Hall of Fame vote in December. Some years there would be a National League Cy Young Award ballot or a Rookie of the Year ballot in September.
I always felt honored to participate in these awards and took the responsibility seriously. I was well aware that the citations had meaning to the potential recipients as well as to millions of fans who rooted for and idolized them. Nevertheless, I always felt comfortable mailing in my selections.
I wasn’t as comfortable on two other occasions. Both times I found myself on a three-person panel charged with choosing the Most Valuable Player of the National League Championship Series. The award, itself, was almost trivial. By the time the second pitch of the World Series is thrown few people care — or even remember — which players were named the MVP of their respective LCS. There was a different reason why casting this vote made me apprehensive.
The winner would get a brand new automobile.
As a voter I was doing more than just deciding who I thought was worthy of a particular honor. I was voting to bestow material wealth on someone. Believe me, that’s not the same. At least it wasn’t for me. I can’t imagine what it would have felt like if there had been millions of dollars riding on my vote but several members of the Baseball Writers Association of America might be about to find out how that feels.
The BBWAA was handed some heavy new responsibilities last week and was not even given the opportunity to say no.
The BBWAA annually
bestows eight postseason awards — Most Valuable Player, Cy Young Award, Rookie of the Year and Manager of the Year in each league. Each award is voted on by a panel of 30 writers, consisting of two in every city in the league. This is the writers’ way of recognizing those who had the greatest positive impact on each particular season. None of these awards was ever intended to be more than an honor and a legacy.
Last week the owners and players ratified a five-year contract that potentially makes BBWAA awards something they were not created to be. In some cases a player’s contract status and annual compensation will depend on the outcome of postseason voting. Not a single scribe was consulted before the owners and players decided jointly to bestow this responsibility on the writers.
One of the players’ gripes at the bargaining table is the fact that clubs purposely hold rookies in the minor leagues just long enough to deny them credit for the first year’s service. By doing this the team effectively delays by one year the date when the player will be eligible for salary arbitration and the date when he will be eligible for free agency.
The players demanded an end to this practice but got nowhere, other than one concession by the owners. They agreed that any player who places first or second in the Rookie of the Year balloting will receive credit for a full year of service time regardless of when he was called up to the majors.
In a perfect world that wouldn’t be a problem
but when there’s money at stake human beings have a way of being less than perfect. Sooner or later there will probably be players and their agents lobbying for votes. Sooner or later there will probably be general managers and owners lobbying to suppress votes. How far will they go to influence the voters? Where is the line between lobbying and threatening? Where is the line between lobbying and bribery? What happens if somebody crosses that line, which is fuzzy to begin with?
And that’s only the Rookie of the Year Award. There are potentially larger problems relating to the Most Valuable Player and Cy Young Award voting.
The most contentious issue at the bargaining table was the players’ claim that the most productive players sometimes receive the lowest salaries because they have little or no bargaining power. Teams can get away with paying the major league minimum to pre-arbitration players, regardless of their contribution to the team’s success.
Again the owners insisted on keeping the existing rules in place and, for the most part. got their way. However, they did agree to provide an annual $50 million fund that will be divided among pre-arbitration players. Each player’s share will be determined by a statistical formula and, if applicable — his position on the BBWAA awards ballots.
Holy Abner Doubleday, look what this does!!!
Last season Corbin Burnes of the Brewers won the National League Cy Young Award, prevailing after a very close race that saw three pitchers receive first-place votes. A single writer’s ballot could have made the difference.
Burnes’ reward was an impressive piece of hardware and having his name etched forever alongside those of Warren Spahn, Sandy Koufax, Tom Seaver, Steve Carlton, Greg Maddux and other immortals. What he didn’t get was any money — at least none beyond the $562,800 he earned for the season. The Brewers weren’t obligated to pay him a penny more and they didn’t.
If that had happened under this year’s rules the Brewers still wouldn’t have to pay him anything else but Burnes would have been entitled to a big chunk of that $50 million bonus pool. According to one estimate the Cy Young Award would have paid him an additional $4 million.
That’s staggering. One writer’s vote would have been worth more money to one man than most of us see in a lifetime.
Think about how much pressure that will place on each voter this season. I guarantee you they’ll be thinking about it, especially if a close vote is anticipated. Obviously, the potential for external pressure is tremendous.
Many years ago the New York Times declared that’s it sole function is to report the news and it should never have a hand in making the news. Accordingly it prohibited its staffers from voting for any awards in baseball or other sports or participating in weekly football and basketball ranking polls. To my knowledge no other newspaper followed suit but I wonder if that might be about to change. I think some editors and publishers will think long and hard before allowing their staffers to continue to vote for awards under these new circumstances.
Perhaps the BBWAA should take the first step. Perhaps the BBWAA should simply suspend all postseason awards until the players and owners find a different way to resolve their squabbles.