Grady Sizemore, 2006 MVP!!!

I think a hard working darkhorse candidate has emerged for the 2006 A.L. MVP award, and his name is Grady Sizemore.

Several other names have been bandied about since the beginning of August, David Ortiz, Manny Ramirez, Jermaine Dye, Travis Hafner, yet none of those four players are currently favored for the MVP. Ortiz, Manny and Jermaine's teams have all faltered in the playoff run.

Derek Jeter has been mentioned, Thome should get some mention as well, but when you start putting together the sum of all parts of what an MVP is, Grady Sizemore had blossomed into that player.

His offensive stats are beginning to eclipse all other ballplayers in terms of extra bases, runs scored, and stolen bases, his OBP is very acceptable, and his defense has been stellar.

Just how much better can a centerfielder get than the year Grady Sizemore has had? Remember, his extra base hits total stand at 90 and there are still 7 games to play.

At some point, whether a player helps lead a player to the playoffs has to be tempered against a player who has basically meant so much to a team that without him the team would probably be 15-20 games worse.

I found an interesting stat that I think proves Grady should have gotten way more votes than he did.

When batting with runners on base, Grady scored more than 50 percent of the time! It's important to really comprehend this statistic.

Basically, Grady is at bat, there is a runner on base, and by the innings end, Grady has scored. What happened to the runners already on base? Probably a good thing happened because Grady only ground into two double plays all year long.

There were literally only a handful of players with such a high percentage as Grady's in total in both leagues, less than 10. Add in Grady's stellar defensive range in the outfield and I think Grady should have been top five in the the MVP vote getting.

Can Grady still improve? Against lefties, yes, and perhaps we'll see his batting average creep up to between .300 to .310, and maybe 30 stolen bases, and a .400 OBP.

If that happens, The MVP should be Grady's. But what I LIKE most about Grady is that he just plays the game and doesn't worry about any of this stuff.