BBWAA Writers Place Non-Rookie Fourth in Rookie of the Year Voting

The Rookie of the Year voting yesterday went as it should have, if you only look at the winners of the awards. It's hard to congratulate the crusty old members of the Baseball Writers Association of America, though, in light of the fact that those two choices were awfully clear-cut.

If you dive further into the results, however, you will be left scratching your head. Kosuke Fukudome netted a third place vote ... oh, and a second place vote. That voter put Geovany Soto first and Fukudome second. So Fukudome had a better season than Joey Votto? Really?

This was not even close to the biggest mistake, though. Edinson Volquez of the Reds was not a rookie, yet received some votes. Not even just one. Three idiots voted for him to finish second. I have no idea why these ballots were even counted, as they voted for an ineligible player. Rules are rules, and yet we're going to look at the voting results for the 2008 NL Rookie of the Year voting in twenty years on BBReference and see Volquez in fourth place.

While most of the BBWAA guys are respectable and knowledgeable -- like the great Peter Gammons -- they are being given a bad name. We are constantly seeing ineptitude and irresponsibility from some of the members, many of whom wish to belittle those people who have the audacity to care about stats other than batting average, ERA, wins, and RBI. God forbid we use more stats to make decisions in a stat-based game.

An organization like this should be a bit more strict with its members, especially since they are the ones voting for awards and the Hall of Fame. Personally, I think the three guys who voted for Volquez should lose voting privileges for next year. You can't really punish bad judgment (the Fukudome votes, for example), but egregious oversights concerning the actual rules cannot be tolerated.

Hat-Tip: Shysterball