I never really understood why it was three anyway when the MVP ballot went to ten.

I'm fine with this. I'd like to see the ROY ballot expanded too.

What's the point breakdown, though?

Following a vote in which St. Louis’ Chris Carpenter received the most first-place votes but not the NL Cy Young award,

Not true, but I see it's been corrected on the link.

And, yes, it' s impossible to know just what this means without knowing how the votes will be weighted. If they go to 5-4-3-2-1, or even 9-7-5-3-1, then first-place votes will be devalued even more.

Feinsand said his proposal was note made as a response to Tim Lincecum winning the award in a vote in which Carpenter was left off two ballots last ballots.

Will it make a difference, let's see...

Under the system that was in place, the voting breakdown was:

Player.....1st...2nd...3rd...Points
Lincecum....11....12.....9......100
Carpenter....9....14.....7.......94
Wainwright..12.....5....15.......90

with 5 points for a first, 3 for a second, 1 for a third.

Let's assume these two new places result in Carpenter getting two additional fourth-place votes. We'll ignore all other players. The results would be:

PLayer.....1st...2nd...3rd...4th...5th...Points
Lincecum....11....12.....9.....0.....0......???
Carpenter....9....14.....7.....2.....0......???
Wainwright..12.....5....15.....0.....0......???


I can't find how many points each place is worth (the article doesn't say), so I'll try a few ways:
5-4-3-2-1:
Lincecum.....130
Carpenter....126
Wainwright...125

OK, that doesn't change anything.

How about 10-5-3-2-1?
Lincecum.....197
Carpenter....185
Wainwright...190

Hmm, that hurts Carpenter. Let's try 10-7-5-3-1:
Lincecum.....239
Carpenter....229
Wainwright...230


So, while I think the change is good (no sense limiting ballots so much), the proposer clearly didn't check to see if his intended outcome (Carpenter winning, I assume) would have been achieved by his proposal. Unless his intended outcome is just "Carpenter to be named on every ballot", which just seems odd.

According to him, his proposal was NOT (I'm assuming note was a typo) made in response to this year's results.

the proposer clearly didn't check to see if his intended outcome (Carpenter winning, I assume) would have been achieved by his proposal.

I think the article was supposed to say that the proposal was NOT (rather than note) made as a response . . .

As as been pointed out before, even if you give Carpenter the two "rogue" votes, a second that went to Vazquez and a third that went to Haren (EDIT), the order of the three leading candidates is unchanged.

The 3rd went to Haren, not Penny. If a vote went to Penny this year, Will Carroll would have been hung and burned in effigy.

Sorry, had a couple of things going at once. Fixt.

According to him, his proposal was NOT (I'm assuming note was a typo) made in response to this year's results.

I think the article was supposed to say that the proposal was NOT (rather than note) made as a response . . .

Ah, my mistake. Sorry guys.

It's just great that Bill Madden is given the Spink Award the same week he writes that the Mets (read Omar Minaya)is only interested in acquiring "low-budget Latin players."

Here's Madden in last Sunday's NY Daily News:


Mets? Did somebody say the Mets? They won’t spend the money for Holliday, Bay or Lackey and apparently, they’re only interested in signing low-budget Latin players, having shown little or no interest in Byrd, Figgins, DeRosa, Wolf or even Staten Island’s Jason Marquis, while waiting for their markets to come to them. At the same time, the Phillies and Braves wasted no time in addressing their needs. Sad.

What's "sad" is this hack getting honored for the likes of this fine analysis. And BTW, the Daily News later dropped the word "Latin" from the story on their website.

So, while I think the change is good (no sense limiting ballots so much), the proposer clearly didn't check to see if his intended outcome (Carpenter winning, I assume) would have been achieved by his proposal. Unless his intended outcome is just "Carpenter to be named on every ballot", which just seems odd.

And more importantly, as pointed out in #1 and implicitly by you, Lincecum had more #1 votes than Carpenter anyway, so there's no way to construct a system that will put Carpenter over Lincecum no matter what you do - they were named 1/2 on 23 ballots and 3/4 on 9 ballots. Lincecum got two more firsts and 2 more thirds; he just flat-out beat Carpenter (it was Wainwright who had more 1sts than Lincecum, but this doesn't help him because he wasn't left off of anybody's ballot).

it's not about getting carpenter a vote, but deepening the number of candidates who get a vote... if someone wants to make a moronic argument like Law and Carroll did, they aren't forced to use a real voting spot.

Bill Madden in the Hall of Fame/J G Taylor Spink award winner. As Foster Brooks said when the subject of the Dean Martin roast was Joe Garagiola: "Have we really sunk this low?"