Should we be worried about Bill Belichick?

Time again for the JoeBlogs Weekly Awards — as a reminder, we hand out the JoeBlogs trophies every week to the players who are my current picks for MVP, Cy Young, Rookie of the Year, and more. Below each award, I’ll list last week’s winner.

American League MVP: Aaron Judge
(Previously: Aaron Judge, 3 weeks in a row)

From May 4–9 — five games — Aaron Judge went 3-for-19. Yes, all three hits were for extra bases (one homer, two doubles), but the point is that’s a .158 batting average, and Judge fell below .400 for the season.

Inevitable, right? I mean, nobody is going to hit .400 in today’s high-strikeout, elite-defense, million-reliever march.

Since then, Judge is hitting .424, and his average is back above .400.

I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how we compare players from one generation to the next. Well, to be fair, I always think about that topic. But I do feel like there’s an evolution in my thinking. I’m sure I’ll be writing more about this soon.

As part of this, it’s becoming more and more plausible to me that Aaron Judge might just be the best hitter who ever walked the earth.

I mean, no, I still don’t expect him to hit .400 for the season. He might not even hit .350. But when you consider his 62-homer season in 2022, his wackadoodle 1.159 OPS season last year, and what he’s doing this year … I mean, that puts him in the stratosphere with Ruth and Bonds and Williams.

And none of them—not even Bonds—played in this absurdly challenging era for hitters.

National League MVP: Pete Crow-Armstrong, Cubs
(Previously: Corbin Carroll)

I mean, yeah, the MVP is going to be Shohei. Of course, it’s going to be Shohei. He seems destined to win every MVP for the rest of time, whether he pitches or not. Shohei homered again on Monday, that’s 17 for the season, that’s right on schedule for 60 homers this season. Yep, he’s surely going to win his fourth MVP award in five seasons.

If I had a vote RIGHT NOW, I think I’d pick Pete Crow-Armstrong or Fernando Tatis. Let’s go with Crow-Armstrong. This feels to me a lot like the Mike Trout-Miguel Cabrera thing of a few years ago; Cabrera won the Triple Crown, Trout did a million different things well, and we were left trying to weigh what is more valuable.

Shohei, at the moment, is purely an offensive player. It’s the most important thing to be, obviously, but he adds no value as a defender. Crow-Armstrong, meanwhile, is a fantabulous centerfielder, maybe the best defender in baseball.

Does that make up for the 200 or so points of OPS that separate him and Ohtani? It’s a tough call. Tatis might have the more compelling case because he’s got a significantly higher on-base percentage than Crow-Armstrong and is also an elite fielder (though not quite in Crow-Armstrong’s stratosphere).

I’ll give this week’s award to Crow-Armstrong. There’s plenty of time to come back around to Shohei or Tatis or Pete Alonso or someone else later.

American League Cy Young: Hunter Brown, Astros
(Previously: Tarik Skubal)

Do you know who leads all American League pitchers in bWAR?

Right. It’s Kansas City’s Kris Bubic.

Houston’s Hunter Brown leads in fWAR.

New York’s Max Fried leads in ERA.

Friend, Brown, and Detroit’s Casey Mize lead in wins.

Garrett Crochet leads in strikeouts.

Detroit’s Tarik Skubal not only leads in strikeout-to-walk ratio, he also leads in both categories individually — most strikeouts per nine innings (11.8) and fewest walks per nine innings (1.0).

I’m just going to say it: We as a baseball society are flailing, seriously flailing, as we try to make sense of starting pitchers in this new era. Say what you want about the wins and ERA era, but everyone did agree more or less on what an ace was supposed to look like. An ace was a 20-game winner! An ace had a great ERA. Skubal is not even in the Top 10 among AL pitchers bWAR despite his undeniable dominance. Fried is not even in the top 5 despite his 1.29 ERA.

I still believe we need a new pitching statistic — and the most promising is some sort of “Season Score” built around Bill James’ toy statistic, “Game Score,” which scores each pitcher’s start based on a whole bunch of factors, including strikeouts, walks, runs, innings, etc.

Here are the top five average game scores in the American League:

1. Hunter Brown, Astros, 67.7

2. Nathan Eovaldi, Rangers, 65.5

3. Max Fried, Yankees, 64.1

4. Joe Ryan, Twins, 63.2

5. Garrett Crochet, Red Sox, 63.1

I’m going to ask our guys, Tom Tango and Bill James to weigh in (again) on how to make average game score a much better statistic, but for now, let’s put Hunter Brown in the Cy Young spot.

National League Cy Young: Zack Wheeler, Phillies
(Previously: Logan Webb)

We have similar chaos in the National League.

Philadelphia’s Jesús Luzardo leads the league in bWAR as he pretty much has all year.

Logan Webb, thanks to his newfound strikeout superpowers, leads in fWAR.

Arizona’s Brandon Pfaadt leads all of baseball in wins.

The Mets’ Kodai Senga leads the league with a 1.49 ERA.

Washington’s MacKenzie Gore leads in strikeouts.

Zack Wheeler in strikeouts-to-walk and WHIP.

Paul Skenes is the Vegas choice.

Again, little of it connects. Logan Webb is No. 1 in fWAR and not in the top 10 in bWAR? It’s just weird.

I kind of think Wheeler is the best pitcher in the league right now. And HIS average game score backs me up:

Top 5 average game scores in the National League:

1. Zack Wheeler, Phillies, 64.0

2. Paul Skenes, Pirates, 62.0

3. Yoshinobu, Yamamoto, Dodgers, 61.6

4. Logan Webb, Giants, 60.9

5. Kodai Senga, Mets, 59.8

American League Rookie of the Year: Jacob Wilson, Athletics
(Previously: Jacob Wilson)

As Boston’s Kristian Campbell slumps badly, this has turned into a runaway. Wilson is hitting .343 and has struck out just 10 times all season. We’re getting closer to that moment when we should start thinking about where in Sacramento to put the Jacob Wilson statue.

National League Rookie of the Year: Drake Baldwin, Braves
(Previously: Agustín Ramírez)

Over in the National League, Drake Baldwin is doing some Jacob Wilson things — in 29 games behind the plate, he’s hitting .357 with some power — and I guess he’s the guy right now. Also in Atlanta, pitcher A.J. Smith-Shawver has been very good in his seven starts (2.33 ERA).

And because Brilliant Reader Michael asked, we are going to give a special shoutout to St. Louis’ Victor Scott, who is playing some superior defense and is killing it on the basepaths. He would be the runaway leader in the Rookie of the Year voting … except he’s not actually rookie eligible. He had 145 at-bats last year.

American League Manager of the Year: A.J. Hinch, Tigers
(Previously: A.J. Hinch 2 weeks)

The Tigers still have the best record in baseball. I like some of the stuff that Dan Wilson is doing in Seattle, too.

National League Manager of the Year: Rob Thompson, Phillies
(Previously: Carlos Mendoza)

My Phillies gift to two of my favorite people — Linda Holmes and Ellen Adair.

Best American League Team: Detroit Tigers
(Previously: Detroit Tigers)

This is all beginning to feel very real in Detroit. That starting rotation of Skubal, Mize, Reese Olson, Jack Flaherty and Jackson Jobe is hot.

Best National League Team: Philadelphia Phillies
(Previously: Los Angeles Dodgers)

The Dodgers are scuffling a bit right now, which has led my Dave Roberts-loathing friend Jonathan to push once again for his firing. Meanwhile, as mentioned, the Phillies are kicking it into gear even as Aaron Nola searches.

Tank Shark!: Colorado Rockies

The Rockies are going to be at the top of this list every year — it’s unclear where the line between “purposeful tanking” and “gross incompetence” belongs, but at some point it doesn’t actually matter, does it? The Rockies are one of the worst teams we’ve ever seen.

We do need once again offer a special mention to the 15-31 Orioles. There’s time for them to right the ship, at least a little bit, but if this keeps going, they would have to go at or near the top of any Most Disappointing Teams in American Sports History list, right?

Kathleen’s Corner

• Kyle Schwarber sent his 300th home run flying 466 feet at Coors Field.

• Zoo Atlanta is making souvenir baseball cards for their animals ahead of the All-Star Game. There will be eight cards and I need them all.

• The University of Nebraska Press released this great list of recently published baseball books to enjoy this summer.

• This is a week old, but it’s been in my bookmarks. For First Responders Night, the El Paso Chihuahuas had this talented pup deliver the game ball.