Felger & Mazz: The BBWAA Got It Right
BOSTON (CBS) - Mike Felger and Tony Massarotti opened their show Wednesday discussing Major League Baseball's Manager Of The Year award, which was announced last night on the MLB Network.
For once, Felger actually agrees with the Baseball Writers Association of America.
Clint Hurdle of the Pittsburgh Pirates was the easy choice to win National League Manager of the Year, leading his team to the playoffs for the first time since 1992.
But the American League Manager of the Year award wasn't so easy. However in the end, former Red Sox skipper and current Cleveland Indians manager Terry Francona took home the honors.
Francona received 16 of 30 first-place votes to 12 for Farrell.
Long an adversary of the BBWAA, Felger opened the show ridiculing the Boston Chapter in their defense of Farrell for the award. On the whole, Felger believes the BBWAA got it right.
"The BBWAA got it right. It was a neck and neck decision and it was a close race. You turn in your ballots at the end of the regular season and Francona closed like a mother," said Felger. "He took a team to the playoffs that was way worse than yours - and I'm not talking about payroll, I'm talking about players. That's your manager of the year."
"Someone give the Boston media a hanky...they need it," added Felger.
Tony Massarotti didn't have a vote, but if he did it would've gone to John Farrell. However, just because Farrell didn't win doesn't mean there was some great injustice done. Tony feels like both were deserving of the award.
Having said that, Tony took to task two writers from Toronto, one writer from New York and a Texas writer for their individual ballots and called their integrity into question.
Mazz thinks it's stupid that Jim Leyland and Ron Washington even received votes, and for the Toronto writers (who view him as a villain) to leave Farrell off their ballots signals their displeasure and bias for him having left the Blue Jays for the Red Sox last offseason.
Listen to the full discussion below:
BBWAA Got It Right
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