Connie Mack Award (Manager of the Year, awarded October 15)

• Bob Melvin (Oakland Athletics)
• Buck Showalter (Baltimore Orioles)
• Joe Maddon (Tampa Bay Rays)

Willie Mays Award (Rookie of the Year, awarded October 16)

• Mike Trout (Los Angeles Angels)
• Yoenis Cespedes (Oakland Athletics)
• Tommy Milone (Oakland Athletics)

Goose Gossage Award (Top Relief Pitcher, awarded October 17)

• Fernando Rodney (Tampa Bay Rays)
• Ryan Cook (Oakland Athletics)
• Jim Johnson (Baltimore Orioles)

Walter Johnson Award (Pitcher of the Year, awarded October 18)

• Justin Verlander (Detroit Tigers)
• David Price (Tampa Bay Rays)
• Felix Hernandez (Seattle Mariners)

Stan Musial Award (Most Valuable Player, awarded October 19)

• Mike Trout (Los Angeles Angels)
• Miguel Cabrera (Detroit Tigers)
• Robinson Cano (New York Yankees)

“It seems only appropriate to honor Craig Calcaterra, as he could be seen as ‘living the dream’ for many bloggers,” said outgoing BBA president Daniel Shoptaw.  “Calcaterra quit lawyering, began blogging and quickly rose to a place of prominence.  What blogger wouldn’t want to follow in those footsteps?”

Voters were allowed to vote for three of the five nominees, casting a first, second and third place ballot.  Those ballots were tabulated based on a 5-3-1 point scale.

Calcaterra received 276 points, which included 32 first-place votes from the 119 ballots cast.  Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports was runner-up with 245 points and Kevin Goldstein of Baseball Prospectus third with 209 points.  Dave Cameron of FanGraphs (208) and Jon Heyman of CBS Sports (194) rounded out the ballot.

The Baseball Bloggers Alliance was formed in the fall of 2009 to encourage cooperation and collaboration between baseball bloggers of all major league teams as well as those that follow baseball more generally.  You can follow the BBA on Facebook and Twitter or contact them at baseballbloggersalliance@gmail.com

Larkin, a 12-time All-Star who fashioned an .815 OPS over 19 seasons, received the largest percentage of votes, being named on 84.25% of the 148 ballots cast.  This is the highest percentage garnered by any player in the three years of BBA voting.

Bagwell, who hit 449 HR and had a .948 OPS in his 15 seasons in Houston, was selected on 115 ballots for a 78.77% rate.  As with the official voting done by the Baseball Writers of America, a player must be named on 75% of the ballots to be recommended by the alliance.

Last year, the BBA recommended second baseman Roberto Alomar and pitcher Bert Blyleven, both of whom were inducted into Cooperstown during the summer.  In 2010, no player reached the 75% mark in BBA balloting, the year that outfielder Andre Dawson was selected for the Hall by the baseball writers.

The Baseball Bloggers Alliance’s vote has no impact on the official vote taken by the Baseball Writers of America.  However, the BBA has often been a predictor of major awards granted by the writers.

The final voting results are as follows:

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Bautista holds off Ellsbury in American League

Kimbrel beat Milwaukee’s John Axford by 13 points in the votes submitted by the National League voters of the Alliance, accumulating 78 points and garnering 12 first place votes.  Axford, on the other hand, received 65 points on the strength of seven first place selections.  Kimbrel’s bullpen teammate Johnny Venters was a very distant third with nine total points.

The race in the American League was a little more anti-climatic as Detroit closer Jose Valverde gained 13 first place votes on his way to a league-leading 74 point total.  Two New York Yankees followed him in the voting, with Mariano Rivera receiving four first place votes and 56 total points while David Robertson gained 39 points for third.

The complete voting results are as follows (first place votes in parenthesis):

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Kansas City first baseman Eric Hosmer and Tampa Bay pitcher Jeremy Hellickson both received 67 points in American League voting, creating the first tie for an award since the Alliance began handing out the honors in 2009.  Hosmer received nine first place votes, while Hellickson garnered eight.  Rounding out the top three in the AL was Mark Trumbo, the first baseman for the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim.

In the National League, Kimbrel, who set a rookie record for saves as Atlanta’s closer, outpaced his teammate, first baseman Freddie Freeman, by thirty points.  Kimbrel received 65 points, including 11 of 16 first place selections.  Washington Nationals second baseman Danny Espinosa was a distant third.

The complete voting results are as follows (first place votes in parenthesis):

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Arizona Diamondbacks manager Kirk Gibson and Tampa Bay Rays manager Joe Maddon were named the 2011 Connie Mack Award winners today by the Baseball Bloggers Alliance.  The Connie Mack Award recognizes those considered the top manager for the season.

Gibson took over an Arizona team that finished last in the National League West in 2010 and led them to a divisional title in his first year on the job.  Gibson’s Diamondbacks led all year long and finished a comfortable eight games ahead of defending World Champion San Francisco to move on to the postseason stage.  Voting was done before the Diamondbacks lost to the Milwaukee Brewers in five games in the National League Divisional Series.

Gibson was a unanimous winner, scoring the top slot on all 21 ballots cast by the portion of the membership that voted on the National League award.  Ron Roenicke, whose Brewers defeated Gibson’s squad, finished second in the balloting, while St. Louis Cardinal manager Tony La Russa finished third.

Maddon was rewarded after leading his team to the largest September rally in history, leading his Rays from nine games back in the wild card race to passing up the Boston Red Sox on the last day.  As in the National League, voting did not take into account the Rays falling to the Texas Rangers in four games in the American League Divisional Series.

Maddon received the top billing on 22 of the 25 ballots cast for the American League voters, easily outpacing Detroit’s Jim Leyland and Texas Ranger manager Ron Washington.  Washington garnered the three first place votes that did not go to Maddon.

The complete voting results are as follows (first place votes in parenthesis):

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Outfielders Jose Bautista of the Toronto Blue Jays and Matt Kemp from the Los Angeles Dodgers led their respective leagues in balloting for Major League Baseball’s All-Star Game as conducted by members of the Baseball Bloggers Alliance and announced today.

Bautista, who has an American League-leading 1.133 OPS to go along with his 24 home runs, was named on 50 ballots, not including one ballot that placed him at third base.  Bautista was joined in the outfield by Curtis Granderson of the New York Yankees, who received 48 votes, and Jacoby Ellsbury of the Boston Red Sox, who tallied 23 votes.

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The Writer of the Year Award was created by the BBA to honor those writers who, beyond being exceptionally great at their craft, have taken to the internet in a full and vigorous fashion.  Voters were instructed to take into account not only the writing abilities of the nominees but also their online presense, whether via blog or other media, as well as how they interact with their followers and fans.
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BBA RECOMMENDS ALOMAR, BLYLEVEN FOR HALL OF FAME

Second baseman Roberto Alomar and starting pitcher Bert Blyleven were named today as the recommended 2011 Hall of Fame class by the Baseball Bloggers Alliance.

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The World Series will have a familiar look in October, according to the Baseball Bloggers Alliance.

For the first time, the membership of the BBA was polled for their preseason predictions, with the New York Yankees and the Philadelphia Phillies being the most common selections for World Series participants.  The Yankees received 36 votes to easily outpace Boston’s 18, while the Phillies’ 31 votes edged out St. Louis’s 24.  The rematch ends the same as last year, with New York being the choice of 20 of the 75 that cast ballots.

Members of the Alliance registered their opinions on a number of things for the coming 2010 season, from divisional standings to award winners.

In the American League, New York, Minnesota and Seattle were chosen as the favorites to win their respective divisions.  Seattle barely edged out Los Angeles and Texas in the tightest divisional race.

Over in the National League, Philadelphia, St. Louis and Los Angeles are considered the favorites.  The Dodgers just edged past Colorado for the top spot in the NL West.

When it comes to postseason hardware, the National League picture looks a lot clearer than the American League.

All of the National League award selections were clear cut.  Atlanta’s Bobby Cox was selected as the top manager, beating out Philadelphia’s Charlie Manuel and St. Louis’s Tony La Russa by six votes.  Atlanta outfielder Jason Heyward, a spring training darling, received more than three times the votes than his closest competition, Washington pitcher Stephen Strasburg, for best rookie. Philadelphia pitcher Roy Halladay was almost four times more likely to be named the league’s best starter than his runner-up, San Francisco’s Tim Lincecum.  St. Louis’s first baseman Albert Pujols put them all to shame, though, holding a 43-7 vote edge over second place in the player of the year voting.

Even the newly minted Goose Gossage Award was definitive in the National League, with Los Angeles’s Jonathan Broxton receiving over double the votes of San Diego’s Heath Bell.

In the American League, things were relatively closer.  Seattle’s Don Wakamatsu outpolled Minnesota’s Ron Gardenhire by five votes.  Detroit outfielder Austin Jackson took top rookie honors by six votes over Texas pitcher Neftali Feliz and Baltimore hurler Brian Matusz.  Seattle’s Felix Hernandez had a comfortable cushion over Kansas City’s Zack Greinke for the AL’s best starter, and Twins catcher Joe Mauer is favored to win his second straight MVP by six votes over Yankee third baseman Alex Rodriguez.

The most dominating winner in the American League was New York reliever Mariano Rivera, who is favored to win the inaugural Goose Gossage Award.  Rivera received three and a half times the votes of runners-up Jonathan Paplebon of Boston and Joakim Soria of Kansas City.

The Baseball Bloggers Alliance was formed in 2009 and numbers 147 blogs across baseball, representing every major league team and including numerous general baseball blogs. The official website of the BBA is located at www.baseballbloggersalliance.com.  The BBA can be found on Twitter by the handle @baseballblogs and the hashmark #bbba.  Members of the BBA may also be heard at Blog Talk Radio each Tuesday night with their call-in show, BBA Baseball Talk.