American League Win Shares

The Hardball Times has updated Win Shares up to September 2nd.

Here are some observations based on the numbers:

If you use win shares as your guide for MVP voting (but exclude players from non-playoff contending teams) then the ranking for AL MVP would be:

1. Gary Sheffield (27)
2. Hideki Matsui (24)
3. Vlade Guerrero (23)
4. Manny Ramirez (23)
5. Jose Guillen (22)
6. Hank Blalock (22)

In the real voting I think Matsui may draw off some votes from Sheffield but the same may also be true of Guillen taking votes from Vlade and Ortiz taking votes from Manny. The MVP voting should be very close and very interesting.

Johan Santana is by far the top rated pitcher using win shares. He has 20 while Mulder and Schilling both have 17.

I was surprised that Johnny Damon was ranked slightly ahead of Ichiro. People overlook the fine season Damon is having (10th in batting average, 1st in runs scored and 11th on OBP). It is also interesting to note that Damon is by far the highest rated outfielder in terms of defensive win shares (5.9) - only Mark Kotsay of the A's is even close (5.2).