Advertisement

Gregg Zaun draws ire of Blue Jays fans for saying something that is accurate

Ian Denomme
Gregg Zaun draws ire of Blue Jays fans for saying something that is accurate

Former journeyman-catcher-turned-analyst Gregg Zaun likes to stir the pot from time to time. In his role as the in-studio analyst for Toronto Blue Jays games on Sportsnet, Zaun has taken on a Don Cherry-like TV personality and doesn’t shy away from hot takes.

This week he has drawn the ire of Blue Jays fans for his latest scorching take – Mike Trout should be the American League most valuable player, not Josh Donaldson.

The nerve!

While there are still six weeks left in the season and much baseball to be played, it’s not an outlandish claim. The majority of baseball observers might agree with Zaun, but the problem is he said it to a record-setting television audience of suddenly-rabid Blue Jays fans, on a network that is owned by the same company that owns the team. So naturally, cue the outrage from fans:

That’s just a small sample of the vitriol sent Zaun’s way this week. He even appeared on another Sportnet radio show on Wednesday to defend himself. It’s a situation certainly not unique to Blue Jays fans, but when your team is rolling, and casual fans hop aboard the bandwagon, your guys are always the best. Certainly, Donaldson is having a career year and is a worthy MVP candidate and frontrunner, and Zaun did go out of his way to go against the grain.

Thing is, he’s right. It’s certainly not a foregone conclusion, but at this point Trout is the favorite. By almost any metric, traditional or advanced, Trout is having a slightly superior season thus far. Here are the particulars, as of Thursday morning:

 

AVG

OBP

SLG

HR

RBI

R

bWAR

fWAR

Donaldson

.293

.362

.570

33

91

89

6.7

6.6

Trout

.295

.392

.585

33

71

79

7.1

6.7

There’s certainly not a lot separating the two, but as Zaun also said, defense has to be taken into consideration and Trout plays a premium position, centerfield, with aplomb. Though, Donaldson is no slouch at third base.

“But, RBIs!” Blue Jays fans have screamed. Another former Blue Jays player and Sportsnet analyst, Dirk Hayhurst, shot down the RBI argument in a blogpost of his own going to bat for Trout.

“Imagine if Trout were a Jay right now. How much more of a beast would he be? And if Donaldson were an Angel, would he be statistically better or worse?

RBI’s and runs scored are byproducts of your team, so you can’t use them to weight a player’s MVP ranking. Instead, you can compare what the respective players have done in their chances to drive runs in, not how many they’ve actually driven in as that number can tell a very different story.”

To that end, Trout is batting .352 with and .515 on-base percentage with runners in scoring position this season. Donaldson is very close behind at .350 and .445, but the kicker is Donaldson has had 29 more at-bats with runners in scoring position than Trout.

As the old baseball cliché goes, there’s still lots of baseball left to be played. Both the Blue Jays and Angels have 40 games to go this season, so it’s too early to really have an MVP debate regardless.

Blue Jays fans may want to lay off Zaun and just enjoy their first playoff race in 22 years. The playoff push continues on Friday against none other than the Angels.

More MLB coverage from Yahoo Sports:

Ian Denomme is an editor and writer for Yahoo Sports. Email him at denomme@yahoo-inc.com or follow him on Twitter.