Melky Cabrera DQ's himself from batting title

Which is exactly why it is the wrong thing to do.

Cran says it would be an unfair result if Cabrera wins the batting title? Great. Prove to me that nobody else is cheating and I"ll buy that. Changing the rules in the middle of a contest makes them a farce. It was one of the few things baseball did better than the NFL, but now that goes out the window, too.

 

It's not an exception, it's a rule. Moreover, Melky Cabrera is the one overruling it. Statistics are pure and irrefutable. They are based on measurable quantities and agreed-upon rules. This undermines that.

 

"agreed-upon rules" opens the window in your argument there.

 

It's a written exception to the rule that you must have 3.1 PA's per team game played to qualify for the batting title. It was, presumably, written to protect players who lose time due to injury. Or get called up from the minors late in the season, like Trout, theoretically. The argument would proceed that it is absurd to think that the writers of the rule intended for it to cover players who lose time due to suspension. Therefore, they are not among those covered by it. This is not necessarily the opinion I would come to. But I like it better than a retroactive, overt midstream amendment of what is written. I'm more comfortable with my reasoning.

 

Statistics are pure and irrefutable; rules are not.

 

Except that it is a retroactive, overt midstream amendment of what is written and it opens the door for more, which could make a very big mess of things.

Even if nobody ever tries to exploit that, MLB got it very wrong this time. Unless the Giants have a game rained out or somebody somehow manages to pass Cabrera, baseball is going to have an "official" batting champion and a real one in the National League this year and that sucks.

 

Not my way.

 

This is really an outgrowth of the Joint Drug Agreement provisions, which have been opened and reopened as necessary in recent years. I see it as an oversight corrected. I'm pretty sure it will be taken up in the off-season and probably permanently adopted going forward.

 

You know what would be great? If someone got suspended for, say, charging the mound and that's how they lost their PA's. Does the carve-out only apply to drug suspensions? Or all suspensions?

 

2012 MLB NL BA

1) vacated .346

2) Andrew McCutchen PIT .336

 

Just drug suspensions, per the press release.

 

Pretty much. What a farce.