Who is your Orioles MVP this year?

[hoosiers]

Lots of guys have stepped up and performed above average to well above average.

I think Jones and Wieters have very strong cases as would a healthy Markakis. Johnson has been stellar.

I know this guy has missed a lot of time, but IMO the one guy who made me think we can win this year early in the season was Jason Hammel. He made the starting pitching work by leading it as by far the best starter. I don't know if I would cast my vote with him (I would probably lean toward Adam Jones), but more than any other player Hammel emerged as a true difference maker that was going to enable this team to win a lot more games than expected.

[Todd-O]

This is a really tough question for me. This team really has new guys stepping up every night.

I love what Adam Jones has brought to the table... and what an awesome start to the season he had (and he has been strong all season).

I think at this point, though, I'd have to go Johnson. Over the past 3 or 4 years the O's have had a terrible time closing out games. With the number of extra inning and 1-run wins the O's have had this year, Johnson has been a HUGE factor in making sure those games end with a W.

With that in mind, Jim Johnson is my MVP.

[Rene88]

Adam Jones, and to me it isn't even close. The true leader this team has needed for the past decade and a half. Go O's!

[section18]

Three way tie in the voting with Wieters, Johnson and Jones sharing it. Nick made things really interesting before getting hurt and he would have votes as well. Rig the vote like the Academy Awards and Grammys and give all three a trophy. Win! Win!

[El Gordo]

Adam Jones is the media spokesman MVP and Wieters is the real MVP.

[Frobby]

Adam Jones, and to me it isn't even close. The true leader this team has needed for the past decade and a half. Go O's!

Adam Jones is the media spokesman MVP and Wieters is the real MVP.

I think Adam Jones is a good guy in the clubhouse, and likes having a leadership role, but he is far from the only leader on the team.

On the field, Adam has had a very good season. Both fWAR and rWAR would say he's been the most valuable player on the team. But, there are a lot of things a catcher does that are not measured by WAR stats.

I don't think the Orioles would be where they are without both of them. Those two and Hardy have been the backbone of the team -- just as Dan Duquette said in his opening press conference and about a hundred times last winter. Markakis was a huge key too, when he was healthy.

[Brendan25]

It has to be between Jones and Wieters right now, and I would almost make it co-MVP's this year. They are both so critical to this team.

[BMann]

It has to be between Jones and Wieters right now, and I would almost make it co-MVP's this year. They are both so critical to this team.

Agreed. My vote (as of 9/22) would look like this:

1a) Adam Jones

1b) Matt Wieters

3) Jim Johnson

[backwardsk]

#10 if you're scoring at home.

[George Zuverink]

Dempsey was a lot closer then most people think. Even including his decline years he ended up with a 40% CS rate.

Edit- Baseball reference has him 70th all time in dWAR with 17.3.

I was wondering if someone was going to call me on that. Dempsey was an outstanding catcher. Frobby pointed out that the league CS% was higher during Rick's career. As it turns out, both Weiters and Dempsey were/have been 5% above league average. Purely on that basis, the best we've had was Gus Triandos, who was 47% versus a league average of 41%. There are two things that tip the scale for Matt in my mind. He is dealing with a much greener, less stable pitching staff than Rick did. I have never seen anyone better at blocking home than Weiters. If Ibanez had run into Weiters the way he ran into Norris today against the A's, Girardi would be picking up his pieces with tweezers.

[Can_of_corn]

You can't hold the veteran nature of the staffs then against Dempsey.

I think Dempsey's numbers with the O's are close enough to what Wieters has done. I will say that Wieters' defensive play last season was at another level but he has failed to sustain that level of play this season.

[better]

Jason Hammel. His ace worthy performance even made this race possible. There were definitely times in this season, where this team could have collapsed, but the starters (especially Hammel and Chen) held their own and enabled the bullpen's success in the first place.

[waroriole]

If I had to pick today, I'd say Adam Jones.

Ask me tomorrow and I could say Wieters or JJ or Chen.

[Abadie]

I'm going to pick 3 guys):

1a) Darren O'Day

1b) Adam Jones

1c) Jim Johnson

[George Zuverink]

You can't hold the veteran nature of the staffs then against Dempsey.

I think Dempsey's numbers with the O's are close enough to what Wieters has done. I will say that Wieters' defensive play last season was at another level but he has failed to sustain that level of play this season.

Perhaps a "degree of difficulty" criteria isn't fair in comparing two outstanding players. It's not like gymanstics or iceskating, where the athletes decide whether to perform a certain skill based on its point value and their level of mastery. Both Weiters and Dempsey played the hand dealt to them and both did it well.

In saying I believe Weiters stands a small notch above Dempsey in the pantheon of O's catchers, I asked myself a question. Going into extra innings in Boston in a game we must have to make the playoffs, putting hitting aside, who would I rather have catching? I would feel lucky to have either, but choose Matt if I could.

I haven't seen enough games to have an informed opinion to compare Matt's performance this year to last.His CS% is down 2% from last year, but further above the league average, both of which could just be sample size issues. The pitching results are better and I seem to read more comments about "he called a great game," but, of course, that would happen when the results are better. (Who hears a pitcher say, "Matt called a great game, but I threw like crap"?) I do have to say that the Wieters OH GIF factor seems lower, fewer clips of Matt gunning down or stonewalling runners.