Cleveland Indians: Baseball Needs to Revise the Gold Glove Eligibility Requirements

The Indians best chance for a Gold Glove wasn’t even eligible

The Rawlings Gold Glove Awards were announced Tuesday night and no members of the Cleveland Indians took home any hardware. This is no surprise as there were zero Indians’ players that were even finalists for a Gold Glove award.  That’s right, not even Francisco Lindor was a Gold Glove finalist this year. How could this have been after the season he had at shortstop?

Well, for starters, he was not even eligible to be considered for the award. Back in 2011, the rules of eligibility of the Gold Gloves was changed, with one of the bigger changes being a minimum requirement of time spent at a position a player must have to be eligible to win a Gold Glove.  While I do agree some kind of minimum playing time requirement is a good idea, I fully believe the rules need overhauled yet again…

Current Qualification Requirements Per Rawlings

According to Rawlings (who hands out the Gold Glove Awards), to be eligible for a particular position, a player must have played a minimum number of games or innings at that innings, which are as follows:

• All pitchers must have pitched in at least 137 innings by his team’s 137th game;
• A catcher must have played in at least half of his team’s games by his team’s 137th game (a minimum of 69 games);
• All infielders and outfielders must have played in the field for at least 690 total innings through his team’s 137th game: this equates to playing in the field for approximately 7.5 innings per game in approximately 67% of his team’s games by his team’s 137th game; this ensures that only full-time players are considered);
• All infielders and outfielders with at least 690 total innings played qualify at the specific position where he played the most innings (i.e. where his manager utilized him the most)

Now, maybe it’s just me but there are a few things here that I just don’t understand at all. What I do understand is baseball wanting the Gold Glove awards to go to “full-time” players. It was a joke when Rafael Palmeiro won the Gold Glove at first base in a season he only played 28 games at the position. And while utility infielders can be great defensive players, this keeps people from arguing that a John McDonald or Clint Barmes type should get the award.

However, what I do not understand is why the inning requirement is based on a team’s first 137 games. Why are the first 137 games more important than games 138 to 162?  Essentially what this is saying is that games in September mean LESS in regards to winning a Gold Glove than games in April, May, June, July, or August, which to me is very perplexing. 137 games put most teams around September 8^th this year, yet there were still four weeks left in the season at that point, so why make cut-off then? 

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Yes, you do a lot get September call-ups the last month of the season, but I’m not sure how that factors into a Gold Glove award. Is Rawlings suggesting that it’s easier to make great plays in September when minor leaguers are called up and possibly playing?  I sure hope not because that makes no sense. However, if that’s not what’s being suggested here, then exactly what is? I can’t imagine Rawlings decided it needed those extra four weeks to collect votes. The US postal service may not be firing on all cylinders these days, but I’m pretty sure they can deliver votes in the mail quicker than four weeks…

In any case, as noted by Jordan Bastian, Lindor came up just short this year in qualifying for Gold Glove consideration…

"Lindor, who was promoted to Cleveland on June 14, logged 655 1/3 innings through the Indians’ 137th game, falling 34 2/3 innings short of Gold Glove eligibility."

So Lindor finished less than four games short of qualifying for the Gold Glove.  That’s hard to swallow, especially when you consider that at the end of the season, Lindor finished with the 12^th most innings at shortstop in the American League (just behind fellow rookie Carlos Correa, who was also ineligible for the Gold Glove award).  If you ask anyone, be it a casual Cleveland Indians’ fan or a baseball insider paid to follow the sport, who the Tribe’s full-time shortstop was in 2015 I guarantee the answer you’d get 99 time out of 100 would be Lindor.

Bottom line, there was no good reason for Lindor to not be eligible for the Gold Glove this year, and the “137^th game” requirement needs to be amended.

The Cespedes Argument

For Yoenis Cespedes, he “first 137 games” rule came into effect this year in the opposite way as it did with Lindor.  Cespedes began 2015 with the Detroit Tigers as their starting leftfielder, and he played extremely well, particularly on defense.  In 99 game in left field for the Tigers, Cespedes posted a +11 DRS (Defensive Runs Saved) and +15 UZR (Ultimate Zone Rating).  Both his DRS and UZR ranked first in the American League among leftfielders, this despite him switching leagues midseason upon his July 31^st trade to the New York Mets.

Cespedes was still eligible for the American League Gold Glove in left field since he played 865.2 innings in left field for the Tigers in 2015, which is more than the 690 required through the team’s first 137 games.  Not only was Cespedes deemed eligible for the American League Gold Glove in LF, he won it.  This despite spending the final two months of the season in the National League.  Think about that for a minute now…

Cespedes spent only four months in the American League. He played in 865.2 innings in left field…and won the Gold Glove.  Francisco Lindor played the final four months of the season in the American League and played in 865.1 innings at shortstop…but was “ineligible” for a Gold Glove.  You read that right, Yeonis Cespedes played exactly one third of an inning more in left field for the Detroit Tigers than Francisco Lindor played at shortstop for the Cleveland Indians.  One won a Gold Glove, the other was not even eligible to be considered for the award.

An Easy Fix Can Be Done

I have no issue with Cespedes winning the American League Gold Glove in left field to be honest.  He started over 60% of the Tigers’ games in leftfield (99 of 162) and was really the best defender in leftfield this year among American League players.  Sure some guys played more innings there but what Cespedes did in his time arguably made up for that missed time.  But shouldn’t the same line of thinking apply to Lindor?  He too started in over 60% of his team’s games at his position (97 of 161), and he, like Cespedes, was the best at his position at preventing runs in 2015, despite missing two months of the season.

The simple fix for the Gold Glove awards is to keep the rules the same but instead of going off the first 137 games, go off the entire seasons (162 games). What does this do for the inning requirement?  For infielders and outfielders the following happens:

"All infielders and outfielders must have played in the field for at least 810 total innings of his team’s 162 games: this equates to playing in the field for approximately 7.5 innings per game in approximately 67% of his team’s games (comes out to 108 games).Next: Indians Twitter account trolls its own fans"

Maybe it’s just me, but this seems to make way more sense than going off the first 137.  It allows young players like Lindor and Correa to be eligible along with players like Cespedes who were dealt to a new league midseason.  Baseball and Rawlings can make things easier too and just call it an even 800 innings in the infield/outfield to qualify for the Gold Gloves. For catchers it’s still simple, play in 82 games (one more than half the season) instead of the current 69 games by the team’s 137^th game. For pitchers, have them pitching 162 innings on the year (one for each game).  It really just seems so simple and logical…

So what do you think, am I missing some key reason why the “137 game” rule makes sense and should stick around? Or are you in agreement with me that the award requirements should be amended? Let us know in the comments section below.