No surprise: Miguel Cabrera and Andrew McCutchen win MVPs

I don't have any brilliant analysis to offer about this year's MVP awards, but since we've been talking about postseason honors on this blog this week, I should probably note that Detroit third baseman Miguel Cabrera and Pittsburgh center fielder Andrew McCutchen have been named the MVPs of their respective leagues.

Neither vote was a surprise. Cabrera led the American League in batting average (.348), on-base percentage (.442) and slugging percentage (.636). He ranked second in home runs (44) and RBIs (137) behind Chris Davis of Baltimore.

Cabrera got 23 of the 30 first-place votes and finished comfortably ahead of Los Angeles outfielder Mike Trout. Davis took third in the balloting.

McCutchen won in a landslide, picking up 28 of the first-place votes in the National League. He batted .317 with 21 home runs, 84 RBIs and 27 stolen bases. He also played an excellent center field in leading Pittsburgh to its first winning season and first playoff appearance since 1992.

Arizona's Paul Goldschmidt finished second, while St. Louis catcher Yadier Molina took third.

So, trading for Max Scherzer worked out well for the Tigers

I often say it's hard to make snap judgments when a trade is made. You often need three or four years before you can decide whether a particular deal is good or bad for the parties involved.

It's now been four years since the Detroit Tigers acquired right-hander Max Scherzer as part of a three-team deal with the New York Yankees and the Arizona Diamondbacks.

Arizona gave up Scherzer in that trade, and I'll bet that's a move they still lament to this day. On Wednesday, Scherzer was named the Cy Young Award winner in the American League by a landslide. He received 28 of the 30 first-place votes.

Scherzer, the lone 20-game winner in baseball this year, finished the season 21-3 with a 2.90 ERA for the AL Central champion Tigers. He easily outdistanced second-place finisher Yu Darvish in the voting.

Let's go back and look at that trade from December of 2009.

The Tigers traded pitcher Edwin Jackson and outfielder Curtis Granderson and received Scherzer, outfielder Austin Jackson and relief pitchers Phil Coke and Daniel Schlereth.

The Yankees dealt pitcher Ian Kennedy, Coke and Austin Jackson and acquired Granderson.

The Diamondbacks gave up Scherzer and Schlereth and got Edwin Jackson and Kennedy.

If you're an Arizona fan, are you gagging yet?

Edwin Jackson had a brutal year for the Diamondbacks in 2010. He's played for three teams since. Currently, he's the Cubs' problem. Kennedy did have a couple good years in Arizona, including one very good year in 2011, but he's since fallen on hard times. The Diamondbacks traded him to San Diego for spare parts and future considerations in a midseason deal this past summer.

Likewise, the Yankees got a couple good years out of Granderson, but he had an injury-plagued 2013. He's a free agent this offseason and is likely headed elsewhere.

Meanwhile, the Tigers got a legitimate top-of-the-rotation starter in Scherzer and a leadoff hitter and top-notch center fielder in Austin Jackson.

Shrewd move by Detroit. The Tigers have made more good moves than bad over the last five years, and that's why they go to the playoffs every season.

Kershaw wins NL Cy Young

The National League Cy Young Award voting was also one-sided. Los Angeles Dodgers left-hander Clayton Kershaw was a slam-dunk choice, earning 29 of 30 first-place votes.

Kershaw finished 16-9 for the NL West champions, and his 1.83 ERA was the best mark by any qualifying pitcher in the last 13 years.

Rick Hahn: Door is open for Paul Konerko to return to White Sox

White Sox general manager Rick Hahn and manager Robin Ventura visited with free agent first baseman Paul Konerko last week at Konerko's Arizona home, according to media reports.

Hahn says he told Konerko the door is open for him to return to the Sox in a reduced role for 2014, despite the team's decision to sign first baseman Jose Abreu.

“We had a real good open and honest conversation about where his mind is at and his hopes for going forward, and a good talk about the club and our hopes for moving forward,” Hahn said. “At this time, he’s still going through his process of deliberating about what he wants to do next year.”

Konerko has offered no timetable on his decision, but I suspect we'll know within the next month whether he intends to play next year.

I would be surprised if we see Konerko back with the Sox. Resigning him would create a logjam of first baseman/designated hitter types. Are there enough at-bats to go around for Abreu, Konerko and Adam Dunn? I don't believe so, and Abreu and Dunn are already under contract for next season. The Sox aren't paying Abreu $68 million to start the season in the minors. He's going to be on the club. Dunn is going to be on the club, too, unless Hahn can find a taker for his $15 million salary. Unlikely. So where does that leave Konerko? Probably elsewhere or retired.

In this day and age where clubs carry 12 pitchers, it's really hard to go into a season with three 1B/DH types. You only have four position players on the bench, and you'd really like to have some speed and versatility there. Neither Konerko nor Dunn provide you with those things. In my mind, it's impossible to justify keeping both of them around when neither of them is going to play every day.

For now, we are in a holding pattern.Will Konerko take a reduced role with the Sox? Will another team offer him a full-time job at first base? Will he just retire? We'll see.

Four 'untouchables'

In other news, rival executives say Hahn is willing to trade anyone except these four players: Chris Sale, Jose Quintana, Abreu and Avisail Garcia.

I agree with three of the four, but I'm a little surprised to see Quintana's name on that list. Not that I don't like Quintana. He's a tough kid, a good competitor, an above-average pitcher in the American League. As an added bonus, he's left-handed. I'm just not sure his skill set ascends him to the level of "untouchable," especially since the Sox have so many other holes to fill.

I would never trade Sale, because I think he's a special talent that only comes along every so often. As effective as Quintana is, he's not in that class. If Hahn could fill two or three other holes by trading Quintana, wouldn't he have to consider that?

Rookies of the Year; Cubs radio booth; and Joe Mauer

The announcement of the Rookies of the Year on Monday proved to be anticlimatic. The two favorites won easily: Tampa Bay outfielder Wil Myers and Miami pitcher Jose Fernandez.

Myers, 22, hit .293 with 13 home runs and 53 RBIs in just 88 games after being called up from the minors June 18. His middle-of-the-order presence was key to Tampa Bay's surge to the playoffs. His selection as Rookie of the Year was a no-brainer, since the rest of the AL crop was weak.

Myers got 23 of the 30 first-place votes, easily outdistancing Detroit infielder Jose Iglesias, who got five first-place votes. Tampa Bay pitcher Chris Archer and Oakland pitcher Dan Straily each earned one first-place vote.

I thought the NL voting would be a little tighter, just because of the hype surrounding Yasiel Puig. The outfielder plays in a major media market and was widely credited with turning around the Los Angeles Dodgers' season, but in the end, substance won out over style.

The year Fernandez put together was too good to ignore. He earned 26 of the 30 first-place votes, while Puig got the other four. Fernandez is also a finalist for the NL Cy Young award, as well he should be. The 20-year-old went 12-6 with a 2.19 ERA and recorded 187 strikeouts. Those are gaudy numbers for anybody, but it's especially impressive when you consider Fernandez pitched for the 62-100 Marlins.

I was wondering if Fernandez would be forgotten by some writers because he toils in relative obscurity on a bad team. He was not forgotten. Unlike Puig, he was in the majors the whole season and excelled the entire year. Accordingly, he is more deserving of the award.

Former players vie for opening in Cubs radio booth

I saw an entry on Robert Feder's blog on Monday that the Cubs have pared their list for the analyst job in their radio booth. The position is open after Keith Moreland resigned to spend more time with his family.

As you might expect, many of the candidates are former Cubs players: Rick Sutcliffe, Kerry Wood, Todd Hollandsworth, Mark DeRosa, Ryan Theriot, Eric Karros, Doug Glanville and Dave Otto.

Feder reports former WGN broadcaster Andy Masur is also on the list, but I would think he would be more of a candidate if they were looking for a play-by-play guy. My guess is one of the former players gets the gig.

If they pick Sutcliffe, I will probably vow to never tune into a Cubs radio broadcast again. I can't stand Sutcliffe on ESPN. He never shuts up. Baseball is a sport where you have to let the game breathe a little bit, you know?

If it were my call, Hollandsworth, Karros and Glanville would be the finalists. 

Joe Mauer permanently moves to first base

I read an article the other day that said Minnesota Twins catcher Joe Mauer is making a permanent move to first base.

Thank goodness.

Whoever the Twins put behind the plate next year will probably make about 75 percent fewer trips to the mound than Mauer, whose propensity for conferencing with the crappy Minnesota pitching staff is enough to make a sane man brain himself. 

Cubs name Rick Renteria manager

The painstaking five-week search is over. The Cubs have named former San Diego Padres bench coach Rick Renteria manager.

Renteria, 51, reportedly agreed to a three-year contract with club options for 2017 and 2018. Terms have not been disclosed.

Did the Cubs get their man?

Well, to hear Sun-Times reporter Gordon Wittenmyer tell it, Renteria was "by all accounts" the Cubs' first choice all along. Hmm.

Who is making these accounts? Wittenmyer? Cubs front office people who are trying to frame this hire in the best possible way? Steve Rosenbloom from the Tribune had a little different take on the whole thing, and I'd probably fall more in line with his opinion than Wittenmyer's.

About a month ago, Wittenmyer and everybody else who covers the Cubs reported that the team was talking with New York Yankees manager Joe Girardi "through back channels," and that Cubs brass was "poised to make an offer." That leads me to believe Girardi was the first choice, as well he should have been. The Cubs went for the home run hire and missed. It happens. But it doesn't make any sense to backtrack now and say Renteria is the guy they wanted all along. If that were the case, the Cubs could have made this hire a couple days after they fired Dale Sveum or at any other time over the last month.

Instead, they pursued Girardi. That didn't work out. The Cubs also interviewed Brad Ausmus, who ended up taking the Detroit job amid local speculation that the Tigers wanted to move quickly to prevent Ausmus from going to the Cubs. There's also strong evidence the Cubs waited until the World Series was over in hopes of interviewing Boston Red Sox bench coach Torey Lovullo. That request was denied by the Red Sox front office, which is still unhappy about the way Cubs president Theo Epstein left the Boston organization.

So, at best, Renteria was the Cubs' second choice. He might have been no higher than their fourth choice. All that said, this doesn't mean he is incapable of doing the job. I think experience is overrated when it comes to managers. Sure, you'd like to have a manager with experience, but it's not necessarily mandatory for success. Other guys who have never managed before have had success in their first job. Just look at St. Louis manager Mike Matheny, who has guided the Cardinals to two playoff appearances and one National League pennant in his first two years on the job.

Of course, Matheny has a number of good players on his roster. Renteria, in contrast, takes over a team with a losing clubhouse culture, with few established major league players, and with no real hope of contending in 2014. And that's really the issue at hand. It doesn't matter whether Renteria was the Cubs' first choice or their 10th choice. It doesn't matter how much experience he has, or what his reputation in the game is. Players win and lose games, and the Cubs simply have too few good players for anyone to reasonably expect Renteria to thrive in his new position.

Like Sveum before him, Renteria appears set up to fail.

White Sox decline to make qualifying offers to Paul Konerko, Gavin Floyd

The White Sox on Monday declined to give qualifying contract offers to first baseman Paul Konerko and pitcher Gavin Floyd.

I was a little bit surprised to see the story splashed across the top of the Chicago Tribune sports section on Monday morning. I think the decision on this was pretty obvious. It really wasn't big news.

Qualifying offers are for one year and $14.1 million. Why $14.1 million, you ask? Well, that's the average of the highest 125 contracts in baseball. That's how they arrive at that figure, and obviously, neither Konerko nor Floyd is worth that kind of money at this stage of their respective careers.

Konerko, 37, is mulling retirement after a lackluster 2013 campaign in which he batted just .244 with a career-low 12 home runs and 54 RBIs.

Floyd, 30, is recovering from Tommy John surgery after going 0-4 with a 5.18 ERA in just five starts in 2013. It has been assumed for months that Floyd has thrown his last pitch in a Sox uniform.

Both players are free agents and are now able to sign with any team. If they do, the White Sox will not receive draft pick compensation as the result of their decision not to extend a qualifying offer.

White Sox to season ticket holders: 2013 season 'simply unacceptable'

I received my White Sox season ticket renewal notice in the mail on Thursday. Prices for next year are the same as they were this year. They better be, given the woeful 99-loss performance the Sox had in 2013.

The first couple paragraphs of the letter enclosed, written by Senior Vice President for Sales and Marketing Brooks Boyer, were interesting. They read as follows:

Dear White Sox Season Ticket Holder,

Thank you for your support of our team despite what was a very trying baseball season. Your passion is what drives our organization and any success we have is only because of your continued loyalty.

We want you to know we share your frustration and disappointment regarding the 2013 season, but everyone with the White Sox is confident we will be competitive again, and soon. We are going to be better. No one in the front office is willing to sit through another season like the past one. That is simply unacceptable to all of us, and I am sure, to you.

Indeed, it was simply unacceptable. I'm still renewing my tickets for 2014, and I do expect much better from the White Sox next season. The team that was put on the field this summer was embarrassing, not much better than Triple-A quality. Major changes are needed this offseason, and hopefully the signing of international free agent Jose Abreu is just the start.

It's worth noting that Boyer is not the GM. He's the marketing guy, so his words are not necessarily a foreshadowing of significant moves on the baseball side. However, you would like to think Boyer has some inside information about the direction the organization will be taking this offseason. Would he have written what he did if the club didn't plan on being active this winter?

As a season ticket holder, I'm going to take it as a positive sign they didn't send me a letter asking for patience. They don't seem like they are getting ready to undertake a lengthy rebuilding. Instead, they are boldly telling their best customers, "We are going to be better."

Good. That means they can't stand pat this offseason. To be better, change is necessary.. I'm anxious to see what general manager Rick Hahn has in store for us.