I’m popping open the virtual champagne this afternoon, as word has come forth from on high that four more Internet writers have been added to the ranks of the BBWAA. (Maybe now that they’re starting to embrace the Interwebs, they can fix their hideous website.) The newbs are ESPN’s Keith Law and Rob Neyer, who were unaccountably snubbed last year, and Will Carroll and Christina Kahrl of Baseball Prospectus. This last has been in an especially bright spirits because she’s one of my faves and, hey, she’s a chick! I think that makes…what, six or seven? You go, extreme minority of girls! I think, if I squint, I can see a tiny speck on the horizon that might just be a future where I don’t feel morally obligated to rip everything the BBWAA does.

Somewhere, Murray Chass is gnashing his teeth and no doubt making an angry phone call.

On Monday, we wrote a post upon noticing that Edinson Volquez finished fourth in NL Rookie of the Year voting despite the fact that he’s not a rookie. And we challenged our readers to “out” those three BBWAA members who didn’t bother to actually inform themselves of this fact.

But before anyone could report back, Keith Law has figured it out over at his personal blog (which, if you like to read novels and/or cook, is a very good place to go).

The three voters who included Volquez were Jeremy Cothran of the Newark Star-Ledger, John Klima of the Los Angeles Daily News, and Jay Paris of the North County Times in San Diego.

So there you go, fair readers.

Clearly, members of the Baseball Writers Association of America do not read UmpBump.

If they did, they would know that EDINSON VOLQUEZ IS NOT A FREAKING ROOKIE.

And yet, Volquez finished 4th in the National League Rookie of the Year voting.

Right.

And it’s the bloggers who don’t know what they’re talking about? We’re the uninformed?

By the way, if any of can find out who the three writers were who gave Volquez those 2nd place votes, please name them in the comments section.

I’m all for recognizing true defensive excellence in baseball. Far too often, we the fans ignore the runs that were prevented in favor of runs that were scored. Which is why I felt that Tampa Bay’s acquisition of Jason Bartlett from the Minnesota Twins back in November was a pretty good one. Not only were they able to get Matt Garza as well in that trade that sent Delmon Young to Minnesota, but Bartlett was a pretty good defensive shortstop in 2007. His 67 Out of Zone plays was good enough for fourth in MLB among shortstops, which helped make up some for his below average Revised Zone Rating (.804).

But this is 2008, and Bartlett hasn’t been as good this year. His RZR has remained consistent (.808), but even with the 100 fewer innings in the field, his OOZ is just 44, a 35% decrease. His Range Factor is also down from 4.67 last year to 4.22. And with an Adjusted OPS of 83, I really don’t think that he’s helping the team all that much.

So you can imagine my surprise to see that the Tampa Bay chapter of the Baseball Writers Association of America has voted Bartlett as the team MVP this season. Cue the confusion.

While it’s true that he’s still an improvement defensively over Brendan Harris who manned the position last year (which really isn’t saying much, by the way), it’s difficult to understand the logic here. What Bartlett has over Harris with the glove is canceled out by his deficiency with the bat. Harris had 13 Win Shares in 2007. Bartlett has 10 so far this year.

I do think that the BBWAA is on the right track in crediting the Rays’ W-L improvement over the past year to their defense. But I give just as much credit, if not more, to rookie third baseman Evan Longoria’s work at the hot corner. And BJ Upton’s markedly improved performance in center field deserves commending as well. And you know what? Longoria and Upton’s offensive contributions blow Bartlett’s out of those warm Tampa waters (full disclosure – I have no idea if Tampa’s waters are warm. I digress). It’s not even close.

I understand the tendency to point to free agent signings or trades rather than internal moves when we see vast improvements in a team’s performance. We look for what that “missing piece” was for success. And Bartlett fits the bill, I suppose, in that sense. But in the case of the Tampa Bay Rays, it was more Upton gaining experience and the performance of Longoria that we ought to be crediting.

So I was doing some research for this week’s Boston Metro column, and I googled “Baseball Writers’ Association of America” just to do some fact checking. I had never actually been to the website of the BBWAA before. Looking at their homepage, I got the feeling I wasn’t alone:

Holy old-school frijoles! That is some quality mid-90’s web design right there. Anyone else feels like this explains a lot?