Posted by Bill Baer on Monday, July 20, 2009 at 3:23 pm

The 2009 Rookie of the Year campaigns are interesting because, unlike last year, there are very few players who have come out and grabbed your attention as Evan Longoria did last year. Catcher Matt Wieters of the Baltimore Orioles had a lot of hype, but hasn’t come out hitting Major League pitching as well as everyone hoped. Some candidates have come from seemingly nowhere — Jason Jaramillo (a catcher the Phillies traded for another catcher), is a good example.

Despite the lack of big name prospects making their names heard around Major League Baseball, the RoY races promise to be exciting and entertaining as Dexter Fowler runs his way to 40 stolen bases, Colby Rasmus slugs his way to 25 HR, and J.A. Happ pitches his way to 15 wins. Let’s take a look at some players likely to contend for the award in both leagues.

First, let’s make sure we understand the qualifications. MLB.com says:

The qualifications for rookie status are simple: A player must not have had 130 career at-bats, pitched 50 innings, or spent 45 days (excluding September) on an MLB roster.

The cut-offs I used for rookie hitters were 1) at least 150 PA and 2) OPS of .700 or greater. For rookie starting pitchers, the cut-offs were 1) at least 70 IP and 2) ERA of 4.50 or lower. For rookie relief pitchers, the cut-offs were 1) at least 35 IP and 2) ERA of 3.50 or lower.

Glossary: Wins Above Replacement (WAR); Batting Runs (BR); Fielding Runs (FR); Earned Run Average (ERA); Fielding Independent Pitching (FIP).

National League Hitting

The Cardinals’ Colby Rasmus and the Reds’ Chris Dickerson are the only players who are above average both offensively and in the field. Rasmus is far and away the favorite, at least offensively.

National League Starting Pitching

Kenshin Kawakami’s pitching performance is most closely aligned with what we’d expect based on factors he can control (strikeouts, walks, home runs), while J.A. Happ has enjoyed much more success than we would expect.

Due to the fact that Happ plays on a winning team that just so happens to be the defending World Series champions, he will get a lot more notoriety for pitching well than Wells or Kawakami as both play on mediocre teams unlikely to reach the post-season. However, it will take a sterling pitching season to yank the Rookie of the Year award from Colby Rasmus.

National League Relief Pitching

The rookie relievers in the NL highlighted above are interesting, but don’t receive much coverage because they’re not pitching the ninth innings for their respective teams. However, most of them are outperforming their FIP by far, so we should expect some regression as the season grows older. The Dodgers’ Ronald Belisario has been particularly impressive and his FIP doesn’t scream “fluke”.

American League Hitting

Getz has a .698 currently, but I included him just so the American League didn’t look so barren in terms of rookie hitters. He is at 2.8 WAR, tied with Rasmus in the NL. Getz gets more than nine runs for replacement level and more than one run for positional adjustment, so it’s roughly a full win based on his league and position. Reimold, on the other hand, only gets 6.8 replacement level runs and has 2.6 runs taken away because he plays left field.

American League Starting Pitching

Brad Bergesen and Brett Anderson have been pitching the best so far according to FIP, as both are at 4.23. Anderson has caught fire recently while Bergesen has been Mr. Consistent with 11 quality starts (at least 6 IP, no more than 3 ER) in 17 total starts.

Despite the FIP, the Blue Jays’ Ricky Romero has to be included in the Rookie of the Year talk as well. Romero’s Achilles heel recently has been his inability to find the strike zone. After walking just ten batters in more than 34 innings (2.64 BB/9) in June, he’s walked 15 in nearly 27 innings (5.00 BB/9) in July.

American League Relief Pitching

The Athletics’ Andrew Bailey is an interesting piece in the RoY race. The last relief pitcher to win the award was Huston Street — then an Athletic as well — back in 2005. Simply put, Bailey is having an incredible season especially considering he wasn’t the team’s first option to close out games.

Aceves of the Yankees has been enjoying success as well, but that FIP makes you think things are going to start catching up with him.

The Favorites

It’s important to note the difference between the most deserving and the most likely to win. The Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA) is a group comprised of fallible, biased human beings (like everyone else) who place value on different criteria. Last year, Edinson Volquez was given three second-place votes for the NL RoY award despite the fact that he was not rookie-eligible. Mistakes can be made.

So, I’m going to list the most deserving players as well as the players I think are most likely to win the award.

Most Deserving

• AL: Nolan Reimold, LF, Baltimore Orioles (2nd place: Brett Gardner)
• NL: Colby Rasmus, CF, St. Louis Cardinals (2nd place: Randy Wells)

Most Likely to Win

• AL: Ricky Romero, SP, Toronto Blue Jays (2nd place: Andrew Bailey)
• NL: J.A. Happ, SP, Philadelphia Phillies (2nd place: Colby Rasmus)