Dustin Pedroia Should Win 2014 AL Second Base Gold Glove

By Justin Patrick @calling_allfans on October 31, 2014

Second baseman Dustin Pedroia of the Boston Red Sox should win the AL Gold Glove for second basemen for the 2014 season. The other finalists are Ian Kinsler (Detroit Tigers) and Robinson Cano (Seattle Mariners). The award winners will be announced on Tuesday Nov. 4, and Pedroid should be the clear favorite to win for the second basemen.

Far too often, Gold Glove winners receive the award because of name recognition or their performance at the plate. To people who follow baseball, Pedroia is certainly recognizable and he can produce at the plate, but Gold Glove awards should purely be about defense, and Pedroia provided better defense than any other second basemen in the AL this season.

The winner of the Gold Glove should be sure handed, right? Kinsler and Cano each had nine errors in 2014, while Pedroia only had two errors all season. It’s true that Pedroia played fewer games (1,187 innings) than both Kinsler (1,414 innings) and Cano (1,304 innings), but if you look at errors/total chances, Pedroia made fewer errors per chance.

His two errors came in 654 chances (0.00305 errors/chance), while Kinsler’s nine came in 697 chances (0.01291 errors per chance) and Cano’s nine came in 766 chances (0.01175 errors per chance). Pedroia’s fielding percentage of 0.997 is better than Kinsler’s (0.988) and Cano’s (0.987). Range factor helps measure the total number of outs in which a player participates. Pedroia’s 2014 RF was 4.94, while Kinsler’s was 4.82 and Cano’s was 4.75, showing Pedroia to be superior in yet another statistic.

The Society for American Baseball Research posts Defensive Index rankings on its website, which account for approximately 25 percent of the Gold Glove voting. It’s added to the votes made by the managers (who cannot vote for their own players) and coaches in each league. The latest SABR Defensive Index numbers available were through Sept. 7, 2014, and they show Pedroia ranked first among second basemen and fourth overall in the AL (12.9).

Kinsler was ranked second among second basemen and sixth overall in the AL (10.0), while Cano was ranked eighth among second basemen, and wasn’t close to making the top 25 in the overall list for the AL (0.7).

For those who watch baseball, it is apparent that Pedroia simply makes plays; not to take anything from the other finalists or second basemen, but he makes more plays than they do. Not only does he pass the eye test, the numbers back Pedroia winning this fourth Gold Glove come Nov. 4.

Justin Patrick is a New England Patriots writer for www.RantSports.com. Follow him on Twitter @calling_allfans, like him on Facebook and add him to your network on Google. You can also email him at [email protected].