13
2012
Who Was The Mets Most Valuable Player In 2012, Wright Or Dickey?
An article by 
There wasn’t a real lot to rave about when you consider the Mets 2012 season as a whole, but even in an 88-loss season, there were a few bright spots.
We had our first No-Hitter in franchise history, we saw one of our top prospects breakthrough in a big way, and one of the Mets’ longest held traditions finally returned – Banner Day.
There were also two remarkable performances this season; one by third baseman David Wright and the other by our mound ace R.A. Dickey. Two truly amazing feats by two truly amazing individuals. But which one was the team’s Most Valuable Player?
This was the question I put to the Writers of the MMO Roundtable…
The R.A. Dickey Camp
Ed Leyro – Without question, the Mets MVP for 2012 has to be R.A. Dickey. Dickey was 20-6 for a team that won 74 games. He was credited with 27.0% of the team’s victories, which was the highest percentage in team history (Tom Seaver was the previous record holder, as he was credited with 26.8% of the Mets’ 82 wins in 1975). From the beginning of July to mid-September, every one of Dickey’s victories came directly after a Mets loss. Although he couldn’t pitch every day, he prevented the Mets from having long losing streaks. (Despite losing 88 games, the Mets never lost more than six in a row all season.) Wright, on the other hand was great in the first half and inconsistent after the All-Star Break. He had too many stretches where he didn’t drive in runs and had too many oh-fers to be the team’s MVP. From July 24 to the end of the season, Wright hit .247 with 6 HR and 26 RBI in 64 games, and he had half of those homers and 11 of the 26 RBI in his last ten games, when the Mets were just playing out the schedule. Those aren’t MVP numbers. (Although I will say that Wright had his best defensive season and should win his third Gold Glove this year.) Dickey was consistently good, if not great, all year. Wright had patches of greatness and long stretches of mediocrity. Dickey is my choice for 2012 Mets MVP.
Jim Mancari – Dickey was consistent throughout the entire season and was always there when the Mets needed a win. In the first half, David Wright was clearly the team’s MVP, but as the team started to swoon in the second half, it was directly correlated with Wright’s offensive struggles. Dickey is even more deserving than Wright because R.A. was able to have sustained success, even when the team faltered. What’s a real shame in this whole situation is that we as fans have to ponder life without both potential team MVP’s based on the team’s finances. I’m optimistic that the Mets will be able to keep both Wright and Dickey with the hope that they both put up team MVP-type seasons in 2013.
Jessica DeMattia – Dickey for sure….we could always count on him when we needed a win and he was the most consistent player all year. DW gets an honorable mention.
Taryn “Coop” Cooper – Simply put, his 20 wins gave the Mets – what – 27% of their total wins as a team? Where were those coming from, otherwise?
Clare Lafferty – As much as I love David Wright (my favorite player), this has been R.A. Dickey’s year. He will never have another year like this one. When Dickey pitched, you felt good about winning every time. It was fun to see him just fool every hitter he faced. And after reading his book as well, I have so much more respect for the man. If he doesn’t win the Cy Young, that would be an injustice.
Joe Spector – Who should be the Mets MVP for 2012? If you asked this question prior to the All-Star break it could have easily been a toss up between Wright or Dickey or both. After the All Star break it’s easy to say that David Wright, who’s first half could have ranked him among the NL leaders for possible MVP, became Bizzaro Wright in the second half of the season. I find it hard to accept that he had a lack of protection in the lineup since the only other real threat in the Mets lineup was Ike Davis, and we all know how well he performed after the All Star game. On the other hand R.A. Dickey was astounding from game one to 162, all while pitching with a torn abductor muscle. He should be the NL Cy Young winner and is easily the team MVP. No question.
Drew Staley – David Wright was well on his way to one of the best offensive seasons any Met ever produced at the plate, and then the second half happened. While Wright and the rest of team tanked after July, one constant remained and that was the greatness of what R.A. Dickey was doing on the mound every fifth day for the Mets. Dickey’s magical season sort of sneaked up on us. We were so amazed by what Johan Santana and David Wright were doing, that it wasn’t until his back to back one-hitters that all of baseball stopped and took notice of the magic that was going on. Dickey was the MVP of 2012 for the entire season – not just a part of it – all of it.
Sean Kenny – The 2012 MVP was R.A. Dickey without a doubt for his contributions to the team. Dickey won 27% of the Mets overall games, pitched like an ace pitcher every time he went out and as the Mets fanbase later found out pitched virtually an entire season with a torn abdominal muscle. Even if you ignored the contributions of a player who only played every five days, the contributions of R.A. cannot be ignored. He kept his offense in the game with his long outings allowing few, if any runs and had a never say die attitude when it came to being pulled from the game.
Satish Ram – A starting pitcher has the most influence on the outcome of a game on an individual basis. Although Dickey played in less games than Wright, it can be argued that he had the most impact. Dickey is one of the front-runners for the NL Cy Young while Wright is nowhere near the NL MVP talks.
XtreemIcon – Dickey in a landslide. Wright had a great season, for sure, but Dickey had a season for the ages (Mets fans ages, anyway). The fact that Dickey should be a shoo-in for the Cy Young notwithstanding, an MVP is the kind of player who can raise the standards of the other players. The most telling stat to me when looking at RA Dickey’s numbers isn’t his wins or his ERA or his strikeouts. It’s his run support. The NL average runs per game this past season was 4.22 runs per game. The Mets scored 650 runs, 33 fewer than league average, for a 4.01 average. However, Dickey’s runs support averaged 4.61 runs a game, .40 higher than league average and .60 higher than the Mets average. To put it in perspective, if the Mets hit for everyone else the way they hit for Dickey, they would have scored about 747 runs, which would have put them fourth in the league. Dickey made the offense better. He made the offense want to score runs for him. And it wasn’t all just because the pursuit of 20 wins. I checked to make sure, and the Mets only scored 3.83 runs per game for Dickey in his last six starts. The Mets scored nine runs in a game five times for Dickey, and they only scored more than nine runs four times all season. I’d give Wright the offensive MVP, but Dickey was on another level.
* * * * * * * * *
The David Wright Camp
Jessep – It’s a really tough question. Personally, I think it has to be David Wright for the mere fact I cannot give an MVP to a guy who plays 30-something games out of 162. You simply cannot deny what Wright’s value at the plate meant in the first half, and frankly during the first half I felt Johan Santana was more valuable than Dickey was because of he seemed to drive the rest of the pitchers to go above and beyond. For Wright, he had a brutal 2nd half but still maintained a gold glove caliber 3B. I think Wright’s 2nd half performance had more to do with the Mets young players seemingly playing over their head than Dickey’s pitching did.
Mitch Petanick – The most valuable player is the player that does the most for the team, which is not always the player with the best statistics. David Wright is the team MVP. I think Dickey had a great year, and accomplished more than we could have hoped for as fans, but if you remove Dickey from the team, I don’t think it would have as much of an impact as if we removed Wright from the team. David wasn’t as consistent in the second half, but he was still a more important player when looking at the bigger picture. If you ask me who had the better year statistically, obviously it was Dickey, but when asking who the team MVP is, it is definitely David Wright. The fact that the Mets are trying to lock up David to a long-term deal, then going to work on Dickey’s deal afterwards, says it all. The Mets know who the more valuable player is.
Michael Barrett – David Wright. Carried the team offensively for 75% of the year and played gold glove defense at third base. Dickey has a great season but I can’t give it to him based on the fact that Wright was on the field every day.
And the winner is….
By a finally tally of 13 votes for R.A. Dickey and 3 votes for David Wright, the winner by a landslide for Most Valuable Player of the 2012 Mets is… the incomparable R.A. Dickey.
We thank Dickey for giving us one of the best overall pitching performances we have ever seen by a Met.
Later this week, we hope to see R.A. come away with the Cy Young Award – the first one by a Mets pitcher since 1985 when Dwight Gooden won it.
About the Author: Joe DeCaro
I'm a lifelong Mets fan who loves writing and talking about the Amazins' 24/7. From the Miracle in 1969 to the magic of 1986, and even the near misses in '73 and '00, I've experienced it all - the highs and the lows. I started Mets Merized Online in 2005 to feed my addiction. Follow me on Twitter @metsmerized.
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This shouldn’t even be a question joe D… And whoever said DW needs to lose his “Writter” of MMO pass immediately… The guy was on fire for the first 2 months, THAT’S IT.. throughout the whole season RA Dickey was money and came up big for most of the time. the other guy did his usual disappearing act in the second half, hell ike davis put up way better numbers than him. not sure why anybody, other than his lovers would pick him ahead of dickey.. Mind you, who really wanna be MVP of a 4th place team, but since the article has been written one most comment to share one’s opinion, but i see the usual bias towards a guy who MIA during the mets second half COLLAPSE..
So how do you like my R.A. Dickey graphic?
Fantastic! Reminds me of Caesar looking across the Rubicon.
“Dickey saw, he came, he conquered”!
AWESOME!!!
the CORE does salute YOU and all those who kept their bias aside to vote here…
This shouldn’t even be a question joe D… And whoever said DW needs to lose his “Writter” of MMO pass immediately…
What’s a Writter? Don’t you think you should at least be able to spell the word when you call out someone else for doing what you can’t?
“The guy was on fire for the first 2 months, THAT’S IT.. ”
Actually he was one of the top players in all of MLB for 3 (three) months
“throughout the whole season RA Dickey was money and came up big for most of the time. the other guy did his usual disappearing act in the second half, “hell ike davis put up way better numbers than him.”
Actually no he didn’t other then homeruns and here I thought it was #chicksdigthelongball, while his numbers were lower the second half they were still the most consistent on the team, but fact never seem to get in your way of your hatred tirade.
“not sure why anybody, other than his lovers would pick him ahead of dickey.”
You really mean, why would anyone ever say a world positive about Wright ever, I mean they should just release him now, worst player the Mets ever had according to your daily rants.
” Mind you, who really wanna be MVP of a 4th place team, but since the article has been written one most comment to share one’s opinion, but i see the usual bias towards a guy who MIA during the mets second half COLLAPSE..”
Funny how its about the METS MVP, not over all so why bring up 4th place team. Even funnier that you use the word bias when any time someone brings up Wright you blow your stack if anything is said good about the guy.
Jason Bay!!!
His bad play outperformed Wright & Dickeys good performances.
I guess that should be most un-valuable player
I would usually go with the position player over the pitcher, but in this case RA’s season was so superior that the Mets would have been the Astros without him, and they would not have been the Astros without DW. Graphic looks good too, Hopefully it isn’t a final monument to RA as a Met.
David Wright was great at the beginning but totally disappeared the 2nd half of the season Dickey was consistently great throughout.
Except for a minor hitch right after the All Star break R.A. was absolutely dominating when he was on the mound.
Wright just kind of wore out after the All Star break and descended from his trip to Mt.Olympus when he was batting in the high 300s.
Of course the no brainer for Mets MVP is R.A.Dickey. Of course the no brainer of who the Mets get rid of is R.A. Dickey. Sad commentary on an organization run Fred, Saul and little Jeffy the Troika of Ineptitude.
Better stock up on Maalox for next year my stomachs killing me already.
I’m glad to be in the minority here. When was the Mets season relevant to the point where they could have had an MVP finalist?
1st half.
Anything Dickey did after that didn’t do anything for the Mets as a team other than keep them from being mediocre maybe. I fully appreciate Dickey’s season, but lets be a tad honest here – Dickey had 0 impact on 54 Mets victories.
How can you be the Most Valuable player on a team if you’re on the bench for roughly 130 games? (yes, I don’t think Verlander should have won the MVP)
Lets ignore the fact that the 3 of us are getting called names for thinking 1 Met was more valuable.
But here’s a fact for some:
David Wright played in 18 out of 20 Dickey wins. Do you know his stats for those games?
Batting Average: .357
RBI: 23
HR: 7
That’s in 18 games.
Answer me these two questions:
1) Can you look at those numbers, and Dickey’s 18 wins and honestly say David Wright had NOTHING to do with any of Dickey’s wins? Absolutely nothing? If you’re being honest, you cannot say that.
2) In non-Dickey wins, Wright was a .299 hitter with 14HR and 74 RBI. Can you honestly say RA Dickey had something/anything to do with those numbers?
If we’re being perfectly honest, David Wright had more to do with the Mets overall “success” than R.A. Dickey did.
Dickey had a great year and I hope he’s rewarded with a Cy Young but you can’t be the most valuable in my opinion when you sit on the bench 80% of the season.
It’s a classic debate that I see both sides of. Myself I am going with Dickey just because of how special his season was and he really was the prototypical stopper. However, a case can certainly be made for the impact of Wright in a lineup that generally under-performed aside from Wright.
R, A, Dickey won 20 games with this team even if David Wright hit great in a lot of those games he didn’t help pitch did he and at 37 R.A. pitched back to back one hitters un real hands down Mets MVP and Cy Young award winner to me what a year on a very bad team come on Mets spend some smart money for once and get this team back on top.
You can argue that while Dickey only had 33 starts, he affected those 33 games more than most hitters can affect a week’s worth of games.
If Wright didn’t hit that homerun in the game that gave Dickey his 20th win, he probably would not even be the favorite to win the CY Young, and only have 19 wins.
Revoke my writer priveledges – pitchers only impact 1/5 of the games during a season and should never be discussed in MVP talks – that’s why there is a Cy Young award. Dickey is the MVP of the Mets pitching staff, but not the team.
Ok Met fans if not the teams MVP who was the most exciting player to watch this year on the Mets hands down R.A. Dickey by far? yes or no !!!!!
I was in Dickey’s camp, but Jessop just convinced me…
I can’t argue with those numbers because he’s right.
I think I’m supposed to say “^^^ This” haha.
But thanks, I appreciate that you at least read it.
I have to respectfully disagree with my friend Xtreemicon here
“Dickey made the offense better. He made the offense want to score runs for him”
So wouldn’t that mean that the years we saw Johan Santana get 0 run support, that the offense didn’t want to score runs for him?
When Verlander actually won the league MVP, Rick Porcello got over 1 run more in support. So does that mean Verlander didn’t make the offense better?
Sorry I can’t buy into the fact that because the Mets scored 0.24 runs more per game for Dickey than they did for Niese that somehow that means Dickey gets credit for the offenses performance.
In 7 of Dickey’s 20 wins, the Mets scored in the 1st inning giving him a lead. How does Dickey get credit for that?
Jessep, the Mets played their best baseball when Dickey was pitching. Perhaps it was all a coincidence, but getting the ace out there perks up the whole team. There’s intrinsic value in being able to raise the game of the rest of the team, and I think that has as much to do with value than stats do. I disagreed with you last year about Verlander and I disagree again.
Wow, really??? is that what we’re going with?? Stats in a pitcher’s victory?? then how about giving CREDIT to the guy who was in the mound? in VICTORIES the pitcher who won the 20 games had this numbers:
20 WINS 1.18 ERA 152 IP 105 HITS 30 BB 150 K 0.88 WHIP
FIRST HALF: 12-1 2.40 120 IP 80 HITS 26 BB 123 K 0.93 WHIP
I mean, how ridiculous is that?? an MVP is a body of work for the WHOLE year, not a first half, and if you look at the numbers, wright started his decline beginning of july, he batted 263 12 43 in the last 81 games since then… NOT MVP worthy numbers… again, all year dickey was the man, wright for the first 2 months…
Alex – My point was, a pitcher isn’t the only reason a team wins a game. If David Wright as Mitch pointed out has anything to do with at least ONE Dickey victory, Dickey isn’t the Cy Young favorite right now. If you turn David Wright into an average 3B during Dickey’s starts, maybe Dickey wins 15 or 16 games?
Your value is determined by what you do when the team has success right? Hitters unlike Pitchers do not get to sit on the bench for 4 straight days. Therefore isn’t it more likely that they slump or hit rough patches than a pitcher would?
Again, I’m not suggesting Dickey should not win the Cy Young – I think he should.
But for the Mets, what did Dickey do for the 128 games where he didn’t even have to get dressed? Nothing.
In Mets victories, David Wright went:
.336 Batting Average, 12HR, 64RBI, .428OBP, .577SLG, 45BB, 42K, 1.005OPS
That’s over the course of 72 games that he played in when they WON.
What value does ANY player have on ANY team when they lose? None. It doesn’t matter what happens when the team loses. Would it have been wonderful had the Mets won more games? Absolutely, but we cannot change history.
You cannot deny Wright’s value over the course of 72 games – if you do, you’re just trying to ignore the fact.
Jessep. i have a feeling you only picking wright to rile people up, you honestly cannot be serious.. i am not ignoring the fact that the man helped the team be a surprised team for the first part of the season.. Hell, i said if the season ended today (Back in june) he was the MVP of the league. the man was on fire. the mets were 47-39 at one point and everyone was super excited. then july came up and he hit only 260 with little to no power and no run production.. While dickey kept pitching to par for the rest of the season.. he was the best positional player, yes, i give you that, but the MVP of the team whether you agree with it or not is dickey.. and not sure whether debating the MVP of a 4th place team is worth arguing. i said my piece and i don’t intend to argue over this, shouldn’t be any debate at all if you ask me
If presenting thoughtful arguments to state my case is “riling people up” then sure.
You haven’t denied any of the facts I presented, you’ve just ignored them.
If the same exact stats were that of Ike Davis, you’d say Ike was the MVP. Your issue isn’t the numbers, it’s the name of the guy with the numbers
Again, who argubly had the better second half? Ike davis or david wright? I am not ignoring wright’s contribution to the team and the team’s success in the first half, but the MVP is the whole body of work no? and that means the ENTIRE season… Arguably wright was the MVP of the season the first 81 games… then, the second half happened and he along with the mets season went into the tank. If you wanna go ahead and stick to wright as the mets MVP of the season go ahead, i’ll be sure to ship his MMO award via fedex..
Nothing really to argue there either, Ike had a better 2nd half than David did but as you said it’s about the entire season so Wright’s season was by far better than Ike’s.
So in the first half you admit Wright was the MVP correct?
In the 2nd half, Dickey won 8 games and lost 5. If you give him credit for the W’s then he has to get credit for the L’s also.
So are you are telling me that 3 games made Dickey the MVP and that Wright didn’t help the Mets win at least 4 games in the 2nd half?
This is why a pitcher can’t be the MVP to me. You’re ignoring 120+ other games. Games where Dickey got to chomp on seeds and Wright carried the team through 82+ games.
It’s a philosophical argument as old as the awards themselves. There will always be those that look at an MVP award as the best season and there will be those who look at it as the most valuable. There will be those who want to give that only to a hitter and those that again look only at which player had the best overall numbers.
I can’t see why it’s a big deal either way.
Well, not sure what to tell you… It’s your opinion i guess about a pitcher not being an MVP. you must’ve not seen what a guy like bob gibson did for the cards in 68 or hell, velander’s whole body of work in 2011 then… Dickey was the man for the whole year.. while as you pointed out he lost 5 games and only won 8 games in the second half he was a winner, while wright second half plummeted. again, wright most valuable position player for the year, dickey was MVP of the team..
Alex, without an actual stat that everyone excepts, like what WAR attempts to do, these debates are always going to be based on opinion and whim. It’s easy to say that Dickey is best pitcher on the team and Wright was the best hitter. Determining MVP though is way too subjective because there is no clear cut acceptable definition. It leads you back to the same thing as clutch.
TRS, again. i admit wright was the man in the first half, just like mccutchen of the pirates he faded in the second half along with the team.. end of story wouldn’t you say?
I get that some people like to debate and stir people up to start a conversation up in this blog, i get that.. but to be objective and call david wright MVP of anything is beyond ridiculous at this point. how much does a person have to love one player to make this stupid claims? and not only that, bring up numbers!! how moronic is that? We all saw how bad the guy failed in the second half, numbers are not needed but even numbers can back up what most of us saw, his once again disappearing act in the second half..
How can one say “A hitter who didn’t hit 30 HR’s, didn’t drive in 100 runs nor score 100 runs be the MVP of a team that has a 20 game winner and was arguably the best pitcher in the league? It’s getting a bit sad at this point..
Nice to be back after 12 days without power, water, heat!
I vote for RA, he was the man all season long and I will be sad to see him traded.
Man of all seasons.
The choice is clear and it’s the right one. Sorry David, but this honor belongs to R.A., but hopefully you’ll both get the chance to do it all over again for us in 2013.
R.A. Dickey should be voted Time Magazine-s 2012 Man of the Year.
after some thoughts and comments here , i have to say it has to be RA .
sure you can argue a pitcher is only on the field for 1/5 of all games BUT you cannot forget the impact a good (starting)pitcher and especially a red hot good pitcher can bring to the team…the whole team…not only does he affects the other SP´s , no he has a real big impact on the positional players as well . A SP with an streak like RA takes a lot of pressure from the positional players . Not ONLY in the games he participate , cause if you knew RA is up for you the next day, you possible feel comfortable about it and taking the current game( without RA ) even more serious cause the players think tommorow its RA for us, so probably he will win it for us , so get a win tonight …..
I was about to say DW is the MVP , but RA had a BIG impact on the whole team all season long, not only things you can see with stats though
Right, I am going with RA as well but seriously it shouldn’t bring about hate and venom just because someone chooses the best hitter instead.
you are right, everyone can take DW , heck even Hairston
, doesnt effect my world 
It makes me laugh how many people formulate their opinions based on what another poster says or how the media portrays someone.
well its simple , they only can get over other people´s opinion, its pathetic , but hey long time before spring
ill enjoy the show
trs86, can you actually see where there’s venom in this article?? Is this the same as when you called the shoutbox a fuming pile? While i disagree with jessep ( a guy i can’t stand) i am just stating my case and him his.. No need to take a shot at people here for no reason. you’re dushery has no boundaries!
An easy answer: Dickey.
He is a Cy Young candidate on a poor team. Wright, even though he did it in an odd fashion, was just typical for him…300/20/90.
And I say this in full agreement with the camp that a pitcher shouldnt USUALLY be the MVP of anything. But there are times when the stats outpace all else that is around.
I guess that when I think of the M.V.P. I look at it as whomever had the best season so in that sense I would pick R.A. Dickey as the Mets M.V.P. but reading some of the counter points I can see how an everyday player could have more weight on the season than a starting pitcher.
If you allow for where they overlap for example games where Dickey started and Wright played 3rd in the same game the Mets won 65% of the games Dickey appeared in (35 games overall) and 46% of the games Wright appeared in (156 games overall). I think because Dickey was such a key part of so many of the Mets 74 wins (30%) I look at him as the Mets M.V.P. this past season.