Carter Jensen finished fifth in AL Rookie of the Year voting.
Major League Baseball revealed the final results Monday night. Jensen placed behind winner Kevin McGonigle (Tigers) and received 31 points in the voting. McGonigle led with 204 points, including 28 first-place votes.
Jensen received four third-place votes, nine fourth-place votes and one fifth-place vote.
This season, Jensen produced a special rookie campaign. He hit .239 with 27 home runs (team high) and 81 RBIs (also team high) while finishing
with a 3.3 WAR in 149 games.
You can see the full voting results here.
Bobby Witt Jr won the Royals Les Milgram Player of the Year award (as voted by the local KC BBWAA chapter).
Witt, 26, has won the award five consecutive seasons. He ranks second behind Royals Hall of Famer George Brett — who took home the honor eight times in his career.
“Bobby, five times winning the Player of the Year, probably not going to be the last either,” Royals manager Matt Quatraro said. “You know, I mean, just the special talent, the humility, the person. All the things we love about him. You know, from his standpoint, and I’m sure he’ll tell you, he didn’t feel like he had a good year and he’s still an MVP candidate.”
Michael Wacha won the Royals pitcher of the year award and Salvador Perez won the Royals special achievement award.
Wacha earned Pitcher of the Year honors after one of the most durable seasons of his 13-year Major League career.
The 35-year-old right-hander went 9-10 with a 3.32 ERA in 32 starts, recording career highs in starts, innings (200 2/3) and quality starts (21). He led the American League in both innings and quality starts, becoming the third Royal to lead the AL in both categories, according to Elias Sports Bureau, following Bret Saberhagen in 1989 and James Shields in 2013.
MLB mothership has 2027 Rookie of the Year candidates for each team.
Royals: Lucas Braun, RHP (No. 16)
Braun’s stuff is never going to wow anyone, but he’s spent the past three years at the upper levels and is ready for a shot. He scuffled a bit after getting dealt from the Braves to the Royals at the Trade Deadline, but he’s been a very durable starter, topping 140 IP twice in the last two years (over 130 IP this past season) and could be a very solid inning-eating back-end starter in 2027.
Kevin O’Brien looked at Trent Grisham as an option in center field.
Sal Stewart won NL Rookie of the Year.
The case for each Manager of the Year candidate.
Old friend alert.
Michael Baumann at FanGraphs wondered how Cooper Pratt fits into the Brewers’ long-term plans.
CPBL reliever Jyun-Yue Tseng will enter the posting system for MLB free agency.
The White Sox agreed to give a $4M bonus to a 14-year-old from the Dominican Republic.
The KC Current will play against Gotham in the NWSL semifinals on a 5000-seat pitch due to poor field conditions at the original stadium.
Sporting KC fired head coach Rapha Wicky after a dismal season.
Mizzou footbal is big mad about the officiating against Texas.
Mauricio Pochettino, current USMNT coach, is apparently the favored candidate to replace the not-yet-fired (at least as I typed this) Michael Carrick at Manchester United.
The Jaguars made a flurry of trades, highlighted by getting DT Jordan Davis from the Eagles.
Arizona Cardinals QB Gardner Minshew maybe tore his UCL in his throwing arm. Soooo…TJ surgery for a football player? How odd. They may not do surgery.
Jensen Huang, the Nvidia CEO, is in some hot water (different link than Max’s yesterday).
Your song of the day is Electric Guest with Oh Devil.
