The Gold Glove Awards will be given out a bit differently this year. Instead of an announcement of so-and-so winning the awards, ESPN is televising the first-ever Rawlings Gold Glove Awards Show at 10 p.m. on Nov. 1. So they announced a list of the finalists today.
Obviously if you've read the headline you already know Alex Avila and Austin Jackson are among the finalists. Other catching finalist are Matt Wieters of the O's and A.J. Pierzynski of the White Sox. Other center field finalists are Jacoby Ellsbury of the discolored Sox and Peter Bourjos of the Angels.
I'm not sure the Tigers' players should be considered favorites at either position.
The surprise to me was Jhonny Peralta being left out. I'm not saying he shouldn't have been left out. When I think of defensive wizards at short stop Peralta is not on my top three list. But generally speaking, we think of the Gold Gloves as going to guys who have high fielding percentages who hit the ball well. Peralta fulfills both of those requirements. Heck, he actually ranks pretty high by UZR/150. So... you know what ... maybe Peralta should be in the final three after all!
Instead, the nominees are Erick Aybar of the Angels, JJ Hardy of the Orioles and and Asdrubal Cabrera of the Indians. They may have whiffed a bit on two of those. But, at least they didn't nominate Derek Jeter, right?
The complete list of nominees can be found here.