Miguel Rojas was robbed of a Gold Glove

Miguel Rojas is a great defensive SS. Is he the best option for the Miami Marlins at the position? Obviously we need offense and after the offensive season that he’s had, it’s hard to be happy with him as a starter. Defensively it’s a different story. Rojas is the best defensive SS in the game. There’s no excuse for him to lose the NL Gold Glove award at SS to Atlanta Braves’ upcoming free agent Dansby Swanson. Miggy was robbed.

Miguel Rojas was robbed of the NL Gold Glove award.

Miguel Rojas is not better than Dansby Swanson in general. Let’s get that out of the way. Obviously if the Miami Marlins had Swanson and his .277/.329/.447 batting line from 2022, along with his 25 HR and 96 RBI, we’d be a better team. Miggy provided us with a .236/.283/.323 batting line, 6 HR and 36 RBI. He’s not as good, we all know it. Rojas gave us 2.5 WAR and Swanson was worth 5.7 for Atlanta.

Offense isn’t under consideration here, this is about an award that ONLY rates defense. We can look at multiple defensive statistics and Miguel Rojas comes out on top in all of them. Want to look at dWAR? OK, Miggy blows Swanson out of the water with his 2.6 compared to Dansby’s 2.0.

Would you prefer more traditional stats? Would you like to look at fielding percentage? No problem. Swanson had a .986 fielding percentage. That’s excellent! Miguel Rojas beats him with his .987. Miggy is just better.

Still not convinced? How about errors? Surely whoever makes less errors is better right? It’s close. Swanson had 8 errors, Miggy had 7. Miggy still wins. Either way that you look at it, Miggy is a better defender at SS than Swanson.

Why did Dansby Swanson win and Miguel Rojas lose? Miggy is better than Swanson defensively, but Swanson is significantly better offensively. Swanson is the better overall player and plays on a team that won the World Series last year. Swanson won because he’s more popular and has a better reputation. Miggy is still a potential clubhouse issue and Swanson is a professional. This was a popularity contest and Miggy just wasn’t as liked.