Rawlings announced their American League Gold Glove winners on Tuesday. Let’s take a look at who won a Gold Glove in the AL in 2010.

P – Mark Buehrle, Chicago White Sox

C – Joe Mauer, Minnesota Twins

1B – Mark Teixeira, New York Yankees

2B – Robinson Cano, New York Yankees

SS – Derek Jeter, New York Yankees

3B – Evan Longoria, Tampa Bay Rays

OF – Carl Crawford, Tampa Bay Rays

OF – Franklin Gutierrez, Seattle Mariners

OF – Ichiro Suzuki, Seattle Mariners

I have a couple of thoughts on the award winners.

 


Ichiro won another Gold Glove in 2010

I think for the most part Rawlings got it right. Crawford, Gutierrez, and Ichiro were all deserving in the outfield and nobody can argue with Teixeira and Longoria at third.  Cano and Mauer were both deserving as well.

Cano, in particular, has really improved defensively. When he first came up with the Yankees, he had the arm, but the other aspects of playing the position weren’t there. Most importantly, the mental aspect.

Cano would take plays off from time to time and go after balls in a lackluster manner. Not anymore.

I think Larry Bowa deserves a lot of credit for that. He worked with Cano on a daily basis when he was a member of Joe Torre’s coaching staff and made Cano a much better fielder.

Now comes the part where we talk about the undeserving. The fact that Jeter would win a Gold Glove for his play in 2010 is an embarrassment to fielders everywhere.

By any advanced statistic you want to slice it by, Jeter had a terrible defensive year. Even if you didn’t go off advanced statistics, and watched Jeter on a daily basis, you saw the decline. Lack of range, lack of arm strength, you name it, it was there.

I shouldn’t be surprised by Jeter winning the Gold Glove. This has been going on for years. The Gold Glove award is now an overall achievement award rather than a defensive player award.

If a player has a great season offensively, there is a good chance he will be up for the Gold Glove award. I also think the award has become a lazy award. It seems as if a player wins the award one year, he will will continue to win the award just based on reputation.

The National League Gold Glove award winners will be announced on Wednesday. It will be interesting to see who wins that award at each position.

You can follow The Ghost of Moonlight Graham on Twitter @ theghostofmlg

Read more MLB news on BleacherReport.com