Matt Thornton played almost all of his career in a set up role and was good enough at it that he would be named an All Star in 2010.  Throughout his tenure he predominantly relied on his fastball, a tool that made him effective in his role and he pitched more than 700 Games in the Majors.  He notably at one point was the all time leader of the American League in Holds.

Marlon Byrd played for ten teams over his Major League career (one team twice) and accumulated 1,534 Hits over his career.  In 2010 Byrd was named a National League All Star and he had a career high 170 Hits.  Later in his career he would have four seasons of 20 or more Home Runs, though he would be popped twice for Performance Enhancing Drugs, which might explain his power surge in his mid 30’s.  That fact alone might keep him off of the ballot completely.

Bringing a strong power game to all four of the Major League teams he played for (Texas, Atlanta, Los Angeles Angels, New York Yankees), Mark Teixeira would go deep 409 times in his career, including winning the Home Run Title in 2009 (39) with eight other seasons of 30 or more.  A three-time All-Star and three-time Silver Slugger, Teixeira also showed off good defensive skill at First Base as he was a five-time Gold Glove winner.  It should also be noted just how strong his 2009 season was, in which he helped the Yankees win the World Series and finished as the American League runner-up for the MVP.

Teixeira’s overall resume is pretty good, but those two words are the key: “pretty good”.  In this era, the overall stats for a first baseman need to be stellar, and Teixeira isn’t quite there, though he did receive a few votes, as was expected.

Kyle Lohse is one of the few players in Major League history to hold victories over all 30 teams, so needless to say he won a lot of Games!