All-Star Contest!

Hey guys. I'm doing a quick All-Star Game contest here at the very blog which you are reading. The winner will receive a random relic card from his/her team of choice and a random stack-o'-cards from his/her team(s) of choice, free and postage free.

Five St. Louis Cardinals players are set to appear, at former manager Tony La Russa's discretion, in the big game tomorrow night. Your mission is to predict which Cardinals player is, in essence, the most valuable.

Win Probability Added (WPA) is a stat used to measure "value" on a game-by-game basis. I'll be using this metric to pick a winner for this contest. In order to enter the contest, you must choose both the player and your total WPA prediction. All players' WPA totals will be fractions of one whole number as a score of 1.000 would mean that a player was 100% responsible for the victory.

For batters, I will add the WPA+ (Win Probability Added) to the WPA- (Win Probability Subtracted) to arrive at the final total. For pitchers, I will simply use the WPA. If a pitcher ends up becoming a batter somehow, Tony La Russa should be fired on the spot. Oh, wait...

For example, last year's MVP by WPA was Prince Fielder with 0.231, while @str8edgeracer was the big goat at -0.347. I suggest you check out B-R's All-Star Game Index for past box scores to get an indication of what WPA looks like as I will be using this as the basis for judging the contest.

(Please note that Yadier Molina will not be appearing in the game as he is on bereavement leave and was replaced by Matt Holliday on the roster.)

OKAY, I AM YELLING NOW FOR THE SHORT ATTENTION SPAN PEOPLE. JUST PICK A CARDINAL ALL-STAR, A DECIMAL NUMBER SOMEWHERE BETWEEN -1 AND 1, AND LEAVE A COMMENT ON THIS BLOG.

Contest entries close at 4:59 PM PDT on Tuesday, July 10th. Good luck. Feel free to ask questions in the comments.