Historically, Major League Baseball’s most valuable player award has been presented to a superb player whose team will play well into the postseason. This season however, things do not seem to be so clear-cut in the race for NL MVP.

Los Angeles Dodger’s centerfielder Matt Kemp has challenged this notion with his outstanding play in his attempt to become the first player in the majors to hit for the Triple Crown since 1967. Kemp will fall short of the feat, but the fact that he even came so close so late in the season speaks volumes to the type of career year he had.

A tightly contested race for the NL MVP is heating up between Kemp and Milwaukee Brewer’s left fielder Ryan Braun. If Kemp were on a winning team like Braun he would win the MVP award, but he plays for a near .500 third place team.

Kemp leads the NL in home runs and RBI with 38 and 124 respectively, and is third in batting average at .324. He is also second in stolen bases with 40 on the season, looking to become only the fifth member of the 40-40 club.

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As baseball season comes to a close, we as fans are presented with several questions. What is the playoff picture going to look like? Who is going to make it to the World Series? What the hell happened to the Red Sox? This is also the time when we start to predict who is going to win the MVP for the AL and the NL.

Justin Verlander of the Detroit Tigers, José Bautista of the Toronto Blue Jays and Adrian Gonzalez and Jacoby Ellsbury of the Boston Red Sox have all had fantastic seasons, and are all seemingly deserving of the award based on stats alone. But the award doesn’t go to the player with the best stats. It goes to the player with the best stats who has meant the most to his team and came up strong in the clutch.

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With 16 seniors currently on the roster, the UCSB baseball team will be reloading with a strong recruiting class of seven high school players that have a chance to play right away for a young Gaucho team.

“We’re hoping that they are going to contribute,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “We graduate a lot of players, and there will be some great opportunities for the young guys to come in and contribute right away.”

Austin Pettibone, a right-handed pitcher from Esperanza High in Anaheim, chose UCSB over other schools including Pepperdine, Riverside, and Santa Clara. He has a chance to take over as a starter or take on a role in the bullpen, as UCSB will lose nine pitchers to graduation.

Chris Paul is a versatile shortstop and right-handed pitcher out of Laguna Beach High School and currently holds a 10-1 record as a pitcher. He recently led his team to a first-round playoff victory as the starting pitcher but is expected to play infield for the Gauchos.

“Austin Pettibone and Chris Paul are probably the two guys that we think might be able to come in and help right away,” Brontsema said. “Quite frankly, they’ve all been given an opportunity and they’ll all have a shot.”

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After an inspiring victory at UCLA this past Tuesday, things did not quite go as hoped this weekend for the UCSB baseball team as No. 17 UC Irvine swept the Gauchos in a three-game series.

Freshman lefthander Cameron Cuneo was ran out early by the Anteaters in just his second start of the season on Sunday, as UCSB capped off the series with a 4-2 loss.

“We’ve got to bounce back,” senior right fielder Mark Haddow said. “There’s not much we can take from this series. We made a lot of mistakes.”

With the loss, the Gauchos fall to 21-24 on the season (6-12 Big West) while Irvine remains in second place in conference with a 34-13 record (13-5 Big West).

Cuneo pitched two innings for the Gauchos, allowing two runs before senior righthander Nick Loredo relieved him. Loredo allowed two runs over six innings, but despite his efforts, UCSB could not salvage a victory.

“There wasn’t really a lot of highlights in this,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “Mark Haddow played extremely well and continues to play extremely well. I thought we competed against a very good team; in these last two games in particular.”

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UCSB baseball was provided with a much-needed boost in morale after defeating the No. 13 UCLA Bruins 5-4 on the road Wednesday night.

With the victory, UCSB rebounds to 21-21 on the season and closes its seven game road streak with a 3-4 record and a two-game winning streak.

“It was very important to get this win,” junior third baseman Ryan Palermo said. “It puts us back at the .500 mark and it gives us a boost to our morale for this weekend against UC Irvine.”

Freshman left-hander Cameron Cuneo pitched four innings of relief for the Gauchos while earning his first career victory. He allowed one run and five hits but was able to get out of big jams and keep the Bruins from opening up the game.

“That is the longest outing of his career right there, which was outstanding,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “He got big outs when he needed it and he got his first win of his college career.”

Starting pitcher Nick Loredo gave up one run in his two innings before Cuneo came as relief. In total, UCSB used five pitchers to send the Bruins to a 3-5 record against the Big West after Tuesday night’s loss to Long Beach. UCLA is now 27-18 overall on the season.

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After six tough games on the road, the UCSB baseball team will conclude its seven-game road trip on Wednesday when it takes on No. 19 UCLA.

The Gauchos, losing two of three at Northridge last week, dropped to 2-4 on their road trip thus far. They look to end it on a good note with a victory against the runner up of last year’s national title.

“Every time you play a good team like that, you’ve got to bring everything you got,” senior right fielder Mark Haddow said. “You have to play your best ball.”

UCSB stands at 20-21 on the season (6-9 Big West) and is hopeful for a third-place conference finish and a postseason birth if they can finish off the season in strong fashion.

“Every game from this point is going to be important for us,” Haddow said. “We need to get back to .500 first of all and then we need to basically win out. It’s huge if we are going to put a winning streak together here at the end.”

UCLA entered Tuesday night’s contest against Long Beach on a five-game winning streak, improving its record to 27-16.

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With their hopes of a Big West title slowly dwindling, the UCSB baseball team will travel south for a vital three-game series against Northridge in hopes of keeping their championship chances alive

After losing two of three to Riverside on the road last weekend, the Gauchos stand at 19-19 overall and 5-7 in the Big West and are in serious need of a series victory to move up in the conference standings.

“It’s probably one of the most important series for us this year,” senior right-handed pitcher Greg Davis said. “We just had a tough series against Riverside so I think we really need to bounce back to put ourselves back into the upper half of the Big West standings.”

The Gauchos already faced Northridge twice this season, both nonconference games. In an April 12 contest at Northridge, the Matadors took down the Gauchos 3-2, while UCSB won an April 26 decision at home by a score of 6-4.

“I think it’s going to be different,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “It’s going to be tough — they’ve thrown some tough arms against us. But midweek games are different than weekends. We’ll take something from those games, but not a whole lot.”

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The road has not been kind to the Gaucho baseball team this season. After an impressive 4-1 mark in its home stand last week, UCSB went 1-2 against Riverside in a three-game series over the weekend.

The team won the rubber match on Sunday with a 9-5 victory, but their record in away games now stands at 3-14. The team also dropped to 5-7 in conference play after the series, putting them in second-to-last place in the Big West ahead of 1-10 Northridge.

“You’re never pleased about not winning a series,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “But I’m extremely pleased with the fact that we had a couple of rough games and we came back and responded very well [Sunday].”

After Sunday’s win, UCSB improved to 19-19 on the year (5-7 Big West) on its way to snapping Riverside’s seven-game winning streak that dated back to April 17. The Highlanders fell to 22-15 (6-6 Big West) with the loss, falling behind early to an eager UCSB offense.

“They had the confidence going into the game, so it was important to go out and strike first,” senior right fielder Mark Haddow said. “That gave us a lot of confidence and kind of shut them down a little bit.”

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Following a 4-1 home stand, the UCSB baseball team will now pack up its bags for a seven-game road trip starting with a three-game series at Riverside today.

The Gauchos improved to 18-17 overall (4-5 Big West) on the season following a 6-4 win over Northridge on Tuesday, boosting their home record to 15-5. Their luck on the road, however, has been a different story.

“We have to play better on the road,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “Going down to play a very good Riverside team will be a challenge. We just have to get in there and play with some energy.”

Road games have been cruel to the Gauchos, as they hold a 3-12 record when traveling. Riverside, which stands at 20-14 on the year and 4-5 in the Big West , will look to continue the Gauchos’ road woes as the teams jockey for pecking order in the Big West.

“We’ve played great at home so far and we need to try and translate that on the road,” senior center fielder Ben Edelstein said. “Each series from here on out gets more and more important. Any momentum we can get, we want to go forward with it and hopefully get some wins together.”

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If you are in a fantasy baseball league that isn’t rotisserie style, you’re doing it wrong. That’s just a fact.

Unfortunately, rotisserie style fantasy baseball can either be one of two things: horribly frustrating or downright infuriating. It’s the points system.

At first glance, rotisserie play seems to be designed to make fantasy owners pull out their hair in blind fury just so the good people at ESPN can share a malicious smirk in between talking about Brett Favre for no reason and making fun of the Oakland Raiders.

A closer inspection, however, reveals that there actually is a somewhat coherent method to ESPN’s scoring system. In rotisserie play, you gain points based on how well you do in the various scoring categories compared to the rest of the teams in your league. If you do better in a category than your opponents, you gain points. If you do worse, you lose points. How you rank in the individual categories also affects how you obtain points. For instance, if you are ranked No. 1 in a certain category, you won’t gain any points for doing well in that category because you’re already ranked first. You can’t do any better in that category.

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With two outs in the bottom of the eighth, Ben Edelstein came up to the plate for his first at-bat of the game, with a runner on second and the score tied at four. The senior sent a three-and-one fastball up the middle to center field, driving in sophomore shortstop Steven Moon and securing the eventual game-winning run over Northridge.

“I came up there and I was relaxed,” Edelstein said. “I took it like it was any other at-bat. When I went in to play defense, I realized I was going to hit. It turned out that came out to be the big hit.”

Edelstein’s RBI single propelled the Gauchos to a 6-4 win over the Matadors yesterday, boosting the team’s record to 18-17, including 15-5 in home contests. With the loss, Northridge falls to 18-22 just two weeks after defeating the Gauchos 3-2 on their home field.

Coming in to pitch the ninth with a fragile two-run lead, senior right-handed pitcher Greg Davis managed to strike out two of three batters in a perfect inning to notch his fourth save of the year.

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Gaucho baseball split the final two games of its three-game conference series with Long Beach State this weekend, pushing the team’s record to 17-17 overall and 4-5 in the Big West.

With the series win, UCSB has won two of its three conference series so far this season, but a sweep at the hands of No. 8 Cal State Fullerton last weekend has the squad struggling to get back to .500 in Big West play. The team now holds the No. 5 seed in the Big West along with UC Riverside. No. 4 Long Beach dropped to 6-6 in conference play and 19-18 overall.

Sunday’s 6-2 loss snapped a three-game winning streak for the Gauchos, who might be showing signs of last season’s streaky play. Their three consecutive wins matched their season-high streak that began the season but was predicated by four straight losses.

LBSU’s Brandon Pinder tallied six strikeouts in Sunday’s game, allowing only four hits and two runs. He put away the first 15 batters he went up against and lasted 6.1 innings in the win, while Long Beach scored two runs in the first inning and three more in the third against junior right-hander Matt Vedo. Head Coach Bob Brontsema pulled Vedo early in the fourth after allowing a homerun to left field.

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After four hours of play, UCSB was ready to go home. Senior right fielder Mark Haddow ended the Gauchos’ longest game in program history with his two-out walk-off home run over the center field wall to secure a 3-2 win over Pepperdine yesterday.

“That game was getting pretty long there at the end,” Haddow said. “It feels good to end it for the team and get a win after the tough weekend. I was thinking about getting a pitch I could drive, and he put it right where I was looking and I capitalized.”

UCSB improves to 15-16 overall with the victory while the Waves fall to 16-19. With the game threatening to be called due to the sunset, Haddow was the squad’s last chance for victory. The senior came up big, swinging on the first pitch he saw.

“I took a couple of steps out of the box and knew it was gone,” Haddow said. “It’s one of those feelings off the bat that you just know. It’s right up there with some of my other moments, and it was huge to end the game on that note and get some momentum.”

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Despite leading the majority of the time this weekend, the UCSB baseball team was swept in a three-game series by No. 7 Fullerton, losing all three games by one run.

The Gauchos fall to 14-16 overall on the season (2-4 Big West), while the Titans continue their dominance in conference, moving to 27-9 (8-1 Big West).

“We felt going into the game that we could compete, and whether or not we believe it remains to be seen,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “We certainly went toe-to-toe with them but unfortunately we let them off the hook.”

Sunday’s 5-4 loss summed up the weekend for the Gauchos, as they led 4-2 heading into the bottom of the ninth inning before senior right-handed pitcher Nick Loredo allowed the Titans to score three runs in a disappointing comeback.

Junior pitcher Matt Vedo started for the Gauchos, pitching a solid 6.2 innings while giving up only two runs. Senior Nick Capito then pitched 1.1 innings of relief, before walking a batter in the ninth and handing it over to Loredo.

“The other two days the bullpen did a good job, but today Nick Loredo wasn’t sharp,” Associate Head Coach Tom Myers said. “He fell behind in the count and paid the price.”

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UCSB baseball will continue conference play with a road series at No. 7 Cal State Fullerton this weekend. Fullerton, reigning Big-West champion and the top-ranked team in the league, is currently 5-1 in the Big West.

“We see this [series] as an opportunity to elevate our status,” Head Coach Bob Brontsema said. “Any time you play someone highly ranked in your conference, you have a chance to make a statement.”

The Gauchos beat Cal Poly in the team’s first series of Big West play last weekend. After losing the first game of the series, UCSB was able to take the final two, including a 13-inning finish in the third game. Junior right-hander Matt Vedo held Cal Poly to five hits in seven innings in the final game and struck out five batters as well.

“Our bullpen has been phenomenal,” senior left-handed pitcher Nick Capito said. “We got great effort from Vedo on Sunday.”

Fullerton swept UC Davis in its first Big West series by a combined score of 25-2 throughout the three games. The Titans then took a series 2-1 against No. 17 UC Irvine last weekend. Fullerton is 12-3 at home this season, and 2-1 at home during Big West play.

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