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Yesterday's Lineup Card featured nine fictitious awards that we'd like to see given to players for their efforts in areas not formally recognized. One such award was the Jeff Ballard Award, which honors “the most effective pitcher who can't strike out batters.”

We named this year's winner, and introduced two voting factions–the Effectivists (who favor good pitching to lack of strikeouts) and the Punchlessies (who lean toward lack of strikeouts). But because everything needs a historical context, here is the complete list of Jeff Ballard Award winners, as determined by yours truly (an Effectivist):

Year

Player

IP

ERA

K/9

W-L

FIP

WARP

1989

Jeff Ballard

215.1

3.43

2.6

18-8

4.09

1.7

1990

Tom Browning

227.2

3.80

3.9

15-9

4.06

3.2

1991

Bill Gullickson

226.1

3.90

3.6

20-9

4.01

2.4

1992

Bob Tewksbury

233.0

2.16

3.5

16-5

3.13

1.3

1993

Tom Glavine

239.1

3.20

4.5

22-6

3.99

2.5

1994

Ricky Bones

170.2

3.43

3.0

10-9

4.67

0.8

1995

Mark Gubicza

213.1

3.75

3.4

12-14

4.62

0.9

1996

Tim Belcher

238.2

3.92

4.3

15-11

4.76

2.6

1997

Rick Reed

208.1

2.89

4.9

13-9

3.69

2.6

1998

Carlos Perez

241.0

3.59

4.8

11-14

3.96

2.3

1999

Omar Olivares

205.2

4.16

3.7

15-11

4.81

0.5

2000

Kirk Rueter

184.0

3.96

3.5

11-9

4.95

2.1

2001

Joe Mays

233.2

3.16

4.7

17-13

4.32

1.8

2002

Kirk Rueter

203.2

3.23

3.4

14-8

4.35

1.6

2003

Shigetoshi Hasegawa

73.0

1.48

4.0

2-4

3.85

0.7

Brian Anderson

197.2

3.78

4.0

14-11

4.70

0.8

2004

Ryan Drese

207.2

4.20

4.3

14-10

4.21

1.6

2005

Kenny Rogers

195.1

3.46

4.0

14-8

4.10

2.7

2006

Chien-Ming Wang

218.0

3.63

3.1

19-6

3.95

1.2

2007

Aaron Cook

166.0

4.12

3.3

8-7

4.52

1.7

Chien-Ming Wang

199.1

3.70

4.7

19-7

3.86

1.7

2008

Aaron Cook

211.1

3.96

4.1

16-9

3.73

2.5

2009

Mark Buehrle

213.1

3.84

4.4

13-10

4.51

1.7

2010

Mark Buehrle

210.1

4.28

4.2

13-13

3.87

2.8

2011

Mark Buehrle

205.1

3.59

4.8

13-9

4.02

2.1

2012

Scott Diamond

160.2

3.64

4.8

12-8

3.91

0.4

The beauty of awards–aside from their questionable inherent meaning–is that in determining who is the winner, you follow a process. And that process can lead to fascinating questions: Why Browning over Greg Hibbard in 1990? Why not Hipolito Pichardo in 1993? Or Roger Bailey in 1997? Carl Pavano in 2010? Why did I soften my stance on the great Hasegawa/Anderson debate of 2003?

It never ends. Perhaps you have other ideas?

Thank you for reading

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carligula
9/27
How on earth did Carlos Silva miss out on one of these?
gyoung858
9/27
He was a strong contender in 2004 and 2005, but Ryan Drese and Kenny Rogers were just too much better in my estimation. You could make a good case for Silva either year.
Drungo
9/28
You have to give at least an honorable mention to Steve Trachsel in 2007. Before he was traded by the O's to the Cubs he had a 103 ERA+ in 140 innings, despite 69 walks (4.4 per nine) and 45 (2.9 per nine) strikeouts.
Drungo
9/28
Jeff Ballard's '89 Orioles have to be in the running for some kind of team Ballard Award. They averaged 4.2 K/9, last in the AL by about 3/4ths of a K/9, and still won 87 games. Pete Harnisch was the only pitcher on the team to make 2+ starts and average more than 5.0 K/9.