I probably don't have to tell you how awesome Carlos Ruiz is. On the other hand, you probably aren't tired of hearing about how awesome Chooch is. So go ahead, check out my nifty charts after the jump.

Bill Petti wrote a post at fangraphs today Identifying First Half MVP Candidates, and Ruiz did make his short list, although he picked David Wright as the NL frontrunner.

Check out the fWAR leaderboard for the NL:

Chooch is 5th in the NL in fWAR with about 80% of the plate appearances of the others on the list.

Here is the same list, sorted by WAR/PA

This isn't exactly rigorous anlysis, and I obviously have an agenda. However, in a frustrating season it is pretty cool to think of Carlos Ruiz as an MVP candidate.