Not a surprise but still very cool!
This afternoon, Major League Baseball announced the finalists for the 2024 Silver Slugger Award, given to the 10 best hitters in each league by position (one catcher, one designated hitter, one utility player, one player at each infield position and three outfielders). San Francisco Giants third baseman Matt Chapman, who slugged 27 home runs and posted a .791 OPS in 154 games this season is, unsurprisingly, a finalist for NL Third Baseman.
The winner for each position will be announced next week. Per MLB.com,
The manager and three coaches from every Major League team cast their votes for the winners, which will be announced Tuesday, Nov. 12, at 6 p.m. ET on MLB Network.
Chapman didn’t win the award while in the American League but did make it as a finalist. His first year in the National League was a resounding success on both sides of the ball. His competition this year is Philadelphia’s Alec Bohm and San Diego’s Manny Machado. After his Gold Glove Award win last night, you’d like to imagine him having a perfect season (career-defining extension, becoming a father, Gold Glove, Silver Slugger) on a personal level, but locking up this accomplishment won’t be quite so easy.
Machado would seem to be the frontrunner just by having more home runs (29) and a higher OPS (.797) than either Bohm (15, .779) or Chapman (27, .791). He also has 105 RBI, which might still matter some of the crustier voters; and, despite both Chapman and Bohm having more extra base hits in total (68 and 61, respectively, to Machado’s 59), his .472 slugging percentage is superior. In Bohm’s favor is that he was an All-Star in 2024 while the other two were not.
Chapman is all the first San Francisco Giant to be a finalist since Joc Pederson and Thairo Estrada in 2022. The team’s most recent Silver Slugger was… Donovan Solano in 2020!