With the season over, let's take a look at who won the first set of Ullamaliztli Awards:
As is the theme with the league and the teams, the award names are in Nahuatl, so I will provide an explanation as to what each of the award names mean.
Tlatoani Award
Tlatoani typically means "the one who speaks", though it was also the name typically given to a ruler in many of the Nahuatl-speaking kingdoms of Mesoamerica. For this reason, some people have mistranslated the word to mean "ruler", though it comes from the root word tlahtoa, which itself is composed of tla- (something) and ihtoa (to say), literally to say something. So, I will also give the title of Tlatoani to the best player of a given season in the Ullamaliztli Namiqui.
As for the winner of the 1936 Tlatoani Award, look no further than this man:
I mentioned Monterrosa as one of Mérida's top hitters this season and his season fully warranted an award. There were several interesting players in the running (I'll talk about them shortly) but here's why I ultimately gave the prize to Antonio:
Led the league in Hits (119), Total Bases (154), Slugging (.439) and Runs Created (48.43). 2nd place in RBI (41), Extra Base Hits (23), ISO (.100), wOBA (.381) and wRC+ (156.7) and 3rd place in AVG (.339). He played most of his innings at short (79 games) but also played 2B, 3B, CF and RF, having the highest Fielding Percentage of all qualified shortstops, as he made only 7 errors this season.
Overall, his offense was top of the line, and his defense might not have been the best according to Zone Rating but was still good enough. Both of these factors were key in Mérida's title-winning season, making SS Antonio Monterrosa the 1936 Ullamaliztli Tlatoani.
Other players I considered for the award were Guadalajara's 2B César Loaiza (more about him later) and Mérida's CF Celestino de la Rosa, who was the league's best offensive CF, leading the league in 3B (10), Runs Scored (50) and ISO (.111). Jaguares' 3B Rico Santistevan led the league in WAR, though his offense wasn't Tlatoani-level (9th in RBI, 13th in OPS) so I ultimately didn't consider him for MVP.
Atlatl Award
Átlatl means "extended arm" and is associated with Mexica spear-throwing instruments. With this short explanation, I hope the award name makes sense. I mean, surely this motion seems familiar:
So, who won the award?
Pérez was another player who was key as the Howlers won the title. Here are his credentials:
Led the league in winning percentage (70.8%) and tied 1st in shutouts (7). 2nd in wins (17) and ERA (1.76). 3rd in K/BB (1.77) and Quality Start % (84%). He was also 5th in WAR, 6th in strikeouts, 6th in FIP and was 1st in RA9-WAR.
His great pitching was fundamental for the championship so he earns the 1936 Atlatl Award.
Of course, there were other throwers who could have been considered for the award. Firstly, let's talk about the elephant in the room, the guy who was 1st in both ERA and WHIP: Puebla's Iván Moctezuma. The only reason why I didn't consider Moctezuma is of course because he is a reliever. He had a 7-3 record, pitched 109 innings in 35 games, making him qualified and with a 1.57 ERA and 0.96 WHIP could be considered the best pitcher in the league. Here's the thing, Pérez threw 215 innings, every pitcher who finished above Pérez in WAR threw at least 230 innings except for Tampico's Israel Pastrana who threw 192. The only other pitcher who I could have considered to take the award from Pérez is his teammate Roberto García who led the league with 4.8 WAR, but his ERA was more than 1 run higher despite starting just 3 more games than Pérez.
Moyaomamachtiani Award
Wow that's a long word. Well, according to the UNAM Nahuatl dictionary, it's the word for someone who's new in war so what better concept than that to use for the rookies of the league?
Now, it's the first season so who can be called a rookie anyways? Technically, everyone. For this reason, I limited the award to players 24 and under and he was the best one:
There were only 13 U24 players who qualified (9 hitters and 4 pitchers). Out of these, Loaiza led in average (.347), slugging (.435), OPS (.818) and came second in stolen bases (10), RBI (30) and OBP (.383). Leaguewide, he of course won the batting title, leading in RC/27 (5.6), wOBA (.384), OPS and wRC+ (161.5). He was a contender for the Tlatoani award and it made sense to hand him the Moyaomamachtiani Award.
Other players who could come close were León's catcher Victor Albornoz and Mérida's catcher José Trujillo (their stats are in the last post).
Teyaotlani Award
Teyaotlani means warrior, battler or soldier, so here are the best offensive players by position:
P Miguel Cazares (Puebla) - .324/.343/.353, 2 2B, 10 RBI
C José Trujillo (Mérida) - .341/.381/.393, 9 2B, 1 3B, 1 HR, 39 RBI
1B Daniel Rivera (Puebla) - .299/.394/.363, 14 2B, 2 HR, 30 RBI
2B César Loaiza (Guadalajara) - .347/.383/.435, 15 2B, 2 3B, 3 HR, 30 RBI
3B Rico Santistevan (Jaguares) - .311/.342/.387, 13 2B, 1 3B, 3 HR, 30 RBI
SS Antonio Monterrosa (Mérida) - .339/.356/.439, 14 2B, 6 3B, 3 HR, 41 RBI
LF Andrés Suárez (León) - .292/.364/.391, 15 2B, 1 3B, 5 HR, 34 RBI
CF Celestino de la Rosa (Mérida) - .304/.383/.415, 9 2B, 10 3B, 2 HR, 31 RBI
RF Victor Barrios (Águilas) - .317/.374/.388, 9 2B, 1 3B, 3 HR, 25 RBI
Temanahui Award
Temanahui is the Nahuatl word for defender, so here are the best ones by position:
P Francisco Camacho (San Luis)
C Alfredo Hernández (Jaguares) - 72.7% of runners thrown out!
1B Miguel González (Águilas)
2B Antonio Sánchez (Jaguares)
3B Enrique Canul (Mérida)
SS Manuel Portillo (Puebla)
LF Andrés Suárez (León)
CF Jorge Ramírez (Puebla)
RF Antonio Tapia (Puebla)
So that's it for these year's awards! Next post will go over any offseason moves and rule/stats changes I make.