There has certainly been an outage of offense in the American League this season. The questions of why and for how long remain unanswered. Here is a list of the Top 3 players by position using Baseball Prospectus' VORP statistic. Note how much difference there is just between the top player and the third-best one. This would lead me to believe a Stars & Scrubs versus a balance approach may be the best fantasy strategy. Agree?

Also, note how poorly the OF VORP leaders due relative to the other position players. The top VORP is lower. This supports the contention that the OF is "shallow" relative to the other positions. However, the drop-off is not as dramatic. There could be more depth in the OF relative to other positions. This supports a strategy that focuses on acquiring the top positions player at the expense of OFs. Agree?

Finally, look at the top three DHs. This helps epxlain the drop in AL production this season. That extra hitter has struggled mightily. I bet the answer to this question goes a ways to explaining the production outage in the AL.

Baseball Happenings dynamic feature that draws on the collective knowledge of the blogging community to provide intelligence on which players are currently considered the leading contenders for the big three baseball awards - MVP, Cy Young and ROY - for the American and National leagues enters its 4th week.  The NL voting will be available here  . 

Here is the way I voted.  My biases for voting in the Cy Young and MVP awards lean towards those hitters and pitchers playing on contending teams.  ROY determination is not tied are strongly to his team's record, but good rookies on expected play-off contenders will get additional consideration.

NL Cy Young:

1.  Brandon Webb, Arizona Diamondbacks
2.  Edinson Volquez, Cincinnati Reds
3.  Carlos Zambrano, Chicago Cubs

8-0 on a 1st place team is a lock.  Coming in second is the ERA and Strikeout leader, Edinson Volquez, and closing fast is Chicago Cubs' ace Carlos Zambrano.  I'd expect Zambrano to surpass Volquez shortly, but, until then, I'll just marvel at what Volquez has accomplished.

NL MVP:
1.  Lance Berkman, Houston Astros
2.  Chase Utley, Philadelphia Phillies
3.  Hanley Ramirez, Florida Marlins

Lance Berkman leads the NL with a 1.235 OPS.  Add sixe stolen bases and you get the best hitter in the NL.  Chase Utley offers a 1.089 OPS and an NL-leading 13 HRs.  He just noses out Florida Marlins SS Hanley Ramirez as a result of those HRs.  Albert Pujols just missed with his .500 OBP, bhut I can't get too excited because of the mere 7 HRs.

NL ROY:
1.  Geovanny Soto, Chicago Cubs
2.  Kosuke Fukudome, Chicago Cubs
3.  Joey Votto, Cincinnati Reds

Chicago Cubs' catcher Geovanny Soto takes over the top spot with a 1.003 OPS.  Teammate Kosuke Fukudome falls to second because Soto's postion and SLG outpace Kosuke's excellent .481 OBP.  Reds' 1B joey Votto noses out Braves' SP Jair Jurrjens thanks to history-making 3HR/1Sb day.  He is also drawing some walks which should serve to keep his OBP respectable.  In a weaker field, Dodgers' 3B Blake DeWitt would get more props with a slash stat line of 323/398/479 - after doing worse between Hi A & AA last season!