BASAs Day 5 - Young Player of the Year

Climbing the Ladder has announced the winner of the fifth BASA award. Today's award goes to Young Player of the Year.

The winner is... (click here)

This week has been filled with speculation and titillation around the MLS world over who will get a BASA. With just five more awards to be handed out, I'm sure there are more then a few nervous folks out there. I just hope it doesn't have a negative effect on any of these weekend's matches.

Enough of that, what about yesterday's BASA. The award went to Defender of the Year. Here are the results:

1- Danny Califf
2- Eddie Robinson
3- Tyrone Marshall
4- Jimmy Conrad
5- Michael Parkhurst
6- Brian Carroll
6- Steve Jolley
8- Wade Barrett
9- Todd Dunivant
10- Brian Namoff
10- Jay Heaps
10- Samuel Caballero
10- Greg Vanney

As you can see, there were a lot of names mentioned. I think this reflects the difficulty is easily evaluating defenders. There is no "Shots blocked" or "Passes broken up" stat, so you have to go on what you see.

Anyway, here are my picks:

1- Tyrone Marshall (LA)
2- Jimmy Conrad (KC)
3- Michael Parkhurst (NE)

So I ended up voting for neither of the top 2, go me. Anyway, I thought Marshall held his team's backline together this year, much like Conrad did, however I think Marshall did it better. For Parkhurst, it just seemed like every NE game I watched, his name kept coming up.

I looked back over my notes and I really don't know what I did not put down either Eddie Robinson or Danny Califf. I was looking at both of them, but, for some reason, neither made the grade. Sorry, I wish I could explain myself better.

By the way, if you have not done so yet, go Vote for USMNT Player of the Year.