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I heard some rumblings earlier today about Orioles center fielder Adam Jones winning a Gold Glove, with the official announcement coming in another week or so. His brother apparently spilled the beans on his MySpace page.

My first thought: People still use MySpace?

My second thought: He ought to know.

I'm told that it's true, which means Jones will be only the second Orioles outfielder to take home the award. Paul Blair won eight of them.

Somehow, Jeff Stone kept getting snubbed.

Ichiro, Torii Hunter and Grady Sizemore usually have a strangehold on the award, but at least one of them has been kicked to the curb.

There were very few things that Seattle Mariners centerfielder Franklin Gutierrez couldn’t catch in 2009; so few things that he earned the nickname “Death To Flying Things.”

A Rawlings Gold Glove award, baseball’s highest accolade for defensive prowess, however, was one of those things Gutierrez just couldn’t snag.

In an announcement made Tuesday, the official 2009 American League Gold Glove outfield consists of the stalwart defensive standards of Ichiro Suzuki and Torii Hunter and first-timer Adam Jones.

Seattle’s Suzuki and Los Angeles’ Hunter both took home the award for their ninth consecutive seasons. Baltimore’s Jones, in just his second full Major League season, earned the Gold Glove despite playing, by all advanced defensive metrics, an average centerfield.

It was an award that Gutierrez, who patrols Jones’ former-centerfield in Seattle’s Safeco Field, should have won.

In 2009, Gutierrez played the best defense of all Major League Baseball players, not just outfielders.

No player possessed a better UZR in 2009 than Franklin Gutierrez. In fact, it wasn’t even close.

Gutierrez saved his team 29.1 combined runs in 2009. Tampa Bay’s B.J. Upton was the next closest centerfielder with a positive-11.0 mark. Among all fielders, Tampa’s Evan Longoria was Gutierrez’s closest contemporary, but still fell 10 points short, posting a UZR of plus-18.5.

His positive-29.3 range runs saved was also 10 points higher than the next closest everyday fielder.

Gutierrez’s UZR was the best in a season since the inception of the statistic in 2002.