Who Should Win the MVP?

By: Christian Puglielli (cp1685@mynsu.nova.edu)

The Most Valuable Player (MVP) award is given to the player that provides the most value to a team. That player does not necessarily have to be the player that put up the better numbers. That is why team success is valued in this award, because it, for the most part, is given to an irreplaceable player that contributed most to a team’s success. Would that team have made a playoff run without this player? That is the real question. The MVP is given out to one American League player and one National League player. Also a big side note is that this award is often given to a position player, although it can be given to a pitcher. This is mainly because many view the Cy Young award as a sort of “MVP award for pitchers,” although the criteria for that award is more about who put better numbers.

For the American League, the top 5 candidates are most likely J.D. Martinez, Mookie Betts, Jose Ramirez, Alex Bregman, and Mike Trout. Out of these players, I believe that J.D. Martinez should be the MVP. I normally do not pick a player from a team with multiple MVP candidates because that usually brings up the case that one’s impact may not have been felt as much. But I have to make an exception this time. J.D. Martinez has flat out had an amazing year. And although he may not win the Triple Crown, he is very close. The Triple Crown has to be the hardest award to achieve in baseball because it requires that you lead the league in Batting Average, Home Runs, and RBIs (Runs Batted In). That feat alone should be enough to win an MVP on its own, but his impact for the Red Sox lineup is extraordinary. It is no secret that he is a major part of the reason why they have won the American League East Division as easily as they did, despite having a team in the Yankees that were seen as being as close to a super team as you can get. Without Martinez, the Red Sox may have not won the division, and could have possibly slipped to the Wild Card. His impact is too great to ignore.

For the National League, the top 5 candidates are most likely Javier Baez, Christian Yelich, Matt Carpenter, Jacob DeGrom, and Nolan Arenado. I believe that the MVP should go to Christian Yelich. For some similar reasons to J.D. Martinez, he has come very close to winning the Triple Crown for the National League. The difference here is that he has no teammate that deserves MVP consideration. He has single-handedly gotten the Milwaukee Brewers to the playoffs. Without him, they might have slipped up and allowed a team like the St. Louis Cardinals, to take them over in the division and Wild Card. It is interesting to mention DeGrom however. As mentioned before, the award does not normally go to a pitcher. But DeGrom’s numbers this year have been historically great, and does garner attention. However, his team (New York Mets) was nowhere near a contender, and there are definitely plenty of deserving position players so he would just have to settle with a, likely unanimous, Cy Young award.

Christian Yelich 2018 SUMMARY

WAR

7.4

BA

.324

HR

36

RBI

109

SB

21

OPS

.998

 

References:

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/m/martijd02.shtml

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/y/yelicch01.shtml

 

For more articles like these, check out the links below:

https://aroundthehornbaseball.music.blog/should-the-designated-hitter-be-used-by-both-leagues/

https://aroundthehornbaseball.music.blog/a-new-playoff-format/