Major League Baseball hands out its principal awards this week, with the Baseball Writers’ Association of America adding a new Reliever of the Year Award for each league. MLB Network will televise the nightly presentations at 7 p.m. ET Monday through Thursday, starting with Rookie of the Year and concluding with MVP on Thursday, while a live awards ceremony from Las Vegas will air Wednesday at 8 p.m. ET.
The AL MVP finalists are Yordan Alvarez of the Houston Astros, Junior Caminero of the Tampa Bay Rays and Bobby Witt Jr. of the Kansas City Royals. According to AXE, qualifying AL hitters who ranked second through sixth posted OPS+ figures of 153, 149, 148, 146 and 144; Alvarez led that group at 190, sweeping the slash categories and falling one home run and seven RBIs short of a Triple Crown.
AXE credited Alvarez with pacing AL hitters in win probability added (6.9), a mark described as 68% better than the second-place finisher, Pete Alonso. The Astros finished 81-81 and barely reached the postseason; the analysis in the source text said they would have been a lottery team without Alvarez. Broadcaster Doolittle’s pick for AL MVP was Alvarez.
Bobby Witt Jr. was described as likely to remain a regular finalist owing to his multi-faceted value, even in a season that was, by his standards, less dominant. AXE noted a discrepancy for Caminero: he ranked fourth in the AL in batting runs above average but 12th in win probability added, a situational-hitting issue that the AXE metrics flagged despite his selection by BBWAA voters.
The NL MVP finalists are Pete Crow-Armstrong of the Chicago Cubs, Shohei Ohtani of the Los Angeles Dodgers and Brice Turang of the Milwaukee Brewers. AXE and the BBWAA were in agreement on those finalists. The source material says Crow-Armstrong surged in June with a 1.249 OPS for the month, overtook Ohtani in AXE by early August and finished one of the most notable two-way seasons in recent memory, while Ohtani battled injuries and had limited impact in October.
