MLB Awards Week is a wrap.
As we look ahead to 2024 and await some of the offseason’s biggest free agent signings (where will you go, Shohei Ohtani?), baseball celebrated the best players (and managers) in the game during the 2023 regular season.
The week started off with Baltimore’s Gunnar Henderson unanimously winning American League Rookie of the Year honors and Arizona’s Corbin Carroll becoming a unanimous selection in the National League. Next up, Henderson’s skipper, Brandon Hyde, won AL Manager of the Year, with Miami’s Skip Schumaker taking home the NL silverware.
On Wednesday, San Diego’s Blake Snell took home his second Cy Young Award — this time in the NL, after having previously won in the AL in 2018 — while the Yankees’ Gerrit Cole unanimously won the AL’s Cy Young, the first in his career.
Finally, on Thursday, MLB history was made as Ohtani earned his second AL MVP Award in three seasons and Atlanta’s Ronald Acuna Jr. rode an unprecedented 40/70 campaign to land his first MVP trophy — both players winning unanimously.
Here’s everything you need to know about this week’s awards, from the final voting tallies to analysis on each winner from ESPN’s Bradford Doolittle.
Jump to … :
Rookie of the Year: AL | NL
Manager of the Year: AL | NL
Cy Young: AL | NL
MVP: AL | NL
American League MVP
Winner: Shohei Ohtani, Los Angeles Angels
Final tally: Ohtani, Angels 420 (30 first-place votes); Corey Seager, Rangers 264; Marcus Semien, Rangers 216; Julio Rodriguez, Mariners 197; Kyle Tucker, Astros 178; Yandy Diaz, Rays 137; Bobby Witt Jr., Royals 83; Gunnar Henderson, Orioles 77; Adley Rutschman, Orioles 50; Jose Ramirez, Guardians 40; Gerrit Cole, Yankees 30; Luis Robert Jr., White Sox 21; Yordan Alvarez, Astros 16; Adolis Garcia, Rangers 14; Aaron Judge, Yankees 7; Bo Bichette, Blue Jays 5; J.P. Crawford, Mariners 5; Cal Raleigh, Mariners 2; Rafael Devers, Red Sox 2; Isaac Paredes, Rays 2; Sonny Gray, Twins 2; Alex Bregman, Astros 1; Josh Naylor, Guardians 1
Experts’ pick: Ohtani (13 votes) (unanimous choice)
Doolittle’s take: This race was ostensibly over by the middle of August, with Ohtani building up such a big lead in his dual role that no one else came close, even though Ohtani’s season ended nearly a month early.
On Aug. 9, when Ohtani made his last full-fledged start on the mound (he made a brief four-out start on Aug. 23), he had already piled up 9.0 bWAR, 3.1 more than any other player in the majors. Ronald Acuna Jr., who had an MVP campaign of his own in the NL, was at 5.9.
At that point, Ohtani’s 5.5 bWAR for his hitting alone would have given him the AL lead, before we even started tacking on his performance on the mound. Which, incidentally, was terrific — he was third in the AL behind Cy Young winner Cole and Texas’ Nathan Eovaldi with 3.5 pitching bWAR, the same figure posted by the NL leader, Cy Young winner Blake Snell.
Ohtani finished with 10.0 bWAR, 1.7 more than anyone else even though he made his last appearance on Sept. 3. He still managed to lead the AL in homers (44), on-base percentage (.412), slugging (.654), OPS (1.066) and total bases (325). He even batted over .300 — one of just seven MLB qualifiers to do so — for the first time in his career. On the mound, he went 10-5 with a 3.14 ERA over 23 starts with 167 strikeouts, whiffing 11.4 batters per nine innings.
As has been written so many times, we’ve just never seen anything like this. This was peak Ohtani, a unicorn of a superstar at the absolute height of his powers. In a way, that’s kind of bittersweet. With Ohtani undergoing Tommy John surgery for a second time, we don’t know what his future on the mound will look like. And his magical 2023 season, had it lasted a little longer, could have firmly established itself in the minds of many as the best single season a player has ever had.
Ohtani is far from done, and some team will soon be opening up the vault for him in a major way. But there is no guarantee that Ohtani will be able to replicate or surpass what he has done the past couple of years. If he does, we have a lot to look forward to, no matter what uniform he ends up wearing.
Seager’s season is a bit of what-if as well. His eye-popping slash line (.327/.390/.623) included an AL-high 42 doubles and 33 homers even though he got into just 119 games because of injury. With Ohtani’s season ending when it did, if Seager had repeated his 151 games played from 2022, who knows how this race might have shaken out. If you prorate his bWAR to 151 games, it’s still “only” 8.7, so perhaps nothing would have changed. It would have been nice to find out. Seager will console himself with another World Series MVP trophy.
Here’s how my AXE leaderboard had it:
1. Ohtani, Angels (159 AXE)
2. Seager, Rangers (141)
3. Semien, Rangers (137)
4. Tucker, Astros (133)
5. Rodriguez, Mariners (132)
Note: AXE is an index that creates a consensus rating from the leading value metrics (WAR, from Fangraphs and Baseball Reference) and contextual metrics (win probability added and championship probability added, both from Baseball Reference).
MVP must-reads:
Shohei Ohtani Tracker: Where will MLB’s top free agent land?
Is Corey Seager the new Mr. October?
National League MVP
Winner: Ronald Acuna Jr., Atlanta Braves
Final tally: Acuna Jr., Braves 420 (30 first-place votes); Mookie Betts, Dodgers 270; Freddie Freeman, Dodgers 227; Matt Olson, Braves 223; Corbin Carroll, Diamondbacks 165; Juan Soto, Padres 106; Austin Riley, Braves 68; Luis Arraez, Marlins 67; Francisco Lindor, Mets 52; Cody Bellinger, Cubs 49; William Contreras, Brewers 39; Bryce Harper, Nationals 36; Blake Snell, Padres 16; Fernando Tatis Jr., Padres 5; Ha-Seong Kim, Padres 5; Ozzie Albies, Braves 4; Logan Webb, Giants 3; Pete Alonso, Mets 3; Marcell Ozuna, Braves 2; Devin Williams, Brewers 2; Dansby Swanson, Cubs 2; Kyle Schwarber, Phillies 2; Zac Gallen, Diamondbacks 1; Christian Walker, Diamondbacks 1; TJ Friedl, Reds 1; Nick Castellanos, Phillies 1
Experts’ picks: Acuna (12 votes), Betts (1)
Doolittle’s take: In some ways, the quality of this year’s NL MVP race is illustrated not by what the three finalists did but what the fourth-place finisher did. Poor Matt Olson banged 54 homers, drove in 139 runs, led the NL in slugging, played in all 162 games for Atlanta and rolled up 7.4 bWAR. And he didn’t even get to be on MLB Network’s MVP announcement show, which features the finalists.
Betts was more or less even steven with Acuna in the value metrics, and some have pointed out that he should get even more credit because his ability to flex from right field — where he is a generational defender — to both middle infield positions was of immeasurable value to a Dodgers team that needed help in that area. It’s a valid point.
Still, sometimes we can overthink these things, and Acuna’s season is what an MVP season should look like. Slash line: .337/.416/.596, and who knows where he pulled that batting average from after hitting .277 over his first five MLB seasons. He led the NL in hits (217, the most by any player in nine years) and runs (149, the most by any player in 23 years). He hammered 41 homers and drove in 106 — from the leadoff spot — rolling up 383 total bases. And, oh yeah, he stole 73 bases in baseball’s new thievery environment, becoming the first 40/50, 40/60 and 40/70 player.
This was Acuna’s age-25 season, and while it’ll be awfully hard to top what he did in 2023, this is just the start of what should be the prime of his career. If Acuna stays healthy, he will be putting up mind-boggling numbers over the next few years, and this isn’t the last time we’ll be talking about him in the MVP race.
Still, this was not a no-brainer. Betts has every claim to the title of baseball’s best position player and perhaps best overall player now that the pitching half of Ohtani is on the shelf. Freeman, the metronomic superstar, continues to bolster his Hall of Fame résumé with each passing year. The NL is so loaded, players like Olson might find out in the years to come that 50-plus homers and 130-plus RBIs just aren’t enough in today’s senior circuit.
Here’s how my AXE leaderboard had it:
1. Acuna Jr., Braves (152)
2. Betts, Dodgers (151)
3. Freeman, Dodgers (144)
4. Olson, Braves (141)
5. Carroll, Diamondbacks (137)
MVP must-reads:
Inside Ronald Acuna Jr.’s return to MVP form
How Mookie Betts became a Dodgers … infielder
