Let’s not beat around the bush here, Aaron Judge is the American League MVP not Shohei Ohtani.
Yes, what Ohtani is doing is special and has never been done on the field before. Everyone should appreciate how special of a player he has been and what a tragedy that yet another phenom is showcasing his talents on a team like the Angels. This season however, Aaron Judge is leading ALL of baseball in Runs Scored, home runs (he has twenty more than Kyle Schwarber, who is in second with 40), RBIs, BB, IBB, OBP, SLG%, OPS, OPS+ and total bases. He is also on track to break the American League single season record for home runs (and in the eyes of this writer, all time due to a lack of performance enhancing drugs).
Those statistics are impressive in themselves, right? To add on to that he now has the highest batting average in the American League. Capping off the season winning the Triple Crown, MVP and setting the AL home run record and with no trace of steroids in his system, would be the greatest offensive season of all time. As great as Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Roger Maris, and the Babe were, none of them ever accomplished that feat.
Shohei Ohtani, meanwhile, is in the middle of the pack of league leaders in many offensive categories. He does not place in the top ten in offensive WAR or OPS+ which adjusts a player’s OPS taking different ballpark factors into account. The Angels being an absolute dumpster fire for most of the season does not aid Shohei’s case. Even when he contributes, like having multi home run games, the Angels still find a way to lose.
Ohtani has the 4th best WAR among pitchers and leads the league in strikeouts per nine innings, and is in the top ten FIP, ERA+, K/BB (strikeout to walk ratio). As well as he’s played, Ohtani has not helped the Angels as much as Judge has helped the Yankees. If the Angels did not have Ohtani on their roster, their standing in the American League West would remain by in large the same. If they were fighting for a Wild Card spot or contending with Houston for the division title with Ohtani leading the way, he would win MVP by a margin wider than the distance from LA to Tokyo. The Most Valuable Player award is not just how productive you are, but also how much your value contributes to helping the team win.
During the Angels’ fourteen game losing streak in June, which would end up being the beginning of their demise, Ohtani batted .192 in that span, striking out eighteen times in a span of 47 at bats. he would pitch nine innings and pitch to a 9 ERA in the two starts he made in that span, while the offense was only able to muster 4 runs across his two starts.
When the Yankees have been both on hot streaks and during their recent skid, the key to their success has been Judge. He singlehandedly kept the Yankees in first place in the AL east during the month of August as he was the only consistent bat in the lineup. Other players would come through on occasion, but he kept his torrid pursuit of the home run record and ensured the division lead did not slip away. He has come through when the team was firing on all cylinders and kept them afloat when they were coming apart at the seams.
You know, what an MVP does.
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