Front-page contributors to SB Nation websites were asked to cast ballots after the season for the awards we're all used to seeing. Here is the other award handed out with interest to Twins fans.
American League Most Valuable Player: Joe Mauer
Talk about a surprise! For Twins fans, this isn't necessarily out of order as it wouldn't be most of our first choices. Joe Mauer is one of three Twins who deserved some credit for MVP, and it looks like the rest of SB Nation agreed which Twins deserved that credit.
Points Name
175 Joe Mauer
152 Derek Jeter
127 David Ortiz
98 Jermaine Dye
81 Justin Morneau
80 Johan Santana
75 Travis Hafner
62 Grady Sizemore
54 Frank Thomas
33 Vladamir Guerrero
All in all, there were 26 players who received votes, but any player beneath Guerrero (number ten in MVP balloting) was a dubious vote at best. You will notice that three Twins pierce the Top 10, as do two Indians. Surprisingly there are no Tigers, although four players from Detroit did receive votes.
The largest surprise isn't that Mauer won, or that someone beat Derek Jeter, but that Frank Thomas came in ninth! One first place vote, two seconds and one fourth, fifth, seventh, eighth and ninth. This is the player who, for $500,000 guaranteed, hit .270/.381/.545 with 39 homers and 114 RBI, smack dab in the middle of a sub-par Athletic offense. I shudder to imagine where Oakland would have been without the threat of The Big Hurt's bat in the middle of that order.
National League Most Valuable Player: Albert Pujols
Um, yeah. No real surprise here. The only other real, legitimate threat to take this prize would have been Ryan Howard, but he was sitting at home watch the playoffs in October, and that seems to make a big difference in how people vote.
Points Name
416 Albert Pujols
264 Ryan Howard
190 Carlos Beltran
185 Miguel Cabrera
172 Lance Berkman
We're stopping at five in the NL, because only one other player received a first place vote (Alfonso Soriano), and he didn't even clear 80 points.
Pujols had another stellar year, batting .331/.431/.671 (YES, HE SLUGGED .671!!), with 49 homers and 137 RBI. His main competition, Howard, hit .313/.425/.659 with 58 homers and 149 RBI.
Who would you have voted for? Does Joe Mauer deserve an MVP award (as fake as it is from a bunch of baseball nerds/fanatics/obsessives) over other Twins Justin Morneau and Johan Santana?