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The Major League Baseball Most Valuable Player Award (MVP) is a Major League Baseball (MLB) award given each year to one outstanding player in the American and National Leagues. Since 1931, it has been awarded by the Baseball Writers Association of America (BBWAA). The winner receives the Kenesaw Mountain Landis Memorial Baseball Award. The award is named in honor of the first MLB commissioner. Landis served from 1920 to 1944. MVP voting takes place before the postseason. The results are not announced until after the World Series. The BBWAA began asking three writers in each league city in 1938. They made that number two per league city in 1961.
First basemen, with 34winners, have won the most MVPs among infielders. This is followed by second basemen(16), third basemen(15), and shortstops(15). Of the twenty-fourpitchers who have won the award, fifteen are right-handed while nine are left-handed. Walter Johnson, Carl Hubbell, and Hal Newhouser are the only pitchers to win more than once. Newhouser won his in back-to-back seasons, 1944 and 1945.Hank Greenberg, Stan Musial, Alex Rodriguez, and Robin Yount have won at different positions. Rodriguez is the only player to win the award with two different teams at two different positions. Barry Bonds has won the most often(seven times). He has also won it the most times in a row (2001–2004). Jimmie Foxx was the first player to win more than once. Nine players have won three times and 19 have won twice.
Ty Cobb won the first American League Chalmers Award in 1911 and was at the center of the controversy over the previous season's award.
Before the 1910 season, Hugh Chalmers of Chalmers Automobile announced he would present a Chalmers Model 30 automobile to the player with the highest batting average in Major League Baseball at the end of the season. The 1910 race for best average in the American League was between the Detroit Tigers' widely disliked Ty Cobb and Nap Lajoie of the Cleveland Indians. On the last day of the season, Lajoie overtook Cobb's batting average with seven bunt hits against the St. Louis Browns. American League President Ban Johnson said a recalculation showed that Cobb had won the race anyway. Chalmers ended up giving cars to both players.
The following season, Chalmers created the Chalmers Award. A committee of baseball writers were to come together after the season to determine the "most important and useful player to the club and to the league". Since the award was not as useful at advertising as Chalmers had hoped, it was discontinued after 1914.
Babe Ruth was ineligible for the award in his famous 1927 season by the rules of the American League award because he had previously won in 1923.
In 1922 the American League created a new award to honor "the baseball player who is of the greatest all-around service to his club". Winners, voted on by a committee of eight baseball writers chaired by James Crusinberry, received a bronze medal and a cash prize. Voters were required to select one player from each team. Player-managers and prior award winners were could not win. These problems resulted in the award's being dropped after 1928. The National League award, without these restrictions, lasted from 1924 to 1929.
Baseball Writers Association of America's Most Valuable Player (1931–present)
The BBWAA first awarded the modern MVP after the 1931 season, took the format the National League used to distribute its league award. One writer in each city with a team filled out a ten-place ballot. Ten points were given for the recipient of a first-place vote, nine for a second-place vote, and so on. In 1938, the BBWAA raised the amount of voters to three per city and gave 14 points for a first-place vote. The only significant change since then happened in 1961, when the number of voters was lowered to two per league city.
Jimmie Foxx was the first player to win three MVP awards.Willie Mays won the award in 1954 and 1965 with the same team in different cities.Barry Bonds' seven MVPs are the most for any individual player.Alex Rodriguez won the award with two different teams at two different positions.Albert Pujols won the award three times, all at first base with the St. Louis Cardinals.