Biggest MVP snubs ever

[Carter08]

Originally Posted by Deertick

But in this case, even your hometown writers didn't vote you #1.

Guy was buried on the Expos. I happen to love Expos history but they lacked the national attention other teams received. If Carter had that kind of a season on the Yankees probably would have gotten AL MVP and immediate induction into Cooperstown.

[mrreality68]

Originally Posted by Carter08

Guy was buried on the Expos. I happen to love Expos history but they lacked the national attention other teams received. If Carter had that kind of a season on the Yankees probably would have gotten AL MVP and immediate induction into Cooperstown.

That I cannot disagree with. As I mentioned I/We do not know the external factors in the voting and a small market team could be a disadvantage in the voting. Also having other worthy team mates can also dilute support for Gary Carter(Andrea Dawson was on the team and he batted .301 with 23 HR, 107 runs, 83 RBI and even stole 39 bases)

Another big factor for Dale might be TBS. Owned by Ted Turner all the Braves games were broadcast on that station while other games of your local team were not always. So the Braves and Murphy had National Exposure more than other players.

Regardless many worthy candidates but Dale Won.

[SteveWhite]

It is interesting no one has posted about Andre Dawson winning in 1987 for the last place Cubs. Cardinals won the East and the Giants won the West. The Mets and Expos each won over 90 games. Ozzie Smith or Will Clark not worthy candidates. From the voting it looks like Smith lost some votes to Jack Clark from his own team.

[G1911]

X won the MVP
Y did not win the MVP
X deserves the MVP over Y because he finished much higher in the vote.

The supposition is illogical, unless we conclude that the MVP voters are infallible. If rank in the MVP determines who actually deserved the MVP, every MVP vote has been correct and every single finish has always been in the correct order or close to the correct order. If we acknowledge that this is not the case, then the fact that X finished Z slots over Y is irrelevant.

Whether a player finished 1st, 12th, or 117th doesn’t logically matter because the question is who deserves the MVP, not who actually won.


I would pick Carter over Murphy that year, but I do not see any robbery here. Schmidt had a good case that year too.

[RICHIEHARRIS]

An issue I have always thought about was 1979 when there was not one...but two....MVPs. (Hernandez and Stargell).
The 'M' in MVP is for MOST.
How do you have two MOSTS?

[tod41]

Originally Posted by SteveWhite

It is interesting no one has posted about Andre Dawson winning in 1987 for the last place Cubs. Cardinals won the East and the Giants won the West. The Mets and Expos each won over 90 games. Ozzie Smith or Will Clark not worthy candidates. From the voting it looks like Smith lost some votes to Jack Clark from his own team.

Jack Clark should have been the MVP hands down. He missed time due to an injury and that cost him. He was the main reason the Cardinals won that year. That and Doc Gooden's drug problem and the injuries to the Mets' pitching staff.

[rats60]

Originally Posted by Carter08

Guy was buried on the Expos. I happen to love Expos history but they lacked the national attention other teams received. If Carter had that kind of a season on the Yankees probably would have gotten AL MVP and immediate induction into Cooperstown.

That didn't hurt his teammate Al Oliver who finished 3rd in MVP voting. It was more likely that the voters under valued defense. Oliver was the better offensive player, but a stiff on defense, while Carter was a gold glove winning catcher.

[mrreality68]

Originally Posted by rats60

That didn't hurt his teammate Al Oliver who finished 3rd in MVP voting. It was more likely that the voters under valued defense. Oliver was the better offensive player, but a stiff on defense, while Carter was a gold glove winning catcher.

very good point. Some how I forgot about Al Oliver.

[cgjackson222]

Sorry to bump my own thread, but we were talking about Steve Garvey in a thread on the front page, and I was looking at his MVP year in '74.

Garvey wasn’t even the best player on his team—that would be Jim Wynn.
More than a dozen players deserved the award more than Garvey, but none as much as Mike Schmidt.

Garvey's slash line: .312/.342/.469 with an OPS of .811 and an OPS+ of 130.
Garvey had 21 HRs and 111 RBIs.

Schmidt's slash line: .282/.395/.546 w/ an OPS of .941 and an OPS+ of 158.
Schmidt led the League in HRs with 36 as well as slugging.

Schmidt even stole 23 bases to Garvey's 5.

Schmidt was an outstanding fielder at third base, and Garvey, despite winning a Gold Glove, was a below average fielder at first base.

Schmidt's league leading WAR of 9.8 was more than double Garvey's 4.4.

And Schmidt came in 6th place in MVP voting.

[brian1961]

I think I remember reading that Commissioner Ford Frick was so disturbed over the 1952 NL MVP voting, he worked towards creating the Cy Young Award. I am sure the Cubs would have been nothing were it not for their slugger, Hank Sauer. Be that as it may, the Phillies' great iron man, Robin Roberts, went 28-7 with the fourth place Phils.

Another snub was the 1969 National League MVP voting. I like Willie McCovey, who had a great season. Regardless, second place vote getter Tom Seaver had a brilliant season, and without Tom, the Mets would have been nothing. He was the player his teammates constantly looked to for confidence, inspiration, and leadership. Not taking anything away from Manager Hodges, but as far as the Met players go, their go-to teammate was Seaver.

What does it matter now, the voting occurred late in '69. There might have been some jealousy amongst the writers about all the adulation, attention, and glamour that was coming Seaver's way, what with his gorgeous loving wife, Nancy. --- Brian Powell

[D. Bergin]

Originally Posted by cgjackson222

Sorry to bump my own thread, but we were talking about Steve Garvey in a thread on the front page, and I was looking at his MVP year in '74.

Garvey wasn’t even the best player on his team—that would be Jim Wynn.
More than a dozen players deserved the award more than Garvey, but none as much as Mike Schmidt.

Garvey's slash line: .312/.342/.469 with an OPS of .811 and an OPS+ of 130.
Garvey had 21 HRs and 111 RBIs.

Schmidt's slash line: .282/.395/.546 w/ an OPS of .941 and an OPS+ of 158.
Schmidt led the League in HRs with 36 as well as slugging.

Schmidt even stole 23 bases to Garvey's 5.

Schmidt was an outstanding fielder at third base, and Garvey, despite winning a Gold Glove, was a below average fielder at first base.

Schmidt's league leading WAR of 9.8 was more than double Garvey's 4.4.

And Schmidt came in 6th place in MVP voting.

Point taken on Schmidt being the better player. That's a given I think.

Aside from the fact OPS+ and WAR were long from springing into existence to assess players on, I've gotta dispute the "Below Average Fielder at 1st Base" statement.

I'm not a Garvey mark by any means, but Garvey was 1st in the league in Range Factor and 2nd in the league in Fielding% at 1st Base. I'm not sure what else he's supposed to do to appease the WAR Gods.

It still kind of blows my mind that DH's get more of a benefit of the doubt in regards to Defensive WAR then 1st Basemen. A defensively average 1st Baseman who plays the field everyday is seen as a less valuable commodity defensively than a DH by the WAR metric.

The only defensive position on the field that sees more action than the 1st baseman is the Catcher. Yankees were blessed with a string of fantastic defensive 1st basemen in Don Mattingly, Tino Martinez and Mark Teixeira.

However between Martinez and Teixeira we were cursed with Jason Giambi. An Offensive juggernaut and an OBP god in his prime, but an absolute goofball at 1st base. When they couldn't push him into the DH hole, which was often, since the Yankees have always loved to employ multiple DH types every year, the entire infields morale would take a hit.

From the eye test anyways, it seems obvious to me, that an excellent 1st Baseman takes a lot of pressure off the rest of the infield.

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by cgjackson222

Sorry to bump my own thread, but we were talking about Steve Garvey in a thread on the front page, and I was looking at his MVP year in '74.

Garvey wasn’t even the best player on his team—that would be Jim Wynn.
More than a dozen players deserved the award more than Garvey, but none as much as Mike Schmidt.

Garvey's slash line: .312/.342/.469 with an OPS of .811 and an OPS+ of 130.
Garvey had 21 HRs and 111 RBIs.

Schmidt's slash line: .282/.395/.546 w/ an OPS of .941 and an OPS+ of 158.
Schmidt led the League in HRs with 36 as well as slugging.

Schmidt even stole 23 bases to Garvey's 5.

Schmidt was an outstanding fielder at third base, and Garvey, despite winning a Gold Glove, was a below average fielder at first base.

Schmidt's league leading WAR of 9.8 was more than double Garvey's 4.4.

And Schmidt came in 6th place in MVP voting.

The Dodgers won 102 games in 1974 and in those days, I think it was more likely for a player on a division winning team to be voted MVP even if someone else had better stats but was on a team that missed the playoffs.

[cgjackson222]

Originally Posted by jayshum

The Dodgers won 102 games in 1974 and in those days, I think it was more likely for a player on a division winning team to be voted MVP even if someone else had better stats but was on a team that missed the playoffs.

Then it should have been Jim Wynn.

[G1911]

The AL was also a bad choice in 1974, there were numerous guys better than Jeff Burroughs that year, ignoring new analytics that determine this and just using the stats of that time.

[jayshum]

Originally Posted by cgjackson222

Then it should have been Jim Wynn.

Garvey led Wynn in hits and batting average by a lot and RBIs by 3 in 1974. Wynn had 11 more home runs and 9 more runs scored. Garvey was also a gold glove winner that year so he was considered to be a good fielder (apparently still up for debate now). Those were the stats considered most important back then. People weren't looking at OBP and OPS or other advanced metrics. Based on those stats, it's not surprising Garvey won the MVP over Wynn.