The Evolution of MVPs

Two things right off the top. First, I might talk about axes in this edition, so please be aware in advance that it refers to the plural of “axis” and not a bunch of sharp, chopping implements. Though I will say that it would be awesome if every MVP won an axe as part of the award. That’s much more cool than a plaque.

Second, I spent way too much time sitting in front of a big Excel spreadsheet as I pulled all of this information together, so now you folks have to suffer through a bunch of charts. I’m sorry about that, but it really was the best way to summarize the information and show where the outliers are and how the trends have developed over time.

The subject today is the history of the MVP. Not chapter and verse about who won it and why, but more of an overview of the factors that have gone into it, and how those have shifted in important ways over time. And by factors, what I really mean is the age-old argument about whether the MVP is for the best player, or for the player who helps his team win the most. Those are not the same thing, as we’ve seen over the years.

That argument has been going on for a long time, and for quite a while it was really clear that the folks who made these decisions cared a lot more about team success than individual accomplishments on the field. To illustrate that, I’m going to show the first chart, but let me explain it first.