The Most Inexplicable MVP Award in MLB History

• The American League in 1984 featured several great performances by legendary players. A 23 year-old Cal Ripken, coming off of his first MVP award the previous season, hit .304/.374/.510 with 27 HR, 37 doubles, and 7 triples while playing all 162 games. His 10.0 WAR that year was the second highest of his career, following only his 11.5 in 1991. He finished 27^th in American League MVP voting. Ripken's fellow Oriole Eddie Murray was almost as good. He played all 162 games as well, hitting .306/.410/.509 with 29 homers, 26 doubles, 110 RBI, and a league-leading 107 walks while winning the Gold Glove and Silver Slugger at first base. He finished with a career-high 7.1 WAR, and was 4^th in MVP voting. A 24 year old Lloyd Moseby hit .280/.368/.470 with 18 homers, 28 2B, 39 steals, 7.2 WAR, and led the league with 15 triples. He finished 22^nd in MVP voting. The always underrated Alan Trammell had a great season as well; his 6.7 WAR that year tied for the second-highest of his career. He hit .314/.382/.468 with 14 home runs, 34 doubles, and 19 steals while finishing with 2.2 dWAR (second among shortstops to Ripken's 3.6) and won the Gold Glove. There were some great pitching performances in the American League that year as well. Dave Stieb went 16-8 with a 2.83 ERA, led the MLB in innings pitched (267), ERA+ (146), and pitching WAR (5.6). He finished 7^th in Cy Young voting. His fellow Blue Jay Doyle Alexander went 17-7 with a 3.13 ERA and 3.8 WAR. He did not receive a single Cy Young vote. Out in Cleveland, Bert Blyleven was almost as good as Stieb, with a 19-7 record, a 2.87 ERA, 245 innings pitched, 144 ERA+, and 5.1 WAR. He finished third in Cy Young voting.

  

  Cal Ripken

  
  
• So who won the 1984 American League MVP? Was it Ripken, far and away the best player in either league? His teammate Murray? Allan Trammell, the best player on the Detroit Tigers, the MLB's best team? The answer: Willie Hernandez. Hernandez was the closer on the Tigers, and had a pretty good season. He finished 9-3 with a 1.92 ERA and 32 saves. His 4.8 WAR put him 9^th among all pitchers. He was a solid all-star player on the league's best team. His season should be remembered as such, but he won the MVP and Cy Young that year which would imply that his was one of the greatest seasons of all time. 

  

  • I have had this Topps card of Willie Hernandez since I was about 5. When I was that age I just thought he was a weird-looking player. Years later when I found out he had won the MVP, I knew something must have gone horribly wrong.

  
  
  

  

  More Hernandez cards. Between the hair, glasses, mustache, and giant wad of tobacco, I don't know if anyone has ever looked this bad on this many baseball cards.

• Generally, for a pitcher to win an MVP they have to be historically great. Here is the list of all pitchers who have won the MVP award since 1950:
  

  1. Clayton Kershaw 2014
  1. 21-3, 1.77 ERA, 7.1 WAR 
  2.  Justin Verlander 2011
  1. 24-5, 2.40 ERA, 8.4 WAR
  3.  Dennis Eckersley 1992
  1. 7-1, 1.91 ERA, 51 Saves, 2.9 WAR
  4.  Roger Clemens 1986
  1. 24-4, 2.48 ERA, 8.9 WAR 
  5. Willie Hernandez 1984
  1.  9-3, 1.92 ERA, 32 Saves, 4.8 WAR
  6.  Rollie Fingers 1981
  1. 6-3, 1.04 ERA, 28 Saves, 4.2 WAR
  7. Vida Blue 1971
  1.  24-8, 1.82 ERA, 9.0 WAR
  8. Bob Gibson 1968
  1. 22-9, 1.12 ERA, 11.2 WAR

  
  

  

  Bob Gibson, a deserving MVP

  
  
  

  1. Denny McLain 1968
  1. 31-6, 1.96 ERA, 7.4 WAR
  2.  Sandy Koufax 1963
  1.  25-5, 1.88 ERA, 10.7 WAR
  3.  Don Newcomb 1956
  1. 27-7, 3.06 ERA, 4.5 WAR
  4.  Bobby Shantz 1952
  1. 24-7, 2.48 ERA, 9.1 WAR
  5. Jim Konstanty 1950
  1. 16-7, 2.66 ERA, 22 Saves, 4.7 WAR

• So these MVP-winning pitchers fall into 3 distinct categories:
  • 1: Dominant pitchers during historically pitching-dominated eras (Koufax, McClain, Gibson, Blue, Verlander, Kershaw)
  • 2: Great pitchers in seasons without a dominant hitter (Clemens, Shantz, Fingers, Eckersly). Clemens and Shantz were the deserving winners in their years. When Rollie Fingers won he wasn't anywhere near the best player, but it was a weird strike season where teams only played about 105 games each and the best players by WAR in the AL were Dwight Evens (6.6), Rickey Henderson (6.6), and Buddy Bell (6.2). Since there was no great candidate, they gave it to the dominant closer with the cool name and cooler mustache who played on the league's best team. 1992 was a year with several dominant pitchers, with the American League's top three players by WAR being Clemens (8.8), Mike Mussina (8.2), and Luke Appier (8.1). So the MVP should have gone to one of those three, but there wasn't any great hitter in the American League that year to win the award.

    

    Rollie Fingers

    
    
  • 3: They were sick of giving it to the same couple players every year:
    • This is just a guess, but I think it explains Konstanty, Newcomb, and Hernandez. When Konstanty won in 1950, Jackie Robinson had won the previous year and Stan Musial had won 2 of the past 5. In 1956, Roy Campanella had won 3 of the last 5 and Willie Mays had won the previous year. In 1984 Cal Ripken deserved to win but had won it the previous year.
• Of all of these, Hernandez's win is still the hardest to explain. There was an absolutely dominant position player that year in Cal Ripken. Hernandez's team was the best in the league, but he was not their best player; Trammell, Chet Lemon, and Kirk Gibson finished with a higher WAR than he did, and Hall of Famer Lou Whittaker was not far behind. He certainly wasn't as valuable as Stieb or Blyleven. Even if you consider saves as an important statistical category, he was behind Bruce Sutter, Dan Quisenberry, Bill Caudill, and Lee Smith in total saves that year. He doesn't even really compare to the other two times a relief pitcher won the MVP. Relievers generally are not valuable enough to win MVP awards, since they do not affect the game anywhere near as much as a starter or an every-day player. For both of the other relievers who won MVP it was a bit of a career achievement award in years without a dominant hitter. When Eckersly won he was an 18-year vet who was already a sure-thing Hall of Famer, Fingers was a 13-year vet and also a guaranteed HOFer. When Hernandez won he was in the middle of a career that would mostly be spent as a pretty good middle reliever; his 4.8 WAR was an outlier in a career where his second best season was 3.2 WAR and his career average (including the 4.8) was 1.3 WAR per year. Without that season, his career is basically the same as former Phillies reliever Ryan Madson's (Madson averaged 1.1 WAR/season over 8 years, mostly as a middle reliever; removing his best year, Hernandez would have averaged 1.0 WAR/year over 12 seasons mostly as a middle reliever).

  

  The Ryan Madson card that came in the Phillies team pack I bought in 2006; great card but who knew he would go on to have a career as good as a guy who won both an MVP and a Cy Young?

  
  
• While he had a pretty good season in 1984, Willie Hernandez is almost certainly the worst player to ever win the MVP (and possibly the Cy Young) award. Cal Ripken should have been a no-brainier to win the AL MVP that year, and either Dave Stieb or Bert Blyleven should have taken home the Cy Young. Although the MVP and Cy Young awards, especially in that era, were pretty subjective and not always based on real evidence, they are still important and should go to the best player.Willie Hernandez was nowhere near the best player, and for that reason his 1984 American League MVP is the most inexplicable MVP award in MLB history.