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AL MVP race

The American League MVP Race With A Month To Go

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The American League MVP race, at least in the eyes of the media, seems to have been narrowed to two candidates. Los Angeles Angels’ centerfielder Mike Trout and Detroit Tigers’ third baseman Miguel Cabrera. I find it hard to argue with the merits of either candidate, but before we barrel into September and lose sight of everyone else, can we give the field a proper vetting? That’s our purpose here today.

The American League MVP Race

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It’s time for midseason MVP honors and TheSportsNotebook begins today with the American League, where we’ll rank the Top 10, based on current performance to the All-Star break. Before we get into the rankings, let me preface by saying there are two criteria that don’t matter nearly as much to me as they do to the actual voters. I don’t particularly care if someone is on a playoff team. In an ideal world I’d like to see team success be a part of the equation, but not only is it not essential (this is, after all, an individual award. We have these little things called the playoffs & World Series as team rewards), I also define it more broadly, to include things helping a surprise team achieve a winning record or some other non-playoff benchmark no one expected them to get. And I don’t have a bias against starting pitchers. They may only go every fifth day, but the impact on the games they do play is easily enough to offset that. So here we go with TheSportsNotebook’s Top 10 in the AL MVP race…