Yankees' Cam Schlittler, Rays' Junior Caminero Are Crashing Yordan Alvarez's AL MVP Party

Welcome to MLB's potentially permanent post-Aaron Judge MVP landscape. Now it's a three-horse AL MVP race, still undecided even in the last 10 days of the season.

It's Yordan Alvarez vs. Junior Caminero vs. Cam Schlittler. Choose your fighter.

If there is a favorite, it's Alvarez. He's had one hand on the AL MVP for most of the season, and FanDuel is ready to assume he'll eventually get the other hand on it. Here are their current odds:

1. Yordan Alvarez, Houston Astros: -20000
2. Junior Caminero, Tampa Bay Rays: +1400
3. Cam Schlittler, New York Yankees: +7000
4. Bobby Witt Jr., Kansas City Royals: +10000

However, the tide is turning. Yankees manager Aaron Boone is openly pondering whether Schlittler deserves the MVP. And after hitting two walk-off home runs in four games, Caminero has turned a low hum of an MVP case into a loud scream.

Is this an erasure of what Alvarez has done? Or are there genuine cases for Caminero and Schlittler? Let's discuss.

Yordan Alvarez's AL MVP Case Is Ironclad… Sort Of

The Gist: He leads the AL in everything, but his case does break down upon examination.

Alvarez came into 2026 with a conundrum. He was clearly one of baseball's best hitters, yet he had never led the AL in any key statistical category.

Talk about making up for lost time. The 29-year-old has stayed healthy and mashed all year, resulting in AL-leading marks in:

• AVG: .310
• OBP: .428
• SLG: .594
• OPS: 1.022
• OPS+: 188

Alvarez also has 39 home runs and 98 RBI, putting him just two and four off the AL-leading paces set by Caminero and Pete Alonso. We're still on Triple Crown watch with Alvarez.

There's just one problem: Alvarez has gone kind of cold.

That is, "cold" relative to his own standards. Through the end of July, Alvarez had a 1.077 OPS and 35 homers. Since August 1, he has a .860 OPS with four homers. Nick Sogard has more homers since then, and he began his major league career with 252 plate appearances without going deep even once.

If this year's MVP voters want to hold the AL West against Alvarez, that wouldn't be unfair. It's a historically bad division, and Alvarez has benefited to the tune of an MLB-high 447 plate appearances against teams with losing records through play on Tuesday.

He has a 1.118 OPS against those teams, compared to a .817 OPS against all others. That's an unflattering 301-point gap.

Junior Caminero Has the Vibes

The Gist: There's more here than just the home runs.

Caminero's 41 homers are the only true statistical advantage he has over Alvarez. Unless, of course, you want to count double plays grounded into. For the second year in a row, Caminero leads in that category, too.

Aside from that, Alvarez has a 1.024 OPS vs. Caminero's .897 OPS. It's also Alvarez's 6.1 rWAR vs. Caminero's 5.6 rWAR.

So what does Caminero's AL MVP case come down to? Vibes, mostly.

There's only a minuscule difference between Caminero's performance against losing teams (.908 OPS) and winning teams (.880 OPS). That has mattered to a Rays squad that built its AL-best 92-59 record in part by going 38-24 against other winning teams.

This is a form of clutchness in itself, and some argue it matters more than Alvarez's generic blend of clutchness. Even there, the comparison between the two is basically Great vs. Greater. In high-leverage spots, for example, Caminero has a .958 OPS to Alvarez's 1.190 OPS. Nothing wrong with either one.

The other side of the ball matters, too. Caminero hasn't started even one game at designated hitter, compared to 126 for Alvarez. While Caminero hardly has a sterling reputation at third base, Mike Petriello of MLB.com noted that he has moved into positive territory in Fielding Run Value since the start of June.

Cam Schlittler Is More Than an Also-Ran

The Gist: According to one stat, he should be the favorite.

Aaron Judge? He knows a thing or three about MVP awards. So what does he think about the Yankees' right-handed ace winning it this year?

"They've got a Cy Young Award for a reason—best pitcher in the game," Judge said, per Chris Kirschner of The Athletic. "He's got my vote, definitely, for the Cy Young."

Harsh… but fair? Not if you look at Schlittler's ranks on the AL leaderboard! He's the leader in:

• ERA: 1.95
• ERA+: 216
• WHIP: 0.904
• WAR: 7.0

Those first three are impressive marks for a pitcher. That last one is impressive, period. By rWAR, Schlittler literally is the most valuable player in the AL.

This isn't necessarily an automatic mic drop for MVP voters. As Brian Murphy of MLB.com noted, eight full-time pitchers have led the AL in rWAR over the last 30 years, and only one (Justin Verlander in 2011) won the MVP.

Context matters, though. In this case, Schlittler has been a constant in a season otherwise marked by turmoil for the Yankees. He's allowed two earned runs or fewer in 25 of his 31 starts, making him the only pitcher who can claim that. The Yankees are 19-6 in those games.

Predicting Who Comes Out on Top

The Gist: It could be close.

Here's the thing about Alvarez as the heavy AL MVP favorite: He's the favorite because he should be.

We talked about the numbers. What we didn't talk about is how screwed the Astros would be without him. For example, they are 20-14 in games where he's hit at least one home run. Eliminate or greatly reduce those 34 games, and they're not hanging onto the AL West lead with a 76-76 record.

It should also work in Alvarez's favor that there isn't a united front behind Caminero or Schlittler. They could end up merely splitting whatever votes don't go to Alvarez. And if any of the three is going to get more than one-third of the bunch, it's probably Alvarez.

Even so, it's hard to ignore the feeling that Alvarez's case is more precarious than it should be.

Whereas his MVP creds peaked in July and have been in stasis ever since, Caminero and Schlittler have been busy strengthening theirs. They also play on better teams in a better division that tends to have more eyes on it. I'm told they call it "East Coast bias."

Nobody likes boring predictions, so here goes with a bold call for how the AL MVP voting will play out:

1. Junior Caminero
2. Yordan Alvarez
3. Cam Schlittler

I'm caught between thinking Caminero shouldn't win it and thinking he shouldn't not win it. What's clear is that he wants the AL MVP and is pushing hard for it. Those two walk-offs are just two of four homers he's hit in his last 10 games. It doesn't make for a bad narrative that it's service of a Rays team that is outpacing a Yankees team that is spending three times as much money on payroll.

So, congratulations to Junior Caminero. Or, sorry for the jinx. It depends on what actually happens.

Stats courtesy of Baseball Reference, FanGraphs and Baseball Savant.