2016 MLB Awards Race Odds Updates with 3 Weeks to Go
With the exception of the Rookie of the Year Award in each league, here's hoping that those voting for MLB's biggest individual honors in 2016 have been filling out their ballots in pencil and not pen.
The races for Comeback Player of the Year, Manager of the Year, Cy Young Award and MVP in the American League and National League remain volatile, with hot-and-cold streaks shuffling the odds and, even this late in the season, adding and subtracting contenders from the field.
While statistics remain the driving force in calculating the odds on the pages that follow, both gut feeling and past voting trends played a part as well.
Let's take a look at how the races stack up with only three weeks left in the 2016 regular season.
AL Comeback Player of the Year
1 of 10
The Field
- Ian Desmond, CF, Texas Rangers: 11-9
- Rick Porcello, SP, Boston Red Sox: 11-9
- Robinson Cano, 2B, Seattle Mariners: 9-1
Thanks for playing, Robinson Cano, but this is a one-on-one contest between Ian Desmond and Rick Porcello—and right now the game is tied.
Desmond continues to swing a solid bat (tied for seventh in MLB with 103 runs scored) while providing quality defense at a premium position—one he's had to learn on the fly—while Porcello has been the ace of a Boston rotation that features David Price and picked up his 20th win of the season with seven innings of two-run ball against the Toronto Blue Jays last Friday.
Assuming neither one pulls away down the stretch, this race might hinge on how each player's team finishes the season.
Should the Red Sox fail to win the American League East, the odds might tip back in Desmond's favor. But if both the Rangers and Red Sox finish the year as division champs, it'll come down to how many voters the allure of Porcello's 20-win campaign swayed.
NL Comeback Player of the Year
2 of 10
The Field
- Tanner Roark, SP, Washington Nationals: 7-3
- Jean Segura, 2B, Arizona Diamondbacks: 3-1
- Wilson Ramos, C, Washington Nationals: 5-1
- Wil Myers, 1B, San Diego Padres: 7-1
- Julio Teheran, SP, Atlanta Braves: 9-1
- Marcell Ozuna, CF, Miami Marlins: 47-3
Strong cases can be made for the three front-runners in this race, but Tanner Roark has jumped into the lead after tossing six innings of one-run ball against Philadelphia last Friday, striking out eight.
His batterymate, Wilson Ramos, continues to scuffle at the plate and is trending in the wrong direction, as is Wil Myers, the presumptive front-runner at the season's halfway point. Each has posted a second-half OPS that's more than 190 points lower than his first-half mark.
The same can't be said about Jean Segura, who has improved upon already impressive first-half numbers down the stretch. Despite his team's putrid play (sits at 59-84), Segura is a legitimate threat to take home the award.
Julio Teheran and Marcell Ozuna will collect some votes, but neither one has a real shot at emerging victorious.
AL Manager of the Year
3 of 10
The Field
- Terry Francona, Cleveland Indians: 3-1
- Jeff Banister, Texas Rangers: 3-1
- Buck Showalter, Baltimore Orioles: 7-1
- Brad Ausmus, Detroit Tigers: 7-1
- John Gibbons, Toronto Blue Jays: 7-1
- Joe Girardi, New York Yankees: 7-1
With four previous winners (in either league) part of the field for AL Manager of the Year, there's a good chance this year's victor will be someone who already has an award sitting in his house.
That includes Joe Girardi, a new entrant to the field who was named the NL Manager of the Year in 2006 while at the helm in Miami. With his New York Yankees continuing to defy logic and playing their way not only back into the playoff picture, but also the AL East race, he belongs in the conversation.
But the Yankees have three teams to climb over in the division, and odds are that a division-winning skipper is going to walk away with the honor. Since 2006, only three AL Managers of the Year have come from teams that didn't finish in first place.
Terry Francona is one of those managers, having won it with a second-place Indians club in 2013. Jeff Banister, the other front-runner in this year's race, is also a past winner, having won the award last season as the Rangers claimed their first AL West crown since 2011.
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NL Manager of the Year
4 of 10
The Field
- Joe Maddon, Chicago Cubs: 1-1
- Dusty Baker, Washington Nationals: 3-1
- Dave Roberts, Los Angeles Dodgers: 3-1
The closer the Chicago Cubs get to the 100-win mark, the closer Joe Maddon gets to winning his second consecutive NL Manager of the Year Award and fourth overall, having won twice previously in the AL with the Tampa Bay Rays in 2008 and 2011.
Dusty Baker and Dave Roberts will both get attention for their division-winning efforts in Washington and Los Angeles, respectively, but this award seems to be Maddon's to lose—especially if the Cubs wind up as baseball's only 100-win team, which is a distinct possibility.
The bigger question is this: Will the Cubs sweep the rest of the major Senior Circuit awards? With viable candidates in both the Cy Young and MVP races, it's not a stretch.
Dropped from the field: Don Mattingly (MIA)
AL Rookie of the Year
5 of 10
The Field
- Michael Fulmer, SP, Detroit Tigers: 1-2
- Tyler Naquin, OF, Cleveland Indians: 17-3
- Edwin Diaz, RP, Seattle Mariners: 17-3
- Gary Sanchez, C, New York Yankees: 19-1
After a rough three-game stretch that saw him go 0-3 with a 6.48 ERA, Michael Fulmer got himself back on the winning track last Friday, tossing seven innings of two-run, three-hit ball against Baltimore.
"He was good tonight, probably better than the last time he faced the Orioles," Tigers manager Brad Ausmus said after the game, per MLive.com's Evan Woodbery. "The first time he faced them, he really hadn't discovered (his changeup). He had that, and it was a weapon for him. ... It's a constant cat-and-mouse game."
Fulmer's expanding arsenal and willingness to lean on pitches he may not yet be comfortable with only adds to his allure as the AL Rookie of the Year. Had Fulmer's struggles continued, both Tyler Naquin and Edwin Diaz are playing well enough that it would become a more interesting race.
NL Rookie of the Year
6 of 10
The Field
- Corey Seager, SS, Los Angeles Dodgers: 1-9
- Aledmys Diaz, SS, St. Louis Cardinals: 19-1
- Trevor Story, SS, Colorado Rockies: 19-1
Even with Aledmys Diaz returning to action after missing more than a month because of a fractured thumb, Corey Seager has nothing to worry about when it comes to the NL Rookie of the Year Award. It's already been engraved with his name.
How important has Seager been to Los Angeles' success? The Dodgers are 62-44 in games that he records at least one base hit. In games where Seager goes hitless, they're 16-17.
Thankfully for the Dodgers, Seager's bat still has plenty of hits left in it. Over 10 September games, he's hitting .385 with four extra-base hits (two home runs), seven RBI and a 1.004 OPS.
AL Cy Young Award
7 of 10
The Field
- Zach Britton, RP, Baltimore Orioles: 3-1
- Corey Kluber, SP, Cleveland Indians: 5-1
- Rick Porcello, SP, Boston Red Sox: 8-1
- Justin Verlander, SP, Detroit Tigers: 8-1
- Chris Sale, SP, Chicago White Sox: 8-1
- Cole Hamels, SP, Texas Rangers: 11-1
- Jose Quintana, SP, Chicago White Sox: 11-1
- Aaron Sanchez, SP, Toronto Blue Jays: 11-1
Zach Britton's otherworldly numbers out of the bullpen (0.63 ERA, 0.84 WHIP, 41-for-41 SV) keep Baltimore's closer in the lead, but Corey Kluber is doing his best to separate himself from the rest of the starting pitcher field to emerge as Britton's stiffest competition.
Kluber (16-9, 3.05 ERA, 1.04 WHIP) tossed seven shutout innings of four-hit ball against the Minnesota Twins his last time out, walking two and striking out 10. He's also among the Junior Circuit league leaders in nearly every statistical category, including ERA, WHIP and strikeouts.
Porcello's MLB-leading 20 wins are sure to impress some voters, while Justin Verlander and Chris Sale have put together seasons that deserve attention and look poised to deliver strong finishes to the regular season. But there simply might not be enough time left for that trio to catch Britton or Kluber.
NL Cy Young Award
8 of 10
The Field
- Max Scherzer, SP, Washington Nationals: 4-1
- Kyle Hendricks, SP, Chicago Cubs: 4-1
- Madison Bumgarner, SP, San Francisco Giants: 14-3
- Noah Syndergaard, SP, New York Mets: 9-1
- Jake Arrieta, SP, Chicago Cubs: 9-1
- Johnny Cueto, SP, San Francisco Giants: 9-1
- Jose Fernandez, SP, Miami Marlins: 9-1
With all due respect to the rest of the field, it's the trio of pitchers at the top—Max Scherzer, Kyle Hendricks and Madison Bumgarner—who figure to be the finalists for the NL Cy Young Award. And as we learned watching Sesame Street growing up, one of these things is not like the other.
You've got your traditional power arms in Scherzer and Bumgarner, both with gaudy strikeout numbers and the ability to blow their fastball by batters when needed. Then there's Hendricks, the finesse guy, the pitcher with a high-80s fastball who nearly tossed a no-hitter against the St. Louis Cardinals on Monday night.
"Unbelievably great," Maddon said after the game, per ESPN.com's Jesse Rogers. "They did not have a good swing against him all night. He was in charge of that entire game. It has to catapult him in the minds of people voting right now. That was spectacular."
Hendricks, whose efforts lowered his already MLB-leading ERA to a minuscule 2.03, sits among the NL leaders in WHIP (0.96), wins (15) and innings pitched (173). He's allowed only 123 hits in those 173 frames, which works out to a 6.4 hits-per-nine-innings rate, baseball's third-lowest mark.
AL MVP Award
9 of 10
The Field
- Mookie Betts, OF, Boston Red Sox: 3-1
- Jose Altuve, 2B, Houston Astros: 4-1
- Josh Donaldson, 3B, Toronto Blue Jays: 4-1
- Mike Trout, OF, Los Angeles Angels: 4-1
- Manny Machado, 3B, Baltimore Orioles: 12-1
- David Ortiz, DH, Boston Red Sox: 12-1
There's been a shift atop the field for AL MVP, with Mookie Betts jumping ahead of Jose Altuve, Josh Donaldson and Mike Trout in the race to be declared the Junior Circuit's best player.
That shift has less to do with what Betts has done since we last checked in on the race (.250 BA, .657 OPS in six games) and more to do with a lack of production from his three competitors, all of whom find themselves mired in September funks.
It also doesn't hurt that Boston sits atop the AL East, two games ahead of Donaldson and Toronto.
Still, this is a wide-open race, one that might not be decided until the last minute. Whichever player gets hot down the stretch could be the one who emerges victorious.
NL MVP Award
10 of 10
The Field
- Kris Bryant, INF/OF, Chicago Cubs: 7-3
- Daniel Murphy, INF, Washington Nationals: 3-1
- Nolan Arenado, 3B, Colorado Rockies: 13-3
- Corey Seager, SS, Los Angeles Dodgers: 13-3
- Anthony Rizzo, 1B, Chicago Cubs: 37-3
While Kris Bryant remains the front-runner to become the NL MVP thanks to his all-around awesomeness, Daniel Murphy isn't going to concede the award without a fight.
Murphy has recorded at least one base hit in every September game in which he's played, a 10-game streak that finds him hitting .421 with six doubles, four RBI and a 1.056 OPS. He leads the Senior Circuit in batting average (.347), slugging percentage (.598) and OPS (.990).
Nolan Arenado is well on his way to leading the NL in home runs and RBI for the second consecutive season, but he loses points with voters because of his solid but unspectacular numbers away from Coors Field.
Unless otherwise noted/linked, all statistics current through Monday's games and courtesy of Baseball-Reference.com, MLB.com and FanGraphs.
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