Bonds wins sixth NL MVP Award

Major League Baseball ^ | November 18th, 2003 | Chris Shuttlesworth

[Sabertooth]

11/18/2003  1:07 PM ET 

Bonds wins sixth NL MVP Award

Slugger receives 28 of 32 first-place votes

By Chris Shuttlesworth / MLB.com

	Barry Bonds hit .341 with 45 home runs for the Giants in 2003. (Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP)

SAN FRANCISCO -- Barry Bonds captured his record sixth National League MVP Award and unprecedented third in a row Tuesday, beating out St. Louis' Albert Pujols by a 426-303 point margin. Bonds received 28 of 32 first-place votes, while Pujols received three.

The six MVP honors put Bonds far and away in his own class among baseball players, as no other player has won more than three. Bonds is now one of just four athletes in the four major U.S. sports to win an MVP Award six times. The NBA's Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and the NHL's Gordie Howe each won six, while hockey legend Wayne Gretzky captured nine MVP Awards in his sport.

 NL MOST VALUABLE PLAYER

 Player

1st

Total

 Bonds

28

426

 Pujols

3

303

 Sheffield

1

247

 Thome

-

203

 Lopez

-

159

 Gagne

-

143

 Helton

-

75

Besides Bonds, no other player has won more than three MVP Awards. The three-time winners:

AL Player	Years
Jimmie Foxx	1932, 33, 38
Joe DiMaggio	1939, 41, 47
Yogi Berra	1951, 54, 55
Mickey Mantle	1956, 57, 62
NL Player	Years
Stan Musial	1943, 46, 48
Roy Campanella	1951, 53, 55
Mike Schmidt	1980, 81, 86

 AL MOST VALUABLE PLAYER

 Player

1st

Total

 Rodriguez

6

242

 Delgado

5

213

 Posada

5

194

 Stewart

3

140

 Ortiz

4

130

 Ramirez

1

100

 Garciaparra

1

99

 •

MORE AL COVERAGE
• Rodriguez wins first MVP Award
• Delgado second in MVP voting
• Posada third in AL race

• Stewart places fourth in MVP race

• Ortiz, Manny, Nomar are top seven

Since the BBWAA began handing out MVP Awards in 1931, the award has gone to players from a team without a winning record only seven times:

Year	Player	Team	Record
1952	Hank Sauer	CHC	77-77
1958	Ernie Banks	CHC	72-82
1959	Ernie Banks	CHC	74-80
1987	Andre Dawson	CHC	76-85
1989	Robin Yount	MIL	81-81
1991	Cal Ripken	BAL	67-95
2003	Alex Rodriguez	TEX	71-91

Bonds' title gives the Giants the league's top individual honor in each of the last four years -- Jeff Kent edged Bonds in 2000 -- a feat never before accomplished in the National League. Mickey Cochrane, Lefty Grove and Jimmie Foxx (twice) of the Philadelphia A's won the award four times in a row from 1928-33 (no award was given out in 1929 or 1930), while the Yankees saw Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle combine for four in a row from 1954-57 and Roger Maris (twice), Mantle and Elston Howard do the same from 1960-63.

While Bonds' 45 homers were far below the 73 he hit in winning the MVP Award in 2001 and his .341 average -- third best in the league -- fell short of the .370 mark he posted in winning a batting title and another MVP Award in 2002, his performance in 2003 was perhaps more remarkable.

It came as Bonds watched his father, former Giants All-Star Bobby Bonds, succumb to cancer, with the superstar son leaving the team several times to be with his ailing father and then to mourn with his family after Bobby's death.

Bonds returned from that final bereavement leave after missing five games, hit a home run in the second at-bat of his first game back and then was hospitalized overnight for an irregular heartbeat brought on by stress and sleeplessness.

Rookie of the Year:
AL - Berroa, KC   NL - Willis, FLA

Cy Young:
AL - Halladay, TOR   NL - Gagne, LA

Manager of the Year:
AL - Peña, KC   NL - McKeon, FLA

Most Valuable Player:
AL - Rodriguez, TEX   NL - TBA 11/18

MLB.com's complete coverage >

Just before his father's death and immediately after his first bereavement leave to be with the ailing Bobby, Bonds ended two games against the Braves with a walk-off homer in the 10th inning. In the other contest of the three-game sweep of Atlanta, Bonds received an intentional walk to load the bases in the ninth and Edgardo Alfonzo followed with a game-winning single.

Bonds tallied another walk-off homer, the ninth of his career, on his 39th birthday July 24, just after he threw out a potential go-ahead run at the plate. That homer also made him the all-time San Francisco Giants home run leader, passing Willie McCovey.

Bonds won his first MVP Award in 1990 with Pittsburgh before narrowly losing the 1991 race to Terry Pendleton. He then won back-to-back awards in 1992 and 1993, the latter his first season with San Francisco. In 2001, after setting the single-season record with 73 homers, he won his unprecedented fourth MVP Award with 30 of 32 first-place votes and then last year captured his first unanimous honor, easily topping Pujols.

The slugger helped the Giants capture the NL West title in 2003 as the club remained in first place every day of the season before falling to the eventual world champion Marlins in the Division Series. He easily led the Majors with a .749 slugging percentage, a .529 on-base percentage and 148 walks, 61 of those intentional, though far more were unofficially intentional.

Barry Bonds   /   LF
	Height: 6'2" Weight: 210 Bats/Throws: L/L More info: Player page Stats | Splits Giants site Bonds shop

By comparison, Boston's Manny Ramirez finished second with 29 intentional free passes. Only two other entire teams had more intentional walks than Bonds -- the Cardinals with 68 and the Diamondbacks with 63.

Despite the kid-gloves treatment, Bonds still powered 45 home runs, two behind league leader Jim Thome, who finished fourth in voting behind Atlanta's Gary Sheffield. Bonds also drove in 90 runs and scored 111 times despite playing in only 130 games and recording 390 at-bats -- 201 fewer ABs than Pujols, who hit 43 homers and walked 79 times (12 intentional). He tied the NL mark jointly held by himself and Duke Snider by reaching base safely in 58 consecutive games.

Bonds ended the season just two homers shy of tying godfather Willie Mays' 660 for third on the all-time list. By hitting at least 30 homers for the 12th straight season, Bonds extended his own NL record and tied Foxx's Major League mark established from 1929-40. With three multihomer games in 2003, he moved past Mays into third on the all-time list with 64 such games, three shy of Mark McGwire and eight behind Babe Ruth.

He became the charter member of the 500-500 club when he stole his 500th career base in the 11th inning June 23, subsequently scoring the game-winning run. He also passed Ruth for second on the all-time walks list with 2,070 and is 120 free passes shy of Rickey Henderson's Major League record.

Chris Shuttlesworth is an editorial producer for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.

[Alberta's Child]

When I was a kid, I was into putting together all sorts of "lists" related to baseball -- Ten Best Sluggers in Baseball History, Ten Records That Will Never be Broken, etc. Hank Aaron came out #6 on my list of Top Ten Players of All Time.

[SpringheelJack]

Good point. When Pujols moves to a new stadium designed just for him, who knows what his numbers will look like!

In 2001, Bonds hit 37 home runs at home, 36 on the road.

[Alberta's Child]

In the National Football League, Pro Bowl selections are based partly on player votes (they used to be based entirely on them). I've noticed that in any given year there are a few players who have no business being on a Pro Bowl roster, and a few players who get left off despite outstanding seasons.

[mrbillxx]

What would impress me is seeing what Bonds could do in those additional 200 ABs.

Pujols could've just flopped earlier in the season when he was hitting up around .390 -- would that have been enough to impress you?

[Sabertooth]

A .646 winning percentage over the course of a 161-game season translates to 104 wins. Which means that in additiona to the home runs, RBIs, on-base percentage, etc., you should also add a statistic called "Games Lost By Team Due to Player's Inability to Compete" -- by my reckoning, Bonds cost his team four games this year simply by not being in the lineup.

Let's say a hypothetical minor-leaguer gets a game-winning hit in his only at-bat during the last week of a late-season call-up for the Detroit Tigers this season. By your reckoning, how many games did he cost the Tigers by being out of the line-up? 119?

[mrbillxx]

I think if you have every player vote for ONE player that they thought was MVP -- you'd get a more reasonable vote than having them try to pick a team or valuable players by position.

I would wager that the players would come up with one of the top 2-3 players in the league for MVP

[Sabertooth]

One additional fact. The players voted Pujols Player of the Year.

It's a different award than MVP. Not as dependent on making the playoffs.

[mrbillxx]

Ah. So then A-Rod getting the MVP was based on.....??

[Alberta's Child]

That's exactly my point -- if you are going to take the player's absence into account, you have to be consistent and take the good with the bad.

If a player's value to his team is dictated by how poorly they play without him, then by using that logic I could probably find a couple of cases in recent sports history where a player who was on the disabled list for the entire season should have been selected as his league's Most Valuable Player.

[Proud_texan]

"steroid use in baseball is wildly out of control"

I bet that it's out of control in any big money sport where the difference between making the cut and making a boatload of money is very thin.

I've known a couple of guys that went to NFL training camp, none of them made it, but all of them had admitted to doing at one course of steriods which means that they probably did at least two (if not more).

And this was the 80's. I can't imagine what it must be like these days.

[SpringheelJack]

What would impress me is seeing what Bonds could do in those additional 200 ABs. Pujols could've just flopped earlier in the season when he was hitting up around .390 -- would that have been enough to impress you?

Pujols would impress me more if hadn't wasted so many at bats (at least relative to Bonds). Bonds reached base 291 times last year, Pujols 301. But Pujols made 132 more outs than Barry as he got there (398 to 266).

[discostu]

A miscarriage of justice. If I were a voter I wouldn't even consider a player whose team didn't make the playoff, in order to be an MVP one's team must accomplish something, not making the playoffs is not accomplishing anything, therefore the player can't have been an MVP. It's probably over simplified thinking but there it is, not just in baseball either, any MVP in any sport that goes to a player that wasn't in the playoffs is silly IMHO.

[mrbillxx]

This is this year. That was last year.

Go ahead and make up some worthless stat based on extrapolating how Barry would've hit 237 triples if he'd played all the games.

Sorry. Doesn't fly.

[mrbillxx]

I agree..but the award guidelines say something like "the player who is most valuable to his team" They really don't say anything about playoffs, etc.

This in reality probably makes it more difficult as "value" is rather subjective.

[Sabertooth]

If a player's value to his team is dictated by how poorly they play without him, then by using that logic I could probably find a couple of cases in recent sports history where a player who was on the disabled list for the entire season should have been selected as his league's Most Valuable Player.

No, you're omitting half of the information in that case. We're talking about the MVP, which is an assessment of how valuable a player is to his team.

One measure is how much a player's presence affects his team's performance. The baseline for that assessment is how well the team performs in that player's absence. This measure of a player's value to a team is determined on the basis of presence vs. absence.

Other measures are individual stats and the team's finish in the standings.

It's not a scientific determination, it's based on a vote by baseball writers. They are hardly a natural constituency for Barry Bonds.

[discostu]

In the end most of these awards only exist to keep people talking about the sport when it's not being played, especially in the MLB where the awards come out weeks after the World Series. That's probably why the guidelines are so vague and subjective.

[SpringheelJack]

This is this year. That was last year.

No, that was 2003. I see now I should have said "last SEASON" to avoid such confusion.

Go ahead and make up some worthless stat based on extrapolating how Barry would've hit 237 triples if he'd played all the games.

I didn't make up any "worthless stat" that I'm aware of. Nor did I extrapolate anything. Those numbers I posted are cold, hard facts.

[mrbillxx]

And had he played a whole season, who knows what those numbers might've looked like.

If you can't be on the field for your team 95% of the time..that's another reason you shouldn't be MVP.

[Sabertooth]

It's probably over simplified thinking but there it is, not just in baseball either, any MVP in any sport that goes to a player that wasn't in the playoffs is silly IMHO.

Well, it certainly should be the exception rather than the rule. Sometimes a player's performance is overwhelming and historic (Bonds in 2001 is an example), or there are just no standouts on any pennant winners. In those cases a vote for a player on a non-first place team has merit.

The team ought to at least contend, though.

[Alberta's Child]

One measure is how much a player's presence affects his team's performance. The baseline for that assessment is how well the team performs in that player's absence. This measure of a player's value to a team is determined on the basis of presence vs. absence.

This is where I disagree completely, because the "presence vs. absence" comparison is as much a function of the quality of a player's replacement as it is of the player's skill and statistics.

If you use this comparison as the basis of your assessment, then a player who is backed up by a career .180 hitter with no speed and no power will always come out ahead of a comparable player who is backed up by a decent player who could start for any other team in the league.

Also, if you use this comparison as the basis of your assessment you are introducing a statistical measure that can't be applied to a guy who shows up to play in 162 games.