Of all of this year’s MLB awards races, the most interesting debate surrounds the American League MVP. That debate is moot — the balloting is long over, and the winner will be announced Thursday night — but it remains a classic conversation about two of this past season’s best performers.
With all due respect to perennial candidate Jose Ramirez — once again an MVP finalist — the winner is going to be the Seattle Mariners’ Cal Raleigh or the New York Yankees’ Aaron Judge. Whatever your opinion on that selection, there is no wrong answer. This is the perfect encapsulation of pretty much every debate about the MVP award we’ve had over the decades.
My AXE system for rating players is built off of the leading bottom-line metrics with the hope of settling this kind of thing. Often, it’s as much a sorting mechanism as it is a definitive answer, but if there is a clear division between players, AXE is usually on target.
Editor’s Picks
2 Related
2025 AL AXE LEADERS
1. Aaron Judge, Yankees (164)2. Cal Raleigh, Mariners (150)3. Bobby Witt Jr., Royals (145)4. Jose Ramirez, Guardians (138)5. Julio Rodriguez, Mariners (134)6. Jeremy Pena, Astros (132)7. George Springer, Blue Jays (131)8. Byron Buxton, Twins (129)9. Maikel Garcia, Royals (128)10. Gunnar Henderson, Orioles (128)
There is a clear separation between Judge and everyone else in the AL. So, it’s an easy call, right? For all Raleigh did that was historic, Judge has the upper hand in the metrics, and the Mariners’ star just picked the wrong year to shuffle the record books.
And yet it still doesn’t seem so clear-cut. This is just the sort of paradox that makes me want to dive deeper and figure out whether we can arrive at a rational explanation for what will always be an imperfect process.
Who will win, and what will that ultimately tell us about what voters value?
Let’s sift through the arguments, each of which views the Raleigh vs. Judge debate through a different prism and all of which have held various degrees of sway during baseball’s MVP era, which dates more than a century.
The ‘He’s won before’ argument
We begin with this one because it’s not a literal criterion — but it used to be, and it can quickly end an argument.
MLB most exciting player bracket
Ohtani or De La Cruz? We narrow the field — with a rep from every team — to one true must-watch player. Bracket »
Before the BBWAA assumed the MVP selection reins in 1931, the process was a bit chaotic. Both leagues gave out an award, the AL starting in 1922 and the NL in 1924. (And even before that, there was a proto version — the Chalmers Award, which was given out from 1911 to 1914.)
The criteria between the leagues were not compatible: The AL would not allow repeat winners, but the NL didn’t care. Though Babe Ruth should have racked up five or six MVP awards during that span, he won only one — in 1923. Rogers Hornsby won twice on the NL side. As with many old-time practices now viewed from the perspective of the present, it’s weird.
Anyway, this would settle the Raleigh-Judge debate because Judge wouldn’t be eligible. Heck, he wouldn’t have been eligible last year, either. That would have been good news for Bobby Witt Jr. fans.
The trad-stats argument
The irony about the backlash you sometimes encounter over the use of advanced metrics is that sportswriters have always relied on numbers to make their arguments. It’s just that the numbers they used to use were too often cherry-picked or flat-out misleading. For the longest time, some of those same commentators decried the new numbers by citing the old ones. That kind of thing has largely been phased out, thankfully.
When you look at the more egregious MVP mistakes from the past, they often resulted from the use of the wrong numbers. Batting average and RBIs tended to be overvalued, though in fairness to the voters, teams themselves made the same mistake for decades. On the pitching side, wins were the be-all and end-all, which also sometimes encroached on the MVP debates.
Let’s take 1979’s AL voting as an example. And I’m going to use WAR to shorthand this review. The debate should have been glorious:
1979 AL WAR LEADERS
1. Fred Lynn, Red Sox (8.9)2. George Brett, Royals (8.6)3. Darrell Porter, Royals (7.6)4. (tie) Jerry Koosman, Twins (7.2)Dennis Eckersley, Red Sox (7.2)
Eck! Lest we forget, was a very good starter before he revolutionized the closer role under Tony La Russa. But we digress … who do you have, Lynn or Brett? What about Porter, sneaking in as a catcher, as Raleigh is doing this year?
1979 AL MVP VOTING LEADERS (with WAR totals)
1. Don Baylor, Angels (3.7)2. Ken Singleton, Orioles (5.3)3. George Brett, Royals (8.6)4. Fred Lynn, Red Sox (8.9)5. Jim Rice, Red Sox (6.4)
The winner: Don Baylor, who finished with 3.7 WAR, though no one knew it at the time because WAR was decades away from being invented. Baylor hit .296 with 36 homers (fourth in the AL) and led the league with 139 RBIs and 120 runs. And he did this with the Angels, who emerged from baseball’s back pages to win their first AL West title.
What it’s really like facing Aaron Judge
We asked everyone from MLB aces and former college rivals to a tech salesman for their best tales of squaring off against the Yankees slugger. Facing Judge »
Granted, it’s a lot of RBIs. But Baylor led the AL in plate appearances with runners on base. His RBI percentage (19.5) was not among the AL leaders and was well behind, among others, Lynn (22.9%) and Brett (20.3%). Heck, Baylor didn’t even think he should have been MVP.
“There’s no doubt he should be considered as the MVP and Comeback Player of the Year,” Baylor told the Sporting News at the time. He was talking about teammate Bobby Grich (6.0 WAR). “He has had one helluva season.”
This, friends, is why we needed advanced metrics.
But let’s shift into a 1979 mindset and consider this year’s AL race.
Judge: .331 (led AL), 53 homers, 114 RBIs, 137 runs (led AL)
Raleigh: .247, 60 homers (led AL), 125 RBIs (led AL), 110 runs
Four and a half decades ago, there would have been much ado about Raleigh’s average. Of course, the 60 homers would have fallen one short of Roger Maris’ then-single-season record, and his chase would have entranced America over the last couple of months of the season.
Who would have won? I don’t know! But I’m guessing Raleigh’s near-record home run total and league-leading RBI count — as a catcher — would have held sway. Voters loved catchers with lots of RBIs (see Thurman Munson, 1976), though that didn’t help Porter (112 RBIs) get over the top in 1979. But Judge’s huge edge in batting average would have earned him plenty of support.
The ‘Where would they have been without him?’ argument
This gets at the semantic argument some have over the MVP award, the one in which people over-parse the actual words — Most Valuable Player.
Look, it’s just a label. Don’t overthink it. The voters are told: “There is no clear-cut definition of what Most Valuable means.” So put away your Merriam-Webster and save your argument about whether the MVP describes “valuable” or “best.” There is much more nuance and context involved, as there should be.
Is Shohei Ohtani’s 5-year run the best ever?!
The Dodgers’ two-way star is on the verge of his fourth MVP in five years. Here’s how he compares to MLB legends. David Schoenfield »
We can use WAR to reimagine the respective rosters without Raleigh or Judge on them in hopes of gaining a window into where their teams would have been without their epic seasons for those who do choose to use ‘value’ more literally.
Let’s assume in both cases that their time would have been filled by replacement-level players, just to keep things nice and simple. That leaves us here:
Yankees
• With Judge: 94-68, tied for first in AL East
• Without Judge: 85-77, third in AL East, no playoffs
Mariners
• With Raleigh: 90-72, first in AL West
• Without Raleigh: 83-79, second in AL West, no playoffs
Since Judge had the higher WAR (using the Baseball Reference version), the Yankees take the bigger hit in losing him than the Mariners would in losing Raleigh. But this quick and dirty method doesn’t really do justice to Raleigh since his subtraction would potentially have a big impact on the Seattle pitching staff.
Let’s call this one a draw.
The ‘Best player on the best team’ argument
We’re back into semantics here, so let’s dispatch this one quickly. For one thing, this generally comes into play when there is a deserving MVP candidate from a non-playoff team, as opposed to a solid but lesser candidate from a winner.
The classic case was the 1947 AL MVP race, when Joe DiMaggio edged Ted Williams by a single point — 202 to 201 — in the balloting results. DiMaggio hit .315 with 20 homers, 97 RBIs and 4.7 WAR for the pennant-winning Yankees. Williams rolled up 9.5 WAR while winning the AL Triple Crown — .343, 32 homers, 114 RBIs.
The only point in DiMaggio’s favor was the Yankees’ first-place finish. Still, Williams would have won if not for one voter leaving the “Splinter” off the ballot entirely. The identity of the suspect voter remains a historical mystery.
Stars who ruled the 2025 MLB playoffs
From playoff breakouts to World Series heroes, here’s a full squad of players who shined brightest under the postseason lights. All-October team »
Nevertheless, the argument for DiMaggio simply would have been that he was the best player on the best team. A number of questionable MVP winners through the years can be summed up that way.
I’m not sure there is a winner in this category between Judge and Raleigh. Both were the best players on their respective teams, though Raleigh emerged as that player during the season, while Julio Rodriguez would have held that distinction entering the campaign. (And might hold entering next season as well.) Judge has been the unquestioned star of the Yankees for years now.
But which team was best? The Yankees had a better record and a much better run differential but were a wild-card entrant. The Mariners won their division and earned a first-round bye. So, we’ll call this one a draw as well.
Besides, if you want to get really strict with the language and fixate on the concept of “best” then there’s no contest. You don’t really earn that distinction in one year; it takes multiple years of excellence. Judge’s 25.1 WAR over the past three years far outstrips second-place Witt (20.8). Raleigh is at 15.5.
“MVP” and the “best player” are different concepts. Judge is the AL’s best player. That argument is easy. This year’s MVP? Not so simple.
The metrics argument
This one swings toward Judge. That’s illustrated by the AXE leaderboard we began with. But let’s look at the subcomponents of the system to illustrate why it’s like that.
Baseball Reference WAR
1. Judge (9.7)2. Raleigh (7.4)3. Witt (7.1)
FanGraphs WAR
1. Judge (10.1)2. Raleigh (9.1)3. Witt (8.0)
Both leading versions of WAR favor Judge, with the Baseball Reference version seeing it as a runaway. The differences between the systems often baffles consumers of baseball analytics and, I would argue, undermines the general acceptance of the WAR framework. (And let’s not even get started on the formulations of WAR on the pitching side.)
The FanGraphs version sees it so much tighter because of how it incorporates defense — actual fielding and in positional value. The latter is hard to articulate, but intuitively we know that someone who caught 119 games carried more defensive responsibility than someone who played 95 games in right field. (Both players logged lots of DH time as well.)
Another wasted year of Aaron Judge
Will the captain end up the greatest Yankee never to win a World Series — or can the Bombers build a championship team around him? Jorge Castillo »
In terms of actual fielding performance, Raleigh is assessed four runs below average from fielding in the Baseball Reference system; he gets 11.4 runs above average at FanGraphs, which is very generous with crediting catchers for framing pitches. So, whether you believe the Baseball Reference or the FanGraphs comparison in WAR is more accurate comes down to which defensive assessment you want to believe. Either way, Judge has the edge.
It’s the same story when you get to probability added categories, which also feed the AXE formulation. I view it like this: WAR tells you the sum total of what a player did, but probability added tells you about the context in which he did it.
Judge wins both categories. He led the AL in win probability added (plus-5.6) and championship probability added (plus-4.9%). Raleigh ranks high but still behind: fourth in WPA (plus-3.7) and second in CPA (plus-3.0%).
I doubt there are many MVP voters who see the balloting as something that should simply reflect the WAR leaderboard. But there are certainly fans who see it that way. (And plenty who don’t believe WAR should be considered at all.) Well, if you want to make WAR the be-all, end-all … Judge is the easy choice.
The narrative argument
In my awards preview, I cast my vote in favor of Raleigh. This was just a vote written into an article — I did not have an MVP vote this year — but I agonized over it just the same.
I agonized over it because it’s a choice that runs counter to my instincts and values as a baseball analyst. I have always leaned on metrics in my analysis and did so long before the practice became mainstream. I had nothing to do with the creation of WAR, but I first advocated for a win-based bottom-line metric more than 20 years ago. I think both versions of WAR need improvement and even more importantly, I’d like to see the discord between the systems ironed out. But I’m still an advocate for having such a measure.
The previous sections lead to the conclusion that Judge should win, and he very well might do just that. Through each prism, either Judge wins handily, as he does in the metrics, or it’s too close to call. So why did I end up favoring Raleigh?
It’s the narrative.
Why the Mariners are built to be back
The 2025 season was the closest Seattle has come to the World Series — and the team believes even better days are ahead. David Schoenfield »
When it comes to metrics-based comparison, you have to always acknowledge that there is a gray area. These are numbers that read as very precise, especially when they are carried out to decimal points. But they are not. These systems have choices made in their construction. Rational choices, but choices, nonetheless. That’s opposed to, say, batting average. While lacking, average is more precise than WAR as it measures an observable thing: hits as a portion of at-bats. WAR and win probability just don’t work like that.
For position players, the estimates for run creation are very good, but even those lack context. In fact, that’s kind of the point. But when it comes to handing out something like an MVP award, it’s not always about establishing a neutral context for comparison or creating a baseline for future performance. It’s about describing what actually happened.
Intangibles play into it but can’t be overemphasized. Raleigh is an acknowledged leader on the Mariners in the grand tradition of catchers as the spiritual hearts of a ballclub. But Judge is the Yankees’ captain, an honor that ranks among the most prestigious in the sport. Both of these players are exemplary big leaguers and team leaders.
For me, Raleigh has the better 2025 story. Judge, as great as he was, has done this before. He was better offensively in 2024, though both seasons were historically elite. He posted solid defensive numbers but was only a right fielder and, late in the season when he battled an elbow injury, he couldn’t even do that. In the end, Judge just put up another Aaron Judge season, which is itself an incredible accomplishment. Statistically, he was the best player in the league.
On the other hand, Raleigh did things no one has ever done before, and in baseball, historical context means a lot. The most basic fact is this: We can debate the marginal value of Raleigh hitting just seven more homers than Judge. But those seven homers gave him 60 — an unthinkable figure that’s been reached by just six other players (including, of course, Judge).
Raleigh entered the season as an established, top-tier player but his career high in homers was 34. He topped that on the Fourth of July. The story was and remains amazing, and it captivated us all season.
Before this season, the record for homers by a primary catcher was the 48 that Kansas City’s Salvador Perez hit in 2021. Raleigh went past that on Aug 24. The record for homers by a switch-hitter was the 54 hit by Mickey Mantle — Mickey Mantle! — in 1961. Raleigh passed that on Sept. 16. Raleigh hit these historic benchmarks while leading the league in RBIs and catching at a top-tier level for a division champion, for whom he was the team leader.
And yet, while I ended up favoring the historic nature of Raleigh’s season over the routine brilliance of Judge, I have to admit: Had I been handed an actual ballot, I’m not sure I could have pulled the trigger for Raleigh, mostly because I’m not sure how I could have justified it by underlining “narrative” as I have done here.
But you know what? This is great stuff. This is why we hand out MVP awards, to parse and dissect and pick apart the résumés of the game’s best players. This kind of debate is great for the game.
Tonight, either Aaron Judge or Cal Raleigh will be crowned as the winner of the 2025 American League MVP trophy. Make no mistake though — there is no real loser in this competition, and in the end, thanks to them, we all win.
