I found a thread on Baseball-Fever.com asking which players had the best season without receiving a single MVP vote. So I figured that I would do a query using Baseball-Reference’s WAR.
Since most of the players on the list are Pitchers, I decided to separate the list between Position Players and Pitchers. This is because there is a disagreement amongst voters about whether Pitchers should be included in the MVP vote.
Top Position Players
| Player | Year | Team | Pos | WAR | oWAR | dWAR |
| Roberto Clemente | 1968 | PIT | RF | 8.0 | 4.7 | 2.5 |
| Willie Davis | 1964 | LAN | CF | 7.9 | 4.5 | 3.4 |
| Barry Bonds | 1989 | PIT | LF | 7.8 | 3.5 | 3.6 |
| Eddie Mathews | 1963 | ML1 | 3B | 7.6 | 5.8 | 1.8 |
| Troy Glaus | 2000 | ANA | 3B | 7.5 | 6.0 | 1.9 |
| Brooks Robinson | 1967 | BAL | 3B | 7.4 | 3.7 | 4.2 |
| Arky Vaughan | 1936 | PIT | SS | 7.2 | 7.4 | 0.8 |
| Nick Markakis | 2008 | BAL | RF | 7.2 | 4.8 | 1.7 |
| Ozzie Smith | 1989 | SLN | SS | 7.1 | 3.4 | 4.7 |
| Andruw Jones | 1998 | ATL | CF | 7.1 | 3.6 | 3.9 |
| Darrell Evans | 1974 | ATL | 3B | 7.1 | 4.7 | 2.7 |
| Jimmy Wynn | 1965 | HOU | CF | 7.0 | 7.1 | -0.1 |
| Brett Gardner | 2010 | NYA | LF | 7.0 | 3.3 | 3.4 |
| Bobby Grich | 1975 | BAL | 2B | 7.0 | 5.2 | 2.4 |
| Gary Carter | 1983 | MON | C | 6.8 | 3.8 | 4.0 |
| Andruw Jones | 1999 | ATL | CF | 6.8 | 3.4 | 3.8 |
| Brian Jordan | 1998 | SLN | RF | 6.8 | 4.3 | 2.0 |
| Barry Larkin | 1988 | CIN | SS | 6.8 | 5.5 | 2.2 |
| Randy Velarde | 1999 | MULT | 2B | 6.7 | 5.2 | 2.0 |
| Dwayne Murphy | 1980 | OAK | CF | 6.7 | 4.3 | 2.4 |
You’ll notice most of these players had high dWAR’s. Fielding ability can easily be overlooked (or incorrectly evaluated) by voters, which may explain why some of these players did not receive votes.
Top Pitchers
| Player | Year | Team | Pos | WAR |
| Lefty Grove | 1937 | BOS | SP | 9.0 |
| Jim Bunning | 1966 | PHI | SP | 8.7 |
| Jon Matlack | 1974 | NYN | SP | 8.4 |
| Pat Hentgen | 1996 | TOR | SP | 8.2 |
| Mark Langston | 1993 | CAL | SP | 8.2 |
| Phil Niekro | 1977 | ATL | SP | 8.1 |
| Andy Pettitte | 1997 | NYA | SP | 8.0 |
| Frank Tanana | 1977 | CAL | SP | 8.0 |
| Jim Bunning | 1965 | PHI | SP | 7.9 |
| Don Drysdale | 1964 | LAN | SP | 7.8 |
| Frank Viola | 1987 | MIN | SP | 7.8 |
| Kevin Appier | 1992 | KCA | SP | 7.7 |
| Bill Hands | 1969 | CHN | SP | 7.7 |
| Phil Niekro | 1974 | ATL | SP | 7.7 |
| Bret Saberhagen | 1987 | KCA | SP | 7.7 |
| Roy Halladay | 2003 | TOR | SP | 7.7 |
| Wes Ferrell | 1936 | BOS | SP | 7.6 |
| Bert Blyleven | 1974 | MIN | SP | 7.5 |
| Chuck Finley | 1990 | CAL | SP | 7.5 |
| Bob Gibson | 1972 | SLN | SP | 7.5 |
While it’s a good list, not all of these are all that surprising.
For starters, a lot of the guys on the MVP list are there because of high dWARs. Voters rarely award MVPs based on defense. And if you look at the offense for some of them, it doesn’t look anything like a guy the voters would EVER give an MVP to. Willie Davis in ’64: .294 AVG, 91 R, 77 RBI, 12 HR. Nothing stands out.
The most surprising one to me is Arky Vaughan’s 1936 season. He cracked 30 2B, scored a league-leading 122 R, and played every game – at SS, no less. Of course, that was coming off his ’35 season, in which he led the NL in all three of the slash stats, and voters don’t usually like a let-down. So that one’s probably not even THAT surprising.
Great list!
Matlack is so underrated. I think he’s the only pitcher to lead the majors in WAR for a season and not receive a Cy Young vote! Just a shame that he had such a great year that’s not even acknowledged by his own fan base.
Matlack had a 2.41 era, with a 1.119 whip and 7 shutouts! and finished 13-15. Horrible run support and terrible Mets’ defense.
Matlack, Bunning, Langston, Niekro ’77, Drysdale, Appier, Viola, Hands and Blyleven didn’t even get a Cy Young vote!
Mostly they got screwed because they didn’t have overwhelming w-l records. Bunning got caught behind Koufax and I don’t know why Hands never even got a Cy Young vote even though he won 20 games.
For some reason the writers gave Jeff Reardon some MVP votes in 1987 even though he had a 8-8 record with a 4.48 era, 1.22 whip and 31 saves yet Viola didn’t get one!
The reason Velarde did not get any votes in 1999 was because his season was split between two seasons, he was a middle infielder that WAR inflates just because he plays a middle infield position, and too many of his 200 hits that season were singles. All that… AND… it was his only really good season. There was no build up to that season. 1996 was pretty good, but he was out for all of 1997 and he played for half of 1998. I don’t think it was a true fluke season, but there were enough trends to dismiss his accomplishments in the eyes of voters.
Put this season on the list of seasons that WAR inflated past its true historical value. His fielding stats for the Angles that year were overvalued too. Just look at his career record in the Fielding Runs above average column on Baseball Ref. That “13” does not match his career record at all.
http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/v/velarra01.shtml
Oops, I meant to say split between two TEAMS…
Those are some great points. DRA has Velarde at 17 Runs saved with the Angels in 1999 and a career total of 19, so he was below average the rest of his career.
Splitting time between teams surely does hurt award voting. The two exceptions that come to mind without doing a search are Rick Sutcliffe in 1984 (winning the NL Cy Young even after playing in both leagues), and Shannon Stewart in 2003 after being traded to Minnesota midseason. I’m sure there are more, but these two stood out in my mind for some reason.
I think it helps when you go to a different league because you’re stats are more isolated. I still don’t know how Sutcliffe won the N.L. Cy Young without even qualifying for the N.L. ERA title or any N.L. rate stat? I think Sutcliffe was the only starting pitcher to win the Cy Young without qualifying for the ERA title.
Gooden should have won the Cy Young that year. If you just isolate WAR for pitchers, Gooden had the best in the N.L. in 1984. Rhoden has the best overall WAR for an N.L. pitcher but some of that came from his amazing hitting year. Rhoden hit .333 in 1984 with a .750 ops in 92 plate appearances.
I think Seaver’s trade hurt him somewhat in Cy Young voting for 1977. I still don’t understand why Carlton won that year. In retrospect Reuschel should have won it but Seaver only finished 4th.
Rickey Henderson’s trade in 1989 probably both helped and hurt him. War see’s him as the best position player in the A.L. that year. Rickey might have been better served if his pre-A’s numbers came in the N.L. Then the A.L. voters would only see his A’s numbers.
David Cone didn’t get any Cy Young votes in 1992 when he was traded to the Blue Jays. Ironically he got rather poor run support when he went to the WS champion Blue Jays.
Great article … very original .. I would also point out that it is not just playing great D .. It is NOT playing in the right city for coverage ..