Andre Dawson vs Ozzie Smith: The battle for the 1987 NL MVP
The 1987 NL MVP award came down to two players: Andre Dawson, the best player on a bad team and, Ozzie Smith, the best player on a great team.
Each year when the Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA) votes for the Most Valuable Player award they must determine if the award goes to the league’s best player or the player who helped his team succeed the most.
There is no better argument for this scenario than the 1987 NL MVP award which pitted Andre Dawson against Ozzie Smith to determine who would win the hardware at the end of the year.
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Dawson was an interesting case to begin with. He was a free agent after spending his entire career with the Montreal Expos. He was looking for a good payday though was met with only low ball offers in what he deemed was collusion amongst the owners.
In the end, Andre Dawson gave the Chicago Cubs a contract signed with his name and told them to fill in the dollar amount. They penciled in $500,000, less than half of what he was paid the year before.
Ozzie Smith was the acrobatic, gold glove shortstop, who was lovingly nicknamed the Wizard of Oz. By 1987 the stat-stuffing speedster was already a veteran of two World Series, even taking home the MVP award in the 1985 NLCS.