MLB: These are the 5 (or so) best National League MVP candidates
By Bill Felber
NL MVP candidates: Mookie Betts
With a 3.0 WAR, Mookie Betts is the major league leader in that category. To SABRmetrically minded voters, that can be the only MVP credential anybody needs.
Among those biased toward position players, it also helps Betts’ candidacy that the three closest candidates to him in WAR are all pitchers: Max Fried (2.9), Zach Wheeler (2.8) and Aaron Nola (2.6). The closest position player is Manny Machado back at 2.4.
The only position player among the NL’s top 10 is Freeman at 2.3.
Betts’ candidacy is certainly enhanced by the fact that he’s the leading candidate from the leading team. He may also be helped if he continues to lead the home run race; he’s currently tied with Tatis at 15.
At 2.2, Betts is second to Freeman in Base-Out Wins Added, and he’s also second in Win probability Added at 2.1. At 161, he is fifth in OPS+.
Betts, too, has an MVP history. He won the award in 2018, and hasn’t finished lower than eighth since 2016.
That also gives him an opportunity to make a bit of history. Only one player, Frank Robinson, has ever been named MVP in both leagues. Robinson won in the National League in 1961, and in the American League in 1966. Betts has a chance to become the second.