On Tuesday, the Baseball Writers Association of America will announce the winner of the 2010 AL MVP, the last of the major awards to be given out. Tigers first baseman Miguel Cabrera is one of the players in serious contention for the award. Rangers outfielder Josh Hamilton and Yankees second baseman Robinson Cano are also in the running to be named the American League's most valuable player.
The general consensus seems to be the Hamilton will win the award. He won the batting title, hitting .359 this past season, and also led the AL in slugging (.633). Although Hamilton did miss most of the final month of the season, his numbers are extremely impressive and he did play on a first-place team, which could have influenced the voters quite a bit.
Cabrera's case for being named the AL MVP comes down to his big numbers across the board. He led the AL with 126 runs batted in and an on-base percentage of .420. Also, he was highly ranked in the batting average, home runs, runs scored and total bases categories. While the Tigers did not finish first or even second in the AL Central, just imagine how bad they would have been without Cabrera. Case in point: Cabrera missed the final week of the season with an injury and the Tigers lost six of their final seven games, averaging only 2.57 runs a game over that stretch. Over the course of the entire season, the Tigers averaged 4.64 runs a game.
The third legitimate contender for the award is Cano, who was second in the AL in hits (200) and third in total bases (334). What's more, his fielding was very good and he played on a Yankees team that finished only a game out of first in its division and won the AL wild card.
Although it looks like Hamilton will be the AL MVP for 2010, upsets can happen. Just look at Austin Jackson. Many expected him to be the AL Rookie of the Year, but the Rangers' Neftali Feliz ended up winning instead. Hopefully this time around it will be a Tiger pulling off the upset.