With the Atlanta Braves being crowned World Series champions, the 2021 MLB season comes to a close and what a season it was too. There were some incredible individual performances, some younger stars shining brightly, resurgent players who had big-time bounce back years and some surprising teams challenging for the playoffs.
Keep an eye out for our pre-season predictions review coming soon. But *spoiler alert* we got an awful lot more wrong than we did right.
Before all that though, we wanted to give our takes on who we think deserves the end of season awards that MLB will award in the coming days. For the sake of simplicity, we're not going to look at the Gold Glove nor the Silver Slugger awards.
So with all that said, let's get on with it!
AL MVP - Shohei Ohtani
NL MVP - Bryce Harper
Shohei Ohtani had a truly historic season as a two-way player and he was able to stay healthy enough to pitch 130+ innings and play 155 games this season. He hit 46 home runs, led the league in triples and finished the year with 100 RBI, which are pretty great numbers by themselves. But he did all that while going 9-2 with an ERA in the low 3's while striking out 156 batters. He led all of MLB in WAR this season which means that picking Ohtani for MVP is probably the easiest choice we'll have to make in this list.
The NL MVP race is much closer for us but Bryce Harper narrowly edges it ahead of Juan Soto & Fernando Tatis Jr. Soto led all NL position players in WAR but his case wasn't helped by playing on a team which finished last in their division and Tatis led the NL in home runs, but Harper just pips them at the post for us. His league leading 42 doubles and .615 slugging %, alongside his 35 home runs for a team which was challenging for a playoff spot into late September earns him the NL MVP for us. We certainly wouldn't have an issue with Soto winning though.
AL Cy Young - Robbie Ray
NL Cy Young - Zack Wheeler
In 2020, Robbie Ray had an ERA of 6.62 and walked 7.8 batters per 9 innings. Whatever he has done with Toronto in 2021 has been simply incredible - especially considering his rough season prior. This season though, Ray lead the American League in both innings pitched and ERA, he led all of MLB with 248 strikeouts and he lowered his BB/9 to a career low 2.4. Lance Lynn and Gerrit Cole both had stellar years too, but Ray was the best in the AL for us.
Zack Wheeler built on the strong start he made in Philadelphia in 2020 by putting up career best ERA, innings pitched, strikeouts, H/9 & BB/9 in 2021. His pitcher WAR of 7.2 was the best of any starting pitcher; and by a considerable margin too. Walker Buehler - who had an excellent season too - was 0.9 WAR behind Wheeler. Max Scherzer and his incredible performances following his trade to LA, and the pair of Brewers; Brandon Woodruff & Corbin Burnes all deserve honourable mentions too.
AL Rookie of the Year - Randy Arozarena
NL Rookie of the Year - Jonathan India
Arozarena feels like a strange candidate for the 2021 Rookie of the Year award because it seems as though he has been around for a lot longer - playing in 3 postseasons will do that. But with rookie eligibility, his 20 HR, 20 SB and .274 batting average means he gets our pick in the AL. His Tampa Bay teammate Wander Franco put up similar numbers, but for us, Arozarena has the advantage of having played in more than double the number of games this season.
Jonathan India was solidly consistent all season long for Cincinnati and his numbers were somewhat overshadowed by the attention Winkler, Castellanos & Votto received. His .269 batting average and 21 HR shouldn't be ignored, but his 34 doubles ranked 8th most in the NL and his .376 OBP was good enough for 6th best in the National League.
AL Manager of the Year - Kevin Cash
NL Manager of the Year - Gabe Kapler
Kevin Cash once again worked miracles with Tampa Bay to guide them to their 3rd straight playoff berth, winning an AL high 100 games in the process. Even more impressive was how they managed to win that many games with the 5th lowest payroll according to spotrac. When you consider that they traded away Blake Snell in the offseason (a move which once again has us questioning why any team would trade with the Rays), Kevin Cash is clear choice for our AL Manager of the Year.
Similarly, the performance of the San Francisco Giants this season makes Gabe Kapler an easy choice for Manager of the Year in the National League. Few people predicted that the Giants would finish the year over .500, let alone do as well as they did. An MLB high 107 wins in the same division as the big-spending Dodgers is a simply incredible performance by them. Kapler was rewarded by signing a well deserved 2 year contract extension.
Do you agree with us? Who do you think is deserving of some off-season hardware? Let us know in the comments or on twitter.
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