MVP races in the majors normally play out like six-month marathons, but on Thursday night the AL battle will briefly become more like a boxing match with Vladimir Guerrero Jr. and Shohei Ohtani stepping into the ring.
Because position players usually bring home the hardware — only 23 of the 181 MVPs in MLB history have been pitchers — we’re consistently denied the pleasure of seeing the top candidates battle each other head-to-head.
Since 1992, only two pitchers have been named MVP (Justin Verlander in 2011 and Clayton Kershaw in 2014), and Kershaw didn’t even face the man who came second in the MVP race that year (Giancarlo Stanton).