November 18, 200322 yr Tuesday, November 18, 2003 By Tim Kurkjian ESPN The Magazine It's a two-man race for National League MVP: the best hitter most of us have ever seen against the best young hitter perhaps anyone has ever seen. Bonds At age 39, OF #25 had another spectacular season. He batted .341 with 45 home runs, one every 8.7 at-bats. His slugging percentage was .749, a staggering 82 points higher than the runner-up, Albert Pujols. Bonds' on-base percentage of .529 was the fifth highest since walks became an official statistic in 1913, and 71 points higher than runner-up Todd Helton. Leading the league in slugging and on-base percentage, almost by definition, makes you the best offensive player. Bonds did it for a division winner. Only six players have led their league in slugging and on-base percentage, gone to the playoffs and not won the MVP: Stan Musial, Mickey Mantle, Duke Snider, Pedro Guerrero, Jack Clark and Jason Giambi. To appreciate Bonds' season is to understand the reverence showed by opposing pitchers. He walked 148 times, 37 more than anyone in the league, more than Pujols and Sammy Sosa combined. He was intentionally walked 61 times, which was more than the next three NL players combined, and nearly twice as many as Alex Rodriguez has in his career. You can also make a compelling MVP case for Pujols. He was a Triple Crown candidate deep into the season. He led the NL in runs scored, hits, extra base hits doubles and batting & and at age 23, he became the youngest batting champion since Tommy Davis in 1962. Pujols became the first right-handed hitter to win the NL batting title since Andres Galarraga in 1993. Pujols joined Rogers Hornsby in 1922 and Vladimir Guerrero in 1999 as the only players to have a 30-game hitting streak in a 40-homer season and Pujols nearly carried the Cardinals to the playoffs. But Bonds' team made it to the postseason and he had another historic season. That could spell MVP No. 6. Tim Kurkjian is a senior writer for ESPN The Magazine and a regular contributor to Baseball Tonight. E-mail tim.kurkjian@espnmag.com.
November 18, 200322 yr Author 11/18/2003 1:07 PM ET Bonds wins sixth NL MVP Award Slugger receives 28 of 32 first-place votes By Chris Shuttlesworth / MLB.com OF #25 hit .341 with 45 home runs for the Giants in 2003. (Marcio Jose Sanchez/AP) SAN FRANCISCO -- OF #25 captured his record sixth National League MVP Award and unprecedented third in a row Tuesday, beating out St. Louis' Albert Pujols by a 426-303 point margin. Bonds received 28 of 32 first-place votes, while Pujols received three. The six MVP honors put Bonds far and away in his own class among baseball players, as no other player has won more than three. Bonds is now one of just four athletes in the four major U.S. sports to win an MVP Award six times. The NBA's Kareem Abdul-Jabbar and the NHL's Gordie Howe each won six, while hockey legend Wayne Gretzky captured nine MVP Awards in his sport. NL MOST VALUABLE PLAYER Player 1st Total Bonds 28 426 Pujols 3 303 Sheffield 1 247 Thome - 203 Lopez - 159 Gagne - 143 Helton - 75 Besides Bonds, no other player has won more than three MVP Awards. The three-time winners: AL Player Years Jimmie Foxx 1932, 33, 38 Joe DiMaggio 1939, 41, 47 Yogi Berra 1951, 54, 55 Mickey Mantle 1956, 57, 62 NL Player Years Stan Musial 1943, 46, 48 Roy Campanella 1951, 53, 55 Mike Schmidt 1980, 81, 86 AL MOST VALUABLE PLAYER Player 1st Total Rodriguez 6 242 Delgado 5 213 Posada 5 194 Stewart 3 140 Ortiz 4 130 Ramirez 1 100 Garciaparra 1 99 ? Complete results > MORE AL COVERAGE ? Rodriguez wins first MVP Award ? Delgado second in MVP voting ? Posada third in AL race ? Stewart places fourth in MVP race ? Ortiz, Manny, Nomar are top seven Since the BBWAA began handing out MVP Awards in 1931, the award has gone to players from a team without a winning record only seven times: Year Player Team Record 1952 Hank Sauer CHC 77-77 1958 Ernie Banks CHC 72-82 1959 Ernie Banks CHC 74-80 1987 Andre Dawson CHC 76-85 1989 Robin Yount MIL 81-81 1991 Cal Ripken BAL 67-95 2003 Alex Rodriguez TEX 71-91 Bonds' title gives the Giants the league's top individual honor in each of the last four years -- Jeff Kent edged Bonds in 2000 -- a feat never before accomplished in the National League. Mickey Cochrane, Lefty Grove and Jimmie Foxx (twice) of the Philadelphia A's won the award four times in a row from 1928-33 (no award was given out in 1929 or 1930), while the Yankees saw Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle combine for four in a row from 1954-57 and Roger Maris (twice), Mantle and Elston Howard do the same from 1960-63. While Bonds' 45 homers were far below the 73 he hit in winning the MVP Award in 2001 and his .341 average -- third best in the league -- fell short of the .370 mark he posted in winning a batting title and another MVP Award in 2002, his performance in 2003 was perhaps more remarkable. It came as Bonds watched his father, former Giants All-Star Bobby Bonds, succumb to cancer, with the superstar son leaving the team several times to be with his ailing father and then to mourn with his family after Bobby's death. Bonds returned from that final bereavement leave after missing five games, hit a home run in the second at-bat of his first game back and then was hospitalized overnight for an irregular heartbeat brought on by stress and sleeplessness. Rookie of the Year: AL - Berroa, KC NL - Willis, FLA Cy Young: AL - Halladay, TOR NL - Gagne, LA Manager of the Year: AL - Pe?a, KC NL - McKeon, FLA Most Valuable Player: AL - Rodriguez, TEX NL - TBA 11/18 MLB.com's complete coverage > Just before his father's death and immediately after his first bereavement leave to be with the ailing Bobby, Bonds ended two games against the Braves with a walk-off homer in the 10th inning. In the other contest of the three-game sweep of Atlanta, Bonds received an intentional walk to load the bases in the ninth and Edgardo Alfonzo followed with a game-winning single. Bonds tallied another walk-off homer, the ninth of his career, on his 39th birthday July 24, just after he threw out a potential go-ahead run at the plate. That homer also made him the all-time San Francisco Giants home run leader, passing Willie McCovey. Bonds won his first MVP Award in 1990 with Pittsburgh before narrowly losing the 1991 race to Terry Pendleton. He then won back-to-back awards in 1992 and 1993, the latter his first season with San Francisco. In 2001, after setting the single-season record with 73 homers, he won his unprecedented fourth MVP Award with 30 of 32 first-place votes and then last year captured his first unanimous honor, easily topping Pujols. The slugger helped the Giants capture the NL West title in 2003 as the club remained in first place every day of the season before falling to the eventual world champion Marlins in the Division Series. He easily led the Majors with a .749 slugging percentage, a .529 on-base percentage and 148 walks, 61 of those intentional, though far more were unofficially intentional. OF #25 / LF Height: 6'2" Weight: 210 Bats/Throws: L/L More info: Player page Stats | Splits Giants site Bonds shop By comparison, Boston's Manny Ramirez finished second with 29 intentional free passes. Only two other entire teams had more intentional walks than Bonds -- the Cardinals with 68 and the Diamondbacks with 63. Despite the kid-gloves treatment, Bonds still powered 45 home runs, two behind league leader Jim Thome, who finished fourth in voting behind Atlanta's Gary Sheffield. Bonds also drove in 90 runs and scored 111 times despite playing in only 130 games and recording 390 at-bats -- 201 fewer ABs than Pujols, who hit 43 homers and walked 79 times (12 intentional). He tied the NL mark jointly held by himself and Duke Snider by reaching base safely in 58 consecutive games. Bonds ended the season just two homers shy of tying godfather Willie Mays' 660 for third on the all-time list. By hitting at least 30 homers for the 12th straight season, Bonds extended his own NL record and tied Foxx's Major League mark established from 1929-40. With three multihomer games in 2003, he moved past Mays into third on the all-time list with 64 such games, three shy of Mark McGwire and eight behind Babe Ruth. He became the charter member of the 500-500 club when he stole his 500th career base in the 11th inning June 23, subsequently scoring the game-winning run. He also passed Ruth for second on the all-time walks list with 2,070 and is 120 free passes shy of Rickey Henderson's Major League record. Chris Shuttlesworth is an editorial producer for MLB.com. This story was not subject to the approval of Major League Baseball or its clubs.
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