In nearly any sport you possibly can identify, offense is king. For those who’re the one who scores the targets, the factors, the runs, the no matter they name it in polo – the biscuits, possibly? – you’re going to get the plaudits. Who’s the best defenseman within the historical past of hockey? It’s Bobby Orr, after all, as a result of he was the primary nice offensive defenseman. This sample very a lot holds on the subject of baseball.
Amongst different issues, the sabermetric revolution helped us codify the worth of hitting relative to the opposite aspects of the sport. To wit, in accordance with weighted runs above common – and we’re utilizing that exact stat as a result of, like customary baserunning and defensive metrics, it’s a counting stat that compares a participant to the efficiency of a mean participant – probably the most worthwhile hitter throughout the 2025 season was one Aaron Choose. Choose created 82.5 extra runs than the typical hitter. That’s 21 runs greater than another participant, and an astonishing 36 greater than another participant not named Shohei Ohtani. Choose was one of the best offensive performer within the recreation by a mile, which makes him the frontrunner for the American League MVP award, regardless that he put up unfavourable worth as a baserunner and, relying on which metric you belief, his protection graded out someplace between fairly good (DRS, FRV) and actually unhealthy (DRP). The perfect defender was Patrick Bailey, who put up 30 fielding runs, and one of the best baserunner was Corbin Carroll, who completed with a measly 10.3 baserunning runs. Offense is simply extra worthwhile than protection and baserunning. Right here’s the distribution of values for the three parts of the sport:
Hitting is a lot extra worthwhile than the opposite two elements, and the vary of outcomes is far wider. There’s no such factor as a baserunner who’s so sluggish that they will’t advance from first to second on a single or so quick that they will constantly go all the best way from first to residence. A fielder can solely steal an out at a time (or a strike, in the event that they’re a catcher), and also you get much more probabilities to hit a house run than to rob one. Ohtani and Choose are unquestionably one of the best gamers within the recreation proper now due to their hitting prowess (to not point out that entire Ohtani pitching deal), however what if we have been to even issues out?
On this article, we’re going to behave as if protection and baserunning are simply as worthwhile as hitting in an effort to discover the best all-around place participant within the recreation. With a purpose to do this, we’ll have to put all three parts on the identical scale. Basically, we’re handicapping batting worth in an effort to weight all three aspects equally. Fortunately, these values are already normalized towards the league common, so we don’t have to fret about that half. For the sake of simplicity, we’ll normalize every thing to 100 runs. Choose’s 82.54 wRAA constitutes 100 of our runs, so each participant’s wRAA is multiplied by 1.21. Likewise, Carroll’s 10.3 baserunning runs imply that each one baserunning totals are multiplied by 9.74 and Bailey’s 30 fielding runs imply that each one fielding totals are multiplied by 3.33. Is there a wiser, extra difficult method to do that? In all probability, however this could work simply superb. Now fielding and baserunning are each bit as worthwhile as hitting.
So who’s the MVP on this league? If you wish to peruse all the leaderboard, this hyperlink will take you to a spreadsheet. I’ll present you the highest 10 and the underside 10 right here. Within the spirit of kindness, I’ll share some ideas in regards to the leaders, and I’ll spare you the gory particulars about how poor Edgar Quero ended up with a rating of -85.
Bobby Witt Jr. is our king, which feels becoming as he’s already royalty. Witt makes an entire lot of sense on the prime. He’s a real five-tool participant, which suggests so much on this specific model of actuality. Take into account that we’re not messing with positional changes, so he’s not getting a bump as a result of he performs shortstop. He’s simply that nice at every thing. That’s rarer than you could understand. Solely three gamers put up sufficient worth this yr to be above a 20 in all three classes: Witt, Trea Turner, and Fernando Tatis Jr. It’s a extremely spectacular feat. In the meantime, due to a -40 in baserunning, Choose fell all the best way to nineteenth regardless of his 100 mark in hitting.
The massive takeaway is that we’ve received an entire lot of athletes on this leaderboard. Pace is de facto useful on the subject of each baserunning and protection, so it’s no shock to see gamers like Carroll and Pete Crow-Armstrong. As we’ve all been saying for years, Byron Buxton actually is likely one of the finest, most full gamers within the recreation when he’s wholesome. We shouldn’t be shocked to see José Ramírez both. Irrespective of how tortured our math, no listing of the sport’s finest all-around gamers can be full with out him.
After all, you possibly can’t preserve Shohei Ohtani off the highest 10 both, regardless of that he doesn’t get any defensive credit score as a delegated hitter. He’s that good a hitter, and he’s that good a baserunner even when he’s not going out and stealing 59 bases. By all rights, we should always change his defensive zero with a complete that displays the worth he brings as a pitcher. If we have been to take action – giving him credit score for 17.6 runs above alternative, which might flip into 29.8 after we grade on our curve – he would sneak previous Turner for fourth place at 141. He’s fairly good, and admittedly, he threatens to make a mockery of this entire train. How might anybody be extra well-rounded than Ohtani?
One enjoyable factor to notice is that regardless that Ohtani was the second-most productive hitter in baseball this yr, his rating within the hitting column is just 75. That’s as a result of Choose is totally destroying the curve for everyone. However nearly as good as Choose is on offense, Bailey is crushing the curve even more durable on protection. The second-highest defensive mark is a 73, as a result of 30 FRV is the second-highest mark recorded within the 11 years the stat has been accessible. First place belongs to Bailey’s normal supervisor Buster Posey, who earned 32 FRV in 2016. Baserunning is way more egalitarian, with De La Cruz coming in second at 91.
That quantity prompts the surprising realization that as a lot as we have fun De La Cruz’s exploits, we should still be underestimating his baserunning prowess. Though he didn’t repeat his massively aggressive 67-stolen base 2024 season, he nonetheless notched 37 swipes and continued to be one of many video games finest baserunners past simply stealing. He vaulted to second within the league as a result of he stayed simply as aggressive by way of taking the additional base, and he didn’t get thrown out even as soon as when making an attempt to take action.
The place’s Cal Raleigh, you may ask? Properly, Raleigh is all the best way down at thirty fifth partly due to his -27 baserunning, but additionally as a result of the 2 areas through which he excels are the 2 elements of the sport which have the steepest curves. He was fifth in our offensive rating, at 55, however that was nonetheless 45 factors beneath Choose. He was a robust defender, however not on Bailey’s degree; his protection graded out at 23, which ranked thirty second.
Ceddanne Rafaela could be the most fascinating participant on this listing. He’s the one member of the highest 15 with a unfavourable quantity in any column. For some time this season, it appeared like Rafaela may add hitting to his glorious protection and baserunning, however he regressed and completed with a 91 wRC+. What makes his protection much more spectacular is that accidents to teammates as soon as once more compelled him into the infield, the place he’s not a particular defender. He spent 24 video games at second base and his protection graded out completely common there. He earned a Gold Glove as an outfielder and completed prime three in all three main defensive metrics regardless of principally ceding one-seventh of the season. Rafaela’s baserunning can also be a pleasing shock. He was price 0.6 baserunning runs in 2024, however he added 15 share factors to his stolen base success fee and received extra aggressive when it got here to taking additional bases. He actually could be a worthwhile piece even when he by no means figures it out on the plate, and on this warped model of actuality, he’s already one of many perfect.
It might be enjoyable to stay on this world, the place baseball’s most athletic gamers dominate the sport simply as totally as any large slugger, and the wiry Bobby Witt Jr. reigns as king. As a substitute, we’ll have to remain in our boring actuality the place, properly, I suppose we nonetheless have Shohei Ohtani. It’s not all unhealthy.