While it doesn’t come as much of a surprise given the season that it had, the Baseball Writers Association made it official today and named Alex Rodriguez the American League MVP for the third time in his career:
Alex Rodriguez, the soon-to-be-minted $275 million Yankee, was voted the Most Valuable Player in the American League today. It is the third time he has won the honor.
Rodriguez, who is close to completing a new 10-year contract with the Yankees after opting out of his previous deal during the World Series, received 26 of the 28 first-place votes in balloting by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America. Magglio Ordonez of the Detroit Tigers finished second in the voting, winning the other two first-place votes, cast by Tom Gage of the Detroit News and Jim Hawkins of the Oakland Press in Pontiac, Mich.
Vladimir Guerrero of the Los Angeles Angels finished third, followed by David Ortiz and Mike Lowell of the Boston Red Sox and Jorge Posada of the Yankees. Another Yankee, Derek Jeter, ranked 11th.
Rodriguez, who is 32, batted .314 with 54 home runs and a career-high 156 runs batted in for the 2007 season, with 143 runs scored. But his performance in the division series against Cleveland was just ordinary — 4 for 15 with a solo home run — and the Yankees were eliminated in the first round for the third season in a row.
Still, that did not deter the team from reaching an agreement to re-sign him last Wednesday, after vowing not to chase him as a free agent when he opted out of his former contract on the advice of his agent, Scott Boras.
Congratuations A-Rod.
