The Story of the MVP

Welcome to my first mini-book!

Here is my first in what I hope will be multiple mini-books I’m planning for paid subscribers over the next few months. This one was very fun and much more intensive than I expected… you wouldn’t necessarily think that the history of the MVP Award would be fascinating, but the more I got into the story, the more I couldn’t let it go.

I guess I’m always looking for sports stories that I can use to tell a larger story about who we are and where we come from and all that. This turned out to be perfect for that. The history of the MVP let me dive into the early days of cars, the mix of sports and gambling, the evolution of how we rate baseball players, why MLB doesn’t own its biggest awards, the gigantic sports impact of someone you’ve almost certainly never heard of named Alan J. Gould, the question about whether the Yankees win more MVPs than they should, and how advanced statistics have changed everything in the way we vote. Lots of other stuff, too.

A version of this, I imagine, will be in an actual, physical book someday. I’ve got a couple ideas on that. You’re getting a rawer, first-draft version of it today, long before anyone else. Thank you so much to all you paid subscribers, you allow me to do this thing I’ve always wanted to do, and I am eternally grateful.

I hope you get a huge kick out of The Story of the MVP.

And if you would like to join the fun, here’s a subscribe button. And welcome.

Today,