Most Meritorious Player: 1897 Ballot

Here are the specific rules for this election:

Candidate Eligibility: Any North American professional baseball player is eligible for the Most Meritorious Player (MMP) award including players on independent teams. Voters should consider the player’s on-field contribution to Major League Baseball (MLB) team(s) in that season only. If part of the season was spent outside MLB, that value may be considered as well. However, the player’s on-field contribution should be judged in relation to the highest level major league, not relative to a minor league. A season may include playoff or World Series games but does not include spring training or exhibition games. No credit will be given for games not played due to injury, wartime service or contract holdouts.

Ballot Length: For 1897, each voter should rank 10 players.

Voter eligibility: All voters who did not vote in the previous year’s election must post a preliminary ballot in the ballot discussion thread. All voters must fill out a complete ballot. Voters must briefly explain their ballot choices. One person, one vote; anyone determined to have voted with multiple accounts will be banned and their votes will be disallowed. The MMP ballot committee has authority to exclude any ballot that does not meet these requirements.

Scoring: Points will be given in descending order with the highest-ranked player receiving 15 points, the second highest 14 points, and so on until the last player on the ballot receives 1 point. The player with the highest point total will be named the Most Meritorious Player. In case of a tie, the tiebreaker will be number of first place votes. If the tiebreaker does not determine a winner the players will share the title of Most Meritorious Player.

Balloting will close at 4pm EST on 6 April 2022.

Anyone can vote, even if you do not normally participate in Hall of Merit discussions. If you have never participated in an MMP election, just post a preliminary ballot in the discussion thread by 5 April 2022.