Times mentioned on a ballot

15: Mays, Aaron
10: Mathews, Mantle, Robinson
9: Berra
7: Kaline, McCovey
5: Banks, Drysdale
3: Pascual, Boyer, Pinson, Minoso, Newcombe

Congratulations to Ernie Banks on winning the 1959 MMP. Banks joins fellow shortstops Phil Rizzuto ('50), Cal Ripken Jr. ('83, '84) and Alan Trammell ('87) on the list of MMPs. Banks is also the first Cub to win the MMP though Ron Santo ('67) and Ryne Sandberg ('84) won the NL only version.

Congratulations to Mickey Mantle on winning his 5th straight MMP award (1955 to '59). Mantle has a shot at winning 8 in a row if he can hold off his Yankee teammate Roger Maris in 1960 as he's already won the '61 and '62 awards.

This was an incredibly tight election for pitchers so I'd like to request a runoff. If you voted in the 1959 election, please submit a list of your top three AL and top three NL pitchers.

AL pitching MMP

1. Hoyt Wilhelm
2. Camilo Pascual
3. Bob Shaw

NL pitching MMP

1. Sam Jones
2. Warren Spahn
3. Johnny Antonelli

AL MMP

1) Camilo Pascual
2) Hoyt Wilhelm
3) Bob Shaw


NL MMP

1) Warren Spahn
2) Sam Jones
3) Vern Law

with overall rank (all players) in parenthesis

AL MMP
1- Pascual (5)
2- Wilhelm (9)
3- Shaw (26)

NL MMP
1- Newcombe (7)
2- Law (11)
3- Jackson (14)

AL
1. Wilhelm
2. Pascual
3. Shaw

NL
1. S Jones
2. Law
3. Spahn

AL
1. Pascual
big gap
2. Wilhelm
3. Shaw

NL
1. Drysdale
2. Newcombe
3. Jackson

AL (In Order)-Wilhelm, Pascual, Shaw

NL-Jones, Law, Newk

Mantle is the fifth-best player in baseball in what was widely considered a terrible year by his standards. That dude could play some baseball.

Mantle is the fifth-best player in baseball in what was widely considered a terrible year by his standards. That dude could play some baseball.

If he had only taken better care of himself...

#2, who won in 1982 if not Yount?

AL:
1. Pascual
2. Wilhelm
3. Shaw

NL:
1. Jackson
2. Newcombe
3. Spahn

AL :
1. Wilhelm
2. Pascual
3. Shaw

NL
1. Jones
2. Jackson
3. Drysdale

It's pretty impressive for Ernie Banks to win an MMP award (and the real-life MVP award) considering:

1)It's not like the Cubs were a great team bringing a lot of attention to him with the media
2)He was in a league with Willie Mays and Hank Aaron...when they were both at or very close to their peaks

You've got to be a heck of a player to be able to accomplish that!

At any rate, my picks for pitchers in order:

NL:
1. L. Jackson
2. W. Spahn
3. D. Drysdale

AL:
1. H. Wilhelm
2. C. Pascual
3. B. Shaw

AL:
1. Wilhelm
2. Pascual
3. Shaw

NL:
1. Law
2. Sam Jones
3. Larry Jackson

#2, who won in 1982 if not Yount?

Good catch. You're right- Yount won the MMP in '82 and should have been included on the list of champion shortstops.

AL
Pascual
Wilhelm
Shaw

NL
Law
Newcombe
Spahn

Thanks for participating in the runoff everyone. We've heard from all of the voters except bjhanke though I included a partial ballot for him based on his original vote.

As a result of the runoff, I'm prepared to call a second tie* for the pitching MMP. Camilo Pascual appeared to have a slight advantage over Hoyt Wilhelm as he led on the initial MMP results 83 points to 80. However, they both received the same number of votes (9) which is why I suggested the runoff. The runoff revealed identical support for the two candidates: 6 first place and 6 second place votes for each. When I factored in the NL (based on the full ballots), each candidate received 6 first place votes, 4 seconds, 1 third and 1 omission. That's about as close as it gets so congratulations to Camilo Pascual and Hoyt Wilhelm, our co-MMPs for 1959.

While, we're at it- congratulations to Bob Shaw of the White Sox who was a unanimous third place finisher.

*Our previous tie came in 1974 when Phil Niekro and Gaylord Perry ended up with the same number of points, good enough for 5th overall.

The National League vote was about as wide open as it gets. 6 different pitchers received 1st place votes (4 of whom were named on official MMP ballots, 2 others who were named first on non-ballot spaces). I thought it might come down to 2nd and 3rd place votes but it really came down to who got the most number ones.

Sam Jones led the way with 4 firsts and 2 seconds for a total of 26 points (5 points for a 1st, 3 for a 2nd). He was named on barely half of the ballots but that was enough.

Vern Law didn't get a single MMP vote but he finished second in the runoff on the strength of 2 firsts, 3 seconds and 1 third for 20 points. bjhanke also voted Law first among NL pitchers which would have brought him up to 25 points but that isn't enough to catch Jones (plus, I don't know who bjhanke listed 2nd and 3rd).

Larry Jackson and Don Newcombe had the highest finishes on the full MMP ballot with 2 votes a piece. However, they were leapfrogged by Jones and Law in the runoff. Larry Jackson had 2 firsts, 1 second and 3 thirds to finish 3rd with 16 points. Don Newcombe had 1 first, 3 seconds and 1 third to finish 4th with 15 points.

Warren Spahn rounds out the top five based on 1 first, 2 seconds and 3 thirds for 14 points.

Don Drysdale made the MMP vote but he didn't have a lot of support in the runoff. He finished with 1 first and 2 thirds for 7 points and 6th place.

The NL MMP is intriguing to me because of how wide open it was.
Looking over my ballot now, I'm amused to see that the NL MMP I have in 6th place [Newcombe, Law, Jackson, Spahn, Drysdale, Jones].

I also had him in 6th place. He was second if I didn't consider hitting, but 4 of the 5 pitchers ahead of him were very good hitters and he was very poor. I'm not sure that everyone considers hitting when evaluating pitchers.

All my rankings for pitchers are considered for offensive value, FWIW.

chris - Sorry. Im down deep in the yearly HoF vote, and just checked by here to see what had happened. My 3 best NL pitchers would be:

Law
Spahn
Sam Jones

My three best AL pitchers would be:

Wilhelm
Bob Shaw
Pascual

Don't know fi that would changes any rankings or not. - Brock Hanke

Brock - That breaks the tie in the AL and changes the NL rankings to Jones, Law, and a tie for 3rd among Spahn, Jackson and Newcombe.

DL is right. That breaks the AL and overall tie in Wilhelm's favor- though I feel bad for DL as he was one of Pascual's biggest supporters. It also helps Spahn jump a couple of spots but doesn't affect the top spot for the NL.

I, personally, was a BIG fan of Wilhelm and a serious fan of Pascual. Shaw was the surprise. I could not remember even hearing about him, so I had to go with numbers alone. He's nowhere near Pascual over the career. The NL guys I knew. Spahn was certainly the greatest of them considering their careers. Then Law, who was VERY good and just had a hot year in 1959, and then Sam Jones, who was mostly famous for talking about throwing at hitters to knock them down. Sort of like Sal Maglie. They were both quality pitchers, but the knockdown reputation was most of what they were known for. - Brock

Duplicate post.

Please ignore comment #29. I was trying to post it to the old-timers thread, but it ended up here, and I can't find a way to delete it. - Brock