Shohei Ohtani vs. Aaron Judge: Who Should You Bet for American League MVP?

Things are getting heated between the BetSided team. 

Peter Dewey and Reed Wallach are on opposite sides of who they think should win the American League MVP award this season. 

Right now, Aaron Judge is the favorite, and while there is no value in betting him at WynnBET at -135 odds, he has made a compelling case to win the award. However, there is also two-way phenom Shohei Ohtani, who is literally making history just about every time he steps on the field. 

That’s hard to compete with. 

Betting value aside, who should you take to win AL MVP this season? Reed and Peter made their case for their winner: 

Latest Odds to Win American League MVP

• Aaron Judge: -135
• Shohei Ohtani: +175
• Yordan Alvarez: +700
• Jose Ramirez: +1000
• Mike Trout: +1000

The Case for Aaron Judge to Win AL MVP

Are we really going to act like Aaron Judge isn’t the runaway AL MVP?

Judge currently leads the league in home runs, runs scored and runs batted in with an impressive .287/.366/.627 slash line. 

The argument against Judge and for Ohtani is because of Ohtani’s pitching ability, but are we going to gloss over the fact that Judge has seamlessly transitioned to the Yankees’ every day centerfielder to give them more flexibility in the lineup? 

Judge hasn’t made an error this season and has a Total Zone Total Fielding Runs Above Avg (The number of runs above or below average the player was worth based on the number of plays made) of five this season. 

To compare, Yordan Alvarez, the No. 3 player in the odds, has a rating of two, and he only plays left field. 

Fielding isn’t why Judge is the MVP, but it is part of the story. He is the best hitter in baseball right now, for the team that is 5.5 games better than any other team in the league. 

Judge may not be leading in WAR, but he still has an impressive one at 3.6. As much as counting numbers have been ditched in conventional baseball wisdom for advanced stats, Judge is putting up the counting numbers at an alarming rate. He has five more homers and six more RBIs than Alvarez and 12 homers and 11 RBIs than Ohtani. 

If the Yankees keep up this pace winning ball games, I can’t willingly give Ohtani, who is the best player on a fourth place team, the MVP over him. It simply wouldn’t make sense. – Peter Dewey

The Case for Shohei Ohtani to Win AL MVP

With all due respect to Mr. Judge, I actually think he's the third most likely player to win MVP. We are intoxicated with home runs and records, but the truth of the matter is that voters will see through this come the end of the season. 

Yes, wins are important, but what is Judge's value actually? He is fourth in WAR for position players per Baseball Reference and is behind Yordan Alvarez in all major hitting categories outside of home runs and RBI's.

That brings us to Mr. Ohtani. There's no point in linking to all the tweets that show just how dominant the Angels slugger and pitcher is, but the reigning AL MVP is actually better in 2022. 

He isn't hitting as many homers this year, but has 18 home runs and 53 runs batted in while hitting .259. Oh, and he has a 2.44 ERA and is striking out more than 12 batters per nine innings. One could argue he has been the third best pitcher in the American League and a top-10 hitter.

It's simply not fair to judge Ohtani to Judge and Alvarez, but he is elite at doing the two most important things. Yes, the Angels are losing, but we are underselling the value of the two-way star. 

On Wednesday, Ohtani tossed seven innings with 10 strikeouts and didn't allow an earned run. He also had a two-run RBI that put the Angels in front for good.

Alvarez is a better hitter than Judge, but the Yankees gaudy win total puts him ahead of the Astros slugger. However, when we look past it, we see that Ohtani is truly the Most Valuable Player. Don't overthink it, the cream will rise to the top. – Reed Wallach