Recently I investigated the topic of Andruw’s MVP vote totals. My idea was to verify my understanding that Andruw had not received very much recognition in his career, as an MVP candidate. Having looked at the issue, I think there is reason to believe that that is true. His MVP numbers are not consistent with what one would usually call "one of the best players in baseball," the basic standard for Hall of Fame inclusion. 

      When I went to check Andruw’s record, I was confronted with two basic facts, and unhelpfully, they pointed in opposite directions. The first fact was Andruw’s Awards Share total, which at 1.10 was noticeably modest. On the other hand, it had not really entered my consciousness that Andruw had hit as many as 434 home runs in his career. 

     434 home runs is quite a heap of bombs. Andruw had his monster year in 2005, of course, when he led the major leagues with 51 swats -- in my head, that year was more of an outlier than it was in reality. He did, after all, have other years in which he hit 41, 36 (twice), 35, 34 (twice), and 33 home runs. Andruw was more of a consistent slugger than I had realized. 

     In a certain sense, one could say that this information settles the debate in favor of Andruw. If you have a guy hitting 434 home runs who is also widely regarded as a supreme outfield defender, well, that’s a very solid resume for the Hall of Fame. 

     The low MVP tallies nagged at me, however. The 434 home runs placed Andruw at the 47th slot all-time, while his Career Awards Share clocked in as the 233rd most impressive total all-time. Andruw never won an MVP award -- he finished 2nd in the NL vote of 2005 and never finished higher than 8th apart from that one year. 

     It occurred to me to ask, how many players who rank ahead of him on the all-time HR chart had weaker showings in MVP voting? My guess was pretty darn few. 

     That guess was certainly correct, but whether that is a true argument to be marshaled against Andruw as a Hall of Fame candidate is for others to decide. The real purpose of this article is to investigate the all-time HR list with an eye to the Career Awards Share tallies of each person in the top 50. It’s interesting information. 

     Here are the top 50 HR hitters of all time, with Career Awards Share info included: 

Andruw’s Career Awards Share total is a little low for a player who should, as some argue, be ushered into the Hall of Fame. The only players in the top 50 with a weaker performance in the MVP votes are Adam Dunn, Dave Kingman, Paul Konerko, and Carlos Beltran. Of that group, the only one who has a reasonable argument for the Hall of Fame is Beltran. 

I must say it was highly interesting to learn that Beltran’s MVP tallies have been so unimpressive. I don’t know why Beltran had such difficulty getting votes in MVP balloting. As a center fielder with considerable defensive value as well as some speed and power, it seems to me that Beltran is the most comparable player to Andruw on the list. 

I don’t have any big conclusion to draw here. We all have perceptions about career value and peak value, consistency and excellence, superstars and compilers, multi-faceted players and players with a narrow skill spectrum. This chart speaks to those perceptions. 

In no particular order, a few observations: 

* An obvious point, but Bonds’ total there is just staggering. Bonds has become a kind of unmentionable persona in the Hall of Fame debate and that has tended to obscure his credentials. The man won the MVP Award 7 times. It’s proper for someone to say that every now and again. 

* How many people do you suppose are aware that Albert Pujols has the third most impressive MVP Awards Share in baseball history? Obviously, he has a hypothetical chance of passing Musial to hit #2 all-time, but at this stage it would be unwise to wager that Pujols will be getting any MVP votes before his career is over -- wouldn’t it? On a lower level, Miguel Cabrera’s total jumped out as me as a bit more impressive than I would have expected before checking it.

 * The low total of Ruth is interesting. It would be tempting to explain that by reference to how early Ruth’s career took place, but the strong total of his obvious contemporary Lou Gehrig causes one to question that assumption. Does anyone know why Ruth’s MVP tallies are so low? Were multiple winners disallowed in his era? Did Gehrig’s numbers spike because he was always finishing lower than first? 

* The relatively weak showing of Willie McCovey parallels something I have always perceived, which is that McCovey had a somewhat recessive image as a great player. If you somehow could rank players by "number of words written about," McCovey would finish way, way behind a lot of his peers, such as Cal Ripken, for instance. 

* On November 23, 2017, Bill tweeted his view that Jim Thome is an obvious Hall of Fame candidate. As we all learned recently, Thome now is in the Hall of Fame, but his MVP performance was strikingly weak for someone who hit 612 home runs. That figure may be a tribute to his consistency, but ordinarily we would look at it as a negative showing.

 * A moment of true respect for Adam Dunn, who managed to swat 462 dingers without anyone ever buying into the idea that he might be one of baseball’s most prized performers.