Yordan Alvarez of the Houston Astros and Pete Crow-Armstrong of the Chicago Cubs were named the 2026 Most Valuable Players on Thursday, and both won unanimously, MLB.com reported.
Alvarez received all 30 first-place votes in balloting by the Baseball Writers' Association of America, becoming the third player in Houston history to win an MVP award after Jeff Bagwell in the National League in 1994 and Jose Altuve in the American League in 2017. Junior Caminero of the Tampa Bay Rays finished second, and Bobby Witt Jr. of the Kansas City Royals finished third.
A year after injuries limited him to 48 games, Alvarez served notice early by winning AL Player of the Month for March and April, posting a 1.199 OPS with 12 home runs and 27 RBIs in the season's first 32 games. He went on to win his first AL batting title by hitting .316, and he led the league in on-base percentage (.432), slugging (.601), OPS (1.033), offensive WAR (7.2), total bases (341), walks (109) and extra-base hits (77). He finished second in RBIs with a career-high 106 and tied for second in home runs with a career-high 42. He also drew 33 intentional walks, the second-most in AL history, MLB.com reported.
Alvarez is only the second player to win the award as a designated hitter, joining Shohei Ohtani, and the fourth Cuban winner, the first since José Abreu of the White Sox in 2020. "Everybody knows I had some injury struggles last year and everybody knows what happened last year, so yes, that was on my mind," Alvarez said. "I was anxious to get back to this season and now see where that ended up here with an MVP Award." When the announcement was made live on MLB Network, his son, Jordan, kissed him on the cheek and on top of his head.
Crow-Armstrong ends Ohtani's run
Crow-Armstrong also received all 30 first-place votes, becoming the first unanimous MVP in Cubs history. He finished ahead of runner-up Ohtani, the Dodgers' two-way star who had won three straight MVP trophies and four in the previous five seasons. "Tonight's kind of the right time for me to appreciate who I won the award over," Crow-Armstrong said. "That guy has been outright the best baseball player in the world for the last 10 years."
Crow-Armstrong finished with 45 home runs and 41 stolen bases, only the seventh 40-40 season in MLB history and the first for the Cubs. He joined Ohtani (2024) and Alfonso Soriano (2006) as the only players to compile at least 45 homers, 40 steals and 30 doubles in one year. He led the majors with 10.6 WAR, per FanGraphs, the second-highest mark in Cubs history behind Rogers Hornsby's 11.0 in 1929, and he finished 3.6 WAR ahead of Witt, the first gap of at least 3.0 between the top two players since Mickey Mantle and Duke Snider in 1956, MLB.com reported.
He hit .280 with a .372 on-base percentage and led the National League in slugging (.570) and OPS (.942). His 45 homers tied Phillies slugger Kyle Schwarber for the major league lead, and his 84 extra-base hits, 119 runs and 357 total bases each led the majors outright. He was 24 years and 186 days old on the final day of the regular season, the fifth-youngest unanimous MVP according to the Elias Sports Bureau.
There have now been 26 unanimous MVPs since BBWAA voting began in 1931, and this is only the third time both winners were selected unanimously, after Ohtani and Aaron Judge in 2024 and Ohtani and Ronald Acuña Jr. in 2023. It is also the first time both MVPs and both Cy Young Awards were unanimous in the same year, after Cam Schlittler and Jacob Misiorowski swept their awards on Wednesday.