The National League MVP conversation has turned into a tight race between the Chicago Cubs’ Pete Crow-Armstrong and Los Angeles Dodgers star Shohei Ohtani, and two White Sox players have come down on Ohtani’s side.
That choice stands out because ESPN’s Jesse Rogers polled 21 players and found 15 of them backing Crow-Armstrong as MVP over Ohtani. Still, among the four players who picked Ohtani, two were members of the White Sox: Sean Burke and catcher Drew Romo.
Burke pointed to Ohtani’s impact on both sides of the ball, saying, "A half season of Cy Young-level pitching and what he does offensively, no one has done that on both sides of the ball. He gets my vote,"
Romo backed him up with a broader argument about Ohtani’s place in the game, saying, "He's the most valuable. He's maybe the greatest player of all time, and I know the MVP is a 'this year' award, but I just think Ohtani is the greatest. That first half on the mound was enough for me,"
The White Sox duo’s reasoning comes back to Ohtani’s pitching work earlier in the season. He was dominant during that stretch and gave the Dodgers major value before going off the mound for a while.
That absence matters. If Ohtani doesn’t return to pitching, he’ll need to keep piling up elite offensive numbers to stay ahead of Crow-Armstrong, whose overall production has made a strong case of its own.
PCA has been doing damage everywhere - at the plate, on the bases and in the field - and that all-around performance has been enough for many to put him in front in the MVP race.
Even so, Burke and Romo landed on Ohtani.
And after Crow-Armstrong’s last two games against the White Sox - two leadoff homers and a walk-off home run - it’s fair to wonder whether those answers might look a little different now.
In Other News...
Huascar Brazobn Is Already Giving The White Sox A Bullpen Problem
The White Soxs latest roster shuffle brought in four fresh names, but not every addition came with the same sense of clarity. Luis Castillo, Brenton Doyle and Joey Bart each seem to fit a role or at least a path to one, while Huascar Brazobn has already complicated things in the bullpen. Chicago was intrigued enough to bring him aboard, but the early returns have not matched the relief profile he built with the Mets.
Brazobns results in Chicago have looked a lot shakier than the version the White Sox were hoping to get, with the kind of inconsistency that can turn a low-key bullpen move into a real roster question. The larger concern is whether this is just a rough stretch or the start of a familiar seasonal slide, because if the struggle keeps going, Chicago has the flexibility to make a move and reset the situation before it becomes a bigger problem. [Read more 🡒]
Cubs Starter's Early Exit Changed Everything Against The White Sox
Kevin Gausmans afternoon against the White Sox took a strange turn once his command started to wobble, and the Cubs were suddenly forced to navigate the rest of the game without the starter they had planned around. What had been a routine division matchup shifted when Gausman began dealing with discomfort, and the ripple effect was immediate for both the Cubs and the White Sox on a day that had already been moving at a tense pace.
The injury was traced to a cramp that affected his glove hand, something the Cubs and Gausman later explained after he was unable to keep going at full capacity. The issue surfaced during the middle innings and lingered long enough to alter the shape of the outing, leaving Chicago to piece together the rest of the game while wondering how much the early departure changed the outcome. [Read more 🡒]