With the calendar flipping to September, now is the time where we will see the best that baseball has to offer in the pennant and awards races.
Frequently we see the narrative of the pennant race determine which players win awards. Mike Trout was the American League MVP last season until Miguel Cabrera won the Triple Crown. Buster Posey led the Giants into the postseason with a brilliant September that carried him to the NL MVP.
This year, even though we can officially declare a few races over—enjoy your second Cy Young award, Clayton Kershaw—there is enough debate about most of of the major awards that it should make for an interesting final month.
For this, I am presenting a ballot as I would fill it out right now with some notes on the player and where I view their stock in the awards race at this moment. I list the top three candidates in each category, except for the NL and AL MVP awards where I will list the top five. I will also include a list of players rising and falling at the end of each page.
These are the choices as I would list them, not what I think will happen when voting occurs in four weeks. With that in mind, let the debate begin.
Note: All stats courtesy of Fangraphs and Baseball Reference unless otherwise noted.