Chicago Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong and Houston Astros designated hitter Yordan Alvarez were named unanimous winners of the Most Valuable Player award in their leagues on Thursday night. The MLB MVP winners for 2026 each received all 30 first-place votes in balloting by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, and both are first-time winners of the award.
Crow-Armstrong, 24, won the National League award ahead of four-time MVP Shohei Ohtani in second place and Milwaukee Brewers second baseman Brice Turang in third. Alvarez, 29, won the American League award ahead of Tampa Bay Rays third baseman Junior Caminero and Kansas City Royals shortstop Bobby Witt Jr. The MLB MVP winners were announced on the same night, and each of them won the award in a unanimous vote.
The MLB MVP winners in the National League
Crow-Armstrong set career highs by batting .280 with 45 home runs, 107 RBIs and 41 stolen bases in 162 games. He won a Gold Glove award in center field and led both leagues with a 10.6 fWAR. He led the league with 119 runs scored and shared the major league lead with 45 home runs with Philadelphia Phillies designated hitter Kyle Schwarber.
Crow-Armstrong became the seventh player in major league history to turn in a 40-40 season, with at least 40 home runs and 40 stolen bases in the same year. The MLB MVP winners list now includes Crow-Armstrong as the ninth member of the Cubs selected for the honor, and the first Cubs player to win the National League MVP award since Kris Bryant in 2016. Crow-Armstrong agreed to a $115 million, six-year contract in March, and he began the season batting ninth before he moved to leadoff in mid-May and hit .300 with a .398 on-base percentage in that role.
His win ended the run of three straight MVP awards for Ohtani, who had won the National League honor in each of the last two seasons and the American League honor before that. Ohtani finished second in the voting this time, and Turang finished third. Crow-Armstrong played in the postseason in each of the past two years, but the Cubs were eliminated each time.
The MLB MVP winners in the American League
Alvarez hit a league-best .316 and finished second in home runs with 42 and second in RBIs with 106, which left him just short of the Triple Crown. He received all 30 first-place votes and 420 total points in the voting. The season was his first as an MVP winner, and it came after he hit a career-high .316 with 42 homers and 106 RBIs for the American League West champions.
Alvarez is the 31st player in history to win an MVP award and a rookie of the year honor. He is the third Astros player to win the MVP award, after Jeff Bagwell and Jose Altuve, and the first American League MVP from Houston since Altuve in 2017. Alvarez joined Aaron Judge in 2025 and Miguel Cabrera in 2012 as the only players since 1970 to win an American League batting title with at least 40 home runs.
A voting first for the MLB MVP winners
This is the first season in which both league MVP winners and both Cy Young Award winners were selected unanimously. The MLB MVP winners were unanimous selections in each league in the same year for the third time, after 2023, when Ohtani and Ronald Acuna Jr. won, and 2024, when Aaron Judge and Ohtani won. The vote also showed how far ahead the two winners finished, since each of them took every first-place vote on offer.
By FanGraphs’ measure of offensive value, Alvarez led the majors at 60.2, with Crow-Armstrong second at 57.7. The MLB MVP winners finished one-two in that measure, which shows how far ahead of the field the two of them were in 2026.
New York Yankees ace Cam Schlittler, the unanimous American League Cy Young winner on Wednesday, placed fourth in the MVP voting. The MLB MVP winners gave their clubs a first in years: Houston’s first MVP since 2017 and Chicago’s first since 2016. Crow-Armstrong and Alvarez now head into the winter as the two players who defined the 2026 season at the plate.