Over the past couple of weeks Major League Soccer has been collecting the ballots for the various regular season awards that will be announced over the next few weeks. The list included major awards like the Most Valuable Player, Rookie of the Year, and Goalkeeper of the Year, along with lesser known awards like Referee of the Year and Public Relations Staff of the Year. Since the polls closed this past Monday afternoon, MLS has released the finalists in each award category and media members have revealed their first choices. For me, the most interesting of the categories is that of MVP.

Turn on your radio or television and you can’t miss them — campaign advertisements for politicians and propositions hoping to earn your vote ahead of state and local elections in early November. Most of these ads end up being of the mudslinging variety, but some try to focus in on the positive attributes politicians support and the promises they hope to bring forth if elected. Discussions and debates rage on between supporters on either side of each race and issue, while those few left in the middle and undecided try to weigh the merits of the opposing campaigns. In a few weeks’ time, all the fuss, all the arguments, all the vitriol will give way to a slate of winning candidates and new laws, and the losers will soon be forgotten.

I grew up really, really caring about baseball.  In baseball, a sport that is as much an individual pursuit as it is a team game, awards given to players really, really matter.  Careers can be made on a Cy Young or an MVP, and even lesser awards like the Gold Gloves and Silver Sluggers are hotly debated.  Every year the same question pops up when it's time to crown MVP: should the award go to the best player in the league, or should it be given to the player who means the most to his team?  Despite the debate, the award inevitably goes to the best player, meaning the guy with the best stats.  Hit a lot of homeruns and collect a lot of RBI, and you're likely to be the MVP.  All that talk about what "valuable" actually means is just a bunch of window dressing.

Landon Donovan won his first MLS MVP award yesterday, beating out fellow finalists Shalrie Joseph and Jeff Cunningham. Donovan's win is hardly surprising, and while he was not MFUSA's pick, to say he was undeserving would be unfair. Donovan had a sparkling season while playing for LA, racking up twelve goals six assists. He was limited to twenty-five games due to international duty.


Therein lies the rub, and why Donovan's MVP win will be questioned by some. Unfortunately, awards like this tend to go to the best player rather than the most valuable one. If voters went strictly by the spirit of the award, I think it would be difficult to argue Donovan deserved it over Joseph; the Revs, handcuffed by injury much of the season, relied on Joseph steady midfield play and timely goals all year long.


Should we just change the name of the award to "Most Outstanding Player"? Probably, but there's the problem of the long-standing American tradition of giving out an MVP award holding sway, and it wouldn't really matter anyway; certain people will always take issue with the winner, lament the lack of understanding on the part of the voters, and scream bloody murder that the whole thing is one big popularity contest.


Whatever, it's just a dumb award that has nothing to do with anything anyway. Any backlash against Donovan (and I have really seen any, but then again, I haven't really looked either) is probably more about his team, his image, and the general hate people seem to have for the guy.