MINF MVP, no relation to MILF, II

Jim Baker at ESPN has an article on the top candidates for AL MVP. He ranks Miguel Tejada, Alfonso Soriano, and Alex Rodriguez 1-2-3. He's probably right, though I'm still hoping A-Rod will win. It does seem like it will be close though.

One odd thing about the Tejada-Soriano-Rodriguez trifecta is that it would mark the first time that three middle infielders have finished in the top 3 in MVP voting ever. If I may quote myself, "The closest was 1912 when Larry Doyle (1), Honus Wagner (2), and Joe Tinker (4) finished in the top four in the NL." I did a post on the MINF MVPs back in October.

There have been a number of close two-man races, but what is the closest three-man MVP vote? Many people remember that the 1960 AL MVP vote was very close between number 1, Roger Maris (225 of the maximum 336 points, or 67% of the maximum, and 8 1st places) , and number 2, Mickey Mantle (222, 66%, 10 1st places). But not a lot of people remember that Brooks Robinson was right behind them (211, 63%, 3 1st places). There were only four percentage points between number one and number 3. The next closest is 5 percentage points which happened three times: NL 1957 (Aaron, Musial, and Schoendienst), AL 1955 (Berra, Kaline, and Al Smith), and NL 1952 (Sauer, Roberts, and Black). A six-point differential happened once: AL 1999 (Pudge Rodriguez, Pedro Martinez, and Robbie Alomar).