Sure enough, since 1980 there have been 56 MVP awards given in Major League Baseball. Only seven times has the award been given to a player under 6 feet tall:
- 1989 Kevin Mitchell, 5'11 / 210 lbs (NL)
- 1990 Ricky Henderson, 5'10 / 195 (AL)
- 1991 Terry Pendelton, 5'9 / 180 (NL)
- 1999 Ivan Rodriguez, 5'9 / 205 (AL)
- 2001 Ichiro Suzuki, 5'9 / 160 (AL)
- 2002 Miguel Tejada, 5'10, 170 (AL)
- 2007 Jimmy Rollins, 5'8 / 160 (NL)
Dustin Pedroia is listed by both Mlb.com and baseball-reference.com as standing 5'9, 180 lbs. If he were to win, he would be taller than only Rollins for recent MVP winners. It is interesting to observe that baseball writers seem to favor short players in bursts (1989-1991, 1999-2002), before falling back in love with hulking outfielders.
Most-valuable second basemen are also rare, regardless of height. It has happened only 6 times previously:
- 1931, Frankie Frisch, St. Louis Cardinals, 5'11, 165
- 1949, Jackie Robinson, Brooklyn Dodgers, 5'11, 204
- 1975, Joe Morgan, Cincinnati Reds, 5'7, 160
- 1976, Joe Morgan, Cincinnati Reds, 5'7, 160
- 1984, Ryne Sandberg, Chicago Cubs, 6'2, 180
- 2000, Jeff Kent, San Francisco Giants, 6'1, 185
Pedroia would be the second-shortest second basemen to ever win the award. Chase Utley (6'1, 170) and Ian Kinsler (6'0, 200) are also capable of winning awards now or in the future, but they tower over Pedroia.
It is worth noting that the weights listed at the two sites I visited differ dramatically. Mlb.com lists Alex Rodriguez at 225 pounds, while baseball-reference.com lists him at 190 pounds (espn.com also lists A-Rod at 225). So it is likely that the weights I cite, taken from baseball-reference.com, date to when the players made their Major League debuts. Or perhaps simply what the players wish they weighed. Pedroia could not possibly weigh only 10 pounds less than A-Rod. And Dmitri Young does not weight 215 pounds.
Weight, after all, has become a sensitive topic in baseball, with media pointing out the conspicuous weight loss of players suspected of steroid use. Like basketball players who prefer to be the merely-tall 6'11 rather than the freakish 7'0, perhaps baseball players close to the 6-foot mark claim that last inch or two in order to make their hulking frames seem more proportional. After all, according to the government's BMI count, virtually all major league players are "overweight" or "obese."
So the listed weights of MVP players suspected of steroids (Barry Bonds, 228 pounds) or cheeseburgers (Mo Vaughn, 230 pounds) may be suspect. But unless steroids (or cheeseburgers) can change a player's height, it is safe to assume that the heights of the game's top talent remain chemically pure.
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UPDATE: Jon Heyman, writing for SI.COM on 9/5/08, refers to Pedroia as five-foot-seven. Perhaps Heyman has visited the Red Sox clubhouse and read the tick marks on the doorframe to the trainer's room. In that case, Pedroia's MVP candidacy is even more remarkable, as far as height goes.
