Reusse: Cal Raleigh’s superb season at catcher makes him, not Aaron Judge, the AL MVP

Baseball was king in the 1950s, and the newspaper writers covering the major leagues were sharp folks. This can be ascertained looking at the MVP selections for the start of the decade. There were three voters from each of the eight franchises per league, and they went with a theory that would serve us well seven decades later.

That being, “When in conflict, go with the outstanding catcher.”

The New York Yankees’ Yogi Berra and the Brooklyn Dodgers’ Roy Campanella were the MVPs in 1951. Campanella was the National League winner in 1953. Berra was the American League winner in 1954. Campy and Yogi swept the honors in 1955.

The appreciation for all that an exceptional catcher brings to a team has waned with MVP voters through the years. There have been seven seasons in which a catcher won an MVP vote in the past six decades:

In 1963, the Yankees’ Elston Howard. In 1970 and 1972, Cincinnati’s Johnny Bench. In 1976, the Yankees’ Thurman Munson. In 1999, Texas’ Iván “Pudge” Rodríguez. In 2009, the Twins’ Joe Mauer. In 2012, San Francisco’s Buster Posey.

The first catcher in 13 years and only the third this century should be receiving the AL’s MVP award during this offseason:

Cal Raleigh, Seattle’s thick and durable receiver, had reached 56 home runs as of Wednesday … surpassing Mickey Mantle’s record of 54 for a switch hitter set in 1961 with the Yankees (when teammate Roger Maris hit a record-breaking 61 to surpass The Babe).

Raleigh’s was an excellent .951.

This two-man race should not be determined by a combination number that selected baseball brains have adopted as the most vital in assessing performance. The voting should be based on the word in the middle — Valuable — and Raleigh has had a bolder “V” for the Mariners than has Judge with the Yankees.

Start here: The Yankees’ preseason betting total (after the loss of pitching ace Gerrit Cole) was 89.5 wins, tops in what was predicted to be a compact American League. Entering Wednesday, the Yankees were 84-67 with 11 games left, good for second place to Toronto in the East.

The Mariners’ win number was 84.5, putting them a narrow third in the West behind Houston and Texas. Entering Wednesday, they were 83-68 and had taken a half-game division lead because of a 10-game winning streak.

There is also this: Judge benefits from playing in Yankee Stadium, with that ridiculous home run porch across right field. This allows the large man to have a controlled swing to the opposite field and still find home runs there.

There was a late-summer slump for Raleigh and questions as to whether, as a receiver, he was getting the most out of a high-potential pitching staff. There have been numerous “2s” in runs allowed by the M’s lately.

Raleigh has been in the Seattle lineup 147 times in 152 games — 112 as the catcher, 35 as DH. The backup at catcher is Mitch Garver, a 31-run homer contributor to the Twins’ Bomba Squad in 2019. This was a recent Garver response to a Raleigh question:

“I’ve seen him flourish over the last two years to become probably the best switch-hitting player in the game. He has tons of power. And on the defensive side ... he’s a great blocker, thrower, framer.”

Judge, already a two-time AL MVP (2022, 2024), hasn’t been in the lineup quite as often: 141 games, with only 86 in right field.

Let’s see here: It has been a season with a slugger occupying the toughest position on the field in many more games than the MVP competition has been in the outfield — and the catcher is also a leader on a team that’s smoking hot in September.

“I guess the difference of opinion comes with whether you’re from Seattle or New York,” he said. “I am a big admirer of Mr. Judge, the career he’s already had, but I would say Raleigh would be my choice.

“The job of being a catcher has gotten more challenging, more complicated, than when I was playing.

“Raleigh, behind the plate, he’s an absolute horse. He reminds me of Salvador Perez, and that’s a Hall of Famer there.

“You can see the way Raleigh tries to navigate a pitcher. Bryan Woo, George Kirby, those guys, he does a nice job of finding a way to get a pitcher deeper into a game. As a catcher, you have to realize the key to winning is that guy standing 60 feet, 6 inches in front of you.

“You can tell Cal Raleigh knows that.”