MLB All-Time Most Valuable Assets

New York Yankees, right fielder

1920 season, age 25

54 home runs, 137 RBI, .376 average, 1.382 OPS. League average OPS: .730.

He hit more home runs by himself than any other team in the American League managed, in his first year as a Yankee, three seasons after he had last been a full-time pitcher.

Homestead Grays, catcher

1937 season, age 25

A .974 slugging percentage, the highest single-season figure in the official record book.

When Major League Baseball incorporated Negro Leagues statistics into its official records in 2024, Gibson became the all-time leader in career batting average, slugging percentage and on-base plus slugging, ahead of Cobb and Ruth. He was 25 and a catcher.

Washington Senators, pitcher

1913 season, age 25

36-7, 1.14 ERA, 243 strikeouts in 346 innings. League average ERA: 2.93.

The most dominant pitching season of the dead-ball era, roughly one earned run allowed for every nine innings, across a workload no modern arm goes near. He was 25 and pitching for a Washington club that had never finished higher than second.

Boston Red Sox, left fielder

1941 season, age 23

37 home runs, 120 RBI, .406 average, 1.287 OPS. League average OPS: .728.

The last man to hit .400, at 23. He went six for eight in a season-ending doubleheader rather than sit out to protect the number.

New York Mets, pitcher

1985 season, age 20

24-4, 1.53 ERA, 268 strikeouts in 277 innings. League average ERA: 3.59.

A Cy Young Award at 20, which no pitcher has managed younger.

New York Yankees, first baseman

1927 season, age 24

47 home runs, 175 RBI, .373 average, 1.240 OPS. League average OPS: .747.

The Most Valuable Player award, batting behind Ruth’s 60 home runs, which is the measure of what it took to win it. He was 24.

Los Angeles Angels, centre fielder

2012 season, age 21

30 home runs, 83 RBI, .326 average, .963 OPS. League average OPS: .731.

Rookie of the Year at 21, combining power, average and base stealing at a level nobody that age had reached. Los Angeles held his rights for five more seasons.

Seattle Mariners, shortstop

1996 season, age 21

36 home runs, 123 RBI, .358 average, 1.045 OPS. League average OPS: .795.

A 21-year-old shortstop hitting .358 with 36 home runs, a combination the position had never produced. Seattle had him near the league minimum with years of control still to run.

Philadelphia Athletics, first baseman

1932 season, age 24

58 home runs, 169 RBI, .364 average, 1.218 OPS. League average OPS: .748.

Fifty-eight home runs at 24, two short of Ruth’s record, with the Most Valuable Player award. Philadelphia traded him to Boston three years later in a deal built around $150,000, which says more about the Athletics than about Foxx.

New York Yankees, centre fielder

1956 season, age 24

52 home runs, 130 RBI, .353 average, 1.169 OPS. League average OPS: .733.

The Triple Crown at 24, leading the American League in average, home runs and runs batted in.

Cincinnati Reds, catcher

1970 season, age 22

45 home runs, 148 RBI, .293 average, .932 OPS. League average OPS: .721.

A 22-year-old catcher leading the National League in home runs and runs batted in, and the Most Valuable Player award with it. No catcher has been this good this young, at the position that wears players out fastest.

Montreal Expos, pitcher

1997 season, age 25

17-8, 1.90 ERA, 305 strikeouts in 241 innings. League average ERA: 4.20.

A Cy Young Award for Montreal at 25, the season before the Expos traded him because they could not pay him. He struck out more than a batter an inning as the sport entered its most hitter-friendly decade in a century.

New York Giants, centre fielder

1954 season, age 23

41 home runs, 110 RBI, .345 average, 1.078 OPS. League average OPS: .742.

The Most Valuable Player award and a World Series at 23, in his first full season back from two years in the Army.

Nineteen more seasons followed, through 1973.

Detroit Tigers, centre fielder

1911 season, age 24

8 home runs, 127 RBI, .420 average, 1.088 OPS. League average OPS: .689.

A .420 average and 83 stolen bases at 24.

Washington Nationals, right fielder

2015 season, age 22

42 home runs, 99 RBI, .330 average, 1.109 OPS. League average OPS: .713.

The unanimous Most Valuable Player award at 22, a season that stood clear of the rest of the National League. Washington controlled him for three more years.

Seattle Mariners, centre fielder

1993 season, age 23

45 home runs, 109 RBI, .309 average, 1.025 OPS. League average OPS: .745.

Forty-five home runs at 23, in the middle of the run that made him the most watched player in the sport, and before Seattle had to decide what he was worth.

St. Louis Cardinals, right fielder

1943 season, age 22

13 home runs, 81 RBI, .357 average, .988 OPS. League average OPS: .669.

The Most Valuable Player award at 22, hitting .357, before he lost a year of his own to the Navy.

Milwaukee Braves, right fielder

1957 season, age 23

44 home runs, 132 RBI, .322 average, .978 OPS. League average OPS: .721.

The Most Valuable Player award and a World Series at 23, the third of twenty consecutive seasons of at least 20 home runs.

St. Louis Cardinals, left fielder

2003 season, age 23

43 home runs, 124 RBI, .359 average, 1.106 OPS. League average OPS: .749.

A batting title at 23 in his third season, hitting .359 with 43 home runs, two years after St Louis took him in the thirteenth round.

New York Giants, pitcher

1905 season, age 25

31-9, 1.28 ERA, 206 strikeouts in 339 innings. League average ERA: 2.99.

Thirty-one wins at 25, then three shutouts in six days that October, which remains the best pitching any postseason has seen.

New York Yankees, centre fielder

1939 season, age 24

30 home runs, 126 RBI, .381 average, 1.119 OPS. League average OPS: .757.

A .381 average and the Most Valuable Player award at 24, in a fourth season that ended in a fourth pennant.

St. Louis Cardinals, second baseman

1922 season, age 26

42 home runs, 152 RBI, .401 average, 1.181 OPS. League average OPS: .749.

A .401 average with 42 home runs from a second baseman, a line nobody at the position has approached since.

New York Mets, pitcher

1969 season, age 24

25-7, 2.21 ERA, 208 strikeouts in 273 innings. League average ERA: 3.60.

Twenty-five wins, the Cy Young Award and a World Series at 24, for a club that had lost at least a hundred games in five of its seven seasons.

Los Angeles Dodgers, pitcher

2013 season, age 25

16-9, 1.83 ERA, 232 strikeouts in 236 innings. League average ERA: 3.73.

A third straight earned run average title and a second Cy Young Award at 25, signed the following January to the extension that made him the highest-paid pitcher in the game.

Detroit Tigers, pitcher

1945 season, age 24

25-9, 1.81 ERA, 212 strikeouts in 313 innings. League average ERA: 3.36.

A second consecutive Most Valuable Player award at 24, the only pitcher to win it twice running, then two wins in the World Series.

Oakland Athletics, pitcher

1971 season, age 22

24-8, 1.82 ERA, 301 strikeouts in 312 innings. League average ERA: 3.46.

The Most Valuable Player and Cy Young awards in the same season at 22, for an Oakland club about to win three straight World Series.

Pittsburgh Pirates, pitcher

2025 season, age 23

10-10, 1.97 ERA, 216 strikeouts in 187 innings.

A unanimous Cy Young Award in his first full season, at 23, the first qualified pitcher that young with an earned run average starting with a one since Gooden in 1985. Pittsburgh holds him through 2029 and has shown no sign of being able to extend him.

Kansas City Royals, shortstop

2024 season, age 24

32 home runs, 109 RBI, .332 average, .977 OPS. League average OPS: .703.

A batting title from a shortstop at 24, with 32 home runs and 31 stolen bases, on a Kansas City team that had lost 106 games the year before.

Baltimore Orioles, shortstop

1983 season, age 23

27 home runs, 102 RBI, .318 average, .888 OPS. League average OPS: .728.

The Most Valuable Player award and a World Series at 23, from a shortstop a year into a streak that reached 2,632 consecutive games.

Atlanta Braves, right fielder

2023 season, age 25

41 home runs, 106 RBI, .337 average, 1.012 OPS. League average OPS: .740.

Forty-one home runs and 73 stolen bases, the only season anyone has combined those two numbers, and a unanimous Most Valuable Player award at 25.

Baltimore Orioles, shortstop

2024 season, age 23

37 home runs, 92 RBI, .281 average, .893 OPS. League average OPS: .703.

Thirty-seven home runs from a 23-year-old shortstop, the season after he was Rookie of the Year, with four more years of club control at that point.

Seattle Mariners, catcher

2025 season, age 28

60 home runs, the most ever hit by a catcher and by a switch-hitter.

Sixty home runs from a catcher, which no one at the position had come within twelve of, and the first player to hit twenty from each side of the plate. He finished second in the Most Valuable Player voting to Aaron Judge.

Los Angeles Dodgers, pitcher

1981 season, age 20

13-7, 2.48 ERA, 180 strikeouts in 192 innings. League average ERA: 3.49.

The Cy Young Award and Rookie of the Year in the same season at 20, the only player to do both, ending in a World Series.

Toronto Blue Jays, first baseman

2021 season, age 22

48 home runs, 111 RBI, .311 average, 1.002 OPS. League average OPS: .731.

Forty-eight home runs and a .311 average at 22, tying for the American League lead in home runs and leading it outright in on-base percentage and slugging.

Seattle Mariners, centre fielder

2022 season, age 21

28 home runs, 75 RBI, .284 average, .853 OPS. League average OPS: .701.

Rookie of the Year at 21, then a twelve-year extension running through 2034, with options that can carry it further still.

Boston Red Sox, right fielder

2018 season, age 25

32 home runs, 80 RBI, .346 average, 1.078 OPS. League average OPS: .734.

A batting title, the Most Valuable Player award and a World Series at 25, with a Gold Glove in right field.

Los Angeles Dodgers, pitcher

1963 season, age 27

25-5, 1.88 ERA, 306 strikeouts in 311 innings. League average ERA: 3.29.

The Most Valuable Player award, the Cy Young Award and a World Series at 27, ending with two complete-game wins over the Yankees.

Los Angeles Angels, designated hitter

2021 season, age 27

46 home runs, 100 RBI, .257 average, .965 OPS. League average OPS: .731.

The unanimous Most Valuable Player award in a season he also went 9-2 with a 3.18 earned run average and 156 strikeouts over 130 innings. Nobody had been an elite hitter and an elite pitcher in the same year since Ruth stopped trying.

Pittsburgh Pirates, left fielder

1992 season, age 28

34 home runs, 103 RBI, .311 average, 1.080 OPS. League average OPS: .684.

A second Most Valuable Player award in three seasons at 28, in his last year in Pittsburgh before free agency took him to San Francisco.

Chicago White Sox, first baseman

1994 season, age 26

38 home runs, 101 RBI, .353 average, 1.217 OPS. League average OPS: .779.

A second consecutive Most Valuable Player award at 26, in a season the strike ended in August.

Houston Astros, first baseman

1994 season, age 26

39 home runs, 116 RBI, .367 average, 1.201 OPS. League average OPS: .747.

The unanimous Most Valuable Player award at 26 in the same shortened season, four years after Boston traded him for a relief pitcher.

Boston Red Sox, pitcher

1990 season, age 28

21-6, 1.93 ERA, 209 strikeouts in 228 innings. League average ERA: 3.91.

An earned run average title at 28, in the middle of the run that made him the best pitcher in the American League for a decade.

Atlanta Braves, pitcher

1994 season, age 28

16-6, 1.56 ERA, 156 strikeouts in 202 innings. League average ERA: 4.21.

The most era-adjusted dominance any pitcher has produced: a 1.56 earned run average in a league averaging better than four runs a game. The third of four consecutive Cy Young Awards.

Los Angeles Dodgers, catcher

1997 season, age 29

40 home runs, 124 RBI, .362 average, 1.070 OPS. League average OPS: .744.

A .362 average with 40 home runs from a catcher, which no one at the position has matched. Los Angeles traded him eight months later rather than meet his price.

Detroit Tigers, pitcher

2024 season, age 27

18-4, 2.39 ERA, 228 strikeouts in 192 innings. League average ERA: 4.02.

The pitching Triple Crown and a unanimous Cy Young Award at 27, leading the American League in wins, earned run average and strikeouts, with arbitration years still to come.

Philadelphia Athletics, pitcher

1931 season, age 31

31-4, 2.06 ERA, 175 strikeouts in 289 innings. League average ERA: 4.38.

Thirty-one wins against four losses and the Most Valuable Player award at 31, his fourth of nine earned run average titles, and the third of four in a row.

New York Mets, pitcher

2018 season, age 30

10-9, 1.70 ERA, 269 strikeouts in 217 innings. League average ERA: 4.02.

A Cy Young Award with ten wins, because the Mets scored nothing behind him. His 1.70 earned run average was the lowest by a qualified starter since Zack Greinke in 2015.

New York Yankees, centre fielder

2022 season, age 30

62 home runs, 131 RBI, .311 average, 1.111 OPS. League average OPS: .701.

Sixty-two home runs, the American League record, and the Most Valuable Player award, in the last season before free agency. He signed for nine years and $360 million that December.

St. Louis Cardinals, pitcher

1968 season, age 32

22-9, 1.12 ERA, 268 strikeouts in 305 innings. League average ERA: 2.99.

A 1.12 earned run average, the lowest of the live-ball era, so far beyond the rest of the sport that baseball lowered the mound that winter. He was 32.

Pittsburgh Pirates, shortstop

1908 season, age 34

10 home runs, 109 RBI, .354 average, .957 OPS. League average OPS: .605.

A shortstop hitting .354 in a league that hit .239, the third-widest gap between a player and his era on this list. He was 34 and won two more batting titles.

Raw numbers do not travel between eras: a .354 average meant something different in 1908, when the league hit .239, than it does now. Every season is judged against the league it was actually played in, and the stat line carries that league’s own average for the year beside the player’s figure, so the comparison sits on the page rather than in the reader’s head. Two seasons here are too recent for the historical database the rest is drawn from and run without that figure. Awards the season itself produced count as part of the record, because they are how the sport judged him at the time.

How old he was at the end of that regular season, computed from his date of birth rather than stated. A season of this quality at 22 outranks the same season at 32, because a club holding the 22-year-old is holding everything that follows it as well.

What the club still held after the season shown. Baseball’s answer to this question has changed twice: the reserve clause bound a player to his club for as long as it wanted him until arbitration arrived in 1970 and free agency in 1975, and the six-year service ladder that governs the modern game did not exist before that. A pre-1975 season is judged on the control clubs actually had under the rules of the day, which was close to total.

How hard the job is to fill. A catcher or a shortstop producing at the plate is rarer than a first baseman doing the same, because the defensive demands of those positions usually cost a club offence. A pitcher carries the opposite adjustment: the best of them decide games more directly than any hitter, and they break more often.

The list covers the modern era, 1901 onward, which leaves out the unstable leagues of the 1880s and 1890s where a season could be played against opposition that barely qualified as major. It includes the Negro Leagues, whose statistics Major League Baseball incorporated into its official records in 2024, which is why Josh Gibson is here and near the top: he holds the official career records for batting average, slugging and on-base plus slugging.

Every stat line, team, position and age on this page was drawn from the Lahman database and the era adjustments computed from it, rather than typed from memory. Gibson’s figures and the two 2025 seasons fall outside that database and were sourced separately.