SAN FRANCISCO – The NFL MVP award was handed out at NFL Honors on Thursday night, and in one of the closest races in league history, Matthew Stafford edged Drake Maye to take home the award.
Once the NFL season hit December, the MVP battle was widely viewed as a two-horse race between Stafford and Maye, but they only ended up accounting for 47 of the 50 first-place votes. Three voters didn’t have Maye or Stafford at the top, consequently skewing the MVP outcome.
The voting panel, chosen by the Associated Press, consists of 50 voters who rank five players. The points awarded for first to fifth places are 10, 5, 3, 2, and 1 respectively.
The final tally was as follows:
- Matthew Stafford: 366 points (24 first-place votes)
- Drake Maye: 361 (23)
- Josh Allen: 91 (2)
- Christian McCaffrey: 71 (0)
- Trevor Lawrence: 49 (0)
Regarding the critical votes that went to Josh Allen and Justin Herbert, the latter voter expressed his rationale,
“I was the Justin Herbert vote. The guy had the worst offensive line in the NFL all season, working miracles in almost every game. Stafford’s OL became 2/5ths as bad as Herbert’s for 5 minutes and he became a turnover howitzer. He embodied ‘value’.”
The implications of this voting pattern were profound. It could have easily swung in Maye’s favor had one of these votes been redistributed differently. Essentially, these votes flipped the narrative of the MVP race, allowing Stafford to secure his first MVP title.
It’s a lesson in how critical every vote is in the MVP race and how essential it can be to think beyond traditional paradigms. However, the eventual outcome left many pondering the decision-making processes behind such pivotal voting choices.
