Pedro Martinez Claims He Lost MLB MVP Race to Ivan Rodriguez Because of ‘Racist’ Baseball Writers
At his peak, Pedro Martinez might have been the most dominant pitcher ever. He was deserving of American League MVP honors in 2000 and he was stiffed of the award in 1999.
Martinez led the league in wins, strikeouts and ERA, recording numbers that were unheard of, especially in the midst of the slugging steroid era. For whatever reason, two writers left Martinez off their ’99 MVP voting ballots, effectively voiding him of the award. Martinez, however, offered one possible reason – they were racist.
“You don’t wanna say you racist, but sometimes you have to think – there are people that are racist,” Martinez told his former teammate David Ortiz and Jared Carrabis of Barstool. “Because how can you give votes to people that didn’t belong in the MVP contention to just harm someone individually. And I had nothing against those two guys. I’ve always been a professional.”
The 1999 AL MVP race featured five minorities as the top vote getters. Ivan Rodriguez won the award, Martinez was second, followed by Roberto Alomar, Manny Ramirez and Rafael Palmeiro.
George King of the New York Post and La Velle E. Neal III of the Minneapolis Star Tribune are the two writers who omitted Martinez from their ’99 AL MVP ballots. “MVP is for everyday players. Pitchers have their own award,” King said at the time in defense of his decision. Although King reportedly gave MVP votes to pitchers David Wells and Rick Helling the year prior.
“I don’t know why two persons like that would just pick on one signal person,” Martinez continued on the Barstool podcast Call Him Papi. “To just do that, to be that bad, out of 20 places that they have, each one of them – they couldn’t just give me a 19th place vote?”
Baseball writers have been known to flex their muscles in the past when it comes to award voting. If players stiffed them on interviews or made their jobs as journalists difficult in any way, some writers would be vindictive with their award ballots.
It’s why Albert Belle isn’t in Cooperstown and why Jim Rice had to wait 15 years before finally getting inducted into the Hall-of-Fame. There’s no question some writers have agendas when it comes to award voting, but to call them out for “racism,” while the top-five vote getters were minorities might be a tough sell.
Watch above via Barstool
