Awards Week has arrived.

The Baseball Writers’ Association of America (BBWAA) will announce its award winners this week, beginning with the Rookie of the Year Awards on Monday. The finalists for each BBWAA award were announced last week, and now is the time to find out which players will take home hardware for their excellent 2026 seasons.

Meanwhile, the 2026 MLB Awards presented by MGM Rewards will take place on Wednesday from the Chelsea Theater at the Cosmopolitan in Las Vegas, with the MLB Network broadcast hosted by comedian Roy Wood Jr., along with Mookie Betts. The Hank Aaron Awards and Rivera/Hoffman Reliever of the Year Awards will be among the honors handed out.

Before all of these announcements commence, let’s take a look at some storylines to watch during a busy week honoring the game’s best. But first, here is the week’s schedule of events.

  • Mon., Nov. 9: BBWAA Rookie of the Year (7 p.m. ET, MLB Network)
  • Tue., Nov. 10: BBWAA Manager of the Year (7 p.m. ET, MLB Network)
  • Wed., Nov. 11: BBWAA Cy Young and Reliever of the Year Awards (7 p.m. ET, MLB Network)
  • Wed., Nov. 11: MLB Awards (Includes Hank Aaron Award, Comeback Players of the Year, Mariano Rivera and Trevor Hoffman Relievers of the Year, Edgar Martinez Outstanding DH of the Year, All-MLB First and Second Teams, MLB Executive of the Year Award)
  • Thu, Nov. 12: BBWAA MVP Awards (7 p.m. ET, MLB Network)

A wave of fresh faces is coming

If last year’s awards were about repeat winners, this year’s rendition could not be any different.

In 2025, Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge both defended their 2024 MVP wins (and Ohtani won for a third year in a row). Tarik Skubal was named the AL Cy Young Award winner for a second straight season. And Pat Murphy won his second straight NL Manager of the Year Award. (More on Murphy later).

The 2026 awards should have a decidedly different outcome. While Ohtani is a finalist for NL MVP again, Cubs center fielder Pete Crow-Armstrong looks like the clear frontrunner for NL MVP, having received all 38 first-place votes in MLB.com’s final staff poll in late September. Meanwhile, whoever wins AL MVP will be a first-timer as well, whether it’s the Astros’ Yordan Alvarez (the leader in our most recent poll), Rays third baseman Junior Caminero or Royals shortstop Bobby Witt Jr.

Five of the six Cy Young Award finalists also have never won before, with the Braves’ Chris Sale the only exception. However, it would be a surprise if the Brewers’ Jacob Misiorowski and the Yankees’ Cam Schlittler -- who were both pitching in their first full MLB season -- didn’t come away with the awards. Both were unanimous picks in the final MLB.com staff poll.

Can Yordan overcome the DH question?

Getting back to the AL MVP race, Alvarez is the likely frontrunner, given that he was the best hitter in baseball in 2026 and led the Majors in average (.316), OBP (.432), SLG (.601), OPS (1.033) and wRC+ (181). Despite playing just 25 games in the field and primarily handling DH duties, Alvarez’s 6.8 WAR, per FanGraphs, ranked third among position players.

Excluding pitchers, Ohtani’s two-way seasons in 2021, ‘23 and ‘25, and the 2020 season, the only times when an MVP had fewer than 90 fielding games in a season was Ohtani in 2024 (zero games). Alvarez has a chance to join that fairly exclusive list this year.

Alvarez has some competition, though, given that Witt ranked second with 7.0 WAR due to his all-around contributions and Caminero hit 42 home runs with an .885 OPS. In fact, this race could be closer than we expect if voters prioritize Witt’s contributions on both sides of the ball or Caminero’s impact for the best team in the American League.

Should Caminero prevail, it would be the first MVP Award in Rays history, leaving the D-backs and Mets as the only teams without one. Either way, Caminero already has surpassed Evan Longoria (sixth in both 2010 and ‘13) for the highest finish in franchise history.

Will we see a tight Rookie of the Year race?

The Rookie of the Year Awards could be fascinating for both leagues.

In the National League, it figures to be a close race between Cardinals second baseman JJ Wetherholt (.704 OPS, 25 Outs Above Average, 4.6 WAR), Mets outfielder Carson Benge (.776 OPS, 20 HR, 4.3 WAR) and Reds first baseman Sal Stewart (32 HR, 112 RBIs and .787 OPS).

Wetherholt derived a ton of his value from defense, Benge was more balanced across the board and Stewart was an RBI machine, ranking third in the Majors in that category. This will present a good litmus test for what some of the voters value this year.

In the American League, there’s also an interesting battle between Detroit’s Kevin McGonigle (.806 OPS, 129 wRC+, 5.4 WAR) and Cleveland’s Parker Messick (2.56 ERA, 4.9 WAR in 186 1/3 innings). Both were excellent -- Messick is also a Cy Young finalist -- so it could come down to whether voters side with an everyday player or a starting pitcher.

As a side note, Messick has already made history even if he doesn’t win Rookie of the Year. According to Elias, Messick is the sixth rookie to finish in the top three for Cy Young, joining:

2024 Paul Skenes, third in NL
2013 José Fernández, third in NL
1984 Dwight Gooden, second in NL
1981 Fernando Valenzuela, first in NL
1976 Mark Fidrych, second in AL

Messick could also break one of the longest droughts in the Majors. Cleveland hasn’t had a Rookie of the Year winner since Sandy Alomar in 1990, the second-longest active drought behind the Padres (Benito Santiago in 1987).

Will Pat Murphy’s run continue?

Circling back to Murphy, he’s on quite a run as Brewers manager. Of course, his Milwaukee squad just won the franchise’s first World Series title in 2026, after also finishing with the best record in the Majors during the regular season (a franchise-record 103-59) and capturing a fourth straight NL Central title.

Murphy already was named NL Manager of the Year in both of his first two seasons at the helm in Milwaukee. With a third win in 2026, he would move into the top five for the most such awards since it was introduced in 1983. Furthermore, Murphy has a chance to join fun company by winning Manager of the Year and a World Series in the same season. If Murphy does so, he’d join:

2005 Ozzie Guillen, White Sox
2003 Jack McKeon, Marlins
2002 Mike Scioscia, Angels
1998 Joe Torre, Yankees
1996 Joe Torre, Yankees
1991 Tom Kelly, Twins
1988 Tommy Lasorda, Dodgers
1984 Sparky Anderson, Tigers

Mattingly and Tracy’s unique positions

After the Phillies began 9-19, the club parted ways with Rob Thomson and hired Don Mattingly, then the bench coach for Philadelphia. The Phillies proceeded to have the fourth-best record in baseball the rest of the year.

Chad Tracy became interim manager for the Red Sox on April 25. (He was named full-time manager on Sept. 22). His club ended up securing the second Wild Card spot in the American League.

If they win their respective Manager of the Year Awards, Mattingly and Tracy would join Jim Tracy (2009 Rockies) and Jack McKeon (2003 Marlins) as the only managers to win the award as an in-season replacement.

For Tracy, there’s also family history he could make, considering the aforementioned Jim Tracy is his father. If Chad Tracy wins, it’d be the first time that a father and son won a BBWAA award, whether it’s Manager of the Year, MVP, the Cy Young or Rookie of the Year Award.

There’s now two awards honoring relievers; will they agree?

This is the first year that the BBWAA is voting on a reliever of the year in each league. For the National League, the nominees are Jhoan Duran (Phillies), Trevor Megill (Brewers) and Mason Miller. In the American League, it’s Bryan Baker (Rays), Cade Smith (Guardians) and Louis Varland (Blue Jays).

These are different from the Trevor Hoffman and Mariano Rivera Reliever of the Year Awards, which have selected the best reliever in each league since 2014. Whereas the BBWAA award is decided on by a contingent of voters (same as the other BBWAA awards), the Hoffman and Rivera awards are voted on by a panel of former relievers.

That means there could be a big difference in how these awards shake out. That said, there would seem to be a clear frontrunner, at least in the NL, where Miller (1.67 ERA and 129 strikeouts) had one of the best relief seasons ever. It’s easier to imagine disagreement in the AL, considering that Baker and Smith tied for the Major League lead in saves (41), both with ERAs under 2.00, while Varland (1.27 ERA and 97 strikeouts) boasted the lowest ERA in the Majors among pitchers with 50-plus innings.