TROUT, BELLINGER CLAIM MVP AWARDS

ANAHEIM — Five years ago, Angels center fielder Mike Trout became the youngest player at the time to be named most valuable player in a unanimous vote. He was 23, already two full seasons into his dominating romp of the major leagues. He had nearly won the American League award the two previous seasons but finished runner-up to Detroit slugger Miguel Cabrera each time.

In 2014, members of the Baseball Writers Association of America finally refused to snub Trout’s dynamic skill set.

Trout is now 28. He is still employed by a team that participated in the playoffs once in this decade.

He also remains one of the sport’s most captivating talents. He proved it in 2019 by tapping into his power more often than he ever had without sacrificing the basic tenets of his contact-first philosophy. He continued to enhance his stellar defense, flaunting arm strength he had not previously exhibited.

For all that, the voting body of baseball’s premier awards revealed Thursday that Trout was named the American League’s

MVP. It is Trout’s third time receiving the honor. He had 17 of the 30 first-place votes. Houston Astros infielder Alex Bregman finished second and had the other 13 first-place votes. Oakland Athletics shortstop Marcus Semien finished third.

Trout has presented a strong case to win the MVP award in seven of his eight full seasons. The only season Trout did not finish first or second in MVP voting was 2017 when he finished fourth.

Trout slugged a career-high 45 home runs, drove in more than 100 runs for the first time since 2016 and batted .291 in 134 games.