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Ceremony date November 27, 2016, 11:30 PM PST Winners Shohei Otani, Shohei Otani, Pa League MVP, Pa League MVP, Takahiro Arai, Takahiro Arai, Ce League MVP, Ce League MVP, Yuki Yanagita, Yuki Yanagita, Pa League MVP, Pa League MVP, Tetsuto Yamada, Tetsuto Yamada, Ce League MVP, Ce League MVP, Chihiro Kaneko, Chihiro Kaneko, Pa League MVP, Pa League MVP, Tomoyuki Sugano, Tomoyuki Sugano, Ce League MVP, Ce League MVP, Masahiro Tanaka, Masahiro Tanaka, Pa League MVP, Pa League MVP, Wladimir Balentien, Wladimir Balentien, Ce League MVP, Ce League MVP, Mitsuo Yoshikawa, Mitsuo Yoshikawa, Pa League MVP, Pa League MVP, Shinnosuke Abe, Shinnosuke Abe, Ce League MVP, Ce League MVP | ||
The Most Valuable Player (MVP) Award (最優秀選手, Saiyūshūsenshu) is an honor given annually in baseball to two outstanding players in Nippon Professional Baseball (NPB), one each for the Central League and Pacific League.
Each league's award is voted on by national baseball writers. Each voter places a vote for first, second, and third place among the players of each league. The formula used to calculate the final scores is a weighted sum of the votes. The player with the highest score in each league wins the award.
The first recipient of the award was Eiji Sawamura, and the most recent winners are Alex Ramírez, from the Central League, and Yu Darvish, from the Pacific League. In 1940, Victor Starffin became the first player to win the award consecutively and multiple times. Eiji Sawamura and Kazuhisa Inao are the youngest players to receive the awards in 1937 and 1957, respectively, at the ages of 20. In 1988, Hiromitsu Kadota became the oldest player to receive the award at the age of 40.
The most recent winners of the award are Takahiro Arai of the Hiroshima Toyo Carp and Shohei Otani of the Hokkaido Nippon-Ham Fighters.
Multiple winners
There have been 22 players who have won the award multiple times. Sadaharu Oh currently holds the record for the most awards won, with nine. Hisashi Yamada (1976–1978) and Ichiro Suzuki (1994–1996) share the record for the most consecutive awards won. Yutaka Enatsu and Michihiro Ogasawara are the only players to have won the award in both the Central League and Pacific League. Alex Ramírez is the only non-Japanese player receive the award multiple times after the formation of two league system.