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Juan Soto earns title of Mets MVP with stellar season

Originally posted on New York Mets on SI
By Kenneth Teape | Last updated Sep 23, 2025 6:00 PM ET

Given that the New York Mets are currently on the outside looking in of the National League's playoff picture, it is hard to currently find many positives on the field.

Missing the postseason in the first year of the Juan Soto era would be a massive disappointment. The Mets didn’t sign him to a historic 15-year, $765 million deal to be a fringe playoff team; title contention and MVP awards were the expectation.

Alas, there is only so much control a single player has over the success of a baseball team. Soto had his struggles early on, but he has been on a torrid pace for weeks now. He had a historically productive August, leading to the team’s offense as a whole breaking some franchise records.

Unfortunately, that success was overshadowed by just how bad the pitching staff performed. Despite the power display, New York finished 11-17 in August. They have played just as poorly in September, going 7-12.

Unraveling in this fashion, especially since the Mets held the best record in MLB at 45-24 on June 12, would be a catastrophic letdown. While a lot of blame is going to be given to Soto, that will be misplaced because what he has accomplished at the plate this season is nothing short of extraordinary.

Juan Soto earned Mets team MVP Award

Because of that, it should come as no surprise that Sotp was selected as the team’s MVP by Tim Britton of The Athletic (subscription required). When the team was rolling, fans gave him a hard time for going through some struggles. Since he has heated up, fans are cheering him on amid a truly eye-opening stretch of dominance.

Since the calendar flipped to August, Soto has nearly recorded a 20/20 season with 17 home runs and 20 stolen bases. He has a .309/.436/.634 slash line in 47 games and 219 plate appearances, despite the team going 18-29 over that span.

For the entire season, Soto has produced a .267/.399/.534 slash line with 42 home runs and 20 doubles; he has 35 stolen bases, getting caught only four times. 117 runs have been scored, and he has 104 RBI. His 123 walks are the most in the majors.

No. 42 was LAUNCHED! pic.twitter.com/6oMRp53m8O
— New York Mets (@Mets) September 20, 2025

Soto has been a one-man wrecking crew at the plate. Unfortunately, it takes more than one player to get a team over the hump. Just ask Mike Trout how well it has gone in his career as a one-man show with the Los Angeles Angels, outside of a few years with Shohei Ohtani (which still resulted in little team success).

Speaking of the current Los Angeles Dodgers superstar and reigning NL MVP, he is the only player with a higher Win Probability Added (WPA) than Soto this year. The Mets superstar certainly deserves to be in the running for the award, but his campaign is going to be viewed in a totally different light if New York misses the playoffs.

This article first appeared on New York Mets on SI and was syndicated with permission.

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