Where does George Springer stand among 2025 AL MVP race?

This entire season has seemingly felt like one never-ending hot streak for Springer, who’ll turn 36 on Friday. Sure, there have been peaks and valleys, as there are for any player. It wouldn’t be baseball without them. But even when his bat has cooled off, there’s rarely been a sense of concern regarding his low points.

That’s largely because his “low points” haven’t actually been that poor — outside a few brief stretches in May and June. Throughout the second half, however, he has remained above a league-average hitter per wRC+ (100 league average) across his peaks and valleys, highlighting his exceptional performance.

It hasn’t been just one or two players carrying Toronto’s offence this season. It’s been a whole-team effort, with all 13 position players — 14 this month — executing when their name is called. That’s part of what makes this year’s team feel special. Everyone has a role to play.

The stars still have to lead the way, though, and the Blue Jays wouldn’t have emerged as one of this season’s biggest surprises without theirs — namely Springer. Even with the likes of Vladimir Guerrero Jr., Bo Bichette, Alejandro Kirk, Daulton Varsho and Addison Barger, he’s arguably been the club’s best hitter since Opening Day and hasn’t slowed down since then.

Thus, Springer currently leads the team in several offensive categories with less than two weeks remaining in the regular season.

If not for Bo Bichette, Springer’s .302 batting average would also rank first among Blue Jays hitters, sitting second behind the injured shortstop’s .311 clip — third-highest in the majors behind Jacob Wilson (.318) and Aaron Judge (.318).

Given how poorly the last two seasons went for Springer, he has an excellent case to win this year’s AL Comeback Player of the Year award. It may be tough to outmatch Texas Rangers starter Jacob deGrom, though, considering the two-time NL Cy Young winner owns a sub-three ERA and has been a three-win pitcher per fWAR over 28 starts — his most since 2019 amid an injury-plagued career.

But that probably won’t be the only award he receives consideration for. He’ll likely earn MVP votes, too.

Nobody’s mistaking Springer for Judge or Cal Raleigh here. Let’s make that clear. He isn’t threatening either of the top two favourites at this point, and probably won’t even finish as a third-place finalist behind them. Still, he’s more than deserving of recognition among the 10 positions that players can receive votes for.

Last season, for example, 19 AL players received at least one MVP vote behind Judge’s unanimous victory, with Guerrero placing sixth and future Blue Jay Anthony Santander finishing 14th.

This year, Springer has a strong chance to place inside the top 10 in MVP voting for the second time in his career — he finished seventh during his ridiculous ’19 performance. And it’s possible he could end up in that position this time around, too.

The 2017 World Series MVP won’t earn more votes than Judge, Raleigh or Bobby Witt Jr. — all of whom have been worth at least 7.0 fWAR in ’25. Cleveland’s José Ramírez also figures to come in ahead of Toronto’s primary DH.

On the pitching front, aces Tarik Skubal and Garrett Crochet should command a higher vote total than Springer, slotting him into another seventh-place finish. But he could potentially be bumped down another spot or two, depending on how the voting committee views the likes of Hunter Brown and Max Fried.

Nevertheless, even a 10th-place finish, if that’s how it plays out, is nothing to scoff at.

Springer deserves his praise for an incredible bounce-back performance, which has him second among qualified AL hitters (min. 450 plate appearances) in wOBA and wRC+, trailing only Judge in both metrics. It’s also put him third in OBP, fourth in SLG, fifth in AVG and 10th in fWAR.

The fact that Springer has made over 50 per cent of his starts as the DH — or OP (offensive player), as he calls it — has prevented his fWAR rating from climbing higher up the leaderboard. His defensive woes in limited outfield reps have played a key role in that, as well, given his minus-six outs above average and minus-seven fielding run value across 411.2 innings.

While wins above replacement isn’t the be-all end-all of statistics, that metric typically has a major influence on MVP conversations, and this season likely won’t be any different.

As such, chances are Springer will end up placing somewhere between seventh and 10th in AL MVP voting this fall. For most players, that’d be a massive achievement. For someone in their mid-30s, coming off consecutive poor offensive performances, it’ll be extraordinary.

Entering this season, most assumed Springer’s best days were behind him. But now, nearly six months removed from an abysmal spring training, he’s looking rejuvenated in a new role that has him fresh and playing like his late-20s again. And his best work may still be to come.

This remarkable chapter of Springer’s late-career resurgence still has a few pages left, most of which will take place in the post-season. He’s yet to deliver an iconic playoff moment for this franchise, something he made a living off of during his Astros career. But perhaps we’re still building to that climax in this story.

As meaningful as a top 10 MVP finish would be, regular-season accolades can’t compare to playoff success, which the Blue Jays organization hasn’t experienced in nearly a decade. If that’s to change this fall, odds are Springer — whose six-year, $150-million contract will be entering its final season in 2026 — will be at the forefront of it.