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2020 SILVER SLUGGER™ AWARD WINNERS ANNOUNCED Trout wins his 8th. Betts & Cruz get their 4th. Eight players win their first. Braves boast 4 winners.
CHICAGO (Nov. 5, 2020) – Louisville Slugger®, the Official Bat of Major League Baseball®, is proud to announce the winners of the 2020 Silver Slugger™ Awards. The awards were presented tonight in a special hour-long telecast exclusively aired on MLB Network®. The Silver Slugger Award is the top offensive award in Major League Baseball®, with the season’s best players at each position selected in a vote by MLB® coaches and managers in their respective leagues.
Los Angeles Angels outfielder Mike Trout picked up his eighth Silver Slugger Award. The Dodgers’ Mookie Betts and Twins’ Nelson Cruz both landed their fourth. José Abreu of the White Sox, Salvador Perez of the Royals and José Ramírez of the Indians each won their third Silver Slugger. Ronald Acuña Jr., Freddie Freeman and Marcell Ozuna of the Braves joined DJ LeMahieu of the Yankees in winning their second each. Eight players won their first Silver Slugger Award: Tim Anderson and Eloy Jiménez of the White Sox, Travis d’Arnaud of the Braves, Teoscar Hernández of the Blue Jays, Manny Machado and Fernando Tatis Jr. of the Padres, along with Donovan Solano of the Giants and Juan Soto of the Nationals.
Atlanta sits atop the Silver Slugger leaderboard with four Braves taking home the award: Acuña Jr., d’Arnaud, Freeman and Ozuna. The White Sox had three winners: Abreu, Anderson, and Jiménez. The Padres had two; Machado and Tatis Jr. No other team had more than one winner.
HOW WINNERS ARE DETERMINED Louisville Slugger® Silver Slugger™ Award winners are decided by a vote of MLB managers and coaches who select the players they determine to be the best offensive producers at each position in the American and National Leagues. Each team receives four (4) votes; the manager and three coaches of their choice. They base their votes on a combination of offensive statistics including batting average, on-base percentage, runs, RBIs, and slugging percentage, as well as the managers’ and coaches’ general impressions of a player’s overall offensive value. The accounting firm of Mountjoy Chilton Medley LLP verifies the tabulation of balloting.
THE SILVER SLUGGER AWARD TROPHY Each of the 18 winners will receive a three-foot tall, beautifully crafted Silver Slugger Award from Louisville Slugger in honor of their achievements. Each trophy bears a custom engraving of the recipient’s name, along with the names of the other Silver Slugger winners in that player’s league. The awards will be displayed for public viewing at the Louisville Slugger Museum & Factory in Louisville, Kentucky before being sent to MLB teams for on-field presentations at the start of the 2021 season.
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Following is a complete list of the 2020 Louisville Slugger® Silver Slugger™ Award winners: NATIONAL LEAGUE POS PLAYER TEAM STATS # of SSA’s won/Year(s)
1B Freddie Freeman Atlanta Braves 60 G, .341 BA, 1.102 OPS, 73 H, 13 HR, 53 RBI, Second SSA 51 R, 23 2B 2019, 2020
2B Donovan Solano San Francisco Giants 54 G, .326 BA, .828 OPS, 62 H, 3 HR, 29 RBI, 15 First SSA 2B 2020
SS Fernando Tatis Jr. San Diego Padres 59 G, .277 BA, .937 OPS, 62 H, 17 HR, 45 RBI, 11 First SSA 2B 2020
3B Manny Machado San Diego Padres 60 G, .304 BA, .950 OPS, 68 H, 16 HR, 47 RBI, 12 First SSA 2B 2020
OF Juan Soto Washington Nationals 47 G, .351 BA, 1.185 OPS, 54 H, 13 HR, 37 RBI, First SSA 14 2B 2020
OF Mookie Betts Los Angeles Dodgers 55 G, .292 BA, .927 OPS, 64 H, 16 HR, 39 RBI, 9 Fourth SSA 2B 2016, 2018, 2019, 2020
OF Ronald Acuña Jr. Atlanta Braves 46 G, .250 BA, .987 OPS, 40 H, 14 HR, 29 RBI, 38 Second SSA BB 2019, 2020
C Travis d’Arnaud Atlanta Braves 44 G, .321 BA, .919 OPS, 53 H, 9 HR, 34 RBI, 8 First SSA 2B 2020
DH Marcell Ozuna Atlanta Braves 60 G, .338 BA, 1.067 OPS, 77 H, 18 HR, 56 RBI, Second SSA 14 2B, 145 TB 2017, 2020
AMERICAN LEAGUE POS PLAYER TEAM STATS # of SSA’s won/Year(s)
1B José Abreu Chicago 60 G, .317 BA, .987 OPS, 76 H, 19 HR, 60 RBI, 15 Third SSA White Sox 2B, 148 TB 2014, 2018, 2020
2B DJ LeMahieu New York Yankees 50 G, .364 BA, 1.011 OPS, 71 H, 10 HR, 27 RBI, Second SSA 10 2B 2019, 2020
SS Tim Anderson Chicago 49 G, .322 BA, .886 OPS, 67 H, 10 HR, 21 RBI, 10 First SSA White Sox 2B, 45 R 2020
3B José Ramírez Cleveland Indians 58 G, .292 BA, .993 OPS, 64 H, 17 HR, 46 RBI, 16 Third SSA 2B, 45 R 2017, 2018, 2020
OF Mike Trout Los Angeles Angels 53 G, .281 BA, .993 OPS, 56 H, 17 HR, 46 RBI, 9 Eighth SSA 2B, 41 R ’12, ’13, ’14, ’15, ’16,’18,’19, ‘20
OF Teoscar Hernández Toronto 50 G, .289 BA, .919 OPS, 55 H, 16 HR, 34 RBI, 7 First SSA Blue Jays 2B 2020
OF Eloy Jiménez Chicago 55 G, .296 BA, .891 OPS, 63 H, 14 HR, 41 RBI, 14 First SSA White Sox 2B 2020
C Salvador Perez Kansas City Royals 37 G, .333 BA, .986 OPS, 50 H, 11 HR, 32 RBI, 12 Third SSA 2B 2016, 2018, 2020
DH Nelson Cruz Minnesota Twins 53 G, .303 BA, .992 OPS, 56 H, 16 HR, 33 RBI, 6 Fourth SSA 2B 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020
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MLB NETWORK HAS EXCLUSIVE ANNOUNCEMENT OF WINNERS
For the 12th consecutive year, MLB Network made the exclusive announcement of the Silver Slugger Awards presented by Louisville Slugger in a special, one-hour telecast hosted by Stephen Nelson and Sean Casey. All 18 awards were inside MLB Network studios and featured throughout the Louisville Slugger Silver Slugger Award show.
About Louisville Slugger Founded in 1884, Louisville Slugger is the Official Bat and Equipment Bag of Major League Baseball. This iconic baseball brand is part of Chicago-based Wilson Sporting Goods Co., the largest baseball and softball equipment provider in the world today. In the sports of baseball and softball, Wilson manufactures high-performance gloves, bats, uniforms, apparel, protective gear, accessories and player development equipment and tools through its Wilson®, DeMarini®, Louisville Slugger®, EvoShield®, and ATEC brands. The company uses player insights to develop products that push equipment innovation into new territories and empower athletes at every level to perform at their best. Wilson is a subsidiary of Amer Sports Corporation.
About MLB Network Launched on January 1, 2009, MLB Network is the ultimate television destination for baseball fans, featuring the multiple Emmy Award-winning MLB Tonight, live regular season and Postseason game telecasts, original programming, highlights, and analysis. MLB Network is distributed by TV providers throughout the U.S., Canada, Caribbean and Latin America, and is available for live, authenticated streaming via MLB At Bat and MLBNetwork.com/Watch. For more information, go to www.MLBNetwork.com.
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