Commissioner Bud Selig announced Wednesday that the Reliever of the Year Award for the American League will be named after none other then Mariano Rivera. The National League’s Reliever of the Year Award will be named after Trevor Hoffman. The official name of the awards are the Mariano Rivera American League Reliever of the Year Award and the Trevor Hoffman National League Reliever of the Year Award.
The titles of the awards honor Baseball’s all time saves leaders. Both of them spent their entire careers in their respective Leagues: the 13 time AL All Star Mo with 652 saves and the seven time NL All Star Hoffman with 601 saves. A panel of nine of the greatest relief pitchers in history will vote on who will win the awards each season. In addition to Rivera and Hoffman, other voters include four Hall of Fame relief pitchers: Dennis Eckersley, Rollie Fingers, Rich “Goose” Gossage and Bruce Sutter. The other three voters round out the top five in career saves: Lee Smith (478 saves), John Franco (424 saves) and Billy Wagner (422 saves).
The panel will rank the top three AL relief pitchers and the top three NL relief pitchers based solely on regular season performance using a 5-3-1 weighted point system (five points for a first place vote; three points for a second place vote; and one point for a third place vote). The reliever from each league with the most points will win.
On the decision to change the name of the award Commissioner Selig said, “Both Mariano and Trevor represented our sport magnificently on and off the mound and earned the universal respect of our fans in their legendary careers. I believe it is appropriate to redefine an existing award in honor of their contributions to Baseball, and I am delighted that many of the most decorated relievers in history will select the winners.”
