Late Thursday, an American League fan base is going to be in a froth. Count on it.

That’s when the 30-man U.S. Baseball Writers Association panel voting for American League MVP is going to be announced. It’s Aaron Judge of the Yankees or Cal Raleigh of the Mariners, and boosters of the loser in this competition are going to want to burn it all down.

Judge is phenomenal. Raleigh is sensational. What’s a voter to do?

I have the perfect, imperfect solution:

Judge and Raleigh split the award down the middle. Each gets a piece. They both win.

Ah, you say, we’re copping out. We’re taking the easy path.

Maybe so. But it might be the only fair resolution.

There’s precedent, you realize. Back in 1979, the writers covering the National League named co-MVPs – Willie Stargell, the Pirates slugger, and Keith Hernandez, the slick-fielding, high-average Cardinal. Both were first baseman. Stargell hit 32 homers, drove in a modest 82 runs, with an average of .281. Hernandez homered 11 times, drove in 105 and hit .344 to win the batting title.

To an aging, college-basketball scribe, this calls to mind 20 years ago, when J.J. Redick of Duke and Adam Morrison of Gonzaga waged a crazy, memorable coast-to-coast duel of long-range one-upmanship. For weeks, it was a game of can-you-top-this? Redick went for 41 points one Saturday in December, and a few hours later, Morrison cut into Redick's ESPN face time by banking in a deep shot to beat Oklahoma State.

Weeks later, Redick had a 41-point game and Morrison matched him two days later. Soon after, Redick went for 40 and the same day, on a different coast, Morrison posted 42.

It was terrific theater. Sports Illustrated’s cover one week posed them back-to-back and asked, “Who’s the best?”

There was no wrong answer. Yes, Redick was doing it in the ACC and Morrison in the WCC. But in a two-week span, Morrison dropped 43 in a triple-overtime screamer over Michigan State in the Maui Invitational and matched himself in a high-level loss at Washington.

At the Final Four in Indianapolis, word was out that the U.S. Basketball Writers were splitting their vote for player of the year. I ran into the late Jim O’Connell, the AP’s college-basketball writer from New York, legendarily both crusty and beloved.

“Why can’t we just name one winner?” he complained, as a mission statement.

I get that thinking. But sometimes the circumstances just shout otherwise. Judge-Raleigh is one of those. It’s going to be borderline criminal for either to be runner-up.

Judge dominated American League hitting numbers. He won the batting title at .331. He had 53 homers, a lusty .457 on- base percentage and a thunderous OPS of 1.144.

Raleigh hit 60 regular-season homers, in what's known as a pitcher's pari. He hit 25 percent more of them than any player in history at the catcher position. He obliterated Mickey Mantle’s record for homers by a switch-hitter. And in hitting 60, he made it a cozy foursome of players to do that absent the stain of steroids, joining Judge, Roger Maris and Babe Ruth.

The analytics folk will argue for Judge, but the delicious part of this debate is, it’s not about analytics. Happily, I think, we’re left to sort out what the rigors of catching do to diminish that player as a hitter.

Imagine coming to the park, and you want to work on some nettlesome little aspect of your swing that’s not quite right. But wait, you’ve got to be a voice at the pre-game pitchers meetings, and oh yeah, you wanted to spend some time with Logan Gilbert, just you and he, discussing whether he’s relying too much on the breaking ball and whether he’s better being a power pitcher.

How many games does a catcher not add some physical impertinence to the collection of affronts to his body? Five, 10 maybe, where there isn’t a foul tip to a finger or a wayward bat recoiling into his shoulder or a spiked splitter that comes up and bites him in the groin? There’s a reason no catcher had ever hit more than 48 homers before 2025.

Judge, nursing an elbow injury, played 56 games as a designated hitter. Raleigh played 38 as a DH among his 159 games. A year ago, Raleigh won the American League Platinum Glove award, and his stellar fielding didn’t just go away a year later.

Judge has won the MVP in both 2022 and 2024. For Raleigh, this is probably it as an MVP candidate, with a once-in-a-career kind of year unseen in baseball history at his position.

The Big Dumper or Judge?

Both deserve it. At least, half of it.