In the game of baseball, both amateur and professional, it is tradition to annually recognize the one player in the league who has contributed the most to the success of the player's team.
The Chalmers Automobile Company awarded an automobile in 1910 to the batting average leader in each league. This led to a contoversy in the American League; Ty Cobb and Nap Lajoie entered the final day of the season neck-and-neck. St. Louis, playing Lajoie's Cleveland team, played their infield back, allowing Lajoie to beat out seven bunt singles in a doubleheader and win the title. In the ensuing debacle, Chalmers awarded automobiles to both players. (The question of who really won the batting title is still debated.)
For 1911, the Chalmers Company decided that batting average was too narrow a focus for an award. The Chalmers Award was the first attempt to recognize a player for overall contributions to his team's success — hence the designation Most Valuable rather than "player of the year", a distinction which remains today.
In the 1920s the leagues awarded MVP titles, but limited the ballot options to one player per team, which led to there being no National League MVP in 1922 or 1923. A League Award could also be won by a player only once, leading to unusual results like Babe Ruth's 1927 (one of the greatest offensive seasons of all time) not being eligible for the award. The rule was changed in time for Rogers Hornsby to become the first man to win two MVP awards, in 1929.
In 1956 the Cy Young Award was first given to the best pitcher in Major League Baseball (the current practice of honoring the best pitcher in each league did not begin until 1967). After that, the belief arose that the Most Valuable Player ought to be a position player, since pitchers had their own award. On occasion, though, pitchers still win the award, and the current rules for the MVP specifically state that pitchers are to be considered.
The ChalmersAward was the first of those three and it was presented by between 1911 and 1914 by Chalmers Automotive — a Detroit based automobile company.
The ChalmersAward was not brought back in 1915 mainly because the company would not allow the same player to win twice and the public simply lost interest.
Did you know that the winner of ChalmersAward was given a brand new Chalmers "30" roadster, and when Ty Cobb won in 1910 he already owned one of the automobiles?
Thomas C Chalmers, MD Throughout his career, Tom was an outspoken advocate of randomised trials, whether at the bedside, at professional meetings, in class, or in situations pertaining to his own life.
The Thomas C ChalmersAward was established with individual donations to celebrate and recognise Tom’s interests, and was awarded for the first time at the 2nd Cochrane Colloquium in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada, in October 1994.