The 101st New York Baseball Writers’ Gala was held on Saturday night, honoring the winners of the 2025 Baseball Writers’ Association of America awards -- MVP, Cy Young, Rookie of the Year and Manager of the Year.
The headliners of the event were the two greatest stars in the game today, each of whom won his league’s MVP Award: Shohei Ohtani and Aaron Judge.
Ohtani won his fourth career unanimous MVP Award last year after hitting a career-high 55 home runs with a National League-best 1.014 OPS for the Dodgers while also posting a 2.87 ERA with a 33% strikeout rate over 14 starts on the mound.
Although the Japanese superstar normally utilizes an interpreter, he delivered his acceptance speech entirely in English. He accepted his 2024 NL MVP Award in English, too, but that was on a prerecorded video.
“To all the writers who voted for me, thank you,” Ohtani said, “This MVP Award is very meaningful, and winning it again means so much to me.”
Ohtani also congratulated the 1986 Mets team that won the World Series, as that group was also honored at the annual dinner.
“To my fellow recipients, congratulations to all of you for your achievements -- especially the ’86 Mets team,” Ohtani said. “I now know the feeling of what it’s like to become a world champion. And it’s great. So congrats on your 40th anniversary.”
Judge, who was introduced by former Yankees teammate Anthony Rizzo as “the King of New York,” expressed appreciation for the annual event in his home city. He also alluded to the amount of talent represented at the dais behind him.
It was lofty praise from a man who is putting together possibly the greatest peak of any right-handed hitter in baseball history. Judge smashed 53 home runs in 2025 while leading the Majors in batting average (.331), on-base percentage (.457) and slugging (.688).
“To all the award winners up here tonight, this is just an incredible group,” said Judge, who has won three MVP Awards. “I’ve never been around so many great players -- even starting down there with the Rookies of the Year, it’s cool to see them develop over the years. And everybody up here, hopefully we see this group a couple more times over the years.”
Judge also shared a quote from his father, one that serves as motivation for him and gives the baseball world insight as to how he has been able to put up such prodigious numbers.
“I look at it every day,” Judge said. “‘If what you did yesterday still seems big today, then you haven’t done anything today.’”
As with the American League MVP Award, there was a repeat winner for the league’s Cy Young honor -- Tigers left-hander Tarik Skubal, who was even more dominant in 2025, posting a 2.21 ERA and 0.89 WHIP with 241 strikeouts.
“I’m humbled to be part of this group, and the greatness from everyone up here is part of what pushes me to be the best version of myself every time I take the mound,” he said. “ … It’s an honor to be back here, and it’s something I’ll never take for granted.”
Skubal’s NL counterpart, Pirates flamethrowing phenom Paul Skenes, was introduced by none other than Mets great Dwight Gooden, who, like Skenes, won an NL Rookie of the Year Award (1984) and followed that up with an NL Cy Young Award the next year.
Skenes led the Majors with a 1.97 ERA after posting a 1.96 ERA in his 2024 rookie campaign. The 23-year-old right-hander struck out 29.5% of the batters he faced and finished sixth in NL MVP voting. For the second consecutive year, he started on the mound in the All-Star Game for the NL.
“As cool as the award is, I think that’s probably the coolest thing about tonight, getting to be introduced by Doc Gooden,” Skenes said. “ … To whoever is watching, I want to say this: No matter where you come from, no matter how long the road feels, no matter how many times you hear ‘not yet’ or ‘not possible,’ keep going.
“Bet on your work, trust the process and never let anyone else define your ceiling. I’m here right now because I don’t understand the word ‘can’t.’”
The NL Rookie of the Year, Drake Baldwin, became only the third catcher in more than three decades to win a Rookie of the Year honor and the first since Buster Posey in 2010. The 24-year-old produced an .810 OPS with 19 home runs in 124 games for the Braves.
In his speech, he spoke about how special it was to win the honor not just because of what it conveyed about his own accomplishments, but because of its namesake.
“To be able to win the Jackie Robinson Award as an African American is pretty special,” Baldwin said. “Just some recognition for him being able to allow me to play the game I love.”
The AL Rookie of the Year, first baseman Nick Kurtz, made it a point to thank the Athletics organization for believing in him enough to bring him up to the big leagues just a year after being drafted.
It paid off in a big way. Kurtz put up monster numbers despite playing in just 117 games, launching 36 home runs -- four of which came in a 6-for-6, eight-RBI performance for the ages in Houston on July 25 -- while posting a 1.002 OPS.
“I want to thank the A’s organization for taking a chance on me in 2024 and bringing me up real fast,” Kurtz said. “They gave me the confidence and ability to do what I can do.”
The managers of the year -- the Guardians’ Steven Vogt in the AL and the Brewers’ Pat Murphy in the NL -- each won the honor for the second consecutive year.
While Vogt, who led Cleveland to a second straight AL Central title despite trailing Detroit by 11 games on Sept. 4, was unable to be in attendance, he did send a video message.
“I didn’t think it would happen two years, back to back,” Vogt said of winning the award. “But I’m super thankful and super blessed.
“I couldn’t be more proud of the job our team did this year -- the resilience that they showed through a lot of adversity, some tough times on the field and off the field. They continued to keep their heads down and compete, and come back and win the division title.”
Murphy, whose Brewers had the best record in baseball last year, was introduced by his son-in-law, former Pirates slugger Pedro Álvarez.
“This Manager of the Year thing … this is about the organization and the players,” Murphy said. “I had an amazing group of guys that were hungry and aware and wanted to win. And it was their priority. And it never wavered.”
There were many other awards presented by the New York BBWAA chapter, including the Joe DiMaggio “Toast of the Town” Award (Pete Alonso), the Sid Mercer/Dick Young New York Player of the Year Award (Judge), the Joan Payson/Shannon Forde Community Service Award (Carlos and Ashley Rodón) and the Babe Ruth Postseason MVP Award (Yoshinobu Yamamoto).
Perhaps the best encapsulation of what this night meant to those who were honored came from Skubal.
“We’re at an incredible point in the history of our great sport,” he said. “And it’s so humbling to stand here and take a moment to recognize my place within it.”