I think individual awards are bogus, especially the Most Valuable Player award, which might be given to Dustin Pedroia today. Sure, the MVP trophy helps line the pockets of successful players, many of whom signed incentive-laden contracts that pay them handsomely for finishing in the top 10 in MVP balloting. But all you need to know about this BS-exercise is this: Albert Pujols won the National League MVP yesterday, and Pujols was the only player named on all 32 ballots. So MLB took 32 baseball "experts," and the only thing they could all agree on was that Albert Pujols was one of the 10 most valuable players in the NL last season.

Brilliant.

Pedroia might win today. Or maybe he’ll lose some votes to Kevin Youkilis, which might throw the MVP to Josh Hamilton or Justin Morneau or Francisco Rodriguez. Frankly, who cares? I couldn’t sit here and tell you that Pedroia was definitively more valuable than Youkilis this season. Why? Because no one can decide what "most valuable" means; everyone uses their own convenient definition, while excluding candidates who don’t fit those parameters.

I mean, Rob Neyer of ESPN.com picked Lance Berkman as National League MVP. And Jonah Keri, also of ESPN.com, picked Cliff Lee as American League MVP. Why? I don’t know, and frankly, I don’t care. They have their reasons, so that’s that. In baseball, reading why someone’s voting for such and such a person is the second-biggest waste of time. Writing about who you’d vote for is the biggest.

Seriously, I’d no more argue about the MVP award (and who deserves it) than try to convince someone about the existence of God or the inanity of the Democratic party. At the end of the day, every baseball writer thinks their definition of "most valuable" is the proper one.

Ultimately, all I’d like to do is go back to the beginning of the MVP award, find out who came up with that term "most valuable," and promptly punch them in the throat.

Cam Martin also writes for CBS Sportsline and BugsandCranks.com.