A lot of people figured that the 2010 N.L. MVP Award would end up being something of a tight race between Cincinnati's Joey Votto, St. Louis' Albert Pujols, and Colorado's Carlos Gonzalez. Instead, it ended up being a blowout, as Votto picked up 31 of a possible 32 first-place votes for a landslide victory.
The BBWAA website has the full voting results, which are also copied below for your convenience. The other first-place vote went to Pujols, who also picked up 21 of a possible 32 second-place votes. Gonzalez, meanwhile, collected seven second-place votes and 13 third-place votes, rounding out the top three.
For Votto, it's a great honor following a breakthrough season that saw him initially get snubbed from the N.L. All-Star team. He finished the year with a .324 average, a 1.024 OPS, 37 home runs, and 113 RBI, and he was the biggest individual reason why the Reds went 91-71 and made the playoffs for the first time since 1995. Though the Reds were subsequently swept out of the postseason, playoff performance isn't taken into consideration for MLB's awards.
Votto - the 27-year-old Canadian-born first baseman - is the first Reds player to win the N.L. MVP since Barry Larkin in 1995. It's the 12th time a Reds player has won overall.
The full results:
| 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | 6th | 7th | 8th | 9th | 10th | Points | |
| Joey Votto, Cincinnati | 31 | 1 | 443 | ||||||||
| Albert Pujols, St. Louis | 1 | 21 | 8 | 1 | 1 | 279 | |||||
| Carlos Gonzalez, Colorado | 7 | 13 | 5 | 4 | 2 | 1 | 240 | ||||
| Adrian Gonzalez, San Diego | 1 | 3 | 15 | 8 | 2 | 1 | 197 | ||||
| Troy Tulowitzki, Colorado | 2 | 1 | 7 | 8 | 4 | 3 | 2 | 132 | |||
| Roy Halladay, Philadelphia | 1 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 5 | 2 | 5 | 3 | 130 | ||
| Aubrey Huff, San Francisco | 3 | 2 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 70 | |||
| Jayson Werth, Philadelphia | 3 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 2 | 2 | 52 | ||||
| Martin Prado, Atlanta | 1 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 5 | 2 | 51 | ||||
| Ryan Howard, Philadelphia | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 50 | ||||
| Buster Posey, San Francisco | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 4 | 1 | 40 | |||
| Matt Holliday, St. Louis | 1 | 4 | 1 | 4 | 32 | ||||||
| Brian Wilson, San Francisco | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 28 | |||||
| Scott Rolen, Cincinnati | 1 | 1 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 26 | |||||
| Ryan Braun, Milwaukee | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 19 | |||||
| Ryan Zimmerman, Washington | 2 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 18 | ||||||
| Carlos Ruiz, Philadelphia | 1 | 1 | 1 | 12 | |||||||
| Dan Uggla, Florida | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 12 | ||||||
| Adam Wainwright, St. Louis | 1 | 2 | 1 | 12 | |||||||
| Jason Heyward, Atlanta | 2 | 1 | 1 | 11 | |||||||
| Brian McCann, Atlanta | 1 | 1 | 1 | 9 | |||||||
| Adam Dunn, Washington | 1 | 1 | 3 | 9 | |||||||
| Ubaldo Jimenez, Colorado | 1 | 7 | |||||||||
| David Wright, New York | 1 | 3 | |||||||||
| Corey Hart, Milwaukee | 1 | 2 | |||||||||
| Josh Johnson, Florida | 1 | 2 | |||||||||
| Heath Bell, San Diego | 2 | 2 |