St. Louis Cardinals award winners and league leaders completed decade since the League Award was given except in the 1950s. MLB baseball introduced this award in 1999 to recognize the top hitter in each league. The World Series Most Valuable Player has been awarded since 1955. Starting in 1977, MLB created the NLCS Most Valuable Player Award to recognize the top player of that season's NLCS. Introduced in 2011 by Rawlings, the Platinum Glove is fan-voted award conferred annually to single out the top-fielding player from all Gold Glove winners in each league." Hillerich & Bradsby, the manufacturer of Louisville Slugger baseball bats, first awarded the Silver Slugger
Hillerich & Bradsby son, John "Bud" Hillerich. Legend has it that Bud, who played baseball himself, slipped away from work one afternoon in to watch Louisville's major league team, the Louisville Eclipse. The team's star, Pete "Louisville Slugger" Browning, mired in a hitting slump, broke his bat. Bud invited Browning to his father's shop to hand-craft him a new bat to his own specifications. Browning accepted the offer, and got three hits to immediately break out of his slump with his new bat the first day he used it. Browning told his teammates, which began a surge of professional ball players to the