MLB Monday reaches a monumental time period in baseball history with the 1989 World Series: yes, that one. The Bay Bridge Series turned into the Earthquake Series, and the sport would never be the same going forward, for many reasons … related and unrelated. But we digress: there are 5 awards to analyze in this final year of the 1980s, themselves a decade of change in the United States that we still are coping with.

1989 World Series MVP: Dave Stewart, SP, Oakland (original); Rickey Henderson, LF, Oakland (revised)

The Fall Classic was interrupted by a huge tragedy in the form of an earthquake that rocked the San Francisco/Oakland Bay Area, and around that event, the Oakland Athletics swept the San Francisco Giants (making their first World Series appearance since 1962). This was the A’s first MLB title since 1974, and the team has not won another since then, either. Oakland starter Dave Stewart won the MVP vote at the time.

His numbers (2-0, 1.69 ERA, 16 IP, 14 Ks, 0.750 WHIP) are stellar, but are there others to consider? Stew was an emotional choice, we suspect, so we want to be sure. Four regular A’s hitters posted OPS marks over 1.000 in a matchup where theyoutscored the Giants by a 32-14 margin. Oakland won the first 2 games at home by a 10-1 combined margin before the disaster, and the A’s won the next 2 on the road (22-13 score).

Oakland left fielder Rickey Henderson (.474 BA, 1 HR, 3 RBI, 3 SBs, 1.419 OPS) was the best of the hitting bunch. However, even considering the offensive outburst, he was better than the other 3 guys who mashed the ball. Meanwhile, SP Mike Moore (2-0, 2.08 ERA, 13 IP, 10 Ks, 0.923 WHIP) was almost as good as Stewart. Yeah, it was that kind of sweep, so it’s down to either Stewart or Henderson: splitting hairs, really.

We’re going to go with Henderson, simply because he played in all 4 games, of course, and his 9 hits featured 5 singles, 1 double, 2 triples, and 1 homer—not to mention the 3 stolen bases. He was one-man wrecking machine on offense for the A’s in this matchup, and when you’re on base 11 times in 4 games (he oddly only walked twice in the Fall Classic), you’re single-handedly destroying the opponent. Rickey, it is.

1989 ALCS MVP: Henderson (original, confirmed)

Oakland topped Toronto in 5 games to take a second-straight AL pennant, and Henderson (.400 BA, 2 HRs, 5 RBI, 7 BBs, 0 Ks, 8 SBs, 1.609 OPS) was voted the MVP. This is the series he is most famous for, really: just Google the highlights, as there are too many to link here. What people don’t remember is that the A’s won the last 2 games of the matchup by 1 run each with closer Dennis Eckersley getting the save both times.

Eck actually saved 3 games in the matchup, while Stewart also went 2-0 in this series, as well, although his overall numbers weren’t as good as they were in the Fall Classic against the Giants. Either way, it took a lot of great performances from the A’s stars to beat the Blue Jays, but when we break it down, only Henderson’s effort was truly historic, so we will confirm his hardware right now. We just had to check it out fully first.

1989 NLCS MVP: Will Clark, 1B, San Francisco (original, confirmed)

Three Giants led the offensive onslaught against the Chicago Cubs in this matchup, as San Francisco won the series in 5 games. But first baseman Will Clark (8 RBI, 1.882 OPS), left fielder Kevin Mitchell (7 RBI, 1.134 OPS), and third baseman Matt Williams (9 RBI, .983 OPS) all destroyed the Cubs pitching staff, led by future Hall of Famer Greg Maddux. Clark won the MVP vote, so we have to make sure it was rightly done.

The S.F. pitching staff had a 4.09 ERA for this 5-game set, so it has to be one of those 3 guys. Clark’s batting average (.650) was just about the same as Mitchell’s (.353) and Williams’ (.300) put together, though, and that OPS is hard to ignore overall. Clark was the right choice; we confirm it after this cursory glance at the data. Between Henderson’s ALCS and Clark’s NLCS, these have to be the 2 most incredible simultaneous outputs.

1989 AL MOTY: Frank Robinson, Baltimore (original); Cito Gaston, Toronto (revised)

For the second year in a row, we have an odd situation here: the Blue Jays started out 12-24 under one manager (Jimy Williams) and then went 77-49 under a second manager (Cito Gaston). They won the AL East Division by 2 games over the Baltimore Orioles and Manager Frank Robinson (plus-4 PPP) winning the AL MOTY vote. Overall, Toronto finished with a combined minus-1 PPP mark, which is Williams’ issue.

The A’s won the AL West by 7 games over the Kansas City Royals, for the record. Royals Manager John Wathan (plus-5 PPP) posted the best official mark in the league, but we have to imagine the impact Gaston had on the Toronto roster was more significant than that. We will go with Gaston for this award, which rights a wrong done a long time ago where we think the press was favoring Robinson for nostalgic reasons.

1989 NL MOTY: Don Zimmer, Chicago (original); Jack McKeon, San Diego (revised)

The Cubs won the NL East by 6 games over the New York Mets, while Chicago Manager Don Zimmer posted a plus-3 PPP mark to win the vote. However, Mets Manager Davey Johnson (minus-4 PPP) probably cost his team another pennant. In the NL West, S.F. Manager Roger Craig (even-zero PPP) didn’t do anything to hold off the San Diego Padres (3 GB) and/or the Houston Astros (6 GB). So, we have a dilemma.

Especially with Padres Manager Jack McKeon (plus-6 PPP) and Astros Manager Art Howe (plus-7 PPP) doing the best jobs in the league, we’re more inclined to give this nod to McKeon as he was better than Zimmer, and his competition was much better, too. Even though the Cubs won their division, they benefitted more from Johnson’s blunders than Zimmer’s guidance. McKeon did the most with the least.