National League MVP Best Bets, Predictions, Odds for 2025 Season

With the 2025 MLB season right around the corner, it's about time we take a look at who will rise above the rest of the league to capture the MVP award in their respective leagues.

We'll discuss the National League, where a trio of under-appreciated stars could flip the MLB Futures market.

All odds via FanDuel as of March 8, 2025.

Kyle Tucker NL MVP Odds: +1700

I'm going to skip over Shohei Ohtani and Juan Soto here for some juicier options. It's not because I don't think they're deserving favorites, but both will have a lot to adjust to. Ohtani will be pitching for the first time in almost two years while Soto will be adjusting to a new park and a new team.

• Kyle Tucker will also be doing that, but unlike the two men above he's not so reliant on home runs to be great.

The Chicago Cubs were really just one big piece away from making the leap to contending last season following a promising 2023, and now they've got one of the top-10 hitters from the American League to drive the ship.

​​

Sportzino

3.7/5

Lock in National League MVP Picks at Sportzino ⚾️

• Realistic sportsbook-style gameplay
• +600 free-play casino games
• Excellent welcome offer

Get up to 10 SC FREE + 220,000 Gold Coins

Open Sportzino

He should be surrounded by plenty of offensive talent from Michael Busch and Seiya Suzuki to top prospect Matt Shaw, and with the Cubs' eye for contact and consistency he should find many opportunities to drive in runs and win games for an underrated pitching staff.

As we'll get to next, the narrative can be huge in this market -- and if Chicago wins the division it'll be hard to credit anyone else.

Catch all the latest updates and tips before placing your bets in our betting news section.

Ronald Acuna, Jr. NL MVP Odds: +3500

You want to play the narratives in the MVP market, because after all this is an award voted on by human beings. A player can seemingly be single-handedly responsible for a team's turnaround, and with that I don't understand why we're not collectively higher on Ronald Acuna, Jr.

• The Braves had a down year in 2024 on account of two major injuries -- one to Acuna, and the other to ace Spencer Strider. With that, however, this pitching staff still managed to dominate behind Chris Sale and some organizational success stories, while the offense sputtered.

It wasn't the fastest start for Acuna last season in 49 games, but it's important to remember that he was undoubtedly the best hitter in the National League in 2023 with a 1.012 OPS and the most hits and runs recorded in the bigs -- earning him the MVP.

He's still in his prime at 27, and now with Atlanta looking set for a bounce-back year after taking the last year to heal from injuries there's a high likelihood that Acuna gets plenty of votes if he can find his normal form once again.

Paul Skenes NL MVP Odds: +7500

As a contrarian and hater by nature, I get it. You don't want to believe that the guy who you hear about every day is actually as good as they say. Especially when they've yet to even play a full season.

• Well, I'm going to take things a step further and say that not only is Paul Skenes the best pitcher in baseball, but he may be good enough to win the MVP at a historically difficult position to do so.

Skenes possesses the coveted ability to rack up strikeouts, something that has lifted even Dylan Cease to the Cy Young Award, but what he has also been able to do is limit walks and home runs -- which few strikeout pitchers have the tendency to do.

Furthermore, he managed to go 11-3 last year for a bad team, and while I don't think the Pirates' leap this season will be big enough to get them into the playoffs, you could be looking at a man who wins the pitching triple crown this year.

Tarik Skubal did it in 2024, which helped him finish seventh in AL MVP voting, but for Skenes to do it on a much worse team would be an incredible achievement. He won 11 of his 23 games with a 1.96 ERA, so why can't he win 20 this season? What if he gets even better?

MLB Betting Resources:

MLB Betting

MLB Odds

MLB Live Odds