Cleveland Guardians first baseman Josh Naylor of Mississauga, Ontario, won the 2023 Tip O’Neill Award on Thursday Canadian Press. The 26-year-old former first-round pick of the Miami Marlins is the first player in Cleveland Guardians/Indians history to win the award. The Tip O’Neill Award is presented annually to the best Canadian player in Major League Baseball.
In 2023, Naylor batted .308 with 17 home runs and 97 runs batted in. In 121 games, 495 plate appearances and 452 at bats, he scored 52 runs and had 139 hits, 31 doubles, 10 stolen bases, 33 walks, 221 total bases, seven sacrifice flies, a .354 on-base percentage and a .489 slugging percentage . Naylor may have had three fewer home runs in 2023 (had a career high of 20 in 2022), but showed more consistency in the field as his batting average was 52 points higher in 2023 than it was in 2022.
Naylor’s most memorable games in 2023 came on May 31 and July 18. On May 31, Naylor posted a career-high four hits (one single, two doubles and one home run) and six runs batted in in a 12–8 win over Cleveland against the Baltimore Orioles. In a 10-1 Guardians win over the Pittsburgh Pirates on July 18, Naylor hit two home runs and six runs batted in. He hit a three-run home run and a two-run home run.
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