Baseball has always been a popular sport in Latin America, with countries and territories such as the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico, Cuba, Venezuela, Mexico and many others having shined on the baseball field.

America's pasttime may be Latin America's current time.

This 2014 MLB season has less than two weeks remaining before the playoffs, and many Latin American players will be in the running for Major League Baseball awards:

MVP

Giancarlo Stanton

Stanton, who has Puerto Rican roots, is the favorite to win the National League Most Valuable Player Award this season. Stanton is having a monster season with 37 home runs and 105 runs batted in, and leads the NL is both categories. Stanton has also hit four of the top five longest home runs this season.

Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Clayton Kershaw will get a lot of votes, but pitchers just don't win MVP awards in the NL. The last time a pitcher won the NL MVP was in 1968 when Bob Gibson did so. The Miami Marlins have their franchise player for a long time.

Victor Martinez

Mike Trout of the Los Angeles Angels is the favorite to win American League MVP, but Victor Martinez is right behind him. The 35-year-old veteran has led the Detroit Tigers to an 80-66 record this year. Unlike Stanton, there's a great chance that Martinez will be playing in the postseason.

Martinez is another great baseball player from Venezuela. This season, he has a career-high 30 home runs and .333 batting average. Amazingly, Martinez has struck out just 39 times this entire season.

Rookie of The Year

Jose Abreu

This is an easy choice. The Chicago White Sox's first baseman is not only having a great rookie year, but he's having one of the best rookie seasons in MLB history. The 27-year-old Cuban-born slugger has 33 home runs and counting. His 99 runs batted in ranks 5th in all of MLB baseball.

Not only is Abreu hitting the ball out of the park at an all-time high rate, but he's doing it efficiently. Abreu is batting .317 at the plate and his slugging percentage (.589) is the highest in all of baseball. You would think Abreu was a veteran player in this league.

Reliever of the Year Award

Fernando Rodney

The "Reliever of the Year Award" is annually given to best relief pitcher in baseball. Rodney is no stranger to this award, as he won it back in 2012. His 44 saves this season lead all of baseball. There's a good chance we will see Rodney win his second relief award in the three seasons. One thing is for sure: this native of Samaná, Dominican Republic knows how to close games.

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