Becoming an MVP at 23 puts Mike Trout in impressive company

Let's stop any debate: Yes, Mike Trout is that good.

At one point between his wowing rookie season and newly crowned MVP campaign of 2014, Trout became something of a polarizing player. Most baseball fans recognize his ability and his plentiful across-the-board contributions to the Los Angeles Angels, but there's a subsection of fans who maintain, still today, that Trout is overrated.

This is probably because Trout has become the poster boy for advanced stats in baseball. The number-crunchers loved him before the general baseball fan did, so now, to many people, he represents the shift in thinking that they don't want to accept. Change is tough, you know. Change in baseball, that's tougher. You know how the home-plate collision rule went.

But if you look at what Trout does, it's what baseball was about 100 years ago and what's about it today. He produces runs. He led MLB in runs scored and led the AL in RBIs. There are very many facts and figures out there about how great Mike Trout has been in his first three seasons. He's the only player in baseball history, for example, to score 300 runs, hit 75 homers and steal 75 bases in his first 400 career games.

On the occasion of Trout being crowned the MVP on Thursday, three months and six days after he turned 23, here's another way to look at the historical significance of his career thus far: He's the fifth-youngest player to win an MVP award. And the list of players who have won an MVP at 23, well, it's very nice company to keep.

• Vida Blue — he won in 1971 at 22.
• Johnny Bench — he won in 1970 at 22.
• Stan Musial — he won in 1943 at 22.
• Cal Ripken Jr. — he won in 1983 at 23.
• Hal Newhouser — he won in 1944 at 23.
• Willie Mays — he won in 1954 at 23.
• Jeff Burroughs — he won in 1974 at 23.
• Hank Aaron — he won in 1957 at 23.
• Fred Lynn — he won in 1975 at 23.

That's it. Ten players, including Trout, have been MVP by age 23. A few factoids: Blue is the youngest, as he started his season at 21. Ripken was only three days younger than Trout when he won in 1983. So Trout is almost fourth-youngest. Of the other nine, six are Hall of Famers. Lynn, Blue and Burroughs aren't in Cooperstown.

That's still a long ways off for Trout. No one's enshrining him just yet — another of the complaints from the anti-Trout crowd is too much hype, too soon. But if he keeps going at the rate he has in his first three seasons, at the very least Trout should get another MVP or two.

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Mike Oz is an editor for Big League Stew on Yahoo Sports. Have a tip? Email him at mikeozstew@yahoo.com or follow him on Twitter! Follow @MikeOz