Every NFL season produces a handful of unforgettable storylines—franchise turnarounds, breakout stars, late-game heroics—but only one individual award tends to define the year the moment it’s announced: Most Valuable Player.
The MVP isn’t just a trophy. It’s the league’s shorthand for the central figure of the regular season: the player whose performance most shaped outcomes, lifted a team into contention, and held up under the pressure of week-to-week expectations. And as the league heads deeper into the postseason, that conversation has narrowed to a final list.
On January 22, 2026, finalists for The Associated Press (AP) 2025 NFL MVP were announced: Josh Allen, Trevor Lawrence, Drake Maye, Christian McCaffrey, and Matthew Stafford. The winner will be revealed at NFL Honors on Thursday, February 5, 2026, airing at 9 p.m. ET on NBC, the NFL Network, and streaming on Peacock and NFL+.
Why the AP MVP is “the” MVP
Fans hear “NFL MVP” and assume it’s one unified award, but multiple organizations hand out MVP honors. The one most commonly treated as the official headline is the Associated Press MVP, because it’s the award formally recognized at NFL Honors, the league’s annual awards show.
That makes AP MVP the version that ends up in legacies and Hall of Fame arguments—on broadcasts, in record books, and in the “how did we remember this era?” debates a decade later.
How NFL MVP voting works now
The AP vote is handled by a 50-member panel of media members who cover the league. Votes are submitted before the playoffs, meaning postseason performances—no matter how electric—are not supposed to influence the result.
In 2022, the voting format was revamped into a ranked ballot that asks voters to list their top five choices for MVP. That change was meant to better reflect the reality that voters often have a clear top tier rather than a single unanimous pick.
The 2025 season finalists: five different MVP “cases”
This year’s finalists represent five distinct versions of “value”—and that’s what makes this race feel unusually open heading into the NFL Honors reveal.
Matthew Stafford
Stafford’s candidacy is built on classic quarterback MVP logic: elite passing production, weekly command of a high-level offense, and a season where his team’s ceiling rose because he played at an All-Pro level. ESPN’s All-Pro voting recap emphasized Stafford’s statistical profile, including league-leading passing yardage and touchdowns in the 2025 regular season.
Drake Maye
Maye’s case looks like the modern, efficiency-driven MVP argument: top-end quarterback play that isn’t just about volume, but about precision and season-long steadiness. AP’s awards coverage noted Maye’s strong efficiency markers, including leading in passer rating and completion percentage among the highlights cited in the finalist announcement.
Josh Allen
Allen is the familiar MVP template: dynamic quarterbacking that blends arm talent with off-script playmaking and the ability to swing games with a handful of signature moments. He’s also the most recognizable “recent MVP standard” in the field—Allen won the AP MVP last year (for the 2024 season), and voters often compare repeat candidates not only to the league, but to their own best versions.
Trevor Lawrence
Lawrence’s spot on the finalist list speaks to the kind of season that changes how a franchise is perceived. Finalist announcements included Lawrence in both the MVP discussion and other major award consideration, underscoring how comprehensive his season was viewed in the awards landscape.
Christian McCaffrey
McCaffrey is the outlier—and the storyline. Running backs rarely win MVP in today’s NFL because quarterbacks touch the ball every play. But McCaffrey’s season was significant enough that he became the first player to be named a finalist for three AP NFL awards in the same year: MVP, Offensive Player of the Year, and Comeback Player of the Year.
That kind of across-the-ballot presence matters: it means voters across positions and preferences found his impact undeniable, even in a QB-dominated era.
What usually decides MVP when the finalists are this strong
When the MVP comes down to a tight top tier, voters tend to lean on a few tiebreakers—some explicit, some unofficial:
- Team success and narrative gravity: MVP often follows teams that were consistently in the national spotlight and won at a high level.
- Quarterback baseline: even an extraordinary non-QB season must clear an extra-high bar simply because QBs influence every possession.
- “Most valuable” vs. “best player”: some voters interpret MVP as “the best season,” others as “the player whose absence would most change a team’s fate.”
- Clarity of separation: if one player has a clean statistical edge or a defining signature stretch, that can break a deadlock.
The ranked ballot format introduced in 2022 can amplify this: a player who isn’t everyone’s No. 1, but is consistently in voters’ top two or three, can benefit in a way older voting approaches didn’t always capture.
When you’ll know: NFL Honors details
If you’re planning to watch the announcement live, the key facts are set:
- Event: NFL Honors (AP awards revealed)
- Date: Thursday, February 5, 2026
- Time: 9 p.m. ET
- Where: NBC, NFL Network, plus streaming on Peacock and NFL+
Between now and then, the debate will only get louder—but the vote is already in, locked before the playoffs began.
