Let the 2012 American League Most Valuable Player debate be forever known as the first large-scale battle in the WAR War. And much like Bull Run and the Marne, Trout-Cabrera might soon be the site of another skirmish.

Last year’s details have been hashed out ad nauseam, but as a quick refresher, Miguel Cabrera batted third for a playoff team and became the first Triple Crown winner in 45 years, finishing first in batting average (.330), home runs (44), and runs batted in (139). Trout was the best all-around player in the league almost from the moment he was called up on April 28, turning in one of the greatest rookie seasons ever and leading the league in Wins Above Replacement (10.2, via Baseball Reference) by a wide margin; Cabrera finished third in the sabermetric category with a WAR of 6.9.

Both players had historically great seasons and in almost any other year would have been the clear choice for MVP. But only one could win, and the WAR War’s first battle concluded with …

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Fresh off a division title in 2012, which amounted to only their second playoff berth since 1995, the Cincinnati Reds had high hopes for the 2013 campaign. And while the Washington Nationals have struggled to maintain a winning record, the high-spending Los Angeles teams have floundered below the .500 mark, and the Toronto Blue Jays have spent the season’s first half dwelling in last place, the Reds are one of the few preseason favorites to have met those expectations.

At the All-Star break, they are on pace for 90 wins, which should be sufficient for another playoff berth, especially with two wild card spots available. They rank fourth in the National League in both runs scored and allowed. Their lineup boasts the top two players in on-base percentage, Joey Votto and Shin-Soo Choo, whose .434 and .425 marks, respectively, are the only percentages above .400. As a team, Cincinnati ranks second in the senior circuit in on-base percentage, and its pitching staff is tops in strikeouts. Yet even in their own division, the Reds have remained largely anonymous.

Instead, baseball scribes have spilled ink about the Reds’ division-mates: the Cardinals and Pirates.

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Readers of The New York Times sports section received a significant signal in late May, whether or not they realized it. If they were paying attention when they read the section from May 20 through May 28, they were seeing a major makeover before their very eyes.

Baseball, which was heating up in the final week of the second month of its season, was not the featured sport in the section that had long featured baseball. Suddenly soccer was king.

In that nine-day period, soccer stories dominated the section, appearing on the first page eight of the days while baseball showed up in that prominent position on four days. Adding sports insult to journalistic injury, on one of those nine days, baseball’s New York Yankees appeared on the first page of the sports section but not for baseball.

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