Does Anyone Want to Be NFL MVP?

Is an NFL MVP as good as his best performance, as bad as his worst or somewhere in between? Is the award based on the body of work – a full season of steady, solid production – or the brief-but-dizzying peaks achieved throughout a campaign? Does it matter if player threw 12 of his touchdown passes in a two-week span, or lead the league in rushing yards while also fumbling in half of his games?

These are the questions voters will ask themselves at the end of the NFL season, when one player (most of the time) is named MVP. Or they could just take the easy route and give the award to Peyton Manning again. After all, that seems to be the theme of this NFL season through 10 weeks: Each of the usual suspects has taken the lead in the MVP race at one point or another, and in a field full of sure things, it’s usually smart to bet on the surest of them all.

Which means that Manning – already the all-time leader with five MVP Awards – could be in line for number six. But that brings us to another theme of this season: Every time a player seems to separate himself from the pack, he quickly falls back to earth.

This past Sunday, it was Aaron Rodgers’ turn to “solidify himself” as the frontrunner, based on the strength of six first-half touchdown passes against one of the worst defenses in the NFL. That career day gave him the league lead in touchdown percentage, yards per attempt and passer rating, and he’s got the resume – MVP of Super Bowl XLV and the NFL in 2011, unquestioned leader of a perennial powerhouse, most chillaxed dude in the league – to prove it wasn’t a fluke. So let’s give the award to him, right?

Not so fast. Hours before he picked apart the Bears, at least one site ranked Rodgers fourth in this year’s MVP race. And that’s pretty much par for the course: It took a record-tying performance for Rodgers to suddenly “surge into MVP lead,” and one can assume that he’ll only hold that lead until someone else comes along and bombards a defense. After all, going into Sunday night, Rodgers had thrown 19 touchdowns to go along with a paltry 3 interceptions – and that wasn’t even good enough for him to make the MVP podium.

Remember Philip Rivers and the 5-1 Chargers? Less than a month ago, San Diego stood as the league’s biggest surprise, with Rivers tossing 15 touchdowns against only two interceptions, despite having an average supporting cast of skill players. It would have been hard not to vote for Rivers as MVP after six games, so it’s probably a good thing that the NFL season isn’t six games long: The Chargers have lost three in a row, with Rivers throwing five touchdowns and six interceptions in those games. From frontrunner to also-ran, in the span of three weeks.

That made way for Manning.