As the continue to establish themselves as the NFL's best team, Drew Brees has cemented his status as the frontrunner for league MVP. , Brees placed ahead of quarterback in CBS Sports' MVP ballot, once again finishing in first place on all five individual ballots. With only five games remaining in the season, this is Brees' award to lose. Mahomes is a worthy challenger, but he's got some ground to make up in a very limited timeframe. In the third edition of CBS Sports' MVP ballot, the top two spots remained completely unchanged from last week. Brees is our unanimous MVP while Mahomes secured all five second-place votes. This shouldn't come as a surprise given Mahomes enjoyed his bye this past weekend while Collin McHugh Jersey Brees threw for 171 yards, four touchdowns, and one interception in one of his games of the season. What Brees is doing right now -- 76.4 completion percentage, 3,135 yards, 29 touchdowns, two interceptions, and a 127.3 pa ser rating -- is historically impre sive especially after factoring in his age (39). Unle s he struggles and Mahomes goes on a tear down the stretch, Brees should walk away with his first MVP award. More on the NFL Just because the top two spots were unanimous doesn't mean the rest of the ballot isn't noteworthy. What's worthy of mentioning is that was the biggest mover from last week to this week, jumping from sixth-place with four points to third place with 10 points (stream Chargers-Steelers and all the games Sunday , try it for free, and stream the CBS games ). For that, he can thank his nearly perfect outing against the , when he went 28 of 29 for 259 yards, three touchdowns, and a 138.4 pa ser rating. , meanwhile, remains the highest-ranked defender. He appeared on three of five ballots, which is especially impre sive considering we're in an era of historically good quarterback play. Lastly, we should note that while the don't have any MVP frontrunners, they're the only team with multiple MVP candidates in , , . Unfortunately for those three players, the presence of other MVP-caliber players on their own team appears to have hurt their individual cases as they continue to pluck votes from each other. The field is also shrinking. Two weeks ago, . Last week, nine players appeared on our collective ballot. This week, the field has been narrowed to eight players. The two players who have fallen off our board entirely? Two Steelers in Ben Roethlisberger and . Below, you'll find the standings heading into Week 13. Farther below, you'll find all five individual ballots along with each writer's explanation. 2018 MVP vote heading into Week 13 1. -- 25 points 2. Patrick Mahomes -- 20 Chris Sale Jersey points 3. Philip Rivers -- 10 points T-4. Khalil Mack -- 6 points T-4. Jared Goff -- 6 points T-6. Todd Gurley -- 3 points T-6. Aaron Donald -- 3 points 8. -- 2 points John Breech's ballot Drew Brees Patrick Mahomes Todd Gurley Khalil Mack Philip Rivers Drew Brees had a completely average game in Week 12 and he STILL threw four touchdown pa ses. When your average performance involves throwing four touchdowns, that means the MVP is yours to lose. As for the next two spots on my ballot, I had Mahomes and Gurley ranked two and three last week and what kind of horrible person would I be if I dropped them down after a week where they didn't even play due to a bye. I don't want to be that person, so they're staying put. As for Khalil Mack, I wanted to have at least one defensive player on my ballot and he gets the nod. I also thought about putting Aaron Donald or J.J. Watt here, but Mack is hands down the best player on a defense that might very well carry that team deep into the playoffs. Finally, I'm sad to report that my preseason MVP choice, , has finally been taken off my ballot. I just couldn't justify keeping Big Ben on my list after he threw away the game for the in their lo s to the . In his place, I have Rivers, and that's mainly because I've decided that anyone who completes 25 pa ses in a row should automatically be getting a spot on my ballot for at least a week. Will Brinson's ballot Drew Brees Patrick Mahomes Philip Rivers Jared Goff Andrew Luck The drama here isn't in figuring out who to put on the list but how to slot these guys. Luck is Rick Porcello Jersey a new entrant but definitely deserving, and he's going to get some serious heat if the make a run to 8/9/10 wins. Same for Rivers if the overcome the Chiefs. Goff will have a tough time winning with Todd Gurley on the roster, but he's definitely deserving. The reality is, barring a serious change in things over the next five weeks, this is going to be Drew Brees' award to win unle s Patrick Mahomes just explodes for like 15 more touchdowns in the final five weeks. I think Brees is worthy, he's got the lifetime achievement tiebreaker and the Saints are destroying everyone in their path right now. Jared Dubin's ballot Drew Brees Patrick Mahomes Jared Goff Khalil Mack Philip Rivers Same as last week, with Brees again looking awesome, Mack making a difference on Thanksgiving, and Rivers tearing up the Cardinals, while the Chiefs and Rams were on their bye. Right now this seems like Brees' award to lose, but I could pretty easily see Mahomes or Goff going on a run down the stretch to steal it away. Sean Wagner-McGough's ballot Drew BreesPatrick MahomesPhilip RiversKhalil MackJared GoffNo movement at the top of my ballot with Mahomes on a bye and Brees throwing four touchdowns. The race isn't over for me if Mahomes goes on a dazzling run to close the season, which he's more than capable of. But at this point, Mahomes is clearly chasing Brees. Rivers dropped out of my top five last week after his turnovers doomed the Chargers against the Broncos, but he's back up to three in the aftermath of his near perfect display against the Cardinals. There's a substantial gap, however, between Mahomes and Rivers. Only Mahomes has a chance to catch Brees. For a Carl Yastrzemski Jersey second-straight week, I've got Mack at the fourth position. He continues to lead the upstart Bears, who have emerged as the clearcut best team in the NFC North. Mack might be slightly behind Aaron Donald in the best defensive player conversation, but Mack is way more valuable to the Bears than Donald is to the Rams, who are absolutely loaded with MVP-caliber players like Todd Gurley and Jared Goff. Speaking of Goff, I have him slightly ahead of Andrew Luck for fifth place, but Luck has a chance to surpa s him if he continues playing this well down the stretch and the Colts make the playoffs. At this point, Luck's slow start to the season (which matters) has him outside my top five, but only just barely. Ryan Wilson's ballot Drew Brees Patrick Mahomes Aaron Donald Philip Rivers Andrew Luck We can't envision the situation in which we're prompted to move Drew Brees out of the top spot. He's in his 18th season and is setting career marks for completion percentage (76.4) and pa ser rating (127.3). And advanced stats agree with the conventional one; Brees is first among all pa sers in value per play, according to Football Outsiders. Perhaps the most amazing part of all this isn't Brees' sustained succe s -- he's been very good for a long Mookie Betts Jersey time -- it's that he's never won an MVP award. That changes this season. Patrick Mahomes is only in his second season but he's already one of the NFL's best players. The 37 touchdowns and 117.9 pa ser rating attest to as much. And if you need further evidence, Mahomes is second behind Brees in value per play. Aaron Donald might be the best player in football -- in any league, at any level -- and his ability to take over games has as much to do with the Rams' succe s as Sean McVay's offensive genius. Donald has 14.5 sacks, including two strip-sacks against Mahomes in Week 11 that led to 14 points in the Rams' 54-51 win. We were ready to put Philip Rivers on this list last week but then he went out and threw two terrible interceptions in the lo s to the Broncos. He more than made up for that against the Cardinals, completing his first 25 pa ses, an NFL record. For the season, Rivers has 26 touchdowns and just six interceptions, and is completing 69.5 percent of his throws for the 8-3 Chargers. Andrew Luck continues to play like his old self. He completed 81 percent of his pa ses for 343 yards and three touchdowns in Sunday's win over the ; it was Indy's fifth-straight win and Luck has been sacked once in the last six games. Perhaps the biggest obstacle between Luck and the MVP Award is coach Frank Reich continuing to line him up at receiver. Luck took a huge hit against Miami, which seems like a terrible idea for a franchise quarterback coming off serious shoulder surgery. His 68.4 completion percentage and 102.7 pa ser rating are career bests. And with Indy's remaining regular-season schedule, Luck is primed to lead this team back to the playoffs for the first time since that '14 campaign.
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