Melvin and Johnson are top managers

Bob Melvin of the Oakland Athletics and Davey Johnson of the Washington Nationals were named managers of the year on Tuesday in voting by the Baseball Writers Association of America.

Melvin, who led Oakland to an unlikely American League West title, and Johnson, who steered Washington to the National League East crown, joined just four other men to win the manager awards with teams in both leagues.

Melvin, who won the National League award in 2007 with the Arizona Diamondbacks, guided the A's past two-time American League champions Texas Rangers and a beefed-up Los Angeles Angels team that had added free agent slugger Albert Pujols to win the AL West.

The A's skipper won a close race in the voting with Baltimore Orioles manager Buck Showalter, taking 16 first-place votes to 12 for Showalter to edge him by 116-108 points.

Oakland, relying on a young starting rotation that featured four rookie pitchers, launched a strong second-half charge to join the playoff race.

They finished the regular season with a six-game winning streak, including a sweep of the Rangers in their season-ending series to claim the division title on the last day of the season with a 94-68 record.

Johnson guided the Washington Nationals to their first winning record since the former Montreal Expos moved to the US capital in 2005 and their first playoff appearance after they registered a 98-64 mark that was best in Major League Baseball.

Johnson, 69, received 23 first-place votes among 32 ballots submitted by two writers representing each league city to score 131 points.