Gordie Howe Trophy

The Gary L. Davidson Award was given to the most valuable player of the World Hockey Association regular season, from 1973 to 1975. It was named in honor of WHA co-founder Gary Davidson, but for the 1975–76 WHA season, it was renamed the Gordie Howe Trophy in honor of one of hockey's all-time greats; Gordie Howe, who won the award in 1974 at the age of 46, becoming the oldest hockey player to win the MVP.

The vote was done by media members after the season ended. On June 7, 1973, Bobby Hull was named the first league MVP. He received 199 points from a panel of sports writers and broadcasters in WHA cities and finished ahead of Gerry Cheevers (66 points) and J. C. Tremblay (48 points); notably, Hull won the award after scoring 51 goals in 63 games that saw him miss the first fifteen games of the year due to litigation trying to stop him from playing. The original prize for winning the award was a silver trophy and $4,000. In 1974, Howe won the balloting (135-86) over Mike Walton. In the media vote for 1977, Robbie Ftorek of the Phoenix Roadrunners won the MVP award in the closest finish ever, edging out Anders Hedberg by one vote (168-167), with Réal Cloutier being third at 80 points. Ftorek was the first American to win an MVP award for a professional hockey league and notably did so for a last-place team that dissolved that same year. On May 16, 1979, the final MVP award was given out to Dave Dryden on the Edmonton Oilers, winning the vote by broadcasters and sportswriters with 79 votes to the 69 for Real Cloutier and 48 for Robbie Ftorek (in contrast, a vote by players in April picked Ftorek over Cloutier).