American League
Jered Weaver, David Price and Justin Verlander all had excellent years, so it's no surprise they are the finalists for the AL Cy Young Award. However, I view this as a two-man race between Price and Verlander. On the surface, Jered Weaver had a certified bad-ass year going 20-5 with a 2.81 ERA but he also only threw 188.2 innings. David Price also had 20 wins but did it with a league leading 2.56 ERA in 211 innings pitched. Justin Verlander only received 17 wins but had a 2.64 ERA in a league leading 238.1 innings pitched. Weaver pitched well and his 20 wins certainly means something but it's hard to say he pitched better than Price who also had 20 wins with a better ERA. It's also hard to say he deserved three more wins than Verlander considering last year's winner threw 49.2 more innings with a better ERA.
Price v. Verlander
Price: 20-5, 211 IP, 2.56/3.05/3.21 ERA/FIP/xFIP, 77 FIP-, 7.2 RA9-Wins, 8.74 K/9, 2.52 BB/9, 53.1% GB% 5.1 fWAR
Verlander: 17-8, 238.1 IP, 2.64/2.94/3.31ERA/FIP/xFIP, 70 FIP-, 7.6 RA9-Wins, 9.03 K/9, 2.27 BB/9, 42.3% GB%, 6.8 fWAR
This is a nice little battle. Price wins a few classic stats and advanced stats and Verlander wins a few classic stats and advanced stats, One would be silly to use WAR as an end all be all number, but it's interesting that Verlander's total is more than an insignificant amount higher than Price. Also, if we use Baseball Reference WAR Price comes in at 6.4 and Verlander 7.6 - Verlander still is higher, but less so. Anywho, the point isn't to say Verlander more WAR, therefore Verlander better. The point is to ask, well why does Verlander have a higher WAR?
Verlander struck out more batters while walking fewer than Price, but Price also killed a lot more worms with the ground ball compared to Verlander. On a per pitch basis, Verlander and Price were pretty similar in value but Verlander threw 27.1 more innings than Price. That has a lot of value and it shows up in the totals, whether you use fWAR, bWAR or RA9 Wins. It might be boring to give the Award to Verlander again, and it sure is nice to see an even 20 next to the win column for David Price but Justin Verlander was the best pitcher in the AL this year and he's my choice for AL Cy Young. Again.
National League
Clayton Kershaw, Gio Gonzalez and R.A. Dickey.
R.A. Dickey led the league in strikeouts and innings pitched and finished second in ERA (2.73) and wins (20). Who had more wins? Gio Gonzalez with 21. Who had a better ERA? Clayton Kershaw with a 2.53 ERA.
What about the advanced numbers, we love the advanced numbers!
Well, now I'm not sure what to think. It seems to be a three-headed race but I did forgot to mention innings pitched. Well, I mentioned how Dickey led the league (233.2) but I failed to mention how Kershaw threw 227.2 innings and that Gio Gonzalez finished well below the two of them with 199.1 innings. The best thing a pitcher can do is not give up runs, the next best thing a pitcher can do is that over a lot of innings, so although Gonzalez had a fantastic year, like Weaver his lack of innings pitched hurts him here. Alas, another two man battle!
Ten years ago this would be a pretty obvious win. R.A. Dickey has the awesome story and the stats to back it up - 20 wins and a 2.73 ERA. It's cool that Kershaw led the league in ERA but he only won 14 games. 14 games!
Luckily, or unfortunately since I do love the Dickey story, we know that wins don't really tell us anything valuable about a pitcher. Dickey had a damn good year and there are some intriguing ways to argue his case but sadly, I have to choose Kershaw for NL CY Young.
R.A. Dickey had a Cy Young year but Clayton Kershaw was just a smidgen better. Most of the time, I'll get slightly annoyed if the voters don't agree with me, but in this case, even though I would vote for Kershaw I want Dickey to win - it's just been that fun of a year watching him pitch.
So, Kershaw and Verlander, just like last year. Boring but appropriate. Now let's hope we get a knuckleball and Dickey wins the award!
Dude this post is awesome
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