The votes are in and the Cy Young Award winners have been announced in both leagues. This year there were no surprises as the winners in each league were the favorites to win the award and received 28 and 29 first place votes out of a possible 30. While it was no surprise that Max Scherzer and Clayton Kershaw would win the awards for their respective leagues it was a surprise that it was such a landslide.
Kershaw had a fantastic year for a team that made a run deep into the playoffs. He led the National League in ERA, strikeouts and finished second in innings pitchers with a 16-9 record, there is little doubt that he had the best pitcher of any starting pitcher in the National League, but, what about non starting pitchers?
The only player that could honestly have given Kershaw a run for his money for the award finished in fourth in voting for the Cy Young and a case could be made that he was the most impact on his team out of any pitcher in the league. Craig Kimbrel led the league with 50 saves, had a miniscule ERA of 1.21, and he struck out 13.2 batters per every nine innings and when you combine his four wins with his 50 saves he helped lead to 54 wins while only taking the loss three times. I’m not saying Kimbrel should have beat Kershaw, but it is unbelievable to believe that he would run away with the award while Kimbrel doesn’t even finish in the top three.
The argument against Scherzer is the same. It is hard to argue with the guy who finished first in the league in wins, second in the league in strikeouts and fifth in the league in ERA, especially when the top two contenders couldn’t really hold a candle to his stats. One pitcher, though, who finished in sixth in voting for the award probably should have given Scherzer a better challenge for his award.
40-year-old Bartolo Colon for some reason finished sixth in voting for the award, but when it comes down to the numbers Colon stacked up best against Scherzer. Colon finished second in wins, only three behind Scherzer, second in ERA, only .08 points behind league leader Anibal Sanchez and walked only 29 batters all season long. In the end the argument for Scherzer would win out because of his high strikeouts and astonishing win percentage, but stacked up against each other Colon measures much more favorably against Scherzer than Yu Darvish who led the league in strikeouts and Sanchez who led the league in ERA.
Both players should have won the award, but the landslide they won shouldn’t have been quite as great. In the future the award needs better voting, because closers aren’t getting enough credit for the award and there may have been a bit of ageism against the 40-year-old Colon.