So who gets it? First, I am going to eliminate King Felix Hernandez from the pack, although, if I were building a team he might be my first pick. Hernandez’s numbers are impressive - a 2.38 ERA over 211 innings with 200 strikeouts - but he is nonetheless 10-10. He got ripped off last year, in my opinion, with a 19-5 record he should have been the Cy Young winner over Zach Greinke. Not this year.
Wins matter. The most important thing a starting pitcher does is win games, and though a starter has less control over his decisions than he used to in the days of complete games, he still has a lot to do with it. Sabathia doesn’t have 19 wins by accident. He has them because he holds leads, finds ways on nights when he doesn’t have it, such as in Chicago last weekend, and goes deep into games, deep enough to allow his team to bypass shaky middle relievers and get right to the closer.
For this reason, I have usually used three wins as a benchmark margin. If Pitcher A has three more wins than his nearest competitor, I am likely to go with him for the Cy Young if the other numbers are reasonable close. In comparing starters, innings pitched is a big stat for me, too, because a pitcher throwing 230 innings has pitched through fatigue and helped his team, for the aforementioned reasons, more than the guy who has averaged six innings per start and throws, say, 190 innings. The ERA can be misleading - some pitchers win 8-0 and lose 3-2, others win 8-4 and 2-1. It’s when you give up those earned runs that makes the difference in winning and losing. Pitching isn’t like a golf tournament where the lowest aggregate score wins, it’s Match Play - the job of a starting pitcher is to match the other guy on each given time out. This is why a great pitcher can win a ton of games for a bad team, like Steve Carlton in 1972, while others, no matter how talented, seem to find their way to .500 no matter what kind of team they’re on, such as A.J. Burnett.
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1. HGM Posted: September 03, 2010 at 10:40 PM (#3633297)So Mo pitches in Seattle in his spare time? If we're bringing closers into it, that's a point in favor of Felix.
Felix leads the Al in innings pitched and he gets 5 more starts he might hit 240 IP.
Agreed. His HR/FB% is 2.6%. Ridiculous. What's even more ridiculous, is that his ERA+ is only 127, despite that flyball rate, a 3.4 K/BB ratio (with a K/9 over 9), and a GB% of nearly 54%. You'd think his ERA+ would be something like 150 with those peripherals.
That's silly. They have a grossly disproportionate impact on the outcome of the game. They don't "win it by themselves" but you rarely get 20+ wins by accident.
The fact that CC has been the only reliable starter for the last 2 months on the best team in baseball, and has the wins to prove it, means a lot more than Hernandez's wonderful, but completely meaningless pitching.
10-10 on a last place team doesn't and shouldn't get the Cy Young, unless there is absolutely no one else worthy.
I can see either C.C. or Felix taking the award, and I'd put Buchholz and Price into the mix if they went as deep into games as consistently as those two. Given how most starters use their bullpens as a crutch these days, Sabathia's and Hernandez's ability to go 7+ innings with ridiculous ease puts them above the crowd. How many "day after" games have they won for their teams by their ability to rest their bullpens for the pitchers behind them who might need it more?
In Felix's case, probably not too many.
I wouldn't be surprised if by season's end, CC is the definitively logical second choice to Felix, in which case, he'll most certainly win it.
I don't what this means--probably just that he pitches for a truly lousy team--but King Felix has a shot at one of the stranger seasons in recent memory. Only three pitchers--Ed Siever, Ed Walsh and Fred Anderson--have ever had an ERA+ of 169 or better and a W% of .500 or below, which Felix could easily manage given the team he plays for. The worst W% for someone with that ERA since 1917 is David Stieb in 1985, he went 14-13 (.519) for the Jays.
over Baker????
I agree with the basic thought, but Baker is definately in the running, the Cardinals were by the best team in every pre-season poll out there and yet the Reds are running away with the division.... I don't see how Baker doesn't get some recognition... the west was always considered a crappy division with no clear winner.
Really? I thought the Dodgers were, at worst, the second best team in the NL.
Baker's a very strong runner-up, followed by Cox.
I find this to be an utterly asinine position to take.
"Stops matter. The most important thing a starting pitcher does is stop games, and though a starter has less control over his decisions than he used to in the days of complete games, he still has a lot to do with it."
Doesn't really have the same ring to it.
there's shards of truth in them der words
there. i always wanted to use the word 'shards' here.
I always love when someone makes a comment like this. Any team not in a playoff race is playing completely meaningless games!
Is that even legal?
Don't write on the Internet if you don't want your words taken out of context.
It really annoys me too. Maybe this is a sentimental view but I think of the loyal fans of losing teams whenever a season like King Felix's is discounted in Cy Young or MVP discussions. The season was made compelling by a truly brilliant performance by at least one player and that's worth a lot. Ok, I sort of feel cheesy for that, but whatever.
Sabathia has pitched well, but I have to believe that if they'd been traded even-up in March the Yankees would be slightly better than 21-8 and the Mariners slightly worse than 14-15 in those respective games, and that's what should matter in an awards vote.
However, if one of your criteria is "who played for the better team?" a vote for Sabathia is more understandable.
He dismisses who could be the top candidate, because his team sucks. He eliminates others partly because each fails his non-coincidental benchmark of (win leader - 3). Last year his benchmark would've been (win leader - 1), as he thought Sabathia would be a "shoo-in" over the likes of Hernandez and Verlander had he won 20 and the others (who ended up with 19) didn't. Last year he recognized there was no way Greinke wouldn't win - though at the time he didn't comment on whether Greinke deserved to win. He then went on to say, "One thing that is certain. If there were a Most Valuable Pitcher award, Sabathia would be the winner." This is because Yankees wins are the most valuable thing to Dom Amore.
(And "doesn't know how to win" is Amore's rationale for the difference between Sabathia and Burnett, FWIW. He uses that argument, just not in the case of the 2010 CYA.)
Don't get me wrong - Sabathia belongs in the discussion. It's because of quality and IP, not the win totals. But after having read Amore for many years, when I saw him say he usually uses 3 wins as a difference-making benchmark I knew without looking it up that Sabathia had to have 3 more wins than anyone else.
Seriously though, if Felix was pitching for the Yankees, he would quite possibly have pitched fewer innings (better bullpen) and allowed a few more hits (worse defense) and HR (smaller home park and smaller road parks in his division). We very well might be having the same conversation with the players' roles reversed.
there is
But Burnett doesn't know how to win. Not this season at least. For one thing, he's not striking out enough guys. He's also walking too many and giving up too many HR.
after having read Amore for many years
Why?
That doesn't indicate a cognitive failure. He might well know how to win, but be mostly incapable of it.
You find the position taken by 95% of the baseball-following world "utterly asinine"?
Look it say "Most Valuable Pitcher" right on the damn award, see [30].
However great Felix has been, he hasn't been particularly valuable. His success hasn't translated into wins on the field. His team is 14-15 when he pitches, and they've been out of contention since around May 5th.
You're basing this entirely on a shiny ERA/FIP, but doesn't that need context adjustment too? Felix pitches in a great pitchers' park and as a great RHP, in a park that kills LHB, probably benefits more than the park factor indicates. The Mariners are alleged to have one of the great defenses of the ages, which it surely isn't, but they're probably better than the Yankees. He's also got two putrid offenses and one average one in his division, vs. 2 excellent, 1 average and 1 putrid for the AL East.
Are we even sure Felix has been better at run prevention, when we fully context adjust?
We are sure the Yankees won all those starts CC made.
Practically nobody bases their Cy Young evaluations on whether the guy is playing in "meaningful games". And for good reason: it's horseshit. "His team is 14-15 when he pitches" amounts to the same thing as privileging RBI. It is asinine to reduce an individual award to the performance of a player's teammates.
The rest of it, that's all valid, and should be taken into account. I have grave, grave doubts, however, that it makes up for 37 points of ERA+ in 9 more innings. It's not asinine -- it's just wishful thinking from a Yankee fan.
He's in the local paper? I haven't read the Courant much in recent times, but it was a habit for over 30 years.
That's a valid point, wth, and quite a different one from the position that looks just at wins, losses, and the standings. As I said, Sabathia has pitched well; Hernandez has pitched better, but some portion of each guy's record is due to his defense and bullpen (though I'm not sure that one necessarily pitches less because one's bullpen is better: maybe by pitching more Hernandez would have given the Yankee bullpen a little more rest and made it even stronger). In any case the discrepancy in IP between them is small, advantage Felix, but small.
Whenever I pose the "trade them even-up" question, someone mixes it up with real-life comparisons of the actual teams. (I had it proposed to me a few years back that the Phillies wouldn't have traded Jimmy Rollins for David Wright because they already had a 3B, or something :) So I should probably phrase it as "who would you have drafted first, if you were starting from scratch?" It's not a huge gap between them, but all the evidence points slightly to Hernandez.
And snapper, whatever about defense or park, the difference in W-L record must be attributable to run support in a huge degree. Again, if you give each man the other's run support, game for game (an easy comparison since both have 29 starts), Felix suddenly has an 18-8 record and CC has 12-16. Hernandez just had a month (seven starts) where the Mariners scored eight runs for him. He went 1-5 with an ERA of 1.93 in those seven starts. Ye Gods.
At first I thought #10 was parody, but I guess not. I haven't seen the "count da ringzz" logic used here in a long while.
I was going to add a "team/manager philosophy" qualifier in addition to the better bullpen thought. CC has come out of a few games when he certainly could have gone another inning or at least another couple of batters. I think that has at least something to do with Girardi wanting him strong for (hopefully) another 30-45 innings in October.
Always considered by whom? The NL West had by far the best record of any division in the league last year.
I'm done.
The Yankees have gone 64-42 in games that Sabathia didn't start; the Mariners have been 39-67 in non-Felix contests. The difference between 21-8 and 14-15 is nearly identical to the difference between 64-42 and 39-67.
Felix pitches in a great pitchers' park and as a great RHP, in a park that kills LHB, probably benefits more than the park factor indicates. The Mariners are alleged to have one of the great defenses of the ages, which it surely isn't, but they're probably better than the Yankees.
B-R's WAR accounts for all of these things except for the handedness advantage - but NYS favors lefties, at least by reputation, so CC should have the same edge that Felix does there. And Felix leads in WAR by a decent margin.
He's also got two putrid offenses and one average one in his division, vs. 2 excellent, 1 average and 1 putrid for the AL East.
I have no idea how BP's opponent quality by OPS is figured, but Felix's is .731, while Sabathia's is .717.
180 degrees from reality.
Well, Felix never gets to pitch against the Mariners, and CC never has to face the Yankees.
Edit: Also, CC has faced Seattle 3 times (Bal 4, Bos 4, TB 3, Tor 0), and Felix has faced the Yankees three times. (LA 4, Oak 3, Tex 4), so they may as well be in the same division.
Here are a few of Felix's lines from games he got hung with an L or took a ND:
8/31 vs LAA: 7.0IP, 3H, 0R, 0ER, 3BB, 8K
8/10 vs OAK: 8.0IP, 5H, 0R, 0ER, 1BB, 13K
7/21 vs CHW: 8.0IP, 2H, 0R, 0ER, 0BB, 8K
6/24 vs CHC: 9.0IP, 5H, 2R, 2ER, 1BB, 8K
5/29 vs LAA: 8.0IP, 6H, 1R, 1ER, 3BB, 7K
5/13 vs BAL: 7.0IP, 5H, 1R, 1ER, 2BB, 7K
Plus a bucket of starts where he pitched into the 7th or 8th inning, gave up 2-3 runs, and didn't win. He's been significantly better than CC this year, but the M's shitehouse offense and unreliable bullpen have absolutely murdered Felix's W-L record.
Also, if Buchholz and Price are in the conversation...no love for Jered Weaver?
Hernandez doesn't need to win 16 or 20 games to prove his value. It's right there before your eyes.** And Sabathia shouldn't have to edge above Felix's WAR number to demonstrate his case, either. His 20 to 3 ratio of 7+ innings starts to games where he lasted 5.2 innings or less also says it right there, considering how much relief that's given the Yankee bullpen, compared to Hughes, Burnett and Vazquez. Either way you look at it, this is a very close call.
**If a Yankee fan needs first hand proof of just how great Hernandez has been, just look at those 91, 70 and 82 Game Scores in his three starts against New York, which added up to 26 innings, 16 hits, one run, and a 31 to 8 K/W ratio. When's the last time that any pitcher pulled that sort of a hat trick against the Yankees in one year?
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