AL Cy Young

The best pitcher should always win it. Period. And second-best doesn't count for much when the gap is that big.

I'm not saying Soriano or Soria should be considered. I am saying that they are at least as good, if not better, than Rivera this year, which is a good reason not to consider Rivera. For a closer to win, he has to be by far the best reliever in the league.

 

Plenty of people will argue that since Colon had five more wins than Santana, he was clearly the better pitcher. And no doubt Soria and Soriano are as good as Rivera this year. Guess who I'd pick to close the deciding game of the World Series.

 

And they would be wrong. Flat wrong. Unarguably wrong. Johan Santana was a better pitcher that year than Bartolo Colon. There is no serious argument to be made the other way around. None. Zilch.

 

The more you say that the closer I think you get to changing the world.

 

What indicates that Colon was a better pitcher than Santana that season?

 

Colon's offense was better and we all know how a pitcher can control the run support he gets

 

By my standards, a good starter is more valuable than a closer, no matter how good the closer's numbers are. Rivera might have been more deserving than a pitcher with a 3.48 ERA for the Cy Young, but that year, Santana deserved to win it.

And this year, there are more than enough good seasons by starters -- Hernandez, Sabathia, Buchholz, Lee, etc. -- that closers won't factor into the vote.

 

I went to the White Sox-Yankees game last night.

Sabathia moved another step closer to the AL CY Young as he pitched well enough to pick up his 18th win:

Too bad for Buchholz, he wasn't able to do the same for the Red Sox in Tampa Bay.

 

What a joke. You really believe this line supports your argument? It actually does the reverse. You keep believing all the cliched BS that Girardi spews. The rest of us will realize that Sabathia got the W because of his offense, plain and simple.

IP H R ER BB SO HR
7.0 9 5 5 1 9 2

 

Perfect example of everything that is wrong with counting wins heavily. Buchholz was much better. He gave up one earned run on four hits and two walks while striking out five in 7 1/3 innings pitched. Sabathia gave up five earned runs on nine hits and one walk while striking out nine in seven innings. He won because the Yankees scored 12 runs, not because of his own performance.

 

Dude, I'm not a complete idiot.

I fully understand that Buchholz pitched the better game.

It's a perfect example for your argument. And a stark one at that since they were pitching the same night against quality opponents. I get that.

 

A random sampling of the run support/ERA splits of some of the best pitchers of the last 20 years seems to at least support YankeeFan's support of wins a little bit, i.e. pitchers' ERAs seem to go up as run support increases. Obviously the sample size is small. I'm sure it's been studied more extensively.

Sabathia's splits, however, definitely don't indicate that he's a "knows how to win" guy:

Roger Clemens
0-2: 3.05
3-5: 2.88
6+: 3.46

Greg Maddux
0-2: 3.01
3-5: 3.17
6+: 3.28

Tom Glavine
0-2: 3.26
3-5: 3.35
6+: 4.00

C.C. Sabathia
0-2: 3.57
3-5: 3.58
6+: 3.57

Pedro Martinez
0-2: 2.81
3-5: 2.70
6+: 3.27

Randy Johnson
0-2: 3.00
3-5: 3.23
6+: 3.57