Day three of the SBN awards covers the Cy Young recipients. The voting went down as follows:
Johan Santana deservedly swept the AL vote, while I'm left wondering, "who the hell voted for Justin Duchschurer?" As far as the NL vote goes, my ballot went as follows:
Brandon Webb
Chris Carpenter
Roy Oswalt
Since a relief pitcher doesn't deserve a shot at the Cy Young award if they aren't Eric Gagne in 2003, there were four candidates who immediately stood out in the NL, Webb, Carpenter, Oswalt, and Bronson Arroyo. While pitching 240 very good innings in a launching pad is a great achievement, Arroyo's peripherals were much worse than the other three candidates, so he was dropped from contention. This left the Cy Young award as a three horse race, and to be honest, any of the three would be deserving. Webb lead the group in home runs allowed and innings pitched, Carpenter had the best strikeout rate, and strikeout to walk ratio, while Oswalt lead in walk rate. In the end, I felt that Webb's slightly better home run rate and more hitter friendly home park was more important than the edge in strikeouts that Carpenter had. Oswalt's numbers, while still good, seemed to be just behind Webb and Carpenter. But, as I said before, Webb, Carpenter and Oswalt all have valid cases for the Cy Young.