After a dominant year on the mound, Houston Astros starter Dallas Keuchel was voted the American League (AL) Cy Young Award victor. He was 13-1 on the road and in his nine starts versus NL Central rivals Pittsburgh and St. Louis, Arrieta had an ERA of 1.45.
Since the All-Star Game began in 1933, no qualifying pitcher in Major League Baseball history had compiled a second half like Arrieta, who went 12-1 with a 0.75 ERA, which lowest post-All-Star mark ever.
And of course, Greinke’s 1.66 ERA over the entire season was the best in baseball since Hall of Famer Greg Maddux put up a 1.63 in 1995.
Dallas Keuchel won an American League-best 20 games and notched one last victory in 2015 by collecting the AL Cy Young award.
Price made 11 starts for the Blue Jays after the deal and posted a 9-1 record and a 2.30 ERA to help lead the Canadian franchise to the AL East title and first playoff appearance in 22 years.
Arrieta’s ascent to the elite ranks over the past two seasons has been nothing short of remarkable, and it is fitting that his progress was recognized in the form of one of Major League Baseball’s top honors.
On Wednesday, two pitchers, who looked to be fringe major leaguers just a few years ago, were named the winners of the Cy Young Award. He became Houston’s first Cy Young victor since Roger Clemens in 2004, when the team was in the National League. Sonny Gray was in the mix, but he has plenty of time left in the future.
Greinke finished in second place with 68 first place votes in a tight race. Arrieta received 17 first-place votes and 169 total points, compared to 10 first-place votes and 147 points for Greinke.
If he got some of those by inducing soft contact – that is, by putting pitches in spots that hitters have a hard time handling – so be it.
I don’t think so, but that’s a long way from saying voters blew the 2015 National League Cy Young Award. In that outing, Greinke went 7 strong innings, striking out 8 and allowing 2 earned runs on 5 hits.
“Everything that we were about, the types of guys we had and the character we had overall, really seeing that play out in an incredible way, (it) was probably the most memorable season in my career”, Arrieta said. The dude won three of the last four Cy Young Awards and had a strong claim to the fourth. The right-hander went 0-3 with a disastrous 6.43 ERA over five starts in the month.
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