To the shock of no one, Max Scherzer won the AL Cy Young Award on Wednesday, and Clayton Kershaw won the NL award.
Scherzer went 21-3 for the Tigers, throwing 214 1/3 innings, striking out 240 hitters, and pitching to a 2.90 ERA. His 6.4 fWAR led the American League, and his win marks the fifth time a Tiger has won the award. In three of the four other instances (1968, 1984, 2011), the winner has also won the AL MVP award. That won't happen this year.
Scherzer's win of the Cy Young Award isn't just his first, it's the first time he's ever received votes. He received 28 out of the 30 first place votes and a total of 203 out of 210 points. Yu Darvish of the Rangers finished second with 93 points, while countryman Hisashi Iwakuma of the Mariners finished third with 73 votes. The two remaining first place votes went to Anibal Sanchez and Chris Sale, who finished fourth and fifth with 46 and 44 points, respectively. The voting was rounded out by Bartolo Colon, Koji Uehara, Felix Hernandez, Matt Moore, and James Shields, who received 25, ten, six, four, four, and two points.
Kershaw made a mockery of the National League this year, going 16-9 with a 1.83 ERA and 232 strikeouts in 236 innings for the Dodgers. His 1.83 ERA was the lowest in baseball since Pedro Martinez's 1.74 in 2000, and the lowest in a non-strike shortened NL season since Dwight Gooden's 1.53 mark in 1985.
This win is the second in Kershaw's young career, and he was also the runner-up in 2012 to RA Dickey. He led all pitchers in baseball in fWAR with his 6.5 mark, led the NL in ERA for the third straight year, and led the NL in strikeouts for the second time in three seasons (finishing, again, runner-up to Dickey last year). Kershaw received 29 of 30 first place votes and 207 points to pace the voting. Adam Wainwright was the runner-up, earning the final first place vote and 86 points. NL Rookie of the Year Jose Fernandez finished third with 62 points. The voting was rounded out by Craig Kimbrel, Matt Harvey, Cliff Lee, Jordan Zimmermann, Zack Greinke, Madison Bumgarner, and Francisco Liriano, who received 39, 39, 32, 21, 18, three, and three points respectively.
The MLB awards season will conclude on Thursday with the announcement of the AL and NL MVP winners The finalists in the American League are Miguel Cabrera, Chris Davis, and Mike Trout, while the finalists in the National League are Paul Goldschmidt, Andrew McCutchen, and Yadier Molina.
