NL Cy Young Watch: Blake Snell Doesn’t Have It Locked Up

With scarcely a month left in the season, it’s time to check in on the state of MLB awards races. We just tackled the American League Cy Young, and now it’s time for the National League.

Blake Snell, San Diego Padres

Season Stats: 2.60 ERA, 11-9, 1.26 WHIP, 11.7 K/9, 5.1 BB/9, 157 ERA+, 149 IP (27 starts)

This race is a tangled one: There’s a case to be made for any of these top pitchers. Snell’s is fairly straightforward as the ERA leader. (That helps him lead in Baseball Reference WAR, too.) But it gets trickier once you try to flesh out his case with other figures. His walk rate isn’t just the highest on this list. It’s the highest among qualified starters. His ERA is more than a full run lower than his FIP. A lot will depend on the philosophy of the voters here: Snell has undeniably been on a tremendous run lately, but if you dig into just how he’s done it, there’s less to recommend him as a clear favorite. Especially against some of the stiff competition on the rest of this list.

Spencer Strider, Atlanta Braves

Season Stats: 3.56 ERA, 16-4, 1.05 WHIP, 13.8 K/9, 2.8 BB/9, 124 ERA+, 159.1 IP (27 starts)

Strider’s strikeout rate is what turns heads the most here: He’s chasing the highest number ever recorded by a starter in a full season. (Yes, Shane Bieber put up 14.2 K/9 in 2020, but that was … 2020.) Even if he slips just a bit down the stretch, Strider should finish the year in fantastic company. Look at the other pitchers who have recorded more than 13 strikeouts per nine innings in a full season: 1999 Pedro Martinez, 2001 Randy Johnson and ’19 Gerrit Cole. To put it lightly—that’s quite the list. And his performance is more than just strikeouts. While Strider hasn’t fared as well as Snell or Steele when it comes to run prevention, he leads the league in FIP, which means he’s near the top of the leaderboard for FanGraphs WAR, too. For more traditional voters, the fact that he’s doing all this for the best team in baseball doesn’t hurt, either.

Justin Steele, Chicago Cubs

Season Stats: 2.69 ERA, 15-3, 1.17 WHIP, 8.8 K/9, 1.9 BB/9, 168 ERA+, 144 IP (25 starts)

If you want the same ERA-based case that you can make for Snell without any of the baggage around peripheral numbers: Steele is your guy. He leads the league in ERA+, without nearly as large a gap between his actual and expected numbers as Snell, and he’s stood out as a key part of the Cubs’ playoff push. 

Zac Gallen, Arizona Diamondbacks

Season Stats: 3.32 ERA, 14-6, 1.09 WHIP, 9.5 K/9, 1.9 BB/9, 129 ERA+, 173.1 IP (28 starts)

And then there’s Gallen. He was the favorite for much of the early part of the season. But he’s fallen down the leaderboard as he’s cooled off some in the last two months: His second-half ERA is nearly a full run higher than his first half figure.

Logan Webb, San Francisco Giants

Season Stats: 3.49 ERA, 9-11, 1.09 WHIP, 8.4 K/9, 1.3 BB/9, 121 ERA+, 180.1 IP (28 starts)

Webb stands out as the workhorse candidate. But in fitting with this murky, packed race, there are quite a few players who also could have easily taken this fifth spot: Think Zack Wheeler or Corbin Burnes. And had Kodai Senga been healthy enough to land an extra start or two, he’d be here, too. Expect the stretch run to clarify a lot here.