Who are your Cy young award front runners right now?

[Zoltan]

Time to put it all together now....

Randy Johnson: 16-14, 35 GS, 2.60 ERA, 4 CG, 2 SHO, 245.2 IP, 71 ER, 44 BB, 290 SO, 176 ERA+, 0.90 WHIP, 6.5 H/9, 0.7 HR/9, 1.6 BB/9, 10.6 SO/9, 6.59 SO/BB, 3.56 RS....Opponents batted .197/.241/.315/.557

Roger Clemens: 18-4, 33 GS, 2.98 ERA, 0 CG, 0 SHO, 214.1 IP, 71 ER, 79 BB, 218 SO, 145 ERA+, 1.16 WHIP, 7.1 H/9, 0.6 HR/9, 3.3 BB/9, 9.2 SO/9, 2.76 SO/BB, 4.81 RS....Opponents batted .217/.292/.329/.621

Wins and losses don't tell the whole story. This was from the 2004 season. Clemens took home the Cy. Had I did this with Felix and Price it would have turned out the same. The writers got it right in 2010.

Thats amazing.

[milladrive]

Thats amazing.

I agree. I wonder how much money was exchanged for that vote.

[RaysFan_98]

I agree. I wonder how much money was exchanged for that vote.

What do you mean by that?

[milladrive]

What do you mean by that?

Oh nothing. It's brazenly obvious that Johnson easily deserved it, and I personally have never believed the BBWAA to be the most credible group of individuals on the planet. I tend to think they're not above corruption, and neither is Clemens. Looks as crooked as a four-dollar bill. Clemens got 23 first-place votes; Johnson got 8. Nah, I don't anything incongruous with how this vote turned out.

[RaysFan_98]

Oh nothing. It's brazenly obvious that Johnson easily deserved it, and I personally have never believed the BBWAA to be the most credible group of individuals on the planet. I tend to think they're not above corruption, and neither is Clemens. Looks as crooked as a four-dollar bill. Clemens got 23 first-place votes; Johnson got 8. Nah, I don't anything incongruous with how this vote turned out.

Anything and anyone now days could and can be corrupted IMHO. But i didn't know that.

[Matthew C.]

Oh nothing. It's brazenly obvious that Johnson easily deserved it, and I personally have never believed the BBWAA to be the most credible group of individuals on the planet. I tend to think they're not above corruption, and neither is Clemens. Looks as crooked as a four-dollar bill. Clemens got 23 first-place votes; Johnson got 8. Nah, I don't anything incongruous with how this vote turned out.

This is about the decades-long love affair with W/L record...not bribery. What, was the BWAA suddenly above the corruption when they picked CC over Beckett and Felix over Price and CC or have they started looking beyond just W/L record? Were they corrupt when Welch won over Clemens in 1990?

[milladrive]

This is about the decades-long love affair with W/L record...not bribery. What, was the BWAA suddenly above the corruption when they picked CC over Beckett and Felix over Price and CC or have they started looking beyond just W/L record? Were they corrupt when Welch won over Clemens in 1990?

Yeah, I know you're right. But then how can they call themselves baseball people if they're incapable of looking at the entire picture? I mean, this was, believe it or not, the first time I'd looked at the 2004 Clemens/Johnson records side by side, and I nearly spit on my monitor at the unbelievability of what I'd learned nearly eight years after the fact. It makes me wanna go back, as you've pretty much tempted me to, and look at all the other CYA decisions based solely on wins and losses instead of the full lines. I can only imagine what I'll find.

And, although I may not think the BBWAA is as corrupt as I painted them out to be, I still give them little credibility. Between the Hall of Fame, GG's, and MVP's, among other things, I've long thought of them as pretty much a group of biased self-serving egoists. I've a feeling this is just gonna add unenlightened and misguided to that list of adjectives. Baseball writers who know or care very little about either baseball or justice.

[Matthew C.]

Yeah, I know you're right. But then how can they call themselves baseball people if they're incapable of looking at the entire picture? I mean, this was, believe it or not, the first time I'd looked at the 2004 Clemens/Johnson records side by side, and I nearly spit on my monitor at the unbelievability of what I'd learned nearly eight years after the fact. It makes me wanna go back, as you've pretty much tempted me to, and look at all the other CYA decisions based solely on wins and losses instead of the full lines. I can only imagine what I'll find.

And, although I may not think the BBWAA is as corrupt as I painted them out to be, I still give them little credibility. Between the Hall of Fame, GG's, and MVP's, among other things, I've long thought of them as pretty much a group of biased self-serving egoists. I've a feeling this is just gonna add unenlightened and misguided to that list of adjectives. Baseball writers who know or care very little about either baseball or justice.

I don't think they were ignoring the information they knew was there. It wasn't until 15-20 years ago that much of anybody looked past W/L. It wasn;t until 10 years ago that people started to look past ERA. It wasn't until 5 years ago that people started looking past ERA+, etc. Nobody was trying to quantify park effects or how range affects ERA 15 years ago. People legitimately thought that winning was an intrinsic thing that good pitchers were able to do, regardless of run support. And that the Jack Morris's would find a way to win even if he gave up 6 runs in 5 innings. OF course now, we know he received a embarrassingly high level of run support. People used to think that Bert just didn't have "that thing", but now we know that his run support was dreadful.

And as more information is available, we see it changing the voting mindset. This is how Blyleven made the HOF and how Felix and Grienke won the Cy Young. And the changes happened fast. We went from Colon beating out several better candidates based on wins to CC beating out a high-profile, east coast pitcher with a lot more wins in just a few years. Why? Because the idea of playing time and importance of innings pitched is much more prevalent now then say when Rick Sutcliff won with 150 (or whatever) IP.

WAR may never be mainstream, but the sabermetric influence is powerful and is not going anywhere for a long time.

They just didn't know/understand; even back as far as 2004.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Time to put it all together now....

Randy Johnson: 16-14, 35 GS, 2.60 ERA, 4 CG, 2 SHO, 245.2 IP, 71 ER, 44 BB, 290 SO, 176 ERA+, 0.90 WHIP, 6.5 H/9, 0.7 HR/9, 1.6 BB/9, 10.6 SO/9, 6.59 SO/BB, 3.56 RS....Opponents batted .197/.241/.315/.557

Roger Clemens: 18-4, 33 GS, 2.98 ERA, 0 CG, 0 SHO, 214.1 IP, 71 ER, 79 BB, 218 SO, 145 ERA+, 1.16 WHIP, 7.1 H/9, 0.6 HR/9, 3.3 BB/9, 9.2 SO/9, 2.76 SO/BB, 4.81 RS....Opponents batted .217/.292/.329/.621

Wins and losses don't tell the whole story. This was from the 2004 season. Clemens took home the Cy. Had I did this with Felix and Price it would have turned out the same. The writers got it right in 2010.

And Clemens go hosed even worse in 1990.