Lincecum repeats as Cy Young Winner

[9RoyHobbsRF]

Lincecum gets 100 points
Carpenter 94
Wainwright 90

[Rich the Giants fan]

Very deserving. Very excited for him.

[9RoyHobbsRF]

surpisingly (to me) Wainwright had the most first place votes (12)
Lincecum had 11

Wainwright won the votes for getting huge run support, the most innings, and a strong second half

to me he was a clear distant third

[RationalNYYfan]

225.1 IP, 261K, 2.48 ERA, 105 WHIP, .206 BA

And he can make a very strong argument that his 2009 performance was even better than 2008

[9RoyHobbsRF]

NEW YORK (AP) -- Giants ace Tim Lincecum has won the NL Cy Young Award, becoming the first repeat winner in the major leagues since Randy Johnson was voted the prize four straight times from 1999-2002.

Lincecum led the NL with 261 strikeouts and tied for the league lead with four complete games and two shutouts.

Only 10 points separated the top three in one of the closest ballots in the award's history.

Lincecum received 11 first-place votes, 12 seconds and nine thirds for 100 points in balloting released Thursday by the Baseball Writers' Association of America. Cardinals ace Chris Carpenter was next with 94 points and teammate Adam Wainwright finished third with 90 despite getting the most first-place votes with 12.

[RationalNYYfan]

More K's and W's for Wainwright than for Carpenter - plus he played on a team that was far superior than Carpenter's. I dunno, I expected Wainwright to place 2nd.

[9RoyHobbsRF]

y Chris Haft / MLB.com

11/19/09 2:02 PM EST

SAN FRANCISCO -- For Tim Lincecum, less was indeed more in 2009.

The San Francisco Giants right-hander won fewer games but added to his pitching legend.


Lincecum repeated as the National League Cy Young Award winner, besting St. Louis right-handers Chris Carpenter and Adam Wainwright despite getting fewer first-place selections than Wainwright in the vote conducted by the Baseball Writers' Association of America and announced on Thursday.

Lincecum (15-7, 2.48 ERA, 261 strikeouts) received 11 first-place votes and 100 points. Carpenter (17-4, 2.24 ERA, 144 strikeouts) finished second with nine first-place votes and 94 points, followed by Wainwright (19-8, 2.63 ERA, 212 strikeouts), who had 12 first-place votes and 90 points.

Carpenter also had more second-place votes -- 14 to 12 -- than Lincecum, who became the pitcher with the lowest victory total to win a Cy Young in either league. The previous low win total for a Cy Young winner was 16, by Zack Greinke of the Royals earlier this week and Brandon Webb of the D-backs in 2006. Both of those pitchers went 16-8.

Lincecum is the first pitcher to win consecutive Cy Young Awards since Randy Johnson, a Giant in 2009, won four in a row with the Arizona Diamondbacks from 1999-2002. Other back-to-back winners have included Pedro Martinez (1999-2000), Roger Clemens (1997-98 and 1986-87), Greg Maddux (1992-95), Jim Palmer (1975-76), Denny McLain (1968-69; he shared the honor in '69 with Mike Cuellar) and Sandy Koufax (1965-66).

Lincecum's victory total not only tied him for fourth in the league with seven other pitchers but also represented a dip from last year, when he went 18-5 and joined 1967 Cy Young recipient Mike McCormick to become only the second Giant to win the award.

But Lincecum clearly improved overall. The 25-year-old trimmed his ERA by 0.14. Opponents hit .206 off him this season, compared to .221 in 2008. After walking 84 in 227 innings a year ago, he improved to 68 walks in 225 1/3 innings this season.

The NL's starter in this year's All-Star Game, Lincecum led the league in strikeouts for the second year in a row, the first Giant to do so since Hall of Famer Christy Mathewson (1907-08). Lincecum also topped the NL with 26 quality starts while ranking second in ERA and opponents' batting average and third in innings. He tied teammate Matt Cain for the league lead with four complete games and joined four other pitchers atop the NL list with two shutouts.

Lincecum led the Major Leagues by making seven starts in which he worked at least eight innings and didn't allow an earned run. Kansas City's Zack Greinke, the AL Cy Young Award winner, recorded five such outings. Carpenter and Wainwright had four and three, respectively. Lincecum's eight double-digit strikeout performances, highlighted by his 15-strikeout effort July 27 against Pittsburgh, represented another Major League best.

Lincecum topped Wainwright and Carpenter in several other statistical categories, including opponents' batting average, strikeouts per nine innings and strikeout-to-walk ratio.

[9RoyHobbsRF]

local KNBR radio inerviewed Giants announcer (an ex 20 game winner) Mike Krukow who had these observations:

1) Lincecum will surely get better as he better masters fastball grips (2 seam, 4 seam) and learns to "read" batters which only comes with experience

2) the pitch counts and other restrictions placed on today's starting pitchers limit their starts, Innings pitched, chances for wins and it is a different demographic than a decade or two ago as far as criteria for Cy Young votes. Lincecum's 15 wins is a product of the times, not Lincecum

[Honus Wagner Rules]

More K's and W's for Wainwright than for Carpenter - plus he played on a team that was far superior than Carpenter's. I dunno, I expected Wainwright to place 2nd.

Ummm...Aren't Carpenter and Wainwright teammates?

[9RoyHobbsRF]

the other thread beat you by several minutes

[9RoyHobbsRF]

Ummm...Aren't Carpenter and Wainwright teammates?

yes

Wainwright was not in the top ten in most pitcher batter stats (hits/9, BB/9, K/9)

I saw some columnists (non-voters) who said he deserved it because he had the most wins and IP, which is how a simpleton would vote

[9RoyHobbsRF]

1st 2nd 3rd Points
Tim Lincecum, San Francisco Giants 11 12 9 100
Chris Carpenter, St. Louis Cardinals 9 14 7 94
Adam Wainwright, St. Louis Cardinals 12 5 15 90
Javier Vazquez, Atlanta Braves 1 3
Dan Haren, Arizona Diamondbacks 1 1

[Rich the Giants fan]

1st 2nd 3rd Points
Tim Lincecum, San Francisco Giants 11 12 9 100
Chris Carpenter, St. Louis Cardinals 9 14 7 94
Adam Wainwright, St. Louis Cardinals 12 5 15 90
Javier Vazquez, Atlanta Braves 1 3
Dan Haren, Arizona Diamondbacks 1 1

Exactly how I called the top five.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

local KNBR radio inerviewed Giants announcer (an ex 20 game winner) Mike Krukow who had these observations:

1) Lincecum will surely get better as he better masters fastball grips (2 seam, 4 seam) and learns to "read" batters which only comes with experience

I agree. I think Lincecum will take his game up one more step and perhaps be Pedro-esque in his prime. The Giants should really try to sign him long term RIGHT NOW, say 5 years, $90 million.

2) the pitch counts and other restrictions placed on today's starting pitchers limit their starts, Innings pitched, chances for wins and it is a different demographic than a decade or two ago as far as criteria for Cy Young votes. Lincecum's 15 wins is a product of the times, not Lincecum

I don't think Lincecum is on a strict pitch count. He's thrown a huge number of pitches the past two seasons. He finished second in all of baseball in pitches thrown in '08. He finished 12th in '09 minus one start. With that extra start he probably ends up 6th. But in general Krukow is right. We'll keep seeing fewer and fewer 20 game winners in the future. Lincecum now has two Cy Young Awards and is yet to have a 20 win season.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Exactly how I called the top five.

Good for you, Rich. Do want a cookie? (Just teasin' ya)

[Honus Wagner Rules]

yes

Wainwright was not in the top ten in most pitcher batter stats (hits/9, BB/9, K/9)

I saw some columnists (non-voters) who said he deserved it because he had the most wins and IP, which is how a simpleton would vote

Voters with that kind of mindset are, fortunately, on the way out. Progress is good.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

Isn't it time for Cowtipper to start a Tim Lincecum HoF thread?

[dl4060]

surpisingly (to me) Wainwright had the most first place votes (12)
Lincecum had 11

Wainwright won the votes for getting huge run support, the most innings, and a strong second half

to me he was a clear distant third

I wonder how often that happens, with one guy getting the most first place votes but losing.

I would have voted for Lincecum. It does appear that the two Cards aces split the vote.

I see Carpenter as a better pitcher than Wainwright, but I don't know who I would vote for. Is 190 innings at 183 ERA+ more valuable than 233 innings at 157? I would say probably, but I can see the other argument. 40 innings is pretty significant. Think about it in the context of solving an actuarial problem: The apv of an insurance policy is the probability of a claim X the expected value of a claim/given that a claim occurs. In a sense, it would be nice to break down pitching value in this way, your value per inning, times the number of innings one pitches. This would make a nice, easy equation to solve. Such an equation does not exist, and I don't know just where the value point is. How many more innings does a guy have to pitch to make him more valuable at 157 vs. 183 ERA+?

I can see it being a tough decision with the two cards pitchers. It is hard to give it to a guy who pitches 40 fewer innings than someone with terrific numbers. Having said that, it is also hard to give it to someone who does not pitches almost 20% fewer innings than someone else on his staff. If they were on different teams, one of the Cardinals might have walked away with the award.

Lincecum is something of the best of both worlds. His ERA+ of 176 is excellent, and he threw 35 more innings than Carpenter.

[Rich the Giants fan]

Good for you, Rich. Do want a cookie? (Just teasin' ya)

Chocolate chip, please!

[RationalNYYfan]

Ummm...Aren't Carpenter and Wainwright teammates?

AH crap I was looking at the wrong stats, my bad!

[RationalNYYfan]

the other thread beat you by several minutes

Thanks bud, didn't realize that until you told me

[9RoyHobbsRF]

Lincecum won despite failing to garner the first-place votes of the Bay Area's two balloters from the Baseball Writers' Association of America: Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle and Paul Gutierrez of the Sacramento Bee, both of whom made strong cases for giving Carpenter their top billing.

[AstrosFan]

AH crap I was looking at the wrong stats, my bad!

Rats. I had my money on you just being dumb.*

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Both Greinke and Lincecum were low win pitchers who were usually considered tops by sabermetric evaluations. Can we consider this progress, or should we not get our hopes up too soon?

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*I'm kidding, of course.

[dgarza]

NEW YORK (AP) -- Giants ace Tim Lincecum has won the NL Cy Young Award, becoming the first repeat winner in the major leagues since Randy Johnson was voted the prize four straight times from 1999-2002.

I think Clemens was the youngest repeat winner, but Lincecum became a repeat winner the quickest in his ML career.

[Honus Wagner Rules]

I think Clemens was the youngest repeat winner, but Lincecum became a repeat winner the quickest in his ML career.

Yes, Clemens beat Lincecum by two months.