by Cary Osborne
Max Scherzer was dominant and consistently excellent. Walker Buehler was consistently excellent and indispensable. Julio Urías was indispensable and baseball’s top winner.
On Nov. 10, we’ll find out if that makes one of them the National League’s 2021 Cy Young Award winner. Voting was closed before the start of the postseason.
Arguments could be made for each of them, making this one of the most star-studded rotations for the Dodgers in a single season. But this was also a season that was difficult to separate any of the top Cy Young contenders — the Dodger trio, Milwaukee’s duo of Corbin Burnes and Brandon Woodruff and Philadelphia’s Zack Wheeler.
Between 2015 and 2020, the NL Cy Young Award winner either led his league in ERA or Baseball Reference’s version of WAR.
The bWAR leader in 2021 was Wheeler (7.8). The ERA leader was Burnes (2.43).
But there are other factors that could have swayed the voting toward a Dodger.
Max Scherzer
Scherzer was already chosen by his peers with the Players Choice Award for NL Outstanding pitcher. Next could be a fourth Cy Young Award.
The 37-year-old led the Majors in ERA before his final start on Sept. 29. While Burnes finished the year as the ERA leader (2.43), Scherzer led the Majors in WHIP (0.86), allowed the fewest hits per nine innings (6.0) and ranked second in strikeouts per nine innings (11.8), strikeout-to-walk ratio (6.6) and opponents’ OPS (.570).
Burnes was the best run-preventer in baseball by ERA and fielding independent pitching (FIP), which bakes in stats pitchers can control — strikeouts, walks and home runs allowed. Burnes’ 1.63 FIP is the second-best all-time, and he led baseball in K/9 (6.9). But among these candidates, his 167 innings are the fewest.
Here’s a lesser-valued stat, but one that further explains Scherzer’s excellence in 2021. Scherzer’s average game score (64.0) was the best in the Majors, ahead of Burnes (63.6), Wheeler (62.2) and Buehler (62.0). Game score factors quality (runs, hits, walks and home runs allowed and strikeouts) and quantity (innings) of a starting pitcher’s performance in a given game. It could be said that Scherzer gave the best performance-per-start in the Majors.
Walker Buehler
That could also be said about Buehler with another measurement. Buehler’s 27 quality starts (starts of at least six innings with three earned runs or fewer) led the Majors — by four.
In a season that saw the most pitchers ever used in a Major League season, Buehler tied for the MLB lead in starts (33) and ranked second in innings pitched (207 2/3) while ranking third in the NL in ERA (2.47) and fourth in WHIP (0.97). He ranked second in bWAR (6.7). He entered September with a 2.05 ERA and ended the season with one earned run over his last two starts.
Excluding 2020’s pandemic-shortened season, only one NL starting pitcher since 2000 has won a Cy Young Award with fewer than 200 innings pitched — Clayton Kershaw, who in 2014 had 198 1/3 innings pitched.
Wheeler was similarly durable, edging Buehler in innings pitched by 5 2/3. The Phillies ace ranked second to Burnes in FIP (2.59), followed by Woodruff (2.96). Scherzer had a 2.97 FIP, while Urías was at 3.13 and Buehler was at 3.16.
Julio Urías
The left-hander became the first National Leaguer since Scherzer in 2016 to reach the 20-win mark. Because of the numerous factors that impact pitcher wins, the stat has been lesser considered by voters since 2010, when Seattle’s Felix Hernandez became the first starting pitcher to win the award with fewer than 15 wins in a non-abridged season.
But the Dodgers were 26–6 in Urías’ starts. He and Scherzer each had 17 starts completing at least five innings with one or no earned runs. Only Burnes’ 18 were better in the Majors. Though he didn’t reach the 200-inning mark (185 2/3), Urías made 32 starts and only one lasted fewer than five innings in length. His 2.96 ERA ranked seventh in the NL and his 1.02 WHIP ranked sixth.
The Cubs’ Jake Arrieta (2015) is the last Cy Young Award winner to lead the NL in wins and not lead the league in bWAR, ERA or WHIP. However, he ranked in the top three of all three categories.
Other Notables
FanGraphs has a different way of calculating WAR, as acclaimed baseball writer Joe Posnanski pointed out when he examined Burnes’ season. Its foundation is the run-prevention stats that pitchers can control.
The six 2021 Cy Young candidates ranked the following in fWAR (NL ranks):
1. Burnes: 7.5
2. Wheeler: 7.3
3. Buehler: 5.5
4. Scherzer: 5.4
5. Urías: 5.0
7. Woodruff: 4.7
Another stat to consider: Scherzer had the most starts against teams with a .500 winning percentage or better — 17 of them. He had a 1.90 ERA in those starts, also the best of the bunch. His peers noticed.
Three Dodger aces gave Cy Young voters a lot to consider was originally published in Dodger Insider on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.