He got 23 out of the 32 first place votes and 7 of the second place votes plus one third place vote. That is a total of 137 points, almost doubling the second place winner, Brandon Webb, who had 73 points. The fear that Johan Santana might steal the award with his spirited finish was unfounded as he only received 55 points.
He did this striking out 265 batters, the first time a Giants pitcher has led the league in strikeouts, and he was second in wins and ERA. In addition, the .339 difference between his winning percentage and the Giant's team percentage is the 7th widest difference in the history of major league baseball for any pitcher with at least 15 wins.
I just watched the press conference. Tim was very self-effacing and confortable speaking with the reporters. He was very charming. He refered to a nickname that people closed to him used before but haven't heard in a while, Sea Biscuit (however Giants fans have been using that; I prefer "The Kid", which I came up with, or at least haven't seen anywhere else). I liked his outfit, kind of reminded me of a jacket the Beatles wore before plus a ski hat.
ReplyDeleteHis Filipino heritage was noted; just realized that he is the first pitcher of Asia-Pacific descent to win the Cy Young. Quite a year for minorities in the United States.
Looking back, very few non-white minorities have won the award, though the very first one was won by an African-American, Don Newcombe: Bob Gibson (2), Mike Cuellar, Vida Blue, Fernando Valenzuela, Willie Hernandez, Dwight Gooden, Pedro Martinez (3), Johan Santana (2), Bartolo Colon, CC Sabathia and now Lincecum, the twelveth one.
And he's off to a good start, though Gooden never won another one and while Saberhagen did win another one four years later, his career kind of petered out. Maddux and Johnson won their awards later in their career. Martinez won early and often but, while good later, hasn't won again. Only Roger Clemens seem to have won early and often and later, the others were dominate during a good stretch but not so much outside that stretch, Clemens had the longest stretch of excellence (and most), first Cy in 1986 and sixth in 2001. Maddux and Johnson have four each, Pedro three, Santana has two and was winning it every other year, and he pitched well enough to win this season but Lincecum was that much better. It could be Webb, Santana, Lincecum and Peavy battling it out every year for a while.
Amazingly, no MLB team has contacted his father about his techniques yet. Perhaps that will change now that Tim has won the Cy Young, but I rather doubt it. Teams probably figure that it is something that was a unique situation that can't be reduplicated.
I still think the Giants should put Chris Lincecum on the payroll at some point to do some instructional coaching. He doesn't have to teach his whole method to the players, but rather spend a week with a team, look at each pitcher's mechanics and suggest a tip or three on what the guy can do to improve what he got, letting the other coaches know what he recommended to them. Might teach the coaches a thing or two as well.
Oh, forgot to mention, the Chron noted that there was actually one voter who excluded Tim Lincecum from his ballot and he actually grew up in Sacramento as a Giants fan and had season tickets until 1984: Chris De Luca, national baseball writer of the Chicago Sun-Times.
ReplyDeleteIdiot: "I thought Webb's victories stood out to me more than anything, and Lincecum didn't have the victories. Twenty victories was a big deal."
That's why I suggested on MCC that someone send info to all the voters. Wins, bah! Did the idiot know that Lincecum would have the same number of wins as Webb had our bullpen been as good as Arizona in protecting their leads: the D-backs costed Webb only one win while the Giants costed Lincecum five wins, meaning if he had those four wins, he would be tied with Webb in 2008 in wins. How is their respective bullpen's strength related to how good a pitcher Lincecum is relative to Webb? Wins is important within the whole mix but to make it the sole determinant? Idiot.
And if wins is so important, then why Santana over Lincecum? He had more wins than Santana, despite pitching for a team with one of the worse offenses in the NL. He chose Santana because of the pressure he had to deal with, both the expectations and NY. That's nothing compared to the pressure of pitching for a low scoring team that had lost 25 times (out of 33 starts) before one of his starts, but where he went 14-3 with a 2.79 ERA. There have been many pitchers who come into NY with strong pressure (rarely similar since Santana was arguably the best pitcher around when traded to the Mets) and have done well, should they all get a Cy Young too? Or maybe we can call it the Ed Whitson award for overcoming the pressures of NY?
And Lidge, all that is stated is his 41 for 41 in saves. His WHIP was 1.23 whereas Lincecum in much greater innings had a 1.17 WHIP, much better K/BB ratio, 3.15 vs. 2.63, more impressive when you consider that you want starting pitchers with K/BB over 2.00 but relievers with K/BB over 2.40 because they need to be that much better coming into the game.
How is a fluke 41-for-41 worthy of consideration? And it is a fluke because most pitchers, 99.9999% or something really low, who has at least 20 saves also blow a save or two. No reliever is perfect, thus any season where a reliever is perfect in saves is a fluke, unless, you know, he never gives up a hit or walk, then I guess that would be perfect.
Idiot.