The baseball writers here at Baseball Nation voted on the AL Cy Young award recently and voted Tigers ace Justin Verlander as the 2011 American League Cy Young award winner. Verlander went 24-5 with a 2.40 ERA, 2.99 FIP and 3.12 xFIP to go along with his 7.0 WAR. Verlander did benefit from an extremely high strand rate of 80%, but that has something to do with how dominant he is on the mound. He struck out 250 batters in 251 innings while walking just 57, as he cut his walk rate to just around 2.0, the lowest of his career.
Like the Rookie of the Year ballots, I took care of the National League ballot, while Jason took care of the American League ballot. Here is how Jason voted:
1. Justin Verlander, DET
2. CC Sabathia, NYY
3. Jered Weaver, LAA
4. C.J. Wilson, TEX
5. Doug Fister, DET
The results of all the SB Nation baseball writers ballots after the jump:
I think I would have voted for Dan Haren before Rangers starter C.J. Wilson, but the AL Cy Young voting was much easier than the NL voting, and I am sure you know who I voted for, but we will see who the rest of the SB Nation baseball writers voted as the NL Cy Young award winner tomorrow.
| Num | Name | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Num | Name | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | 4th | 5th | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Justin Verlander | 22 | 2 | Ê | Ê | Ê | 162 |
| 2 | CC Sabathia | 2 | 17 | 4 | 1 | Ê | 96 |
| 3 | Jered Weaver | Ê | 5 | 10 | 4 | Ê | 58 |
| 4 | James Shields | Ê | Ê | 3 | 8 | 6 | 31 |
| 5 | C.J. Wilson | Ê | Ê | 4 | 4 | 5 | 25 |
| 6 | Dan Haren | Ê | Ê | 3 | 5 | 4 | 23 |
| 7 | Josh Beckett | Ê | Ê | Ê | Ê | 3 | 3 |
| 8 | David Price | Ê | Ê | Ê | 1 | Ê | 2 |
| 9 | Jon Lester | Ê | Ê | Ê | 1 | Ê | 2 |
| 10 | Brandon McCarthy | Ê | Ê | Ê | Ê | 2 | 2 |
| 11 | Mariano Rivera | Ê | Ê | Ê | Ê | 1 | 1 |
| 12 | Doug Fister | Ê | Ê | Ê | Ê | 1 | 1 |
| 13 | Felix Hernandez | Ê | Ê | Ê | Ê | 1 | 1 |
| 14 | Gio Gonzalez | Ê | Ê | Ê | Ê | 1 | 1 |