Well, surprise, surprise, surprise, to quote Gomer Pyle. The NL Cy Young award was handed out yesterday, and, like in the junior circuit, the award was given to the wrong man.

Everyone knows that Roger Clemen's 1.87 ERA was the class of the league. Who cares if he had just 13 wins?

I guess you can't get worked up too much for a guy who already has seven statues at home. Who does he have left to give an award to, his cat "Kat"?

I won't bother doing a rundown of the pertinent stats. If a guy leads in VORP, Pitching Win Shares, and adjusted ERA (ERA+), all by a healthy margin, what's the point? Then again, we could decide if Carpenter was the third or fourth best candidate (after Pettitte and Willis). Or we could see if Carpenter is closer to the likes of Pedro Martinez, John Smoltz, and Roy Oswalt than to Clemens. But like, Ricardo Montalban in Star Trek, I grow fatigued.

Somewhere down the line, people will wonder how Clemens didn't win ten or so of the dang things though. I guess that's why they are changing the name to the Lamarr Hoyt award starting next year.

I just have to remark that Clemens is just the 18th pitcher to record a sub-2.00 ERA (150 IP min.) since Bob Gibson recorded a 1.12 ERA in 1968, the Year of the Pitcher (El Ano Del Pichardo), when eight men accomplished the feat. Here are the 17 (including one reliever, Mark Eichhorn, who recorded arguably the greatest season by a reliever in 1986):

One thing about Carpenter though is that he may be the worst pitcher to ever win the award. I mean, that looking at his career stats at the beginning of the year, one wouldn't have expected him to become a Cy Young winner.

Of course, Carpenter turned his career around after switching leagues two years ago. As an NL fan, nothing makes me feel more inferior than to look at all the pitching leaders in the NL who switched leagues in the last couple of seasons—Clemens, Pettitte, Martinez, and Carpenter. I can remember the days when the AL was envious of the NL's pitchers. Oh well.

Anyway, Carpenter came into the year with a 64-55 record and a 4.59 ERA. He had had one year with an ERA under 4.00 in seven tries, and had three seasons with ERAs over 5.00. That made me wonder which pitcher "looked" the worst before becoming a Cy Young winner.

I ran the career numbers prior to a pitcher's Cy Young year and ranked them by ERA. Here 'tis:

Both of this year's winners appear, but Carpenter is in a class all to himself. No one with a thousand previous innings is within a half run of him (well, Viola is, just barely). Most of the guys are youngsters who were still establishing themselves when they had their big year. Carpenter was a well-established, sub-par pitcher for many years in Toronto. Now, he's won the Cy Young, or at least the Hedley Lamarr Hoyt award.

At least, Carpenter had a decent season previous to his Cy Young year (3.46 ERA). Colon had an ERA over 5.00 in 2004. That made me wonder what the worst year prior to a Cy Young-winning one. Here's that:

Colon's second behind Hentgen, but it's surprising how few poor years are on the list—just seven with an ERA over 4.00?!?

So given the ineptitude of the voters and the apparent volatility inherent in pitchers in general, almost anybody could win the award next year. The smart money's on Jeff Weaver. Nuff sed?