Kudos to Cleveland Indians' hurler Cliff Lee on his 2008 AL CY Young Award win. Lee put up stellar numbers in a great comeback season with a 22-3 Won/Loss record and a mean 2.54 ERA.
Few people know or even remember than Cliff Lee along with a couple of other minor leaguers names Brandon Phillips and Grady Sizemore were traded by the Montreal Expos to the Tribe in midseason 2002, for Bartolo Colon, who went on to win a combined 20 games that season, half with the Indians and half with the Expos.
Lee joins a long and distinguished list of former Expos hurlers who have won the coveted MLB best pitcher award:
1974 Mike Marshall Los Angeles Dodgers 15–12 2.42
1995 Randy Johnson Seattle Mariners 18–2 2.48
1997 Pedro Martínez Montreal Expos 17–8 1.90
1999 Randy Johnson Arizona Diamondbacks 17–9 2.49
1999 Pedro Martínez Boston Red Sox 23–4 2.07
2000 Pedro Martínez Boston Red Sox 18–6 1.74
2000 Randy Johnson Arizona Diamondbacks 19–7 2.64
2001 Randy Johnson Arizona Diamondbacks 21–6 2.49
2002 Randy Johnson Arizona Diamondbacks 24–5 2.32
2005 Bartolo Colón Los Angeles Angels 21–8 3.48
2008 Cliff Lee Cleveland Indians 22-3 2.54
Five former Expo pitchers, 11 total Cy Young Awards, five or Randy Johnson, three for Pedro Martinez. Not too shabby! But I'm not bitter... Much!
As an aside, two Canadian-born pitchers whom I wished would have played for the Expos, but did not, HOFer Ferguson Jenkins and Eric Gagne, from Montreal each won Cy Young Awards: Fergie in 1971 and Gagne in 2003.
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