Predicting the Top 5 MLB Cy Young Finishers in AL and NL
Nearly half of Major League Baseball teams reached the "100 games played" plateau this weekend, which means the starting pitchers with Cy Young aspirations have 12-13 chances left to make or break their case for the game's highest pitching honor.
Given what we have seen thus far, though, we're offering up predictions on how the top five will shake out in both the American League and the National League when all is said and done.
We'll start with our top five in the AL before diving into the much more impressive NL race.
Unless otherwise noted, statistics are current through the start of play on Sunday, July 19.
AL Honorable Mentions: Jacob deGrom, Logan Gilbert, Drew Rasmussen, Gavin Williams, Bryan Woo
NL Honorable Mentions: Chase Burns, Max Meyer, Shohei Ohtani, Paul Skenes, Yoshinobu Yamamoto
AL No. 5: Joe Ryan, Minnesota Twins
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Season Stats: 6-5, 110.1 IP, 2.85 ERA, 2.77 FIP, 1.05 WHIP, 10.4 K/9
Perhaps the biggest unknown as it pertains to Joe Ryan's chances of winning the AL Cy Young is whether he'll still be in the AL 15 days from now.
That's looking good, though, with the Twins holding steady in the wild-card picture and unlikely to do anything too drastic at the trade deadline.
So, assuming he stays in Minnesota, could he continue to chase down the likes of Cam Schlittler and Dylan Cease to win this race?
It looked unthinkable in early May, when Ryan had a 3.72 ERA and had just been pulled two batters into a start due to elbow soreness. But he came back five days after that scare and has a 2.39 ERA since, arguably the best pitcher in the American League dating back to Mother's Day weekend.
What's wild is that Ryan is thriving with a pitch that wasn't even part of his repertoire 14 months ago. Opponents are batting .153 against his knuckle curve, striking out in 46 percent of at-bats that end with that offering. Statcast grades it as the third-most valuable knuckle curve in the majors this season.
AL No. 4: Sonny Gray, Boston Red Sox
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Season Stats: 11-1, 95.2 IP, 2.54 ERA, 3.53 FIP, 1.10 WHIP, 8.0 K/9
This will also pertain to Tarik Skubal momentarily and Zack Wheeler later in this article, but Sonny Gray getting snubbed from the All-Star Game is no good reason to rule him out of the Cy Young conversation.
Per the research of MLB.com's Cole Jacobson from two years ago, there have been 22 instances of a pitcher winning the Cy Young vote after not making the All-Star roster, five of which have come in the past 12 years.
And Gray's omission was the most inexplicable of the bunch this year.
Say what you will about wins as a pitching stat, but he ended the first half at 11-1 in his 17 starts for a team that was 46-48 overall. Those 11 wins were the most among all AL pitchers.
Gray was also tied for the AL lead (along with Cam Schlittler and Michael Wacha) with 12 quality starts, including eight in a row heading into the All-Star Break. And with the exception of Cy Young favorite Schlittler (2.05), Gray had the lowest ERA among qualified AL pitchers.
One could pretty easily argue he should have started the All-Star Game, let alone made the roster.
But if he keeps humming along and gets to, say, 18 wins and 21 quality starts, he's going to have a darn good case for winning what is presently a wide-open race for the AL Cy Young.
AL No. 3: Tarik Skubal, LHP, Detroit Tigers
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Season Stats: 6-5, 82.2 IP, 2.83 ERA, 2.85 FIP, 0.93 WHIP, 10.7 K/9
It's wild that a two-time reigning Cy Young winner in the middle of a solid campaign can be a buy-low candidate for a third trophy, but that's where we're at with Tarik Skubal, who is sitting around +6000 at most online sportsbooks.
Between his missing six weeks to an elbow surgery, not pitching quite as dominantly as the previous two seasons and the possibility of getting traded to the National League, it makes sense. He definitely shouldn't be the favorite at this point.
But if he stays in Detroit through the trade deadlineโwhich is looking far more likely than it did two months agoโand makes another dozen or so starts while helping to carry the Tigers back into the playoff picture, let's just say it wouldn't be an under-discussed talking point.
Even if you're convinced he's going to be traded, it's possible Skubal stays in the American League; it feels like every team in the AL East has been a rumored landing spot for him at some point over the past few months, and he could still play a huge role for that TBD postseason-bound squad.
Either scenario could be enough for him to win a third consecutive Cy Young, even though he's probably going to end up with only ~150 innings pitched.
AL No. 2: Dylan Cease, Toronto Blue Jays
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Season Stats: 6-4, 98.1 IP, 2.56 ERA, 2.18 FIP, 1.13 WHIP, 13.5 K/9
Plenty has gone awry for the Blue Jays, who ended the first half in last place in the AL East.
However, their $210M investment in Dylan Cease has thus far been a dream come true.
Despite missing two weeks around Memorial Day with a hamstring strain, Cease is leading the American League with 148 strikeouts, fanning 37 percent of the batters he has faced.
He always has had great strikeout stuff, but he is getting opponents to chase pitches out of the zone like never beforeโparticularly on the changeup that had barely been part of his arsenal over the past four seasons. Cease almost exclusively uses that grip when facing lefties, but they've been helpless against it this year.
Notably for this Cy Young race, though, Cease only has seven quality starts to show for all of those strikeouts. And save for the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign, there hasn't been a Cy Young winner with fewer than 18 quality starts since รric Gagnรฉ won it as a closer in 2003.
Barring a ridiculous run of deep outings through the second half, that might be the biggest factor keeping this All-Star Game starter from winning his first Cy Young award, even as he is well on his way to a sixth consecutive season with at least 214 strikeouts.
AL No. 1: Cam Schlittler, New York Yankees
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Season Stats: 9-5, 118.2 IP, 2.05 ERA, 2.81 FIP, 0.94 WHIP, 10.4 K/9
If the season ended today, Cam Schlittler presumably would be the pick for AL Cy Young.
He entered Sunday pretty much running away with the league's ERA crown, already tossing 12 quality starts. Schlittler has been the steady anchor of a Yankees pitching staff that incessantly has been waiting on at least one of its three $27M-plus starters to get healthy.
Can he keep it up for another 10 weeks, though, ultimately approaching 200 innings?
We know about Dylan Cease's durability; he has made at least 32 starts in each of the past five seasons. Comparatively, Schlittler made 14 starts last year as a rookie and has yet to reach 150 innings pitched in a regular season in his professional career.
He has yet to show any signs of running low on gas, though. In fact, the average velocity (98.4 mph) on his four seamer in his final two starts of the first half was higher than in any previous month of his big league career. He has already made seven starts this season with at least six strikeouts and no walks, and a few more of those might seal the deal.
NL No. 5: Mason Miller, San Diego Padres
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Season Stats: 2-1, 25 saves, 40.2 IP, 0.89 ERA, 0.52 FIP, 0.84 WHIP, 16.6 K/9
Mason Miller is not going to win the NL Cy Young award. The elite closer should get a decent number of down-ballot votes, but there are so many worthy options among this league's starting pitchers that even this fifth-place projection might be a bit too optimistic.
As with Joe Ryan and Tarik Skubal, there's also a possibility he gets traded across league lines, in which case he won't be finishing top five in either league.
But if he were already pitching in the AL, we might be talking about the first Cy Young reliever in more than two decades.
That's how dominant he has been this season, in case the ludicrous 0.52 FIP didn't give that away.
Of the 155 batters Miller has faced, 75 (48.4 percent) have struck out.
On Friday, he allowed his first extra-base hit of the seasonโa double by Carter Jensen. Miller proceeded to fan the next three hitters on a combined 11 pitches.
All four of the earned runs that he has allowed came in non-save situations, and he has yet to blow a save in 25 tries.
He has been darn near perfect since the Padres moved heaven and earth to get him from the A's last summer.
NL No. 4: Zack Wheeler, Philadelphia Phillies
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Season Stats: 10-1, 93.0 IP, 2.13 ERA, 2.95 FIP, 0.89 WHIP, 10.5 K/9
For the first few weeks after his return in April from thoracic outlet decompression surgery, it looked like late-career Zack Wheeler was going to be much less of a strikeout artist. After averaging 10.3 K/9 over the previous five seasons, there were three starts in May in which he only struck out four batters.
Granted, he had a 2.27 ERA through his first seven starts, so no one was exactly complaining. But it's kind of hilarious to compare Wheeler's pitch-specific whiff rates in May (42.1 percent on the curveball, 23.1 percent on the sweeper, 3.8 percent on the sinker) to the sheer dominance and wipe-out stuff he has displayed thus far in July (69.2, 52.6 and 17.4, respectively).
Wheeler ended the first half with three consecutive starts of at least 10 strikeouts, including matching a career-best 14K gem in demoralizing the Cincinnati Reds. It's only the second time in his career (the other coming in May 2021) that he has had a calendar month with a trio of starts with at least 10 strikeouts, let alone three consecutively.
And it certainly doesn't hurt his Cy Young case that those authoritative outings came against the backdrop of seemingly the entire baseball world agreeing that Wheeler absolutely ought to have been in the All-Star Game in Philadelphia. All eyes were already on him in his last two starts because of that whole kerfuffle, and he did not disappoint.
NL No. 3: Chris Sale, Atlanta Braves
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Season Stats: 10-6, 105.0 IP, 2.06 ERA, 2.72 FIP, 1.06 WHIP, 10.5 K/9
As Atlanta tries like mad to not squander what felt like an insurmountable lead in the NL East less than two months ago, Chris Sale has been the Gandalf the Grey to Philadelphia's balrog, screaming "You shall not pass!" on the bridge with strong outing after strong outing.
Since a six-run dud against the Angels in early April, Sale has reeled off 15 consecutive starts with three or fewer runs allowed and a cumulative ERA of 1.72. And his most impressive start of the year just came on Friday, allowing two baserunners over the course of seven scoreless innings in a rout of the Texas Rangers.
What's preposterous about what the 37-year-old Sale is accomplishing this season is that he is throwing harder than ever before.
The average velocity on his four seamer is 96.0 mph, up 1.2 mph from last year. He even hit 98 several times in the seventh inning on Friday.
Surely Boston had no idea Sale still had several years of that left in the tank when they dumped his salary on Atlanta three winters ago. Since that trade, he has arguably been the most valuable pitcher in baseball outside of Tarik Skubal.
NL No. 2: Cristopher Sรกnchez, Philadelphia Phillies
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Season Stats: 11-4, 127.1 IP, 2.62 ERA, 2.70 FIP, 1.19 WHIP, 10.2 K/9
Chris Sale and Zack Wheeler are still legitimately in this NL Cy Young race, as are Chase Burns, Yoshinobu Yamamoto and Paul Skenes.
But it does feel destined to come down to Cristopher Sรกnchez and Jacob Misiorowski in one order or the other for the top two spots.
Sรกnchez has suffered the occasional implosion on the mound, most notably the nine earned runs disaster in Kansas City earlier this month. It's why he is a full run behind Misiorowski in ERA, as the Brewers phenom has yet to allow more than three earned runs in a start this season.
When he's on, though? Good luck.
Not only did Sรกnchez have that historic run of 50.2 consecutive scoreless innings pitchedโthe longest scoreless streak by a left-handed pitcher in MLB historyโbut he has allowed a combined total of 10 earned runs across his 14 quality starts, posting a 0.92 ERA in those 70 percent of his outings.
Only Sandy Alcantara (15) has more quality starts than Sรกnchez, this after the Phillies southpaw also tied for the MLB lead with 22 quality starts in last year's "first runner-up to Skenes for NL Cy Young" campaign.
Last season shouldn't factor into this vote in any way, but Sรกnchez has been MLB's most valuable pitcher since the beginning of 2025. And his durability could be what allows him to ultimately edge out Misiorowski.
NL No. 1: Jacob Misiorowski, Milwaukee Brewers
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Season Stats: 10-4, 111.0 IP, 1.62 ERA, 2.09 FIP, 0.76 WHIP, 13.5 K/9
If there's anyone in the wide world of Major League Baseball who deserved an extended All-Star break due to arm fatigue, it's the one who has routinely tested the upper limits of a radar gun.
Per MLB.com's Sarah Langs, Jacob Misiorowski threw at least 52 pitches at least 100 miles per hour in five of his final six starts of the first half. Prior to his run over the past two months, no one in the pitch tracking era (since 2008) had ever tallied more than 47 triple-digit mph pitches in a single start.
Le Miz has averaged 53.3 such flamethrowers per outing since the beginning of June.
What is even more absurd than the velocity is how well he is controlling it.
There have been countless examples over the years of pitchers who can throw almost as hard as Misiorowski...but who routinely can't find the strike zone. This blistering Brewers ace has issued just 14 free passes over his last 12 starts, posting a 0.92 ERA and an 8.3 K/BB ratio since the beginning of May.
So, yeah, he got scratched from what was supposed to be his final start of the first half and was held out of Milwaukee's first series of the second half, getting what was probably a much-needed two-week respite. And if you're worried it's a sign that he's running out of gas as he approaches what would be his first professional season of at least 130 innings pitched, you're surely not alone.
Misiorowski is leading the majors in ERA, though. Also WHIP, FIP, xFIP, K/9 and K/BB, some of them by a laughable margin. His starts have become bigger must-watch affairs than even Shohei Ohtani's two-way games.
If the Cy Young ballots were due today, Misiorowski would probably win unanimously. Here's hoping his recent hiatus doesn't turn into something more.
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