Max Scherzer Wins 2017 NL Cy Young Award

Washington Nationals ace Max Scherzer's reign as the best pitcher in the National League continued in 2017.

Scherzer won his second straight National League Cy Young award Wednesday, beating out fellow finalists Clayton Kershaw of the Los Angeles Dodgers and teammate Stephen Strasburg.

It was the right-hander's third Cy Young of his career after he captured the 2013 American League version of the award as a member of the Detroit Tigers.

The five-time All-Star helped lead Washington to the National League East crown at 97-65 with one of the most impressive seasons of his career. His 2.51 ERA was a career-best mark, as was his sparkling 0.90 WHIP. He also fanned 268 batters and surpassed the 230-strikeout mark for the sixth season in a row in a testament to his incredible consistency.

What's more, his 200.2 innings marked the fifth straight season he threw more than 200 innings as one of the more durable shutdown pitchers in the entire league.

Unfortunately for Scherzer, he wasn't able to parlay his regular-season dominance into consistent postseason success. He allowed five runs, three of which were earned, in 7.1 innings during Washington's National League Division Series loss to the Chicago Cubs, but the Cy Young is a regular-season award.

His strikeouts and remarkable ability to keep runners off the basepaths meant he posted a 6.0 WAR, per FanGraphs, which was even higher than last year's Cy Young-winning 5.6.

Scherzer is 33 years old but has shown no signs of slowing down in recent years. His third Cy Young is another accolade on what has become one of the best pitching resumes of this generation, but he is still striving for that first World Series trophy.

If he continues to pitch as effectively as he has the last couple of seasons for the Nationals and forms a dominant one-two punch with Strasburg, it is not difficult to envision that changing in the near future.