Hot Stove Coal: Predicting the 2010 Cy Young Winners

Spring training is right around the corner, so I thought it would be a good time to look at some early predictions for Cy Young Award Winners. FanGraphs has projections from CHONE, Marcel and Fans on their website and I plugged that predicted data into the Rob Neyer/Bill James Cy Young Predictor. Unforunately, data like shutouts and division winners were not available for this and saves were not available for CHONE, so there were some modifications needed.

Closers are left out of CHONE completely so take that into account when you see the candidates. I took the 3rd best candidate from each league and subtracted 16 from each starter (12 for the division winner bonus and 4 as a generous number for shutouts) and 12 from each closer (just the 12 for the division winner and of course left out of CHONE) to figure out who would even have a chance of being in the Top 3. Again, there's no science to this method. And Cy Young Predictor (CYP) is not an exact match for the Cy Young. Last season, Zack Grienke was ranked 2nd in the AL and Tim Lincecum was ranked 4th in the NL. But I figured putting this many candidates out there would give a pretty good base of who the projections think will be in the discussion. And I left stats like ERA, WHIP, K/9, BB/9, and K/BB just for comparison.

Let's get started:

AL Cy Young Candidates - CHONE

Name	IP	ER	SO	W	L	ERA	WHIP	K/9	BB/9	K/BB	CYP
C.C. Sabathia	205	80	177	15	7	3.51	1.20	7.77	2.20	3.54	124.64
Javier Vazquez	195	83	182	14	8	3.83	1.22	8.40	2.31	3.64	108.50
Jon Lester	181	73	167	13	7	3.63	1.28	8.30	3.03	2.74	105.47
Zack Greinke	192	71	188	12	9	3.33	1.19	8.81	2.30	3.84	105.33
Felix Hernandez	200	74	183	12	10	3.33	1.23	8.24	2.84	2.90	104.36
Josh Beckett	187	80	174	13	8	3.85	1.23	8.37	2.21	3.78	100.39
James Shields	199	84	148	13	9	3.80	1.20	6.69	1.90	3.52	98.89
Cliff Lee	197	76	148	12	10	3.47	1.19	6.76	2.06	3.29	97.78
Justin Verlander	193	79	190	12	10	3.68	1.24	8.86	2.89	3.06	96.06

NL Cy Young Candidates - CHONE

Name	IP	ER	SO	W	L	ERA	WHIP	K/9	BB/9	K/BB	CYP
Roy Halladay	218	78	190	16	8	3.22	1.13	7.84	1.65	4.75	138.94
Tim Lincecum	197	65	224	13	9	2.97	1.17	10.23	3.11	3.29	123.11
Cole Hamels	192	81	165	13	8	3.80	1.19	7.73	2.11	3.67	101.42
Danny Haren	196	80	188	12	9	3.67	1.17	8.63	1.84	4.70	98.56
Chad Billingsley	181	76	175	11	9	3.78	1.36	8.70	3.78	2.30	87.14
Adam Wainwright	180	74	148	11	9	3.70	1.26	7.40	2.60	2.85	86.33

CHONE likes the Yankees duo of Sabathia and Vazquez who they pick to finish 1-2 with the Red Sox Jon Lester taking third place. In the NL, CHONE goes for the NL's newest ace, Roy Halladay to take it over Tim Lincecum and Cole Hamels. But in any of those races, the 12 points given out to the division winner could change it all.

AL Cy Young Candidates - Marcel

Name	IP	ER	SO	SV	W	L	ERA	WHIP	K/9	BB/9	K/BB	CYP
CC Sabathia	200	76	178	0	15	8	3.42	1.19	8.01	2.43	3.3	123.94
Felix Hernandez	199	75	181	0	14	7	3.39	1.24	8.19	2.94	2.78	120.64
Zack Greinke	189	68	183	0	12	8	3.24	1.19	8.71	2.43	3.59	108.25
Joe Nathan	66	23	67	30	3	3	3.14	1.15	9.14	3.00	3.05	106.25
Cliff Lee	197	77	156	0	13	9	3.52	1.24	7.13	2.1	3.39	105.44
Jon Lester	182	74	170	0	13	7	3.66	1.27	8.41	2.97	2.83	105.28
Josh Beckett	184	80	171	0	14	8	3.91	1.23	8.36	2.35	3.56	104.47
Justin Verlander	200	87	196	0	14	10	3.92	1.27	8.82	2.97	2.97	104.44
Mariano Rivera	65	23	61	28	4	4	3.18	1.12	8.45	2.22	3.81	104.19
Jonathan Papelbon	66	24	67	29	3	3	3.27	1.18	9.14	2.73	3.35	102.75
Javier Vazquez	191	77	190	0	12	11	3.63	1.19	8.95	2.45	3.65	94.94
Jered Weaver	183	82	151	0	13	9	4.03	1.30	7.43	2.90	2.56	92.25

NL Cy Young Candidates - Marcel

Name	IP	ER	SO	SV	W	L	ERA	WHIP	K/9	BB/9	K/BB	CYP
Tim Lincecum	195	63	218	0	13	6	2.91	1.14	10.06	3.14	3.21	129.50
Roy Halladay	204	77	165	0	14	9	3.40	1.18	7.28	1.76	4.13	116.08
Adam Wainwright	190	71	156	0	14	8	3.36	1.25	7.39	2.79	2.64	115.56
Dan Haren	196	73	183	0	13	9	3.35	1.12	8.40	2.02	4.16	111.14
Francisco Rodriguez	66	26	68	33	3	4	3.55	1.32	9.27	4.36	2.13	108.83
Jair Jurrjens	186	68	140	0	13	9	3.29	1.25	6.77	3.19	2.12	107.00
Chris Carpenter	157	53	115	0	12	5	3.04	1.15	6.59	2.35	2.80	105.81
Josh Johnson	173	68	155	0	12	6	3.54	1.24	8.06	2.81	2.87	101.03

CHONE and Marcel agree that Sabathia is king but for 2 and 3 in the American League Marcel goes with King Felix and Zack Greinke. In the NL, Marcel like Lincecum over Halladay and one of the finalists from 2009, Adam Wainwright. The closers make their debut on this list with Rivera and Papelbon in the AL and K-Rod in the NL. The difference between Greinke (3rd) and Papelbon (10th) is only 5.5 CYP so there is a lot of room for maneuvering in there.

AL Cy Young Canidates - Fans

Name	IP	ER	SO	SV	W	L	ERA	WHIP	K/9	BB/9	K/BB	WAR	CYP
Felix Hernandez	220	69	210	0	18	7	2.83	1.07	8.59	2.58	3.33	6.0	164.72
Zack Greinke	219	69	225	0	16	8	2.84	1.03	9.25	2.18	4.25	6.8	151.42
Jon Lester	211	75	214	0	17	7	3.22	1.18	9.13	2.64	3.45	5.6	148.06
CC Sabathia	220	83	198	0	18	8	3.40	1.21	8.10	2.37	3.41	5.6	147.72
Mariano Rivera	74	20	76	40	4	3	2.39	0.85	9.24	1.58	5.85	2.2	145.44
Joe Nathan	75	20	87	41	3	2	2.36	0.93	10.44	2.40	4.35	2.0	145.42
Justin Verlander	218	83	230	0	17	9	3.42	1.24	9.50	2.56	3.71	5.8	141.28
Joakim Soria	73	19	84	39	3	2	2.38	0.95	10.36	2.59	4.00	2.0	140.06
Cliff Lee	220	78	174	0	16	8	3.18	1.07	7.12	1.68	4.24	6.0	138.72
Andrew Bailey	74	24	76	39	4	4	2.89	1.14	9.24	2.92	3.17	1.5	136.94

NL Cy Young Canidates - Fans

Name	IP	ER	SO	SV	W	L	ERA	WHIP	K/9	BB/9	K/BB	WAR	CYP
Tim Lincecum	220	65	257	0	17	6	2.64	1.04	10.51	2.70	3.89	7.9	168.64
Roy Halladay	223	70	193	0	18	8	2.81	0.94	7.79	1.37	5.68	6.4	161.97
Jonathan Broxton	80	25	106	44	4	3	2.80	1.15	11.93	3.38	3.53	2.6	156.28
Huston Street	75	27	83	41	4	3	3.20	1.15	9.96	2.16	4.61	1.8	142.08
Johan Santana	206	70	189	0	16	8	3.06	1.11	8.26	2.32	3.57	4.7	140.19

I added WAR here just because it was available. The fans of FanGraphs seem to like King Felix for the AL Cy Young with Greinke and Lester rounding out the top 3 and Lincecum in the National League with Halladay and Jonathan Broxton behind him. There are a lot of closer candidates in here and I assume this is because the CYP formula may slightly inflate saves (considering how rarely closers win Cy Young awards).

What does this all mean? Maybe absolutely nothing. Tim Lincecum could have a horrible year or CC Sabathia could spend a month on the DL and then all these predictions go out the window. But this was a fun tool to use when trying to do early predictions for Cy Young.