The Detroit Tigers’ Max Scherzer won his first American League Cy Young Award, while the Los Angeles Dodgers’ Clayton Kershaw easily grabbed his second NL Cy Young in three years as the Baseball Writers’ Association of America announced winners this evening.
Scherzer, the AL starter in the All-Star Game, went 21-3, leading the majors in wins and his league in WHIP while striking out a career high 240 batters and helping Detroit to its third straight AL Central title. He received 28 of the 30 first-place votes. Fellow Tigers starter Anibal Sanchez, the AL ERA leader, and White Sox lefty Chris Sale split the other two first place votes. Scherzer finished with 203 points overall, more than double the total of runner-up Yu Darvish of the Rangers, who had 93.
Kershaw was chosen first on 29 of the 30 ballots cast. The Cardinals’ Adam Wainwright got the other first-place vote and finished second overall. The Marlins’ Jose Fernandez — who won the NL Rookie of the Year award on Monday — was third. Kershaw led the majors in ERA for the third straight season with a 1.83 mark that was the best in the bigs since Pedro Martinez had a 1.74 ERA for Boston in 2000. He also paced the majors in WHIP and the NL in strikeouts while being the ace of the staff for the NL West-winning Dodgers.
