The BBWAA announced their finalists for each end-of-the-year award including the National League Cy Young. The three finalist are Chicago Cubs right-hander Kyle Hendricks, Cubs lefty Jon Lester and Washington Nationals right-hander Max Scherzer.
Missing from that list is New York Mets ace Noah Syndergaard. The 24-year old righty finished his first full Major League season 14-9 with a 2.60 ERA in 183.2 innings covering 30 starts and one relief appearance.
Thor wasn’t a finalist despite leading Major League Baseball with his 6.5 fWAR, 2.29 FIP and 0.54 HR/9 among qualified starters. His 2.60 ERA was third among starters as was his 23.5 K-BB%.
Hendricks, 26, led the majors with his 2.13 ERA and his 0.98 WHIP was second in the National League. His 3.24 FIP was fourth in the NL and the 4.5 fWAR he posted was sixth among NL pitchers.
Lester has finished fourth in Cy Young voting twice so far in his career, once with the Boston Red Sox in 2010 and again in 2014 when he pitched for the Red Sox and the Oakland Athletics. This past season the 32-year old was second in the NL with 19 wins, second with a 2.44 ERA, and his 4.3 fWAR was seventh.
Scherzer, 32, finished fifth in NL Cy Young voting in the previous two seasons and won the award in 2013 with the Detroit Tigers. In 2016, he led the NL with 20 wins and 284 strikeouts while finishing third with a 5.6 fWAR.
Syndergaard jokingly showed off his displeasure with the snub on twitter. “Not a Cy Young finalist…not a big deal…right Dwight?”
He was certainly deserving of being a finalist and should be a top 5 finisher.
