Staff Blog
Brad Lidge Does Not Win the NL Cy Young
Tim Lincecum; the babyfaced, flamethrowing San Francisco righthander who is threatening to re-define pitching mechanics, just took home the NL Cy Young Award, handed out annually to the best pitcher in the league.
Lincecum won handily, getting 23 of the 30 overall first place votes. It would be hard to argue that he didn’t deserve it: he struck out 265 batters, and help opponents to just a .221 overall average. Still, the margin by which he won – and rest of the top 5 – does come as some surprise.
Take a look:
| 2008 NL Cy Young Award Voting | ||||
| Pitcher, Club | 1st | 2nd | 3rd | Points |
| Tim Lincecum, SF | 23 | 7 | 1 | 137 |
| Brandon Webb, ARI | 4 | 15 | 8 | 73 |
| Johan Santana, NYM | 4 | 8 | 11 | 55 |
| Brad Lidge, PHI | 1 | 7 | 10 | |
| CC Sabathia, MIL | 1 | 1 | 1 | 9 |
| Ryan Dempster, CHC | 4 | |||
Towards the end of the year it was widely assumed that CC Sabathia had played himself into a three-way runoff with Lincecum and Arizona sinkerballer Brandon Webb. Smart money would predicted Linc, but it was supposed to be close, and it was supposed to be out of those three. Considering that voting happens at the end of the regular season it remains a mystery as where that hype was coming from, and a bit of a shock that Johan Santana not only beat out CC, but also tied Webb in first place votes.
The Phillies’ own Brad Lidge got an attaboy of his own with a top-5 finish. Nice way to cap off his perfect season.
