As of August 29th, Clase is t-4th in bwar amongst AL pitchers. Fedde(2nd in bwar) has regressed in his couple of starts so far for ST(5.3+ FIP) and Anderson(3rd in bwar)’s FIP is more than a full point higher than his current era. Obviously, Skubal looks like a beast rn and is by far the favorite to win the award. However, I wouldn’t be surprised if Clase finished top 3 in Al cy young voting if he can keep this up. 0.58 era is crazy no matter if you’re a closer middle reliever or starter.

Not a big baseball fan anymore but got me intrigued enough to google it and figure out it's possible, just not easy.

Ted Williams was a freak of nature, perhaps a once in an ever. His naval visual and reactions scores were supposedly way off the charts and never matched before or since.

Love from Taipei. Cool summary. I love your sound of "funnel phenomenon", hope the saber metric community picks this up!

I swear if injuries weren’t a thing players with a skill ceiling so high will just get injured and never be the same player again just take 2021 Jacob degrom if he didn’t get injured and he kept up his performance he would have had the best pitching season in mlb history

Im pretty sure my whole tee ball team had over .400

Because baseball needs a reliever exclusive award

Only way I see Clase really getting traction is in the playoffs. If this dude does something crazy like striking out Soto, Judge and Stanton back to back to back, I see the hype building.

TL;DW: Because a Supra has less than a third the range of a Prius, the extra miles the Prius goes make it more deserving of being called the best Toyota over the Supra.

they don't pitch that much innings

Why should a relief pitcher who knows hes unhittable for one inning, who just pitches that one inning for a save, get the award? Starting pitching is more difficult thats why. Unless your the first guy out of the bullpen, no closer or relief pitcher should ever be considered lmao They pitch little innings HOW IS THIS EVEN A QUESTION 😂😂

Over 650 ERA + is INSANE. It seems video game ish actually. Regardless, barring a mega implosion it will be remembered as one of the all time great seasons for a reliever.

Let me introduce you to our surreptitiously enhanced bionic human, coming soon to a ballpark near you.

I can still see a closer winning a Cy Young award. With starters throwing fewer innings and getting injured more often you can get a season with no standout pitcher and someone having a season like Clase could win it. If it wasn't for Skubal there is no other pitcher having a season that is much better than anyone else. Fedde was traded. Anderson and Crochet are on bottom tier teams. Crochet last nine starts have been four innings or less. Lugo, Ragans, Houck Blanco. I can see a black swan event where a closer gets a lot of second and third place votes, and everyone else splits up the first where it could happen.

I think that it would only make sense if none of the starting pitchers in a given year are very impressive And as a Cleveland fan, Clase can be an absolute lock in the 9th, but it's often meaningless when our starting rotation is so terrible that he doesn't get a chance to come in. I would gladly trade Clase for like a number 2 starter in a heartbeat because that's where the most value is. A solid starter would be so much more useful to Cleveland right now.

I appreciate WAR, but I hate it when MVP or CY is considered like the Most Highest WAR Award. Having an unhittable closer like Clase means like giving the opponent only 8 innings to score, and that means so much more than the WAR tells you. Besides, Clase's 2024 numbers are not like usual closer numbers... giving up 4 runs in the the 60 most meaningful innings of the game, and ERA+ of 697 is unbelievable. He's 3 times better than usual Mariano Rivera season.

relievers face a few batters every appearance and get to usually avoid the best hitters as a result. Yet your supposed to think highly of these low stamina low exposed guys. At least old relievers used to do two innings, instead of their two to three batters. They've become quite the joke.

Enjoyed the video, but whenever anyone makes the argument that it's not Clase's fault that he doesn't have the volume to beat someone like Skubal and that's just the reality, I also counter with the opposite. It's not Skubal's fault that his 'greater' contributions aren't contributing to more team success like Clase, but that's just the reality.

Clase has given up fewer earned runs all year than Skubal did in his last start against the Royals

I think gagne did deserve to win the cy young in 2003. 55/55 save opportunities with a 1.20 era is crazy

Astrossssssss ( we didnt cheat )

🤔maybe because after 1941 they start letting POC play and the pitching fielding athleticism all went up so there are more chances to make an out

A closers CY Then?

Albert Pujols in 2003 was the closest we have seen recently. He was hitting as high as 393 deep into the season

You shouldn’t include 2020 in your graph

Cy young has the all time record for games started, complete games, and wins. It feels like if you are naming an award after him it’s meant to be an award for starters anyway

Cy young has the all time record for games started, complete games, and wins. It feels like if you are naming an award after him it’s meant to be an award for starters anyway

and shouldn't

When Bazzana gets adapted to the pro game, he and Kwan will be a force that opposing pitchers will dread.

I dont know man, Reyez at 0.450 in my Baseball 9 sim

What's a batting average?

Using WAR as a reliever assessment before going into rate stats is a bit off. One of the flaws of WAR calculations is that relievers are skewed, so an absolutely dominant reliever will generally receive less WAR per inning pitched than a hypothetical starter with the exact same rate stats. It makes some sense because relievers naturally pitch fewer innings and thus can put more strain on their body, so it adjusts to average performance, but it means absolutely dominant relief pitching is fundamentally valued less on a rate basis than good starting pitching.

Maybe I'm wrong here but I always thought that if you hit for a higher average you will end up with more doubles, triples, rbi's, etc. If you are hitting .350 I think you're a pretty good hitter. If you hit 35 homeruns but 20 of them came when the game was already decided how much did you really help the team? Guys that strike out a lot are frustrating to watch when you have a guy on 3rd base with 1 out and you just need to put the ball in play.

Why would a walk not be as valuable as a single? (In WARC+)

It’s not impossible, Ted Williams hit .407 after serving in world war 2.

Moreno is the reason this franchise is garbage

pitching & defense today is vastly superior than it was 80 years ago.

Todd Helton had a good run in 2000. I KNOW… the altitude 🙄. His road stats were good too that year. He was at .400 in late August though!

Interesting how 2 of the top 5 "luckiest" players whose BA outperformed their xBA were on the 2017 Astros 11:10

Relief pitcher in MLB are a lot like backup goalies in the NHL or punters in the NFL. You don't need a good one until you don't have a good one.

G.Brett .390 & T.Gwynn .394 were the closest BUT they both played less than 120 games ...Williams .407 played 143 which is harder & better...not going to happen in our lifetime - if it does the one who does it will make it w/ just enough minimum ABs or PAs

I disagree with saves being like wins, saves can only occur in high leverage situations so Gagne for example succeeded 55 times in a high leverage situation without fail, that’s pretty damn impressive

A closer winning the CY would be like the best hitter by a mile getting a season ending injury 40% through and still winning MVP

I always believed this, but a few during my younger days have won it, including Sutter, Eckersley, and later on, Gagne.

WAR isn't the end all be all like you say in this vid, for example hunter Greene of the cincinnati Reds is leads the NL in WAR but won't win the award, Chris Sale will, Innings, ERA, ERA+, and WAR all play factors but 1 stat shouldn't determine a whole award

Theres a lot of relievers who won cy young awards

I think the only reliever that should have won the cy young was Zack Britton in 2016

I personally love the closer role. Just seems cool to come out of the pen cause the team needs to you to shut down the opposing offense and secure the win for the time and time again. Mariano Rivera, Trevor Hoffmen, Francisco Rodriguez, Rollie Fingers, Aroldis Chapman, etc. Just straight baller to close out games time after time and then walk off the field like its the norm.

WAR, huh, good god y'all. What is it good for?

Great vid dude Subbed.