Brandon Gearing: Adam Wainwright should win this year's NL Cy young. He was on a fist-place team and Wainwright also led the NL in innings pitched, games started and batters faced. Face it, the guy is durable. When you combine his durability with his success this season, it's tough to argue against him.
Justin Diaz: The NL Cy Young award clearly belongs to Cardinals' pitcher Chris Carpenter. He led the NL in both ERA and winning percentage by a landslide, was second in WHIP by a mere .01 and was second in wins with 17. He was consistently dominant throughout the entire season, and deserves to be rewarded with his second Cy Young award.
Brandon: Carpenter had a great year without a doubt, but it is in fact his teammate, Adam Wainwright who deserves the Cy Young award this year. Wainwright led the National League with 19 wins, a number that is also tied for the Major League lead. Voters for this award cannot overlook this fact. After all, what statistic best signifies being "the best" better than wins? Wainwright's ERA of 2.63 is also a mere 39 points higher than Carpenter's. When you consider that Wainwright pitched over 30 more innings than Carpenter, you're really splitting hairs with that one.
Justin: There is no denying that durability is an important quality, but it is by no means the determining factor for the Cy Young Award. Besides, it's not like Carpenter was constantly on the DL this season. He did miss some time toward the beginning of the season, but so did Joe Mauer, and isn't he in line to win the AL MVP? Wins are obviously an important statistic, but when you consider the fact that Wainwright had only two more wins than Carpenter in six more starts, it is unfair to say that he deserves the award because of his win total. The award should be given to the pitcher that is the most dominant, and the statistics prove that Carpenter was in fact the most dominant pitcher in the national league.
Brandon: Regardless of what I say, the writers that vote for the Cy Young Award consider wins very important. In the last 20 years, only four starting pitchers have won with less than 18 wins. Those players are Brandon Webb(16), Randy Johnson (17), Pedro Martinez (17) and Greg Maddux (16). Webb won in a relative down year for pitching in the National League in 2006 and the other three players had eye-popping statistics that forced voters to look past the low win totals. Johnson registered an astonishing 364 strikeouts in 1999 when he won the award. Carpenter trails that number by more than 200. Pedro eclipsed 300 strikeouts as well in 1997 while pitching for the Montreal Expos. He also added a 1.90 ERA. Finally, Greg Maddux ended the year with an absurd 1.56 ERA the year he won the award.
With Carpenter and Wainwright's other statistics so close, I think Wainwright's superior totals in wins and innings pitched is enough for the voters to choose him for the Cy Young. Carpenter has a heartwarming story after coming back from being plagued by injury, but save that sob story for "Comeback Player of The Year."
Justin: I wouldn't call the guy who led the league in ERA, win percentage, and was a close second in wins and WHIP a "sob story", but maybe that's just me. You say that their statistics are "so close," but Carpenter is ahead of Wainwright in virtually every statistical category. The only statistics that Wainwright leads Carpenter in are wins, innings pitched and strikeouts, all of which are a product of the fact that Wainwright had more starts than Carpenter. Like I said before, win total is an important category, but two more wins in six starts does not give Wainwright an edge over Carpenter. I would agree with your argument if Carpenter had missed a large portion of the season, but the fact is he only missed six starts, less than a fifth of a very long season.
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