Burnes isn’t one of the Cy Young favorites at this point only because so many other guys are doing even better
It’s been more than 30 years since an Orioles player won the Most Valuable Player award. That’s a long time. You have to go back another decade-plus before Cal Ripken Jr.’s second MVP to find the last time an Orioles pitcher won the Cy Young. That most recent piece of hardware was won by Steve Stone back in 1980. With a past Cy winner in Corbin Burnes in the fold, O’s fans could have real hope of having one of the top pitchers in the league before the season began for the first time in… I don’t even know how long.
On Camden Chat yesterday, I wrote about how Gunnar Henderson is the MVP of all of MLB to date, a statement that remains true one day later with Henderson still leading all players with 4.3 bWAR. That’s still fun. Burnes entered the season as one of the early betting leaders for the Cy, probably because he had name recognition from his past win. That was also fun.
If everyone stays on their current trajectory, would Burnes win another one? The short answer is no. A comparison of Burnes against some of the competitors who are ahead of him right now:
Corbin Burnes
- bWAR / fWAR through 6/4: 1.7 / 1.9
- Pitching stats through 6/4: 13 GS, 6.12 IP/GS, 2.26 ERA, 3.16 FIP, 1.017 WHIP
Burnes occupies the following spots on the American League starting pitching leaderboards: Fifth place in ERA, seventh place in park/league-adjusted ERA+, ninth place in WHIP, and second place in IP.
All of these things added up together shouldn’t put Burnes as the league leader in WAR for pitchers, and I don’t expect that, but it’s surprising to see that he’s not even in the top ten for bWAR. The leader in the category, LA’s Tyler Anderson, has nearly doubled up Burnes in WAR at 3.3 to date. In the FIP-based fWAR, Burnes sits sixth, 0.8 behind the leader, Boston’s Tanner Houck. That feels closer to right.
Burnes made a great first impression on Opening Day, striking out 11 Angels in six innings. Maybe he’d pitch like it’s 2021 again? He’s only struck out more than six batters one time in the outings since then. It’s only disappointing if you expected him to duplicate his 2021 Cy campaign. He has still been a great pitcher in the results he’s gotten even without gaudy strikeout totals that he was getting two or three years ago.
When the Orioles acquired Burnes, I would have screamed with delirious joy if you’d promised me that he’d have a 2.26 ERA at this point in the season. In 2024, there are just several guys with even gaudier ERAs than Burnes. Consider this: Last year’s Cy winner, Gerrit Cole, finished the season with an ERA+ of 165. Cole was the AL’s best pitcher, no question. Burnes is currently at 163 ERA+ – and that’s only seventh.
Tyler Anderson
- bWAR / fWAR through 6/4: 3.3 / 0.7 (MLB leader in bWAR)
- Pitching stats through 6/4: 12 GS, 6.33 IP/GS, 2.37 ERA, 4.66 FIP, 1.132 WHIP
In general, I prefer bWAR to fWAR for pitchers because I think bWAR is more grounded in what actually happened. Most of the time, you can look at what pitcher is leading in bWAR and that is easily understood based on how well he’s pitched (ERA and ERA+) and how often (IP), with other statistics involving his performance usually lining up with that.
And then there’s Anderson up to this point in 2024. I am not surprised that he has a WAR that exceeds Burnes’s. Anderson’s slightly higher ERA comes out better in the park-adjusted ERA+; he’s fifth there. Averaging six and a third innings per start, he’s a workhorse. It’s a good season for him, and the fact that he’s pulling this off on an awful Angels team (23-38) is impressive. But nearly doubling up Burnes in WAR, really? That’s weird. I don’t have an explanation for it.
Anderson is probably getting crushed in FIP because he has struck out just 50 batters in 76 innings, and he’s walked 32. That’ll hurt the fWAR. Anderson’s BABIP of .210 shouts of likely regression. It’ll probably come when he’s got men on base; Anderson has stranded 88.7% of runners, another career aberration for him.
Seth Lugo
- bWAR / fWAR through 6/4: 3.0 / 1.6
- Pitching stats through 6/4: 13 GS, 6.49 IP/GS, 2.13 ERA, 3.47 FIP, 1.020 WHIP
The fact that a pitcher with Lugo’s performance is so high on WAR and other leaderboards is not surprising. What’s surprising is that a pitcher in his age 34 season who’s only been a full-time starting pitcher twice in an MLB career that stretches back to 2016 is suddenly pitching like this. Lugo for two years and $30 million guaranteed might be the best value contract of this past offseason.
With several more innings pitched than Burnes, an even lower ERA, and a much higher/better ERA+ of 193 (compared to Burnes’s 163), the gap between these guys in bWAR is easier to understand. Lugo is the standout guy so far in what’s been a pretty darn good Royals starting rotation. It speaks to how many guys are doing amazing things this season that Lugo isn’t a runaway favorite for AL Cy at this moment.
Luis Gil
- bWAR / fWAR through 6/4: 2.7 / 1.8
- Pitching stats through 6/4: 12 GS, 5.78 IP/GS, 1.82 ERA, 2.95 FIP, 0.923 WHIP
I take absolutely no pleasure in observing that a pitcher who has a strong argument for being the best pitcher in the AL is pitching for the Yankees. Before the season, this would have been a believable statement about Gerrit Cole, last year’s AL Cy winner, but he hasn’t even thrown a pitch. No, it’s Gil, who will be a strong Rookie of the Year contender in addition to a Cy contender, because at age 26, he still had rookie status heading into this season.
Orioles fans have some acquaintance with Gil this season because he blanked the team in a 6.1 inning start on May 1, what turned out to be the only game the Yankees won over that four-game series. A month ago, this loss was kind of irksome, seeming like one of those games where the O’s hitters get rolled by someone who isn’t very good. Gil brought a 4.01 ERA into that start.
That turned out to be the beginning of a near-absurd heater for Gil. Starting with that May 1 outing against the O’s, his next seven starts have seen him hold batters to a combined .355 OPS and he’s allowed just three runs in 44.2 innings. That’s a 0.60 ERA. It’s ridiculous. One of the only marks against Gil as a Cy contender is his innings total, which is mostly held back by his April outings. If his June is as good as his May, look out.
Tanner Houck
- bWAR / fWAR through 6/4: 2.8 / 2.7 (MLB leader in fWAR)
- Pitching stats through 6/4: 12 GS, 6.5 IP/GS, 1.85 ERA, 2.15 FIP, 0.962 WHIP
Fresh off of having to say good things about a Yankee, I must now turn to saying good things about a Red Sock. Houck’s 2024 leap is nearly as much of a surprise as Lugo’s. This is the age 28 season for Houck, his fifth in the bigs, and he’s never looked like this. A year ago, he had an ERA over 5.
Things have clicked this year. Houck is sporting the best-in-the-AL adjusted ERA+ of 225, which is to say he’s 125% better than the average pitcher. That’s a big percentage. One part of Houck’s success this season is that he’s allowed just one home run in 78 innings pitched. Home runs are down across the league this year, but that’s still ridiculous. Houck has yet to face the Orioles.
For every one of these guys who’s finding success that runs ahead of his track record, it’ll be interesting to see if he’s still doing it in two months time. Maybe Houck will still have an ERA under 2, or maybe his Statcast expected ERA of 3.36 (still darn good, but not Cy contender great) will start to catch up with him. Batters are, on average, hitting the ball decently hard against Houck. He’s just managing to devastate them with breaking pitches.
Other players in either the bWAR or fWAR top 5
- Tarik Skubal (Tigers)
- Cole Ragans (Royals)
- Garrett Crochet (White Sox)
- Jack Flaherty (Tigers)
Yes, it’s the same Jack Flaherty who was useless here after being acquired from the Cardinals last August 1. In nine games with the Orioles, he had a 1.673 WHIP. So far this year, it’s 0.963.
Crochet has been converted into the rotation by the league-worst White Sox, which might end up making him an interesting trade piece when they realize they are going to continue to stink for a while. Ragans was a trade piece just last year, acquired by the Royals when they traded Aroldis Chapman to Texas. The Rangers won the World Series and Ragans is great this year. Everybody is winning.
Skubal has the most ridiculous WHIP of all, sitting at 0.877. One might wonder how the Tigers are barely above .500 with these two guys in their rotation. That’s not my problem, so I’ll leave that wondering to someone else.
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Returning to my original question: If everyone stays on his current trajectory, will Burnes win another Cy Young? At the end of the long answer is also the short answer: No.
What you can say for Burnes is that he might have the best chance out of all of these guys, based on his career track record of both performance and workload, to keep pitching close to this well. There could be a different picture by the time we get to the end of the regular season.
Anderson’s ERA could float up towards his FIP; even getting halfway there would probably wipe him off the bWAR leaderboard. Gil, who has never even thrown 100+ innings in a season in the minors, could tire as Tyler Wells tired last season. Houck’s good home run luck could stop. It’ll be interesting to see who’s still doing their thing in another month or two.