Johnny Cueto and Masahiro Tanaka retook the lead in NL and AL Cy Young tracker points respectively Wednesday night. Cueto pitched six shutout innings against the Dodgers, allowing just three hits and no walks while striking out 12. That lowered his ERA to 1.85, and with a rare win for him, Cueto moves 2.6 points ahead of Adam Wainwright.
Tanaka took a shutout into the ninth inning against the Mariners, but with one out allowed a single, and then a home run to Robinson Cano. Rather than leave the game, he struck out the next two batters to complete the 4-2 victory. His ERA remained at 2.02, but Tanaka walked one and struck out 11. He now has struck out 103 for the season with just 14 walks. Tanaka leads Felix Hernandez by 4.5 points.
Yu Darvish moved up in the race to third place in the AL race with a shutout of the hard-hitting Marlins. He walked three and struck out 10. With a 2.11 ERA, he sits 1.8 points behind Hernandez. He might be first if injuries had not caused him to miss a start.
Wow, so have we entered the era of the Japanese pitcher? In fact, interesting: of the five pitchers you mention, only Wainwright was born in the USA. (Felix is Venezuelan and Cueto is Dominican.)
I know I’m in the minority, but I *like* these low-scoring seasons. Maybe after the tainted offense era what we need is a batch of awesome games and years for pitchers.
James » I’m with you James. There is no “right” level of scoring, the game is interesting however it is played. Long term, nine runs a game seems to be the optimum level for fans, but there’s nothing wrong with bouncing around that number.