Did Keshaw deserve to win the Cy Young?

Let me start this out by saying while I am a homer. I am objective about who wins awards, whether they are a Dodger or not. While I think Matt Kemp was a deserving MVP candidate in 2011, I'm not sure he was the winner.

How about the 2012 NL Cy Young? Clayton Kershaw had a worthy season, but he did not win. That obviously went to R.A. Dickey, no doubt the success story sympathy winner, but did he truly deserve to win based on his merits? Gio Gonzales, Craig Kimbrell, Kyle Lohse and Johnny Cueto also had very dominant years and should be part of the conversation.

Dickey had a great year, winning 20 games for a medicore Mets team. All these pitchers mentioned here, except him pitched for contenders, so their chances of winning, even when they did not pitch well, were much greater. Dickey pretty much had David Wright and a bunch of scrubs. His ERA of 2.73 was solid, and his 8.9 K/IP were truly outstanding for a knuckleballer. His WHIP of 1.05 said he did not walk alot of batters or give up alot of hits, so what had here was a very ace-type season from a guy who would be happy to be a fifth starter on most teams not that long ago. At 37, he is also at an age where most guys are either finished or playing mop-up on their career. He was most certainly the feel-good story of the year, no sarcasm intended

Gio Gonzales equaled Steven Strasburg in leading the Nationals out of irrelevance into being a viable contender. Strasburg got the press, Gonzales got the work done (as did Strasburg, but nobody expected Gonzales to rise up to be what he was.). He went 21-8, and while wins don't mean much as a pitchers stat, you do not hit 20 cherry-picking from your offense every time out. He had a 2.89 ERA pitching many games in a park not as friendly to pitchers as some of the other ones, he had a 9.3 K/9 which was positively dominating and his 1.12 WHIP showed a guy who was not walking near as many guys as a National as he was on the A's. Certainly worthy.

Craig Kimbrel had one of the most dominating years as a reliever, ever (sorry Eric Gagne). he had an ERA of 1.01. his 42 saves led the league for the second year in a row, his 16.7 K/9 brooked no arguement as to the fear he surely struck into batters when he showed up to nail a game down, and his WHIP of 0.65 was by far the best of any of these guys we're talking about.

Johnny Cueto won 19 games for a resurgent Reds team, he had a 2.78 ERA which is the best of any pitcher in this conversation who was not a reliever and not names Clayton, his WHIP of 1.17 was quite commendable, and his WAR of 5.8, was also higher than anyone not named Clayton. Ace-like? yes Cy Young? probably not. He was not as dominant as Kershaw or Kimbrel, and did not have Dickey's storyline.

Kyle Lohse found himself in the ace role when Chris Carpenter was injured and Adam Wainwright was not his usual dominant self. he won 16 games, had a 2.86 ERA and best of all, he had a 1.09 WHIP, better than anyone not named Clayton or Craig. Not a power guy, and while he was the main driver of a strong rotation, he was not the typical ace-type guy and although some of his numbers were quite outstanding, some of the others in this conversations had better numbers.

How about our man Clayton?  His 14 wins were underwhelming for an ace, but as we can say, pitchers don't really have much to do with wins. His 2.53 ERA was easily the best among elite starters, as was his 1.02 WHIP. He only gave up 6.7 hits per nine innings, the best in the league. He also had 6.2 WAR, the most among all starters in the league. Except for wins, he either led or almost led every category. His only crime was he was slightly less dominant than he was the year before.

So call me homer, call me cold-blooded (or blue blooded for that matter), but Kershaw did deserve the Cy Young, if it was truly a numbers thing. Take nothing away from Dickey. A journeyman's journeyman, he had a strong 2011 to set this year up, but nothing else in his career pointed to this. Lohse, a once and former middle rotation guy, deserves something, while Gonzales and Cueto came in to their own as aces. Kimbrel? deserves it some level, but he is a relever, and while relievers have won it before, it is primarily a starter thing.

The writers will be writers and while stats are certainly important, other things certainly played into the conversation. Even then, it would still be hard to argue against Kershaw.

OTHER STUFF-

More than anything, the Dodgers need a #2 starter. If they are the front-runner for Zack Greinke, they need to "finish". A rotation core of Kershaw, Greinke and Josh Beckett would be quite formidable.

Armchair O' Malley is now on facebook. Check it Out!

Ned Colletti the Gunslimger

Ned Colletti the gunslinger, or shall we say Stan Kasten, Magic Johnson and the Guggenheim group as gunslingers?

They pluck Hanley Ramirez away from the Marlins in the latest Jeffery Loria fire sale, they get Adrain Gonzales, Josh Beckett, Carl Crawford and Nick Punto from last year's Valentine/Boston fiasco, and now, they pay 25 million to a Korean team for negotiating rights to Ryu Hyu-Jin, a guy they forsee as their third starter should everything go right, we're talking negotiation here, not even the actual contract.

Not that I'm objecting. The generally underwhelming performance by the post-trade Dodgers is overshadowed, in my view, by the fact that their are owners who actually want to win, by owners who will invest in the franchise, by owners who see the Dodgers as what they are, a classic baseball franchise who needs to always be in champion contnetion conversations.

The genius of Ned Colletti has always been his ability to scrape together successful teams with limited means at his disposal. For many years he was a thorn in the dodgers side, working his magic with the Giants. For the last few years, he has kept the Dodgers competitive almost every year, despite the ownersjip shenanigans.

Now he has money to play with. Now he has a solid baseball guy, Kasten, behind him. he also has Mr. Los Angeles himself, Magic Johnson behind him. he also has the big bucks of Guggenheim behind him. It will be interesting to see how he does. it will be interesting to be baseball be relevant in L.A. again, instead of the faded, mis-used relic it had become.

Go for it, Ned!