The American League and National League have a sizable pool of potential Cy Young Award winners as we approach the halfway point of the 2024 season. Still, a few pitchers—including the two new leaders in our most recent Cy Young Award survey—have started to stand out from the pack.
As usual, MLB.com analysts were asked to rate their top five Cy Young choices in each league, taking into account both past performance and projections for the remainder of the season. With 41 people taking part, pitchers received vote points on a 5-4-3-2-1 scale, meaning five points for a first-place vote, four points for a second-place vote, and so on. These are the outcomes.
1. Tigers’ Tarik Skubal (32 votes in the first spot)
The fervor surrounding Skubal keeps intensifying. The left-hander has made eight starts in 2024 and is 5-0 with a 2.02 ERA, 60 strikeouts, and eight walks over 49 innings. He also has an AL-best 0.86 WHIP and an MLB-leading 2.03 FIP after making waves in his comeback from flexor tendon surgery last summer.
And if that wasn’t enough, during Sunday’s start, he reached 100 mph for the first time in his career. It should come as no surprise that he garnered 32 of the 41 first-place votes cast by our panel, considering how dominant he has been since last year.
Although Kyle Bradish, Grayson Rodriguez, John Means, Tyler Wells, and Kyle Bradish, the O’s starters, have already missed time due to injury in 2024, Burnes has been a reliable member of the starting lineup. When Baltimore purchased the Brewers’ 2021 NL Cy Young Award winner in February, that was precisely what it had in mind. Burnes has a 2.68 ERA, a 1.01 WHIP, and 49 strikeouts over 53 2/3 innings over nine starts. He was the AL leader in our first Cy Young poll of 2024. In addition, he has not allowed more than three runs in any of his nine appearances.
Although Lopez’s ERA of 3.89 is still a little high, he has opened May by striking out 18 batters in 12 1/3 innings while only giving up two runs. The right-hander established himself as an ace for Minnesota last season, earning his first All-Star selection and finishing sixth in the AL Cy Young Award race. This season, he has improved his FIP (3.02), WHIP (0.98), K/9 (11.3), and K/BB ratio (6.88).
Gilbert is still off to a great start this season, recording a 2.94 ERA with 54 strikeouts over 52 innings in eight games, despite a rough outing against the Twins in his most recent outing. Fueling his rise from excellent to exceptional, the right-hander has reduced his hard-hit rate by 7.7 percentage points (44.6% to 36.9%) while increasing his strikeout rate (27.1%) by nearly three percentage points from the previous season.
Crawford had a record 4.74 ERA over 208 2/3 innings before into this season. However, he has suddenly turned around and posted a 2.24 ERA with 52 strikeouts in nine starts for Boston. The righty’s projected batting average of.208 over the last two seasons, which is the fourth lowest in MLB (minimum 500 batters faced), indicating he’s a real player even though his track record isn’t that impressive.
Seth Lugo (Red Sox), Tanner Houck (Mariners), Luis Castillo (Mariners), Cole Ragans (Royals), Ronel Blanco (Astros), Bryce Miller (Mariners), José Berríos (Blue Jays), George Kirby (Mariners), Brady Singer (Royals), Nathan Eovaldi (Rangers), Yusei Kikuchi (Blue Jays), Kevin Gausman (Blue Jays), Mason Miller (A’s), Joe Ryan (Twins) are some of the other people who received votes.
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