Detroit and Philly's star hurlers faced off Tuesday -- and showed us why they're both in the race for baseball's best pitcher.
You probably didn't have that one on your bingo card back in March. Entering Tuesday night's game in Detroit, the two lefties were most likely the leading contenders to win the Cy Young Award if the vote had been held the same day. Suarez was 10-1 with a 1.75 ERA and led the National League in wins and ERA while holding batters to a .191 average and .538 OPS. Skubal was 8-3 with a 2.50 ERA while holding batters to a .207 average and .592 OPS.
Now, saying they might win isn't quite the same thing as saying they're favored to win the award at the end of the season. Skubal entered the matchup as the odds-on favorite in the American League at +185,The showdown did set up the rare possibility of Cy Young winners starting against each other in the regular season during the same season they won the award. It has happened just one other time, whenof the Rays faced R.A. Dickey of the Mets on June 13, 2012.
Skubal dominated after that, allowing just one infield single over his final four innings, finishing with seven scoreless innings and seven strikeouts. At just 91 pitches, Detroit manager A.J. Hinch probably could have let Skubal go another inning, but he appears to be on a strict 100-pitch limit . Skubal certainly looked like a Cy Young favorite: His arsenal is ridiculous.
Anyway, it was a bit of a tough-luck outing for Suarez, and he wasn't too happy when Phillies manager Rob Thomson took him out after six innings. Can he keep it going?I wouldn't project a 2.01 ERA the rest of the way, of course, but Suarez has increased his strikeout rate this year -- 99 in 98⅓ innings -- and hasn't simply been a guy who's been hit-lucky. He gets a ton of grounders; in this game, they just found holes.
Fun game to watch: 2 hours, 4 minutes. And if both guys go on to win Cy Young Awards, put it down as a fun bit of historic trivia as well.
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