Forget the All-Star Game, Cristopher Sánchez Is a Cy Young Contender
The Philadelphia Phillies sensation continues to make his All-Star snub look more and more unjust, as he's crafting a legitimate Cy Young case.
This season, like every season, there were countless fan voting missteps and pitching and reserve snubs for the annual MLB All-Star Game.
The Philadelphia Phillies‘ star-studded rotation, arguably the best rotation in baseball, was represented at last month’s Midsummer Classic with ace Zack Wheeler being named to his second consecutive and third career All-Star Game. However, they certainly presented a more than reasonable case to have two or even three starting pitchers head to Atlanta.
One of those names was none other than Cristopher Sánchez, who was unjustly robbed of his second straight All-Star selection, despite being one of the best starting arms in baseball.
His 2.50 ERA and 2.77 FIP at the time (up until July 13) ranked in the top 10 among all qualified starters, sitting 10th and tied for ninth, respectively. He paired those numbers with a very respectable WHIP (1.14) and BAA (.229).
But as the saying goes, there’s no point in crying over spilled milk. What’s done is done, and at least Sánchez was paid like an All-Star even if he couldn’t take the field as one, with the Phillies activating his $50K All-Star contract bonus as a show of good faith.
Now that the All-Star game is in the past, the focus is on the final stretch of the season, and so far in this stretch, Sánchez has not only made his All-Star snub look even more egregious, but he’s also establishing himself as a top-tier NL Cy Young contender.
Cristopher Sánchez Has Sparked a Whole New Debate
Following his torrid first half, Sánchez has continued to be nothing short of utterly stellar in his first four outings of the second half.
In 29.2 innings, he’s thrown to an incredible sub-2.00 ERA (1.82) with a 2.77 FIP, 0.84 WHIP and .198 BAA.
This has propelled him up the ranks on the season-long leaderboards, as he now holds the fourth-lowest ERA at 2.36, the fifth-lowest FIP at 2.77, the 14th-lowest WHIP at 1.08 and the 20th-lowest BAA at .223.
To further put this in the context of the Cy Young race, among qualified National League starters, Sánchez trails only the great Paul Skenes in ERA, and just Skenes and Logan Webb in FIP. He also ranks among the NL’s top 10 starting arms in WHIP and BAA.
While more surface-level stats are usually the main motivating factor in the Cy Young voting process, Sánchez also has the underlying metrics to support his newfound superstardom this season.
In terms of strikeout metrics, his 25.9% K-rate sits in the 74th percentile, his whiff rate of 29.6% sits in the 79th percentile and his chase rate of 31.0% sits in the 81st percentile.
When it comes to the quality of contact Sánchez surrenders, his 48th percentile hard-hit rate and 52nd percentile average exit velocity look rather mediocre, yet his 5.6% barrel rate ranks in the 86th percentile and his 57.9% groundball rate sits in the 96th percentile.
Then he adds on a 6.0% walk rate that sits in the 83rd percentile of league arms.
For the old-fashioned Cy Young voters, Sánchez also seems to check a lot of boxes. His 11 wins sit tied for third in the National League, only trailing Milwaukee’s ace Freddy Peralta (13) and, somewhat surprisingly, Arizona’s Brandon Pfaadt (12). His three losses are the second fewest among qualified NL starters.
For further context when it comes to Sánchez’s win-loss dominance, the presumptive NL Cy Young frontrunner Skenes only holds a 7-8 record.
Sánchez also happens to be leading a dominant Philadelphia Phillies rotation alongside Wheeler. The Phillies hold the best starting staff ERA in the National League this season (3.37). They only trail the Texas Rangers for the MLB-wide lead. They also hold the best starter FIP in all of MLB this year (3.40).
Sánchez is not only setting the league ablaze, he’s doing so for a team with serious World Series aspirations at 68-49, the NL’s second-best record.
Whether or not Sánchez has the power to overtake Skenes, or even his rotation mate in Wheeler, for this year’s top NL pitching honor remains to be seen. However, what shouldn’t be in doubt is the fact that he’s more than earned the right to be one of the finalists at the end of the year.
He’s only managed to get better as the season has raged on, so the time is now for the baseball world to take notice of Cristopher Sánchez.
It’s no longer Sánchez, the former one-time All-Star. It’s shaping up to be Sánchez, the Cy Young finalist.
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