al cy young

The Seattle ace won the AL Cy Young Award on Thursday despite a 13-12 record. Victimized by poor run support all season, Hernandez found ample backing with the voters. King Felix got 21 of the 28 first-place votes and 167 points in balloting by the Baseball Writers' Association of America. Sabathia, who led the league with 21 wins, drew the other three first-place votes and finished third at 102.

The 13 wins by Hernandez marked the fewest for a Cy Young starter in a full season. Playoff expansion. There would be two wild-card teams in each league, and the wild-card teams would meet to determine which advances to division series with the three first-place teams in each league.

Governor Paterson made it official on Wednesday — the Empire State Games are over.

The Mets won the press conference when they hired Sandy Alderson as general manager.

Not sure how many baseball curmudgeons had to talk themselves off the ledge this week after Seattle’s Felix Hernandez won the AL Cy Young Award with just 13 wins.

Can you pitch terribly and get a win?

The 2010 Cy Young Award winners were announced this past week, with Roy Halladay of the National League and Félix Hernández of the American League donning top honors.

The Cy Young Award is an honor awarded annually to the best pitcher in each league of Major League Baseball (MLB), the American League (AL) and National League (NL). The award is derived from Hall of Fame pitcher Cy Young, who over the span of his career won 511 games, the most in MLB history. Roy Halladay of the Philadelphia Phillies won his second Cy Young Award this year, previously winning the award in 2003 while with the Toronto Blue Jays of the AL. Halladay led the NL in wins (21) and finished second in strikeouts (219) and walks plus hits per inning pitched (1.04).

 Halladay was unanimously voted as the 2010 Cy Young winner as he received 32 out of 32 first place votes. Adam Wainwright of the St. Louis Cardinals finished second with 28 second place votes.

Hernández, who is only 24 years old, led all of MLB in ERA (2.27), a stat that counts the earned runs allowed per nine innings pitched. Hernández also finished second in the AL in strikeouts (232) and walks plus hits per inning pitched (1.06). Despite winning only 13 games, the lowest total for any Cy Young award winner, Hernández did all he could to help his team win. Tampa Bay Rays starter David Price (19) and New York Yankees starter CC Sabathia (21), who finished second and third, respectively, in the Cy Young voting, both had more wins than Hernández.