For all intents and purposes, the mainstream media had seemingly unanimously agreed by Memorial Day that Milwaukee Brewers ace Jacob Misiorowski would win the NL Cy Young Award. Regardless of how the voting turns out, the Misiorowski narratives should nonetheless have Phillies standout Cristopher Sánchez feeling robbed.
Rarely in the social media age does a pitcher of Sánchez’s caliber go under the radar, especially not when they pitch in a major media market like Philadelphia. Yet so much of the attention regarding the best pitchers in the NL goes to Misiorowski, the Pirates’ Paul Skenes and the Dodgers’ Tarik Skubal.
But when you objectively dive into the contextual numbers, you’ll realize just how special Sánchez’s underdiscussed 2026 season has been.
Comparing Cristopher Sánchez’s NL Cy Young Award case to Jacob Misiorowski’s
We’re not in the business of hot takes or farming overreactions for engagement. There is no denying that Misiorowski has had a phenomenal year and is a significant reason why the Brewers earned the No. 1 seed.
So if Misiorowski has the advantage in team success, ERA and strikeout percentage, then how can we realistically justify arguing that Sánchez deserves the Cy Young Award?
Let’s start with Wins Above Replacement, where Sánchez’s 8.1 bWAR easily triumphs over Misiorowski’s 6.5 mark. Sánchez also pitched 207 innings to Misiorowski’s 174.2, and workload should still matter in these conversations.
Most analytics also heavily favor Misiorowski, and that’s not even factoring in his incredible velocity. When you put their statistics against one another, you’ll realize why the Brewers phenom has been the odds-on betting favorite for so long.
But that’s our biggest issue: The voters are far too invested in Misiorowski to give Sánchez his flowers and at least explore the latter’s résumé. You don’t record 8.1 bWAR by accident.
Do you want to learn something incredible? Excluding Sánchez’s 2021 season, there have been 31 instances of a full-time pitcher recording at least 8.0 bWAR since 2000. Over half of those pitchers (17) won their league’s Cy Young Award that season.
Sánchez’s 8.1 bWAR ranks 22nd among pitching seasons since 2000. However, his 2.91 ERA would be the highest of any Cy Young winner since Rick Porcello (3.15 for the Red Sox) and Max Scherzer (2.96) each won in 2016.
Does Cristopher Sánchez deserve the NL Cy Young Award over Jacob Misiorowski?
Ideally, you’d hope that awards like MVP or Cy Young would go to the most deserving player. Porcello might be the last pitcher we see whose win-loss total (22-4) likely earned him the Cy Young.
In our eyes, it comes down to a simple question: Does Misiorowski’s viral dominance overrule Sánchez’s workload and historic numbers?
Except things aren’t that simple. We always try to be objective, and the truth is that Sánchez’s case is far stronger than most would envision. There’s also something to be said about someone who averages roughly 6.2 innings per start as opposed to Misiorowski’s 5.8.
Personally, we’d pick Sánchez, and not solely to go against the grain. When you’re in the same conversations as Randy Johnson, Pedro Martínez and Jacob deGrom, that needs to matter.
But if and when we’re wrong, at least we can sleep well knowing that we didn’t make our final decision before summer started.
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