Take Two for Lincecum

So today I'm really, really happy to be wrong.

In my season recap blog about a month and a half ago I compared Chris Carpenter's stats to Tim Lincecum's, and while I thought Lincecum definitely had a shot at repeating as Cy Young winner, I figured it would go to Carpenter since he had more wins with less games and virtually the same amount of run support on average per game.

But nope--it was Tim's time again, and as a Giants fan, I'm pretty psyched. I know people are lamenting about how this is kind of a bad thing because it means he's going to demand even more in arbitration now Ray Ratto: "Worst News for the Giants", but really I think that's beside the point for today. Am I a little concerned at how much it's going to cost to keep Lincecum and about whether or not he'd want to negotiate a long-term contract with us? Of course. But for right now all I care about is that he won the Cy Young award for the second straight year, the first pitcher to accomplish the feat in his first two full years of professional baseball.

All orange-and-black bias aside, can anyone argue now that there is someone else who qualifies as the best pitcher in baseball?!

On a side note, I don't think San Francisco Chronicle beatwriter Henry Schulman should be criticized as much as he has for picking Chris Carpenter. Henry Schulman: Why I Picked Chris Carpenter. Many Giants fans have been giving him a hard time about that and saying he's a moron, but come on. If Carpenter had won it (and it was pretty close--he trailed Lincecum by six points), we'd all be eating our words right now. I don't think Schulman should have worried as much as he seemed to about coming off as a homer if he picked Lincecum, but other than that he explained his reasoning in a pretty methodical, logical way by comparing all their stats. He said he pored over statistics sheets for a whole day when he was trying to decide who to vote for; he definitely took it seriously. Does it mean it was a poor choice now that it ends up he was wrong? I don't think so; like I said, I can relate to his decision since I came to the same conclusion in this blog last month after doing some research about the two pitchers.

So let's bask in the news, Giants fans. We've got the best pitcher in all of Major League Baseball and spring training will be here before we know it.

P.S: Thanks to MLBlogs for putting my blog on the front page! This is the second time it's happened and like last time I got pretty excited about the plug. Hopefully it means a few more views and comments by Giants fans and all baseball fans alike!