1898 Cy Young Award

1898 National League - Clark Griffith, Chicago Orphans

24-10, 1.88 ERA, 190 K

Kid Nichols, who was the best NL pitcher in each of the two previous seasons as well as in 1891, pitched possibly the best season of his career in 1898, but he was outdone by another Hall of Famer, Clark Griffith.  Griffith led the league in ERA and ERA+ (190) by a substantial margin, and finished third in WHIP (1.133) and second in WAR (9.2).  It could certainly be argued that Nichols was the better pitcher in 1898, but, as has been the case before, I gave preference to Griffith's substantially lower ERA over Nichols's smaller lead in other categories, such as WHIP and WAR.  Probably the biggest thing in Nichols's favor was his substantially larger win total (31, which led the league, to 24 for Griffith), but Nichols also had a much better offense to back him up and improve his win totals.  It was close, but in the end I think that Griffith happened to be the better pitcher that year.