Retroactive Cy Young Awards Summary

Over the past few months, I have been going through each MLB season before the Cy Young Award was instituted in 1956, and I chose the pitcher who I believed would have been most deserving of the award, had it existed then.  Along the way, I gave the award to some of the all-time greats of the game, like Walter Johnson and Lefty Grove, but also to some lesser-known pitchers, like Vean Gregg and Bill James.  My goal in this post is to recap the 80 seasons of retroactive awards and highlight the players who were recognized the most.

There were a total of 149 awards given; some years only had one league, other years had three.  A total of 86 pitchers won those awards, with 55 winning once, 18 winning twice, 7 winning three times, and 6 winning four or more times.  The list below shows all players who won the award at least three times, and the number of times that they won.  Players in bold are members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame.

Lefty Grove	9
Christy Mathewson	8
Walter Johnson	7
Cy Young	5
Grover Cleveland Alexander	4
Bob Feller	4
Tommy Bond	3
John Clarkson	3
Kid Nichols	3
Old Hoss Radbourn	3
Warren Spahn	3*
Dazzy Vance	3
Bucky Walters	3

*Spahn also won an actual Cy Young Award, in 1957. Early Wynn is the only other pitcher to win both one of my retroactive awards and a real Cy Young Award; he won one of each, in 1951 and 1959.

Of the 13 pitchers who won three or more times, 11 of them are in the Hall of Fame, and although there's little argument in favor of Bond or Walters being inducted, they certainly put together an impressive run of great seasons.  In general though, the number of awards that the other pitchers won certainly matches up well with how they are perceived among the all-time greats; with the possible exception of Feller, all of the pitchers who won 4 or more are unquestionably top 10 pitchers of all-time.  By way of comparison, the list below shows the pitchers who have won three or more actual Cy Young Awards, from 1956 to the present.

Roger Clemens	7
Randy Johnson	5
Steve Carlton	4
Greg Maddux	4
Sandy Koufax	3
Pedro Martínez	3
Jim Palmer	3
Tom Seaver	3

Note that the all of the pitchers on this list who are not in the Hall of Fame are not yet eligible.

Now, this doesn't necessarily prove that Walter Johnson and Roger Clemens were equal to each other, nor does it necessarily mean that Lefty Grove, in winning 9 times, is necessarily the greatest pitcher of all time (although I do think it's something to consider).  But, I think it's helpful to have some way of showing who the greatest pitchers were in each season before 1956, to better judge some of the all-time greats from the past, as some have by now taken on an almost mythical perception among baseball fans.