Houston Astros ace Dallas Keuchel won the AL Cy Young Award on Wednesday, as Major League Baseball confirmed on Twitter.
This marks the first Cy Young Award of Keuchel's career. The 27-year-old beat out Oakland Athletics righty Sonny Gray and Toronto Blue Jays southpaw David Price for the prestigious honor. According to ESPN Stats & Info, Keuchel is the third Astros pitcher to win the award and the first to do so since Roger Clemens in 2004.
Keuchel remained humbled when accepting his award, per MLB Network's PR account: "Something I definitely never expected. Just playing the game is good enough for me. This is by no means an individual award. This is a big body of work, not just this season."
Price took to Twitter to offer his thoughts on the voting results:
Keuchel came from out of nowhere in 2014 to become a quality starter, but the bearded one reached another stratosphere in 2015.
The lefty was the American League's only 20-game winner as he went 20-8, and he supplemented that with a 2.48 ERA, 1.02 WHIP and 216 strikeouts in 232 innings as one of the top workhorses in baseball.
Keuchel was named to his first All-Star team in 2015, and he led the AL in several major categories, including wins, WHIP and innings pitched. He was also second to only Price in ERA.
The Astros were perhaps the biggest surprise in the league this season as they nabbed a wild-card spot after being one of the worst teams in baseball in 2014. Keuchel was a huge reason for that.
While winning the Cy Young likely marks the greatest accomplishment of Keuchel's career to this point, this offseason has been a decorated one for him in general.
He won the American League Gold Glove Award at pitcher for the second consecutive year and also took home a Players Choice Award as the AL's top pitcher.
The Astros are often lauded for their super-talented lineup that includes Carlos Correa, Jose Altuve, George Springer, Evan Gattis and others, but Keuchel was arguably the one player who set them apart from teams who just missed out on the playoffs.
Houston didn't necessarily have the deepest starting rotation in the AL. But it could count on Keuchel almost every time he took the mound, and his performances down the stretch prevented what could have been a major collapse.
Keuchel firmly established himself as one of Major League Baseball's elite pitchers in 2015, and he is now officially the class of the American League.
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