PHILADELPHIA -- Cristopher Sánchez has a legitimate claim as the best pitcher in baseball right now.
He carries a 29 2/3-inning scoreless streak into Friday night’s start against the Guardians -- which just so happens to come on his own bobblehead night. The lefty has a National League-leading 1.82 ERA, while his 80 strikeouts trail only Milwaukee’s Jacob Misiorowski (88) and Toronto’s Dylan Cease (84) across the Majors.
But this isn’t just about what Sánchez has done through 10 starts this season.
Over his past 40 starts going back to last year, Sánchez has a 2.26 ERA. He has 276 strikeouts in 255 1/3 innings during that stretch. To put that in perspective, Zack Wheeler – arguably the best pitcher of the past half-decade – has never had an ERA lower than 2.39 over any 40-game stretch in his career.
In fact, the only other Phillies pitchers with a sub-2.30 ERA and at least 250 strikeouts over any span of 40 outings are Hall of Famers Steve Carlton and Jim Bunning.
Now consider this … only five other active pitchers have matched Sánchez’s ERA and strikeout totals while throwing at least 250 innings in a 40-game stretch -- and all five have won at least one Cy Young Award:
• Justin Verlander (three Cy Young Awards)
• Max Scherzer (three)
• Jacob deGrom (two)
• Tarik Skubal (two)
• Gerrit Cole (one)
That’s a combined 11 Cy Young Awards, which begs the question: Could Sánchez be next?
There’s obviously a lot to be decided with more than four months left in the season, but the NL Cy Young race is currently shaping up to be one of the better in recent memory.
Here’s a look at how Sánchez stacks up against some notable candidates at the moment:
• Sánchez (PHI): 5-2, 1.82 ERA, 80 K's in 64 1/3 IP
• Paul Skenes (PIT): 6-3, 2.62 ERA, 63 K’s in 55 IP
• Misiorowski (MIL): 4-2, 1.89 ERA, 88 K’s in 57 IP
• Shohei Ohtani (LAD): 4-2, 0.73 ERA, 54 K’s in 49 IP
• Chase Burns (CIN): 6-1, 1.83 ERA, 64 K’s in 59 IP
• Chris Sale (ATL): 7-3, 1.89 ERA, 72 K’s in 62 IP