Scherzer named NL Cy Young victor

This did not sit well with his fiancée, Kate Upton.

The announcement of this year’s American League Cy Young Award victor didn’t seem inherently dramatic, even with Boston Red Sox starter Rick Porcello surprisingly beating out his ex-teammate Justin Verlander (who’s still with the Detroit Tigers).

Verlander received 14 first-place votes to eight for Porcello, but slipped behind him because he was left off two of the 30 ballots, which each allowed five pitchers to be named. Verlander had more first place votes, 14-8. To burnish her opinion, it should be stated that Ms. Upton has appeared on the cover of Sports Illustrated more often than Verlander and Porcello combined. Verlander, who won the 2011 award, would’ve gotten $500,000 for this win.Porcello bounced back from going 9-15 in his first season with the Red Sox, finishing 22-4 for the AL East champs.

Red Sox right-hander Rick Porcello was mere decimal places ahead of Tigers right-hander Justin Verlander in Fangraphs.com’s Wins Above Replacement, with both of them rounded to 5.2.

And the fact that he didn’t appear on two ballots it’s surprising too, considering Verlander’s dominant numbers in 2016. The story really should have ended there – but Verlander’s girlfriend, model Kate Upton, stole all the headlines when she spoke out about his loss.

Verlander finished second, bested by Boston’s Rick Porcello, as voted on by the Baseball Writers Association of America.

Porcello, the only one of the three AL finalists without a Cy Young already on his resume, easily had the best season of his career in 2016.

“I feel bad that people are upset about this; I did the best I could”, Chastain said (via the New York Daily News).

After a bounce back season in which Verlander saw his numbers return to the top of almost every metric available, many pegged him as the likeliest Cy Young award victor this season.