Burnes a Cy finalist; Counsell up for MOY

MILWAUKEE -- Four decades after Rollie Fingers and Pete Vuckovich gave the Brewers back-to-back American League Cy Young Award winners in 1981 and ’82, Corbin Burnes comes along with credentials that would make both of those Milwaukee legends envious.

Burnes on Monday was named one of three finalists -- with Max Scherzer of the Dodgers and Zack Wheeler of the Phillies -- for the Baseball Writers’ Association of America’s NL Cy Young Award, and he’s not the only Brewer up for an award. Craig Counsell is a finalist for NL Manager of the Year for the second time in three years, along with Gabe Kapler of the Giants and Mike Shildt of the Cardinals.

The winners will be announced next week during MLB Network specials. Managers of the Year in each league will be revealed Tuesday, Nov. 16 at 5 p.m. CT followed by Cy Young Award winners on Wednesday, Nov. 17 at 5 p.m. CT.

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No Brewers pitcher has finished among the top three in Cy Young Award balloting since Teddy Higuera finished second to Roger Clemens in the AL in 1986, but Burnes is guaranteed a top-three finish after setting a slew of strikeout records in 2021. He was 11-5 with a 2.43 ERA in 28 starts and finished as the Major League leader in ERA, strikeout rate (35.6 percent), strikeouts to walks (6.88), FIP (1.63) and percentage of barrels (3.1 percent). Only Scherzer had a lower WHIP than Burnes’ 0.94.

“However you want to say it, it’s been remarkable, is what it’s been,” Counsell said after Burnes put the finishing touches on his resume. “He’s had a historical season.”

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Counsell was not embellishing. Here are some of the ways in which Burnes’ season was historic:

• Burnes began the season with 58 strikeouts before issuing a single walk, a record going all the way back to 1893 when the mound was set at 60 feet, six inches, according to Elias. The previous record for a starting pitcher belonged to the Cardinals’ Adam Wainwright, who struck out 35 before issuing a walk in 2013. The record for any pitcher was set by Dodgers closer Kenley Jansen in 2017, when he had 51 strikeouts before his first Ball 4.

• Three months later on Aug. 11 at Wrigley Field, Burnes matched Tom Seaver and Aaron Nola’s AL/NL record by striking out 10 consecutive batters during one particularly dominant stretch of a 15-strikeout, eight-inning masterpiece.

• A month after that at Progressive Field in Cleveland, Burnes and Josh Hader joined up to throw the first combined no-hitter in Brewers history, and the first no-no in team history since Juan Nieves in 1987. Burnes struck out 14 and walked one in eight brilliant innings that night.

• In the divisional era (since 1969), only one pitcher -- Pedro Martinez of the 1999 Red Sox -- had a better FIP than Burnes. FIP can be useful in evaluating a pitcher’s performance because it focuses solely on the events a pitcher has the most control over -- strikeouts, unintentional walks, hit-by-pitches and home runs.

• As noted by the Washington Post last month, Burnes led the Majors in a new metric gaining steam. CSW rate is the total of called strikes plus swinging strikes divided by the total number of pitches thrown to account for the number of times a pitcher threw a strike without contact. For Burnes, the rate was north of 33 percent, best in baseball.

“For me personally,” Brewers shortstop Willy Adames said with a smile, “it's kind of boring because I don't get any ground balls. It's amazing to see the ability, the dominance he has on the mound. He dominates everybody.”

For BBWAA voters who preferred more standard stats -- they were required to submit a ranked list of five prior to the first pitch of the NL Wild Card Game -- Burnes made a strong case there as well. He became the first pitcher in Brewers history to win his league’s ERA title, besting Dodgers teammates Scherzer (2.46) and Walker Buehler (2.47).

The only area in which Burnes was not among the elite is innings pitched. Thirty-one pitchers in the Majors, including 19 in the NL, logged more than Burnes’ 167 innings. If there is a knock on Burnes’ candidacy, it is that other contenders like the Dodgers’ Scherzer (179 1/3 innings) or Wheeler (213 1/3 innings) worked more innings while also pitching at an elite level. But that is little fault of Burnes, who made every turn in the rotation, aside from two weeks he spent on the COVID-19 injured list in late April and early May.

“I don’t think he should be dinged for our overall plan of how we have used our guys,” Brewers pitching coach Chris Hook said. “It wasn’t because of injury, per se. I think [voters] have to take that into account.

“I think he should be the frontrunner. This is where old school, new school metrics [clash]. You hear people say, ‘I would like to see the guy who gives you the most innings.’ But I mean, he would have given the innings if we would have given him the chance.”

The Brewers came off last year’s pandemic-shortened season planning to use a six-man rotation to manage workloads as MLB reverted to 162 games. Burnes and teammate Brandon Woodruff made only two starts apiece on the standard four days’ rest. Every other outing came on at least five days’ rest.

“I don’t think [the innings question] is a knock,” Counsell said. “He’s right there with the innings. It was our doing. It was also to keep him healthy and effective. I think it’s worked. I don’t want to say ‘worked’ because it’s not the [only] reason, but hopefully, it’s been a small factor to it.”

Counsell added, “I’m not sorry we did it. I’m happy we did it.”

Counsell’s imprint on Brewers’ 95 regular-season victories in 2021 was not limited to managing the pitching. The team employed a total of 61 players during the regular season, eight more than any other year in franchise history as the Brewers were forced to overcome an early-season spate of injuries that saw as many as 18 players on the injured list at one point in May.

The Brewers began their surge during the second half of that month, ultimately building a club-record 14-game lead over the rest of the division before holding off the second-place Cardinals, who won 17 games in a row late in the year and still finished five games back of Milwaukee in the NL Central.

“He's very capable and very skilled at using the players on his roster to the best of their ability to put together wins,” Brewers president of baseball operations David Stearns said of Counsell. “That's certainly been no different this year. We've had a few more guys filter through that clubhouse than we do in a normal year but the skills that Craig is using to help these guys and to put our team in the best position are the same skills he's used since he got the job here.”

A Brewers skipper has never been named BBWAA Manager of the Year.