Ray’s remarkable 2021 season and his chances for AL Cy Young

It would be an understatement to say Robbie Ray’s arrival with the Toronto Blue Jays came inconspicuously.

Ray had shown flashes of dominance in the past, making the National League All-Star Team in 2017, but hadn’t gotten back to that form since and was carrying a dreadful 7.84 ERA seven starts into the 2020 season for the Arizona Diamondbacks.

With D-Backs going nowhere, they dealt the once promising Ray to the Blue Jays in exchange for lefty reliever Travis Bergen, who only had one appearance under his belt last season.

While he showed some improvement, Ray didn’t exactly light the world on fire, pitching to a 4.79 ERA with a 1.74 WHIP in five regular-season appearances after the trade. He also made one relief appearance in Toronto’s AL wild card series against the Tampa Bay Rays, yielding one run in three innings. Still, it was enough for the Jays to give him another shot.

Whatever the team saw in his 23.2 total innings down the stretch, Ray apparently saw too as he became the first free agent to sign last winter, rejoining the Jays on a one-year, $8 million deal.

It made sense for both sides. The Jays needed arms to fill out a rotation filled with question marks and Ray needed to re-establish himself on a ‘prove it’ deal.

After the trade, Ray cut his walks from 9.0 per nine innings to 6.1 and dropped his homers allowed per nine from 2.6 to 1.7. If pitching coach Pete Walker and the Jays could Ray to take some baby steps forward – especially in stat categories that are indicators of future success – what could they accomplish in a full season together?

Well, we have our answer.

Things got off to a bit of a rocky start. Ray missed the first two weeks of the season while recovering from an elbow contusion he suffered after falling down a set of stairs late in spring training. When he finally did make his season debut, it came in Yankee Stadium, which isn’t the friendliest of places for a lefty prone to giving up the longball.

But Ray dazzled through the first four innings and didn’t allow a hit until Rougned Odor singled with one out in the fifth. Next up was catcher Kyle Higashioka, who blasted a 416-foot shot to right-centre field to put the Yankees on top. New York would go on to win 3-1 with Ray taking the loss, but manager Charlie Montoyo was encouraged by what he’d seen from his starter.

“Everyone feels good about the way Ray pitched today,” the Jays skipper said.

From there, Ray went to work.

He allowed no runs over five innings of work in his next outing and combined to walk only five batters over his next nine starts through early June, striking out 76 hitters in 54.1 innings. As the season wore on, Ray only got better, and it kept Toronto in the race.

As mentioned before, there were lots of question marks entering the season with the Jays’ rotation. After finishing third in 2020 AL Cy Young voting, Hyun Jin Ryu was the sturdy ace at the top of the staff. But he had a rough season by his standards and ran out of gas down the stretch. Tanner Roark was let go after three appearances. Nate Pearson was injured in spring training and made just one start all year. Ross Stripling ended the year with 4.80 ERA.

Despite everything that went wrong for the rotation in 2021, even more went right. Steven Matz had maybe his best season as a pro. Alek Manoah finished eighth in Rookie of the Year voting. Jose Berrios was brought in at the trade deadline and was as advertised. But Ray was at the centre of it all. Eight times Ray went seven innings or more and allowed two or fewer runs. His best outing of the season came on Aug. 25 against the Chicago White Sox, a thrilling 3-1 victory where he struck out a season-best 14 hitters over seven innings of work.

"Nights like tonight, they're pretty special," Ray said.

"He's that guy. He's having a hell of a year," Montoyo added.

Ray led the league in ERA (2.84), innings pitched (193.1), strikeouts (248), ERA+ (154) and WHIP (1.04). He also became baseball’s all-time leader in strikeouts per nine innings at 11.2, snatching the crown from Chris Sale.

Gerrit Cole of the New York Yankees and Lance Lynn of the Chicago White Sox are the other Cy Young finalists. While they were both spectacular, it’s hard to argue they were better than Ray.

Cole led the AL with 16 victories but finished well below Toronto’s southpaw in ERA (3.23) and innings pitched (181.1). While Lynn’s ERA of 2.69 is lower than Ray’s, his 157.0 innings don’t even qualify him for the ERA title.

Just looking at their numbers side-by-side, it’s clear who had the best statistical season.

Even though it’s likely he’ll overcome both of them, two things work against Ray.

First off, despite having one of the best offences and sturdiest starting rotations in baseball, the Blue Jays did not make the playoffs. Of the past 10 AL Cy Young winners, only three were on teams that failed to qualify for the postseason.

But unlike the MVP award, which seems to take team success more heavily into account, the Cy Young is awarded to the best pitcher in each league and makes no mention of value.

Maybe the only area where Cole and Lynn truly outshined Ray was in the advanced stats department.

According to Fangraphs, Cole was the most valuable pitcher of the three with a 5.3 fWAR compared to 4.2 for Lynn and 3.9 for Ray. Cole (2.92) and Lynn (3.32) both finished ahead of Ray (3.69) in FIP, a stat used to measure a pitcher’s effectiveness against the three true outcomes – strikeouts, walks/hit by pitches and home runs allowed – using ERA as a scale. Ray allowed 33 home runs compared to Cole’s 24 and Lynn’s 18, which inflate Ray’s FIP to almost an entire run higher than his ERA. And according to Statcast, Ray allowed significantly more hard-hit balls than both Lynn and Cole.

With such a significant edge in traditional stats, will his other shortcomings be enough to cost him? The betting community doesn’t think so as Ray enters as the heavy favourite to take home the award according to most sportsbooks.

With a massive free agent deal expected for Ray this winter, his long-term future as a Jay is up in the air, especially after Toronto dished out $131 million to Jose Berrios Tuesday morning.

But regardless of what happens Wednesday night or in the coming weeks, it sure was a season to remember for Ray and the Blue Jays.