With plenty of big names involved, here's a look at the contenders for the NL Cy Young Award in the American League for the 2026 season.
NL Cy Young Odds - Pre-Season
Paul Skenes (Pittsburgh Pirates) | +240 |
Yoshinobu Yamamoto (Los Angeles Dodgers) | +550 |
Cristopher Sanchez (Philadelphia Phillies) | +900 |
Chris Sale (Atlanta Braves) | +1200 |
Hunter Greene (Cincinnati Reds) | +1200 |
Blake Snell (Los Angeles Dodgers) | +1600 |
Zack Wheeler (Philadelphia Phillies) | +1800 |
Logan Webb (San Francisco Giants) | +2000 |
Freddy Peralta (New York Mets) | +2800 |
Spencer Strider (Atlanta Braves) | +2800 |
Paul Skenes earned all 30 first-place votes last year and he's the favorite to win back-to-back Cy Young Awards.
Jacob deGrom was the last pitcher to win back-to-back NL Cy Young's when he did it in 2018 and 2019, and Skenes certainly has the talent to do it.
Skenes led the major leagues with a 1.97 ERA and struck out 216 batters in 187.2 innings pitched. He features a dominating fastball and sweeper combo, along with a changeup and splitter to keep hitters off balance.
Two Los Angeles Dodgers pitchers are in the top-ten favorites, while Shohei Ohtani is +3000.
Yoshinobu Yamamoto is +550 and Blake Snell is +1600. Both were postseason heroes for the World Series champion team last year and each can shut down offenses on a regular basis.
Yamomoto finished his second MLB season last year with a 2.59 ERA and 201 strikeouts in 173.2 innings, while the southpaw Snell dealt with injuries that limited him to 11 games - he had a 2.35 ERA in those games.
Snell is already 2x Cy Young award winner, winning the AL version of it in 2018 with the Tampa Rays and the NL version in 2023 with the San Diego Padres.
Cristopher Sanchez (+900) and Zack Wheeler (+1800) are the two Phillies' on this list, with each having different pitching styles.
Sanchez, a lefty, uses a nasty sinker-changeup combo that is hard to pick up for hitters out of the hand, while Wheeler's fastball-slider combo overwhelms hitters.
The Atlanta Braves also have two players on the list - Chris Sale (+1200) and Spencer Strider (+2800).
Both pitchers rack up plenty of strikeouts which will add to their Cy Young chase.
Freddy Peralta (+2800) is on a new team with the New York Mets, and the former Milwaukee Brewer led the NL in wins last year with 17.
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All odds featured in this article were correct at the time of writing and are subject to change.
