“It means a lot to me personally," Bauer said. "One, having Greg announce it is awesome. I grew up a Braves fan. For my entire family and entire peer group and friends, it’s pretty special.”
Bauer, who was named the league’s top pitcher in a vote by the players after the season, beat out two other Cy Young finalists: Yu Darvish, of the Chicago Cubs, and the winner of the last two Cy Young awards, Jacob deGrom, of the New York Mets. Bauer received 27 of 30 first-place votes. Darvish received the other three and placed second in the balloting.
Lights out. @BauerOutage wins the NL Cy Young Award. 👏 pic.twitter.com/MWsEilrkc3
— MLB (@MLB) November 11, 2020
In the American League, Shane Bieber, of the Cleveland Indians, was the unanimous Cy Young winner. Bauer and Bieber played together in Cleveland before Bauer was traded to the Reds in 2019.
Prior to this season, the last time a Reds pitcher had come close to winning the Cy Young was 2014 when Johnny Cueto finished second in voting.
In his first full season with the Reds, Bauer, 29, led the league with a 1.73 ERA, a 0.79 WHIP (walks and hits per innings pitched), 5.06 hits per nine innings and a .159 opponents' batting average. He finished second with 100 strikeouts.
Bauer became the fifth pitcher in Reds history to lead the league in ERA and the first since Ed Heusser in 1944.
Bauer became a free agent after the season. The Reds made him a qualifying offer, which he rejected.
“(Bauer) believes the (qualifying offer) is a ridiculous process so let’s just put it to bed," his agent Rachel Luba wrote on Twitter. “Trevor Bauer has rejected the QO but not the Reds (and) he looks forward to speaking (with) them (and) all other interested teams thru free agency.”
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