A History Of Brewers Cy Young Award Finalists; Will Misiorowski Join Their Ranks?

As the calendar is ready to flip over to September, Jacob Misiorowski has done everything the Milwaukee Brewers brain trust has hoped for in the young phenom’s sophomore campaign. The Miz has made 25 starts and will probably make four or five more, depending on how the Brewers want to set up their postseason rotation/manage the flame-throwing right-hander’s workload.

His 222 strikeouts lead the majors, as does his ERA+ of 240, FIP of 2.14, WHIP of 0.76, and ERA of 1.73. Although pitcher victories aren’t the premier pitching stat anymore, Miz ranks tied for fourth in the bigs with 14 wins. By any pitching metric, he is near the top, if not the best, pitcher in baseball this year. Will he hear his name announced as the top pitcher in the National League in mid-November at the MLB award show in Las Vegas? Four or five more starts will tell the story.

In the 56 years of Milwaukee Brewers baseball, three pitchers have captured the Cy Young Award in their respective league. The Brewers played in the American League before switching to the ‘Senior Circuit’ in 1998.

The first hurler to win the award for Milwaukee has his number ‘34’ enshrined among the retired Brewers jerseys at Uecker Field. Four days after he was traded from the San Diego Padres to the St. Louis Cardinals in December 1980, Rollie Fingers came to the Brewers in a blockbuster deal with the Cards that included Ted Simmons, Pete Vuckovich, David Green, Dave LaPoint, Sixto Lezcano, and Lary Sorensen.

There was a work stoppage in 1981, but that didn’t keep the mustachioed closer from compiling some stellar numbers in the shortened season. His 28 saves led all of baseball, besting runner-up Chicago’s Bruce Sutter’s total of 25. Not only did Fingers win the coveted pitching award, but he edged out Oakland’s Rickey Henderson for the American League Most Valuable Player honors. The Brewers earned their first postseason nod but lost in five games to the New York Yankees in the ALDS. Fingers lasted only two more seasons, after missing all of 1983 with forearm tendinitis. He retired with 341 career saves.

The following season, Vuckovich, fresh off a fourth-place finish in the Cy Young race in 1981 behind Fingers, Oakland’s Steve McCatty, and Detroit’s Jack Morris, won 18 games, and although he posted rather pedestrian peripherals (1.50 WHIP and almost as many walks as strikeouts), earned his own Cy award over Baltimore’s Jim Palmer and Kansas City’s Dan Quisenberry. The Brewers won an exciting ALCS over the California Angels, winning the final three games at County Stadium before losing in seven contests to the Cardinals in their only World Series appearance. Like Fingers, ‘Vuke’ missed one season (1984) and pitched in just 28 games over the next two seasons and retired at the end of spring training in 1986.

The third pitcher to be honored was right-hander Corbin Burnes in 2021. Burnes, after switching to a starting role during the shortened 2020 season, was arguably one of the best pitchers in baseball from 2021-2024 and was named to four All-Star teams and earned down-ballot votes in the Cy Young race four times in addition to winning the award in 2021. He also earned votes in the Covid season of 2020 despite only making nine starts among his 12 appearances.

In 2021, Burnes posted a major league-leading ERA of 2.42, a FIP of 1.63, and a strikeouts/nine rate of 12.6, along with 234 strikeouts. After being traded to the Baltimore Orioles for DL Hall and Joey Ortiz in early 2024, Burnes won 15 games for the Orioles, was named to the AL All-Star team, and finished fifth in the AL Cy Young balloting.

Ten other Brewer pitchers earned Cy Young votes in franchise history.

In 1978, Mike Caldwell finished second to New York’s Ron Guidry after winning a franchise-high 22 wins. Throwing 293 1/3 innings, ‘Iron Mike’ tossed six shutouts among his 23 complete games. And just for kicks, he even posted one save across a trio of relief outings.

Perhaps the most memorable Cy Young run was accomplished by CC Sabathia when he finished fifth in the NL CY voting in 2008 after coming to the Brewers in a trade from the Cleveland Indians. In just 17 starts over the last three months of the season, Carsten Charles went 11-2 with an ERA of 1.65 with seven complete games and three shutouts, leading the Brewers to the post-season for the first time since the 1982 season. Unfortunately for Milwaukee, the season workload—a career-high 253 innings—wore down the big lefty, and he was only able to last three and two-thirds innings against the Philadelphia Phillies in Game 2 of the NLDS in a 5-2 loss.

Other pitchers that have earned votes were Freddy Peralta (2025), Josh Hader (2018), Jimmy Nelson (2017), Yovani Gallardo (2011), John Axford (2011), Ben Sheets (2004), Teddy Higuera (1986, 1987), and Jim Colborn (1973).

Can The Miz add his name to the trio of Brewer legends? Time will tell.

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