“He’s [Zack Greinke] got five or six pitches that are just ridiculous. Tonight he threw me a pitch I had never seen from him before—a 95-mph cutter that looked like Mariano Rivera. He’s so good [that] he’s just inventing stuff out there.” –Brandon Inge

The Cy Young Award is about comparing the best pitchers in each league to figure out which one in each respective league is the best. This season, baseball commentators are making all sorts of arguments for and against Zack Greinke. I’ve heard all the arguments against—he doesn’t have enough wins, he plays for a terrible team, he hasn’t faced the AL East often enough, etc. The problem with every one of those arguments is, none of those things are in his control.

I’m not a sabermetrician, but I still believe wins is one of the worst possible categories to judge a starting pitchers by. The starting pitcher has nothing to do with how many runs his team scores and he has little do with the way they play defense behind him. Greinke has eight losses this season and eight no decisions. In those 16 games, the Royals have scored just 32 runs. In four of those games, the Royals have been shut out. Holding him responsible for such inadequacy is ridiculous.

The Royals have had a terrible season. Defensively, they are one of the worst teams I’ve ever seen. They miss cut off men. They throw to the wrong base. They get eaten alive by fairly routine ground balls. And their offense hasn’t been much better. And yet, with such awfulness surrounding him, Greinke has been dominant. If anything, putting up such incredible numbers while playing for a team like the Royals should be used as part of the argument for Greinke winning the Cy Young, not against.

Regarding the AL East argument, I guess only pitchers who pitch in the AL East should be considered for the Cy Young each season. The five previous AL Cy Young Award winners did not come from the AL East and I’m hard pressed to remember experts criticizing Cliff Lee (the 2008 winner), C.C. Sabathia (the 2007 winner), or Johan Santana (the 2006 winner) for feasting on AL Central teams all season to the point that they didn’t deserve the award.

With all of that said, some baseball writers are digging into the stats and making the case in favor of Greinke winning the award. Here’s what Tim Kurkjian said earlier this week: “In the DH era (1973-present), the only AL pitchers to post an ERA as low as Greinke’s in a season of at least 200 innings pitched are Clemens (1.93 in 1990 and 2.05 in 1997), Pedro Martinez (2.07 in 1999 and 1.74 in 2000), Ron Guidry (1.74 in 1978) and Jim Palmer (2.07 in 1972). And, since 1969, the only pitchers as young as the 25-year-old Greinke to have an ERA as low in a season are Dwight Gooden (1.53 in 1985), Vida Blue (1.82 in 1971), Martinez (1.90 in 1997) and Gary Nolan (1.99 in 1972).”

Sam Mellinger recently made this observation about Greinke: “I was fooling around with some numbers and came across this: Greinke’s ERA in his losses and no-decisions is 3.23. CC Sabathia’s overall ERA is 3.31. So, to review: even when Zack is ‘bad,’ he’s better than Sabathia.”

And when he has been good, nobody has been better.

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