New York Yankees star pitcher Gerrit Cole has been nominated as one of the three finalists for the American League Cy Young Award.

Gerrit Cole had one of the best pitching seasons in the whole Major League and probably had the best in the American League. He's going up against two other candidates, Robbie Ray, and Lance Lynn. He has them beat in most advanced metrics. There's not much of a debate against him and Lance Lynn as he clearly had a better season than Lynn did. He and Robbie Ray is going to be an extremely close race but the edge should be towards Cole.

Cole led Robbie Ray in FIP, xFIP, SIERA, K/9, BB/9, K/BB, K%, BB%, K-BB%, and fWAR.

Three reasons Gerrit Cole should win the Cy Young award

3. He had over a point higher fWAR

Gerrit Cole finished the season with a 5.3 fWAR. That was 1.4 higher than Robbie Rays' 3.9. fWAR is an incredible stat that's mostly catered for pitchers.

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2. The race wouldn't be that close if it wasn't for Coles hamstring injury

Gerrit Cole did have a meltdown for about the last month and a half of the season. Cole came back from a hamstring injury and just didn't have the same stuff that he usually does. This is unfortunate for Cole as voters like to see players perform throughout the whole season. In Cole's defense, he was trying his hardest to get the Yankees a playoff spot. The voters could look at this as a bright thing, not that he played bad, but that he continued to pitch even when hurt. Chances are the voters won't look at it from that side and they will only see that he pitch bad for that last month-and-a-half and that could hurt him. Luckily for Gerrit Cole, Robbie Ray also had a similar meltdown and Cole was able to be better throughout the whole season.

1. Cole significantly led him in most categories and the ones he didn't, Ray barely led him

Gerrit Cole was able to significantly beat Robbie Ray in most advanced metrics. In most of the regular stats, Cole and Ray we're about even in terms of leading each other in one or the other. There were certain categories that Robbie Ray had Gerrit Cole beat but it wasn't by a wide enough margin to really mean anything. In the categories that Gerrit Cole led over Robbie Ray, there was a significantly wider margin than in the ones that Ray led.

This is going to be one of the tightest Cy Young races in a very long time. You can make an argument that both of these pitchers should walk away with the award, but only one of them is going to win it. Lance Lynn has an outside chance here as it's likely that only Gerrit Cole or Robbie Ray is going to win this award. If Ray wins this award it's going to be because of how Gerrit Cole pitched coming off of his hamstring injury. Unfortunately for Cole, that's going to be a big thing for the voters, and it might just hurt him on winning the Cy Young