3 reasons why Mariners' George Kirby is winning the Cy Young

Reason #3 he will: He's only getting better

This is the kicker, right? That George Kirby is only getting better. 2024 is going to be his age-26 season, and his 3rd season in the bigs. He's not even to his prime yet, and usually, pitchers continue to get better and better at this point in their career. Luis Castillo is entering his age-31, but with pitchers, thats still in your prime, albeit the back end (normally). Kirby is just getting there.

Could we see a little uptick in strikeouts to that mid-high 9 range? What if he decides to really embrace the K and lets the walk rate up into that 1.5-1.8 range, but we see the K range go into the 11's? Is that going to make him a better pitcher? It could. Or we do see the next iteration of Lee or Maddux, and he turns in some of those seasons where everything goes together, and we are looking at a 200+ IP, sub 20 BB, 200+ strikeout season where he is fighting for 20 wins.

If continues to learn how to pitch, and starts getting even more weak contact and "cheap" outs where guys are just slowly rolling balls over to the infielders and spraying fly balls to the OF that are easy catches, we could be looking at not just the Cy Young, but a frontrunner for the award for years to come.

George Kirby is only getting better, and there is a good chance that he goes home with the most coveted indivudual award out there for pitchers in 2024.