Justin Verlander Could Win Triple Crown with Detroit Tigers

Justin Verlander has a great chance at winning baseball's Triple Crown this year. The Detroit Tigers pitcher is well on his way to winning the American League Cy Young Award, but he might be able to also accomplish a rarity in the game.

In order to a pitcher to win the Triple Crown, he needs to lead the league in wins, strikeouts and ERA. It's a tough thing to accomplish, but the ability to do so has placed some elite pitchers amongst the best in baseball history. The current MLB stats have Verlander leading all three required categories.

Through 30 starts this year, Verlander has a 21-5 record, 224 strikeouts and an ERA of 2.34. Most of the year it had been Jered Weaver of the Los Angeles Angels leading the league in ERA and at other times it was Josh Beckett of the Boston Red Sox. Now Verlander has moved ahead of both All-Star pitchers. In a year that has seen an increase in offense during the summer, there are only seven starting pitchers in the American League posting qualified ERA's under 3.00.

The 21 wins that Verlander have are three ahead of CC Sabathia of the New York Yankees. Sabathia is the only one who could catch him in wins before the end of the season, so it seems likely Verlander will finish as the league leader in that category. When it comes to strikeouts, Verlander has 224, 20 more than Felix Hernandez of the Seattle Mariners. Hernandez is going to be part of a six-man rotation for the rest of the season to spare his arm, so it is likely Verlander should easily win that category as well.

The only statistic that Verlander could have trouble leading the league is ERA, with two pitchers very close to him in the overall rankings. His 2.34 is just ahead of Weaver at 2.49 and Beckett at 2.54. Beckett has to face the Yankees again this season and Weaver will likely have to face the Texas Rangers. Both offenses on those teams are capable of ruining an ERA.

Next up for Verlander will be the Cleveland Indians on Wednesday, then the Chicago White Sox and Oakland Athletics. All three games are easily winnable, and it should set up Verlander to easily become the Cy Young winner in a unanimous vote.