After a season-ending injury fell to Astros ace Justin Verlander, Cristian Javier was given a golden opportunity to try and fill that void in his first season in the league.
In the shortened 2020 season, there weren’t many rookie pitchers that were better than Javier and it was announced on Monday that he was a finalist for the AL Rookie of the Year Award along with Mariners outfielder Kyle Lewis and White Sox outfielder Luis Robert.
The winner, determined by a result of voting by the Baseball Writers’ Association of America, will be revealed Nov. 9 at 5 p.m. CT on MLB Network.
Javier, who made his Major League debut in relief on July 25 against the Mariners before joining the rotation on July 29. went 5-2 with a 3.48 ERA and 0.99 WHIP in 12 appearances (10 starts) for the Astros this year.
Javier is aiming to become the fourth Houston player to earn a Rookie of the Year Award, joining Jeff Bagwell (1991), Carlos Correa (2015) and Yordan Alvarez (2019).