SF Giants Ace's Campaign Has Been Eerily Similar to His Previous Cy Young Season

The San Francisco Giants have been outstanding so far in 2025, and Robbie Ray has returned to form with a Cy Young type season.

Jun 5, 2025; San Francisco, California, USA; San Francisco Giants starting pitcher Robbie Ray (38) pitches the ball against the San Diego Padres during the fifth inning at Oracle Park. | Kelley L Cox-Imagn Images

The San Francisco Giants have had an exceptional start to their 2025 season, and as the halfway point in the season grows ever closer, they remain only one game out of the National League West lead at 38-28. They have been able to stay close to the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Diego Padres, which is an impressive feat in and of itself, but on top of that, they have shown to be a dominant pitching team all season long as well.

Building a team identity can be difficult, especially when it comes to teams that were not performing at a high level for a little bit. The Giants managed to do it rather rapidly, though, as their current five starters in the rotation have all been crucial to their success. Logan Webb has been as dominant as ever, Landen Roupp and Hayden Birdsong have both developed nicely early on, and Kyle Harrison has been slowly but surely improving.

The one notable turnaround has been from Robbie Ray though, after two seasons of less than optimal performances from him, he has finally found his stride once again, and he is looking more and more like his 2021 Cy Young form.

How Has Ray Performed Similarly to His 2021 Season?

When comparing a significant amount of the statistics between 2021 and 2025 for Ray, there is an eerie level of similarity between the two. His ERA is only four-tenths away from 2.84 in 2021 to 2.44 in 2025 and his WHIP is nearly identical from 1.05 to 1.07. He has improved in allowed batting average, going down from .210 to .191, though a full season of sample size may level that out.

In fact, even looking at the team record, the Tampa Bay Rays were 39-24 on June 9 of 2021, and if San Francisco wins on Tuesday, they will have the same number of wins at nearly the same point in the year.

One of the key differences has been his record and winning percentage, where he was 13-7 in 2021 (.650 win rate) he is now at 8-1 (.889 win rate). He will roughly end up with the same number of starts and overall counting stats, with slight deviation in strikeouts per nine and walks per nine, but he is allowing half the number of home runs per nine innings and fewer hits as well.

While a National League Cy Young Award would be difficult given the number of truly impressive pitchers across the sport this year, he certainly has a case to be made as June baseball kicks off.