Mat Latos among a dozen early NL Cy Young contenders

The MLB trend toward dominant pitching continues.  In the National League, the average team ERA was 4.49 just seven seasons ago.  It has steadily decreased to a current mark of 3.82.  Along with that team trend, the individual competition for Cy Young Awards has gotten much tougher.

Mat Latos has been amazing lately - with 20 consecutive non-losing starts dating back to last August, he has set a Reds record for any pitcher since at least 1916.  He's 6-0, with a fantastic 2.87 ERA.  The fact that he still might not even be among the top 5 Cy contenders in the league shows just how ridiculously solid the state of MLB pitching is.

I picked the top 12 statistical performers so far (through the day games on June 9th, 2013).  Here they are, ranked in various categories:

Wins:
1) Adam Wainwright 9
1) Jordan Zimmermann 9
1) Patrick Corbin 9
4) Lance Lynn 8
4) Mike Minor 8
6) Shelby Miller 7
6) Cliff Lee 7
8) Mat Latos 6
8) Hyun-Jin Ryu 6
10) Clayton Kershaw 5
11) Matt Harvey 5
12) Travis Wood 5

ERA:
1) Miller 1.91
2) Kershaw 1.93
3) Corbin 1.98
4) Zimmermann 2.00
5) Harvey 2.10
6) Wainwright 2.34
7) Minor 2.44
8) Lee 2.55
9) Wood 2.65
10) Ryu 2.72
11) Lynn 2.76
12) Latos 2.87

WAR:
1) Wainwright 3.8
2) Kershaw 3.4
2) Lee 3.4
4) Miller 3.3
4) Harvey 3.3
6) Corbin 2.9
7) Wood 2.4
8) Zimmermann 2.3
9) Lynn 2.3
10) Minor 1.9
10) Ryu 1.9
12) Latos 1.6

Strikeouts:
1) Harvey 95
2) Wainwright 91
2) Kershaw 91
4) Lee 93
5) Miller 81
6) Minor 78
7) Lynn 76
8) Latos 74
9) Ryu 73
10) Corbin 65
11) Zimmermann 61
12) Wood 56

xFIP:
1) Wainwright 2.53
2) Harvey 2.88
3) Miller 3.10
4) Kershaw 3.21
5) Lee 3.29
6) Ryu 3.42
7) Latos 3.52
8) Zimmermann 3.55
8) Minor 3.55
10) Lynn 3.62
11) Corbin 3.82
12) Wood 4.43
 
Total combined rankings (averaging everything above)
1) Adam Wainwright
2) Shelby Miller
3) Clayton Kershaw
4) Matt Harvey
5) Cliff Lee
6) Patrick Corbin
7) Jordan Zimmermann
8) Mike Minor
9) Lance Lynn
10) Hyun-Jin Ryu 
11) Mat Latos
12) Travis Wood

No matter how you slice it, Latos has been one of the most valuable pitchers to any team in baseball so far.  But he'll have a lot of work to do if he wants to finish with the Cy.