This story originally ran in Hometown 9 on April 28, 2008.

By Nick Tavares

If you’re not a fan of Jake Peavy and Brandon Webb locked in pitching duels, well, you might want to take the next few years of baseball off. Try the Premier League, maybe catch up on all the reading you’ve been putting off since Luis Gonzalez dribbled that blooper past Mariano Rivera.

But don’t hold your breath waiting for these two to cool it. The West is developing a monopoly on the top starting pitchers in the National League, and yesterday was just more proof that Webb and Peavy are, barring injury, going to dominate the NL for years to come.

Coming into yesterday’s match-up, the San Diego’s Peavy was 3-0 with 29 strikeouts and a WHIP of 1.00 with a 2.00 ERA. Not to be outdone, Arizona’s Webb was 5-0, also had 29 K’s, a WHIP of .97 and an ERA of 2.31.

And the respective lineups for the Diamondbacks and Padres could only manage a combined 9 hits off the two aces. And Arizona got the edge in this one courtesy of Chris Snyder’s two-run homer in the second inning.

But one mistake pitch by Peavy aside, these two are once again locked at the top of the race for 2008’s Cy Young trophy. Webb won the award in ’06, and Peavy beat out the Snakes’ stud for the ’07 award. Early signs show that these two should again find themselves 1-2 in the race for top this season’s honors.

While Peavy has an array of electric stuff aiding him from night to night on the mound, Webb works more as a master craftsman than a gunslinger. The big righty from Kentucky is calm on the mound, mixing his pitches to match his devastating sinker. Never flustered, he instead incites one ground ball after another as he works.

And the results have been constant. 194 strikeouts last year, 178 the year before, to go along with an ERA+ of 156 and 152, respectively. This year, that number is up to a whopping 188.

Granted, this is still early. Last year, Peavy cruised to a unanimous vote, even though Webb rattled off 42 consecutive shutout innings through August. Peavy still has the more electric stuff of the two, and his ERA+ is right with Webb’s this season at 187.

There’s plenty of time to go, and if the Baseball Gods are indeed kind, the NL West aces will square off a couple more times this season. And when they do, don’t come to the park looking for fireworks.