Without Justin Verlander the Houston Astros would not have won the World Series. No explanation necessary.
Without Justin Verlander, currently rated tenth for WAR among pitchers, but first for much of the season, the Astros would not be dominating MLB with the highest Pythagorean won loss record in baseball.
So, paraphrasing the immortal soul singers, Sam and Dave, “when something is wrong with my Justin, something is wrong with me.”
For much of the early season Verlander was on track to break Bob Gibson’s all-time ERA record of 1.12. As recently as June 2nd he still led the league in ERA sporting a nifty 1.