page_title: CC Sabathia
section_title: Player profile
hierarchical_section_title: CC Sabathia / Player profile
caption_attribution_description: English: CC Sabathia (left) and Mark Teixeira
context_page_description: Carsten Charles Sabathia Jr. is an American former professional baseball pitcher who played 19 seasons in Major League Baseball for the Cleveland Indians, Milwaukee Brewers, and the New York Yankees. Sabathia batted and threw left-handed.
  Sabathia made his major league debut with the Indians in 2001 and placed second in the 2001 AL Rookie of the Year voting behind 2001 AL MVP Ichiro Suzuki. Sabathia played the first seven-and-a-half seasons of his career with the Indians, with whom he won the 2007 Cy Young Award. He led the Indians to the 2007 AL Central Division title and their first postseason berth since his rookie year. Following a trade, Sabathia played the second half of the 2008 MLB season with the Milwaukee Brewers, helping them make the playoffs for the first time in 26 years.
  In the 2008 offseason, Sabathia signed with the New York Yankees for seven years and $161 million; at the time, this was the largest contract ever signed by a pitcher. With the Yankees, Sabathia led all of Major League Baseball in wins in both 2009 and 2010 and won a World Series ring in 2009. He was also voted the 2009 American League Championship Series Most Valuable Player.
context_section_description: In August 2017, Sabathia became the all-time American League leader in strikeouts by a left-handed pitcher. As of May 2019, he leads all active Major League players in career wins, career innings pitched and career strikeouts.
  Although he pitches and bats left-handed, Sabathia is actually right-handed.  
  As a hitter, Sabathia acquired 25 hits in 121 at-bats (127 plate appearances). On June 21, 2008, Sabathia hit a 440-foot home run off of Los Angeles Dodgers pitcher Chan Ho Park. On July 13, 2008, in his second game with the Brewers, Sabathia hit his second home run of the season off Cincinnati Reds pitcher Homer Bailey, becoming the third pitcher in history to homer in both leagues in the same season and the first since Earl Wilson did it in 1970 with Detroit and San Diego.
  Sabathia's reputation of pitching a high number of effective innings each season has led to sports broadcasters often referring to him as a workhorse; discounting his injury-shortened 2014 campaign Sabathia has averaged over 200 innings a season in his career (he has reached the benchmark eight times, including seven consecutive seasons of at least 200 innings pitched from 2007 to 2013).
caption: CC Sabathia (left) and Mark Teixeira during the 2009 World Series parade
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