I've been throwing a lot of stats at you guys the last couple of days, but I had to add this one which I think is the ULTIMATE stat on pitching & my extended point that today's pitchers are pampered WAY to much.................. Just going back to the 50s, 60s & 70s these are just some of the percentages pitchers had on complete games per start. Warren Spahn completed 57.3% of his starts Juan Marichal completed 53.4% of his starts Bob Gibson 52.8% Robin Roberts 50.2% Gaylord Perry 43.9% Fergie Jenkins 45.0% Sandy Koufax 43.6% Even guys like Seaver, Carlton, Palmer Ford, Blyleven, & Drysdale completed over 35% of there starts. Lets look at today's greats. ................... CC Sabathia 8.9% Justin Verlander 7.5% Adam Wainwright 8.6% David Price 5.4% Clayton Kershaw 6.1% The only guy with any recent respectability is Roy Halladay & he only completed 17.2% of his starts. Just an amazing turn around from then until now.
Yeah Steve WOW!. There's really no other word for it. How the fuck does a league change so much (not even SLIGHTLY) but so much that pitchers have gone from completing an average of OVER 40% of there starts to less then 10% of there starts. That's just an UNBELIEVABLE difference.
Im going to say that it is tougher to pitch in today's game then back in the day. Hitters are well informed of what pitchers have. They are training more.they are bigger and stronger than ever before. The ball is livelier. Managers dont want a 75% pitcher after 6 innings when he can throw in specialists for a batter or two. Back in the 50's 60's and early 70's the lineups started to increase in talent across the board. Sent from my SPH-L710 using Tapatalk
Al, I understand all of that but.......we're not talking about a difference of 45% to 35 %. We're talking OVER 40% average to LESS then 10% average. Sorry my friend but anyone would be hard pressed to explain away THAT! kind of differential.
Rick, more complete games and you never have a Mo. I recall an essay that linked the development and evolution of relief pitching as a natural consequence of the DH. Blame La Russa, of course.
I love this stuff, stats like these that is. Makes me appreciate watching baseball in those great roaring 60s. Incredible stats of then versus now. That is the era I still long for. Here's an oddity, though he pitched in the dead ball era, and tore his arm to shreds: 1884 Hoss Radbourn had a 59-12 Won-Loss Record. Played in 75 games, started 73 Games and Completed 73 Games. Struck out 441 batters in 678.2 innings. We will never ever see such a feat, dead ball or live ball era or not.
I love this stuff, stats like these that is. Makes me appreciate watching baseball in those great roaring 60s. Incredible stats of then versus now. That is the era I still long for. Here's an oddity, though he pitched in the dead ball era, and tore his arm to shreds: 1884 Hoss Radbourn had a 59-12 Won-Loss Record. Played in 75 games, started 73 Games and Completed 73 Games. Struck out 441 batters in 678.2 innings. We will never ever see such a feat, dead ball or live ball era or not.
Warren Spahn ----> Superman No doubt the greatest LHP of the "modern era" (post ww2/integration era)..... ...quite possibly the greatest LHP of ALL TIME ! The man's numbers are unbelievable and he missed 3 years to world war 2... ...ages 22-24. Won more games than any lefty- while winning 20 games 16 years apart with an era below 3.00 in those years. Incredible, UNDERRATED pitcher.
And in what has been known as the GREATEST game ever pitched (Juan Marichal vs Warren Spahn) A 16 inning 1-0 shut out won by the Giants on a Willie Mays HR. Both pitchers went the full 16 innings. And both pitchers threw OVER 200 pitches. And BTW: did I mention that Span at the time was 42 yrs old? He was also a 13 time 20 game winner & had 382 complete games.
___________________________ yep, and as I said - Warren Spahn -----> Superman He hung around for another 4 years and his career "numbers" took a negative hit. I believe he averaged winning 19 games (and 7 over .500) per season- --for the period of 1946 - 1963. Won more games than ANY OTHER lefthander in history. BTW....ever take a look at many times Greg Maddux won 20 games? I'm not saying Maddux wasn't a great pitcher...of course he was.
Let me make this easy.................. All time 20 win seasons = 1) Warren Spahn (13) 2) Christy Matherson (13) 3) Walter Johnson (12) 4) Grover Alexander (9) 5) Jim Palmer (8) 6) Lefty Grove (8) 7) Edward Plank (8) 8) Ferguson Jenkins (7) 9) Bob Lemon (7) The Following all accomplished the feat 6 times = Juan Marichal, Roger Clemens, Steve Carlton, Robin Roberts, Bob Feller, Wes Ferrell, 3 fingers Brown, Cy Young, Vic Willis, & Joe McGinnity. NOTE: of the 19 players I just listed only 6 of them won OVER 300 games. 9There were 6 other members of the 300 win club with 6 or more 20 win seasons but they pitched during the 1800s. If you're curious, the other 300 game winners had the following amount of 20 win seasons..... Maddox (20, Ryan (2), Johnson (3), Seaver (5), Sutton (1), Niekro (3), Glavine (5) & Wynn (5)
A note on Radbourn is that he started pitching late in his life. I believe he was 26 & was 36 by the time he hung up his 11 year career. with 309 wins. Another amazing guy the following year (1885) was John Clarkson who went 53-16 & completed 68 of his 70 starts & pitched 623 innings & won 328 games during his short 12 year career.
It's hard to even fathome Radbourn and Clarksons feats. Heck I'm still trying to get my head around Matthewson's achievements. What a treat is was though to watch MLB faithfully during the greats you pointed out, eg. Koufax, Marichal, Gibson, Spahn & Sain pray for rain. Seaver, Carlton, Ford, Blyleven (what a curveball), Perry, Drysdale, Sudden Sam McDowell, and a flock of other greats. Those were the days! or Daze!
______________________________________________ Sudden Sam - still owns one of the greatest K/IP ratios in history.
