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#1531788 - 07/17/08 11:35 AM
Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
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Monitor Tanned
Registered: 06/13/05
Posts: 5185
Loc: New Haven, CT
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No relievers. What matters to you? ERA? Total Ks? K/9 or K/BB rate? A streak of dominance? Consistent dominance? The era pitched in?
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#1531789 - 07/17/08 11:38 AM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: stax]
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Mythical Figure
Registered: 08/25/05
Posts: 75820
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Nolan Ryan.
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#1531790 - 07/17/08 11:39 AM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: Mauser98k]
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Monitor Tanned
Registered: 06/13/05
Posts: 5185
Loc: New Haven, CT
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See, Nolan Ryan has been the popular choice in both of the other forums I've posted this in, but I disagree. He was incredibly variable in his ERA largely due to his very high number of walks. He's the strikeout king, but only because he played so long, Randy Johnson and Pedro have been far more efficient in their careers at striking guys out (K/9 rate) and better at getting those strikeouts without so many free passes (better K/BB rates)
EDIT - I said Walter Johnson
Edited by stax (07/17/08 11:40 AM)
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#1531791 - 07/17/08 11:46 AM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: stax]
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SP Contributor
Registered: 08/26/07
Posts: 21457
Loc: San Francisco
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I voted for Pedro Martinez.
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#1531792 - 07/17/08 11:47 AM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: stax]
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Em & Em Lover
Registered: 01/04/05
Posts: 40338
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This like any poll is objective and will be argued regardless but for me it is Cy Young hands down.
The most important job of a pitcher is to put your team in a position to win and he did that more than any other pitcher 511 wins. A record that won't ever come close to be broken. Now there is talk you won't ever see another 300 game winner possibly and this guy almost doubled that. A guy can strike-out 11 batters in a game but if he gives up 8 runs and loses it doesn't make him a great pitcher.
Now you can blame that on closers today blowing a lead for a pitcher and costing him a win but Cy Young and others from that era used to pitch double-headers so to me that is more remarkable than leaving a game after 5 innings with 105 pitches thrown.
Cy Young to me will always be the greatest.
The award they give out each year for the best pitcher isn't called the Randy Johnson award or Pedro Martinez award, and there is a reason for that.
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#1531793 - 07/17/08 11:52 AM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: D5C]
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Permanent Resident
Registered: 09/14/05
Posts: 6968
Loc: Nebraska
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Cy Young
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#1531794 - 07/17/08 11:57 AM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: D5C]
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Monitor Tanned
Registered: 06/13/05
Posts: 5185
Loc: New Haven, CT
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Quote:
This like any poll is objective and will be argued regardless but for me it is Cy Young hands down.
The most important job of a pitcher is to put your team in a position to win and he did that more than any other pitcher 511 wins. A record that won't ever come close to be broken. A guy can strike-out 11 batters in a game but if he gives up 8 runs and loses it doesn't make him a great pitcher.
This is true. However, strikeouts are the ultimate good outcome for a pitcher for an individual at-bat. BABIP, Batting average of balls in play (everything besides K, BB, HR, and HBP), always has a league average of about .300. Pitchers can have very SLIGHT control over it sometimes (like .005-.010), and if you induce ground balls a lot (which are easier to field) you can adjust it, but by and large it's .300. The more strikeouts a pitcher records the better his performance as the less dependant he is on the defense behind which will, on average, allow roughly 30% of balls to fall in.
Also, wins are a stupid, stupid statistic. When Roger Clemens (I watched this game in it's entirety last year, it blew my mind) gave up 8 in 1.2 IP, but the Yanks came back to score 8 in the bottom of the 2nd, he got off with a ND. That's insanity. Jake Peavy can go 8 IP and allow 1 for a loss but Clemens can go 1.2 and allow 8 for a ND?
Wins are a measurement of how many times you can go at least 5 innings and allow fewer runs than your offense scores, and then in that subset how many times the bullpen doesn't blow it. Wins sort of correlate with good pitchers, since the fewer runs allow the more chances you'll have to win, but there are so many better measures.
Quote:
Now you can blame that on closers today blowing a lead for a pitcher and costing him a win but Cy Young and others from that era used to pitch double-headers so to me that is more remarkable than leaving a game after 5 innings with 105 pitches thrown.
That's a product of the era he pitched in though. To look at it objectively, MAYBE Cy Young born today would be like Roy Halladay or something, but the only reason he threw so many CGs and such is the era he pitched.
Quote:
The award they give out each year for the best pitcher isn't called the Randy Johnson award or Pedro Martinez award, and there is a reason for that.
Because he was the greatest at a traditional, if very imperfect, stat.
A great article on how awards likely would've broken down in Cy's era (even though awards are a somewhat silly measure to begin with)
Quote:
Player Awards Years
Walter Johnson 8 (1912-16, 1918, 1924)
Christy Mathewson 7 (1903, 1905, 1907-08, 1910, 1912-1913)
Lefty Grove 7 (1928-33, 1935)
Pete Alexander 6 (1911, 1915-17, 1920, 1927)
Cy Young 4 (1895, 1901-03)
Bob Feller 4 (1939-40, 1946-47)
Robin Roberts 4 (1950, 1952, 1954-55)
Dazzy Vance 4 (1924-25, 1928, 1930)
Bill Hutchison 3 (1890-92)
Kid Nichols 3 (1896-98)
Bucky Walters 3 (1939-40, 1944)
Carl Hubbell 3 (1933, 1936-37)
Ed Walsh 3 (1907-08, 1911)
Quote:
Name Awards Seasons Award %
Christy Mathewson 7 17 0.412
Lefty Grove 7 17 0.412
Walter Johnson 8 21 0.381
Pete Alexander 6 20 0.3
Dazzy Vance 4 16 0.25
Bob Feller 4 18 0.222
Cy Young 4 22 0.182
Quote:
No. 1 in career wins, but led his league only four times, and was out of the top five nine times
No. 1 in career innings, but led his league only twice, and was out of the top five eight times
No. 1 in career starts, but led his league just once, and was out of the top five 14 times
No. 1 in career complete games, but led his league just once, and was out of the top five eight times
Led the league in ERA twice, and was out of the top five 10 times
Led league in K/BB 11 times, and was five times out of the top five
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#1531795 - 07/17/08 12:57 PM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: stax]
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Hardcore
Registered: 08/01/05
Posts: 3623
Loc: The Hidden Leaf Village
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I would say Walter Johnson definetly, he pitched for a very lousy team for over 20 years, against some of the greatest hitters of all time won something like 375 wins, and held the strikeout record for 50 years and likely had one of the fastest pitches even by today's fastball specialists and he had a very good ERA.
Back then pitchers like Johnson, Mathewson and Young had to pitch the whole game as they did not have relievers back then which makes them all the more remarkable when you consider how many complete games by starting pitchers actually accomplish.
Sandy Kofax can also be considered to be one of the greatest starting pitchers because he was a late bloomer and he had painful arthritis in his pitching arm and still continued to consistantly strike out an average of 10 or more batters per game.I never got a chance to see him play, but from reading about him, had he had a full career he might had been the greatest of all time.
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#1531796 - 07/17/08 03:03 PM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: 1oldminer]
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Hardcore
Registered: 10/15/04
Posts: 2299
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I voted for Lefty Grove. He posted fantastic numbers, winning pitching's Triple Crown several times, in an era when hitters dominated like never before or since. And then after he got hurt he became a finesse pitcher and kept winning.
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#1531797 - 07/17/08 03:39 PM
Re: Greatest starting pitcher of all time?
[Re: eppa]
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Hardcore
Registered: 08/01/05
Posts: 3623
Loc: The Hidden Leaf Village
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Warren Spahn is another pitcher to consider, he won something like 325 games in his career and would have won more games had he not enlisted in the army during WW2. I believe he recently passed away a couple of years ago.
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