First, when Koufax was dominating the National League we were not nearly as cognizant of park and league effects as we are today during Helton’s time. As we came to understand park and league effects better as time went by, Koufax’s legacy nevertheless remained intact. Second, Koufax was a pitcher, and fans and writers have a tendency, I think, to romanticize pitchers more than hitters, particularly when it comes to “short but dominating career” type guys (consider that Ralph Kiner, similar to Koufax in that he had a brilliant peak but short career as a hitter, took 20 years after his retirement to make the Hall while Koufax sailed in after only his second year of eligibility).
Third is dominance compared to their contemporaries. Despite the fact that Helton’s peak is equal to that of Koufax’s, Koufax really was the best pitcher of his era. Helton was not the best hitter of his. That honor would have to go to Barry Bonds, and it’s far from clear that Helton was even the second best hitter of his era: in addition to Helton, Vladimir Guerrero, Manny Ramirez, Carlos Delgado, Albert Pujols, and Alex Rodriguez can all lay a legitimate claim to “best non-Bonds hitter of the first half of this decade” title, not to mention Frank Thomas, Ken Griffey Jr., and Jeff Bagwell immediately prior, as well as David Ortiz and Travis Hafner immediately after.
None of which fully explains why Koufax is perceived as one of the greatest pitchers of all time while Helton is viewed as something less than one of the best hitters ever, to say the least. The facts do not lie: Helton and Koufax had great peaks of almost identical value, save for the fact that Helton’s was slightly stronger. Both put up otherworldly numbers because they were great players playing in parks and eras particularly suited for them. Yet Koufax is viewed as one of the greatest pitchers of all time while the perception of Helton is something less than that. Todd Helton is Sandy Koufax.
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If by era you mean 1963-1966, probably (he truly was in 1964 and 1966, and he was 2nd in ERA+ in 1963 and 1965).
Todd Helton has played in 15 postseason games with an OPS of .584.
The point isn't to dismiss Helton's value or to inflate Koufax's, but it does show why great pitchers can easily come to dominate the public consciousness with only a small number of high profile games, in a way that it's much harder for a batter to do.
And playing for the highest possible stakes, Koufax merely certified what everyone already knew: He was the best pitcher of his (brief) era. Nobody would even think of saying that about Todd Helton.
PI indicates that he was CLEARLY the best from 63-66 (ERA+ of 172; Marichal is next at 152)
even if you include 1962-66, Koufax was the best in ERA+ (167 for Sandy, 143 for Marichal)
a VERY narrowly defined "era", of course
As another commenter pointed out, Koufax's ERA+ led the major leagues during his peak five-year period. Helton, by contrast, was fifth among major league batters during his 2000-2004 peak.
It is certainly true that both Koufax and Helton benefited from their home parks. But Koufax's ERA+ during his peak period was far better than Helton's OPS+ during his.
Going by ERA+, Pedro Martinez's peak kicks the crap out of Koufax, but he never gets any "best pitcher of all-time" buzz. Lefty Grove has two completely different peaks (4 and 5 yrs) better than Koufax's best 4 years. Greg Maddux has a 7-year peak more dominant than Koufax. And, of course, all those guys have more career value, Grove and Maddux at least double. That's just 3 names off the top of my head that I checked.
Of course, there are limits as to what this tells you he would have done over a longer career. Much of this may be explained (as would be his post-season success) by citing the narrow statistical sampling, I guess. But, the point is that things like this primed wellsprings the of his myth. This guy was doing that while pitching a whole lot of innings and complete games.
I should also mention that I don't think James reproduces this argument in the NBJHA, but still....
But those are both era issues.
You can't compare to any other great pitchers meaningfully, b/c one or two or three runs was a lot more relative support in the mid 60's than in any other era.
Likewise, he could throw a ton of IP b/c offense was so low; there were lots of easy outs.
Also, OPS+ isn't position adjusted, so Helton loses ground there. His peak is really, really good, but it's not especially close to Koufax's.
??? Koufax was a first ballot guy, and it wasn't even close. It may be a minor nit to pick, but you'd think that someone writing about Sandy Koufax would know that, or at least take 15 seconds to confirm it.
Yes; on the other side of the coin (extreme career stars) I once compared Bert Blyleven to Harold Baines (22 seasons, 118 ERA+ compared to 120 OPS+) and was roundly chided because the 118 ERA+ is a lot scarcer feat. In fact, over at the HOM, Blyleven is a typical first-ballot member and Baines is not even in the discussion.
If one was commanded to find a pitcher whose career was somewhat reminiscent of Helton's, it might be Lefty Gomez or Ron Guidry – also helped by their home park, careers of similar length to the one he's had so far, excellent peak, but not what you'd call awesomely dominant.
Sure, no doubt he was great. 4-3 0.95 ERA in 57 IP in the World Series.
But Whitey Ford, to pick an example, had a World Series streak from '57-'61 where he was 5-2 1.28 ERA, 63.3 IP, and he set the record for most consecutive scoreless IP in the World Series (including 3 straight shutout wins).
But, since Koufax 57 IP is all of his WS record it looks shinier on paper, while Ford pitched a total of 146 IP to a 2.71 ERA. Koufax only pitched in one WS game during the first 7 years of his career, when he was a fairly ordinary pitcher.
Fun trivia fact: Whitey Ford has a lower career ERA and higher career ERA+ than Koufax. 2.75 vs. 2.76, 133 vs. 131.
Pedro gets lots of "best pitcher of all-time" buzz AFAICT. Even the most casual fans understand that, at his peak, Pedro was one of the all-time greats. In any event, Koufax pitched a lot more innings than Pedro during their respective peaks, so it's not accurate to say that Pedro "kicks the crap out of Koufax."
Sure, but if we're only talking rate stats, it's nowhere near close.
His biggest problem to me is that he did this roughly around the time when a number of hitters were putting up big numbers...he doesn't stand out and we'd probably all put others first in line. And with the voters, Coors Field will really hurt him.
But why only look at rate stats? I don't think anyone here would claim that Rivera is the greatest pitcher of all time.
Sure, given that he's only 36 and still playing well. I was just thinking of analogues whose careers were over at this length (roughly like Koufax).
Gomez is in the HOF, of course, though not in the HOM.
Sure, but a lot of the IP difference is ERA. All the good SP's in the 60's threw a lot more IP than the guys in the '90's and '00's.
Compare Koufax's to guys like Grove and Walter Johnson (from eras when SP's threw a lot of IP) and they don't stand out. And those guys had better ERA+ in their peaks as well.
Koufax can't win a rate plus quantity argument, b/c there are guys that have both, and he can't win a pure rate argument, b/c their are guys who have him beat there too.
Because Koufax only has four great years. Once you include quantity, he isn't in the top 20 or 30.
Compare Koufax's to guys like Grove and Walter Johnson (from eras when SP's threw a lot of IP) and they don't stand out. And those guys had better ERA+ in their peaks as well.
Koufax can't win a rate plus quantity argument, b/c there are guys that have both, and he can't win a pure rate argument, b/c their are guys who have him beat there too.
I'm not sure I understand your point. I don't think anyone is comparing Koufax to Johnson or Grove (or Maddux or Clemens). The issues, as I see them, are (a) did Koufax have an all-time great peak for a starting pitcher, and (b) is Koufax a legitimate HOFer. I think the answer to both questions is an unqualified yes. 1600 IP with a 160 ERA+ over a 6 year period is amazing (in fact, it almost perfectly matches Grove's best 6 year stretch). (BTW, has anyone noticed that you can selected several lines in BBRef and it automatically sums those years? That's awesome.)
re the Pedro vs. Koufax argument -- there's no question that the difference in IP is mostly a function of era, but that doesn't change the fact that those extra IP were very valuable and need to be accounted for.
I was referring to the IP in each season for the purposes of evaluating the pitchers' peaks. You can't look at ERA+ without accounting for the number of innings pitched.
OK, but that's a very narrow definition of quantity, and you can't do IP without era-adjustment. Why would you include IP pitched per season in the peak, and then exclude the length of the peak in seasons?
Of course, you also have to era-adjust ERA+ (I'd love to see ERA+ and OPS+ done with standard deviations) since it seems easier to put up gaudy + numbers in some eras.
Basically I'd like to see ERA+ (adjusted to SD's) and IP (adjusted to SD's) for all the SP's. Of course, I have no idea how to construct this data myself.
The HOM all-time combined ballot had Koufax at 23rd. If the ballot allowed more than 20 total votes, he might have placed a little higher or lower as the support was pretty scattered for 19th and lower, so a 30-name ballot might have changed things at the edges. I'd guess he'd probably finish lower than 23rd based on his mixed support in the rankings-by-era balloting. Nevertheless, the peak is big enough for some peak voters to put him top 20.
OK. I'm surprised I got that close with my SWAG.
What length would you use?
That's part of the difference, but only a part. Koufax had only four seasons one could call full (5th most starts in a season: 28) and he was 4th, 3rd, 1st, 1st in IP those seasons. Pedro has had 7 seasons with 30 or more plus 3 more with 29, at a time when 33 was considered full workload. His highest IP finish is 4th, next is a couple of 6ths. Compared to their peers, Sandy was much more the workhorse. (And maybe that's why he had only those 4 full seasons.)
But he had 7 consecutive home run titles. And he didn't do it as a Dave Kingman; he led the league in walks three of those years and hit .300 three of those years.
The problem I have with this line of reasoning is that baseball DID change, in the sense that pitchers throw less innings now versus yesterday (both because of relievers and because the 5 man rotation gives starters less chance to rack up innings than the 4 man rotation did). So either you compare across generations, or you don't, but to me, somebody pitching over 200 innings had enough of a season to compare it with the work horses of before.
That being the case, Pedro's 217 IP, 291 ERA+ in 2000 is much more impressive to me than Koufax's 323 IP, 190 ERA + in 1966.
The one thing I could fault Pedro for is only starting 29 games that season (the league leader were Boomer Wells and Rick Helling with 35, plus a scrum woth of pitchers at 34) and throwing 20.2 innings less than the league leader that season (Mike Mussina, at 237.2), because Koufax was the league leader in starts and innings in 1966.
(If Pedro had pitched 5 more games, averaging the same number of innings as he did in his 29 starts that season, he would have ended up with about 254 innings, which would not have been shabby at all. As it was, he was pitching 7.48 innings per game, which is outstanding in this day and age, and is only 0.40 innings less per game than Koufax in 1966).
I don't know, it's subjective. But Koufax only stacks up well if you look at 4 or less.
This whole subject really does cry out for ERA++, and IP+, i.e. how many standard deviations above average was the pitcher's quality and quantity.
It is more than just era. If you took Greg Maddux, and put him in the conditions of the 60's, I bet he could have racked up the same kind of inning totals. I doubt that Pedro could have done it; he was never the most durable of starters.
And while relievers may give starters less chance to rack up innings, they also get him out of there before he tires and starts to give up runs.
He also does very well if you look at 5 or 6 year periods. As I noted, over his 6 best years (1961-1966), he had 1630 IP and a 156 ERA+.
Grove: 1928-1933: 1680 IP, 164 ERA+
Martinez: 1997-2002: 1220 IP, 213 ERA+
R. Johnson: 1997-2002: 1490 IP, 178 ERA+
Clemens: 1986-1991: 1550 IP, 158 ERA+
Whatever your definition of peak, I don't think there's any doubt that Koufax's peak is one of the best of all time.
That's a key issue, and the reason why direct comparisons of ERA+ are difficult.
Sure, but since he has nothing else, that's just not good enough to put him anywhere near "best pitcher of all time" territory. He'd need to be head-and-shoulders above the other top peaks to even start weighing peak vs. career. That he's in the running with a bunch of guys who have twice the career length means he's not particularly close.
To sum up Koufax: 4 great, great years, but over-rated.
I addressed this argument in post 24. No one is claiming that he's near "best pitcher of all time" territory.
Not in this thread. But in MSM or public opinion polls he gets substantial support.
He and Ryan are probably the most over-rated pitchers in the MSM/public consciousness, although they are extremely different in career shape.
Eat ####. I'm every bit as good a pitcher as the MSM thinks I am.
Sorry, I must have confused you with Randy again.
Try to picture a pitcher who gives up home runs as frequently as McGwire hit them. Now try to picture a pitcher who gives them up as rarely as Duane Kuiper hit them. Neither exists, of course. Then it's clear that there is much more variation between batters than between pitchers. A lot of it is caused by the different positional defensive requirements. Pitchers are only selected for pitching, hitters are selected for fielding and running as well.
I still like to proclaim Pedro the "greatest of all time" just because many/most people dislike him, and it draws them into an argument. Good fun!
Wait - some people don't like Pedro? What the hell is wrong with them?
The weird thing is that Gomez and Guidry did indeed have very similar careers, but Gomez is in the Hall while Guidry never even got 9% of the vote! And Guidry washed out completely after only 9 years on the ballot (failing to get 5% in the 2002 HOF election). Incredibly, Dave Stewart got more HOF votes than Guidry in Guidry's last two years on the ballot. Don Newcombe got 15.3% in his best year. Roy Face (the Pirate reliever) topped 10% seven times. Johnny Sain got 34% of the vote one year, and he had only 139 career wins, a .545 winning percentage and 106 ERA+. Bucky Walters, Lew Burdette, Mickey Lolich, Allie Reynolds, Johnny VanderMeer and Mel Harder all received about 25% or more in the best years on the HOF ballot.
There is a solid case to be made that Guidry is the most underrated pitcher by HOF voters in history.
That's why we need standard deviations. The SD in the 3 R league will very likely be lower than in the 5 R environment, but by how much?
Yesterday the LA Times crossword had a clue: "Like Johnson or Jones" and my immediate answer was: Randy. I don't know what this says about me.
How many innings a season was he pitching compared to them?
Yes, they are called Yankee fans.
What the hell is wrong with them?
See previous answer.
????
I don't understand the comparison. Guidry had one amazing year, a couple other very good ones, and a few more good ones. Guidry was a good pitcher, but nowhere near a HOFer.
From 1963-1966, Koufax tied for the MLB lead in CG and was #3 in IP (0.1 behind #2 and 2% behind the leader). Koufax put up a 172 ERA+, the next best was 152.
From 1997-2000, Pedro was #4 in CG and #7 in IP (8% behind the leader). He put up a 219 ERA+ while the next best guy was at 171.
Pedro was more durable in his prime than most people give him credit for, plus he continued to pitch at that level for another 3 years (albeit with less durability). Koufax was more of a workhorse but it's very difficult not to give Pedro the edge in peak performance.
You can't compare the value of ERA+ to teams from periods with widely differing runs/game. Pedro Martinez could throw a 1 run game or a shutout when league runs/game = 5.0, but Koufax could not throw a -1 run game when runs/game = 3.0. You really have to look at the distribution of runs/game by an average team and compare it to the distribution of runs allowed/game by the pitchers to find out who had the more valuable year.
That's why we need standard deviations. The SD in the 3 R league will very likely be lower than in the 5 R environment, but by how much?
Good point. Pedro's performance was arguably more valuable, but that doesn't mean he could have produced the same amount of value in Koufax's environment. For Koufax to deliver a 219 ERA+, he would have needed a 1.46 ERA over those four seasons. There's only been one single season during the live ball era in which a pitcher put up a 1.46 ERA or better, and that was Bob Gibson's 1968. Only 9 seasons have beaten Koufax's career-best 1.73 ERA in the live ball era; three were in strike-shortened years and none of them topped Koufax's 323 IP.
Now, of course, nobody in the live ball era had exceeded a 258 ERA+ until Pedro came along and posted a 291, so it's hard to say decisively that there's anything he couldn't have done.
Bob Lemon, Don Drysdale, Jim Bunning, Hal Newhouser, Lefty Gomez and Dazzy Vance are all Hall of Famers, and Guidry is very close to all of those guys in terms of length of career - he had 10 seasons where he pitched enough inning to qualify for the ERA title, the same number as Gomez, one less than Newhouser and only 2 less than Drysdale. He has a better winning percentage than any of them. He has an ERA+ comparable to all of them except Newhouser (who benefited greatly from the WW II years). He had more 20 win seasons than Bunning and Drysdale, and had as many as Newhouser - in each case despite the fact that all of those pitchers pitched in 4 man rotations and averaged many more starts per season as a result.
Furthermore, Guidry was the best big game pitcher of his era, winning 26 of 30 September starts for the Yankees in pennant races ('77, '78, '80, '83 and '85) and posting a 3-1 World Series record with a 1.69 ERA across three different World Series. He is the only pitcher to win a Cy Young award and receive CY votes in five or more other seasons and be rejected by the Hall. He is the only A.L. pitcher - and the only pitcher from either league since WW II - to win consecutive ERA titles and be rejected by the Hall. He is the only pitcher ever to make four Sporting News All-Star Teams and be rejected by the Hall (Guidry's four selections are as many as Koufax, Marichal and Seaver). He is the only pitcher to lead the major leagues in wins over a ten-year span and lead his own league in ERA over that span and be rejected by the Hall of Fame. And he is the only pitcher to achieve a decade-long pitching triple crown - leading his league in wins, strikeouts and ERA over a decade period - and be rejected by the Hall.
You may say he's "nowhere near a Hall of Famer", but why isn't he?
Agree with your post completely. Guidry's not a HoFer by modern SP standards, but he's very close, or is one, by historical (pre-1960's) SP standards.
OK, but Koufax was starting 38 games on average, completing 22; Pedro was starting 30, completing seven.
Pedro's performance may have been slightly scarcer than Koufax's, in terms of quality, when compared to other pitchers of his era. But Koufax was having an effect on more games, and a greater effect on each game.
I think that direct comparisons across such different usage patterns are somewhat futile. The best one can really claim is that certain guys were more or less outstanding relative to the common pitcher of their day, at the same time acknowledging that ace starters in certain eras (deadball and before, 1960s and 1970s) just had more impact on the game than ace starters in other eras.
Well, Drysdale and Bunning were not pre-1960's. Nor was Koufax. Nor Catfish Hunter, who pitched only 11 seasons where he qualified for league rate titles. And what about Bruce Sutter? I know he's a reliever, but he had only ten seasons in which he pitched more than 50 innings.
I think Guidry's candidacy suffers from a lot of things - he was one of the first pitchers to become eligible for the Hall who pitched exclusively in the era of 5-man rotations, he lost shots at 20 win seasons in '79 and '80 because he volunteered to go to the bullpen for stretches (and the Yankees stupidly made the move), the strike-shortened '81 season cost him another shot at 17 or 18 victories, and for some reason his amazing clutch pitching performances have been forgotten (winning the '78 one-game playoff against the Red Sox, pitching back-to-back two-hit shutouts against the Sox in September '78 with the race within two games each time, and going 6-0 with a 1.97 ERA in late season starts against other teams contending with the Yanks for a division title).
He belongs in the Hall. Maybe he should get a radio gig and ceaselessly promote his own candidacy, kinda like Blyleven.
Yeah, imprecise language on my part. I meant the impossibly high standards impoved after the slew of 250+ game winners who debuted in the 1960's.
Not in this thread. But in MSM or public opinion polls he gets substantial support.
But that's because their definition of "best" is not the sabermetric version, which ranks pitchers like Blyleven over him. With most people "best" is visible A-level talent that consistently performs at its best in the most important games----and their definition of "most important" does not equate a World Series game with a game in April against the Royals.
It also doesn't necessarily consider career value to override peak value, and five consecutive years of absolute dominance over hitters (with consideration for the fact that Koufax pitched while hurt for much of 1962) is plenty long enough a peak, especially when you throw in those World Series games.
And by that standard, Koufax is definitely in the mix, if not at the very top.
He and Ryan are probably the most over-rated pitchers in the MSM/public consciousness, although they are extremely different in career shape.
Again, though, this is just a matter of how you define "best." Ryan pitched seven no-hitters and struck out what, a thousand more batters than the runner-up? To some people, that's a strong case for "best." It's not yours and it's not mine, but it's not as if they're choosing Steve Dalkowski or Sam McDowell. When you see a pitcher like Ryan at his best, and you don't bother to remember the rest, it's easy to see why they'd overrate him by a more rational standard.
It is difficult to conceive of a more misleading statement. Guidry had ten full seasons, and only in one of them was he a below average pitcher ('84, when he had arm problems and an ERA+ of 84). Furthermore, to characterize "6-7 of them" merely as "above average" is a bit absurd, considering that Guidry received Cy Young Award votes in six of those seasons. Guidry took only nine years to accumulate six seasons in which he received Cy Young Award votes; the following pitchers never achieved this: Carlton, Glavine, Jenkins, Eckersley, Ryan and Morris.
There are 12 pitchers to win a Cy Young and receive Cy Young votes in five or more other seasons: Tom Seaver, Jim Palmer, Ferguson Jenkins, Steve Carlton, Ron Guidry, Dennis Eckersley, Roger Clemens, Randy Johnson, Greg Maddux, Pedro Martinez, Tom Glavine and Johan Santana. Every single one is in the Hall of Fame or is a mortal lock for induction - except Ron Guidry. And Guidry never even got 9% of the vote.
How does one explain that?
seriously, Guidry had 170 wins, 2392 IP and a 119 ERA+ (3.29)
The following are pitchers with 150-200 wins, 2000-2800 ip and an ERA+ between 114 and 124 (ranked by Fibbonacci Win Points):
out Sam Leever 222out Larry Corcoran 206
out Jesse Tannehill 205
out Deacon Phillippe 200
out Ed Reulbach 191
out Ron Guidry 190
out Lon Warneke 189
out Urban Shocker 185
out Jimmy Key 183
out Wes Ferrell 181
IN John Ward 163
out John Candelaria 160
out Ed Lopat 153
out Eddie Rommel 153
out Ed Morris 149
out Sadie McMahon 146
out Virgil Trucks 142
out Hippo Vaughn 142
out Kevin Appier 125
out Curt Davis 113
out Dizzy Trout 96
out Jack Taylor 92
one guy, John Ward, is in the HOF, and he also played 1200+ game sat 2b/ss and had 8000 PAs, and played over 100 years ago.
expand the group- 150-200 wins, 1800-3000 ip, ERA + 111-127:
out Sam Leever 222IN Lefty Gomez 210
out Larry Corcoran 206
out Dwight Gooden 205
out Jesse Tannehill 205
out Deacon Phillippe 200
out Ed Reulbach 191
out Ron Guidry 190
out Lon Warneke 189
out David Cone 186
out Urban Shocker 185
out Jimmy Key 183
out Wes Ferrell 181
IN Dazzy Vance 172
out Tommy Bridges 169
out Babe Adams 167
out Nig Cuppy 165
IN John Ward 163
out John Candelaria 160
out Bob Shawkey 157
out Ed Lopat 153
out Eddie Rommel 153
out Ed Morris 149
out Bret Saberhagen 148
out Sadie McMahon 146
out Virgil Trucks 142
out Hippo Vaughn 142
out Bartolo Colon 141
who is in now:
Lefty Gomez
Dazzy Vance
John Ward
What does Gomez have over Guidry?
19 more wins
100 more IP
1 more 20 win season
high win mark of 26 versus 25
ERA+ 6 points better
They are broadly similar, but Goofy is better
Vance too, but 27 more wins, 600 more IP, better ERA+, has a 28-6 season...
Guidry belongs in a group of VERY GOOD pitchers, but a group that nonetheless are not HOFers
The problem with Guidry is that if you do select Guidry, then what about Cone? Gooden? Urban Shocker (love that name- actually given the name and the story one could make of his career and death I'm surprised he's never gained any traction in HOF talk), or Tommy Bridges
IF Guidry is in, what about Saberhagen????
How does one explain that?
Well, we have to put Eck aside because he was essentially voted in as a closer.
But it's not that hard to explain. Seaver, Palmer, Jenkins, Carlton, Clemens, Johnson, Maddux and Glavine all compiled huge career stats. On peak/rate stats, Pedro blows Guidry out of the water. Santana, whose HoF election is far from certain in my opinion, is the only guy in that list even remotely comparable to Guidry at this point in his career.
Now you can justifiably argue he should have topped 9% but the HoF voters have a very strange voting history on the HoVG set, so it's just not worth getting worked up about. You can argue that he met the pre-60s standards (not sure if I agree or not)but, as someone notes above, once all those 3,000 K - 300 win - 4000 IP guys came along, the starter standards shifted up dramatically. John, Kaat, Blyleven (yet), Tiant, Stieb, Saberhagen, Gooden, Hershiser, etc. are a mix of peak and good, not great, career pitchers who didn't make it.
Relievers aside, there really aren't many peak-only pitchers in the HoF -- Koufax, Dean, Drysdale spring to mind ... and Hunter. And Guidry's peak (77-86) isn't that amazing -- 2100 IP of 121 ERA+. Kevin Brown's career rate stats are more impressive than that in 1000 more IP. Dennis Martinez (87-96) threw 2000 IP of 128 ERA+. Jim Maloney's peak (which is his entire career) isn't far off. Guidry's peak primarily stands out because of all the wins (and win %) and the clutch performance (not that either should be ignored ... just making the point that he wasn't really "dominant" in any historical sense ... over a 10-year period anyway).
And Guidry vs. Blyleven -- oh, come on. Guidry has a 1-point edge in career ERA+; Blyleven has an edge of 2600 IP, 1900 Ks, 117 wins (a few more losses too :-). Yes, they would have chosen Guidry over Blyleven back then -- and maybe they'd have been right to do so -- but it's no mystery why Blyleven is getting more serious HoF consideration.
Also, receiving CYA votes is a pretty flimsy standard. His 1st, 2nd and 3rd place finishes are impressive but finishing 5th (once) and 7th (twice) represents nothing more than a handful of 3rd place votes (12 points total across those 3 years). Point being that in most years, you and I finish no worse than 10th in CYA voting.
The outlier in all of this is Hunter (and maybe eventually Morris), not Guidry.
Tommy doesn't care about that. Like most fanboys he cares only about his guy. There are dozens of pitchers not in the Hall who are better than the worst selections. Pointing out that Guidry is about as good as Gomez is an argument to keep him out, not put him in.
What was the deal with Guidry in 1979. Looking at his game logs, he started on May 2, pitched in relief on May 6 and 8, and then didn't pitch again until a May 16 start. Was he injured? Anyway, he made 30 starts and only 3 relief appearances, and got a win in one of them. So, no, his brief bullpen stint did not cost him 20 wins that year. Maybe 1980, when he was out of the rotation for about 3 weeks (and got 1 relief win). But he would have had to win all 4 of his missing starts to get 20
Hey! I am enough of a Maddux fanboy not to let this pass, even though the discussion has moved on to Guidry. 1994: 271, 1995: 262, both of those over 200+ innings in a shortened season.
Try to picture a pitcher who gives up home runs as frequently as McGwire hit them. Now try to picture a pitcher who gives them up as rarely as Duane Kuiper hit them. Neither exists, of course.
Apparently this book was written before Adam Eaton's career.
I can understand the Gooden and Cone comparisons, but Saberhagen? The guy pitched enough innings to qualify for an ERA title in only seven seasons. He won 20 twice and each time had a losing season the next year, winning seven games or fewer. He had only seven seasons where he won more than 10 games, and only three where he won more than 15. In what should have been the peak years of his career, he had seasons of 7-12, 5-9, 3-5, 7-7 and 7-6. You're comparing that to the guy who led all the major leagues in wins over a decade period and led his own league in strikeouts and ERA? It seems ridiculous on its face.
The Doc Gooden comparison is at least legitimate, so let's turn to it. Gooden'sand Guidry's records are strikingly similar, save for a meaningful, but not huge, edge for Guidry in the ERA+ number. Here's the difference, however. After Dwight's first four seasons he never really put together a season that clearly qualified him as one of the premier pitchers in his league. Despite putting up consistently good winning percentages for good Met teams, Gooden's ERAs and other statistical achievements were notably mediocre. Consider the following:
1. Gooden didn't lead the N.L. in a single major pitching category after his historic 1985 season. He didn't add a single point to his "Black Ink" total.
Guidry, by contrast, led the A.L. in major pitching categories numerous times after his great '78 season - ERA in 1979, WHIP in '81, complete games in '83, wins and winning percentage in '85, and fewest BB/IP in '86. Guidry added 15 Black Ink points after his '78 season - more than half his career total - and passed Gooden, 29 to 23.
2. After Gooden's first four seasons, he went five consecutive years in which he did not have a season with double-digit wins and an ERA+ greater than 102. During that stretch, his best ERA+ was 113 in 1989, but injuries limited Gooden to 9 wins and 118 IP. He won 19 and 18 games in '90 and '88, respectively, but had ERA+'s of only 102 and 98. Gooden would have only one more season in which he'd win more than 10 games and have an ERA+ greater than 102 - he had a 117 ERA+ in 1993 while struggling to a 12-15 record with a Mets team in decline.
Guidry, by contrast, added three more seasons over the latter half of his productive career in which he had both impressive win totals and an ERA+ significantly better than the average: '81, '83 and '85. He had two more 20 win seasons and two more seasons in which his ERA+ was at least 20% better than league average.
3. Gooden received only incidental consideration for the Cy Young Award after his historic '85 season. Gooden finished 4th in '90, 5th in '87 and 7th in '86, and had only a .18 CY award vote share.
Guidry compiled a .87 CY award vote share after '78, finishing 2nd in '85, 3rd in '79, 5th in '83 and 7th in '81.
Gooden was really never the same after his big '85 season, whereas Guidry continued to have 20 win seasons, serious CY consideration, and frequent league-leading performances in major statistical categories. And then there is the post-season records, where Doc just never really got it together.
Doc is your strongest case for your "but if you put in Guidry..." argument, and it's still pretty weak. Big difference between Gooden and Guidry, and all the arguments favor Guidry.
He averaged 13 wins a season over those 10 years (if you adjust for the strike-shortened '94 season and credit him with 16 wins). He never won more than 16 games in a season during that span, despite pitching for some very good Expos and Indians teams. In that entire 10 year period he received Cy Young votes in only one year - 4 votes in '91. No one considered Martinez on the best starting pitchers in baseball during that period; good, yes, but not one of the best. Guidry, by contrast, was generally considered one of the best pitchers in the AL.
There is far more to pitching than ERAs. Martinez had the good run support, he played for many good teams, and he was NEVER a big winner. He never won more than 16 games in a season. And that's still the name of the game for starting pitchers. Sure, you can give a pitcher a break when he pitched for bad teams and/or got miserable run support. But Martinez pitched for an excellent pennant winner in '79 and he goes 15-16. He pitched for a World Series winner in '83 and he goes 7-16. Put him on a 94 game winner in '93 and he goes 15-9.
That's not Hall of Fame, not under any standards, not in any era.
Wow, huge oversight on my part--not sure how I missed that. I think I'm just used to looking at the Baseball-Reference leaderboards and seeing Maddux and Clemens in bold, as active players.
8 seasons, to Guidry's 10, and missed on 2 others by 6 or fewer innings.
And Guidry won 20 only 3 times. I'm not sure what the second part has to do with anything. Guidry had losing seasons after 2 of his 3 20 win campaigns.
And Guidry had only , and one of those was 11.
And 2 seasons of 14 and one of 13. Guidry won more than 13 one time more than Saberhagen
So what? He won 92 games and 2 CYA before Guidry won his second game.
It doesn't matter when you add the value, what matters is the quality and quantity. An objective observer would note that there's not a dimes worth of difference between the two. Guidry has a slight advantage in big seasons, due almost exclusively to 1978. Comparing second, third, fourth best seasons, etc, Sabes is as good or slightly better. And Guidry's 1978 wasn't that much better than Saberhagen's 1989. Likewise, Sabes has a slight advantage in career value, a little less than 200 innings more and a 7 point advantage in ERA+.
I forget, are we talking about Ron Guidry or Jack Morris?
Actually, one of 15 and 2 of 14.
Actually, by WAR, it's not close. Top 5 seasons/career total:
Guidry - 8.5, 6.0, 4.9, 4.6, 4.2/44.4
Sabes - 8.6, 7.0, 6.7, 5.2, 5.0/54.7
and just for grins
Gooden - 11.7, 5.4, 4.4, 3.8, 3.7/47.6
Better, (sometimes significantly better) in each of their top 5 seasons, big advantage in career value as well.
Cue Fanboy in CT spouting off the ridiculousness of a 23-6 season being as good as a 25-3 one.
And therein lies the perfect compromise for the likes of Bonds and McGwire.
That would be a bit odd since neither player ever played for the Yankees but I like the outside the box thinking!
Saberhagen, by comparison, had an 11 year stretch that constituted his prime, running from '84 to '94. During this 11 year stretch he had SIX SEASONS where he had a .500 or worse record. In five of these seasons he won 10 or fewer games. Misirlou can attempt to ignore these seasons, but they count, and they were disasters for Saberhagen and for his team. Consistency counts, particularly for pitchers (like Guidry and Saberhagen) who had relatively short careers. The fact is that Guidry was the most consistent winner in the major leagues over a ten year stretch, while Saberhagen was the most inconsistent, erratic and frequently disappointing pitcher in all of baseball. There is plenty of precedent for inducting pitchers into the Hall who had relatively brief careers (Gomez, Drysdale, Lemon, Vance, etc.) but absolutely NO PRECEDENT for inducting a pitcher who was as often as not a .500 or below pitcher over the peak of his career.
Guidry had one year during his nine-year peak where he was sub-.500 and won only 10 games - '84, when he suffered arm problems. That can't be held against a pitcher; even the most consistent pitchers of the post-WW II era have had a very weak season in the midst of a brilliant run, including Palmer, Seaver, Spahn, Carlton, Clemens, Randy Johnson, etc. Almost alone in never having a very weak season over an extended prime is Maddux. Most often these seasons are attributable to arm problems. But Saberhagen was a continual crapshoot, experiencing arm problems and/or simply bad seasons more often than standout seasons during his prime. He was just as likely to be 5-9 or 7-12 as he was to be 20-6 or 23-6.
If you're going to credit a pitcher with his best peak seasons during his prime, you also have to look at his worst seasons. Saberhagen had more bad seasons during his prime than any other allegedly elite pitcher of his era, and was even more inconsistent that Schilling in that regard. To pretend otherwise, as Misirlou does, is to resort to the most specious reasoning.
OTOH if there's a Hall of Fame that only counts odd numbered years, Sabes might be the first inductee.
You're retarded. Shut up.
Sincerely,
Someone who couldn't give less of a #### if Guidry or Saberhagen was better, but knows stupidity when he sees it.
Yes, looking at a pitcher's 5 best seasons is completely unreasonable.
Saberhagen, by comparison, had an 11 year stretch that constituted his prime, running from '84 to '94. During this 11 year stretch he had SIX SEASONS where he had a .500 or worse record.
Can you offer me a coherent reason why it matters in hindsight that a pitcher's best years were not consecutive?
Because of the obvious lack of reliability factor. If a player signs a long term contract and only lives up to it every other year, that's a positive detriment to his team. When you don't know what you're going to get from year to year, it disrupts any kind of long range strategic planning.
compared to whose? Your's?
Guidry, despite playing on the wrong team, was one of my faves growing up, but come on, the dude had only 2300 ip
The only HOF pitchers with less are:
Addie Joss
Sandy Koufax
Hoyt Wilhelm
Candy Cummings
Dizzy Dean
Goose
Fingers
Ruth
Sutter
Let's throw out the relievers, Wilhelm, Goose, Fingers & Sutter
Let's throw out Ruth and Ward
Let's throw out Cummings (elected as a "pioneer")
that leaves:
Addie Joss
Sandy Koufax
Dizzy Dean
Joss had a huge ERA+ advantage, and his career was cut short by death
Koufax...
Dean
Ok Guidry has an argument regarding Dean
Uh, because bad seasons hurt teams? Are you seriously suggesting that only good seasons count? When the Royals relied upon Saberhagen to be a top-flight pitcher in all those years when he was 5-9 and 7-12 and 3-5, that KILLED them. In what universe does any meaningful analysis of performance credit good performance but completely disregard poor performance?
This is really fantastic, given:
Say it with me: We can make a group!
As between discussing the subject with someone like Misirlou, who can only respond to valid arguments by distorting them, and someone like Eric J, who apparently has no understanding of statistics and probability, I'd probably prefer to address Misirlou. You at least get the sense that Misirlou knows how illegitimate his arguments are, whereas Eric J couldn't possibly hope to understand the absurdity of his arguments.
P.S. Thanks, Jolly Old, you're absolutely correct, of course. You'd think this would be too obvious to point out, but...
First, Saberhagen didn't really have "bad seasons" during his prime - he had mediocre seasons. His 7-12 record in 1986 had a lot more to do with the fact that the Royals couldn't hit than it did with the actual quality of his pitching. And I doubt the Royals were counting on him for anything when he went 3-5, because he was a Met.
Second, why does Saberhagen's 1986 hurt his team more than Guidry's 1986 hurts his? They're both very slightly above average seasons that resulted in losing records, and they both came immediately after 20-win seasons. And the Royals finished 16 games out of the playoffs that year - they weren't going anywhere even if Sabes went 20-6 again. Meanshile, the Yankees finished 5.5 out. I would say that Guidry KILLED his team to a much greater extent that year.
Anyway, I never argued that poor performance should be disregarded. I argued that the sequencing of good and poor performance should (possibly) be disregarded.
This is a valid argument - but at the same time, it relies on a high level of synchronicity between the player's best years and his team's success cycle. A simple counterexample would be Ernie Banks - the Cubs would have been better off if his best years had been randomly distributed throughout his career, because they didn't contend until the late '60s, when he was pretty much washed up.
The point still stands, because in most cases a great player's best years will coincide with his team's best years, for the simple reason that the team has a great player having his best years. But I'd say it's a pretty small factor at best.
Well, this is what I mean by innumerate. Saberhagen was flat out bad in '86. His ERA+ may have been a mediocre 102, but his distribution of performances was horrendous. He had 12 starts where he never made it out of the fifth inning. He had nine starts where he pitched six innings or less and either surrendered four or more earned runs or surrendered more earned runs than innings he'd pitched. Only 40% of his starts that year were quality starts, and that is a terrible figure - out of 56 starting pitchers who started 20 or more games, only FOUR had a worse percentage of quality starts.
No, Eric J, Saberhagen stunk in '86.
Fine. Conceded. He had one bad year during his prime.
Extreme cherrypicking? Comparing 2 player's 5 best years and their overall career stats is cherrypicking? Who knew?
OK, apparently the only valid way to evaluate to players is comparing their best 10 consecutive years.
BY WAR, Guidry 1977-1986: 4.6, 8.5, 6.0, 3.4, 2.7, 3.9, 4.9, 1.3, 4.2, 2.5 total 41.6
Saberhagen 1985-1995: 6.7, 1.8, 7.0, 3.5, 8.6, 3.3, 5.0, 1.5, 2.8, 5.2 total 45.4
In a direct head to head contest (year 1 vs year 1 and so forth), Saberhagen wins 7-3. Arrange the years from best to worst, Saberhagen wins the first (best) 5, Guidry wins the next 4, Sabes the last one . 6-4 Saberhagen. Outside of this 10 year period, Saberhagen has 4 more years better than Guidry's worst.
So Saberhagen beats Guidry on career, best 5 seasons, both consecutive and non-consecutive, best 10 years, both consecutive and non.
Hows that for cherry picking?
Conceding a point to a Troll is not a wise course of action.
I only waded into this because I was a Guidry fan and Guidry's lack of MSM support when Hall voting came around puzzled me too, but only for awhile, if you actually LOOK objectively (which Troll does not), Guidry, despite 1978, despite 3 20 win seasons, despite the facial similarity between his career line and Koufax's, does not come anywhere NEAR the established standards for Hall induction-
His career vaguely looks like Koufax's or Gomez's- BUT THEY WERE BETTER-
Dizzy? Dizzy is/was an extreme outlier
The problem is not that 1 or 2 guys have an argument as good as Guidry, it's that there are more than dozen- that's the problem
OK Guidry was better than
Rube Marquard
Catfish & Jesse Haines,
he has a lot of company
Again, this assumes that Saberhagen's bad seasons were the fault of his team, and not a consequence of either bad pitching or arm problems. Saberhagen stunk in '86, as I've demonstrated; very inconsistent, very few quality starts. Same thing with 1990 - the Royals gave Saberhagen 4.6 runs/game, well above the park-adjusted average of 4.1, and Saberhagen still could only manage a 5-9 record. Same thing for '93 with the Mets - they were a bad hitting team, but they gave Saberhagen above-average support and he still went only 7-7. The Mets scored enough runs for Saberhagen that his Pythagorean winning percentage was over .600, and yet he finished 7-7. He got SPECTACULAR run support in '95 - 5.4 runs/game - and could muster only a 7-6 record. He had a Blyleven-like ability to underperform his Pythagorean projections and make very poor use of the run support he received.
These are bad seasons, seasons where Saberhagen was incredibly erratic and/or received above average run support and still couldn't crack .500.
Jesus Christ, I'm trying to talk to a guy who thinks '85 to '95 is ten years. Hopeless.
As for your complete reliance on WAR, it is a terribly deceptive statistic for pitchers like Saberhagen and Blyleven who too frequently underperformed their Pythagorean projections, squandered average or above run support, and couldn't achieve decent W-L records even when provided with good support.
P.S. '85 to '95 is 11 years, genius.
No, it assumes nothing about Saberhagen, because it was a general argument.
No, you're trying to talk to a guy who made one typo. The totals listed are for '85-'94.
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