While his signing was viewed as a novelty act, Moyer has been the Rockies’ best starting pitcher this season. He didn’t walk clumsily into history against San Diego, instead embracing it with pitches on the corners and at all different speeds. Moyer worked seven innings, allowing no earned runs on six hits. His lone strikeout victim was Padres center fielder Cameron Maybin, who swung so hard he fell to his knees in the sixth inning.
The Brooklyn Dodgers’ Jack Quinn was the previous oldest pitcher to win a game, topping the St. Louis Cardinals in 1932 at 49 years, 70 days.
“I kind of wish I was a baseball historian, and I am a little embarrassed that I don’t know more about it,” Moyer said. “To have my name mentioned with the greats of the past is special.”
...This was vintage Moyer. And that’s saying something for a guy who has thrown more than 58,000 pitches. Baseball scouts armed with stopwatches and radar guns prefer pitchers bigger and stronger. The radar gun becomes the résumé. Moyer, as said before, is a raider of a lost art. He topped out at 79 miles per hour on his fastball and shrewdly blended in a 27 changeups and four curveballs.
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Yeah, that really confused me, since the only thing I knew about him was that according to BB-ref he was born in the Austro-Hungarian Empire.
Edit for the benefit of those who haven't seen the first hundred comments: This comment is not about Jamie Moyer.
Holy crap, I completely missed that had happened. Found the BBTF thread here. Judging by the date, I was on vacation that week.
Geez. Let's hope your children don't want to be screenwriters.
You mean, your friends didn't bombard you with 'Fat Toad is Dead' text messages that week? Did you lose your cell phone while on vacation?
It's fascinating to see the breakdown. of the 3 ball PAs
Count # PA BB IBB BA OBP SLG3-0 8 4 3 2 1.000 1.000 1.000
3-1 23 13 4 0 .333 .538 .667
3-2 30 30 2 0 .393 .433 .679
(In case it's not clear, he was at 3-0 8 times. 4 were resolved at that count. Got to 3-1 23 times. 13 were resolved at that count)
You aren't going to take Cameron Maybin? He'd probably be the third best player in that lineup (after Posey/Sandoval)
Nope, I don't make friends with Yankee fans.
I understand that the Padres are (a) a bad team (b) playing on the West Coast (c) in an extreme pitcher's park, which means their hitters are always going to be overlooked. They have good players at catcher and third base (not just mediocre major leaguers, but actual good players) but part of the issue here is that they double up with the Giants there.
It was a Sunday; here were the daytime (before 7pm) network schedules that day:
ABC
---
before 1:30pm (!) Local or off-air
1:30 Inside Politics (public affairs)
2:00 Directions '63 (religious)
2:30 Adlai Stevenson Show (yes, really!)
3:00 Issues and Answers (this show ran from 1960-81)
3:30 AFL Pro Football (yes!), followed by "Pro Football Scoreboard" at 6:15 or so
6:30 Winston Churchill (documentary)
CBS
---
10:00 Lamp Unto My Feet (religious)
10:30 Look Up And Live (religious)
11:00 Camera Three (variety; these three shows ran some 25 years, c. 1955-80)
11:30 (local)
12:30 CBS Washington Report
1:00 (local)
1:45 NFL Kickoff
2:00 NFL Pro Football (note that there were only two pro football games on per week, unlike now)
5:00 Original Amateur Hour
5:30 GE College Bowl (sigh.)
Why can't I live in a world where there's a place on TV -- somewhere, anywhere -- for a show like the College Bowl? Why? There's a million g@ddamn networks, and they all air the same retarded reality shows, endless cop and courtroom dramas, idiot political commentators, and poker. No room for a show like the College Bowl, a show that features smart kids answering interesting questions. No, not even half an hour a week. Get lost, egghead.
Sometimes I just hate the modern world. Hate it.
6:00 The Twentieth Century (documentary)
6:30 Password (yea!)
NBC
---
1:30 Frontiers of Faith (religious)
2:00 local; no football on NBC, folks (they would get the rights to the AFL in 1966)
4:30 This is NBC News (and don't you forget it!)
5:00 Update (public affairs)
5:30 Bullwinkle Show (oh, yeah!)
6:00 Meet The Press (originally aired in prime time in the 40s, then slowly drifted backward into early afternoon)
6:30 McKeever and the Colonel (sitcom)
The past is a different country, isn't it?
Julio Franco was 49 in 2007. It's just that as an outfielder the pitching records Moyer is challenging don't apply to him.
Moneyball was written 10 years ago.
Also, I am so, so glad that Moyer is still in baseball. Tuesday...that was awesome!
An interesting thing about this Moyer at 49 stuff is how the records for age he is breaking are very old records. Quinn last played in 1933, Paige in 1965, Wilhelm in 1972. Seems odd with medical science improving that someone else hasn't cracked age 49 in the majors.
With salaries at today's levels, anyone who was good enough to still be pitching at 49 probably has enough money that they don't need to.
It's really hard to hit somebody who is so much slower than anybody else you'll face. It's just really hard to suppress everything you've learned about getting the bat started early enough to make solid contact with typical major league stuff.
From the 1987 Scouting Report: (stamped "NEEDS ANOTHER PITCH")
"[...] When things start to unravel, Moyer begins to lose confidence in his best pitches, which are off-speed pitches, and strays from his game plan. His fastball is not a major league pitch."
And in summary:
"Moyer is young and was a bit in awe of the majors last season. He is an enthusiastic rookie who, unlike many players, wants to learn and study more about his opponents. He spends time in the dugout taking notes and watching the master pitchers (presumably on the other team. As noted elsewhere in the report about him, he pitched for a terrible Cubs staff and led the starters in wins with 9 -- RNJ) of the league work their magic. He is very receptive to coaching, and to advice of veteran pitchers. Moyer could develop into a 10-to-15 game winner."
You can. Move to the UK. University Challenge, based on College Bowl, is still running.
This issue seems to be very sensitive to when you pick your endpoints: live ball era, integration, free agency, etc.
I looked at qualifying seasons for players of age < 23 and age > 35 (from B-R PI). Below is the percent of qualifying seasons by decade where the OPS+ (for batters "B") or ERA+ (for pitchers "P") was < 100.
years B-AGE<23 B-AGE>35 P-AGE<23 P-AGE>35 1901-1909 53% 60% 30% 31% 1910s 52 40 42 24 1920s 46 42 50 2 1930s 41 59 26 37 1940s 59 39 40 32 1950s 38 14 49 27 1960s 34 31 33 43 1970s 39 24 40 16 1980s 33 31 24 36 1990s 50 28 41 40 2000s 44 33 33 27You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
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