Roger Clemens "the best pitcher we have seen over the last 40 years"?

I heard this last night on ESPN. I don't think it was Gammons who said it (I hope it wasn't) it might have been Dan Pugh...er excuse me Dan Patirck. Aside from the obvious LOVE the media has for the Yankees I started running pitchers we've seen since 1963:

Sandy Koufax (for a few years there...)
Steve Carlton
Greg Maddux
Nolan Ryan
Tom Seaver
Sid Finch
Bob Gibson
Jim Palmer

Clemens is great one no doubt but the best?

I'll add that I think it helps if you don't have to stand in the batter's box.

but that is my own biased Diamondback opinion

and playing for much worse teams most of the time. Koufax, of course, is god. :-)

Strikeouts.

Yes, only strikeouts. Seven no-hitters is a junk stat. Sure, it's impressive, but a lot of luck goes into pitching a no-no.

Hell, Len Barker and Tom Browning each pitched a perfect game, and that's a lot more impressive than a multi-walk no-hitter. He was very good, and he pitched forever. He ain't in Rocket's league, though.

for 2 of those no-hitters he had the Texas Rangers playing defense behind him. (I'm a life-long Rangers fan so I can rag on 'em.) :)

but it does take a lot of luck. It was very hard for major league hitters to hit Nolan Ryan. That's certainly a mark in the Express' favor. On the other hand, hits are not the only way to beat a pitcher, and Nolan walked a whole boatload of batters.

I don't want to sound down on Nolan Ryan. I think he was a hell of a pitcher, and I always enjoyed watching him.

I loved watching Nolan and got to see him in person many times at the old Arlington Stadium. I was there for the very last game he ever pitched at home and at the new Ballpark for the day they retired his number.

I wish to god I had been there the night he put Robin Ventura in a head lock and wailed on him. Still to this day one of the funniest damn things I've ever seen in sports. Got beat up by an old man. :)

Nolan has a strange kind of legend down here in Texas. He'd be one of those larger-than-life figures we're so famous for if it wasn't for the fact that he comes off as such an ordinary kind of guy. One of the funniest things I ever heard was in an interview when someone asked him how he stayed in shape. His answer was that when he had a craving for dessert he'd split a piece of pie with his wife instead of having a whole piece himself. What a guy. *shakes head*

I think a serious argument can be made for Clemens as the best over the last 40 years. Except for the time period when he got fat and lazy, and got run out of Boston (or ran himself out of Boston), he's had a great career.

Maddux is the only one with career numbers to approximate Clemens' but he is not perceived as a "dominating" pitcher because he doesn't throw the ball 100 mph.

Nahh, I don't think so but I may be a tad biased right now. I'm curious if he gets his way with the cap in the Hall of Fame.

I remember reading the Sid Finch article in SI. I was on the T in Boston. Fascinating stuff. :)

I agree with Bill Simmons of ESPN.com: Roger should go in with a $ on his cap. :P

More Gas than Maddux, not as intimidating as Ryan. More Durable than Koufax.


Sid Finch had a wicked fastball but you could just wait on that Uncle Charlie 12-6.......

Played the tuba too.

(Carlton). Also has the distinction of being even a bigger jerk than Clemens.

He is better than Koufax (who only had 5 excellent years). Clemens has had just as many spectacular years. And a much, much longer career as an excellent pitcher.

He is better than Carlton. Not even close.

He is slightly better than Greg Maddux has been. This could change.

His far better than Nolan Ryan, who had a great and long career, but was never the best pitcher in baseball in any season.

Not clear whether he is better than Seaver. I think he was, but it is not obvious.

Sidd Finch! :-) Good George Plimpton tribute. ;-)

He is better than Bob Gibson. More great seasons. Longer career.

He is far better than Palmer. Not even close.

Clemens' best years were in the 80s and 90s and were well spread out. So they perhaps do not stand out as much as Koufax's great 4-5 year run. But he has had at least 4-5 years as good as Koufax's, and his other 15 or so have generally been very good, if not excellent.

I do not like Clemens as a player, and I hate the Yankees. But I agree with the ESPN commentator that Clemens may have been the best pitcher of the last 40 years.

Here's a good article by Rob Neyer on this subject: http://espn.go.com/mlb/columns/neyer_rob/1558124.html

--Peter

The clincher is the fact that he did his best pitching in this era of ridiculous offensive production.

Carlton & others didn't have to deal with the DH, small ballparks, etc.

Clemens in #1 the last 40 years.

And I still don't like him.

And I am a lifetime Yankees fan.

>Sandy Koufax (for a few years there...)
Exactly right. For a few years ('62-'66), he was nigh well unhittable. For the first half of his career, he was an average pitcher. He was also helped by the Dodger Stadium ground crew making that mound super high.

>Steve Carlton
In his best years ('69, '72, '77, '80, and '81), he was great. Otherwise, he was a hair above average for a long time.

>Greg Maddux
Close. Clemens has pitched at pretty much the same level of effectiveness for a little longer. If Maddux puts together two more years at his career norm, it'll be a virtual tie; but Clemens has the edge for now.

>Nolan Ryan
Ryan could do one thing better than anybody: strike out batters. Actually, he could do another thing at an unparalleled level: walk batters. On the whole, Ryan was very good for very long, and deserves his spot in the Hall. He is not, however, even in the top TEN of the past 40 years.

>Tom Seaver
A very good argument can be made for Seaver. To my mind, he is Clemens' only LEGITIMATE challenger for the title.

>Sid Finch
Hee hee hee.

>Bob Gibson
Fewer innings pitched than Clemens, he also benefitted from playing in the most heavily-tilted pitcher's era since the 1910s. Great pitcher, but not the greatest.

>Jim Palmer
Great pitcher whose reputation is enhanced by the fact that he played on some great teams (and appeared in ads in his skivvies). His career ERA, adjusted for park effects, was 25% better than the league average. Clemens' is 42% better.

. . .the Ryan stuff.

Three things about Ryan make his negative stats deceiving.

1) Ron Luciano, in his second book, actually says that Ryan was so much faster than anyone else that umpires took a few innings to get used to seeing the ball properly. As a result, he honestly believes that umpires tended to call close one balls because they truly couldn't tell if a pitch hit the corner. If you look at Ryan's inning by inning stats, you'll find that he had 58% of all his walks in the first three innings. Since for his career, he averaged around 7 innings per start, that means that he had 58% of his walks in 42% of his innings. Kind of lends credence to Luciano's statement.

2) Ryan is the only guy in MLB history to lead the league in ERA twice, and have a losing record. On a dreadful Astros team one year, he led the league in innings and K's, had an ERA of under 2.4, and was 8 - 18. The BAA was under .240. That's pretty darn good pitching to end up 8 - 18. This same thing happened to him when he was with the Angels in the mid-70's.

3) Greg Maddux left the Cubs to go for less money to the Braves because he didn't see a commitment to winning. In the Chicago papers at the time, (around the time of Ryan having his woes in Houston), Maddux was twice quoted mentioning Ryan as the reason he didn't want to play for a losing team. So, even Maddux knew that Ryan was greater than his numbers let on.

So, his stats and walks sort of need to be taken within the overall context of his situation in the game. Playing for bad teams will make a great pitcher look less great. Actually, i think this ought to further cement Ryan's greatness. He won 300+ games, struck out over 5000 guys, pitched thousands of innings, all while mostly playing for some pretty crummy teams. Had he stayed with the Mets when they were good, or played for Oakland instead of the Angels in the 70's, who knows?
The Professor

On (1) I've never heard that story that you relate from Ron Luciano. I don't know how to take it. Still, it seems very bad form to have to blame the umpires for one of Ryan's main weaknesses.

On (2) You don't get extra credit for being a good pitcher with a losing record rather than a good pitcher with a winning record. Clemens led the league in ERA many more times than Ryan did. Ryan never won any Cy Young awards and arguably didn't deserve to win any. Clemens has won 6, and could easily have won one or two more.

Ryan had a wonderful career and is an obvious Hall of Famer. But his longevity, his no-hitters, and his huge numbers of strikeouts inflated the perception of his greatness above the reality.

--Peter

Exactly how is his greatness inflated. The reality is the man was good enough to still throw a couple of no-hitters in his 40s. The last pitch he ever threw in a game, the one that blew his arm out, still crossed the plate in the high 90s. He's one of only 3 pitchers to average a strikeout per inning over his career (with at least 1500 innings pitched). He's still more than 1500 strikeouts ahead of the man in 2nd place on the all-time strikeout list.

Hard to inflate the reality much. :-)

He's not in the top 5 pitchers of the last 40 years. He's probably in the top 10 though thanks to his incredible longevity.

Many people think he was possibly the greatest pitcher (or at least in top 2 or 3) of recent history. This is way too high, so that's why I think he is over-rated.

7 no-hitters is an amazing stat, but it's only marginally better than 7 1-hitters, which wouldn't get nearly so much attention.

And being a Greg Maddux fan, I think strikeouts are overrated. It's just one more way to get someone out. Who is the pitcher who recorded the most popouts? groundouts? No one bothers to keep track, but those are just as good as strikeouts.

:shrug:

--Peter

where people of good will just have to agree to disagree. One of the best parts about sports is that we can "fight" about this stuff forever and never all agree who was THE BEST.

I would also be interested in knowing whether they keep stats on the pop-outs and ground-outs. However, those outs rely on someone besides the pitcher to make a play on the ball.

BTW, Nolan also shares the record for the most 1-hitters with 12. :-)

I agree that Greg Maddux rocks too btw. It's not all about speed and strikeouts for me. Hell, my favorite pitcher ever was a guy named Charlie Hough who used to play for the Rangers. Was even older than Nolan. Had the nastiest knuckleball I ever saw in person. Took a week to get from the mound to the plate mind you...:-)

Didn't know the 1-hitter stat about Ryan. That's cool!

And strikeouts require the catcher to catch the ball. If he doesn't, the batter gets to go to 1st base. ;-)

:hi:

If you like strikeouts, well, it's hard to argue against Ryan. He was Mr. Strikeout.


--Peter

-Bull Durham

I think that is how the quote goes. :bounce:

The guy has dominated the game for the last 15 years. He hasn't had a losing season since 1987 and has won 15 games or more in each of those years highlighted by a 16-6 1.56 ERA 1994 and a 19-2 1.63 ERA in 1995. He has spent most of his career at hitter friendly Wrigley and the launching pad in Atlanta.

Great pitchers aren't defined by strikeouts and velocity, they are defined by keeping runners off base, keeping runs from scoring and winning ballgames.

Clemens is a great one too, but he's scattered a couple losing seasons and a couple 4.00+ ERA's in his last 15 years.

I'll go with Maddux, but it's a tight race.

If Clemens was still in Boston or Toronto, that Yankee exaltation propaganda statement would have never been said.

I would rate Clemens higher than Maddux in Ks (not ERA or anything else) and higher than Ryan in everything but Ks.

Maddux will have more lifetime W than Clemens.

My vote would be Maddux-R, Koufax-L

For Righties I would say Seaver or Maddux (though I am not objective about that)

Lefties-Lefty Steve Carlton