I haven't gotten to see him pitch since he was in Boston, so I don't know how he looks now. I just know that when he had a start, I made it a point to clear my calender and see it. Even watching on TV, you just knew it was something special in the history of the game. Those years in Boston may never be equaled.
I've always wondered this, why doesn't Tom Seaver ever enter into the discussion of best pitcher ever? His numbers are right there with these other guys.
A side note to the durability thing. Pedro has a higher IP/Start than Clemens, Maddux, Glavine, etc. He's averaged 220 IP over 31 starts a year. He's not as fragile as people seem to think.
The fact that his signing started our resurgence from the Phillips/Duquette eras, I will always love the Pedro signing, and yes I believe he still has rock star status at Shea
He's still been pretty good, but obviously nothing like some of the otherworldly years he had in Boston. I mean, the 2000 season, ERA over 3 runs under the league average 0.737 WHIP and 11.7 K/9. Are you kidding me? If that's not the most dominant season ever by a pitcher it's got to be pretty damn close.
Although to be far he would have easily won 20 games for us his 1st year if we had a bullpen that year
He revitalized the franchise, so on that alone he is notable. We love Pedro for coming here and making it ok for other players to come to New York. Basically Pedro put his faith in Omar and the team, and for that faith he's adored at Shea. I think people sometimes don't remember how bleak thinks were in the Art Howe years. His starts at Shea are on another level in terms of excitement in the stadium. It's on par with a playoff game, you KNOW you have a chance to see something amazing with him on the mound.
Pedro has been as dominant as any pitcher has before him. What takes him down a notch right now in my eyes is his big game performances, which haven't matched his regular season dominance. I'm looking forward to him getting a chance to shed that label in a couple months..
I wouldn't quite consider him the best of all-time, but he's the best pitcher of our era. All-time: 1. Walter Johnson 2. Pete Alexander 3. Christy Mathewson 4. Pedro 5. Maddux
I see stuff like that and all I see is sentimentality. People tend to overvalue ye olde tyme players when comparing them with modern players. Yeah, Mathewson had a career 2.13 ERA compared to Pedro's 2.81. But in Mathewson's time, the ERA in the for the entire league was only 2.88. Pedro's time? 4.49.
They really aren't. It always seemed to me that Seaver has always been a bit overrated. No question he was a great pitcher but I don't think his name belongs in "greatest ever" discussions. I guess his HOF election % has probably contributed to the idea that he was one of the best all time.
Exactly, which is why I say that in 50 years Pedro will come to mind when they have this discussion. It is nice to have a real, civilized baseball conversation for once here though.
I think it's more than that. Until Clemens came along, he was the best righthanded pitcher in the major leagues (particularly in terms of career value) since Pete Alexander, who retired in 1930 (Bob Feller might have been up there if he hadn't lost 4 years to WW II). That's more than 60 years, which is pretty impressive. With Clemens, Maddux, and Martinez there have been a few elite righthanded starters in recent years, when there hadn't been for a long time. BTW, my choice as the best pitcher I ever saw was Sandy Koufax from 1961-1966. When he was out there you never believed anyone would actually score on him, and his four-year span of 1963-1966 defies belief (97-27, an average of 298 IP per year, 22 CG per year, 9.3 K per 9 IP, 0.91 WHIP, 1.86 ERA). He looks slightly less impressive based on the adjusted statistics because it was a time with less scoring, but those stats actually are a little unfair to him. It's almost impossible for a starter to get an ERA less than 1.50 even in bad hitting years, just because of bloops, seeing eye hits, and bad calls by the umpire, so being almost 1.5 runs lower than the league ERA at that time is IMO more impressive than it would be now.
I can't believe I'm about to be stupid enough to argue statistics with someone named statjeff, but here I go... I would take Pedro's 1997-2000 (and I would throw in 2001-2003 if not for keeping it to 4 years) over Koufax's 1963-1966 any day. He was 77-25, 2.16 ERA, 226 IP/year, 13 CG/year, 11.5 K/9, 0.93 WHIP, 5.7 K/BB. You might want to right away give Koufax an edge because of wins and innings, but that was the way the game was at the time. Koufax went an average of 7 2/3 innings a game, while Pedro was right there at 7 1/3. Koufax may have had more innings, but Pedro was among the leaders in innings and wins for each of those 4 years. Wanting to get rid of the adjustments is just a bad idea as it eliminates any frame of reference. Doing that would be like comparing scoring averages in the NBA today with those before the shot clock and 3 point line. They're simply different games. The league ERA during Koufax's career was 3.63. His career ERA was 2.76. That's just 0.87 below. Pedro, by comparison pitched in an era where the league posted a 4.49 ERA and has one himself of just 2.89 for a WHOPPING difference of 1.60. Basically, Pedro was almost twice as good compared to his peers as Koufax was. Imagine if Pedro had the advantage of pitching on a higher mound, against smaller hitters who were clean of steroids, in bigger parks, and without facing a DH. His numbers would be even more unbelievable than they already are.
Ultimately this is just a matter of opinion, but if you are going to argue it, at least criticize what I actually said. I never said that you should get rid of adjustments, only that they will hurt a dominant pitcher in a pitcher's time relatively speaking (they also hurt a dominant hitter in a hitter's time), and that's just true. Quoting Koufax's career ERA is inappropriate, since I specifically mentioned the period from 1961-1966 (or especially 1963-1966); Koufax wasn't remotely close to a great pitcher the first six years of his career, and everyone knows it. During the 1963-1966 period that I referred to, Koufax's ERA was 1.40 runs less than the league average. He led the league in ERA for five straight years from 1962-1966, and led the league in shutouts three of the four years from 1963-1966, finishing second the other time. He earned the pitching triple crown three times in those four years, something only one other pitcher in major league history has ever done (Pedro has only done it once in his career, the only year he led the league in wins); in fact, all three times he led the entire major leagues in wins, ERA, and strikeouts, not just the league, something that has never been done by anyone else in major league history. To diminish Koufax's innings pitched, complete games, and wins because "that's the way the game was" is hardly fair; we're not talking about 1910, when pitchers threw the ball 70 MPH most of the time. Koufax threw the ball 100 MPH for 300 innings per year, and the fact that he had more than 40 starts per season in three of the four years in question, and averaged 8 IP per start, is certainly part of why he was dominant. It's also not accurate to say that's the way the game was, since nobody else was finishing 1st or 2nd in complete games four out of six years, and 1st in wins three out of four. From 1963-1966 the Dodgers ranked 6th, 8th, 8th, and 8th, respectively, in runs scored (in a 10-team league) - if they had had even decent hitting it is likely that Koufax would have won 30 games at least once, and maybe even twice or three times (Koufax nicknamed Phil Regan "The Vulture" in 1966 because he went 14-1 in relief, piggybacking off of many excellent Koufax starts when the Dodgers would score a run in the 8th or 9th to win). That also means, of course, that he rarely had a blowout win - almost every game was tough, and in 1965 and 1966 the Dodgers only won the pennant by two games (where there were no divisions and no wild cards - if you didn't have the best record in the league, you were going home). Koufax also had a 0.95 postseason (World Series) ERA, averaging 9.6 Ks per 9 IP, the last three years against teams ranked 2nd, 1st, and 1st in the AL in runs scored. He was the consummate big game pitcher. I never suggested that Pedro wasn't great for the Red Sox, only that the dominant years for Koufax were IMO the best I've ever seen, and I certainly haven't changed my opinion on that. You can certainly make the case for Pedro from 1997-2000, but to dismiss Koufax is I believe ridiculous.
The problem w/ saying Pedro is #1 is he wasn't a big game pitcher. He has a spotty postseason record and anytime he had real pressure on him he didn't pitch great. From about '97-'01 he was amazing and had his lone great postseason in '9 but since then he has beena good pitcher and a very spotty big game pitcher. I'd put Smoltz and Schilling over him.
