Fields now have the walls much closer, so what would have been a deep fly out in '68 would be a HR in '18. -- Argument Against
Pitchers don't pitch like they did in '68 ... could Kershaw in his prime complete 20+ games and be as good? -- Argument For
Hitters were just regular gym guys -- there was no nutrition (or drug) plan to help them back in '68 -- Argument Against
Fewer teams meant less dilution of talent -- you were seeing the best of the best all the time in '68 -- Argument For
Mound height reduced after this season -- he was good just because he was so high -- Argument Against
If it weren't for one official scorer's determination of passed ball vs wild pitch, he would have had ERA of 1.09 -- Argument For

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

I don't think it's close to the best season a pitcher ever had. The ERA is eye-popping but there are factors that contributed to that beyond his inarguably excellent pitching.

In over a quarter of his starts the opposing pitcher(s) pitched better than he did. Right off the top of my head I'd go with Arrieta, Gooden, Marichal, Koufax, Pedro, and Randy Johnson having had better seasons. And that's without getting into real old guys.

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Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don

Throw Carlton's 27-10 season in there.

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Ed Walsh 1908. 40-15 1.42 ERA 464 innings.

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Reality is your friend, not your enemy. -- Seacrest

I know it wasn't a start to finish season, but you will be hard pressed to find anybody outside of possible Arietta who had a better calendar year than Jose Contreras did from July 2005 thru July 2006.

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I don't buy the diluted talent, MLB is global now. Zero Asians in in the 60's or 70's.. nowhere near the amount of Cubans, Dominicans, Venezuelans etc.

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There's an article that agrees with you.
https://bleacherreport.com/articles/870 ... ry#slide10

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little mofo was just coming of age as a baseball fan in the late 70's, but one of my first baseball heroes was Ron Guidry back during his ridiculous 1978 season. 25-3, 1.74 era, 16 CG and 9 shutouts and almost won the Cy Young AND the MVP (Jim Rice won it). Guidry's career was impressive in that due to arm troubles he was able to successfully transition from a strikeout pitcher to finesse pitcher, and nearly won another Cy Young in '85 in a year where he only averaged 5 SO/9.

Yeah, that Guidry year is better than Gibson's too.

I know W/L record is now considered "meaningless", and when a guy has an ERA of 1.12 he obviously didn't give up many runs. When I point out that in over 25% of his starts some guy pitched as good or better than Gibson, it's not to say that Gibson pitched poorly but to point out that a whole lot of guys were pitching very well, or it was just very difficult to hit.

When compared to the other pitchers at the time when it comes to limiting runs it's hard to top how good Pedro was in '99-'00.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don

Very fair point.

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

Gibson in '68

22 wins, completed all 22, ERA in wins 0.57.

9 losses, completed 6, ERA in losses 2.14.

3 no decisions, completed 0, ERA in those 25 innings 2.52.

That's pretty disgusting.

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The key to Gibson and Carlton's success

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I'm going to bounce from the spot for awhile but I will be back at some point to argue with you about this hoops stuff again. Playoffs have been great this season. See ya up the road.

I'm out.

Five consecutive complete game shutouts as well.

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

After looking at Guidry's run support stats, Gibson takes the crown.

Gibson received 2 runs or less 18 times...and still managed a 9-8 record in those games.

Guidry only had 2 runs or less support 5 times, he went 1-3.

Put Gibson on that Yankees squad in 78 and he may not lose.

Also, in those 18 games the Cards only managed 0-2 runs, Gibson had an era of 0.97. So JORR, who you crappin' that he got out pitched in 25% of his starts.

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Huh? He lost 9 games . He started 34. Quick math means 25% of 34 is 8.5 , round up to 9. So yeah , he was outpitched in 25% of his starts . This isn’t hard .

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Proud member of the white guy grievance committee

It aint the six minutes. Its what happens in those six minutes.

I guess you'd come to that conclusion...if you were an idiot!

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The other thing to note about Guidry's season - he was in the AL with the DH, he was in a ridiculously stacked AL East (in which the Yankees, Red Sox, brewers and orioles all won over 90 games), and he was pivotal in one of the great division races of all time, coming back to beat the Red Sox in game 163 (which he also won). In September and October he started 7 games, winning 6 of them, with 5 complete games and 3 shutouts (two of them against the Red Sox) with a 1.19 ERA and a .755 WHIP down the stretch. He then went on to blow away the Royals and the Dodgers in the playoffs and World Series for 2 wins and a 1.10 ERA. Gibson’s season was amazing and it may be the best of all time, but Louisiana Lightning was lights out back in ‘78 and in the team picture. His 25-3 record was NOT due to run support.

Then there's this BR piece that doesn't have Guidry in the top 10.

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When you consider era-adjusted stats, Pedro and Maddux in their prime had a couple seasons that are at the top of the list.

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Lay off that whiskey and let that cocaine be.

It's actually a little more than 25% of his starts.

What you call "run support" is actually nothing more than the runs allowed by the opposing pitchers in the games that Guidry and Gibson pitched. The fact that Guidry "received" more "run support" isn't an argument in favor of Gibson. It's actually an argument for how much more dominant Guidry was over the pitchers he faced than Gibson was over his opponents.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don

well i'm not going to dissect that list because i dont have a beef about any of the seasons listed, they are all great. Guidry's entire season of '78 and especially his stretch drive through the playoff race and playoffs make him worthy of mention with any of those seasons, but he rarely is mentioned, perhaps due to his lack of HOF credentials for his career. I personally find Maddux and Pedro and the guys who put up miraculous numbers during the steroid era to be particularly noteworthy - especially Maddux.

The steroid era was strange in that while all those batters were putting up pinball machine numbers, there were also a bunch of pitchers throwing up overwhelmingly dominant seasons.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don

and the deeper into his career Maddux got the more the umpires liked calling that backdoor pitch for strikes, further and further off the plate. Maddux was awesome but he had a WIIIIDE plate.

You completely ignore strength of offense...you're assuming all offenses are equal.

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In the space of a single 9 inning game the vast majority of offenses are indistinguishable. The 1968 Cardinals averaged 3.6 runs per game. The worst offense in the NL that year averaged 2.9 runs per game. And the Cardinals did not have to face Bob Gibson. Unless you can show me how to score a fraction of a run in a game, then yeah, the NL offenses in 1968 were equal within the space of any given 9 inning stretch.

The 1978 Yankees averaged 4.5 runs per game. The league average was 4.2. I don't believe that third of a run was what caused Ron Guidry to win 70% of his games and 90% of his decisions.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don

By the way, I love this argument/discussion. I haven't had it in a long time.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don

Yet the Cards could only muster a measly 2 or less in most of his starts.

While the Yankees mashed in the majority of Guidry's starts.

That's just the way it goes some years.

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I think your reading of that is wrong. You seem to think Guidry was lucky with "run support" while Gibson was unlucky. The fact that the Cardinals could "only muster" 2 runs in Gibson's game is not unrelated to the fact that opponents could often only muster a single run or less vs. Gibson. It was very difficult to score in the 1968 NL. Guidry allowed 1.74 when the league average was 4.2. Gibson allowed 1.12 when the league average was 3.4.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don

So, based on this, Gibson's ERA was .33 of league average...while Guidry was at .41 of league average.

Gibson wins again!

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Yeah, if you're strictly an ERA guy.

Anyway, I'm not bashing Gibson. And I don't really think Guidry is a good comp for him. But there are several guys from Gibson's own era who I would rank as at least his equal.

_________________
Anybody here seen my old friend Bobby?
Can you tell me where he's gone?
I thought I saw him walkin' up to The Hill
With Elon, Kash, and Don