Yeah, going back to Carlton, he had that amazing year when he was 27-10 and his team was 59-97. Number of innings pitched: 346

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That team wasn't "dreadful". It was a couple games under .500. And I'm not sure Ryan was any better than Bill Singer. By any objective measure they were very close.

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

the offense was 11/12. Ryan and Singer carried the team. Singer had a great year, just not as good as Ryan in any metric you want to consider.

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

I guess it depends on what we mean by "effective". If he was so effective, how could it be that so many guys he faced did better than he did? Of course, Ryan was difficult to hit. He always struck a lot of guys out. But his numbers that season have to be viewed in the context of where he pitched half his games. The Astrodome certainly aided those numbers outside of his putrid winning percentage. It also undoubtedly aided the winning pitchers that are represented by the "16" to the right of the hyphen.

It gets back to the specious concept of "run support". Saying that McHugh didn't get "run support" in last night's game is a monstrous disservice to Chris Sale.

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

He had a better winning percentage. Regardless, all their numbers are close. Bill Singer was a decent pitcher. You're acting like Ryan was some titan. A lot of guys threw 300 innings in that era.

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

McHugh pitched a great game. if he did that all the time, he'd be a star. 'course this is the White Sox we're talking about, so maybe not.

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

so now ryan didn't pitch that many innings.


I said he was top 50 since 1930. Until someone comes up with 49 better, I'm sticking with it.

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

Only if you view it as McHugh vs Sale. If you view it as McHugh vs the Sox offense and Sale vs the Hou offense there is not disservice to anyone.

That's a really modern non-competitive viewpoint of the game.

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

That's not the way the game works though. McHugh's effort exists only within the game in which it occurred. It is not transferable. It cannot be moved to a game in which Mat Latos allows seven runs.

Part of the reason those two pitchers pitched so "well" last night is because the plate umpire was giving them ankle high strikes all night. That is not unrelated to it being tough to score. That is part of the context of the game in which those performances occurred.

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

I love how the thread switched from the Odor/Bautista fight to Ryan vs. Ventura, and now where Ryan ranks on the all-time list.

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Good people drink good beer - Hunter S. Thompson

<º)))><

Waiting for the time when I can finally say
That this has all been wonderful, but now I'm on my way

so there is no point in discussing anything like season totals or anything cumulative, since everything is in the context of a single game

Ryan would rank a lot lower on the list if Ventura had finished the job rather than showing mercy on him.

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You do not talk to me like that! I work too hard to deal with this stuff! I work too hard! I'm an important member of the CSFMB! I drive a Dodge Stratus!

I didn't say anything like that. But it's silly to say that a guy like Quintana gets "unlucky" all the time. No, he makes bad pitches at the worst possible moment to lose 2-1. That's baseball. McHugh was okay last night, just not good enough to win, which is really all that matters. Of course he had a tough task facing one of the better pitchers in baseball, and make no mistake, he was facing him. And he was aware of that fact.

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

OK. here's WAR per 250 innings. min 2000 innings, 175 wins:

Name WAR.250
Pedro Martinez 7.6
Roger Clemens 6.8
Randy Johnson 6.7
Curt Schilling 6.3
Roy Halladay 6.0
Kevin Brown 5.9
Greg Maddux 5.8
Lefty Grove 5.8
Mike Mussina 5.8
John Smoltz 5.5
Bob Gibson 5.3
Andy Pettitte 5.2
Bert Blyleven 5.2
Dwight Gooden 5.1
Hal Newhouser 5.1
CC Sabathia 5.1
Nolan Ryan 5.0
David Cone 4.9
Rick Reuschel 4.9
Tom Seaver 4.8
Gaylord Perry 4.8
Steve Carlton 4.7
Fergie Jenkins 4.6
Chuck Finley 4.5
Mickey Lolich 4.5
Jimmy Key 4.5
Jim Bunning 4.5
Juan Marichal 4.4
David Wells 4.3
Whitey Ford 4.3
Don Drysdale 4.3
Paul Derringer 4.3
Tommy Bridges 4.2
Mark Langston 4.2
Bob Friend 4.2
Tommy John 4.2
Larry Jackson 4.2
Billy Pierce 4.1
Jim Kaat 4.1
Bob Feller 4.1
Curt Simmons 4.1
Tim Hudson 4.1
Jerry Koosman 4.1
Don Sutton 4.1
Bartolo Colon 4.0
Robin Roberts 4.0
Mark Buehrle 4.0
Carl Hubbell 3.9
Luis Tiant 3.9
Orel Hershiser 3.9

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

I'm no fan of WAR... Andy Pettite over most of that list is absurd.

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Bob Friend, so fucking great that three quarters of the guys he faced pitched better than he did in the actual games in which he faced them.

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

Kevin Brown

Bartolo Colon over Orel Hershiser? Gtfo here

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Clearly better than Maddux. ALL HAIL WAR!!!!!!!!

_________________
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, Tulsi, and Don

Still waiting for someone's list.

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

http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=sta&lg=all&qual=y&type=8&season=2016&month=0&season1=1871&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0

Top 20 by Career WAR

Roger Clemens
Cy Young
Walter Johnson
Greg Maddux
Randy Johnson
Nolan Ryan
Bert Blyleven
Gaylord Perry
Steve Carlton
Pete Alexander
Tom Seaver
Christy Mathewson
Lefty Grove
Don Sutton
Pedro Martines
Bob Gibson
Mike Mussina
Kid Nichols
Tommy John
Fergie Jenkins

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Power is always in the hands of the masses of men. What oppresses the masses is their own ignorance, their own short-sighted selfishness.
- Henry George

Sutton surprises me. I always thought of him as the guy who just hung around and hung around until he got to 300. I guess that's an idiotic thought though because you can't suck and get to 300. And Mike Mussina in the top 20? Wow wouldn't have imagined him that high up historically speaking.

Just for shits and giggles: 133 pitchers made the cut:
1. 1500 innings (not too hard)
2. 150 wins (not too hard)
3. winning % over .500

three ranking categories:
Win %
Innings
Adjusted ERA

top guy in each category gets 133 points, down to 1 for the worst. Add up the 3 categories, here's the ranking:

Roger Clemens
Randy Johnson
Greg Maddux
Jim Palmer
Tom Seaver
Whitey Ford
Bob Feller
Mike Mussina
Juan Marichal
Bob Gibson
Carl Hubbell
Warren Spahn
Red Ruffing
Pedro Martinez
Lefty Grove
Tom Glavine
Kevin Brown
Roy Halladay
Andy Pettitte
Curt Schilling
Steve Carlton
Tim Hudson
John Smoltz
CC Sabathia
Gaylord Perry
Fergie Jenkins
Hal Newhouser
Don Drysdale
Sandy Koufax
Lefty Gomez
Lon Warneke
David Cone
Luis Tiant
Bob Lemon
Phil Niekro
Tommy Bridges
Mark Buehrle
Bert Blyleven
Don Sutton
Dizzy Dean
Tommy John
Jimmy Key
Billy Pierce
Dave Stieb
Robin Roberts
Roy Oswalt
Dwight Gooden
Jack Morris
Orel Hershiser
Jim Bunning
Ron Guidry
David Wells
Dennis Martinez
Bret Saberhagen
Catfish Hunter
Vida Blue
Jim Kaat
Nolan Ryan #58

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

Dennis Martinez....talk about finishing a career strong. Very Kenny Rogers-like

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