OFFICIAL 2023 MLB THREAD!!!!

[ex-powderbroker]

Hahaha. I mean I could believe some cherry picked stats, or I could believe what every player who played against him says. He played til what, he was 108 or something? What do those look like if he retired at 35?

If your stats are convincing you that Ryan isn’t one of the best pitchers ever I don’t know what to say. Stats without context are going to input errors into decision making.

I don’t even like Ryan, so it’s doubly annoying have to defend him.

What cherry picked stats? ERA/ERA+ is the gold standard and Ryan's 112 is not inspiring. That is the overall reason he won about as many as he lost; he was not much better than average (the opposing pitcher / team). WAR is simply a fast way of comparing players but it isn't the end all be all.

He played a long time and struck out a lot of people but allowed tons of people on base (4 walks per 9 and tons of hits) and those people scored. That's not a stat, it's just how not to win ballgames.

You don't have to defend him and I don't see why you would bother defending Woodsy's inane statement. I haven't seen the doc but have you noticed ever that people say nice things about people they looked up to or worked with? How is this shocking? You want to make that the basis of your argument and how he was the best because "Some guys told you so" on the tv? Or you just want to jump in because you think Mussina is overrated?

I had the “honor” pleasure” “privilege” “horror” to stand in the box when that old man was at the end of his run and if he wasn’t one of the best to ever do it then I would be terrified to even think about who would be more intimidating. Pretty easy to throw out some stats and other bs but unless you have seen the absolute knee buckling awesomeness that we are discussing then I lend very little credibility to your argument.


Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums

More ridiculousness. Most FEARSOME, lol. Did I need to pitch to Bonds to know he could hit it 17 miles too? Maybe players were intimidated because they knew he had no control and was almost as likely to walk them as k them. How many major league pitchers have you stepped in against? I would most people would have trouble staying in the box against anyone in AAA.

Back to Nolan, he gave up 2800 free passes, next up on the list was Steve Carlton with 1000 less. They played almost the same number of seasons!

Is giving up the most free bases grounds for declaring him the best ever?

Probably not top 10 since ww2, feel free to change my mind

[Supermoon]

You have to be really fucking good for a long time to walk that many people

[ex-powderbroker]

He was good, he is just not close to "the best of all time" or of whatever period of time - even during his own career.

[Woodsy]

Happy cold ass opening day from the North East where it's below freezing in the Bronx and Boston and should hit a balmy mid 40s by first pitch....

Stupid MLB scheduling...

[Woodsy]

Next up, why Sandy Koufax and Steve Carlton were overrated and CC Sabathia is the greatest left-hander ever based on advanced metrics by ex-powderbroker

[Danno]

Nolan was great. But best ever overall? Not even in the discussion. That's not a knock on him, he was fucking great. Loved the documentary. And expowderbroker is going a little overboard in knocking him down, but he is right that y'all are smoking crack if you think he's in the conversation for GOAT.

[Woodsy]

I must of slept through the part of Moneyball where Brad Pitt told us No Hitters dont really matter

[Danno]

Who said they don't matter? But Johnny Vandermeer had two in one season (back to back games), does that make his season the greatest season ever?

[Danno]

Nolan Ryan was definitely the greatest strikeout pitcher of all time. But there's more to being the GOAT than strikeouts.

[ex-powderbroker]

does anyone remember Rob Neyer? Check him out having the same argument in 2003:

Nolan Ryan isn't the greatest pitcher since World War II, and in fact he's not one of the 10 greatest pitchers since World War II. After the five pitchers -- Tom Seaver, Roger Clemens, Warren Spahn, Greg Maddux, and Bob Gibson -- I mentioned in the article about Clemens, I would list the following (in no particular order): Randy Johnson, Robin Roberts, Steve Carlton, Sandy Koufax, and Jim Palmer.
And Ryan? Obviously, he was a great pitcher. Among post-World War II pitchers, he might be placed in the next group of five, with Gaylord Perry, Juan Marichal, Whitey Ford, and Ferguson Jenkins. Then again, I'm not really so sure that Ryan was better than Phil Niekro, or Pedro Martinez. But Ryan's almost certainly one of the 20 best pitchers since World War II.
Among the very greatest, though?
Saying that Nolan Ryan is the greatest pitcher because he has the most strikeouts and the most no-hitters -- which is essentially the only argument I've seen -- is a little like saying that Pete Rose is the greatest hitter because he has the most hits, or that Mark McGwire is the greatest hitter because his home runs went the farthest, or that John Olerud is the greatest hitter because he's got the prettiest swing.
Seven no-hitters ... yeah, that's impressive. Bottom line, though, seven no-hitters is just a tiny better than seven one-hitters, and just a wee bit better than seven two-hitters. In each of those seven games, Ryan gave his team an overwhelming chance of winning, and his teams did win all seven games. But in a career that included 773 starts, seven games really isn't a huge number: 0.9 percent, to be moderately precise.
Five thousand, seven hundred and fourteen strikeouts ... yeah, that's impressive. It's also impressive that Ryan led his league in strikeouts 11 times. Nobody's ever struck out more batters, or led his league in strikeouts so many times. It's funny, though ... nobody seems to remember that Ryan also walked more hitters -- 2,795, to be absolutely precise -- than anybody else, and that he led his league in walks eight times. Nobody seems to remember that Ryan often had trouble throwing strikes, or that he wasn't any good at fielding his position.
Here are some other things that nobody seems to remember ... This great pitcher led his league in ERA only twice, and never led his league in victories. This great pitcher -- who some tell me was the greatest pitcher of the last half-century -- was never given the most prestigious award for the greatest pitcher of a single season. It's true: Nolan Ryan never won the Cy Young Award. He finished second in 1973, and seven other times he finished in the top 10. He was a very good pitcher for a very long time, he pitched in five All-Star Games, and he probably was the scariest pitcher of his time.
But the greatest? Roger Clemens won six Cy Young Awards. Randy Johnson won five Cy Young Awards. Greg Maddux and Steve Carlton both won four Cy Young Awards. Jim Palmer and Sandy Koufax both won three Cy Young Awards. Nolan Ryan won -- not six, nor five, nor four, nor three, nor two Cy Young Awards. Nolan Ryan didn't even win one Cy Young Award. Nolan Ryan won zero Cy Young Awards.
Is it possible that the baseball writers knew so little about baseball that they would unfairly ignore Nolan Ryan, the greatest pitcher in baseball, for so many years, and reward so many less-deserving pitchers so many times?
Sure, it's possible. But you'll have a hell of a time proving it.

[Supermoon]

Who hurt you?

[Danno]

Who hurt you?

Woodsy

[Danno]

And Rob Neyer was a great baseball writer, I was bummed when he left ESPN and did what, I can't recall.

[ex-powderbroker]

Who hurt you?

Pedro because he was the greatest starting pitcher in my time and he played for the wrong team.

[Danno]

He was good, he is just not close to "the best of all time" or of whatever period of time - even during his own career.

To be fair to Nolan, he was great not good, and was the absolute best at some things.

But arguing that he's on the short list for GOAT (or worse, at the top of that list) is one of those "tell me you don't really understand baseball without telling me you don't really understand baseball".

And I watched the documentary, how many guys actually said "Nolan is the greatest pitcher ever"? They may have said "scariest", they may have talked about how great he was, but I don't recall any of them saying he was better than Pedro/Randy Johnson/Clemens/Maddux/Seaver/Gibson/etc. That wasn't what the documentary was about. It was about how great Nolan was, and how unique he was, and I liked it and like him as a player. But if you polled every last one of the players in that documentary about who the greatest pitcher of all time was, I doubt Nolan would be the winner.

[Supermoon]

It’s on! Pitch clock era starts now!

Edit: second batter in Was/Atl, runner on first, two throw overs, then Acuna Jr tries to steal and just trips over himself. Pure chaos

[Bunion 2020]

Game on, cool day in DC. Go Braves!

[ex-powderbroker]

A Aaron starts another season off right!

[Supermoon]

They giving him the juiced balls again this year?

[teleee]

More ridiculousness. Most FEARSOME, lol. Did I need to pitch to Bonds to know he could hit it 17 miles too? Maybe players were intimidated because they knew he had no control and was almost as likely to walk them as k them. How many major league pitchers have you stepped in against?

More than a few actually. Not saying he was the greatest but in the feared catagory besides the big unit I cant think of anyone who caused more knee quaking in his era.



Sent from my iPhone using TGR Forums

[Timberridge]

A Aaron starts another season off right!

On pace for 162 HR's.

[The AD]

But arguing that he's on the short list for GOAT (or worse, at the top of that list) is one of those "tell me you don't really understand baseball without telling me you don't really understand baseball".

I know we're now actually into the season, so we've moved on a bit, but just wanted to say that I agree. Ryan deserves to be in the HoF, but doesn't deserve to be in the discussion for all-time greatest pitcher. He simply walked too many people. Yeah, he was around forever, but he has almost 1,000 more BBs than the next person on the list (Carlton), and that's fucking incredible when that second place person has 1833 walks. Ryan walked 52% more batters than the #2 guy!!

[ex-powderbroker]

i haven’t moved on! 15 more posts incoming

more than 30% of hitters that faced ryan got on base. that’s ungood.

seriously i didn’t mean to say he was merely good in any way but a few people were overstating his case.

as far as other scary pitchers: bob feller, johnson, chapman? there had to be some other guys that threw triple digits that were scary.

randy johnson threw damn hard, killed birds, set the record for beaten up photographers, struck out more per 9 and walked way less. better and scarier?

in all seriousness i’m glad that there’s a hall of fame where people can go learn about him and other greats because he was great and more than that completely unique - just not the greatest - but the numbers alone fail to capture the whole story.

[The AD]

as far as other scary pitchers: bob feller, johnson, chapman? there had to be some other guys that threw triple digits that were scary.

Sudden Sam McDowell. He was quite Ryan-like, in fact. Led the league in Ks five seasons and also led the league in walks five times.

[Danno]

WHIP isn't some sabermetric advanced stat, and it is fundamentally (next to ERA) the most basic and important thing for a pitcher: keep guys off the bases. And a WHIP of 1.247 is pretty pedestrian for a hall of famer (he did lead the league twice and finished in the top 5 three other times, but he's 307th all time). By comparison, Pedro is at 1.05 (#8), Jake Degrom is #2 on the list (and #1 is a guy who played over 100 years ago) with a WHIP of .998. Kershaw, Mariano, Chris Sale, and Trevor Hoffman are other modern guys in the top 10.

Of course, Ryan was such a strikeout machine that he made those guys on base not matter as much. Again, phenomenal pitcher. Just not the greatest.