@@knowur10sand18s More formidable? When Babe Ruth retired, he had the most strikeouts as a batter with 1330. Today, that isn't even top 50. The game places _far_ less importance on making contact today. Walter Johnson would do just fine.
What makes Johnson even greater is that he did in an era where people didn't strike out nearly as much. It was incredibly rare for a hitter to strike out 100 times a season, but now, it's commonplace.
They don't call him The Big Train for nothing. The man had *110 career shutouts.* Shutouts. Not just 110 complete games. Shutouts. The active MLB player with the most career complete games is Adam Wainwright (in April 2023) with 27.
He must have hurt his hand as he was only connecting to the skull bone and not the face. (Forehead mostly.) If he struck him in the face that many times Ventura's face would have been a bloody pulp. There was not 1 drop of blood.
I’m from Oklahoma and Robin played at Oklahoma State. When Nolan hit him and he ran at Nolan my dad and I started laughing that the old man was gonna teach the young guy what his place was in the pecking order. I actually got to watch Nolan pitch his final game at the old Arlington Stadium. It was a bucket list item.
@@ButterBallTheOpossum Got one on the way as a matter of fact. Let me pitch that name to my 6 month pregnant wife. If you don’t hear back from me I was brutally murdered in a hormonal rage.
All time modern era (post 1900) leader in walks, wild pitches, and errors by a pitcher. Amazing. He and his +32 won lost record must be the best pitcher ever.
The fact that the second person ever to reach 3,000 Ks was Bob Gibson, and he was born 8 years after Walter Johnson's final season, is astonishing. Much less it happening around 50 years after Johnson reached 3,000 himself
Actually to me it makes sense, players had a much higher batting average, and that was mostly due to approach, they weren't trying to hit home runs, and therefore missed less often trying to.
The fact that Tim Keefe was in the Top 15 in strikeouts for OVER A CENTURY is insane! Walter Johnson has joined him, but amazing a 19th century pitcher hung on the list till 1982!
@@nathaniellippert9238 On the same note. There is a lot of talk about how we have more strike outs now. I would have expected at least 1 pitcher to break into the top 15 in the last 10+ years. Batters are being nice and spreading out the strike outs, i guess.
@@jrod4344 to be fair, how many strikeout pitchers have we seen recently that haven't had to get Tommy john, their burning everything out in a few years it seems
@@jrod4344 Verlander is only a few behind Schillings. If he makes the come back from tommy John he’ll definitely crack into the top 15 possibly higher if he pitches as long as he hopes.
Bruh the fact that Tim Keefe took the #1 spot in 1887, stayed top 3 until 1955, and didn't drop below 15 until 1983, almost a century later, is REALLY impressive
Read the book "59 in 84". It's a book about his life, but mostly about the 1884 season when we won 59 (or 60 depending on the source) games. fascinating.
Obviously I knew he was one of the best pitchers of all time, but this list put into perspective just how good and ahead of his time Walter Johnson was
If the stories from the time are to be believed he was the first real flamethrower in baseball (which is nuts give him approach on the mound). Its why I don't shit talking hitters about all the Ks today look at the pitchers they are facing a good amount of todays starters have fastball velos on par (if not better than most guys on this list) and breaking pitches that would make their heads literally spin. Go back to the peak of some of these guys and tell the best hitters in the league that 50% of the starters and basically all of the bullpen would throw as hard or have as filthy stuff as the guys on this list. I would not be shocked if a many said fuck that im not facing this every single day just to get embarrassed. The modern focus of weighted ball training, kinematics and spin rate for pitchers is like steroids to power hitters in the 90s and 2000s.
All time modern era (post 1900) leader in walks, wild pitches, and errors by a pitcher. Amazing. He and his +32 won lost record must be the best pitcher ever.
Pitchers have much higher strikeout rates these days, which does offset the fewer innings they pitch. Only 19 pitchers in the modern era (since 1900) have had a season with 300 or more strikeouts, yet it's been done 4 times since 2017. It's still early in the season, but 5 pitchers are on pace to get over 300 strikeouts this season. (Bieber, Glasnow, Cole, Scherzer, deGrom). Among active pitchers, Verlander already has 3000, Scherzer will get there this season, Greinke and Kershaw are basically locks to get there, if Chris Sale successfuly comes back from Tommy John he will have a very good chance, and Cole will have a good chance if his career continues as it has.
@@Il_Exile_lI yep. The game changed. Strikeouts are watered down now. Everyone swings for the fences or strikes out. Baseball is boring as shit to watch now.
The pitching in the 1800’s stats in most cases will never be duplicated. Old Hoss had over 100 wins in just TWO years pitching. (1883 and 1884 48 and 57 respectively) He also had the second most innings pitched in 1884 with 678.2. The leader is will white in 1890 with 680. Charlie “Old Hoss” started 73 games in 1884. He also had 73 complete games! He pitched a entire season using no relief pitchers! Yet he also came in and pitched in relief 2 times and recorded a save. He also pitched a 1.38 ERA that year as well as had 11 shutout wins. He also had 441 strikeouts and just 98 walks. In today’s standards we have Nolan Ryan as the modern era strikeout king with 383. He allowed 162 walks. All time Nolan Ryan single season strikeout total he is actually 8th. Matt Kilroy recorded 513 in1886. So many awesome stats if you take some time and look. :-)
Fergie Jenkins is one of only 4 pitchers in MLB history to have over 3 thousand strikeouts in his career while walking fewer than 1 thousand. He accomplished it while pitching most of his career for the Chicago Cubs in Wrigley Field which was known as a tough ball park for pitchers. He also had to face some of the toughest hitters in MLB history such as Willie Mays, Hank Aaron, Pete Rose, Reggie Jackson, Willie McCovey and Roberto Clemente to name a few.
I remember the early to mid 80’s when Nolan Ryan and Steve Carlton were going head to head for the All Time Strikeout leader. The wheels fell off for Carlton and the Ryan Express just kept going into the 90’s.
@@drewskij2175 their stats are very similar (ERA, wins, shutouts, etc) but no hitters and strikeouts are what people remember the most and Nolan was a man among boys in those categories
@@danielparker8189 4 CY's to how many from Ryan? What Carlton did in 72 is arguably the best pitching performance in the last 50-60 years. Don't get me wrong, I love Nolan Ryan and mad respect him as a pitcher, next to no one has accomplished what he has on the mound. But fact is, Carlton had a good 6 years where he far and away better than Ryan, let alone everyone else in the league and it was not even close. There's a documentary on the 72 Phillies that you should watch. Carlton nearly won 48% of the teams games that year. Out of the top ten most dominant pitching seasons in MLB history only one was on a non playoff or playoff contenting team, that was 72 Carlton.
@@drewskij2175 awards are given based on man’s opinion. Look at some of the cy young award winners. Most never made the HOF. No hitters and strikeouts are pure skill. If you were to ask me which was the better pitcher, I would prob say Carlton based solely on stats and acclamations. But Nolan Ryan was by far the most dominant pitcher to ever throw a baseball. (No hitters and strikeouts are a total domination of a team/batsman)
@@unclechrome1485 Wins and losses are an irrelevant number. Our metrics for quality have realized how irrelevant W/L pitcher stats are in judging performance. ERA and ERA+ are far more relevant. Even K’s aren’t necessarily indicative of value. A one pitch ground out sustains a pitcher longer in game than a 6 pitch strikeout.
Nolan Ryan pitched to throw no-hitters and get strikeouts. He didn't necessarily pitch to actually win games. He also walked a TON of batters (leading the league 8 times).
I remember in 84 (as a 9 year old) living in Houston as Carlton caught and passed Ryan. Carlton was pitching on 3 days rest and Ryan 4. I thought it was so unfair. Then Ryan kept going so I was happy.
Truly one of the most amazing videos ever done on RU-vid dealing with sports statistics and history. Extremely impressive, whoever did this. Big accomplishment
@@metallifreak100correct, while maddux wasn't a flamethrower for the earlier part of his career throwing 91-93 meant you threw a little faster than average. Today throwing 93-94 is average and throwing 90 is considered somewhat slow. Think many on this list as are safe due to the pitch count era as harder and harder to have quantity of innings to add up to get to the top of the list
Don’t forget that players were much more likely to try to make contact, so it’s not until guys started trying to hit home runs and the Kingman era of not caring about striking out helped produce such large strikeout numbers. That coupled with pitchers that still went 9 innings and it made for some pretty gaudy stats. Then, after starters started getting pulled after 6 innings which started in the 80’s, you basically have no pitchers (Randy Johnson/Roger Clemens) cracking 3,000 strikeouts since, even with the enormous strikeout rates that batters have had the last 20 years.
You're not wrong about the lack of shame nowadays of striking out, but I do thinking making contact in the sport is harder than it's ever been. Today's pitchers are absolute flame throwers, and batters are often facing 3 different pitchers per game. Tough to handle. Bullpens are no longer guys not good enough to start, they're specialists. I believe modern science has proven Bob Feller's fastball, rumored to be near a 100mph, to be more realistically around 92mph, and he was one of the hardest throwers of an era. It could be wrong, but there is some studies on it. You always hear about the greats and the legends, but what's not talked about is what the talent level around the leagues from generation to generation was.
@@mikeshoe74 The really crazy part is, if science keeps going the way it’s going. In a few hundred years they may be able to recreate long dead players and have a generations game.
It’s not a pitch count, it’s a pitch clock. Pitchers take 5 fucking years to throw the ball so they set a timer to speed up the game that resets every time the pitcher pitches the ball. If they don’t pitch it in time it’s an automatic ball. Also if the hitter dicks around for too long it’s an automatic strike.
@@thunderousooner527 It was all about pitching to weak contact in baseball for nearly the first 100 years of the game. Usually led to lower pitch counts too, making it far easier for those guys to pitch every 3-4 days and go the full 9 innings every time.
All time modern era (post 1900) leader in walks, wild pitches, and errors by a pitcher. Amazing. He and his +32 won lost record must be the best pitcher ever.
I did not realize that Bert "Be Home" Blyleven had over 3700 strikeouts. He wasn't considered a Hall of Famer before that time, but that was before the widespread advent of sabermetrics. In the early 90s, Blyleven was considered to have no chance at the HOF while Jack Morris was considered a lock. Then we got to see the real numbers.
@@Karmy. all my memories of Blyleven are as a journeyman pitcher setting records for home runs allowed in the 80s. Weird to see how great he was in the 70s.
Love these visuals. So interesting to see how the list evolved through the 1970’s, then was completely transformed in the 80’s, and now hasn’t had a single addition in the last decade.
Nolan Ryan's record will never be broken. With how pitchers are linited in innings now and how long careers are, i dont think anyone will come close. Maybe in 100 years.
I just knew Pedro would show up! 13th of all time. Not too shabby. I remember listening to the radio at work, in the late 90's, and giggling like a weirdo at the strike-outs. Then to watch the games (occasionally) on the weekends. The batters' legs would wobble.
yeah, when Nolan Ryan pitched, pitchers had a code: 'Finish What You Start'. when Ryan was President of the Texas Rangers, before the season, he went to every Rangers' minor league team to talk to every pitcher in team meetings, and asked everyone to try and go one extra inning every time they pitched.
It’s amazing how far ahead Ryan still is. And with pitchers typically going 5-6 innings a game, no one can catch up. The game would have to revert to having pitchers go longer.
All time modern era (post 1900) leader in walks, wild pitches, and errors by a pitcher. Amazing. He and his +32 won lost record must be the best pitcher ever.
Well people probably thought that Walts record would probably not be broken he took the record in 1921 got his last K in 1927 and nolan took the record in 1982 nolan got his last K in 1993 so 61 years of Walt being the record holder. But yeah 5714 will be hard to beat. Edit I forgot to put a space
@@staciemohler4624 true, but you have to consider that nowadays pitchers are really on a pitch count every outing. No way a manager is going to use a pitcher as often a Nolan Ryan nor it is probable that a pitcher plays after 40
@@staciemohler4624 starting in 1970 and ending in 92 Nolan pitched an average of 221 innings a season. In 2019 the league leader in innings pitched threw just 209. These days guys don't get enough innings to break that record in a season. Not even mentioning 25 seasons.
Baseball is the most insane sport when it comes to extremes. In every sport there are 1 or maybe 2 outlying radical statistics, but Baseball is littered with stratospheric records.
@@jimmysgarage9068 when you walk into Wrigley Field you're offered a scorecard and a pencil. That is what makes Baseball Awesome. Everything that is possible, no matter how strange can be tracked on those score cards. Each game has its own DNA. It can never be replicated.
@@someperson8151 True, but have you seen how big the gap is between Nolan Ryan and #2 on the list? Nolan Ryan gave up 50% more walks than the guy with the second most walks in MLB history.
I was upset when Old Hoss Radbourn's name fell off the list. But, then Bobo Newsom popped in. I love these stats charts. Would love to see a list of best names/nicknames.
That's the wrong picture of Randy Johnson. That's another guy named Randy Johnson who played 2 seasons with the Twins. How the hell do you mix those two up?
I don't think the creator knows of cares about the people or the pictures. They just take the top player statistics over time and compile them into the graphic that you see now. Hence the real Big Unit's picture being absent.
I remember Tanana when he was with the hometown Tigers in the late 80s. My late dispatcher spoke highly of him, and told tales of when he went to Detroit Catholic Central for high school. What a very underrated pitcher as a whole...I'm sure he and Nolan Ryan were a formidable pair in the Angels' rotation.
Was at what happened to be Ryan's last game pitching, in Seattle. Was a Mariners fan, but was still rooting for Nolan. He needed him some Advil that day.
Look at Gibson. He shoots all the way to No. 2 then the 80’s boys (Ryan, Carlton, Blyleven, Seaver, Sutton, Niekro, and Jenkins) all pass him. That means in the late 60’s, 70’s, and 80’s there were more strikeouts than any other period or those pitchers pitched longer than any other group.
It’s both. Before the 70s, pitchers went for a long time in games but hitters rarely struck out. In the 90s and later, hitters strike out a lot more, but pitchers don’t go for as many innings. In the 70s and 80s, pitchers were still expected to pitch 7-8 innings until the closer came out while hitters struck out a lot. Made for some crazy numbers
Nobody is touching Ryan's record. You would need about 250 K's per year for 23 years to pass him. For that matter no one is catching Johnson or Clemens either. There's an outside chance someone gets to 4k with longevity and without injury. For reference Verlander just got to 3K and he's 38 years old so he isn't touching 4K. Sherzer isn't at 3K yet but will be this year and he'll be 37 in a few months, he probably won't get to 4K either.
IDK man, with the way strikeouts are going today, I could see it happening. You just need someone who's willing to pitch deep into their 40's like Ryan did.
@@jyu467 starters dont pitch nearly enough innings anymore. 6 innings is a good outing for a starter now, maybe 7. A complete game is almost a miracle. So nobody is touching 4k pitching 230 innings a season
@@username-zj9id agreed, look at how many innings Ryan, Johnson, Clemens, etc. pitched. Nobody is getting there unless there is some huge revelation in mechanics or biometrics or whatever they use today.
@@andrewhogan6533 any record that has to do with pitching longevity became safe the day they started tracking pitch counts regularly. Innings, complete games, shutouts, etc.
@@username-zj9id that, plus money invested in players. Imagine if Walter Johnson was getting paid a few hundred thousand per season. I think that might have gotten the owner to be a little more concerned about how much his manager was using him. This is also pre Tommy John, so if you had an arm injury, it was adios career. I’m guessing if DeGrom was only making a couple hundred thousand, nobody would really care how many innings he had. Also expansion, I’m sure there were a ton of guys who never made the big show because they were the 10th guy on the pitching depth chart. We could find numerous reasons, but I agree that no one in the near future will come close to those records.
I never got to see Nolan Ryan pitch, but I got to see Kerry Wood pitch, and I always thought Nolan Ryan is basically what Wood would have been had he had a long, healthy career.
People love to bag on Ryan because of his wild pitches and walks. But I don't think they appreciate that a lot of batters knew Ryan to be "conveniently wild." In many cases, he'd've rather nailed someone with the ball than give up a hit. Why? Because the next guy up to bat has to then contend with facing the most intimidating pitcher ever right after his teammate was beaned with some heat. Early in his career with the Mets, he was all over the place. But during and after his run with the Angels, he gained a lot of control. But he didn't always use it to throw strikes. Intimidation was a big part of his gameplan, and he was unparalleled. Plus, he does not get enough respect for his curve ball or his change-up.
@@craenor I got to see him throw his final game in Texas against the A’s. It was definitely a bucket list item I got to mark off. He is the GOAT when it comes to pitching careers. Take the Robin Ventura brawl. He beaned him with an off speed breaking ball and I’ve always said that if Nolan really wanted to hurt him he’d have beaned him with his 98 mph fastball
@@seandobson6221 my dad and I lived a couple of hours from Dallas. We'd make the trek to Arlington a few times a year to see him pitch. The closest thing I saw to a milestone game was the night that Bo Jackson's ground-ball split Ryan's lip open. I'll never forget that. Right as Bo was coming to bat, the big scoreboard flashed a screen: Nolan Knows Bo, and Bo Jackson's stats versus Nolan were awful, lol. It cost him a few stitches, but Ryan chalked up another out on Jackson that play.
@@craenor I watched that KC game with my dad we were dumbfounded that he stayed in there and pitched like a boss with a split lip. I’m from Oklahoma and when I was growing up the only two teams I was able to see on tv were the Rangers and the Cubs. I’ve gone to a bunch of Rangers games over the years. My last one was in 2004. I’ve gotten to see the Cubs live once in St Louis. That’s what you have when you don’t have a major league team to watch. I went to t ton of Tulsa Drillers games when they were still the farm team for Texas. I got to see Pudge, Jose Canseco even did a rehab game in Tulsa one year. I saw oh crap I can’t remember his last name but his first name was Rusty. Man I miss getting to go see games. It’s what really brought my dad and I close. That and OU Sooners Football.
Jim Bunning got knocked out of top 15 in 2005. In the past 15 years it's been the same top 15 players. Verlander (38 yrs) is currently #18, and Scherzer (36 yrs) is #19. We may not see too many more changes to this list!
Funny....whether that's true or not. (Here's another little known fact: As an experiment, for one month in August 1904, MLB mandated that any foul ball would be scored as a ground rule double---and the first team to score 20 runs was automatically declared the winner.)
Unless it's proven that pitchers can complete a game and still win, Ryan's record should stand. That and The fact that he was by far the best power pitcher who pitched foreeeeeeeever.
Okay can we talk about Tim Keefe for a second? He joins this list (the top 15) in 1882 and leaves in 1983. He spends 101 years in the top 15 all time. The only guy who compares is Walter Johnson who has been on the list 107 and counting. But here's the thing. I, and any novice baseball fans, know all about Walter Johnson. I'VE NEVER HEARD OF TIM KEEFE. And I'm enough of a baseball nerd to have heard of Candy Cummings, AG Spaulding, Old Hoss Radborn, Pud Gavin, and Tony Mullane; contemporaries of his when he joins the list. When he last appears on the list, he is there with modern names such as Ryan, Gibson, Jenkins, Carlton, Sever, and Sutton. And again, I've never even heard of the guy. You dropped the ball on this one Kenny Burns. Edit: Did some research. Turns out this guy won 342 games over 14 seasons (slightly more than 24 wins a year and once posted a 0.86 era in 1880. BTW, say all you want about the dead ball era, his adjusted ERA+ (which makes adjustments for things such as era) for 1880 is still the highest of all time. Count me as the newest member of the Tim Keefe fan club! How come no one ever talkes about this guy??
At the time of this list it was pretty amazing that there was no pitchers on the list who started their career after 1992. In the present day though Scherzer and Verlander have moved into that list with over 3300 K’s each. If Geritt Cole stays healthy he’ll be up there too if he pitches to age 40 like most of the pitchers have on this list
Wow i had no idea that after Nolan Ryan took over the #1 alltime spot for a short time he was passed by Steve Carlton only to have Nolan retake the lead and then strike out 1600 more batters! If Randy Johnson couldve gotten his shit together sooner it would be real close.
