José Berríos turned 30 on Monday, giving up an obscure crown.
The two-time All-Star, who began his career with the Minnesota Twins and now pitches for the Toronto Blue Jays, has 88 career wins, which has made him the active leader of pitchers under 30 in the Major League Baseball, according to Baseball-reference.com.
“It’s crazy,” D-backs pitcher Zac Gallen said a few weeks ago. “I didn’t realize he wasn’t yet 30.”
It is now. And his rise to the 30-and-over category has highlighted how few accomplished young pitchers there are in the major leagues these days, at least when it comes to traditional statistics. Forget the 300-win pitcher who was the Hall of Fame benchmark for career excellence for the last century — even 200 career wins may soon be out of the question.
Thanks to a combination of less usage for starting pitchers and an uptick in arm injuries – particularly Tommy John surgery – the promising group of twenty-something pitchers has been slow to catch on. develop. Colorado’s Germán Márquez is now the under-30 leader with 65 career wins, but is recovering from Tommy John surgery.
It’s a common theme. Cleveland’s Shane Bieber is next on the list with 62 wins, and he’s also on the shelf because of Tommy John. Following Bieber is Boston’s Lucas Giolito with 61 wins, and he’s also out after elbow surgery.
The current under-30 pitching leader is Baltimore’s Corbin Burnes, who has 49 career wins and turns 30 on Oct. 22. He is one of the few young flamethrowers who remains relatively healthy. Others, like Atlanta’s Spencer Strider or Miami’s Eury Perez, weren’t so lucky. Not far behind Burnes are Dylan Cease (48 wins at age 28), Walker Buehler (47 wins at age 29) and Logan Webb (46 wins at age 27).
Once the current generation of older pitchers like Justin Verlander (260 career wins), Zack Greinke (225), Max Scherzer (214) and Clayton Kershaw (210) retire, it’s fair to wonder if we One day we will see a pitcher with 200 wins. Again.
There’s still a good chance New York Yankees ace Gerrit Cole, 33, who has 145 career wins, can make it happen. Of course, he’s also hurt right now, with an elbow injury that didn’t require surgery.
Gallen helped the Diamondbacks win the World Series last season and is still under 30 years old. The 28-year-old started in the National League All-Star Game last season and is widely considered one of the best young pitchers in the game. But even with his health and relative success, he has only won 44 career victories.
It’s fair to wonder, when it comes time for Hall of Fame selections in 2040, will there be a pitcher who can qualify? The last pitcher who spent his entire career as a starter and got into the Hall of Fame despite having fewer than 200 wins was Sandy Koufax more than 50 years ago. He won 165 games and three Cy Young Awards, but his career was cut short by injuries at age 30.
“That’s a really good question,” Gallen said. “It used to be 300 wins, 3,000 strikeouts. It was the reference. Now it will probably be closer to 200 wins and 2,000 strikeouts. Careers are not as long. The length of a career is simply shorter.
Indeed, 2,000 strikeouts might also be overkill. The active leader under 30 is Giolito with 1,077, the only pitcher over 1,000.
Gallen is old enough to remember pitchers like Randy Johnson, Tom Glavine, Greg Maddux and Roger Clemens, legends who ended their careers around 2007-09. All reached 300 victories. It may not seem like that long ago, but in pitching, it seems like an eternity.
Gallen says he wouldn’t be surprised if current pitchers were evaluated by similar standards — at least for a while.
“The generation of the next 20 years will be that bridge,” Gallen said. “You would think that some guys who were really good players in their day would get burned for the Hall of Fame, because they just don’t have the numbers.”
There are other alphabet soup stats by which pitchers can be judged, such as WHIP, ERA+, FIP, and SO/9. Either way, these might be better indicators of true dominance.
But there is something that still stands out in this victory. After all, that’s the whole point of competition.
“It makes me appreciate these guys who have played this long at this level and with this much intensity,” Gallen said. “When I was a kid I thought a good career lasted 20 years, but then you get into it and realize 20 years is incredible. Especially being dominant for 15 of them.
Last week, Miami Marlins left-hander Braxton Garrett threw a throwback in a 3-0 win over the Diamondbacks, finishing with a complete-game shutout and needing just 95 pitches to do it. . Highlighting how much the game has changed at every level over the past 20 years, the 26-year-old said it was the first time he had thrown nine complete innings in his life.
Garrett’s teammate, Sandy Alcántara, is the closest thing to a current ironman on the mound after throwing 228 2/3 innings in 2022, including six complete games. This effort earned him the NL Cy Young Award.
After Garrett’s gem, Alcántara jokingly referred to the southpaw as “mini-Sandy.”
“He seems to finish games with ease, so it’s cool to do that in front of him,” Garrett said.
Then again, taking on a heavy workload like Alcántara’s comes with risks. You’ll never guess why the right-hander isn’t pitching this season.
Tommy John surgery.
2024-06-02 01:31:50
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