Do the Astros have best pitching rotation in baseball history?

Ok... So you basically gave the same stats except in a per-game format. What's your point? Mine was that 41 extra runs is a very sizable margin. It's surely worth about 10 games or so back then, considering the average team only scores about 3.8 runs a game. That amount of runs is roughly the equivalent of the Cards 9 game lead on the Astros this year.

I'm too young to remember the transition from 4-man rotation to the current 5-man rotation in baseball. Perhaps they throw just as hard back then. But if so, I can't imagine why no pitcher nowadays can throw nearly 300 innings in baseball. Have all pitchers become lazier now or something?

Pleast stop with the whole "winning 20 games" argument. Among the top 40 pitchers in ERA this year, 17 has more wins than Roger Clemens? Are you saying you'd take each one of those pitchers over the Rocket?

 

My point was to show their ability to score runs was not as "hefty" as you made it out to be. Take into account the Orioles scored 10 or more runs 13 times that year. They won the division by 12 games.

The word is Pampered

The thread title asked if the Astros were the best rotation in baseball history. In my opinion they are not even close to being the best. The 1971 Orioles pitching staff was head and shoulders above this staff. Wins, Complete games, Innings pitched. Look at the 1965 Dodgers for great pitching with little run support, another better staff than the Astros.

You're trying to make it out like todays pitchers a "better" than those of yesteryear. They are not .

 

It's weird that you mention that today's pitchers are pampered then mention the 1965 Dodgers - who's best pitcher was forced to retire due to injury at 30 because of overpitching.

Today's pitchers are better than those in the past - and they'll have longer, and more effective careers thanks to this "pampering".

 

I don't know where Perry got this idea that Rich "El Guapo" Garces was a starter.

 

Imagine paying a pitcher $100 million and running him out there every 4th day? Ain't gonna happen. Of course they will have longer careers only having to pitch 6 or 7 innings (or 100 pitches, whichever comes first) then let the bullpen take over. As for more effective careers, I don't think so.

As far as Koufax, he retired because of arthritis, not overpitching.

 

Nonsense.

Before the 1964 season Koufax was having elbow problems - the Dodgers threw him in a ST game where he threw 150 pitches - his elbow swelled up like a balloon - but the Dodgers proceeded to throw him out there every fourth anyways - is it a coincidence that he retired before he was thirty?

Or that Don Drysdale retired before he was 33?

Or that the Los Angeles Dodgers - having lost two Hall of Famers in the prime of their careers - were one of the first teams to move to a five man rotation?

Pitchers don't pitch as much as they used to because teams actually like to have pitchers have long, effective careers. Because teams realize you can't just pitch through elbow problems without having serious consequences.

 

Drysdale retired because of a torn rotator cuff. Again not ovepitching

 

How did Don Drysdale get a torn rotator cuff then?

 

Same as Chien-Ming Wang or Tommy John

Prognosis

The prognosis for recovery from minor rotator cuff injuries is excellent. For serious injuries, the prognosis is usually good, some six weeks of physical therapy being required following surgery. Full recovery may take several more months. In some cases, the injury is so severe that it requires tendon grafts and muscle transfers. In rare cases, a severe injury is not repairable, usually because the tendon has been torn for too long a time.


So you see, a torn rotator cuff is no longer the "cancer" Drysdale said it was.

 

The thing is, you're showing me two pitchers who both had huge workloads, and shortly after that had to retire due to arm injuries.

I just can't believe that Sandy Koufax's career couldn't have been prolonged if he had a lighter workload, or the Dodgers hadn't thrown him for 330 innings despite his elbow trouble - or that Drysdale doesn't tear his rotator cuff if he hadn't put so much stress on it in the preceeding years by throwing so much.

 

Uh oh, Pitch Count Police in the house.

 

you make it sound like there's no way they could be.

 

A very good read.

 

If either Zeke or wandy would step up and prove they belong in this rotaion or if Backe would start pitching like he did last year, than i would say yes. But, until then, I would say no. A great all-time pitching staff has solid contributions for the 4th and 5th starters, and, this year, we haven't seen that too often.