Best One Two Pitching Punch in a Season

[LouGehrig]

http://major-league-baseball.suite101.com/article.cfm/koufax_and_drysdale_in_1965

[Victory Faust]

Newhouser and Trout each had pretty good seasons in 1944.

[Brooklyn]

I'd also throw out Johnson and Schilling in 2001, with 2002 being no slouch either.

[LouGehrig]

No question about Newhouser and Trout and I refer to Schilling and Johnson in the article. I am going to write a few articles about different pairs. It is really interesting to see how they did. The main criterion could be that the pair led to a World Championship or at least a pennant, but that would eliminate some good pitching pairs.

What surprised me, even though I saw it, was how much better Figueroa was in 1978 compared to what I remember. While Guidry and he didn't quite measure up to Koufax and Drysdale, they were pretty good.

Seaver and Koosman?

Brown and Reulbach were pretty good in 1908.

[brett]

Wouldn't it be Mathewson and McGinnity in '04 or Mathewson and Marquard in '11 or '12?

Guidry and Tommy John had some good years together. '77 for example.

[LouGehrig]

Wouldn't it be Mathewson and McGinnity in '04 or Mathewson and Marquard in '11 or '12?

Guidry and Tommy John had some good years together. '77 for example.

It could be. I am upset that, for the first time, I am beginning to divide baseball into 1901 (AL first year) until 1919 or 1920 and then 1921 to the present.

It was different in the early days and starters, like Chesbro, worked over 400 innings. Valid comparison are virtually impossible.

[STLCards2]

Maybe not in the handful of best ever, but Maddux/Glavine in '93, '95, and '98 were very impresive, as well as Maddux/Smoltz in '96.

[brett]

It is interesting though that teams very rarely had 2 starters who could both be considered "aces" and who both were having good seasons.

In '89 Brett Saberhagen was the AL Cy Young in dominating fashion, and Mark Gubicza was rated in some publications as the top pitcher over a 2 year period-he had gone 20-8 and 15-11.

Dave Steib and Doyle Alexander in '84.


Saberhagen and Leibrant in '85 both had 145 ERA+ scores and over 235 innings.

I would have a hard time going for a season from '44 because of the depletion of players. I would prefer Newhouser and Trout from '46. 188 ERA+ and 292.7 innings for Newhouser and 155 ERA+ and 276.3 for Trout

[dgarza]

Seaver and Koosman?


That was a good late 60s tag team. As was Gibson & Carlton in '69.

1953 Indians had Lemon, Wynn, & Garcia all with very good years.
1956 substitutes Score for Garcia and may be a better year for the Cleveland pitching squad.

[ElHalo]

I'd have to go with the 1914 Boston Red Sox.

Rube Foster: 211 2/3 IP, 158 ERA+
Dutch Leonard: 224 IP, 279 ERA+

Or the 1906 Cubs:

Mordecai Brown: 277 1/3 IP, 253 ERA+
Jack Pfeister: 250 2/3 IP, 174 ERA+
Ed Reulbach: 218 IP, 159 ERA+

You know, I never realized this, but the TEAM ERA+ for that Cubs' squad was 150.

[Ubiquitous]

Mordecai Brown-Ed Reulbach

Mordecai Brown-Orval Overall

Mordecai Brown-Jack Pfiester

Hippo Vaughn-Pete Alexander

[brett]

I'd have to go with the 1914 Boston Red Sox.

Rube Foster: 211 2/3 IP, 158 ERA+
Dutch Leonard: 224 IP, 279 ERA+

Or the 1906 Cubs:

Mordecai Brown: 277 1/3 IP, 253 ERA+
Jack Pfeister: 250 2/3 IP, 174 ERA+
Ed Reulbach: 218 IP, 159 ERA+

You know, I never realized this, but the TEAM ERA+ for that Cubs' squad was 150.


I am wondering, and not to detract from those great relative ERA's but when a team gets 3 guys like that at the same time, I notice that none of them had to stretch up into the 350 inning range. Perhaps that let them pitch more effectively on a relative basis.

That 150 ERA+ coupled with their 112 OPS+ is one of the best combo's in history. If you consider that it would make them 112% of the league rate of hitting and surrendering only 67% of the league rate, they would outproduce their opponents about 1.67 to 1. Just based on that, if they were an average fielding and baserunning team they would have won 73.6%. I have a stat (maybe used by others) to rate a teams hitting and pitching in combination in which I take OPS+^2*ERA+^2/(1-OPS+^2*ERA+^2) and they rate .738 out of a max of 1. (I actually use 1.50 and 1.12 to show their relative ERA and OPS)

[Ubiquitous]

Only one player in all of baseball topped 350 innings in 1906.

Only 68 pitchers started 20 or more games. 63 pitchers 24 or more games.

The average starting pitched started 30.5 games and threw 263.2 innings.

[STLCards2]

I'd like to narrow down my nomination between the Braves seasons I mentioned to 1995. Maddux had one of the best pitching seasons in history finishing 1st in ERA+ with a mark well over 200 while leading the league in IP. Glavine finished 3rd in the league in ERA+, 5th in IP, won a silver slugger and won the World Series MVP. Including postseason, this season has to be one of top in recent history.

[LouGehrig]

Wouldn't it be Mathewson and McGinnity in '04 or Mathewson and Marquard in '11 or '12?

Yes. See the thread for McGinnity and Mathewson in 1904.

http://major-league-baseball.suite101.com/article.cfm/mcginnity_and_mathewson_in_1904

[HDH]

The first was one of the best overall: Mickey Welch - Timithy Keefe. The most famous is Warren Spahn - Johnny Sain. I think most teams in the 1960s and 1970s had a 1 - 2 punch lead by Sandy Koufax - Don Drysdale then Catfish Hunter - Vida Blue. I think the Detroit Tigers best 1 - 2 punch was in 1907 when they had 2-25 ame winners in

1907 Detroit Tigers:

Wild Bill Donovan 25-4 2.19
Ed Killian 25-13 1.78

George Mullin 20-20 2.59
Ed Siever 18-11 2.16

The 1971 Baltimore Orioles had 4-20 game winners; did you know that the 1920 Chicago White Sox did as well?

1971 Baltimore Orioles
Dave McNally 21-5 2.89
Jim Palmer 20-9 2.68
Pat Dobson 20-8 2.90
Mike Cuellar 20-9 3.08

1920 Chicago White Sox
Red Faber 23-13 2.99
Lefty Williams 22-14 3.91
Eddie Cicotte 21-10 3.26
Dickey Kerr 21-9 3.37

[NineWorldSeries]

Guidry and Tommy John had some good years together. '77 for example.

1977, where they pitched for different teams in the World Series??

[CTaka]

If you go by ERA+, I believe there is only one team that boasted two pitchers with an ERA+ over 200: the 1907 Cubs with Jack Pfiester (ERA+ of 216) and Carl Lundgren (ERA+ of 212). Third highest was some guy named Brown who only pitched with three fingers (ERA+ of 179).

Somehow I'm guessing most would have figured that if the Cubbies were the only team with two pitchers over 200, Brown would have been one of them. I certainly did.