20-20

[jdmercha]

Has anyone seen a pitcher with a 20-20 record? With 4 starts left I have John Smoltz with a record of 17-19.

[markp65]

Only Wilbur Wood, Rick Reuschel, Gaylord Perry, and Phil Niekro -type guys.

:D

Your query has me sentimental for the time when there were actual SPs in MLB who went every fourth day. Billy Martin was the last manager to work his SPs this hard. I wonder if any of those Billyballers can lift a beer can these days?

It's crazy that the braintrust on Long Island sees fit to pay homage to this long gone vestige of the game by continuing to include the * 3-day rest starters in the card sets. Why do they do it?

[rgimbel]

ever notice that in the days of 4 man rotations and 300 plus innings that the pitchers pitched for 15 years with no arm trouble now they can barely go 5 innings every 5th day and they still end up on the dl.

[jdmercha]

he's 18-19 now.

Actually I've heard some commentators talking about this. They said that hitters today are much more patient than they were 20 years ago. Today's pitchers who go 220 innings in a year will throw more pitches than the 300 inning pitcher of 20 years ago. Bob Gibson would barely throw 100 pitches for a complete game. Now it's difficult to get through the 7th inning with less than 100 pitches.

Maybe SOM should change the * to mean every 5th day, while all others would be every 6th day.

[kaina7]

I say get rid of the starters pitching on 3 days rest as well. That is completely unrealistic. On the rare occasion you will see someone go on 3 days rest in the Bigs, but not as the norm.

I kind of like the idea of the * being for 4 days rest and the rest even longer.

[DAVIDGAMBLE]

How exactly would that work for a five man rotation to have pitchers need more than 4 games rest? They get skipped I suppose. Which isn't horrible and it would cut down on the innings and consequential inflated raw stats, but it's still not the way we see pitchers used in today's game. I thought the asterisk rule would be implemented best when it's getting down to the nitty gritty and you need your horse to go with short rest for matchup purposes (with some minor fatigue penalties of course), but it's all too tempting just to get your studs to take the ball every fourth game and bloat their innings. I'm wondering why there's not more of a fatigue hit as the season wears on for these pitcher's that go every fourth day week in and week out...maybe if their performance suffers more we'll all be less keen to throw them out there like their rotator cuff is titanium steel alloy.

[LMBombers]

I think Tim Wakefield could go every other day! :wink:

[jdmercha]

In 40 starts Smoltz pitched 20 complete games and finished with a record of 18-19 with 307 IP.

Perhaps SOM should institute an injury rating for pitchers. Then make all starters able to start every 5th game. Any pitcher with more than 30 starts (in real life) would never get injured. Other starters could then be subject to injuries of 5, 10 or 15 games (missing 1 2, or 3 starts).