Greatest RH Starters/ Greatest Beatles Songs

In no particular order:
Roger Clemens
Greg Maddux
Nolan Ryan
Pedro Martinez
Tom Seaver
Bob Gibson
Jim Palmer
Robin Roberts
Don Drysdale
Bob Lemon

(I'd rather Bob Feller over most on the list, and he had a good career post-war, but his glory was pre-war.)

I'm not sure where he would rank but I'm a little surprised no one has mentioned Smoltz yet. I also wonder if his very successful mid career switch to closer has hurt with some of you. I do think he merits consideration regardless

I'm not sure where he would rank but I'm a little surprised no one has mentioned Smoltz yet. I also wonder if his very successful mid career switch to closer has hurt with some of you. I do think he merits consideration regardless

The pain of remembering the Tigers trading John Smoltz for Doyle Alexander causes me to twitch painfully at the mention of his name.

I'm not sure where he would rank but I'm a little surprised no one has mentioned Smoltz yet. I also wonder if his very successful mid career switch to closer has hurt with some of you. I do think he merits consideration regardless

That was exactly why I left him off, and it was tough. If the category had been "Greatest RH pitchers who started significant amount of games," I would have ranked him 8th. However, his starting stats just didn't top Drysdale's, Jenkins', and Roberts'. He also certainly would have been number one on the "best golfing players of all time list."

He should, however, be a first ballot HOFer and join his buddies Maddux and Glavine.

I have a bad case of Pirates fever, so, it may be affecting my judgment, but, I'll give this a try....

1. Steve Blass. 7th game '71 series performance by this Pirate left Oriole hitters off-balance.
2. Jim Bibby. '79 pickup gave Pirates an unexpected lift on their way to '79 championship
3. Vern Law - Two victories over storied Yankees in '60 series solidified his place as one of the all-time great righthanders
4. Edison Volquez - Matching Bumgardner pitch-for-pitch in one-game playoff, his 2-1 victory lifts Pirates to 2014 division series.
5. Bert Blyleven - Probably the greatest right-handed curve-ball in the modern era.

Greatest Beatles Songs
1. In My Life - simple and elegant
2. Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band (Reprise) - Always liked the looseness of this segue to A Day In The Life
3. And Your Bird Can Sing - The only Harrison guitar riff that seemed genius to me.
4. I Wanna Hold Your Hand - the low and high harmonizing by John and Paul really clicks.
5. Nowhere Man - John Lennon was a great writer who knew how to use small, simple words.

Paul, I have what I think is a funny and awesome story regarding Bert Blyleven.

When I was 16 years old my parents were holding a Halloween party for their adult friends. Us kids were supposed to stay out of the way (go play with our fiends sort of thing)...except for me. I couldn't figure out why my father wanted me to stick around for the beginning of his party, but he did.

The reason became obvious when Bert Blyleven and wife come walking up our driveway (we lived in Villa Park, CA at the time) around 6:30 or 7pm that night! Now this was 1979 and the Pirates had just won the World Series, as you well know. It seemed so surreal to me that Blyleven was coming into my kitchen, living room, and maybe bathroom after he was pitching in the World Series a week or so before. Very odd and very weird. My father wasn't even a baseball fan! Step-Mom even less so.

I'm just a 16 year old sports freak (loved watching/listening to sports all the time!) at the time and the first thing I do, of course, is call up my best friend who was a Twins fan in Minnesota when he fell in love with Blyleven in the early 70's. Pretty bizarre he now sees Blyleven in my house. My friend brought over another friend and we were all in awe of course just staring at Bert, waiting for whatever wisdom to come out of his mouth, come out. But it wasn't wisdom Bert was preachin that night! haha

I hope I don't get Bert in trouble but he was HIGHLY entertaining for us kids. I admit at first we were all probably in shock but Bert knows how to entertain like no one else. He starts telling raunchy jokes and that's always fun. But I admit I was a little shocked. I worshiped ballplayers at that time. Bert KILLED my idea of ever worshiping baseball players again! Because in addition to the jokes he goes over to the cloth napkins and proceeds to make interesting shapes from them. It was pretty obvious what they were! Genitalia! Bert is as good at folding cloth napkins into penis and vagina shapes as he was throwing the curve! Believe me! Bert freakin Blyleven was blowing my mind!

Anyhow, it turns out my father knew Bert from his real estate dealings. Blyleven had a home in the area as well. Still shocked me that Bert would be at my home, never mind so soon after winning a freakin World Series!

although his career was split by the war I cannot not leave out Rapid Robert Feller

I also think Phil Niekro is more deserving then Roberts and Drysdale

How about Gaylord Perry?

And while is is not top 10 material......shout out to Jack Morris...loved Morris.

Feller's career was split by the war, but it was still tough to leave him off the list. He would have been as high as 5 for me if it wasn't, but he just lost too many good years in the count.

As to Niekro, he won more games than Roberts and Drysdale (as did Sutton), but he wasn't a better pitcher than them. Roberts had a lower ERA--3.50<3.62--and a lower WHIP--1.17<1.27--than Niekro. He also had much better control and had a period of true dominance--leading the league in wins for 4 straight years--that Niekro never enjoyed. Drysdale also had a better ERA--2.95<3.62--and a better WHIP--1.15<1.27--than Niekro. He also had better control and struck out more batters per inning, and he truly intimidated batters in a way Niekro (or few others) ever did.

As to Perry, he did produce better stats than Niekro and more similar ones to Roberts and Drysdale. I gave him significant consideration for the ten spot, where I fluctuated between him and Roberts. I decided that I would take Perry on his word on the spitball and make that the deciding factor. Yes, he is in the HOF, but he can never say he succeeded the way he did entirely fairly ever again. So, I chose the excellent, once-dominant, but mostly forgotten Roberts.

Great story about Blyleven, Fred. I enjoyed that. Definitely a better story than when Cleveland right-hander Steve Hargan visited our family's house in Tucson during spring training.

It was the highlight of my childhood...easily! we also talked baseball of course. He maintained Pops should win the MVP that year and I said Winfield. He reasoned that the Pirates made the playoffs and the Padres finsihed last...so how could anyone be most valuable.

I probably traumatized his poor wife. I actually went up to her and asked her how she coped with Bert being on the road all the time. Oh boy.

To me, Nolan Ryan severely overrated. I would definatly take Seaver and Martinez over Ryan and probably Gibson and Palmer. For all the no-hitters and strikeouts, Ryan really never had great control, which is really a big understatement. I think he led the league in walks about eight times and barely had a 2-1 strikeout ratio even in some of his big strikeout years. It's at least part of the reason he lost so many games(almost 300). If you want spectacular strikeout numbers or a no-hiiter, Ryan's your guy. If you want the top RH SP, you grab Martinez, Seaver, Palmer or Gibson.