Gomez has a great WS record because of the run support he received. In the 1936 WS he had a 4.70 ERA but the Yankees scored 18 and 13 runs in his two starts. In his 6 starts, the Yankees scored 54 runs, an average of 9 per game. It is pretty hard to lose when you get that kind of support.

Koufax on the other hand started 7 WS games, the Dodgers scored 17 runs total about two and a half per game. In his 3 losses, the Dodgers were shutout twice and scored one run in the third game. Koufax had a much lower ERA, WHIP, K/9, etc.

Plank was a dead ball era pitcher. It is difficult to compare him to Koufax. Plank was the best lefty of his era and one of the greatest pitchers of all time. Also, he is one of the most underrated players of all time.

Yes I did see him pitch. I responded to your assertion that because Gomez was 6 -0 in world series play he was the best left hander in that arena. I started following baseball in 1955. Wasn't a dodger or Koufax fan. I was drafted to be a yankee fan because that's what my family rooted for. Believe it or not, I am from NY but a staunch Minnesota Twins fan. Followed the Twins since day1 in 1961. This brings me to the 1965 world series. I will never forget how Koufax dominated them. I am not a huge Koufax fan but I have to give him his due. Never saw a pitcher like him.
.

rats60

Finally, after 300 posts on this thread, someone agrees with me regarding "Lefty" Eddie Plank.

Incidentally, the title of this thread is...."Best lefty of all-time ?"....therefore, era is immaterial.


TED Z

T206 Reference
.

Tony

Great, having seen him pitch, we both appreciate how good he was. Actually, I grew up being an avid Yankees fan because Phil Rizzuto was my neighbor in Hillside, NJ (his house
was 2 blocks away from ours).

Monday nights (when it was an off day for the Yankees), Phil would join us kids at St. Catherine's School and entertain us with all his stories. Also, he would give us tips on how to
play the game.

We both grew up in some great times, Tony.


TED Z

T206 Reference
.

Koufax’s road ERA was 2.81 those 4 seasons. If that is borderline HOF, then what does that say about guys with higher ERAs like Grove, Spahn, Randy Johnson, Carlton etc.? Are they not Hofers? Should we kick out everyone above your borderline? That would leave us with Koufax and Ford as the only post 1920 HOF starting pitchers and Kershaw and maybe deGrom as the only future HOF pitchers. Koufax was still one of the greatest pitchers of all time on the road those seasons and that is with you excluding his best season.

By the way, Ted is it true that Rizzuto didn't like signing autographs?

Tony

I could tell you many stories about Phil Rizzuto. He was quite a character in real life. But, he loved talking with you. Every BB card show (since the 1980's which I saw him at,
he drew large crowds and it looked like he was having fun talking with the people while signing his autograph.

Here is a personal story I have to tell you. April 1984, I am at Newark Airport standing in the ticket counter line and who's in front of me, but Phil. I tap him in the shoulder to
say hello. We start talking about our old neighborhood in Hillside. It happens that we both are flying out to O'Hare airport in Chicago. Our flight is delayed, so we spend three
hours talking and sipping coffee at Newark. Finally, we board our plane, Phil is in 1st class and I am sitting in the back of the plane. Phil finds me back there and invites me to
sit with him in 1st class. We spent the next 2 hours "Talkin' Baseball". Actually I was mainly listening since he was doing all the talking. That was one very interesting flight to
Chicago.

https://photos.imageevent.com/tedzan...keeStadium.jpg


TED Z

T206 Reference
.

I am a die-hard Dodger fan and love the history of the Brooklyn years. The one autograph I will never part with is my Phil Rizzuto. I've told the story on Net54 before, but I was set up as a dealer at a show in the Poconos when I was 14 or 15. Rizzuto was the autograph guest. At the end of his signing time I realized I hadn't gotten anything and I didn't have anything good to get signed. I took a piece of poster board and a sharpie and drew a quick picture of him with the Yankee logo and took it to get signed. He wanted to know who did it and I told him that I did and that the marker was probably still wet. He said "Holy cow, that's terrific" and signed it.

Fast forward MANY years. I am in my 40's and there's a large package under my parent's Christmas tree. I open it and there's Scooter beautifully framed. My parents had moved that piece of poster board from house to house more years than I care to think about and I had forgotten about it entirely.

Still have to hang it in my office, but I will never part with it.

An ERA of 2.81 (over a piddly four year period no less) is equal to the greatest who ever pitched? 2.81? Really? For starters, ERA? Holy crap. But let's get past that. His road ERA of 2.81 over that four year period on its own is so impressive that he would be one of the greatest of all time had that been his career number. Really? Ok.

Any idea who had a 2.58 ERA over that same four year period? And if you include 1966 to add a fifth year this person had an ERA of 2.34 .

Any idea?

Gary Peters.

But sure. Koufax road ERA of 2.81 from 1962-1965 makes him super special.

Larry.

Walker.

Koufax home ERA 1962-1965............... 1.32

Koufax road ERA 1962-1965................ 2.75


Nothing to see here obviously.

Great story...

Another great story...

All of this isn't true. I'm looking at the data on baseball reference right now, and the highest major league BA for any year in the 1960s was .258. The stretch from 1963-1972 had the lowest runs scored in the league for any time period in the entire live ball era.

It's not a myth that offense was at a low point in the '60s.

don't know where that graph I looked at was pulling it's info but you are closer to correct than I am. Still not exactly a dearth of great hitters, just your league average was lower.

Could it be that the pitching was superior? I can’t believe all the naysayers out there. Koufax was the most dominant pitcher of his time. His election to hall At such an early age proves that.

According to baseball reference, Koufax’s road ERA from 1962-1966 was 2.59. For pitchers with 400 or more innings pitched, the minimum to qualify for the ERA title, that was the best in Major League Baseball. Gibson and Marichal tied for second best at 2.69.

There is nothing to see. Koufax was great on the road and even greater at home. Any advantage Koufax gained from pitching in Dodger Stadium for 5 years is more than offset by pitching 4 years in the LA Coliseum with its 250 foot left field fence and 320 foot power alley in left-center.

He was elected at an early age is because he retired young and was elected in his first year of eligibility.

You are proving my point. If all you complain about is longevity why did the HOF committee elect him on first year of eligibility. There are a lot of players out there with several great seasons on their resume and are still waiting. The man was getting better every year until his injury. They recognized it, it's a shame a lot of you guys don't.

Yeah, the way I look at it, if the offense was "down" it wasn't because of any shortcomings on the part of the hitters, it was just that the pitching was THAT good. And if any players from other eras had had the chance to hit against the pitching of the 60's they wouldn't necessarily have done any better.

Ultimately, you can't really compare eras, although it's a lot of fun. Would batting averages have been as high as they were during the early days if the fielders back then used modern gloves? Would the pitching of the 1960's have been even more effective if they were using the dead ball of the early days? Would night baseball and traveling had any effect on the earlier generation's numbers? How would the dimensions of the ballparks had an effect on play?

I don't think you can say that Koufax getting the Cy Young awards and his early election to the hall, proves that he was "the greatest". But those honors attest to the universal acclaim and high esteem in which he was held by those who saw him play day to day at that time.

I understand the longevity argument in naming a GOAT. But I think what is missing from some of the analysis on this thread, is a respect for what Koufax actually DID. First of all, it wasn't just his record and his numbers, but it was HOW he attained those numbers. He wasn't a junk ball pitcher who was extremely effective. The guy was a force of nature on the mound. Maybe he could have stuck around longer if he learned the knuckleball, or concentrated on throwing off-speed stuff, thus easing up on his arm. But he continued to pitch the way he pitched. Also, to go out ON TOP as he did, was unheard of. Most athletes have their great years and then begin a slide. What Koufax did reminds me of the home run that Mantle hit which almost went out of the stadium in 1963. It was still rising when it hit the facade. (And yes, I do know that it's possible that Josh Gibson may have actually hit one out of the original Yankee Stadium, and that Frank Howard might have as well one foggy evening.)

I have argued that Koufax's success is largely attributable to his own natural talent and the change he made in his approach to his pitching he made in 1961.

The arguments that I think are most pathetic on this thread are the ones pointing to the first several years of Koufax's career. as some kind of detriment. Koufax left that pitcher behind. Yeah, he had a longer apprenticeship than many of the players we think of as greats. But it shouldn't be used against him. The fact that it was longer, and that after it, he found himself and did achieve greatness, is something that should be in his favor.

Yes, the larger strike zone was beneficial to all the pitchers of the time, and Chavez Ravine was a good park to pitch in. But no other contemporary Dodger pitcher achieved what Koufax achieved. The quotes I've seen by the greatest hitters of that era, don't say that he was the greatest of all time, but the greatest of THAT time. Or if they don't say he was the greatest of that time, they say things that let us know that he was not just another great pitcher. There WAS something special about Koufax.

If Koufax is the same pitcher at home as he was on the road he isn't close to a Hall Of Famer. That's a fact. He would have been a really good pitcher for five years. Not the insane pitcher that his stats show. He was able to turn his video game numbers at home over a five year period into the Hall Of Fame. That's not that much of a knock on him. I think Larry Walker should have been in the Hall a while ago. I think Koufax is an obvious Hall Of Famer and one of the best who ever threw a baseball. We all missed out on a lot when he was physically unable to perform.

It just mystifies me why nobody seems to want to admit that he was a creature of his home park during his prime. As you say, even if you take into account his road numbers and just double them, he is likely the best pitcher in the game over those five years. But he's not "Koufax!!!!!!!". He's just Koufax.

And yes, from 1958 to 1961 his home park hurt his numbers. Actually he had an anomalous 1959 season where he was much better at home, but the rest he was much better on the road. He wasn't the same pitcher he would become after 1961 during this time however. Doubling his road numbers to replace his home numbers he was still fairly ordinary over that period, save for a lot more strikeouts than the ordinary pitcher. It is what he did from 1962-1966 that got him immortal status, and that was largely a home field driven event. That's just a fact. His home field over that period is why his numbers are so insane.

Koufax career is very unique in the way it ended. The 4 years of dominance were still very fresh in voters minds when he was elected in his first year. If you flip his career and put those 4 dominant years at the beginning and his bad years at the end, he doesn't sniff the HOF and is the pitchers version of Don Mattingly.

Not a lefty, but 1964-68, Joe Horlen had a 2.32 ERA for the White Sox. There are lots of examples of guys having amazing 5-year runs.

https://sabr.org/bioproj/person/lefty-grove/

Lefty Grove may have been baseball’s greatest all-time pitcher. He was certainly its most dominant. No one matched his nine ERA titles, and his .680 winning percentage (300-141) is the highest among 300 game winners (eighth best overall). After winning 111 games in a minor-league career that delayed his major-league debut until he was 25, Grove led the American League in strikeouts his first seven years, pitched effectively in hitters’ parks (Shibe Park, Fenway Park) and starred in three World Series....

Moreover, Grove routinely struck out between 10 and 14 major leaguers in exhibition games (they may have been reluctant to dig in against him), told Babe Ruth “I’m not afraid of you,” and made good his boast by whiffing the Bambino in nine of 11 exhibition at-bats.

Grove was also elected to the HOF his first year of eligibility (unlike Spahn.)

This is the point.
 

No lefthander competes seriously with Grove.

Mattingly's legacy may be a bigger testament to Yankee lore than any of his legendary predecessors there (which is obviously saying something).

A very good lefty line-drive .300 hitter with gap pop and a shortened career. Whose splits show that Yankee Stadium turned plenty of doubles into short porch homers (he likely wouldn't reached 200 lifetime HRs playing anywhere else).

Sure he was one of the best few hitters in the league for a few years, but even then his numbers didn't dominate anywhere near like Koufax's prime did. The fact that many people consider him an "almost" HOF guy, and that he got 28% of the vote at first, is pretty unreal.

Playing for the Yankees turned him from being Magglio Ordonez into one of the most memorable baseball names of a generation. When I get reincarnated into a top baseball prospect, I'm holding out for pinstripes

Koufax still has a better ERA, WHIP, FIP, K/9 than Grove. So you still want to kick out of the HOF Grove, Spahn, Carlton, Randy Johnson, Feller, Ryan, Maddox, etc. Your new standard has gone from 1 to 8 live ball pitchers, Ford, Palmer, Seaver, Marichal, Gibson, Martinez, Drysdale and Hubbell. Or are you not letting other pitchers who had worse road ERAs in too because Drysdale also benefits from Dodger Stadium? Then he has to go along with Palmer, Martinez and Hubbell. That leaves you with only 4 modern pitchers in your HOF, Ford, Seaver, Gibson and Marichal. What a coincidence that they are all from the same time period as Koufax. Should we kick them out too because the hitters were too weak? Any standard you apply to Koufax, he is still a first ballot Hofer, he was that good, even on the road.

I missed Don Mattingly winning 3 triple crowns, 2 WS MVPs, leading the league in most statistical categories several seasons etc. if Mattingly had been as good as Koufax for a 5-6 year peak, he would have been a first ballot Hofer too. Look at Black Ink, which is a player leading the league in statistical categories. Koufax in his short career has 78 which is almost double what a Hof pitcher has for a career. Mattingly only has 23 which is less than the average a Hof hitter. That is why he is still waiting for the HOF. He just wasn’t that dominant at his peak.

19th
 

Can we all at least agree that Ed Morris was the best 19th century lefty ? or is someone going Frank Killen or Matt Kilroy on us ?

Joe Horlen was a good pitcher, but not in the class of Koufax.

Look at Horlen's innings pitched, complete games, and strikeout totals from 1964 - 1968.

IP:

210.2
219
211
258
223.2

CG:

9
7
4
13
4

SO:

138
125
124
103
102


Compare these totals to Koufax's stats from 1962 - 1966:

IP:

184
311
223
335
323


CG:

11
20
15
27
27


SO:

216
306
223
382
317


And Horlen's W-L record for 1964 - 1968 was:

13-8
13-13
10-13
19-7
12-14


Koufax's from 1962 - 1966:

14-7
25-5
19-5
26-8
27-9


The clubs Horlen was on were largely good too. The White Sox position in the standings from 1964 - 1968 were:

2nd
2nd
4th
4th
9th

All first division clubs except for 1968, and they finished one game behind the Yankees in 1964 and only 3 behind the Red Sox in 1967.

Horlen's E.R.A.'s were great for that 5 year run, but his other stats don't come near challenging what Koufax achieved - by a long shot.

Also if you're looking at lifetime statistics, it's no contest between the two, with Koufax coming out way on top.

C’mon man, there is literally no quantifiable metric to suggest Koufax had the greatest left-handed pitching career. You know the pitching triple crown is far more common than the hitting triple crown (more than 2x as common). The Koufax people in this thread have relied on 2 things only... peak performance and anecdotal evidence. Sorry a pitcher that has the same WAR and almost identical innings pitched as Ron Guidry isn’t gonna get the nod.

Look at the runs scored per game. Home Runs remained; total offense declined significantly. I am not the first, or even the 10,000th to refer to it as a second deadball era as a result. Is it LITERALLY a deadball era? No, but neither was the original. We can call it whatever word you want to denote a low run environment. During Koufax's peak years, NL offense was in a decline. This is a fact. Ty Cobb hit almost .400 every year, but that doesn't mean the deadball era wasn't a low run environment.

Runs per game per team in the NL during the postwar era, using 1963 as Koufax's breakout mega season (though he had an excellent 1962 as well, it breaks down very similarly each year you use as he had a very short peak and all of it was in a pitching dominated era):
1953: 4.8
1963: 3.8
1973: 4.15
1983: 4.1
1993: 4.49
2003: 4.61
2013: 4.00

Can we stop debating things that are easily proven by even a cursory look at the numbers in this thread?

Another way to think about this.

You are a manager and you are getting 1 lefty pitcher for 15-20 Years.

Who do you want? Remember your job is on the line.

No chance you are picking Koufax.


(and don't say well if I was managing for 4 years I'd take Koufax.....because then you can say well if I'm managing for 1 year I'd take so and so.....if you were a manager would you want to manage for 1 year, 4 years or 20 years?.....uh huh)

Theoretical questions are theoretical. If you're considering Koufax at all, he must be Koufax already, no?

If length doesn't matter, Ferdie Schupp (since we are ignoring time and league and offensive context and longevity etc.) in all of 1916 was far better than Koufax's best, by almost a full run. If we must only consider Koufax who is "Koufax already", why don't we apply this same exact standard to every other pitcher, ignore their bad years or lack of longevity and count only their absolute best? Is there any logical reason to treat Koufax so vastly different from every other pitcher?

By your reasoning, Koufax still isn't the best. The Koufax argument relies on longevity being a key factor but lasting for exactly four years, no more. This standard makes absolutely no sense.

Rhett

Thanks.......As a long time Yankees fan, I was thinking of bringing up Ron Guidry, but you did and you said it very succinctly.

I saw Koufax pitch (1955-1966) and I've always considered him one of the best Southpaws. And Guidry is in the same class.

Their career stats are very comparable....Guidry was somewhat more effective in World Series play:

Guidry....Games = 368, W-L = 170-91, ERA = 3.29, World Series W-L = 5-2....WAR = 47.8

Koufax....Games = 397, W-L = 165-87, ERA = 2.76, World Series W-L = 4-3....WAR = 48.9


TED Z

T206 Reference
.

Ted- I do agree about Guidry being a great lefty. Wouldn't you agree that .60 in ERA difference is huge with that amount of work done by both? Also, can you elaborate on the strengths of the Dodgers line-up versus the Ynakees line-up during their careers? Thanks a lot....

Tom- this is laughable. Why not ask or read comments from former players batting against Koufax.. 3 Cy Youngs in 4 years?

Mathematics is much more instructive than heavily biased accounts of players who did not face the other great left handers. Verifiable facts > anecdotal opinions.

Hi Kevin
 

Crunching the numbers, you'll see a distinct difference between the 1977 - 1985 total RUNS production for the Yankees vs. the 1961 - 1966 Dodgers total Runs production.
The Yankees 1977 - 1985 scored an average of 781 RUNS per year vs. the 1961 - 1966 Dodgers 674 RUNS per year. Therefore, Ron Guidry could afford to have Half a RUN
higher in his ERA stat and still win games.

Two of his three 20+ games wins were not your typical low ERA......

1978 W-L 25 - 3, ERA = 1.74

1983 W-L 21 - 9, ERA = 3.42

1985 W-L 22 - 6, ERA = 3.27



TED Z

T206 Reference
.

When I was growing up it was Spahn. I think he belongs in the conversation.

Yeah, I'm sure the guys Grove was striking out (as he led the league 7 straight years) said he was a pretty outstanding pitcher too. Are we supposed to stack up quotes from guys who faced Koufax but not Grove, vs guys who faced Grove but not Koufax, and try to figure out who piled on the superlatives to the greatest extent?

As far as Sandy and his Cy Young awards, Grove would've at least equaled, and probably topped him. Let's compare their top 6 season runs:

Grove
1928 24-8 2.58 (led in wins, strikeouts)
1929 20-6 2.81 (led in ERA, strikeouts)
1930 28-5 2.54 (led in wins, ERA, strikeouts)
1931 31-4 2.06 (led in wins, ERA, strikeouts)
1932 25-10 2.84 (led in ERA, strikeouts)
1933 24-8 3.20 (led in wins, strikeouts)

Plus 148 more career ML wins, and 111 minor league wins

Koufax
1961 18-13 3.52 (led in strikeouts)
1962 14-7 2.54 (led in ERA)
1963 25-5 1.88 (led in wins, ERA, strikeouts)
1964 19-5 1.74 (led in ERA)
1965 26-8 2.04 (led in wins, ERA, strikeouts)
1966 27-9 1.73 (led in wins, ERA, strikeouts)

Plus 36 more career ML wins

Grove's best season, 1931, beats Sandy's best (1963 or 1966, you choose)
Grove's best 6 year run beat Sandy's
The remainder of Grove's career destroys Sandy's (148 more wins to just 36)

For extra credit, Grove was forced to spend his first 5 years in the minors, where he won another 100+ games.

Thanks for chiming in Yogi

This thread is still active?

Koufax Pitching WAR for Lefty’s is 22nd All-Time. Not #1, not #2, not even #21. A lot of bias to put him into the Top 10 I suppose.

Mathematics support Koufax as the greatest lefty ever too.

lol

Yeah, but Grove had higher raw ERA's, and we are pretending that park affects and low-run environments are somehow irrelevant for Koufax :confused:

Low run environment is irrelevant when caused by superior pitching. Same for park affect when you choose to ignore Koufax's 4 years in the LA Coliseum.

The only sensible way to look at ERA is to compare a pitcher to his peers. That accounts for general trends in ballparks, juiced baseballs, mound height, league expansion, etc.

Koufax led the league in ERA 5 times. Pretty impressive. Grove led the league in ERA 9 times. More impressive.

You can't win these arguments, Koufax vs Grove:
Best season - Grove's 1931 is insane. The 3 guys to win 30 games since 1920 are Grove (31 in 1931), Dean (30 in 1934), and McLain (31 in 1968.) Despite Grove and Dean doing it in a 154 game season, and players since 1961 having 8 more games, it hasn't been done in the last 50+ years.

Best run of 6 consecutive seasons: Grove, see above.

Career:
ERA titles: Koufax 5, Grove 9
Wins: Koufax 165, Grove 300
Win percentage: Koufax 65%, Grove 68% (highest among 300 game winners and eighth best overall).

Short term (one season), Grove.
Best years (6 season run), Grove.
Career, Grove.

We remember Koufax. Many of us saw him in his prime. He is a very popular player and fellow.

Grove was better, period.

Yeah, no kidding. The discussion was about ERA and how 2.81 over 5 years was so amazing.

There have to be better arguments for Koufax than things like denying low run environments, denying park affects, and pretending longevity matters for only 4 seasons before no longer being a factor, and anecdotes. There must be a logical, fact-based argument for Koufax somewhere.