Quote:
Originally Posted by jchcollins
Right. And to me those points are Ryan's greatest asset. He was more just astoundingly unique than he was great. I don't know though why people have such a hard time recognizing that.
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I think everybody recognizes his uniqueness - I certainly do. And that's the basis of his appeal to collectors. I've never disputed any of that. But as you acknowledge, uniqueness doesn't necessarily equate to all-time greatness, and my comments have been intended to maintain that distinction rather than letting it get blurred.
Over long careers the W-L records of a player's teams tend to flatten out fairly close to .500 (unless you're a Yankee or something), and his own W-L record can only move the needle so much.
Just FYI, here are the team records of Ryan and the other HOF starters who debuted between 1962 and 1970
Ryan's teams with his decisions: 2062-2010 .5064
without his decisions 1738-1718 .5029
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0035
Carlton's teams with his decisions: 1789-1578 .5313
without his decisions 1460-1334 .5225
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0088
Jenkins's teams with his decisions: 1441-1405 .5063
without his decisions 1157-1179 .4952
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0110
Palmer's teams with his decisions: 1756-1242 .5857
without his decisions 1488-1090 .5772
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0085
Seaver's teams with his decisions: 1592-1584 .5013
without his decisions 1281-1379 .4816
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0197
Blyleven's teams with his decisions: 1691- 1651 0.5060
without his decisions: 1404-1401 0.5005
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0055
Sutton's teams with his decisions: 1918-1662 .5358
without his decisions 1594-1406 .5313
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0045
Hunter's teams with his decisions: 1194-1038 .5350
without his decisions 970-872 .5266
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0084
Niekro’s teams with his decisions: 1684-1765 .4882
without his decisions 1366-1491 .4781
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0101
Gaylord Perry's teams with his decisions: 1815-1686 .5184
without his decisions 1501-1421 .5137
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0047
Perry is an interesting case- he was really two pitchers, a so-so toiler with excellent Giants teams, and then a truly great pitcher for mediocre teams afterwards:
-SF team records 1962-63 (half seasons) 1964-1971 914-708 .5635 / Perry's record in those years 134-109 .5625 (no better than the teams)
-post-SF team records, 1972-1983 901-978 .4795 / Perry's record in those years 180-156 .5357 (.1632 improvement over team - much better than the teams)
SUMMARY OF IMPROVEMENT OF the TEAM RECORD:
Seaver .0197
Jenkins .0110
Niekro .0101
Carlton .0088
Palmer .0085
Hunter .0084
Blyleven .0055
Perry .0047
Sutton .0045
Ryan .0035
By this measure, Seaver is by far the greatest "winning pitcher" of this group of HOFers, and his teams overall, along with Niekro's, were the worst of the group by a big margin. Ryan's teams were middling but not terrible without him (better than Blyleven's, Niekro's, Jenkins' and Seaver's) - and he didn't make them much better in W-L terms.
for comparison, here's Walter Johnson's record:
Johnson's teams with his decisions: 1491-1523 .4947
without his decisions: 1074-1244 .4633
He improved his teams' Win PCT by .0314
I would imagine that this is the greatest improvement that's ever been made by a single pitcher on his team's record. Even so, people seem to have a somewhat inflated notion of how awful Johnson's teams were. They weren't all awful by any means.
Here are the figures I used. For 1907 and 1927 I included half the team's W-L record since Johnson played about half the season.
1907 24 51
1908 67 85
1909 42 110
1910 66 85
1911 64 90
1912 91 61
1913 90 64
1914 81 73
1915 85 68
1916 76 77
1917 74 79
1918 72 56
1919 56 84
1920 68 84
1921 80 73
1922 69 85
1923 75 78
1924 92 62
1925 96 55
1926 81 69
1927 42 34
You'll notice there are 10 winning seasons and 10 losing seasons in that time (with the 76-77 record in 1916 as a wash). The atrocious records of 1907 and 1909 have a particularly large impact on the overall W-L record. If you remove those two seasons, the overall team record goes from .495 to .510.
This is not meant to diminish Johnson's status as GOAT but to reinforce it.
I just wanted to give some context on claims made that "X or Y played on terrible teams his whole career and therefore..." [fill in the blank]