[kkkkandp]

I'm not sure why so many people pooh pooh the stats for 19th century baseball as if they were meaningless. Was the game then exactly the same as it is today? Of course not, but that was the state of the game at that time. For every Radbourn or Galvin who pitched in 70 games a season and managed to last for more than a few years so they could accumulate their 300 wins there were dozens of Elmer Smiths and Larry Corcorans who burned out from overuse after only a couple of years.

One might argue that the only reason someone like Don Sutton managed to win 300 games was that he lasted for 23 years because he only completed 23.5% of the games he started. Someone like Gus Weyhing completed over 89% of his starts. Everything is relative.