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Originally Posted by Ricky
Very true.
I think what you had in the 1900-1920 era were pitchers who pitched hard only when they had to. I'm sure Walter Johnson and Smoky Joe Wood hit 93-95 mph for a few pitches each game, but for the majority of the game they were probably throwing mid-to-high 80s and varying their speeds. Lesser pitchers were probably throwing low 80s and maybe approaching 88-89 a few times per game. It makes absolutely no logical sense to think that those guys were throwing complete games of 120+ pitches every third day all season long and throwing 90s on every pitch, like many do today. No pitcher would have lasted doing that.
Of course, even pacing themselves, some pitchers were still going to break down with that much work.
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That's what pitching is though if you want to throw 9 innings. It would be a little strange to think the last pitch and the first pitch were constant the entire game.