Death by Pitch Count; From a Fav

One of those guys, Langford, I think, ran into big-time arm problems. Norris was out of baseball by the mid-'80s, but probably more to drugs than anything else.

As far as Billy, anyone who gets into a fight with a marshmallow salesman (!! -- this always cracks me up) is in something more than a stupor.

 

And that team is the poster child for pitch counts.


Has anyone thought about sliders and split-fingered pitches doing more to hurt arms than high pitch counts?

 

Um, I kinda thought that had something to do with medical science learning more about how the throwing arm works, not just a "theory" to protect "the poor little babies." And I thought that the new approach went along way toward explaining why pitchers have much longer careers on average now than they used to. I'm guessing Sandy Koufax wouldn't have been forced to retire at 30 if he were playing today.

 

Exactly. The reason more players "get injured" today is we know they are injured. Technology has given us more ways to catch small injuries.

 

koufax retired because of his knee injury.

 

I'm looking forward to reading part 2 of this, because that's where Jenkins will supposedly give his theory for reversing this trend.

It bugs me when people just say "They ought to be able to do it" without mentioning how you are going to reverse the evolution, as it were, of pitching. Like it or not, pitchers are now trained to work this way. You can't just stop on a dime and have them throwing 150 pitches because "That's the way it was back in the day."

It's got to be a process, from the bottom up. Unfortunately, the guys at the bottom (in the minors) are the ones whose pitch counts are enforced the strictest.

The other issue that I think often goes ignored is that the a lot of those old-timers who threw 30 complete games were, I suspect, often completing them with 100 or 110 pitches. The strike zone was bigger and the hitters were smaller, which encouraged pitchers to be more aggressive, hence, not as many deep counts.

Interesting topic, though.

 

No, I don't think so. Can you provide a link to back that up.

As I've always heard, Koufax retired basically because his arm was essentially shot--he endured tremendous arm pain every time he pitched his last couple years (despite still pitching very well)--and it had just gotten to be too much.

 

Plenty of players got dead arms in a hurry back in the hallowed complete-game days. Denny McLain -- a few great seasons, then the arm went bad (and, yeah, his gambling and underworld problem didn't help, either). If you want a case for babying young arms, look at Mark Fidrych. Tom Verducci had a great piece a few years showing how pitchers under 25 who pitched more than 200 innings their rookie year fell off the map the next, and often beyond.

The problem is you don't always know whose arm is made of rubber, and which is made of porcelain. Or even in between. Carlos Zambrano can throw 150 pitches a game, but last year he started struggling because his shoulder was dropping -- a sign of a tired arm. If CC Sabathia breaks down in the postseason, you know every wag is going to wonder why Ned Yost kept pitching him late in the regular season.

Lincecum, given his slight build, should be thankful his manager isn't running him into the ground while he's young and the team sucks.

Also, it would be interesting to see how many more major-leaguers start their careers already having had Tommy John surgery or other arm problems. One thing that's changed as well is how early kids start pitching, and how many pitches they throw by the time they get to the majors. If, say, that 9-year-old New Haven kid starts playing 50-80 games of travel ball a year starting now, he's got as good a shot of being noodle-armed by 14 as he does being a major-leaguer.

 

Man, I love those stats. Mind-blowing.

Billy was everything you said and more, but the guy got results in a hurry. The A's went from 54-108 in 1979 to 83-79 in 1980 to the ALCS in 1981. Of course, they fell to 68-94 in 1982 and the initial success was at the expense of Billy's staff and his liver, but, you know...

 

Jeff Jones was second among relievers with 35 appearances.

Crazy game, crazy team. One that could only be managed by the pickled.

 

An important point, which sometimes gets lost in the discussion, and didn't get mentioned in the original piece. Thanks, FH.

It's been well-documented that pitchers in the Dead Ball Era -- especially the best ones, like Johnson and Mathewson -- had a tendency to "let up" when the chips weren't down. Up by four runs in the ninth inning, just sling it in there at half-speed. There weren't as many hitters who could hurt you, not like today's AL lineups, and the odds have always favored pitchers to get an out before the batter gets a hit.

So yes, they threw a lot more complete games then. But the stress on pitchers' arms over nine innings is far greater today. Obviously, "60 pitches" and "only fastballs" is an exaggeration (in fact, there were a lot more weirder curves back then than there are now; and nobody knows for sure about pitch counts but I would bet even a game that only took 1:10 to play had at least 75 pitches each.)

That said, deeper counts are the norm today and bearing down on every hitter is pretty much a necessity. Some teams base their entire approach on weakening the other team's starter and getting him out of the game. There are pitchers (Owings, Hampton, Zambrano) who can drive the ball as far as any cleanup hitter. Those lineups Chesbro faced in 1904 were weak, weak, weak, regardless of era.

I hope Jenkins doesn't overlook that factor, because it's as important as any other.