Worthless and Weak

Scene: A dark, smoke filled room. A group of figures sits around a table, as they decide in secret who will be the next Democratic nominee for President

Democrat A: Well, the way things are going, it really doesn't matter who we nominate. What with the war in Iraq, the sluggish economy, etc, we could nominate John Kerry and still win the election.

Democrat B: Haha!! Yeah, you're right, but I wouldn't go so far as to say that John Kerry could beat Bush.

Democrat A: No, I'm dead serious. John Kerry could beat George W Bush in 2004.

Democrat B: Wanna bet? If we nominate John Kerry and he wins, then I'll do .......

OK, OK, so thats probably not what happened. But I can't think of any other way that John Kerry could possibly have become the nominee.

(note: the letters ERA, refer to Earned Run Average when capitalized, and the era, as in "which era did the player play in" when not capitalized. The name "Johnson" will refer to Walter Johnson, and not Randy Johnson, unless otherwise noted.)

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So is Roger Clemens the greatest pitcher ever? Well, lets just jump right into this and consider the competition.

Walter Johnson: 21 years, 417-279. 2.17 ERA over 5914.2 IP
Lefty Grove: 17 years, 300-141. 3.06 ERA over 3940.2 IP
Cy Young: 22 years, 511-316. 2.63 ERA over 7354.2 IP
Pete Alexander: 20 years, 373-208. 2.56 ERA over 5190 IP
Christie Mathewson: 17 years, 373-188. 2.13 ERA over 4780.2 IP
Tom Seaver: 20 years, 311-205. 2.86 ERA over 4782.2 IP
Warren Spahn: 21 years, 363-245. 3.09 ERA over 5243.2 IP

For the active players, I'm not going to use this years stats for this argument, as they will change. (note that I'm not saying that you can't use this years stats, only that I won't).

Greg Maddux: 18 years, 289-163. 2.89 ERA over 3968.2 IP
Roger Clemens: 20 years, 310-160. 3.19 ERA over 4278.2 IP

Now, all of these guys are great, first ballot hall of famers. All, (with the exception of Maddux, who will soon) have won 300 games. Now, ERA is a great stat. As are wins. However, neither is perfect, and in fact there are two main problems with each. First, for ERA, it is heavily influenced by the park and era a pitcher plays in. For instance, pitching in the deadball puts the starting point for ERA much lower than say, pitching in the 90's in Colorado. However, there is a way to adjust for this, a stat called ERA+, which already adjusts for park and league. The career ERA plusses of the individual pitchers:

Lefty Grove: 148
Walter Johnson: 146
Greg Maddux: 143
Roger Clemens: 140
Cy Young: 138
Pete Alexander: 135
Christy Mathewson: 135
Tom Seaver: 127
Warren Spahn: 118

A pitcher with an ERA+ of 100 would have pitched exactly league average. Also, Pedro Martinez is first all time with an ERA+ of 174, Grove is next with 148.

Wins have a similar problem, in that they were easier to accumulate years ago. The further back you go, the easier it is to get large amounts of wins in small amounts of time. For instance, of every active pitcher, only Clemens and Maddux even seem to have a chance at 300 wins, while back in the 1880's Tim Keefe, Mickey Welch, and several other people you've never heard of all reached the magical 300 win mark. Also, wins are much easier to accumulate on a better team, as it is the team that actually wins games, not the pitcher.

So, just keep in mind that although Cy Youngs 511 wins are quite impressive, they aren't necessarily more impressive than Spahn's 363.

Now, to get down to the arguments. Each person seems to have one or two really impressive strengths. Lets go down the list.

Johnson: Lots of Wins, Lots of Innings, Low ERA.
Grove: Led the league in ERA 9 times.
Young: Insane amounts of Wins and Innings.
Mathewson: .665 Winning %, with 373 Wins
Spahn: An incredible amount of wins for his era
Maddux: A couple of incredibly low ERA seasons (ERA+ of 273 and 259)
Clemens: From 1986 til 2001, he had 3 average seasons ('93 '99 '02) The rest were awesome. Including 6 Cy Youngs, 6 20 Win seasons, and 6 seasons leading the leaugue in ERA.

Tom Seaver and Pete Alexander are both incredible pitchers. Cases can be made for each that they are perhaps the second greatest pitcher ever. But with both of them, any argument for their greatness can be superceded by anothers claim. For instance, Pete Alexander pitched forever, with a really really good ERA. But Walter Johnson pitched at the same time, with a better ERA, with more innings pitched, more games won, etc. Seaver has had impressive amounts of wins, great ERA+, great seasons. But Clemens had more great seasons, higher ERA+, just as many wins, etc.

So we've got it down to 7 pitchers. And, I can eliminate several others.

First of all, Cy Young's biggest advantage over Walter Johnson was more innings pitched and more wins. Yet if you understand that during the early 1890's the innings an ace pitcher pitched were much higher than the innings pitched during the 1910's, Youngs advantage disappears. For instance, Young Pitched over 400 innings five times, but was as high as second in innings pitched only once of those five years. Walter Johnson led the league in innings pitched five times, (Cy Young led twice), but never pitched 400 innings. Thus, I think the advantage in wins and IP that Young has over Johnson is negated by Johnsons large advantag in ERA and ERA+.

Greg Maddux had two truly great years, '94 and '95 one where he went 16-6 with a 1.56 ERA over 202 innings. One where he went 19-2 with a 1.63 ERA over 209.2 innings. Both of these are just about as good as any seaons anybody has ever pitched. They beat Clemens two best seasons, '90, where he went 21-6 with a 1.93 ERA over 228 innings, and 1997, where he went 21-7 with a 2.05 ERA over 264 innings. Although its still close, as the 264 innings at a very high ERA PLus is one of the best seasons ever, but not quite as good as Maddux's, at least in my opinion. Also, one should note that Maddux's two best years were the strike shortened 94 and 95 seasons. The next two seasons for both, Clemens' '86 and '98, are about as good as Maddux's '97 and '98. Maddux had a slightly better ERA over the these years, Clemens had more wins, (and won an MVP), both had about the same number of innings pitched. In the rest of their careers, they were as follows:

Maddux 217-142 3.17 ERA 3073.3 IP, ERA+ 129
Clemens 224-137 3.46 ERA 3297.2 IP, ERA +130

Again, its close, but Clemens wins in everything but ERA (which doesn't matter, because he wins in ERA+, which takes the designated hitter of the AL into account).

In the end, Maddux v Clemens is a very close match, but I'm going with Clemens, for this reason. I cannot see how one can argue that in all but their best four years, Maddux was better than Clemens. He had less wins, more losses, pitched one season less, at a lower ERA+. For the best two seasons, Clemens pitched much much more than Maddux, 492.1 innings pitched for Clemens vs 411.2 for Maddux. Also, Clemens had 7 more wins than Maddux those two years. One can definately argue that Clemens' best two seasons were equal to Maddux's best two, which puts Clemens ahead of Maddux.

Mathewson vs Johnson is kinds similar to Alexander vs Johnson. Johnson leads in wins, ERA+, and Innings pitched. Mathewsons biggest advantage is his incredible .665 winning percentage, even more incredible considering he had 373 wins. This is a lot more than Johnson's .599. However, you have to consider that Mathewson pitched for the dominatant Giants, while Johnson pitched for the lackluster Senators. Over Mathewsons Career, the Giants went 1456-1025, a .587 winning percent. If you remove his decisions, the Giants were 1084-837, or .564. Which means that Mathewson pitched .101 better than the rest of his teammates, which is impressive.

However, if we do the same for Johnson, we find that he actually pitched .137 better than the rest of the Senators. (1559-1609 total, 1142-1330 without him). Now, one could still argue that Mathewson's raw winning percentage is still more impressive, but not that its so impressive that it beats Walter Johnson's many other advantages.

Well, so far we've compared all the early pitchers to Johnson, and shown that Johnson is in fact better than all of them. And the late pitchers to Clemens, and shown that Clemens is probably better than they are. So, logic would dictate that we compare our two pitchers from the middle of the century, Grove and Spahn. I will compare them, however this is going to be the most difficult comparrison I'm going to make. First of all, their greatness comes from two completely different means, Grove from his incredibly effective pitching, Spahn from his durability and longevity. But, we're gonna go ahead and do it anyway.

Grove's five best seasons:

1931: 31-4, 2.06 ERA, 288.2 IP, 219 ERA+
1930: 28-5 2.54 ERA, 291 IP, 185 ERA+
1935: 20-12 2.70 ERA, 273 IP, 176 ERA+
1936: 17-12 2.81 ERA, 253.1 IP, 190 ERA+
1932: 25-10 2.84 ERA, 291.2 IP, 159 ERA+

(note that he lead the leauge in ERA all five years, and in wins in '30 and '31)

Now Spahn's five best seasons:

1953: 23-7 2.10 ERA, 265.2 IP, 188 ERA+
1947: 21-10 2.33 ERA, 289.2 IP, 168 ERA+
1963: 23-7 2.60 ERA, 259.2 IP, 124 ERA+
1957: 21-11 2.69 ERA, 271 IP, 130 ERA+
1961: 21-13 3.02 ERA, 262.2 IP, 124 ERA+

Now, we can clearly see that any one of Groves best four can compare to Spahn's best season, and two can outright destroy it, and overall the best five of Grove's are much better than the best five of Spahns. But lets look at the next best five seasons.

Grove's next best five seasons:

1928: 24-8, 2.58 ERA, 267.2 IP, 155 ERA+
1939: 15-4, 2.54 ERA, 191 IP, 185 ERA+
1929: 20-6, 2.81 ERA, 275.1 IP, 151 ERA+
1937: 17-9, 3.02 ERA, 262 IP, 158 ERA+
1933: 24-8, 3.20 ERA, 275.1 IP, 134 ERA+

Spahn's next best five seasons:

1951: 22-14, 2.98 ERA, 310.2 IP, 123 ERA+
1949: 21-14, 3.07 ERA, 302.1 IP, 124 ERA+
1956: 20-11, 2.78 ERA, 281.1 IP, 125 ERA+
1950: 21-17, 3.16 ERA, 293 IP, 122 ERA+
1959: 21-15, 2.96 ERA, 292 IP, 120 ERA+


Well, not only do Grove's six through ten best seasons soundly beat Spahn's six through ten seasons, they pretty much beat Spahn's two through five best seasons.

Continuing the analysis:

Grove's eleventh through fifteenth best seasons:

1926: 13-13, 2.51 ERA, 258 IP, 166 ERA+
1927: 20-13, 3.19 ERA, 262.1 IP, 133 ERA+
1938: 14-4, 3.08 ERA, 163.2 IP, 160 ERA+
1940: 7-6, 3.99 ERA, 153.1 IP, 113 ERA+
1925: 10-12, 4.75 ERA, 197 IP, 98 ERA+

Total: 64-48, 3.58 ERA, 1061.1 IP, 126 ERA+

Spahn's eleventh through fifteenth best seasons:

1962: 18-14, 3.04 ERA, 269.1 IP, 124 ERA+
1954: 21-12, 3.14 ERA, 283.1 IP, 119 ERA+
1958: 22-11, 3.07 ERA, 290 IP, 114 ERA+
1955: 17-14, 3.26 ERA, 245.2 IP, 115 ERA+
1952: 14-19, 2.98 ERA, 290 IP, 121 ERA+

Total: 92-70, 3.10 ERA, 1378.1 IP, 119 ERA+

Well, its getting pretty even here. Grove still has one year that I'd group near the top of Spahn's best five, two more very good years, and two filler years. Spahn has 28 more wins with only 12 more losses, 300 more innings, so I think I'd go with Spahns five years. But it is close.

Grove only has two more seasons left, while Spahn has 6 left. Now, looking at their career:

Spahn: 363-245, 3.09 ERA, 5243.2 IP 118 ERA+, 2583 K
Grove: 300-141, 3.06 ERA, 3940.2 IP 148 ERA+, 2266 K

difference: 63 wins, 1303 IP, 317 K

So, looking at it now, Spahn wins in Career counting stats, ties and eleventh through fifteenth best seasons, and loses in five best and 10 best seasons. 63 wins and 1378 innings is a lot. An aweful lot to make up. However, I think that seeing as the top 13 seasons of Grove can beat all but the best two of Groves seasons, that Grove lands on top. Alright, lets look at it another way. Over his career, Spahn pitched 5243.2 innings. The average ERA during that time was 3.65, meaning that in that time, an average pitcher would have given up 2127 earned runs. Spahn gave up only 1798, meaning he saved 329 runs above average over his career. Grove pitched 3940.2 innings, during which the average ERA was 4.54. The average pitcher would have given up 1988 earned runs, while Grove only gave up 1339, a difference of 649. So Grove saved twice the number of runs above average than what Spahn did, in four fewer years. You might say we should compare it to replacement level, not average. Well, thats more difficult (as replacement level isn't well known). But if we assume that replacement level ERA is 130% of the average ERA, we get the following results:

Grove: 1245 earned runs saved.
Spahn: 967 earned runs saved.

If we assume 200%?

Grove: 2637
Spahn: 2455

Simply put, Grove beats Spahn.

So, we're down to our final three, Clemens, Grove and Johnson.

Well, lets look at their best three seasons:

Clemens:

1997: 21-7, 2.05 ERA, 264 IP 226 ERA+ 292 K, 76 Earned Runs Saved vs average
1990: 21-6, 1.93 ERA, 228.1 IP 211 ERA+ 209 K, 54 Earned Runs Saved vs average
1986: 24-4, 2.48 ERA, 254 IP, 169 ERA+ 238 K, 48 Earned Runs Saved vs average

Total: 66-17, 2.15 ERA, 746.1 IP 199 ERA+, 739 K, 178 Earned Runs Saved vs average

Grove:

1931: 31-4, 2.06 ERA, 288.2 IP, 219 ERA+ 175 K, 79 Earned Runs Saved vs average
1930: 28-5 2.54 ERA, 291 IP, 185 ERA+ 209 K, 70 Earned Runs Saved vs average
1935: 20-12 2.70 ERA, 273 IP, 176 ERA+ 121 K, 63 Earned Runs Saved vs average

Total: 79-21, 2.42 ERA 852.2 IP, 192 ERA+, 505 K, 211 Earned Runs Saved vs average

Johnson:

1913: 36-7, 1.14 ERA, 346 IP, 259 ERA+ 243 K, 70 Earned Runs Saved vs average
1912: 33-12, 1.39 ERA, 369 IP, 240 ERA+ 303 K, 80 Earned Runs Saved vs average
1918: 23-13, 1.27 ERA, 326 IP, 214 ERA+ 162 K, 52 Earned Runs Saved vs average

Total: 92-32, 1.27 ERA, 1041 IP, 236 ERA+, 708 K, 202 Earned Runs Saved vs average

Earned Runs Saved vs average isn't the best tool to use, as it rewards good players for playing in high offense eras, like the 20's and 30's, or the 80's and 90's. However, in the dead ball era, it was certainly much easier to pitch 369 innings, as nobody was ever getting on base. So I think the era's do at least partially even out a bit.

The general workload of pitchers peaked in the 1880's, and pretty much steadily went down from there. Therefore, one may say that the impact an individual pitcher had on any one season has steadily gone down. Now, either we can attempt to adjust for that, or we can conclude that 90% of all great pitchers played in or before the deadball era.

Well, after thinking about it for a while, I figured that I need a whole new tool to compare seasons like this against each other. So the first thing I did was average the innings pitched for the top ten pitchers for every year in question, and I could then use this to normalize the innings pitched. For instance, Johnson pitched 371.2 innings in 1914, which is a simply huge amount. However, to simply compare this to Clemens career high of 281.7 would be silly, because nobody pitches 300 innings a year anymore, noboyd, and I don't want to punish Clemens because of the era he pitched in. But after normalizing, Johnson's innings drop to a mere 320 inning, which of course is still a huge amount, but now, at least in my opinion, we can more easily compare pitchers from two eras. Now, if we combine this with a simple ERA normalizer, we can compare the following seasons:

Clemens:

97: 1.68 ERA, 282 IP 66 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
90: 1.79 ERA, 247 IP 55 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
86: 2.24 ERA, 252 IP 43 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 1.90 ERA, 781 IP, 164 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Grove:

31: 1.72 ERA, 273 IP 62 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
30: 2.05 ERA, 267 IP 51 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
35: 2.14 ERA, 259 IP 47 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 1.97 ERA 799 IP 160 Earned Runs Saved vs Average


Johnson:

13: 1.46 ERA, 306 IP 79 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
12: 2.25 ERA, 310 IP 53 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
18: 1.77 ERA, 295 IP 66 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 1.82 ERA, 911 IP, 198 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Well, after normalizing it, the results are simple: Johnson was more dominant in his own time (for his three best years) than either Clemens or Grove. He simply pitched a lot of innings, even relative to his own time. I'd definately say that Clemen's best three were the next best, as he had a lower ERA, higher ERA+, better winning percent, and more runs saved vs average. So the first test goes Johnson, Clemens, Grove.

Now, lets look at their fourth through eigth best seasons:

Clemens:

1998: 20-6 2.65 ERA 234.2 IP, 176 ERA+ 271 K, 53 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1992: 18-11 2.41 ERA 246.2 IP, 175 ERA+ 208 K, 50 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1987: 20-9 2.97 ERA 281.2 IP, 154 ERA+ 256 K, 50 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1991: 18-10 2.62 ERA 271.1 IP, 164 ERA+ 241 K, 51 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
2001: 20-3 3.51 ERA 220.1 IP, 128 ERA+ 213 K, 24 Earned Runs Saved vs Average


Total: 96-39 2.82 ERA 1254.2 IP, 158 ERA+ 1189 K, 228 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Grove:

1936: 17-12 2.81 ERA, 253.1 IP, 190 ERA+ 130 K, 71 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1932: 25-10 2.84 ERA, 291.2 IP, 159 ERA+ 188 K, 54 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1928: 24-8, 2.58 ERA, 267.2 IP, 155 ERA+ 183 K, 41 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1939: 15-4, 2.54 ERA, 191 IP, 185 ERA+ 81 K, 46 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1929: 20-6, 2.81 ERA, 275.1 IP, 151 ERA+ 170 K, 44 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 101-40, 2.71 ERA 1279 IP, 168 ERA+ 752 K, 256 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Johnson:

1915: 27-13, 1.55 ERA, 336.2 IP, 191 ERA+ 203 K, 53 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1919: 20-14, 1.49 ERA, 290.1 IP, 214 ERA+ 147 K, 55 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1924: 23-7, 2.72 ERA, 277.2 IP, 148 ERA+ 158 K, 40 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1910: 25-17, 1.36 ERA, 370 IP, 183 ERA+ 313 K, 46 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
1911: 25-13, 1.90 ERA, 322.1 IP, 172 ERA+ 207 K, 49 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 120-64, 1.77 ERA, 1597 IP, 180 ERA+, 1028K, 243 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Well, before any adjustments are made, I'd say Johnson, Grove, Clemens. However, lets adjust these for IP, and see what we get:

Clemens:

98: 257.2 IP, 2.15 ERA 47 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
92: 250.2 IP, 2.15 ERA 45 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
87: 269 IP, 2.46 ERA 39 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
91: 282.2 IP, 2.29 ERA 47 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
01: 244 IP, 2.96 ERA 22 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 1304 IP 2.40 ERA, 200 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Grove:

36: 244.2 IP, 1.99 ERA, 49 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
32: 271 IP, 2.38 ERA, 42 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
28: 249.1 IP, 2.44 ERA, 33 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
39: 201 IP, 2.04 ERA, 39 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
29: 262.1 IP, 2.51 ERA, 37 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 1228.1 IP, 2.29 ERA, 200 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Johnson:

15: 290.1 IP, 1.98 ERA, 58 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
19: 263 IP, 1.77 ERA, 59 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
24: 259.1 IP, 2.56 ERA, 35 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
10: 314 IP, 2.06 ERA, 60 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
11: 288 IP, 2.20 ERA, 51 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Total: 1414.2 IP, 2.11 ERA, 263 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Overall, I'd have to say Johnson, Grove, Clemens. Johnson because he squarely beats Clemens and Grove in both the unadjusted and the adjusted totals. He pitched more innings at a lower ERA than either Clemens or Grove, even after the deadball era is taken into effect. The adjusted scores of Clemens and Grove are nearly identicle, one with a little more innings, one with a lower ERA, both with exactly 200 Earned Runs Saved vs Average, so I'm gonna go with Grove, simply because of his better winning percent. But its really really close.

Now, if we look at the career totals:

Clemens:

310-160 3.19 ERA, 4278.2 IP, 140 ERA+ 613 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Grove:

300-141 3.06 ERA, 3940.2 IP, 148 ERA+ 649 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Johnson:

411-279 2.17 ERA, 5914.2 IP, 146 ERA+ 659 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Now, if we addjust the stats for era:

Clemens: 4495.1 IP, 2.70 ERA, 539 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Grove: 3833.2 IP, 2.61 ERA, 498 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Johnson: 5176 IP, 2.58 ERA, 690 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Having adjusted for era, I'd go Johnson, Clemens, Grove. Johnson over Clemens and Grove because he has 100 more wins, 150 more runs saved this average (after adjusting for era), more innings pitched, a lower ERA, etc. I'd go with Clemens over Grove because he has more innings pitched, especially after adjusting for era, and a very close ERA, and more earned runs saved vs average after era is taken into account.

So, after the three tests, we see that Johnson takes all three, Clemens takes second twice, and Grove only gets second once, but does it quite cloesly. So, I think that we can conclude that Grove wasn't he best pitcher of all time.

So, I can tell you that Walter Johnson made a greater impact on the game, in terms of results on the field, than any other pitcher in the history of the game. But thats not the question thats asked. The question that was asked is who is the greatest pitcher in the history of the game. Now, I don't know how Roger Clemens would have pitched had he been alive during the deadball era, and I don't know how Walter Johnson would have done had he played in the 80's and 90's. Thats something that we'll just never know.

Pitchers today have better conditioning than ever before. They have better medicine, Tommy-John surgeries, can chart their pitches on video, and have companies selling them statistical analysis on hitters. All of these things make today's pitchers better than pitchers of yesteryear. But all of these things are simply products of this era. And I'm not going to punish Walter Johnson for being born in the 1880's. But I'm not going to reward him either. The population that MLB was drawing from was much much smaller. The population of the US was small, black players weren't allowed to play, and very few foreigners (with apologies to Nap Lajoie) played baseball. Nowadays, the US is a lot bigger, thus we have more players to draw from. Barry Bonds, Frank Thomas, Ken Griffey Jr, etc are all players who are both very good and wouldn't be allowed to play anytime before 1948. There are numerous hispanic players who simply wouldn't have played in the big leagues in deadball era, as well as various Asian players. Thus, there are more players, leading us to believe that the average player is much much better today than 90 years ago. So if Roger was pretty much even with Johnson, I'd definately say that it goes to Roger. But they aren't close to even. But neither are the relative strength of the eras.

Now, I have to choose somebody, because otherwise I wouldn't be fullfilling my obligation to make decisive, ummm, decision. But I feel obligated to say that I'm not entirely confident in the decision I'm about to make.

One way to look at it is how far above in the nearest contemporary are they? Well, Pete Alexander was a very good player, born in the same year as Johnson, had 75% of his career coincide with Johnsons, and was definately the second best pitcher of the 1910's. This is a very good comparison. However, there really isn't one thats as good for Clemens. Randy Johnson is just about as old, but didn't debut until 1988, didn't become a regular until 1990, and wasn't much above average until 1993. Greg Maddux debuted in 1986, and pretty much reached his groove in 1988, two years after Clemens did both of those. However, he is four years younger, and comparing career stats isn't going to be very meaningful, as Maddux's career still has several years left in it. But then again, so might Clemens's, so we don't really know. But, he is the best comparison, and we're going to compare them, dammit!

Clemens vs Maddux

Clemens: 310-160 4278.2 IP, 613 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Maddux: 289-163 3968.2 IP, 542 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
difference: 21-(-3) 310 IP, 71 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Walter Johnson vs Alexander

Johnson: 417-279 5914.2, 659 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Alexander: 373-208 5190, 514 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
difference: 34-69 724 IP, 145 Earned Runs Saved vs Average

Well, the difference between Johnson and the second best guy of his era is about twice the difference between Clemens and the second best guy of his era. This is about what we'd expect. As the average talent of a pool increases, then the difference between any two players is going to be smaller and smaller.

This information of course, doesn't help answer the question of who was better, Clemens or Johnson. However, I do have an idea. What we're gonna do is look at the three through ten best players in ERA+ over selected years of each players career, and then see how far above average (100) each year is. If the average in Johnson's years are twice or more than the average in Clemens's years, then Clemens is the better pitcher. If not, its Johnson. And I will be done forever with this article, which is getting much longer than I ever expected!

So, the years I will be using are, '08, '10, '12, '13, '16, '21 '24 '25 for Johnson, '86 '88 '90 '93 '97 '98 '01 '02.

Well, the results are in, and I'm a bit confused by them. It appears that there is actually een a tad bit more variation in Clemens's era than in Johnsons era, which definately doesn't hold to theory. Which means that I'm gonna say it right here, Roger Clemens isn't the best pitcher of all time, Walter Johnson is. I'm gonna go with Clemens as the second best though, and although my variation idea wasn't true, its still definately harder to pitch today than it was in the deadball era, so the difference between Clemens and Johnson isn't that big, and Clemens still has a chance to bridge the gap if the pitches well into this year, perhaps if he pitches next year too.


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What about Bullet Joe Rogan, Smokey Joe Williams, Satchel Paige, etc?

I don't want to cheapen what the Negro leagues pitchers did. Some of them may in fact rank with Johnson and Clemens as the greatest of all time. But I've had a hard enough time comparing AL players from 90 years apart, I simply don't have the tools to compare players in leagues where statics weren't kept. I really wish I could, but I simply can't, so I won't pretend to. In my opinion, Satchel Paige probably ranks with the guys I mentioned in the beggining, but not with Johnson and Clemens. But that my opinion, and its very very uninformed. The other guys are definately legit hall of famers, but not up there with Seaver or Mathewson. But again, that just my opinion.

What about Sandy Koufax, Pedro Martinez, Joe Wood, Dizzy Dean, etc?

Well, I don't want to take anything away from Pedro or Koufax, as both of them had several fantastic years. But Koufax has 165 wins. Wood has 116, Martinez has 166 (plus this years), Dean has 150. All of these players are great, (with the exception of Wood) all are in (or will be) the Hall. But it takes more than a few great years in order to be the greatest ever. It takes a combination of a high peak, great rate stats, and a great career. Neither Koufax nor Martinez has all of those. Martinez migh well rank as the greatest pitcher of all time, depending on how long he can pitch like he's been pitching.

What about Steve Carlton, Randy Johnson, Bob Feller, etc?

Well, I simply didn't have the time to compare everyone, those who I did compare are those who I think are the best off all time. So Carlton and pals are quite great, but I don't have all year to write this article, ya know?

What about Nolan Ryan! The Strikeouts and the no-hitters! Don't they count for anything?

Well, the strikeouts certainly count for a lot. But you can't simply look at them and ignore his walks. He had huge amounts of K's, but his walks just kept him from being really great. His ERA+ is only 112, Which is good, but I simply can't see how it beats Groove's 148 ERA+. He won 324 games, but lost 292. Simply put, he is really really really unusual. You'll find four Rogers before you find anther Ryan. But as difficult as it was to do what Ryan did, as unusual as it was, he just simply didn't help his team win as much as Roger or Seaver or Spahn did. But he's still great, still one of the best of all time, and I don't want to take a thing away from him.

What about Kid Nichols and Pud Galvin?

Of all the 1800's pitchers, I can't see how you can say that any of them were as good as Cy Young. Kid Nichols and Amos Rusie were perhaps as good as Young during the 1890's (Ok, Nichols was better, Rusie was about as good), but neither of them did much in the twentieth century, and were nowhere near as good as Young Career-wise.

Old Hoss Radbourn won 59 games in one year.

Good for him, but keep in mind he was pitching from 45 feet, and underhand too, I think. Anyway, spectacular one year pitchign performances in the 1800's are neat to look at, but I simply don't see how they can qualify somebody as the best pitcher of all time, unless you had a lot of them, which nobody did.


**********


Appendix:

Earned Runs Saved vs. Average, career:


Young: 811
Johnson: 659
Grove: 649
Clemens: 613
Maddux: 542
Alexander: 514
Seaver: 413
Mathewson: 397
Spahn: 329


(the formula for this is league ERA / 9 * IP - Earned Runs)

Difference in team winning percent vs pitcher winning percent.

Young: .145 above team, or 121 Wins
Clemens: .141 above team, or 66 wins
Alexander: .139 above team, or 81 wins
Johnson: .137 above team, or 95 wins
Seaver: .137 above team, or 71 Wins
Grove: .123 above team, or 54 Wins
Mathewson: .101 above team, or 57 Wins
Maddux: .091 above team, or 41 Wins
Spahn: .083 above team, or 50 Wins

Career stats, adjusted for era.

Young: 5314 IP, 2.78 ERA, 590 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Mathewson: 3874 IP, 2.83 ERA, 409 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Johnson: 5176 IP, 2.58 ERA, 690 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Alexander: 4559 IP, 2.75 ERA, 522 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Grove: 3834 IP, 2.61 ERA, 498 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Spahn: 5145 IP, 3.19 ERA, 337 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Seaver: 4500 IP, 2.98 ERA, 400 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Clemens: 4495 IP, 2.70 ERA, 539 Earned Runs Saved vs Average
Maddux: 4246 IP, 2.66 ERA, 528 Earned Runs Saved vs Average


****************

Umm I'd just like to take this opportunity to recognize baseball-reference.com, without which this analysis wouldn't have approached possiblity. They have huge amounts of baseball stats there, so go there and see lots of stuff.

Ok, I promised an article about Roger Clemens being the greatest pitcher ever here, and I promise that it will come. It's just a lot longer than I thought it would be, as its 7 pages and counting right now. So I'm just gonna say that

A: Its not Roger Week anymore. Its Roger Fortnight.

and

B: It will come soon, probably sometime tomorrow. Anyway, before Roger Clemens retires, it will come. I promise.

Sometimes, people do things that piss me off. And I don't like them when they do that. But if they stop doing the thing that pisses me off, I'll like them again. And it happened just recently. Yes, I'm talking about Roger Clemens.

Roger left the evil empire to play for Jimmy Williams and the Houston Astros. He is truly one of the greatest pitchers ever, and having one heck of a season so far. So I'm gonna devote an entire week of posts to Roger Clemens.

Today, I'll share the results of a Blyleven test. What is a Blyleven test you asK? Well, its genereally done to compare borderline hall of famers to other borderline hall of famers, to see if they deserve enshrinement. It was first used on one Bert Blyleven. There are huge holes in it, but I kinda invented it, so I'm gonna use it here for Roger.

The way it works is basically ranks players in differnet categories (ERA, 20 win seasons, career K/9IP rates, etc), and then adds up the ranks in a specific way to give a final score, the lower the better. Well, the pitchers I used were Roger Clemens, Steve Carlton, Tom Seaver, Greg Maddux, Nolan Ryan, Gaylord Perry and Bob Feller. These are all hall of fame (or future hall of fame) pitchers, all pretty similar (you really can't use a Byleven test to compare players of radically different eras. Trying to put Walter Johnson and Cy Young on the same spreadsheet as Clemens doesn't really work), all (except Feller) played at some point in the 80's, a couple of them even played on the same team at a point in time.

Also, several things should be noted. First, it doesn't include this seasons stats. (Clemens has passed Carlton on the career K list this year, and Seaver and Perry on the all time wins list).

Secondly, one of the categories is how many Cy Young Awards the pitcher has one, and there was no Cy Young Award when Feller pitched, so I estimated the number of awards he would have won. And there are a few really bizarre players that you should never include in a Byleven test, because they are so weird that they just screw up the results. One of those players is Nolan Ryan, who is by far the best all time at the most important thing a pitcher does (strike out batters) but is the worst all time at the second most important thing a pitcher does (not walk people). So you should never do a Blyleven test with people like Ryan. Which I did. But, anyway, here are the results.

1. Tom Seaver 95.58
2. Steve Carlton 95.66
3. Roger Clemens 99.40
4. Nolan Ryan 111.52
5. Greg Maddux 120.28
6. Gaylord Perry 129.79
7. Bob Feller 136.76


Now, if you switch around a couple of numbers to account for Rogers wins and strikeouts this year, he comes out on top. But, it shows that Roger is close enough to Seaver/Carlton to say that the difference isn't important.

Well, there's the intro to Roger, and tomorrow, I will tackle the question, "Is Roger Clemens the greatest pitcher who ever lived?"

Ummm, I need to fixeth my comments, as you can see there is one above my post, not below it. Which doesnt' make sense.

So Saturday, we had the annual Youth Group Auction. I tried to get a plane ride for me and Priss, but I was outbid. Just about everything I tried to get I was outbid on, which means that without paying a cent, I raised hundreds of dollars for the group.

Anyway, today I worked and worked and worked and worked, 13 hours, 15 minutes. And raised much less money for The McMonster fund than the I raised just by raising my hand a couple times for youth group last night. Well, thats life.

My Web site is about 13% done.

And, for the first time, Worthless and Weak presents a week of posts about one topic.

Night, see you later.

testing 1, 2, 3

You deserve better. You're the only girl who ever cared about me ever and I'm sooo fucking afraid that I'm gonna lose you. I wish I could be the boyfriend that you deserve, and I'm really really really really sorry that I hurt you. I love you.

My wallpaper is a picture of a really really really pretty girl. I can't get over how pretty she is every time I look at her. And I'm sooooo lucky, cause not only is she my wallpaper, she's my girlfriend too. (I love you Priss).

So, ummm, I have a bunch of ideas about things to write, and one of these days I'm gonna start writing them down. But not today. Today I just wish to say two more things.

A: Blogger just changed its look and feel. And I hate it!!! HATE IT!!!! The old thing was soooo cool. Now I can't do things like look at my last entry now. It sucks!!!

B: I'm gonna re-arrange my webpage soon. Make it much more McMonsterific. Anyway, see you all later. Goodnight.

Well, I spoke to the great bensaki today. Perhaps the funniest blogger from Minnesota. Anyway, I'm gonna redesign my webpage soon. Perhaps completely.

And in other news, I've got a stalker!!! None other than noted libertarian Jacob Grier himself has said in the comments section, and I quote: "I'm ... a stalker" Anyway, my life is now very cool. I've got a stalker, a girlfriend, a neice/nephew to be. I'm set.

Anyway, tomorrow, I get to see your Boston Red Sox crush the opposing Cleveland Indians at beautiful Fenway Park. Hope to see you all there. Anyway, I've got to get to bed now, so see you all later.

First order of business, anybody want a g-mail account? I can invite one person. So whoever wants one, gimme an e-mail, (thaddeusmcmonster@gmail.com) and you'll get one. Even if you're a complete stranger and I've never talked to you before.

Second order of business, somebody actually linked to my blog from thier blog. And, not only that, but I think that people might actually read his blog. Awesome. I suppose I should link to his now, shouldn't I?

Finally, who is Jacob Grier? And why does he, or someone proporting to be him visit this site? Not to make him feel unwelcome or anything. I'm glad to know that somebody actually reads my blog. And thanks for preserving the finest webpage that Mississippi has ever produced.

Anyway, good evening to you all, see you tomorrow.

In order to be a good web-page, you should have a picture of Spock doing something with his eyebrow.

A great webpage has a pic of an owl reading a book in the middle of a sentence.

Knowning these two things, I present to you the greatest webpage in Mississippi!!! *link fixed*

Anyway, on to other matters. I get to call anyone I want to at 9pm for free. From about 9 to oh 1:15am I was talking to Priss. And I'm really really really really really really glad that we had the discussion, because I think we cleared some things up, and were honest with each other, and we didn't feel the need to hide behind shit and stuff. I just wish there was a way that I could tell her just how much she means to me.

First off, I have added Haloscan comments, for the following reasons:

1. Why the hell not?

2. So people can comment on my stuff.

So comment, comment, comment away!!!!!!!!!!!


Its not easy being perfect. Well, I guess it kinda is. Cause all you really have to do is just be, there's not anything to do. I mean, you're perfect. And if you're perfect, we'll, you'll be perfect forever and ever and ever. And there is nothing you can really do to stop being perfect, cause any action of yours is acted because you are pefection, and nothing imperfect can come from something perfect, so therefore once you reach the state of perfection, it is permanent. So, what I should really say, is that its kinda boring being perfect.