Pitchers with at least 100 wins and 100 saves
Posted by Andy on October 27, 2007
Hey--here's a post that has nothing to do with the post-season. I just wanted to see how many pitchers in history have at least 100 wins and 100 saves in their career. It's a Who's Who of pitchers that spent time as both a starter and a closer:
Cnt Player Year W SV From To Ages G GS CG SHO GF L W-L% IP H R ER BB SO ERA ERA+ HR BF IBB HBP BK WP Teams
+----+-----------------+----+---+---+----+----+-----+----+---+---+---+---+---+-----+------+----+----+----+----+----+------+----+---+-----+---+---+---+---+-----------+
1 Tom Gordon 2007 133 156 1988 2007 20-39 853 203 18 4 339 121 .524 2076.2 1855 993 906 957 1902 3.93 114 173 8909 56 38 5 106 KCR-BOS-CHC-TOT-CHW-NYY-PHI
2 John Smoltz 2007 207 154 1988 2007 21-40 702 461 53 16 204 145 .588 3367 2954 1328 1221 984 2975 3.26 127 275 13810 81 54 16 143 ATL
3 Dennis Eckersley 1998 197 390 1975 1998 20-43 1071 361 100 20 577 171 .535 3285.2 3076 1382 1278 738 2401 3.50 116 347 13534 91 75 16 28 CLE-BOS-TOT-CHC-OAK-STL
4 Rich Gossage 1994 124 310 1972 1994 20-42 1002 37 16 0 681 107 .537 1809.1 1497 670 605 732 1502 3.01 126 119 7506 90 47 5 63 CHW-PIT-NYY-SDP-CHC-TOT-TEX-OAK-SEA
5 Bob Stanley 1989 115 132 1977 1989 22-34 637 85 21 7 376 97 .542 1707 1858 797 690 471 693 3.64 118 113 7238 87 41 2 22 BOS
6 Rollie Fingers 1985 114 341 1968 1985 21-38 944 37 4 2 709 118 .491 1701.1 1474 615 549 492 1299 2.90 119 123 6942 109 39 7 40 OAK-SDP-MIL
7 Ron Reed 1984 146 103 1966 1984 23-41 751 236 55 8 300 140 .510 2477.2 2374 1084 953 633 1481 3.46 108 182 10305 124 50 1 72 ATL-TOT-PHI-CHW
8 Dave Giusti 1977 100 145 1962 1977 22-37 668 133 35 9 380 93 .518 1716.2 1654 764 687 570 1103 3.60 95 126 7251 109 15 7 87 HOU-STL-PIT-TOT
9 Lindy McDaniel 1975 141 172 1955 1975 19-39 987 74 18 2 577 119 .542 2139.1 2099 934 821 623 1361 3.45 109 172 8971 136 15 5 112 STL-CHC-SFG-TOT-NYY-KCR
10 Hoyt Wilhelm 1972 143 227 1952 1972 29-49 1070 52 20 5 651 122 .540 2254.1 1757 773 632 778 1610 2.52 146 150 9164 61 62 4 90 NYG-TOT-BAL-CHW-LAD
11 Ron Kline 1970 114 108 1952 1970 20-38 736 203 44 8 338 144 .442 2078 2113 991 866 731 989 3.75 101 218 8868 118 33 7 59 PIT-STL-TOT-DET-WSA-MIN-PIT-TOT-ATL
12 Roy Face 1969 104 193 1953 1969 25-41 848 27 6 0 574 95 .523 1375 1347 591 531 362 877 3.48 109 141 5691 106 14 2 32 PIT-TOT-MON
13 Stu Miller 1968 105 154 1952 1968 24-40 704 93 24 5 405 103 .505 1694 1522 697 610 600 1164 3.24 115 140 7083 114 39 3 25 STL-TOT-NYG-SFG-BAL-ATL
14 Ellis Kinder 1957 102 102 1946 1957 31-42 484 122 56 10 255 71 .590 1479.2 1421 627 564 539 749 3.43 124 118 6306 8 9 2 11 SLB-BOS-TOT-CHW
15 Firpo Marberry 1936 148 101 1923 1936 24-37 551 187 86 7 271 88 .627 2067.1 2049 971 834 686 822 3.63 116 96 8769 38 4 14 WSH-DET-TOT
A few of these names surprised me, but most make sense.
Does anybody know how Saves are recorded for the old-time pitchers? Since it didn't exist as a stat, did folks go back and simply apply the Save rules to old boxscores and award Saves wherever they qualified?
October 27th, 2007 at 9:37 am
Cool list. And I like that they are in chronological order. Firpo Marberry was the only one for 20 years! Interestingly, three times in his career Firpo had 10+ GS and 10+ SVs in a season. Those were different times.
I was really surprised not to see Rags on your list. Dave Righetti, the first player in history to both pitch a no-hitter and also lead the league in saves in a different season, only had 82 wins.
October 28th, 2007 at 6:50 am
I'm curious if the B-R index can one-up this list... That is, although each of the guys on this list have both 100 wins and 100 saves (and have been both starters and relievers in their careers), there's nothing that shows that their 100 wins happened AS STARTERS.
Tom Gordon, for example, won his 97th game (and last as a starter) in 1997 -- his other 36 wins since then have all been as a reliever.
It's tricky, since ONLY relievers can qualify for a save, but both starters AND relievers can qualify for wins... Is there a way to see something like: "100 wins as SP + 100 saves"?
October 28th, 2007 at 7:28 am
It cannot be done currently in a single search. Of course you can specify the role as a starter when searching for wins, but then you won;t be able to learn anything about saves, since nobody earns saves when the role is as a starter.
Certainly the data is there--and it would be easy to go back and check everyone on that list to see if they got at least 100 wins as a starter.