Most Losses Per Decade
Posted by Chris J. on December 20, 2007
I've heard many times that Jack Morris is the winningest pitcher of the 1980s, but who was the losingest? Jim Clancy. Those early 1980s Jays teams just couldn't hit.
Going back,
1870s: Bobby Mathews, 164
1880s: Pud Galvin, 242
1890s: Amos Rusie, 163
1900s: Vic Willis, 172
1910s: Walter Johnson, 143
1920s: Dolf Luque, 146
1930s: Paul Derringer, 137
1940s: Dutch Leonard, 123
1950s: Robin Roberts, 149
1960s: Jack Fisher, 133
1970s: Phil Niekro, 151
1980s: Jim Clancy, 126
1990s: Andy Benes, 116
2000s: Jeff Weaver, 102
December 20th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
Jack Morris comes in at 3rd for the losingest pitcher of the 1980s.
December 20th, 2007 at 5:03 pm
I wouldn't have guessed Jim Clancy if you gave me 20 tries. Checking him now, he had a far better career than I recalled -- 140 wins. You need to be decent to lose that many games, as you can see from the other names listed above, and I didn't think he was in that class. Actually, the biggest losers of the past few decades all seem to be a lower tier than those earlier.
December 20th, 2007 at 6:49 pm
What about the most wins by decade?
December 20th, 2007 at 6:52 pm
This list is SORT of like the pitchers with 20 losses in a season. Most of them are fairly decent, or else they wouldn't have been given the opportunity to pitch in enough games to lose 20. Clancy was pretty much an average pitcher (career ERA+ of 98) but he put together some nice years, mainly 1982 through 1987 with the exception of 1984.
December 20th, 2007 at 7:37 pm
Most wins is interesting too. The list of the big winners is below, the number after their names is where on the list of winningest pitchers the losingest pitcher appears. Mostly what these lists are is pitchers who pitched a lot of games in that decade. Jack Fisher and Andy Benes are interesting exceptions, much lower on the list of winners than the other big losers.
1870 Al Spalding 3
1880 Tim Keefe 2
1890 Kid Nichols 3
1900 Christy Mathewson 5
1910 Walter Johnson 1
1920 Burleigh Grimes 13
1930 Lefty Grove 9
1940 Hal Newhouser 5
1950 Warren Spahn 2
1960 Juan Marichal 42
1970 Jim Palmer 8
1980 Jack Morris 8
1990 Greg Maddux 12
2000 Greg Maddux 35
December 20th, 2007 at 7:40 pm
Jeff Weaver, I mean. Not Andy Benes.
December 20th, 2007 at 11:47 pm
Since we have Winners and Losers, I'll do the list of starters (from the 60's on) with the most no-decisions. The number is the number of starts without a decision.
1960's Jim Bunning 93
1970's Jim Kaat 80
1980's Nolan Ryan 88
1990's Pete Harnisch 90
2000's Jeff Suppan & Brad Penny 74