It’s hard to choose. . .there are a lot of great pitchers with terrific records in Big Games. But these are my ten:
11. Mike Mussina
I am, by the way, keeping silent for now on the issue of how Mike Mussina compares to Jack Morris. If Morris has a great record in Big Games, I’m not going to mention it until the 10th and final installment in this series.
But Mussina certainly does. Mussina pitched in Big Games for the Orioles in 1992, 1993, 1996, 1997 and 1998, and for the Yankees every year from 2001 to the end of his career in 2008. He pitched well—3.07 ERA in 54 starts—and he won a lot more often than he lost, 27 to 13.
In Big Games, Mike Mussina defeated David Cone twice (September 2 and September 8, 2001), and Pedro Martinez twice (August 28, 2002, and September 19, 2004).
10. Bruce Kison
Bruce Kison won a Playoff Game and a World Series game for the Pirates when he was a 21-year-old rookie, 1971, and won another playoff game the next season. Those were relief appearances, but in his first four post-season appearances, Kison was 4-0 with 0.00 ERA in 20 innings. This gave Kison the reputation for being a Big Game pitcher early in his career.
Kison was tall and thin, almost spectral, always fighting shoulder trouble, and he was never able to pitch 200 innings in a season, even once. But because of his Big-Game reputation he was spotted in Big Games, and he never lost that reputation. In regular season play he was 22-7 in Big Games, 2.72 ERA.
9. Whitey Ford
It is a cliché to observe that Whitey Ford was a Big Game pitcher, but it would be an oversight not to observe it. 36-16, 2.86 ERA.
8. Ron Guidry
We appear to be in the Yankee section of the list. Of the 35 biggest regular-season games of his career, Ron Guidry won 25. No one else in the data did. He had 39 Big Game Starts in his career, eight of them in 1978, when he was winning every start, but the other 31 in others seasons. He was 29-7 in Big Games, 3.10 ERA.
Guidry’s career is like that of Gooden, Saberhagen, Valenzuela, Vida Blue; when he first appeared he was sensational, and then he kind of tapered off and was around for about ten more years, seemingly losing about 4% per season. I think those kind of pitchers are underrated by history because they create unrealistic expectations, and are compared for the rest of their careers to the pitchers they used to be.
7. Andy Pettitte
Pettitte not only pitched more Big Games than anyone else; he also performed well, with a career record of 43-18 in Big Games. Two more wins than anyone else; Clemens was 41-25.
6. Johan Santana
Johan Santana won two Cy Young Awards, was third in the voting twice, fifth once, seventh once. We can forget how good he was, and it wasn’t that long ago. The Twins won their division in both of his Cy Young seasons, 2004 and 2006. They won it in 2006 by a single game, on the last day of the season. In 2008 he pitched for the Mets, when the Mets were in first place on September 19.
So Santana was pitching a lot of Big Games in those years, at a time when he was a dominant pitcher. By my count Santana has made 30 Big Game starts in his career—four with the Twins in 2003 (4-0), three with the Twins in 2004 (3-0), five with the Twins in 2005 (4-1), eight with the Twins in 2006 (which was the year the race went down to the last day of the season; 6-2), two with the Twins in 2007 (0-2), seven with the Mets in 2008 (6-1), and one with the Mets in 2010 (1-0). His teams have outscored their opponents in those games 150 to 74, and have won 24 of the 30 games. Santana’s ERA in those games is 2.16, and his won-lost record is 20-4.
5. John Smoltz
The reason there are 11 pitchers in my Top Ten is that I initially overlooked Smoltz, since his regular-season Big Game record is just good, not truly outstanding. I decided it was better to wedge him in here like this and have you think I was a little slow, rather than leave him out and have you think I was stupid.
4. Don Sutton
I am as surprised as you are to see Sutton on this list, but. .that’s why we do research. Don Sutton was born a few months after Steve Carlton, and both pitchers were National League rookies in 1966. Sutton was 324-256 in his career; Carlton, 329-244. Carlton’s ERA was 3.22; Sutton’s, 3.26.
In spite of those similarities, Sutton was not perceived as being comparable to Carlton. A lot of that had to do with big numbers in a season. Carlton won 20 games in a season, 27, 20, 24, 23. Carlton won four Cy Young Awards, and first-ballot selection to the Hall of Fame with 96%. Sutton would go 15-11, 16-10, 18-10; he won no Cy Young Awards and waited through five elections to get the Call.
Almost everybody, I suspect, would tell you that Steve Carlton was just more of a Big Game pitcher than Don Sutton. OK; I’m not going to argue with you, but let me report on my research. Carlton was 6-6 in the post season; Sutton, 6-4.
In Big Games in regular season play, they made 76 starts apiece, both of them being near the all-time record for Big Game starts. Carlton was 34-32, which is somewhat misleading because his ERA was good (3.19). Sutton was 38-15, ERA of 2.66.
The two started against each other in a Big Game one time, September 5, 1980 at Dodger Stadium, both teams in the pennant race. Carlton gave up one run in 7 innings. Sutton beat him, 1-0, giving up 2 hits, no runs in eight innings, 10 strikeouts.
He started once in a Big Game against Dock Ellis, September 1, 1974, and he beat him.
He started three times in big games against Phil Niekro, and beat him twice. Sutton’s teams won all three games; the third victory went to the bullpen.
He started once in a Big Game against J. R. Richard, and he beat him.
He started seven Big Games against the Big Red Machine, the Reds of the 1970s. He went 3-1 in those games, and the Dodgers won four of the seven.
Sutton never started a Big Game against Seaver or Jenkins; they were in the other division, and, at that time, teams played almost entirely inside the division the last six weeks of the season. There weren’t any Big Games between the Dodgers and Reds in ’75 and ’76, because the Reds finished off the pennant race before there was time for any Big Games.
The record is what it is. Maybe I’m missing something, I don’t know.
3. Randy Johnson
Randy Johnson had a famously poor record in Playoff Series. Although he won three games in the only World Series he ever appeared in, the wonderful World Series of 2001, he never appeared in any other World Series in part because he kept losing critical games in the playoffs. He won two games in the first round of the playoffs in 1997, against the Yankees, but then lost a game in the second round, against Cleveland. He lost two games in the first round in 1998, two more in 1999, one more in 2000. Altogether he was 7-9 in the post season, 3.50 ERA.
And that is the ONLY thing that is keeping me from naming him the greatest Big Game pitcher of the last 60 years. If I were to say that Randy Johnson was the greatest Big Game pitcher of my lifetime, people would say, "Well, what about all those losses in the playoffs," and they would be entirely right to say that.
But in Big Games in regular season play, Randy Johnson was the greatest pitcher ever, by far. As great as he was all the rest of the time. . .Big Games, he was better. He made 48 starts in Big Games. He was 30-5, 2.44 ERA, 421 strikeouts in 345 innings.
The twelve biggest regular season games that Johnson ever started, he won 11 of them. The other one, he pitched 8 innings, and left the game with a 3-3 tie.
2. Bob Gibson
I have to defend the proposition that Don Sutton was a great Big Game pitcher; I have to defend Randy. Bob Gibson, nobody’s going to argue with me.
Gibson’s Big Game regular-season won-lost record isn’t as good as Randy Johnson’s, but it’s still impressive—36-14, 2.26 ERA. Add in the dominant performances in three World Series, and he’s very near the top of the list.
1. Roy Oswalt
And no, I am not just being provocative. Gibson’s won-lost record in regular-season Big Games was 36-14; Oswalt’s is 37-9. Gibson’s teams were 40-17; Oswalt’s were 46-12. Think about it: 46-12 in Big Games. Gibson’s ERA was 2.26; Oswalt’s was 2.63. When you adjust for context, I suspect that Oswalt wins that one. Oswalt pitched 80 fewer innings than Gibson, but struck out almost as many batters (341 to 352) and walked half as many (73 to 144).
In certain ways we are not as good at making myths now as we were a generation ago. The Wild Card system DOES create more Big Games, I believe, but sometimes it creates Big Games for second-place and third-place teams. The story lacks the clarity and symmetry of a pennant race; it is a harder story to tell.
Roy Oswalt won a tremendous number of Big Games for the Astros in the mid-2000s, but when there are six pennant races to follow and two Wild Cards, things get lost in the shuffle. Oswalt’s constant drumbeat of Big Wins late in the season didn’t have the impact of Bob Gibson winning 7 games in September of ’64. But. . .just the facts. Oswalt has won 80% of his Big Games. Wow.