Pitchers of today vs. Pitchers of yesterday....

Here's a theory:

For every pitcher that was able to pitch a ridiculous number of innings, there must have been a hundred flameouts. Of today's pitchers, many would have been weeded out as they threw 300+ innings from young ages. That - and not performance - would be the primary factor weeding out has-beens from major league pitchers.

That's too bad; I think pitching today is probably much better because we don't try to kill every arm that shows promise. Sure, some of today's pitchers probably could throw 300+ innings if they had been trained to do so from a young age. But a huge number of very talented pitchers would also have their arms shredded and never sniff the majors.

it seems. There has been a lot written about this issue, including last year when Dice-K signed with the Red Sox. His case was slightly different, as he pitched fewer games but had incredibly high pitch counts compared to MLP pitchers, going all the way back to his youth league days. But as much as I've read speculation on it, I have yet to see a convincing argument as to how the former pitchers were able to sustain such a load while the modern era has cut back so drastically. The BP guys have made what looks like a pretty convincing argument that going back to a 4-man rotation would not only be feasible but beneficial to a team without hurting the pitchers, but that is still a long way from the huge numbers of innings pitched by some of the old timers.

If you've ever read The Summer of '49, about the pennant race between the Yanks and Sox, the pitching schedules of the starters blows the mind when compared to today's game. I don't think we'll know how the modern pitcher would react unless someone actually tries to change up rotations.

BTW - very cool to be related to Grover Cleveland Alexander.

No, not Beane. Martin. 94 complete games in 1980. Rick Langford started 33 games and finished 28 of them, including 22 in a row! It wasn't uncommon for any the starters to pitch 12, 13, 14 innings in one game.

Langford was done at age 34 (although he started his decline much earlier), McCatty and Keough were through at 31, Norris at 28 (he did make a comeback attempt at 35).

P.S. Thanks for the mention, but I agree with sslinger; extremely cool stuff to be related to Ol' Pete.

P.S.S. I love the fact that some of the people that gave us our first glimpse of baseball were women (like my grandma and oldest sister).

for the decline in workload can be attributed to the rise of Babe Ruth and the end of the Dead Ball Era. Before the home run was a true threat, pitchers would toss it up there fairly easy most of the time, saving their top fastballs/etc. for situations with men in scoring position or maybe a very fearsome hitter. Once home runs became more common, pitchers had to throw their best stuff on pretty much every pitch, which puts a whole lot more stress on the arm. One reason why Walter Johnson's fastball was so legendary is that he threw hard every pitch, a rarity for much of his career.

If you look at the record books, for every old-timer like Alexander or Johnson that had amazing longevity and innings pitched totals, there are tons of guys who were great and flamed out due to arm trouble, like Smoky Joe Wood. By limiting innings and games pitched, teams are giving themselves a much better chance of keeping a productive player healthy while lowering the amount of production from those few pitchers who could handle a heavier workload. I guess they've decided less from more is better than a whole lot from very few. Nowadays, managers risk criticism and decreased job stability if a pitcher blows out his arm pitching a bunch of innings.

I wasn't around then, but my dad suggested that he has noticed kids are throwing a lot more breaking pitches at younger ages now then he could remember as he was growing up in the 50's and 60's...

We remember the fantastic achievements that have stood the test of time, but largely forget the thousands of Irish and Chinese buried along the route.

For every Grover Cleveland Alexander there are probably a dozen Buttons Briggs.