The State of Pitching

In 1944, Yankee infielder George "Snuffy" Stirnweiss stole 56 bases, leading the American League. It would be twelve more seasons before another major league player was able to swipe even 40 bags, with the Giants' Willie Mays reaching that milestone. But things changed a couple of years later when Luis Aparicio made the pennant-winning 1959 White Sox "go-go" with his 56 steals, followed by Maury Wills breaking Ty Cobb's long-standing single-season mark in 1962. The running game was back in the majors, and even in our current era of small ballparks and big sluggers, it has remained an integral strategic weapon. 

Maybe, then, there is hope for the complete game. 

As I write this, about 70% of the major league season has been played, and if there is one thing I've noticed this summer it is the absence of complete games. Seeing a pitcher toss a complete game nowadays is almost as rare as seeing an Edsel drive down the street. (If you are not sure what an Edsel is or looks like, please just stop reading here and go on to the next article, this one is definitely not for you!) Through games of July 28, Mark Mulder leads the American League with 9 complete games, while Jason Schmidt and Livan Hernandez top the National League with 5. 

It wasn't always this way, of course, as the starting pitcher used to be expected to go nine innings. The 1904 Boston Pilgrims (later re-named the Red Sox) played 157 games (three were ties) and chalked up a major league record 148 complete games in winning the American League pennant. The 1914 Boston Braves, George Stallings' "miracle" club, swept the World Series by using just three pitchers; only in Game Three did the starter not go all the way, and even then George "Lefty" Tyler wound up throwing ten innings in a game that went twelve. 

In those early years of the twentieth century, it was routine for at least one of the day's starting pitchers to throw a complete game, and common for both pitchers to go the route. The high-water mark was reached in 1904, when both leagues had a complete-game percentage of 1.75; in 1249 major league games, 2186 complete games were recorded! The CG percentage continually hovered around one per game until the early 1930s, but in the mid-1950s it began its steady descent. Last year was the first time that both leagues fell under ten percent. There were 99 complete games in the American League's 1132 games, led by Detroit's 16. The National League only mustered 96 CGs in 1296 tries, with the Diamondbacks, not surprisingly, setting the pace with twelve. Twelve! For an entire team!! In 1971, Ferguson Jenkins chalked up 30, Mickey Lolich had 29, and seven other pitchers compiled 20 or more. Even as recently as the 1985 season we saw Bert Blyleven register 24 complete games, and Curt Schilling tossed fifteen in 1998. So what has caused the complete game to become such a rarity? 

Managers looking for an edge, my friends. And when they search for new ways to win games, they seem to frequently cast their eyes out to the bullpen. 

Back in the dead-ball era, the bullpen was primarily populated with struggling starters, who were banished to purgatory to try and work out their problems. Between 1901 and 1922, 41 pitchers appeared in 50 or more games in a season, but with just two exceptions, all were starters in at least half of their appearances. There was, in short, no such thing as a relief specialist. 

It was Bucky Harris of the 1924 Washington Senators - of all teams! - who provided the new model for all others to follow. Fred "Firpo" Marberry was a hard thrower and the Senators' fourth starter (he threw 195 innings), but player-manager Harris decided to give him additional responsibilities and began bringing him into games in the late innings. Harris most likely reasoned, as most skippers do today, that the best way to finish a game is with an intimidator, a fresh arm firing fastballs at batters who are a little tired after a couple of hours' work. Marberry appeared in 50 games, 36 of them in relief, and set a new major league record with his 15 saves. When Marberry saved two of Washington's four wins in the World Series that year (he was also the starter and loser in Game Three), it elevated him to star status and brought a new dimension to baseball. The next year he set a new record by appearing in 55 games without making a single start, and in 1926 he appeared in 64 games and saved a record 22. 

The next two managers to advance the cause of the relief pitcher were Yankees: Joe McCarthy and Casey Stengel. In 1937 McCarthy began using Johnny Murphy to close out ballgames and watched the heretofore ordinary hurler blossom. The Yankees easily won the American League pennant and the World Series, making Murphy the new poster boy for bullpen excellence, and for the next decade other teams tried to duplicate the Yankees' success with the likes of Hugh Casey, Al Benton, Ace Adams and Gordon Maltzberger. No one really succeeded, however, until the Bronx Bombers themselves. In 1949, Casey Stengel's first season in the New York dugout, fireballing lefty Joe Page emerged from mediocrity to win 13 games and save 27, breaking Marberry's 23-year-old record. In addition, Stengel also believed in utilizing his complete roster, so he frequently replaced his tiring starters with fresh arms from the bullpen. As a result, the Yankees never led the league in complete games during Casey's twelve-year reign, but they did win ten American League pennants and seven World Series. And because success breeds imitators, other teams attempted to recreate the Stengel magic with the likes of Hoyt Wilhelm, Stu Miller, Don McMahon, Elroy Face, Bill Henry and Don Elston, among others. In 1962, the Red Sox unveiled Dick Radatz, who stood 6-6 and intimidated hitters with his 95 mph fastball. Managers throughout the majors lusted after their own "Monster." 

Except for the closer, however (then known as the short reliever), the bullpen was still primarily the home of the journeyman, as well as the place for the struggling starter to work out his problems. Sparky Anderson changed all that. His Cincinnati Reds of the 1970s needed the powerful bats of Johnny Bench, Joe Morgan, Tony Perez, Pete Rose and others to help offset their mediocre starting rotation. Anderson found that he could win games if his starter only went five or six innings and then handed the ball to the bullpen. Anderson also began using pitchers in specific situations, such as lefty-versus-lefty, and his frequent trips to the mound earned him the nickname of "Captain Hook." Anderson never possessed a dominant closer, yet his tactics were quite successful: from 1970 through 1978, the Big Red Machine dominated the National League, winning five division titles, four pennants and two World Series. 

And finally, there was Tony LaRussa. Dennis Eckersley had been a 20-game winner in his career and had won 151 games in the majors, but by the age of 32 he appeared to be washed up to all except LaRussa, who envisioned the lanky right-hander as the perfect guy to come out of the Oakland A's bullpen and put games away. Eckersley preferred to remain a starter but LaRussa sold his concept by telling him he'd pitch just the ninth inning. A sub-.500 club for the previous five seasons, the A's finished just four games out of first in 1987, with Eckersley recording 16 saves. The following year he led the majors with 45 saves and Oakland began their second period of AL dominance. The role of the modern closer was born. 

In fact, the entire bullpen underwent a transformation, becoming as specialized as a medical clinic. If the star, the closer, was to be used for just an inning -- like a fictionalized Wild West marshal coming in to clean up the town -- then he would need his deputies, guys who specialized in pitching the sixth, seventh or eighth innings. They have become known as "setup men" because they bridge the gap between the starter and the closer, thus setting up the dramatic ninth inning. In this system, the starter is only expected to go five or six innings before turning things over to the bullpen professionals. But these relievers have become real creatures of habit. They want their roles defined early and then not tampered with during the season; if for some reason a "seventh-inning man" is asked to fill a slightly different role - like pitch the eighth! - he often acts like a fish out of water and fails miserably. 

Pitchers are babied more today than ever before. In an effort to preserve their arms, they are closely monitored and are often limited to a set number of pitches, which means that unless the starter is particularly sharp that night, a complete game will be highly unlikely. And let's not forget the financial angle: if that guy out on the mound is being paid $10 million a year, the manager (who earns far less) is undoubtedly under orders to protect that investment, so they coddle their pitchers as if they are young violin prodigies. Between the pitch limits and the bullpen specialists and the multi-million dollar contracts, a manager really has no incentive to let his starter try to go nine. 

Personally, I miss the complete game; I think there's something magnificent about a man finishing what he started. I love seeing someone go out there and dominate another team for nine innings (except, of course, if it is my team being dominated). You can see that look in the players' eyes, the one that wonders where in hell this late-inning stamina is coming from?! A complete game, like a well-placed bunt, is a thing of beauty. 

I don't have any hope that we will see its return any time soon, but I am hopeful that it will be resurrected one day. Some team will find themselves an ace, a new Bob Gibson or Steve Carlton, who will spit tobacco juice in disdain at his bullpen mates and insist on going for those final three outs. And once he leads his team to a World Series triumph, then other managers will decide they need a hoss like that, and pretty soon everyone will be talking up the complete game. And you just know that somewhere Cy Young and Walter Johnson will be smiling.