Hunter Greene still leading team in strikeouts

[*TheLeonardLeap*]

(08-01-2023, 01:09 AM)Crazyjdawg Wrote: The obsession with strikeouts is not a new phenomenon in baseball. It's not a coincidence that the most storied pitchers in the game's history are also among the strikeout leaders. Nolan Ryan, Randy Johnson, Roger Clemens (before the steroids accusations), Tom Seaver, Greg Maddux, Phil Niekro, Max Scherzer, Justin Verlander, Pedro Martinez, Clayton Kershaw etc. Strikeouts are basically synonymous with hall of famers. The top 25 career strikeout leaders are either in the hall of fame, currently active (and surefire hall of famers) or held out because they are not yet eligible (with one player who isn't in the hall of fame but his numbers indicate he should in Mickey Lolich. I wonder what the deal is there...). And then Curt Shilling and Roger Clemens are in there too, who are held out for non-baseball reasons. 

There is a huge difference between getting strikeouts, and FOCUSING on strikeouts. Even more so when you're relying on velocity to focus on strikeouts.

A big reason why all those Hall of Famers are littering the top-25 career strikeout list? Those guys stayed healthy to pitch a LOT of innings for a LOT of years. Nobody in the top 40 pitched less than 2,600 innings. That's 13 years of 200 innings. Guys throwing harder and harder resulting in shorter outings and more injuries will never be able to accumulate enough to be anywhere near the top-25 list before their arm stops working. (I guess Gerrit Cole might have a chance, but if he does it will be largely from the huge boost in Ks he got while cheating.)

Fangraphs only has velocity going back to 2002, but depending on the year in their career, their fastball has largely averaged around...
Scherzer: 93-94
Verlander: 92-95
Kershaw: 90-93


I guarantee you all of those guys could have thrown harder if they wanted to, but in order to do so they couldn't throw as many pitches, couldn't go as many innings, would sacrifice some control that would lead to more walks, and probably get hurt more leading to shorter careers.

Much like how I don't see any run-heavy QB thriving into their mid-30s, I don't think we're ever going to see the 98-100mph starters have long or healthy careers. You see a guy who can hit 100, and you just know it's an eventuality that they're going to have at least one TJ among other problems. 

Human bodies just aren't designed for that kind of punishment, and you'd be much better off with a sustainable low-90s with movement that you can actually locate, mixed with some offspeed pitches will let you throw 100-110 pitches a start, 180-220 innings a year, for 15 years.