Pedro Martinez finally made his 2007 debut tonight for the New York Mets. After allowing 2 runs in this first inning he settled down on got the victory as the Mets beat the Reds 10 to 4. Martinez struck out 3000th career batter and won his 207th career game.

Greg Maddux won his 11th game of the season as the Padres went into first place in the NL West with their 10-2 win over Arizona in Arizona. It was actually Maddux's first career win pitching in Arizona (in 11 career starts there.)

Maddux extended his streak without a walk to 49 1/3 innings proving that at age 41, he still has the amazing control that has made him so successful throughout his career. The NL record for innings without a walk is 72 1/3 by Maddux in 2001. That streak ended with an intentional walk. Bill Fischer holds the MLB record (and AL record of course) with a streak of 84 1/3 innings in 1962.

The win was 344th of Greg Maddux's career.

Labels: Greg Maddux, Pedro Martinez

Continuing my series on the best players by decade I'm moving on now to the best starting pitcher of this current decade: 2000 through 2007.

Pedro Martinez gets the nod currently despite not having played this season at all and having a decidedly sub par year last season.

Why? Martinez is the only starting pitcher with 700+ innings and an ERA under 3.00 during the decade thus far. Martinez is at 2.78, while Roy Oswalt (3.08) and Randy Johnson (3.18) rank second and third in ERA respectively.

Martinez also leads the majors in winning percentage (.702) during this period with his impressive 99-42 record. Randy Johnson leads the decade in wins with 124 and in strikeouts with 1923.

Martinez won the Cy Young in the AL in 2000 with an 18-6 record and a 1.74 ERA. His ERA+ for that season, 285, is the all time single season record. Martinez followed that up ERAs of 2.39, 2.26, and 2.22 before losing his touch a bit in 2004 with a 3.90 ERA.

Johnson did win the Cy Young award in the NL in 2000, 2001, and 2002. He also won in 1999 but we'll get to that in the debate over the best starting pitcher of the 90s.

Certainly Johnson has been outstanding this decade. You could make a good argument that he, and not Martinez, is the best pitcher of the decade but Johnson's highs (ERA+ of 190 in 2002) aren't as high as Martinez's and his lows (ERA+ of 88 in 2006) are lower.

Top Ten In Wins 2000-2007

1. Randy Johnson 124
2. Tim Hudson 121
3. Greg Maddux 119
4. Andy Pettitte 114
5. Curt Shilling 114
6. Tom Glavine 113
7. Mike Mussina 111
8. Roy Oswalt 111
9. Bartolo Colon 110
10. Barry Zito 110

Pedro isn't on the list until #19 with his 99 wins. This is due to his injury problems mostly. Pedro's fragility is the best argument against him. If he can't come back with strong showings the rest of this year and in 2008 and 2009 he'll most likely lose his title of the best pitcher of the 00s despite his amazing peak at the beginning of the decade.

And before you go too long thinking that win totals are that important consider that #14 on the list is Livan Hernandez (104) whose ERA+ for the decade is 102 or barely above average. Certainly it seems to show health and longevity more than anything else as Hernandez actually leads the decade in innings pitched with 1783.

Labels: Best By Decade, Pedro Martinez, Randy Johnson

Today I make the argument that Pedro Martinez at his peak was the best pitcher in the history of the major leagues.

Stay tuned, I'm gathering the evidence.

Meanwhile : Talk Mets at the New York Mets Baseball Forum.

Hello. Thanks for waiting so patiently while I put together my case.

The only reason why I'm using the phrase "peak level" instead of just saying Pedro is the best pitcher in history is due to Martinez's injury problems. I think due to his fragility and the many games he's missed it's not fair to say he's the greatest pitcher in MLB history but I do think that his peak betters any other pitcher's peak.

Here's the evidence:

1. Pedro's career ERA+ is 160. This is the best of all time and it's not even that close. #2 is Lefty Grove at 148. Other active pitchers of note: Roger Clemens at #6 with 144, Randy Johnson at #8 with 139, and Greg Maddux at #12 with 136. I think you can make a pretty good argument that ERA+ is the single most important statistic for evaluating pitcher performance so this is a pretty impressive thing to rank #1 all time for.

2. Pedro's career opponent batting average is .209 (tied for 3rd all time) and his career opponent OBP is .270 (leads all modern era pitchers.) He's also 3rd all time in fewest hits allowed per 9 innings at 6.85 (behind Nolan Ryan & Sandy Koufax.)

3. Pedro's career ERA of 2.81 makes him the only active starting pitcher in the major leagues with a career ERA under 3.00

4. Pedro is MLB's all time leader in winning percentage at .691 (Tim Hudson at .665, Roger Clemens at .662, and Randy Johnson at .656 come in next among active pitchers.) While I personally don't think that Wins or winning percentage is a very good way of evaluating a pitcher's performance (due to the obvious lack of control a pitcher has over how good his offense is) I'll throw this one in there for the old timers.

5. Pedro is #2 all time in career strike outs per 9 innings at 10.2 (behind only Randy Johnson.)

6. Best single season ERA+ in MLB history with 288 in 2000. This is a pretty incredible stat. It means Pedro was almost 3 times better than the average starting pitcher in 2000.

7. Pedro has 5 of the top 35 best single season ERA+ years in history: 1997, 1999, 2000, 2002, & 2003.

8. Lowest single season opponent batting average ever. Batters hit .167 against Pedro in 2000. Let me write that again in case you didn't get it: .167! When you consider the explosive offensive era it's that much more amazing. (Fun Historical Baseball Facts Coming) Certainly far more impressive than Louis Tiant's second place .168 in 1968, during a year when pitching dominated the American League. Carl Yastrzemski lead the AL with a .301 batting average. Yaz was the only American leaguer with over a .300 batting average or a .400 on base percentage.

9. Best two single season years for "Pitcher Wins" (the pitching equivalent to the stat that places Barry Bonds as the all time most valuable position player.) since 1913 with his 8.4 in 2000 and 8.1 in 1999.

10. Best single season WHIP ever with his 0.74 in 2000. He also has the lowest career WHIP (1.02) for any pitcher who started his career after 1904.

Labels: Pedro Martinez