Wilbur Wood
1941-2026
Former major league pitcher Wilbur Wood passed away earleir this month at the age of 84. At first, I wasn't going to note his passing here, but have since had second thoughts because Wood was something that we may never see again in baseball: a true work-horse of a pitcher.
His career spanned 17 seasons, primarily with the White Sox (12 seasons), and he did pitch in 37 games for the Pirates in 1964-65 before being traded to the White Sox for pitcher Juan Pizarro in 1966. In retrospect, perhaps not one of Joe L. Brown's most astute deals.
Wood was a knuckleball specialist, which enabled him to avoid the usual stresses and strains suffered by baseball pitchers. He appeared in 651 games over the course of his career, 297 starts, 198 complete games, and 354 relief appearances. HIs career record was 164-156 with a 3.24 ERA. All of this leads me to highlight some extraordinary statistics from a five year stretch of Wood's career.
Starts | Innings Pitched | W-L | ||
1971 | 42 | 334.0 | 22-13 | |
1972 | 49* | 376.2* | 24*-17 | 3rd in Cy Young vote |
1973 | 48* | 359.1* | 24*-20 | 2nd in Cy Young vote |
1974 | 42* | 320.1 | 20-19 | 5th in Cy Young vote |
1975 | 43* | 290.1 | 16-20* | |
* Led MLB in category |
Just focus on those Innings Pitched totals. To put it into some sort of perspective, compare them to....
- Most IP 2025 - Garrett Crochet, Boston 205.1
- Most IP last ten seasons (2016-25) - David Price, Boston 230.0
- Most IP, 21st century (2001-25) - Roy Halladay, Toronto 266.0
To be sure, Wilbur Wood was no Hall of Famer, but he was an incredibly solid major league pitcher, and we will probably never see an innings eating pitcher like him ever again.
RIP Wilbur Wood.
No comments:
Post a Comment