Most overrated baseball player of all time

yourbuddy,

if youre going to put up the seasons where ryans record did not mirror the teams, you should at least be fair about it. try seasons where his record far surpassed his clubs:

in california:
1972 -- 19-16 on a 75-80 team
1973 -- 21-16 on a 79-83 team
1974 -- 22-16 on a 68-94 team (almost 1/3 of the angels wins)
1977 -- 19-16 on a 74-88 team
houston:
1982 -- 16-12 on a 77-85 team

ryan also has two of the best-ever seasons by pitchers on poor teams -- his 1974 and 1987, with steve carltons 27-10 for the 59-97 1972 philadelphia phillies. in 1987, pitching for the astros (who went 76-86, which wasnt as bad as the two others), ryan finished 5th in the cy young voting despite going 8-16. he led the nl in era, strikeouts, ks/bbs, ks/9ip & hits/9ip. he was third in whip.

be honest in your reporting.

ryans great weakness was his wildness. truth is, he may be the most unhittable pitcher of all time, but there was some bad with that good -- as in, the 1,000 more walks than carlton, who is second all-time. id gladly take him on my team, though.

 

Agreed. The run-and-shoot was for shit, and as someone who saw Barry in person a few times at Soldier Field, you held your breath each time he touched the ball. Emmitt Smith, while consistently good, never really frightened me.

 

From 72-74, Ryan had 329, 383, 367 K's. From 76 to 78, he had 327, 341, 260. From 87 (age 40) to 90, he had 270, 228, 301 and 232. Hmmm, looks like at least three peaks to me. And screw the walk thing; if you strike out two and walk one on average, then most of the time, the inning's gonna be over before the walk does damage.

 

Shawn Bouwens, a free agent scrub. Nobody could ever pick up for Andolsek or Utley. Had nothing ever happened to those guys, the Lions would have been much better and set at those positions for years.

I agree with everything you're saying. Good jacking.

 

Judging peaks only by strikeouts lacks any kind of context and is meaningless. It's like looking at how many shots a basketball player made without looking at how many he took.

OK, I need to get to bed. I'm not arguing that Ryan wasn't very good. If given the choice between Nolan Ryan and all but 25 or so pitchers in baseball history, I take Ryan. I'm not saying Ryan is the equivalent of Mike Hampton or anything outrageous like that. But the idea that Ryan is a 99-percent HOF vote or that he is one of the top five pitchers simply isn't supported by the record. He simply didn't have the consistent dominance of the greatest pitchers ever. He was a very consistent pitcher who was a freak of nature  -- unlike almost every other power pitcher in history, he didn't lose his fastball as he aged. That is enough to get you into the Hall, but because fans put Ryan in that very top echelon (which should be reserved for the Roger Clemens and Walter Johnsons of the world), he is overrated.

 

Look, we could piss and moan all day REE REE REEgarding the most overrated baseball player of all-time.

I know who the most underrated one is: Mariano Rivera.

 ;D  ;D  

 

That Pat Swilling deal you mentioned also cost the Lions Willie Roaf (he might've helped  :) and an assload of karma by un-retiring Schmidt's #56. Did he make a single play during his short, shitty Lion career? This thread is starting to make me angrier than the Nolan Ryan idiots. Cal Ripken is obviously the most overrated baseball player.

 

I'm sorry but give me Nolan Ryan ANY DAY OF THE WEEK and fourteen times on Sunday over Clemens, the epitome of the six-inning pitcher even before he moved to the NL.

And when someone finally decided to fight back against Nolan, he grabbed Ventura and punched him about 17 times on the head. Unlike clemens, who couldn't even look Mr. Peaceful Happy Feeling, Mike Piazza, in the eye after he chucked the bat at him and instead pretended to ask the umpire for another ball. That would have given him one.

 

Cal Ripken would've never gotten off the bench if his dad wasn't the coach.

 

blahblahblahblah

Still ended up with more than 3,000 hits and more than 400 HRs.

 

Are you going to say the same thing to those who are saying Ryan may have been overrated?

blahblahblahblah

Still ended up with more than 5,000 Ks and more than 300 wins.