Friday Stuff

Hall of Fame (or near) Indians Pitchers Edition

I promised you the results of the poll I ran earlier this week, asking if you thought the Monday edition that walked through ten random baseball objects I found at local antique stores was a worthwhile exercise or an abject waste of time. Here’s the outcome:

• Worthwhile Exercise: 95%

• Abject Waste of Time: 5%

Hmmm, it may take me some time to parse the results of such a close race.

Just kidding. The people have spoken about as clearly as possible, so it looks like we’ll have a few more worthwhile exercises of that sort in the future. Thanks to everyone who voted. On to The Stuff…

Monday

This was the date in 1972 when former Indians pitcher Early Wynn was elected to the Hall of Fame. I’m not sure he deserved to be elected on just his fourth ballot given that he was essentially a lesser Don Sutton or Tony Mullane, but Wynn compiled exactly 300 wins in his career, and that made his eventual election a foregone conclusion.

Still, it’s worth remembering a couple things about him. The first is that he really didn’t pitch like a 300-game winner. Once his era, run support, and home ballparks are account for, Wynn’s neutralized win-loss record is 275-254 instead of 300-244. He was really fortunate, in other words, to have those 300 wins.

The second thing to remember is the tortured path Wynn took to hang on long enough and collect that 300th win.