20-game winners: Will the drought continue for these teams?
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Sports Stats ‘on Tapp’ is a biweekly blog published every Wednesday and Sunday
Just under half of the major league teams (14 of the 30 teams) have not had a 20-game winning pitcher on their staff in this century. Two teams, Colorado and Tampa Bay, have never had a 20-game winner. Of those teams that have had a 20-game winner in their franchise’s history, two teams, San Diego and Washington (previously Montreal) have not had a 20-game winner since 1978.
Following are the teams that have the longest drought since their last 20-game winner.
Team Last 20-game winner year, pitcher
San Diego 1978-Gaylord Perry
Washington* 1978-Ross Grimsley
Baltimore 1984-Mike Boddicker
Milwaukee 1986-Teddy Higuera
Cincinnati 1988-Danny Jackson
Kansas City 1989-Bret Saberhagen
LA Dodgers 1990-Ramon Martinez
NY Mets 1990-Frank Viola
Pittsburgh 1991-John Smiley
Detroit 1991-Bill Gullickson
Colorado 1993-Never had a 20-game winner
San Francisco 1993-Bill Swift/John Burkett
Tampa Bay 1998-Never had a 20-game winner
Texas 1998-Rick Helling
* Previously Montreal
Note: With less than 60 games to go in the current season, it looks like most of the teams above will go another year without a 20-game winner. The Tigers, however, with Justin Verlander‘s 14 wins and going for number 15 today, have a good chance to give Detroit its first 20-game winner since Gullickson in 1991. Outside chances for this year include the Dodgers (Clayton Kershaw-12 wins), Brewers (Yovani Gallardo-12 wins) and Pirates (Kevin Correia-12 wins).
Baseball players with same team 20+ years
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Sports Stats ‘on Tapp’ is a biweekly blog published every Wednesday and Sunday
Seventeen major league players played 20 or more seasons in the majors with one team. Topping the list are Brooks Robinson and Carl Yastrzemski who played 23 years with the same team… Robinson with the Orioles; Yaz with the Red Sox.
Following are the players who played 20 or more seasons in the majors, all with the same team.
23 years
Brooks Robinson, Baltimore, 1955-77
Carl Yastrzemski, Boston, 1961-83
22 years
Al Kaline, Detroit, 1953-74
Stan Musial, St. Louis, 1941-63
Mel Ott, NY Giants, 1926-47
21 years
George Brett, Kansas City, 1973-93
Walter Johnson, Washington, 1907-27
Ted Lyons, Chicago White Sox, 1923-46
Cal Ripken, Jr., Baltimore, 1981-2001
Willie Stargell, Pittsburgh, 1962-82
20 years
Luke Appling, Chicago White Sox, 1930-50;
Craig Biggio, Houston, 1988-2007;
Red Faber, Chicago White Sox, 1914-33;
Tony Gwynn, San Diego, 1982-2001;
Mel Harder, Cleveland, 1928-47;
Alan Trammell, Detroit, 1977-96;
Robin Yount, Milwaukee, 1974-93
On the other side of the coin, here’s a list of the players who played 20 or more seasons in the majors with the most teams.
Teams Player, years
12 Mike Morgan, 1978-2002 (22 seasons)
11 Deacon McGuire, 1884-1912 (26 seasons)
11 Terry Mulholland, 1986-2006 (20 seasons)
10 Paul Hines, 1872-1891 (20 seasons)
Note: Current Washington Nationals player Matt Stairs is knocking at the door to match Morgan. Stairs is playing for his 12th franchise in his 19th season. If he can play another season in 2012, he will match Morgan with 20 or more seasons in the majors with 12 teams.
Blyleven not ‘shutout’ of Hall of Fame honor
- Bert Blyleven… Image via Wikipedia
Sports Stats ‘on Tapp” is a biweekly blog published every Wednesday and Sunday
Pitcher Bert Blyleven will be inducted into baseball’s Hall of Fame today along with second baseman Roberto Alomar and executive Pat Gillick.
One of the amazing stats from Blyleven’s career is that he ranks ninth in MLB history with 60 complete game shutouts. With the emergence of set-up men and closers, and teams’ concern for “total pitches” thrown by a starter, there’s a good chance that few, if any, current pitcher will approach Blyleven’s shutout totals, let alone the baseball record of 110 complete game shutouts by Walter Johnson.
What makes Blyleven’s 60 complete game shutouts even more noteworthy is that there is only one active pitcher with 60 or more career complete games (not complete game shutouts like Blyleven; just complete games!!)… Roy Halladay with 64.
With shutouts and the Hall of Fame as the focus, following are those pitchers who had 40 or more complete game shutouts yet are not in the Hall of Fame.
49: Luis Tiant
46, Roger Clemens, Tommy John, Jack Powell
45: Doc White
44: Babe Adams
43: Milt Pappas
42: Tommy Bond, Bucky Walters
41: Mickey Lolich, Hippo Vaughn
40: Larry French, Claude Osteen, Ed Reulbach, Mel Stottlemyre
Note: Ed Reulbach’s name may not be familiar to a lot of you (especially considering he played in the early 1900’s) but his claim to fame is that he is the only pitcher to throw two complete game shutouts in one day. Reulbach threw two shutouts in a doubleheader on September 26, 1908.
Note #2: Active leader in this category is Halladay with 19 shutouts. He is followed by Chris Carpenter (13) and Tim Hudson and CC Sabathia with 12 each.
Sports longest active streak of winning seasons
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Sports Stats ‘on Tapp’ is a biweekly blog published every Wednesday and Sunday.
The New York Yankees are comfortably above .500 as the second half of the Major League Baseball season begins its second week. And if the Yankees want to keep pace with the Detroit Red Wings, they need to finish the season over the .500 mark. (You’re probably thinking to yourself, “This guy is nuts; he’s mixed up his sports. When did the Red Wings start playing baseball?”)
Here’s the simple explanation: The Red Wings finished the most recent NHL season with a 47-25 record with 10 overtime losses). That .634 points percentage was the 19th straight season that the Red Wings had a winning season (better than .500 winning percentage). That’s the longest current streak of winning seasons among teams in the four major sports (MLB, NBA, NHL and NFL).
The Yankees, however, can tie the NHL’s Red Wings’ mark of 19 straight winning seasons by finishing above the .500 mark at the end of the 2011 campaign. If they do, that would also give the Yankees an active streak of 19 straight winning seasons.
Following are the current longest streaks of winning seasons in the four major team sports.
Team, league Current streak of winning seasons
Detroit Red Wings, NHL 19
New York Yankees, MLB 18
San Antonio Spurs, NBA 14
Dallas Stars, NHL 14
Boston Red Sox, MLB 13
Vancouver Canucks, NHL 11
Dallas Mavericks, NBA 11
New England Patriots, NFL 10
Indianapolis Colts, NFL 9
Philadelphia Phillies, MLB 8
Denver Nuggets, NBA 8
Minnestoa Wild, NHL 8
Note: A pair of NHL teams saw their active streak of winning seasons end after the just-completed 2010-11 season. The New Jersey Devils finished under .500 this season, ending their streak at 18 seasons (had they finished above .500, they would be tied with the Detroit Red Wings for the longest active streak). The Ottawa Senators saw their streak of 12 winnings seasons end this past year when they finished below .500.
NFL scores that win
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Sports Stats ‘on Tapp’ is a biweekly blog published every Wednesday and Sunday.
All indications are that the NFL lockout is near an end. To get in the mood for some football, here’s a little stat that will get you thinking about the upcoming NFL season.
So… how many points does an NFL team need to score to win on a consistent basis? Looking at the 256 regular season games and the 11 playoff games from last season, here’s a breakdown of win-loss records when teams scored a certain number of points in a game.
Points…………………………………………………….Record
0-9 points 2-52 .039
10-19 points 48-115 .294
20-29 points 92-84 .523
30-39 points 103-16 .866
40-49 points 20-0 1.000
50 points or more 2-0 1.000
Here’s a few additional stats:
* The most frequent score was 20 points; a team scored 20 points in 39 games. Next was 17 points, which was scored by 38 teams last year.
* Teams that scored 25 or more points in a game were 164-40, an .804 winning percentage.
* Teams that scored under 25 points usually had a losing record, but teams had winning records in four point totals under 25 points… teams were 3-1 when scoring 15 points; 8-5 when scoring 19 points; 4-2 when scoring 22 points; and 16-6 when scoring 23 points.
* Most points scored to lose a game last year was 36.
* Teams were 50-167 (.230) when they scored under 20 points.
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