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See the original image at nytimes.com

1968: A Different Era, a Lower E.R.A.

nytimes.com — This season ’s top pitchers have not equaled the élan of their predecessors from 1968, but their craft seems to be on the rise.

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  • Masternajee, on 07/01/2008, -2/+2There were really some incredible pitchers then... Makes me wonder how good they would be today.
    • 36CrzyFsts, on 07/01/2008, -6/+0They would probably blow now, remember now juicing is no longer AS legit.
      • JustinCase18, on 07/01/2008, -0/+3These pitchers weren't juicing. Maybe today's pitchers aren't as effective due to the juicing of the batters. Steroids makes you more prone to injury, which could be why today's pitchers can throw as many pitches as they could back then.
      • cuptocanada, on 07/01/2008, -0/+6i don't see how you can say those pitchers weren't juicing. everyone is just living in a fantasy world where all the stars from the past were completely clean. you have players from the '60s in the NFL coming out and saying they took stuff... let's not be naive to think it just didn't happen in MLB.
      • Oracle95, on 07/01/2008, -1/+2I don't think they were "juicing", there were however a lot more recreational drugs in use during the 60's and the 70's. Just look at photos of those guys, they were generally scrawny by today's standards. No "Popeyes" back then.
      • cuptocanada, on 07/01/2008, -1/+2fair enough but i think it is quite narrow minded for some people to say that only athletes from today's era are "cheating". it may not have been steroids, but it was pine tar, or spit ball or some other form of "competitive advantage"
    • 0xbaadf00d, on 07/01/2008, -0/+11After that season they lowered the mound.
  • louiebaur, on 07/01/2008, -1/+3and the year I was born:-)
  • jzuska, on 07/01/2008, -0/+4What, no steroids this season?
  • palewook, on 07/01/2008, -0/+4yesterday's pitchers would be like today's best pitchers, just minus the money and the juice..
    • thegreenspanput, on 07/01/2008, -0/+1they would get absolutely shelled.
    • NachoBusiness, on 07/02/2008, -0/+1The above poster is right... pitchers from the 1950s and 1960s would generally get murdered today. There are exceptions of course, Koufax would be great today for example... but you have to consider most pitchers then pitched 10-20% slower than today's pitchers. There use to be 1 or 2 players on an entire staff who could throw 90mph or better... now there are only a few who can't do that.
  • RandomGuySteve, on 07/01/2008, -1/+11It wasn't just steroids back then. Greasing the ball, corking bats, hell I'm sure there were a few cases of outright bribery.
  • flaznog, on 07/01/2008, -1/+4Denny Mclain won 30 games that year. He was great all season. But Lolich was great in the World Series against the Cardnels. Not only did he win 3 games pitching he hit a home run (the only one of his carrier) in game 2. There was no DH. The phrase was "Lolich and Mclain and pray for Rain". The whole Tiger team was great that year...

    It was also the era of Vietnam on TV.
    • abran1984, on 07/01/2008, -0/+3Cardnels??
    • Pedobear, on 07/01/2008, -0/+3I'm pretty sure the phrase "x and y and pray for rain" applied not to Lolich and Mclain, but to Warren Spahn and Johnny Sain...as in, "Spahn and Sain and pray for rain."
    • wattznext, on 07/01/2008, -0/+2In addition, the phrase "X and Y and pray for rain" is meant to indicate that the rest of the rotation is not very good. You have your big two pitch, and then you pray for an off day so you can throw one of them out there again instead of your #3 guy.
      With this said, the phrase "X and Y and pray for rain" would not be a good example of how "the whole Tiger team was good that year."
    • p51d007, on 07/01/2008, -0/+1He was good, and Baltimore won, but....Bob Gibson STILL holds the strikeout record
      in the world series.
      I think it is a different era now. Pitchers then, "went the distance", but now, they are only "required" to pitch 7 innings. Plus, the mound was a lot higher than it is now. After Gibson struck out 17, they lowered the height of the mound. From everything you read, he was a mean SOB of a pitcher, didn't take crap from no one. One time, he said that if one of his players was "brushed back", that the next time that pitcher came up to bat,
      I would throw one right at his face on purpose, just to let him know not to do it again.
      In the world of political correctness run amok, you won't see the likes of him again.
      He's mellowed out in his old age. I've got a baseball I've had since 1972, when I was a kid, got the chance to go onto the field in St. Louis, play catch with the players, go down into the locker room, dugout. Got all the guys to sign the ball EXCEPT Gibson.
      He didn't do autographs back then, was kind of a recluse. If I ever find him anywhere near where I live, I'm gonna tell him the story and see if I can get him to sign it now,
      almost 40 years later.
  • flaznog, on 07/01/2008, -3/+0...and TV riots. The 1967 Detroit riots were just year earlier. Also on TV....

    "The Revolution Will Not Be Televised ..." Gil Scott Heron
  • insurgente, on 07/01/2008, -1/+1In 1968 Europe stood on the brink of proletarian revolution.
    • alanr19, on 07/01/2008, -4/+3Really?

      Or was that just your excuse to use the word "proletarian" and feel all intellectual?
      • NachoBusiness, on 07/02/2008, -0/+1Well... there was some wild riots in Europe that year. But they had nothing to do with baseball.
  • alanr19, on 07/01/2008, -8/+1Once again, its just rounders for fatlads in spandex.
    • kidathinnes, on 07/01/2008, -1/+3Once again, it's alanr19 commenting on something he knows nothing about. Every baseball article you will find this ***** commenting on "fat rounders". Do I need to post these links again to prove your stupid ass wrong?

      http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/stats/rosters?sortCo ...
      207 lbs at 6 ft 1 inch is the average. ONCE AGAIN

      You are such a piece of ***** alanr. blocked
      • alanr19, on 07/01/2008, -2/+1Then please keep me blocked this time moron.

        "You are such a piece of ***** alanr." oooohhh SNAP!!!!!!!!!

        you're obviously a big fan of watching these overpaid drug fueled fattys prancing around pretending to be athletes so I'll leave you to it, you poor deluded schmuck.
      • kidathinnes, on 07/31/2008, -0/+1Lets start ***** over a game you apparently don't care about. Sounds like somebody was raped by a big fat baseball player. I think I touched on a sensitive spot. hahahaha :)

        ***** off dumbass.
  • easypie, on 07/01/2008, -4/+11968.
  • flyskimmy, on 07/01/2008, -0/+19More than anything the 15 inch mound was the reason pitchers were so dominant in the 60's. The mound was lowered to 10 inches for the 69 season.
    • InfamousAtheist, on 07/01/2008, -5/+1I have no idea why anyone would bury that comment... you're exactly right.
      • jspegele, on 07/01/2008, -0/+5which is why nobody has buried it. +6 / -0
  • thesoze, on 07/01/2008, -4/+1steriods....people are aware now....
  • wattznext, on 07/01/2008, -2/+2I've been thinking recently about how the ERA is pretty much a useless number these days.
    ERA = earned runs/9 innings.
    However, complete games are the rarest of rare birds. You are lucky to get 6 innings out of most starters.
    What good does it do me to know how many runs the pitcher will give up in a start and a half?
    The ERA needs to be re-calibrated as earned runs/6 innings
    • burntlungs, on 07/01/2008, -0/+2Not sure if this is what you mean but its actually 9 * (earned runs / number of innings pitched). If it were earned runs/9, closers would have like like a .00001 era!

      Also, take a look at adjusted era, which addresses different ball parks being friendly to batters rather than pitchers and vice versa.

      http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjusted_ERA%2B
      • wattznext, on 07/01/2008, -0/+1OK, in my haste (i'm at work) i got the formula wrong. but that doesn't change my assertion that, however derived, the stat has lost much meaning.

        As far as differently sized and shaped ballparks, this has always been a feature of the game. The amount of innings a starter pitches into a game has declined steadily since the modern ear of baseball began.
    • 0xbaadf00d, on 07/01/2008, -0/+2I wouldn't say it's completely useless, but it is not the most telling stat, especially for relievers. It is possible for a reliever to have an era of zero while letting every single inherited runner score.
    • eggsovereasy, on 07/01/2008, -0/+1I'm a pretty big fan of WHIP, it seems to be help me the most in fantasy baseball when I need a pitcher. If I can find one with a decent amount of IP and a WHIP under 1.3 then they usually end up doing alright for me.
    • jspegele, on 07/01/2008, -0/+1math=good, just take 2/3 of the pitchers era and there you go. it doesn't make the number any better of a measure, just gives you a different perspective.
    • thegreenspanput, on 07/01/2008, -0/+0uhhh... what?
  • jpalva7, on 07/01/2008, -6/+0Spread this story http://digg.com/odd_stuff/Osama_Bin_Laden_doll_fou ...
  • Ex3poo, on 07/01/2008, -0/+2Oh i see what you did in the title.
  • thegreenspanput, on 07/01/2008, -0/+2no mention of Volquez or Lincecum?? Pretty lame if you ask me.
  • web2pointYo, on 07/01/2008, -0/+2“Umpires gave you the high pitch more than they do today,” Lolich said. “A pitch through the letters was a strike. Nowadays, that’s not.”

    I'm old enough to remember seeing a ball right at the catchers face called a strike.
  • boardthis, on 07/01/2008, -0/+3along with the pitching mound and a different strike zone... there were less tools for hitters back then. no video, less elaborate charting, no body armor. without the body armor, batters today can crowd the plate rendering the brush-off pitch less effective.
    • hmmmok, on 07/01/2008, -1/+1Brush-off pitch? Pitchers get suspended for pitching in too close, forget about plunking a batter.
    • ryanicus, on 07/01/2008, -0/+0And hitters now have all kinds of armor, so they don't have to have fear of getting hit. Have you seen Craig Biggio's armor? No wonder he set the record for most HBP. If I was wearing his armor, I'd get as close to the plate as possible and not a budge one inch.
    • Butros, on 07/01/2008, -0/+1Yeah the chin music isn't as effective these days.
  • mikeblur, on 07/02/2008, -0/+0If Lolich thinks today's pitchers are babied, then I wonder what ole Hoss Radbourn would say about Lolich.

    In 1884, ole Hoss (5 foot 9, 168) pitched 75 games, starting 73. He won 59 and lost 12, with an ERA of 1.38 in 678 innings.

    Baseball continually evolves. We're coming out of the roid era now, and a few umps have opened up their strike zone, but none to 1968 levels. Also, you have fewer asshats like Barry Bonds who wore body armor and stood out over the plate. Heck, even Pujols wears less armor, and he has backed off the plate and his numbers ain't what they used to be.
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