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Phils/Diamondbacks trivia and other baseball musings

Moyer and Unit became the oldest lefties ever to face one another.

Johnson struck out the first six guys to face him. "I may have been the old Randy for six innings. Then I just became Old Randy."

Unit pitched great, actually. Six innings, nine K's, no runs allowed. The Arizona bullpen was not up to the task, allowing NINE runs in the last three innings. Big Ryan Howard dealt the big blow - a pinch hit grand slam.

Moyer picked up the win, the 220th of his career.

I have written this before, but Moyer is one of the most amazing "late bloomer" stories in sports history. On his 30th birthday he had a lifetime record of 34-54, and had not pitched a major league inning in more than a year. In his last three major league seasons, he was 6-20.

If you could have found a bookie willing to take the bet, you could have gotten about 1000-1 against his winning 220 games. He won 34 games before his 30th birthday, 186 after!

Warren Spahn won only 86 games before his 30th birthday and 277 after, but he was an unusual case. Unlike Moyer, Spahnie was also a great pitcher before he turned 30, with three twenty-win seasons, and an excellent 86-58 record. His win total was low because of a little disturbance I like to call World War Two. (He surely would have won 37 in those three years he lost, thus placing him in the 400 win club with Cy Young and Walter Johnson.)

Even without the lost years Spahn is still the winningest lefty in history. Only four lefties have won 300. If you're a fan you can probably name Spahn, Carlton and Lefty Grove. The fourth is Eddie Plank, a deadball-era pitcher with the A's who finished with a lifetime ERA of 2.35. That sounds impressive until you realize that his contemporary Big Ed Walsh was below that in every single season in which he was a regular starter (1906-1912), and finished with a lifetime ERA of 1.82! It was quite a different game before 1920.