Great Seasons of the 1960s - Starting Pitchers and Releivers

We’ve explored batters twice and now move onto the great pitching seasons of the 1960s.

While the decade of the 1960s is most known for its general lack of offense, the number of truly elite pitching seasons is limited to innings tossed by four players – Sandy Koufax, Denny McLain, Juan Marichal, and Bob Gibson. One of the important aspects of the FBHOF rating system is the simple fact that each player is compared against the peers of his time. This is critical, since otherwise 20 of the Top-25 pitching seasons all might be from this decade.

This fact also puts the greatness of Sandy Koufax into better perspective. Not only are his three best seasons the best ever (to date), they are the best ever during era infamous for its pitching proficiency. Elsewhere, Denny McLain is celebrated for being the last 30 game winner, but all too often his 0.90 WHIP and 1.96 ERA is overlooked. Juan Marichal turned in 25 wins with a 0.86 ERA in 1966 and Bob Gibson’s legendary 1968 season ranks 17th best during the period 1960 through 2008.



“Innings pitched matters” is a governing principle in the way we calculate reliever and closer scores, and is perhaps more significant than the raw number of saves. Why? Saves is just one category and they can be obtained relatively cheaply from a myriad of places in any given season. You should never pay top dollar for a top closer. Given this, the further back in time you go the higher the reliever and closer scores get because they pitched a great deal more often than their successors.

Dick Radatz had the best closer season during the 1960’s, striking out 181 batters and saving 29 games in 1964. It misses best all time by only the narrowest of margins. Below the Closer table is the list of great middle relief seasons. As you can will see not only are innings pitched elevated (as judged through number of strikeouts), but the number of wins a pitcher records rises along with innings pitched too.