Top 10 Starting Pitchers

Baseball has seen many great pitchers throughout the years. From the pitchers of early baseball, like Walter Johnson and Cy Young, to the great pitchers of today, people having been comparing pitchers. So here is a list of the top 10 starting pitchers of all-time. Two that almost made the lsit: Bob Gibson and Roger Clemens.

10. Pedro Martinez
Pedro Martinez played 18 seasons and was an all-star 8 times. He has 3 Cy Young awards and has a career ERA of 2.93. He is the 1st pitcher to win a World series and a Cy Young award in both leagues. He is also 13th in strikeouts with 3,401.

9. Randy Johnson
Randy Johnson played 22 seasons and was an all-star 11 times. He has the 2nd most Cy Young awards with 5 and has the 2nd most strikeouts with 4,875. He is also the 1st of 2 Diamondback pitchers to throw a perfect game.


8. Nolan Ryan
Nolan Ryan played 24 full seasons(27 total) and all though he is the all-time leader in walks and 3rd in losses, he has the most strikeouts ever with 5,714! That's 1,000 more than following strikeout leader. He also has the most no-hitters(7) too. He was an all-star 8 times and still never won a Cy Young award, but was top 5 in voting 6 times. He could also throw 100 mph.

7. Grover C. Alexander
Grover Cleveland Alexander played 20 seasons and achieved 373 wins. He is tied with Christy Mathewson for the 3rd most wins. He has an ERA of 2.56 and lead the league in innings pitched 7 times. He also lead the league in strikeouts 6 times and had 2,198 total strikeouts. He faced 20,893 batters and gave up 4,868 hits. "Old Pete" also had 437 complete games.


6. Greg Maddux.
Greg Maddux played 23 seasons and was an all-star 8 times. He has the most gold gloves by a pitcher with 18. The second most is 12! He also has 4 Cy Young awards, 3,371 (10th most) and is 8th in Wins Above Replacement for pitchers. Maddux has 355 wins (8th most) and only 227 losses, giving him a win/loss % of .610. He also lead the league in innings pitched 5 times, shutouts 5 times and and ERA 4 times.

5. Satchel Paige
Although Leroy "Satchel" Paige did play in the Major leagues for a few years having 2 all-star seasons, he played most of his career in the negro-leagues. By the time he was in the Majors, he was 51 years old. According to Paige, he won 1,100 out of 1,500 games in the Negro-leagues. Radar guns weren't invented in his time, but Paige is still known as one of the hardest throwing pitchers ever.

4. Sandy Koufax
Sandy Koufax played only 7 full seasons and is still called one of the best pitchers ever. He was an all-star 6 of those seasons and won the Cy Young award 3 times. He even won the MVP award. He has a career ERA of 2.76. He had to end his career early because of an injury.


3. Christy Mathewson
Christy Mathewson played 15 complete seasons(17 total) and was one of the 1st five players into the Hall of Fame. They didn't have Cy Young awards back then, but I'm sure he would have gotten a few if they did. He has a career ERA of 2.13, is tied for 3rd most wins with 373 and finished with a batting average of .215

2. Cy Young
Denton Young was nicknamed "Cyclone", or Cy for short. He was a great pitcher having the all-time records for wins(511) losses(316) games started(815) complete games(749) innings pitched(7356.0) and hits given up.(7,092) They even named an award after him because of his great pitching. He also has the most Wins Above Replacement for pitchers. Cy finished with a career batting average of .210.

1. Walter Johnson
Walter Johnson was an amazing player. He played 21 seasons with the Washington Senators, whose records were among the worst ever and has the 2nd most wins ever with 417. That means he got a win almost every time he pitched. He also has the most shutouts with 110. Johnson also won the MVP award twice and has a career batting average of .235. That's pretty good for a pitcher.