Mike Mussina's thoughts on retirement

When baseball great Mike "Moose" Mussina was an economics major at Stanford, "he wrote a thesis on the wisdom of signing a professional baseball contract out of college rather than high school," reports Allen Barra in the Wall Street Journal (11/25/08). When Mike was in high school, he was "very nearly class valedictorian; rumors in his hometown ... are that he was just too shy to deliver his commencement speech." When Mike announced he was retiring from baseball, "after 18 years and just two average seasons shy of the magic totals of 300 wins and 3,000 strikeouts," most people were surprised.

Mike offered an amazingly refreshing explanation: "People said to me, 'Make sure you do it for yourself.' But the truth is, every decision you make, there's other factors involved. I have young children ... I'm not getting any younger, they're not getting any younger, and you can't get that time back. It's just the right time for me." Just as remarkably, Mike knew all along that this would be his last season, but kept that to himself. "It was like the last year of high school," he said. "You know it's going to end, and you just enjoy the ride."

Incredibly, fans are now debating whether Mike Mussina deserves to be in the Hall of Fame. Detractors focus on what he didn't accomplish -- never won a Cy Young award or a World Series ring, had a losing record in the post-season, and never led in earned run average. Supporters cite his won-loss record of .638, that he won "19 games twice, 18 games three times, at least 15 games in 11 seasons," and 20 games in his final season -- the first to do so since Sandy Koufax in 1966. Sandy's "hall-worthy" record actually is uncannily similar to Mike's in many respects, including arguably the most important stat -- "they both knew enough to quit when they were on top."

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BunchOBull said:

It will be interesting when he becomes hall eligible.

Typically, if you can hang around long enough for 300 wins, win a trophy case full of Cy Youngs, those major accomplishments...you're a shoe in. Obviously Mussina close...but this isn't horseshoes, nor handgranades.

He has some great numbers in his favor though...

1st...consistency... as the article says, he's won 15 games or more 11 times, 17 games twice, 18 games 3 times, 19 games twice, & 20 games in his final season

2nd...a strong win percentage

3rd...his major opponents are scarred by the steroid rumors (in some cases facts)...in the coming 5 to 10 years, how strong will the pool of contenders be? Granted...they could be VERY strong in 5.

4th...(and in my opinion, most important)... he has an ERA+ of 123...that's pretty, if not really, good as compared to the typical HOF pitcher...if I remember correctly his WHIP is pretty strong too.

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ru4scuba said:

Can you reduce the length of your banner please. 1024px is pretty excessive and makes me scroll L to R.

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fengzhang said:

1. Consistency perhaps, but not dominance. He started off with 2 straight sub 3.00 ERA seasons and had 0 sub 3.00 ERA seasons in the 16 years since then. 0 Cy Youngs. Finished in the top 3 in Cy Young voting just once in 18 years. Only 5 All-Star selections in 18 years. Never had a 20-win season before last year.

2. Played on some strong teams. Nolan Ryan argument.

3. His ERA is very very high for a HOFer. In fact, I believe there's only 1 HOF pitcher who has a higher career ERA.

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ALL_THE_HYPE said:

Got an email about this and I'm not sure what site it's from, but I thought it was kinda interesting to read-

Sandy's "hall-worthy" record actually is uncannily similar to Mike's in many respects, including arguably the most important stat -- "they both knew enough to quit when they were on top."

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