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Baseball is
a funny game.  It may be the hardest
sport to judge the best players.  There
are so many nuances and styles of each position that comparing two players
within the same era is difficult let alone players in different eras.  Records like Cy Young’s 511 wins or Hugh
Duffy’s single-season batting average record of .440 will never be broken in
the current era; the game’s just too different.

 

Someday
we’ll label most of the past decade part of the “Steroid Era” and many of the
homerun and run scoring records will be discounted as part of an era where
substance abuse seemed to be the rule rather than the exception.

 

Having said
that, I refuse to ignore those years; they still happened, and baseball was
still played and in spite of all the cheating, it was still one hell of a
decade.

 

I’ve decided
to start off the “…Of the Decade” series with the most important position on
the diamond: the starting pitcher. 

 

There’s
little doubt about the pitcher of the 90′s; it was clearly Greg Maddux.  Nobody in my lifetime has been more dominant;
not even Pedro Martinez.  But this decade
is a little different.  There have been a
handful of dominant pitchers, but none of them stand out from the rest.  So who is the best starting pitcher of the
2000′s?  Nobody started more games in the
decade than Livan Hernandez (332) but it’s safe to say that although he was a
good pitcher in his own right, he’s not the pitcher of the decade.  Why don’t I just talk about who I think are
the top 3:

 

3^rd – Pedro Martinez

If
the decade was divided from 1995 to 2005, Pedro would easily be the best
pitcher, but the last half of this decade has not been kind to the Dominican
pitching wizard.  He wound up leading the
majors with a 3.01 ERA in the decade, which was much better than second place
Johan Santana (3.12) and third place Roy Oswalt (3.23).  He also led the majors with a .691 winning
percentage in the decade.  The problem was
that he was only 22^nd in wins with 112 and didn’t pitch the amount
of innings of some of the other pitchers in the conversation.  Pedro can take solace in the fact that he
will likely be a first-ballot Hall-of Famer.

 

2^nd – Roy Halladay

My
all-time favourite pitcher slides in at number 2 on the decade’s list.  Halladay is fourth in wins, fourth in winning
percentage and posted a 3.40 ERA in the decade. 
He was also first by far in complete games with 47.  Second on that list was Livan Hernandez with
36.  He also led everyone in shutouts
with 14 and did all of this on a team that never once made the postseason.  Not having pitched in October certainly does
hurt him, but if he had playoff success he would have been a clear choice for
number 1.  He’s the best pitcher in
baseball right now, and you cannot ignore that. 
And, oh yeah, he’s also pitched his entire career in the cut-throat AL
East.

 

STARTER OF THE DECADE – Johan Santana

Who
would have thought that a Rule 5 draft selection would end up being the best
pitcher of the 2000′s.  He spent most of
the decade with the Minnesota Twins, winning two AL Cy Young awards.  He won 122 games (15^th for the
decade) and he wasn’t even a staple in the Twins rotation until 2003.  He sits third on the decade in winning
percentage (.670), third in Strike Outs (1733), and second in ERA (3.12).  He also has three ERA crowns including one in
his first year in the NL.  There’s no one
in baseball (except maybe Halladay) that teams dread seeing on their schedule
more than Santana.  When the Mets landed
him in the ’07-’08 offseason it ensured that they would have an ace in their
staff for years to come.

 

Honourable Mention

Roy Oswalt – Finished tied for fifth in
wins (137), fifth in winning percentage (.662) and third in ERA (3.23).  Oswalt was actually my pick to win at first,
but I decided against it.

 

Andy Pettitte – Led everyone in the
decade in wins with 148.  I know, I was
surprised too!  Pettitte is a fierce
competitor who gives in to no one.  He’s
never dominant, but always consistent.

 

Javier Vazquez – Second in starts (327)
and in innings (2163), and one of only two pitchers to record 2000 strike outs
(2001) in the 2000′s (Randy Johnson was the other with 2182).  No one is more durable than Vazquez and in
the realm of pitching that counts for a lot.

 

Randy Johnson – Johnson was second
behind Pettitte in wins (143) and led everyone in strikeouts, but like Martinez,
Johnson tailed off in the second half of the decade.  There’s little doubt that he will be inducted
into the Hall of Fame on his first ballot and will go down as one of the most
dominant pitchers of all time.

 

If you
disagree with anything, just leave it in the comments.  Here are the numbers I dug up from
Baseball-Reference.com:

 

 

Starting Pitchers

In order to qualify, pitchers must have
started at least 60% of their games and have a minimum of 750 innings pitched

Games
Started

Livan Hernandez	332
Javier Vazquez	327
Jeff Suppan	321
Barry Zito	320
Jamie Moyer	315

 

Wins

Andy Pettitte	148
Randy Johnson	143
Jamie Moyer	140
Roy Halladay	139
Roy Oswalt/Tim Hudson	137

 

Winning %

Pedro Martinez	.691
Roger Clemens	.682
Johan Santana	.670
Roy Halladay	.668
Roy Oswalt	.662

 

Complete
Games

Roy Halladay	47
Livan Hernandez	36
Randy Johnson	32
C.C. Sabathia	28
Curt Schilling	26

 

Shut Outs

Roy Halladay	14
Randy Johnson	12
Tim Hudson	11
C.C. Sabathia	11
Chris Carpenter/Mark Mulder	10

 

Strike Outs

Randy Johnson	2182
Javier Vazquez	2001
Johan Santana	1733
Pedro Martinez	1620
C.C. Sabathia	1590

 

ERA

Pedro Martinez	3.01
Johan Santana	3.12
Roy Oswalt	3.23
Jake Peavy	3.26
Brandon Webb	3.27