[snepp]

Quote: Originally Posted by rsox

The Blyleven argument does not really work as their numbers overall are not that comparable. Blyleven played 3 more seasons than Mussina. Made 149 more starts than Mussina, and while Bert won 17 more games than Mike-he also lossed 97 more games. Blyleven's ERA and Strikeouts are much better than Mussina's, Mussina walked 537 fewer batters. In fact, Mussina allowed 1804 fewer base runners than Blyleven. Blyleven was a very good pitcher, but he pitched in a pitchers era. Mussina accomplished all he did in the middle of the steroid era. While that may not impress some, consider that 1987 was a "juiced ball" season (some of you may remember that term from 1994), 28 players hit at least 30 HR's (that was a lot in the 80's). In the one season where the offense was better than the pitching Blyleven gave up 46 Home Runs. During the height of the steroid era Mussina never allowed more than 31 HR's and that happend only once in 1996.

There's nothing wrong with making a "Mussina > Blyleven" case, but this definitely isn't the way to do it.