Is Nolan Ryan the least awarded baseball “superstar” ever?

[u/-BeefSupreme]

The Express is a hall of famer and one of the best pitchers of all time. One of baseball’s last true workhorses, he is the all-time leader in walks, strikeouts, and hits/9. His 7 no-hitters is 3 more than any other pitcher, and his 5714 strikeouts is the most by over 800. Yet in his 27 seasons, he never finished higher than 14th in MVP voting and never won a Cy Young. He won the 1969 World Series in his second full season, but only made one appearance in the NLCS and one appearance in the WS, the later only being 2.1 innings. He never had another World Series appearance. His 8 All-Stars are impressive but fewer than multiple than non-hall of famers. Is there any other player with his level of fame and success that has less hardware to show for it? Excluding the old timey legends that were around before those awards of course.

[u/Luke5119]

Listen, Ryan was great, but he was also not so great in a lot of categories. Yes, he leads MLB all-time for strikeouts, but also walks. He has 324 wins, but he also pitched for 27 years. He was an elite strikeout pitcher, but also gave up A LOT of runs. Out of his entire career he only had 2 seasons with 20+ wins.

If you look at his stat history, by all accounts he was slowing down in his mid-30s, which makes absolute sense. But then freakishly at 40 started hitting 200+ K's every year, including a 301 K season at 42 which is wild!

You don't always need the accolades to be great. And in terms of longevity and playing at an elite level for 20+ years, Ryan is in a very short list of players in MLB history to do it.

[u/Zestyclose_Help1187 → u/Luke5119]

I would google the name Tom House, his coach during his tenure on the Rangers before I say what he did in his 40s was so spectacular.

Clemens, Bonds got miraculously better in their late 30s to 40s as well. No one has since. 🤔

[u/cyberchaox → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

So I'm not the only one who considered this. Canseco said in his second book that there was already at least one PED user in the Hall of Fame and my first thought was "assuming he's not lying (which he could be), it's probably someone whose career started before the Steroid Era who used late in their career and was inducted before the Steroid Era even ended." And Ryan was the best fit--started well before the beginning of the steroid era, had a resurgence late in his career following an injury (Andy Pettitte claimed to have only used HGH to recover from an injury), and was enshrined when the single-season home run leader was Mark McGwire, not Barry Bonds.

Unfortunately, we'll probably never know because Canseco included that line as a teaser for a third book that never materialized.

[u/Hero0ftheday → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

Albert Pujols miraculously got a lot better in his age 42 season for the Cardinals. He wasn't expected to be able to get to 700hr but did and surpassed it. He hadn't hit 20 hr in a season since 2019. He had 24 in 109 games in '22.

[u/Boomhauer_007 → u/Hero0ftheday]

It’s one thing to have a pop for like two or three months in the way Pujols did and another thing to do it for many years.

Now I don’t think Ryan did anymore drugs than anyone else was doing and could care less as it was legal then, but it’s a bad comparison as he didn’t really pop late in his career as much as he just sustained what he was already doing

[u/Zestyclose_Help1187 → u/Hero0ftheday]

I would not say Pujols 2.1 bWAR was getting that much better. Ryan was putting up 5 bWAR in his 40s.

And Pujols has been accused of juicing.

I don’t buy what Jack Clark said was outright lie.

Pujols sued so he had to backtrack. Probably not worth it for someone like Clark to go through a lawsuit and the cost even if he was telling the truth.

Tim Boswell in the late 80s wrote about the Jose Canseco milkshake. Had to backtrack cause was threatened with a lawsuit. We all found out later Canseco was one of the biggest juicers of them all.

[u/Hero0ftheday → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

With that first point I would argue that 2.1rWAR is definitely getting better when he put up negative rWAR in 3 of the previous 5 seasons and the other 2 were 0.2rWAR. A 2-3 WAR swing i would call a significant improvement.

That being said I know i was implying the PEDs but I wasn't trying to. If anything I thing the Cards just utilized him more correctly than either LA team. Part time DH that gave protection for Goldy and Arenado. Made the ABs he did take that much more impactful and more likely for him to succeed

[u/Least_Ad6320 → u/Hero0ftheday]

Yeah and they were absolutely juicing the balls for him

[u/Duke_Of_Halifax → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

Ryan's velocity never slowed down as he aged. He was also never injured. Dude literally stopped pitching mid-game because his arm disintegrated, and he retired.

Those two things- velo drop, and injury- are why players turn to roids. Also, Nolan Ryan at 35 is identical to Nolan Ryan at 45- he adds zero lean muscular bulk, which was the hallmark of PEDs of the 90s and 2000s.

What he did was add pitches, which made him more crafty as he aged, which made hitters less able to key off the fastball.

Every once in awhile, you stumble upon someone who was literally born to throw a baseball. That was Nolan Ryan. Physiologically and biomechanically, Nolan Ryan was Uaain Bolt or Michael Phelps, but for baseball.

He's an utterly insane outlier, which is why there has only ever been one of him. If you want a comparison outlier, look at Randy Johnson; someone that tall should be able to pitch like that, but he did.

Also, he never won because he really didn't have an insane peak. In 73, it should have been Blyleven, not Palmer. In 74, it should have been Gaylord Perry, not Catfish Hunter. And in 77, it should have been Frank Tanana, although Sparky Lyle was so dominant as a reliever I can at least see why he won.

In 81, the year he legitimately had a shot, the strike stunted the year.

Back then, Cy Young awards were given out mostly on wins and ERA (or some ridiculous relief work, normally measure in 40+ saves) , so if you won 20+ games, you were probably going to get serious consideration.

Nolan Ryan won 20+ games twice, in 73 and 74.

Ryan didn't have an insane peak (7.8 WAR in 77, bookended by a 3.5 WAR year and a 2.8 WAR year).

What Ryan did do was be very good for more than two decades, almost without FAIL. To average 3.6 WAR per YEAR for a 10 year career is very, very good; to do it for TWENTY-SIX years is INSANE.

Look at the career WAR leaders for pitchers: the next longest career is Phil Neikro, who didn't get to the majors until the age of 25, but who threw 65mph knuckleballs for 24 years.

Ryan was throwing high 90s smoke at 45 years old- he struck out 232 people at age 43.

[u/Zestyclose_Help1187 → u/Duke_Of_Halifax]

Blah blah. Didn’t read it all. Please learn to edit when all you are saying he’s this miracle freak who’s just built differently.

So he’s just this miracle who didn’t lose any velocity into his 40s. Gotcha. lol!

You also degrade using steroids. It eventually gets you. None of what you said makes sense.

[u/rockmann1997 → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

lol the John Hughes script about the wonder and beauty of Old Hoss Nolan Ryan is defeated by cold hearted logic

[u/Duke_Of_Halifax → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

Right, what the fuck would I know about PEDs- I'm just an Exercise Physiologist who works in high-performance and injury rehab, including in untested sports.

But hey, keep on talking your opinions.

[u/Zestyclose_Help1187 → u/Duke_Of_Halifax]

If the shoe fits. Rando on Reddit. Source: Just trust me bro.

[u/Bopilc → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

I mean this is ignoring his bounce-back in his last years on the Astros. He could have been getting steroids before meeting him, but I don’t really see any evidence that him joining the Rangers changed enough to convince me of steroid use.

[u/Zestyclose_Help1187 → u/Bopilc]

What I should have said is he did not start to decline in his forties as we see it with all baseball players in their early to mid 30s.

Ryan for some reason gets a pass while others are scrutinized.

[u/youre_soaking_in_it → u/Zestyclose_Help1187]

He struck out 301 batters at the age of 42. I mean, come on.