Nolan ryan pitching repertoire12/19/2023 ![]() ![]() The Angels plated a run in the bottom of that inning for the victory, and the book was closed on Ryan’s season as well as the strikeout record. Had the Angels scored in the home half of the 9th, Ryan would have remained even with Koufax at 382, but after a scoreless 10th inning for both teams, Ryan finally whiffed Rich Reese to end the 11th inning and set a modern record. The score was knotted at 4–4, and Ryan retired the Twins in the 9th but without a strikeout. Ryan rang up three strikeouts in the 7th, giving him 14 Ks but still one shy of Koufax, and he tied the record in the 8th after fanning Steve Brye. This finale had a great deal of drama, however. In his only remaining start-at home on September 27 versus Minnesota-Ryan produced the desired result. An additional 16 strikeout victims were needed to reach 383. Laboring through September, Ryan set down 12 White Sox on the 11th, 10 Royals on the 15th, seven Rangers four days later, and 12 Twins on the 23rd. My arm is getting tired.” The Sporting News, September 22, 1973, 20. The task before Ryan was not impossible, but the pitcher admitted, “Sandy said the last 100 are the toughest and I believe it. But by September 3, Ryan’s ascension on the strikeout leader board put him at 326, meaning that in his final five scheduled starts, he would have to fan 57 batters to eclipse Koufax.Īt that point, manager Bobby Winkles and his charges were not much of a threat to division-leading Oakland, and with little to play for other than having a look at some new prospects-Frank Tanana among them-the former Arizona State head coach kept Ryan pitching every fourth day, save for one skipped start on September 7. To be sure, Ryan encountered some missteps along the way, such as his May 11 start at home against the White Sox in which he failed to survive the first inning, and a rare but disastrous relief outing against the Yankees on August 14, when he yielded three straight hits, threw a wild pitch, and walked a batter before at last getting the final out of the eighth inning of a 7–2 loss. As the season ground on and the strikeouts accumulated, Ryan edged ever closer to Dodgers great Sandy Koufax’s 382 strikeouts in 1965. Already known as “The Express” thanks to his blazing fastball, Ryan fanned 12 Royals in his opening assignment, and over the course of the season fanned an average of 10.57 batters per nine innings pitched. Ryan’s first start of 1973 set the tone for the season. Stellar as these accomplishments were, the number of strikeouts Ryan amassed in each succeeding contest quickly outshone them. On August 31 Ryan limited the opposition to one hit. The right-hander spun a pair of no-hit gems, the first coming against the Royals in Kansas City on May 15, the second in Detroit exactly two months later. But the year had moments of intrigue for Ryan, who lumbered along with a winning pace that was below. Thereafter, California took a slow, steady descent to fourth place with 79 wins and 83 losses, a full 15 games behind Oakland. Ryan’s role as a workhorse now established, the 26-year-old hurler looked to improve on the 19–16 record he logged in the strike-shortened season of 1972.įor the 1973 season as a whole, the Angels’ high point came on June 27 when they briefly held first place atop the AL West on the strength of Singer’s 12–3 record. He pitched as many innings (284) as he had in his previous two years combined with his former team, the New York Mets, taking the mound for 39 starts and leading the American League in shutouts (9), walks (157), and strikeouts (329). Ryan had been brought in by Dalton the previous year and had evinced the powerful pitching that became his trademark. ![]() ![]() Joining Singer in the Angels’ rotation were holdovers Rudy May, Clyde Wright, and a young Texan named Nolan Ryan. Now in his second season as GM, Dalton had traded former 20-game winner Andy Messersmith and third baseman Ken McMullen to the Los Angeles Dodgers for a clutch of players that included future Hall of Famer Frank Robinson and another past 20-game winner, Bill Singer. The Angels were counting on improvements engineered by General Manager Harry Dalton after the 1972 season. ![]() The mission of the California Angels in 1973 was to find a way to wrest the American League West Division title from their in-state neighbors to the north, the World Series champion Oakland Athletics. Had Nolan Ryan been afforded the same luxury of facing his mound opponents as Sandy Koufax, rather than the American League’s newly introduced designated hitters, how many strikeouts might he have totaled in his record-setting season of 1973? ![]()
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