Up on the blog today, we go and add New York Yankees great Whitey Ford to my long-running "Minor League Days: Legends Edition" set, one that I have hopes of printing up later this year:
Here
we see Ford suited up with the Binghamton Triplets in A-Ball as a
nineteen-year-old, a brilliant season which will see him go 16-5 over 26
games, sporting a microscopic 1.61 earned run average over 168 innings.
The
following year he'll jump all the way to Triple-A for half the year,
before making the Big Leagues, where he would stay through the 1967
season before retiring at the age of 38.
What else needs to be said about quite possibly the greatest Yankee pitcher of all?
Cy Young winner in 1961, winner of 236 games against only 106
losses (a nifty .690 winning percentage), a 2.75 career earned run
average, and a member of six world championship clubs.
He led the league in wins three times, winning percentage three
times, ERA twice, shutouts twice, and was named to eight all-star teams
during his 16-year career.
His 10 World Series wins (along with his eight losses) are Major
League high marks to this day, and who knows how much more he could have
padded all of his numbers had he not lost two seasons to the military
in 1951 and 1952!
When the Hall of Fame came calling he was inducted on his first try, getting named to 284 of 365 ballots in 1974.
Obviously there's so much more to get into with Whitey, but I could
end up writing a book here if I did, so I'll leave it up to the
Wikipedia's out there to fill anyone in who wants to learn more.
I only wish Ford didn't try to hang on those last couple of years
in 1966 and 1967, when he went a combined 4-9, thus eliminating the
chance of him being only the second pitcher to this day to retire with
200+ wins and LESS than 100 losses (the other being
19th-century pitcher Bob Caruthers, who finished at 218-99 between
1884-1893).
Oh well, I know I'm nitpicking here…It's the nerd in me I guess.