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Glavine travels the Hall-way
Posted: Wednesday May 10, 2000 11:13 AM
To send a question to Tom Verducci's Mailbag, click here. Tom Glavine throws harder than you might think. In his May 5 start against Philadelphia, Glavine hit 90 mph on the radar gun with his fastball. "He's not just a guy tossing changeups up there," said Atlanta pitching coach Leo Mazzone. "In fact, there are times when he throws as many fastballs as anybody we've got." Glavine's career has been much like his heater: very good, but underappreciated. Since 1993 he has been overshadowed by teammate Greg Maddux, who has Won four Cy Young Awards and four ERA titles. Maddux is a Hall of Famer right now. And what about Glavine? Like his fastball, his Hall of Fame chances are better than you think. Glavine's 5-0 start this season gives him a career record of 192-116. "Sure, I think about it," Glavine said of his chances for enshrinement. "I don't know what the criteria are going to be. I mean, I don't know how realistic 300 wins is. I'd like to think I have a realistic shot at 250. For me to get to 250, I'd like to think I've got a chance. "You won't see anybody get to 300 anymore. Roger Clemens has a shot and so does Doggie [Maddux]. After that, forget it. Nobody will do it." The last pitcher to win 300 games was Nolan Ryan in 1990. At the time there were more 300-game winners in baseball history (20) than players with 3,000 hits (16). Not any more. Since Ryan reached 300, eight players have stroked hit number 3,000 without any pitcher rolling up a 300. If this keeps up -- and the offensive boom era gives no indication it won't -- 300 wins will have much more prestige than 3,000 hits. Indeed, maybe 250 wins for a pitcher becomes as magical as 3,000 hits for a player. At this rate, Glavine is closer to the Hall of Fame than even he believes. Glavine is 34 years old and showing no signs of slowing down. He already has four 20-win seasons and two Cy Youngs. He could get 58 more wins through the end of the 2003 season. But maybe he doesn't even need that many. If he cranks out 20 wins this year, his Hall of Fame chances get a huge boost. Tom Seaver won 20 games five times. So did Catfish Hunter. Glavine has a lower career ERA in the postseason (2.89) than he does in the regular season (3.36). That's more telling than his 10-11 postseason record, which is an indication of pitching in tough luck. He also gets bonus points for pitching eight innings of one-hit ball over a potent Cleveland team to clinch the 1995 World Series for Atlanta. What's encouraging about Glavine's Hall of Fame chances is that he has the aptitude and ability to make adjustments to extend his prime years. We're seeing that this season as Glavine has incorporated a cut fastball into his repertoire. The entire baseball world knows that nobody commands the outside part of the plate better than Glavine. The foundation to Atlanta's pitching philosophy has always been the fastball down and away. Everything else works off of that pitch. Until now, Glavine didn't work the inside corner of the plate nearly as much as Maddux, who uses a fastball that tails back over the corner on lefties as his equalizer. Now Glavine has an equalizer with his cutter. He can bore it into the hands of righthanders to keep them from diving over the plate with impunity at his sinker and changeup. "It's not a pitch that I use all that much," Glavine said of the cutter. "Sometimes it's only a handful of times a game. When I do throw it, it seems guys take it for a strike, foul it back or miss it. It's worked real well." Said Mazzone, "He'll throw it enough to get people off the thinking of away, away, away. Certain teams will just look out there all night. Against those teams Tommy will throw the cutter more. Other teams might protect the inside of the plate a little more, and now that opens it up for him to go back to his bread and butter and just keep the ball away." Glavine has shown no dropoff in his stuff at age 34. There's no reason to think he can't pitch at this level for at least another two or three seasons. He's already been one of the best pitchers of his era for at least 10 years. He may not be in the Hall of Fame right now the way Clemens and Maddux are, but Glavine is right on the doorstep. Knuckle up for Smoltz"I predict that when John Smoltz comes back next year he'll be better than he ever was," says Braves hitting coach Merv Rettenmund. "Now all we need to do is find somebody who can catch his knuckleball. It's unbelievable. It's so good you can't catch it, never mind hit it." Smoltz was throwing almost 50 percent knuckleballs in spring training before he blew out his right elbow ligament. "That was my backup plan that I had to go to," Smoltz said. "It was the only way I could get by -- or try to get by." Now Smoltz figures he will throw the knuckler about 25 to 30 percent of the time next year, much to the trepidation of catcher Javy Lopez. "Time to start training somebody in the minor leagues to catch it," joked Lopez. Relieving the gloryThey don't make closers like they used to. We all know that. Ever since Tony La Russa made Dennis Eckersley a specialized specialist, managers have copied the formula of using their best arm for one inning only with a lead and nobody on base. We don't use the moniker "fireman" anymore because closers never put out a fire -- not with the bases empty. No pitcher better represents the modern closer than Matt Mantei. Last year the Diamondbacks used him 30 times, never bringing him into a ballgame with a runner on base. So what happened April 29 was downright stunning. For the first time in 33 appearances with Arizona, Mantei was summoned to put out a fire. And it didn't turn out so well for the D-Backs. Here's what happened: The Diamondbacks led Chicago, 4-2, in the ninth. Brian Anderson, working with a low pitch count and trying for the complete game, retired the first batter and gave up a fly to leftfield to the second. Leftfielder Luis Gonzalez, though, dropped the ball. The Cubs sent Shane Andrews to bat against Anderson. Andrews owns Anderson -- 8-for-10 with five home runs, two doubles and eight RBIs -- so D-Backs manager Buck Showalter summoned Mantei. Cubs manager Don Baylor countered with lefty Henry Rodriguez to bat. Rodriguez greeted Mantei with a game-tying home run. The Diamondbacks did rally to win the game in 10 innings, but don't expect Showalter to start bringing Mantei into games with runners on. "You've been watching Mariano Rivera too much," Showalter said, when presented with that idea. "Mariano's as good as there is and he throws strikes, so he can get four or five outs without throwing a lot of pitches. Most closers can't do that. We prefer to let Matt start the inning and give him more room for error." Rivera inherited 27 runners last year. Only five scored. Those were the exact numbers put up by Braves setup man Mike Remlinger, who had one save. This is not meant to pick on Mantei, who once was dubbed "the most exciting player in baseball" by one of his teammates last year for his penchant for putting runners on and then pitching out of trouble. The Diamondbacks can't afford to risk walks and wild pitches from him with men on base, so he's become the specialized specialist. But that's the way many teams treat their closers now. Last year other pampered closers included Texas's John Wetteland, who inherited only 12 runners all of last season, Toronto's Billy Koch (12), Detroit's Todd Jones (11) and L.A.'s Jeff Shaw (10). The real heavy lifting -- getting guys out with men on base while being able to throw strikes -- goes mostly to set-up men. The glory and the big bucks go to the closers. Sports Illustrated senior writer Tom Verducci covers baseball for the magazine and writes a column for CNNSI.com every Tuesday. Click here to send a question to his mailbag. The opinions expressed here are solely those of the writer.
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