The Neikro and Perry Brothers

Let us take a little bit of a pause between the end of the off season and the beginning of Spring Training baseball games and look at two amazing brother acts of the 1960s, 70s and 80s. No brother acts won more games pitching than the Neikro brothers, Phil and Joe. But right behind them are the Perry brothers, Jim and Gaylord. Two are in the Hall of Fame, two were known "cheaters" and all together, these four men combined to win 1,068 games, pitch 17,534 innings, 769 complete games and 159 shutouts. Remarkable. The two sets of brothers total statistics are amazingly close considering how long they pitched. Just for the fun of it, let's break it all down and compare the Perry brothers to the Neikro brothers.

First, a little background. The Neikro brothers were from Ohio. Phil was born in 1939 and Joe in 1944. Phil was signed as a free agent by the Braves in 1958 and made his debut in the majors in 1964. The Braves were still in Milwaukee. Phil pitched 24 seasons and retired after the 1987 season. Joe was drafted by the Cubs in 1966 and pitched 22 seasons, retiring after the 1988 season.

The Perry brothers were both born and raised in Williamston, North Carolina. Jim was born in 1935 and Gaylord in 1938. Jim was signed by the Cleveland Indians in 1956 and made his debut in 1959. His seventeen year career ended after the 1975 season. Gaylord was signed by the Giants in 1958 and made his major league debut in 1962. He pitched 22 years and retired after the 1983 season. So the Perrys were slightly older and started their careers slightly earlier. But you can safely state that all four are from the same baseball generation and faced similar competition for their careers.

The Neikro brothers, of course, will forever be the answer to the trivia question as to which set of brothers have the most combined wins pitching in Major League Baseball. They finished with 539 combined wins or just ten more than the Perry brothers. But as we should all know by now, a pitcher's won-loss record is not entirely of a pitcher's own doing. A lot depends on the team, the park, his fielders and other factors. We now have other tools that can measure careers relative to those other factors. There is WAR (wins above replacement), ERA+ and other things we can look at. Again, the striking thing about these two sets of brothers is how similar their statistics are. Let's list a few of them.

• Jim Perry: 215-174, 3.45 ERA, 109 complete games, 32 shutouts, 10 saves, 1.255 WHIP, 8.6 hits per nine innings, 2.7 BB/9, 4.3 K/9, 1.58 K/BB ratio, 106 ERA+, 33.3 bWAR.
• Gaylord Perry: 314-265, 3.11 ERA, 303 complete games, 53 shutouts, 11 saves, 1.181 WHIP, 8.3 hits per nine, 2.3 BB/9, 5.9 K/9, 2.56 K/BB ratio, 117 ERA+, 96.3 bWAR.
• Joe Neikro: 221-204, 3.59 ERA, 103 complete games, 29 shutouts, 16 saves, 1.319 WHIP, 8.7 hits per nine innings, 3.2 BB/9, 4.4 K/9, 1.38 K/BB ratio, 98 ERA+, 30.2 bWAR
• Phil Neikro: 318-274, 3.35 ERA, 245 complete games, 45 shutouts, 29 saves, 1.268 WHIP, 8.4 hits per nine innings, 3.0 BB/9, 5.6 K/9, 1.85 K/BB ratio, 115 ERA+, 96.8 bWAR

How remarkably close are those numbers! The Perrys combined for 129.6 bWAR, the Neikros, 127 bWAR. Look at how close their hits per nine rates were! And one stat that wasn't mentioned, this quartet's homers per nine innings are identical. Gaylord (0.7), Jim (0.8), Phil (0,8), Joe (0.7). 

It's a shame to give one set of brothers the edge, but history has already done that by listing the Neikros as the number one winning duo. So, we have to even the score a little bit. The Perrys had 2.6 more combined bWAR compiled in 363 less innings pitched. With Joe's 98 ERA+ total, you have to give the Perrys the edge there too. Between them Gaylord (2) and Jim (1) won three Cy Young Awards. The Neikros didn't win any. Both Joe and Phil each had one second place finish. Both Phil Neikro and Gaylord Perry were selected to five All Star squads. Jim Perry was elected to three, but Joe Neikro never made the All Star team. Phil was the only one of the four to win a Gold Glove and he won five of those.

There is not much to gain by looking at their post season records. The Perry brothers had limited appearances in the post season and both had an ERA over six in their small sample sizes. Phil Neikro started two games in the post season, pitched well, but never won a post season game. Joe Neikro pitched twenty innings in the post season and never gave up a run. But he didn't get any wins either. 

What about batting? Not much to see there. The Neikro brothers had a combined bWAR of -5.8 as batters and the Perry brothers, a combined -4.3 bWAR. The Perry brothers did hit eleven combined homers though whereas the Neikro brothers only hit one each. Put it all together and you have a slight edge to the Perry brothers as the better pair, but it isn't by very much.

Of course, both Gaylord Perry and Joe Neikro were suspended for doctoring baseballs. But that didn't keep Gaylord out of the Hall of Fame. Let's just wrap this up by stating matter-of-factly that we will probably never see two sets of brothers pitch in the same era like that again with that kind of longevity and that kind of success. The two sets of brothers are a remarkable story taken together. And it's a story unique to baseball history.

Some Perry/Neikro trivia:

• Which is the only one of the four never to pitch for the Yankees? Jim Perry.
• Which is the only one of the four never to pitch for the Braves? Jim Perry.
• Which is the only one of the four never to pitch for the Indians? Joe Neikro.
• Which set of brothers had more twenty-win seasons? The Perrys, six to five.
• Which is the only one to lose twenty games in a season? Phil Neikro. He did it twice. Gaylord Perry once lost 19 games.
• Which of the four never had a 40-start season? Joe Neikro. Phil had forty or more three times, Gaylord also did it three times and Jim did it once.
• Which is the only one of the four to win an ERA title? Phil Neikro in 1967.
• Which is the only one of the four to lead the league in strikeouts? Phil Neikro in 1977.
• The quartet won 196 total games as pitchers over the age of 39. Phil won 121 of those. Jim Perry was the only one of the quartet not to pitch past the age of 39.

The Year Phil Neikro Won AND Lost 20 Games

In 1979, Phil Neikro won 21 games and lost 20. The feat is not unique to Neikro though. Wilber Wood did the same thing a few years earlier. But the feat is rare in the live ball era of baseball. Prior to 1920, it happened a lot and before 1900, it really happened a lot. But Neikro's season in 1979 might be the last of its kind in this day of five men rotations and pitch counts and relief specialists. And thus, Neikro's season was special.

The Braves were terrible that season and finished in sixth place for the second straight time under their new manager, Bobby Cox. It was Cox's first stint with the Braves before his side trip to the Blue Jays for a few seasons. But Cox wasn't yet known as a great manager. In fact, if you lived in Atlanta at the time, nobody would even call him a good manager. The Braves lost 94 games and won only 66. Phil Neikro won 30% of them.

Neikro made an incredible 44 starts that season. 33 starts is the modern day norm. Neikro pitched 342 innings. The norm today is around 220. He completed 23 of his starts. He gave an astounding 113 walks and still managed, with all those innings, to post a 3.0 walks per nine innings total. He gave up an astounding 41 homers, or the average number of homers Hank Aaron hit in a season. But probably the most amazing stat of Neikro's season was that he got a decision in 41 of his 44 starts.

Consider that no other Braves' pitcher that season made more than 31 starts. Consider that only one reliever on the team had more appearances (Gene Garber, the closer). Consider that Neikro posted all those innings and all those losses and still had a 120 ERA+ that season. He pitched so many games that he had the fourteenth most plate appearances for the team that season.

In 1979, Neikro faced 1435 batters. Their slash line was: .241/.306/.384. That adds up to an OPS of .691. He averaged 7.77 innings per start. That year he had two or less runs of support from his offense 13 times. He would go 1-11 in those starts. His team would score five runs or less in 29 of his starts. His record in those starts was 7-20. They didn't record pitches thrown in those days. In his game logs for that year, only two games have the amount of pitches recorded. One of them was for 158 pitches. It would be safe to state that Neikro probably averaged around 130 pitches a start. This was just 31 years ago, but there is no relationship to what he did that year and the baseball played today in Major League Baseball.

And the thing of it was, this was nothing new for Neikro. He led the league in innings pitched in 1974, 1977, 1978 and 1979. He led the league in games started in from 1977 through 1980. During those years (77-80), he posted ERA+ figures of 111, 142, 120 and 102. But during those four years, he lost twenty games twice and lost 18 games the other two times. His record during that time was 71-76 though he pitched that well and completed 77 of his starts. He even managed five relief appearances during those years and recorded a save.

Oh, yeah. The Fan left out one pertinent fact about 1979. Phil Neikro was 40 years old at the time. He would pitch eight more seasons after that one including a memorable 1984 where he went 16-8 for the Yankees with a 3.09 ERA (123 ERA+) in 31 starts.

Many will question whether Phil Neikro belongs in the Hall of Fame. But there was nobody else like him. Yes, Wilber Wood was another great knuckleball pitcher, but he never had the breadth of career that Neikro did. Neikro pitched in the big leagues for 24 seasons and won 318 games. Yes, he lost 274 games. But he played for some truly awful teams. His 1979 season will always be a memorable one for this writer. And the Fan truly never expects to see another one like it.

One More Pitch for Burt Blyleven

Every year, Burt Blyleven is overlooked for the Hall of Fame. Jack Morris gets more buzz, but Blyleven was the better pitcher. The only knock on the guy seems to be that he didn't win any Cy Young Awards and he didn't get to 300 wins. But here is how Blyleven stacks up to some of the pitchers from the recent era who are in the Hall of Fame:

Don Sutton 324 wins, .539 WP, 3.26 ERA, 108 ERA+, 1 20-win season, 58 shutouts, 178 CG 1.142 WHIP 2.66 K/BB 6.1 K/9 2.3 BB/9 Led league in ERA once, Led in WHIP 4 times

Phil Neikro 318 wins, .537 WP, 3.35 ERA, 115 ERA+, 3 20-win seasons, 45 shoutouts, 245 CG, 1.268 WHIP, 1.85 K/BB, 5.6 K/9, 3.0 BB/9, Led league strikeouts once, ERA+ once, cg 4 times

Fergie Jenkins 284 wins, .557 WP, 3.34 ERA, 115 ERA+, 7 20-win seasons 49 Shutouts, 267 Cg, 1.142 WHIP, 3.20 K/bb, 6.4 k/9, 2.0 BB/9, Led league in victories twice CG 4 times WHIP once K/bb 5 times Cy Young 197

Gaylord Perry 314 wins, .542 WP, 3.11 ERA, 117 ERA+, 5 20-win seasons, 53 Shutouts, 303 Cg, 1.181 WHIP, 2.56 K/bb, 5.9 k/9, 2.3 bb/9, led league in wins three times, ERA+ once cg 2, IP 2, 2 Cy young

Burt Blyleven 287 wins, .534 WP, 3.31 ERA, 118 ERA+, 1 20-win season, 60 shutouts, 242 cg 1.198 WHIP, 2.80 k/bb, 6.7 k/9, 2.4 bb/9, Led league in WHIP once, Cg once, ERA+ once, K's once

Analysis: Blyleven is in the ball park in Winning Percentage with all of them. His ERA+ is higher than all of them. His Strikeouts Per Nine Innings is higher than all of them. He had more shutouts then all of them. His Walks per Nine Innings and WHIP are right there with them. Only Jenkins had a better Strikeout to Walk Ratio. Fergie Jenkins had a superior stretch of dominance, but less total wins. His Complete Games are in the same ballpark.

Some would say that Sutton and those would be marginal Hall of Famers. This writer says that they are in the Hall of Fame and as such are benchmarks. Blyleven deserves a place in the Hall of Fame. If those guys are in there, he should be in there.