How come people even compare Glavine to Koufax?

Question

Koufax has a career 2.76 E.R.A. Tom Glavine has a career 3.49 E.R.A.

E.S.P.N. says Glavine is better then Koufax

Answer 1

Sorry Glavine is not Koufax. That is ridiculous.

Answer 2

I can see making the comparison. Koufax pitched 12 seasons in the big leagues. For the first 6, he was a mediocre pitcher at best. The final 6 years, he was almost unbeatable. Glavine, while perhaps not having as spectacular numbers as Koufax did in these 6 years, has consistently been a good pitcher. ERA is not the only thing to judge a pitcher on. Keep in mind that the last 6 years of Koufax's career, offensive numbers shrank considerably, leading to a lot of unusually low ERA's and batting averages. In addition, Koufax would have pitched the last 5 years of his career in Dodger Stadium, a well known "pitcher's park" and his ERA was lower then it would have been pitching perhaps in Wrigley Field.
On the whole, Koufax may have had the most spectacular 6 year period of any pitcher, but for consistency over a long career, Glavine wins that hands down.

Answer 3

Glavine certainly has been more valuable than Koufax, because he's pitched much longer, and has almost twice as many IP. That represents real value on the field.

Koufax had a better peak, but his many fans conveniently ignore the first half of his career, when he, to be charitable, sucked. He made up for that, but those lame seasons don't go away.

Glavine has not had the same sort of blazing peak seasons, but has been a good to very good pitcher for many more seasons. Simply looking at ERA is not very informative because we are in an offensive era, whereas the 1960s were much more scoring-austere. Using adjusted ERA, which compensates for the league scoring environment, Koufax is better but it is much closer than many would guess.

Glavine didn't win two NL CYAs by mistake, and he is still playing on.

They're both lefties.

Answer 4

Sandy Koufax is probably my favorite baseball player of all time. However, they may say Glavine is a better pitcher, because he pitched longer and into his 40's unlike Koufax. I think this is an unfair comparison because Glavine pitched longer. I have the upmost respect for Glavine, but Koufax was really only dominant for five years, but he was more dominant in those five years than Glavine was. It's times like these I really wished Koufax pitched longer :(

32 forever

Answer 5

I had the pleasure of watching Sandy Koufax pitch. It was truly poetry in motion. But to get to the question at hand. It's quite common to compare great athletes. Also one must remember that Baseball is different now. It's rare for a pitcher to pitch a complete game now. I also beleive that it's good for Baseball to have two such great pitchers to talk about. How can people even compare Glavine & Koufax? Only you can answer that question. Again I think that it's great. I'm 71 & have been a Baseball fan for a very long time. Please continue to enjoy "Americas favorite pastime"

Answer 6

they are both left handed pitchers who have dominated in their respective era. it's not about numbers per say because koufax did not play as long as glavine has. it is also on how their posture is. baseball analysts compare tim lincecum with roy oswalt, but only because they are small guys who throw in the high 90's.

edit: well glavine has 5, 20 win seasons compared to koufax's 3.

Answer 7

Glavine has an inflated ERA because of his post-Atlanta stint in New York and also his post-prime years in Atlanta. If you look at his ERA previously you will see why.

He is also the guy who pitched eight innings in Game 6 of the 1995 World Series only giving up one hit in a 1-0 victory.

Even compare Tom's first 12 seasons to Sandy's. In two separate Era's, which I think Tom was in the tougher Era.

Answer 8

Not sure. Koufax only played like 9-10 years. Guess cause they're lefties.

Answer 9

Glavine has way more wins(135 more) that is y and is a pretty good playoff pitcher

Answer 10

What's wrong with a 3.49 era in this era of steroidball.?