Why Offense Has Increased: Part 1--The Lowered Pitching Mound - Page 3© Harold Friend
Page 3
Sep 8, 2004
The 1968 season is referred to as "The Year of the Pitcher" but it was a lot more. It was the year that drove home the fact that the number of pitchers with great fast balls was increasing and would continue to increase while the batters would find hitting against those pitchers more and more difficult. Major league teams averaged less than 3.5 runs a game in 1968 and only the World Champion Tigers in the American League and the Cincinnati Reds in the National League managed to average more than 4 runs a game. Then the mound was lowered.
The 1969 season statistics reflected the rule change. Teams averaged over 4 runs a game and earned run averages in both leagues jumped by more than a half run. In a statistical anomaly, each league had the same ERA in 1968, which was 2.98. After the height of the mound was lowered, the American League's ERA jumped to 3.62 while the National League's ERA jumped to 3.59. American League batting averages went up 16 points, National League batting averages increased by 7 points, and seven different batters hit at least 40 homers compared to just one (Frank Howard) in 1968. In the decades that followed, it was becoming less and less unusual for pitchers to approach 100 mph. Vida Blue, James Rodney Richard, Dwight Gooden, Roger Clemens, Mark Langston, Curt Schilling, Kerry Wood, John Smoltz, Pedro Martinez, Randy Johnson, Billy Wagner, Mariano Rivera, and many others all had or have fast balls close to 100 mph and there are others too numerous to mention. Imagine if today's pitchers threw from a mound that was raised five more inches. On September 7, 2004, the Yankees were playing Tampa Bay and the Mets were playing Florida. The Yankees started Jon Leiber and the Mets started Tom Glavine, both of whom are good pitchers (Glavine is clearly much better than Leiber) while Tampa Bay started Jorge Sosa and Florida started A.J. Burnett. If one were watching both games or flipping from one game to another as some fans are prone to do, one would hear the Yankees' announcers state that Sosa's fastball was at 96 mph and then, switching to the Mets, see the radar gun reading of 98 mph for Burnett's fastball. And neither Sosa nor Burnett is considered among the top pitchers in the game. Today's statistics cannot be compared to statistics prior to 1969 because doing so introduces the variable of the lowered pitching mound. It is valid to compare Roger Clemens to Jason Schmidt or Sandy Koufax to Juan Marichal, but comparing Clemens to Marichal presents problems.
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