Top 106 Baseball Players: #78 - Amos Rusie

Amos Rusie

Amos Rusie was the best pitcher in baseball for several years in the 1890's, and although his career was very short, his accomplishments over that short span make him worthy of this spot.

Rusie pitched for the Indianapolis Hoosiers in 1889, but was not very good, but the team folded at the end of his rookie year, and the league transferred most of the team to the New York Giants, which is where Rusie became a superstar.

In his first season in New York, he led the league in strikeouts with 341, but he also led the league in walks with 289, which is still a single-season record. He was known to throw the ball really hard and fast, but he obviously lacked control, leading the league with 36 wild pitches as well.

That would be the story for the next several years, with Rusie leading the league 5 times each in strikeouts and walks over the course of 6 seasons. His 1893 season was exceptional, as he started 52 games, with 50 complete games in the process, along with leading the league in strikeouts, walks and hits allowed.

In 1894 he won the pitching Triple Crown, leading the league in both wins and ERA for the first time while finishing 45 of his 50 starts. His ERA of 2.78 was far below the league average of 5.33 that season, and his 50 starts led the league once again.

After the 1895 season, he felt that he deserved a pay raise, but the team owner disagreed, so he sat out the entire 1896 season in protest. When he returned in 1897, he led the league in ERA for the second time, but his strikeout total dropped off to the lowest total of his Giants career. Injuries started to slow him the next season, and he ended up missing two full seasons due to a combination of arm trouble, hearing damage from a baseball hit to the head, and other personal problems.

 He was traded before the 1900 season to Cincinnati in exchange for Christy Mathewson, who had not yet pitched a game, but would go on to be one of the greatest pitchers in history, while Rusie pitched only 3 games for the Reds and had an ERA of 8.59 in those games, making it one of the most lopsided trades in history, despite it looking lopsided in the other direction at the time.

Though he had a penchant for walking record numbers of batters, Rusie had a very powerful arm and struck out batters at an amazing rate for his time, and even though his career lasted only 10 seasons, he was so dominant over his 7 season peak that he cannot be left off the list of the all-time greats.