Top 106 Baseball Players: #36 - Tom Seaver

Tom Seaver

Tom Seaver was the best pitcher in baseball for many years, and was the man who put the Mets on the map.

Seaver joined the Mets in 1967, and was so good that he won the Rookie of the Year award that season, with an ERA of 2.76. In his second season, he reached 200 strikeouts for the first of nine consecutive seasons, which is still the all-time record.

He won the Cy Young Award in his third season after leading the league with 25 wins, and he nearly threw a perfect game that season, losing it with 2 outs to go. The Mets also won their first ever World Series that season, and though Seaver gave up a bunch of runs in his 3 postseason starts, he still won 2 of those games, and became a champion.

Seaver was the best pitcher in baseball for the next 2 seasons, though he did not win the Cy Young either time. He led the league with a 2.82 ERA and 283 strikeouts in 1970, and also set a record by striking out 10 consecutive batters in a game while tying the record with 19 in that game, although that record has been surpassed. He then had his best overall season in 1971, with a 1.76 ERA and 289 strikeouts, both tops in the league and the best in his career.

He had a slightly down year in 1972, then bounced back in 1973 by leading the league in strikeouts and ERA for the third time in 4 seasons, and took home his 2nd Cy Young. He also helped the Mets to get back to the World Series that season, and pitched extremely well, posting and ERA under 2.00 with 35 strikeouts in 4 appearances, but the Mets fell to the A's, denying him a chance at another title.

In 1975 he led the league in wins and strikeouts, marking the 4th time that he had fallen one category short of the pitching Triple Crown. He did, however, win the Cy Young again, giving him 3 in his career. He attempted to renegotiate his contract during the 1977 season, but after reaching an impasse, he was traded to the Reds.

In his first full season in Cincinnati, Seaver threw his first no-hitter after having 5 one-hitters as a member of the Mets. In 1981, he had another stellar season, finishing with a 14-2 record, which was the best in the league by wins and win percentage, and earned him the runner-up spot in the Cy Young voting, 12 years after he had won his first. He also reached 3000 strikeouts that season, the 5th pitcher ever to reach that mark.

Seaver bounced around for a few more years, reaching his 300th win in 1985 before retiring after the 1986 season. He is one of 2 pitchers in history with 3000 strikeouts, 300 wins, and an ERA below 3.00, along with Walter Johnson. He also has the second-most shutouts of any pitcher since 1920, trailing only Warren Spahn.

Spahn still holds the all-time records for consecutive strikeouts and consecutive 200-strikeout seasons, and led his team to 2 World Series, winning one. He was the Cy Young winner 3 times, though he should have had 6, and is the greatest player in the history of the Mets, and also one of the greatest baseball players of all time.