Clayton Kershaw, the Los Angeles Dodgers phenomenal left-hander, is putting together a season for the ages, which is saying something considering the 26-year-old already has two Cy Young Awards in his trophy case.
Kershaw has been great for the last three seasons, but this year he has crossed the line from great to legendary with the season he is putting together for the Dodgers.
In 23 starts this season, Kershaw leads the majors with a 1.70 ERA, a 0.827 WHIP, 6.112 hits per nine innings, six complete games, a 210 adjusted ERA-plus and a 1.89 fielding independent pitching rating.
He also leads all of baseball with 7.8 wins above replacement.
Baseball-reference.com includes a feature called similarity scores, where players are compared against each other at similar ages.
Kershaw’s list includes some of the greatest pitchers ever to take a big-league mound—Tom Seaver, Jim Palmer, Pedro Martinez, Roger Clemens to name a few.
If Kershaw can maintain an ERA-plus of 200 or greater he would be the 17th pitcher in the expansion era (since 1961) to do so, joining the likes of Martinez, Greg Maddux, Bob Gibson, Dwight Gooden and Clemens.
So he’s having a great season. But what about in terms of the career he’s putting together?
Among pitchers with at least 1,000 innings in the expansion era, Kershaw is fifth with a career ERA-plus of 152.
Two of the pitchers ahead of him were primarily relievers—Mariano Rivera and Hoyt Wilhelm. The other two are Sandy Koufax and Martinez.
But if you take it a step further—again for pitchers with at least 1,000 innings—the only players ahead of Kershaw on the all-time list for ERA-plus are Rivera (205) and Martinez (154).
That puts Kershaw ahead of all-time greats such as Lefty Grove, Walter Johnson and even Cy Young himself.
Kershaw’s career fielding independent pitching rating of 2.76 is tied for 27th all-time with Rivera, but of pitchers who spent the majority of their careers in the live-ball era (since 1920), only Koufax is ahead of him with a 2.69 mark. Next are Kershaw and Rivera, tied at 2.76.
With a career WHIP of 1.059, Kershaw is eighth all-time—trailing Addie Joss, Rivera, Ed Walsh, Monte Ward, Martinez, Trevor Hoffman and Christy Mathewson.
Then we get to the really astounding stuff.
Only seven pitchers with at least 1,000 innings have allowed fewer than seven hits per nine innings and Kershaw is No. 2 on that list at 6.74. The only pitcher with a better ratio is Nolan Ryan (6.56). The other members of the sub-seven club are Koufax, Sid Fernandez, J.R. Richard, Andy Messersmith and Hoffman.
But of that group, only Hoffman (2.5) has a better walks per nine innings ratio than Kershaw’s 2.8.
In terms of pure power pitching, Kershaw has that, as well.
He is seventh all-time in strikeouts per nine innings among pitchers with at least 1,000 innings pitched—one of only 11 all-time to average better than a K per inning.
Kershaw averages 9.39 strikeouts per nine innings for his career. Only Randy Johnson, Kerry Wood, Martinez, Max Scherzer, Ryan and Tim Lincecum have higher rates.
The others with rates of better than nine per nine innings are Hoffman, Oliver Perez, Koufax and Francisco Liriano.
Yes, rate stats can yield some strange results.
Kershaw’s control seems to be improving as he ages, as well. He ranks 28th on the all-time list with a 3.37 strikeout-to-walk ratio, tied with Maddux.
But his 8.08 ratio this season is 10th best of the modern era, since 1901. Interestingly, it’s only third-best in the majors this season—Phil Hughes of the Minnesota Twins has an 11.00 ratio and Hisashi Iwakuma of the Seattle Mariners is at 9.43.
The others in that top 10 include Bret Saberhagen of the 1994 New York Mets (11.00), Cliff Lee of the 2010 Mariners and Texas Rangers (10.28), Curt Schilling of the 2002 Arizona Diamondbacks (9.58), Martinez of the 2000 Boston Red Sox (8.88), Maddux of the 1997 Atlanta Braves (8.85), Martinez of the 1999 Red Sox (8.46) and Ben Sheets of the 2004 Milwaukee Brewers (8.25).
The bottom line is that Kershaw’s name pops up on all sorts of lists that measure diverse pitching skills.
Where does he rank among the all-time greats?
At the pace he’s going, he appears to be on his way to booking a spot in the pantheon of one of the 10 or so best ever to toe the rubber.