Justin Verlander inked a one-year, $15 million contract with the San Francisco Giants last winter. He is 42 years old, in his 20th MLB season, and the hard-throwing righty doesn't want it to end any time soon.
This has been a rocky campaign for Verlander, who boasts a 1-9 record with a 4.53 ERA and 87 strikeouts in 99.1 innings (20 starts). That is the second-worst ERA of his career, ahead of only his injury-plagued 2024 campaign in Houston. But he's still a perfectly adequate back-of-rotation arm, and he made special MLB history in Sunday's outing against the Washington Nationals.
Verlander wasn't very effective in the micro — 11 hits, one walk, five earned runs, six strikeouts in an 8-0 loss — but he reached a special career benchmark. The former MVP and three-time Cy Young winner picked up his 3,500th MLB strikeout, becoming just the 10th player in history to accomplish that feat. He received a nice ovation from the crowd as he closed out the first inning.
Justin Verlander is the 10th pitcher in MLB history to record 3500 Kspic.twitter.com/FUynOOtqhz
— Underdog MLB (@UnderdogMLB) August 10, 2025
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Justin Verlander makes history with 3,500th MLB strikeout with Giants
What a special moment for a special player. While it's easy to get bogged down in Verlander's struggles this season, but he put together one of the most impressive pitching careers this sport has ever seen. He will go down as a first ballot Hall of Famer and an icon of the sport. Nine All-Stars, three Cy Youngs, an MVP award, a Triple Crown, two World Series wins — very few résumés come close.
It's just a bit odd for this special accomplishment to occur in a Giants uniform. With all due respect, San Francisco is a middling team that is quickly falling out of the postseason race. Verlander takes his share of the blame for the Giants' disappointing season, but he has never worn a Giants uniform before. He's on a one-year contract. It's like watching Michael Jordan break scoring records in a Wizards uniform.
Verlander's career, until this season, was predominately split between two organizations — the Detroit Tigers (13 years) and the Houston Astros (seven years). He will enter the Hall of Fame in one of those uniforms. If only he was able to join the ultra-exclusive 3,500 Strikeout Club in one of them.
Tigers missed on golden opportunity for storybook end to Justin Verlander's career
This was all so easy. The Tigers never spend aggressively in free agency, but after a miraculous ascent to the top of the AL Wild Card race a season ago, Detroit was ready for some win-now moves. Verlander could've shored up the back of the rotation and provided the Tigers' young pitching staff with invaluable leadership qualities. Instead, he's doing that for a much less competitive Giants team.
Detroit had another chance to add pitching at the trade deadline, with Verlander very much available to the highest bidder, but the Tigers sought out 41-year-old Charlie Morton instead. Is Morton better than Verlander at this stage of their respective careers? Probably, but only marginally so, and there is a certain sentimental magic to the idea of Verlander helping a Tigers postseason push. It feels like a missed opportunity.
Velander won two World Series with Houston. Right now, there's a real chance he enters the Hall of Fame wearing an Astros cap. That feels wrong, but it is what it is. That was his most successful stint when it comes to individual accomplishments. It may be different if Verlander was breaking records and pitching in October with Detroit right now — where he has still spent almost twice as much time — but alas, we will never know.