Clippard leads majors with 11 wins in relief

by Phil Wood

Relievers with double-digit win totals stand out like a sore thumb.

When Phil Regan was toiling for the Dodgers in 1966, he won 14 games and was nicknamed the "Vulture" for picking up the spoils the starting pitcher left behind. He also had 21 saves that year as the Dodgers won the NL pennant.

Roy Face was an incredible 18-1 for the 1959 Pirates, all in relief. He added another 10 victories in 1960 when the Pirates ended up winning it all.

Tyler Clippard's 11 relief wins lead all of Major League Baseball. His other stats - a 2.77 ERA, and 106 K's in just 87.2 innings - display what he's brought to the Nationals' bullpen this year. All this for a guy who had been purely a starting pitcher prior to 2009.

Earlier this season I asked Tyler on Nats Xtra if he still thought about starting, and on that day anyway, he said that yes, he thought he might like to do that again. I asked the question again last week when he got that 11th win on Wednesday against the Astros, and he'd changed his mind.

"This is what I do now," he said, "and I'm okay with that for as long as they want me to do it."

It wouldn't be a huge shock if Clippard got a shot at the closer's gig in spring training, though conventional wisdom still has Drew Storen sliding into that role on a full-time basis.

A couple of other things: Sean Burnett finally getting his first win of the year to go with 7 defeats reminded me a little of Darold Knowles' 1970 season in Washington: 2 wins, 14 losses and a 2.04 ERA in 71 games. Knowles also notched 27 saves that year.

Finally, I saw that Bob Shaw had passed away at the age of 77. Shaw was a very good pitcher for several teams in both leagues between 1957-67. He was an 18-game winner for the 1959 AL Champion White Sox and was 15-9 for the 1962 Braves when he went to the All-Star Game. He also write the book "Pitching" which has been in my personal baseball library for more than 20 years.